Tiger Woods: Temper your expectations at the Genesis Open

Tiger Woods makes his return to Riviera this week, as he plays both host and massive fan favorite at the Genesis Open. While Phil Mickelson’s win at Pebble Beach last week turned up the heat for his longtime foil, it may be best to temper expectations in Woods’s second start of 2019.

Tiger Woods is never far off the mind of anybody in golf. As it turns out, that’s way more true than we ever thought before, as Phil Mickelson took a routine winner’s press conference question at Pebble Beach, and casually threw out the 14-time major winner’s name as he went.

“Even today, if I play my best, if Tiger plays his best, it’s good enough to win on any week,” Mickelson said, fresh off his victory in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.  “The challenge is there are so many great young players and so many great players in the game today, that it takes our best to win.

“I just think that both myself and Tiger are going to have a really, really good year this year.”

You wouldn’t have to work hard to make the case that Phil’s already having a “really, really good year”, what with Sunday’s win at Pebble Beach, a close-call at the Desert Classic, and – oh yeah – that $9 million win over Tiger in Vegas that saw them essentially playing H-O-R-S-E on the range to end things.

But what about Tiger? He has played just one official TOUR event since winning the TOUR Championship to close the FedEx Cup Playoffs, and he finished tied for 20th in a middling effort at Torrey Pines, a place he knows as well as just about any layout on the TOUR calendar. He prepares to make his second start of 2019 at this week’s Genesis Open, but can he step up and bring home a W to match the newest trophy in Phil’s post-40 case?

I do believe that Tiger will have a great year in 2019. It wouldn’t even shock me to see him bring home his 15th career major, finally moving one step closer to Jack Nicklaus’s record more than a decade after it seemed like such a preordained outcome. But even if that happens, I’m not expecting huge things out of Woods at Riviera.

Why is that? Much has been made over the years of Woods’s lack of a victory at the original “Hogan’s Alley”. It doesn’t really seem to add up when you consider how close it is to his childhood home, and the fact that he basically dominated anywhere he teed it up for more than a decade. However, it’s more a tale of “always a bridesmaid” at Riviera: four top-ten finishes and just one missed cut as a pro. He’s come close to cracking the code, but never quite put it all together.

To hear Woods tell it, you’d think he was hacking it out there. “I love the golf course,” Tiger said last year in his return from back surgery. “I love the layout, it fits my eye…and I play awful.” I know we’ve always held Tiger to a different standard, but maybe the fact that he hasn’t won at Riviera is making it a bigger deal for all of us, himself included. “Awful” isn’t exactly the first word that comes to my mind is all I’m saying.

Throw in the additional responsibilities of being the official tournament host, with all the requisite corporate hobnobbery and the time spent with the TGR Foundation, and you’ve got Tiger Woods at his least focused, during a very early stop on his season’s schedule.

Riviera is, and always has been, a ball-striker’s paradise. Other than a wayward driver, Tiger Woods has what it takes when you get a short iron or a wedge in his hands. But he’s also got to put everything together, just so, for four days to really make a run here. I’m not saying it can’t happen, but there will be better spots down the line. Tiger still says he enters every tournament he plays expecting to win, but for the rest of us, perhaps tempering our excitement a bit would be beneficial.