AUGUSTA, Ga. >> With no Tiger Woods roaming the grounds in today’s opening round of this year’s first major, all we’re left with is one of the most intriguing Masters since he first won here in 1997.
There are at least a half-dozen golfers good enough to make a claim for the green jacket come late Sunday evening, ranging from 22-year-old defending champion Jordan Spieth to 45-year-old grizzled veteran Phil Mickelson.
Without Woods and his phenomenal two-decade run, it’s unlikely golf fans across American and beyond would be treated to such an interesting 80th Masters. What Woods did for the game in the late 1990s is similar to what Arnold Palmer managed 40 years before him; take a country club sport and make it popular for the masses around the globe.
It’s easy to see what Woods has done, what with the number of 20-somethings ready to leave their own ball mark on the game. Young Americans Spieth and Rickie Fowler are joined by foreign contemporaries Rory McIlroy, Jason Day and Hideki Matsuyama. All say Woods played a big part in them taking up a sport that requires you to get up off the couch and leave the Xbox behind.
Even golfers only a decade younger than Woods give him credit for making the PGA Tour what it is today — a worldwide affair with Adam Scott, Justin Rose, Charl Schwartzel and Louis Oosthuizen fitting comfortably in that foursome.
Masters chairman Billy Payne, who publicly chastised Woods after his fall from grace in 2010, said in his state of address this week that Woods is close to rejoining the game he helped shape.
Woods was here for the champions dinner on Tuesday, even praising Spieth for the Texas barbecue served that night as past winners gathered around the feast to talk of days gone by. Woods noted in a tweet how cool it was that he and Palmer and Jack Nicklaus were sitting next to each other and had won a combined 14 jackets.
Missing two of the past three Masters because of injury, Woods may never slip into his fifth green jacket, but that doesn’t detract from what he means to the place Bobby Jones built. In his prime, Woods’ galleries were massive here, beyond anything we will see over the next four days.
As popular as Mickelson is now, not even he commands the same respect of the patrons that Woods enjoyed during his heyday. Television ratings across America would rise and fall depending on where Woods was located on the Masters leaderboard. Folks who never watched a round of golf in their lives would tune in just to see what Woods might do next.
And while it hurts that the 40-year-old is not here, what he has left behind isn’t half bad. Spieth is a popular defending champion, who recently lost his No. 1 ranking to Day. A McIlroy win would complete his own personal grand slam and Masters patrons will likely say goodbye to Tom Watson on Friday in his final appearance here.
Granted, the man who took golf to its current level won’t be on the prowl. But there’s still plenty intrigue to go around until Woods returns to famed Augusta National somewhere down the road.
