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In December, he made a ‘soft’ comeback at one of his foundation’s tournaments – the Hero World Championship in the Bahamas – where he came 18th of 20. His return proper came at the Genesis Invitational in LA in February and in just his sixth start since the car crash in the same city that three years earlier had so almost cost him his right leg, he was forced to withdraw with illness during the second round.
No dramas. Everyone expected him to play at The Players, but he skipped last month’s flagship event on the PGA Tour without explanation. Instead, he set the March agenda by attending a players’ meeting with Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of the Saudi sovereign wealth fund and the chairman of LIV Golf.
Woods is on the Tour’s policy board and has emerged as a huge figure in the negotiations to strike a peace deal. All very noble, but why has he not played since recovering from that bout of influenza in LA? Have his injuries flared up again and if so what is he doing here?
The cynics will claim Woods is duty bound because of the clothing sponsorship deal he recently signed with TaylorMade. His “Sun Day Red” line is due to launch on May 1 and the exposure at The Masters – the most watched of the four majors in the United States – will be seen as paramount in the marketing division.
Yet Woods’s desire to compete surely cannot be doubted. Not after all he has proved, particularly in this event five years ago when he won his first major in 11 years. Nobody had given him a Tiger’s chance in Hell of a fifth greenjacket, when he was suffering with back issues that required four surgeries,
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