Tiger Woods emerged from the fog on Tuesday evening.
Getty Photographs
How was Tiger Woods’ TGL entrance?
That relies upon who you ask.
An unofficial ballot of social media supplied a common hell yeah. Social media likes Tiger Woods. Add a purple shirt, a purple tunnel and a few dramatic fog? Can’t-miss combo.
A harder grader sat front-row contained in the SoFi Heart on Tuesday evening. How would Tiger’s son Charlie, who was slugging a Sprite alongside some buddies, rating his dad’s entrance? 4 out of 10, he informed ESPN’s Marty Smith. Ouch.
However maybe the one necessary perspective got here from Woods himself, who couldn’t cease grinning within the moments after he’d emerged to Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger,” dropped the hammer and laced the opening tee shot down the middle?
“That was superior,” he stated. “That was the perfect.”
It’s all an optimistic mix of previous, current and future, this TGL endeavor. Woods embodies that. He’s 49 years outdated and it’s been a half-decade since he contended in a PGA Tour occasion however he’s nonetheless the game’s largest draw, and this league was constructed together with his skills and his aura in thoughts. There’s no scarcity of nostalgia on this league’s DNA, then, even because it tries to push the game into the longer term. The T in TGL stands (unofficially, because it seems) for Tomorrow. It was becoming that Woods debuted Tomorrow’s Golf League to yesterday’s music. “Eye of the Tiger” was launched in 1982, 27 years earlier than Charlie was born. It was a bit on the nostril. That didn’t a lot matter.
Earlier than lengthy, Tuesday’s competitors became a little bit of a dud. For the crew in purple, an early deficit became a big-time blowout. Y’know that phrase “For those who don’t chortle, you’ll cry?” By the tip Woods did each.
However big-picture, TGL’s Week 2 left us with three burning questions.
1. What’s up with Tiger’s crew?
Look, it’ll take a while for each squad to get its bearings in a brand-new enviornment enjoying what’s not less than a half-new sport. However Jupiter Hyperlinks Golf Membership, consisting on this evening of Woods, Max Homa and Kevin Kisner, was dangerous. Like, dangerous dangerous. Los Angeles Golf Membership — Justin Rose, Sahith Theegala and Collin Morikawa — drubbed ’em, 12-1.
“We had been entertaining,” Woods stated post-round. “We hit a variety of pictures. I feel the individuals right here, they obtained to see how dangerous professionals might be. It was only a boat race.”
Kisner appeared significantly ill-prepared for the endeavor. The longtime fan-favorite Tour professional is a delight on each broadcast he joins — and can be doing that full-time going ahead — however the TGL is a bomber’s league, and his efficiency off the tee informed an unlucky story. He hit simply certainly one of three fairways and averaged simply 159.6 mph ball velocity with driver, 12 mph behind the next-slowest.
However Woods, who appeared wholesome and confirmed off loads of velocity, however supplied a blunt self-assessment.
“The strolling will not be the problem,” he stated. “It’s my recreation will not be excellent.”
If there’s hope for Jupiter it’s that Woods will work out the display screen, Homa can be a dependable presence and so they can draw vitality from the arrival of Tom Kim, their fourth teammate, who is understood for igniting underdogs in crew match play.
“We’ve referred to as Tom and requested him to fly on out right here, dwell on this factor for a short time,” Homa stated.
“What’s [Tom] considering proper now? Woods requested. “Oh my God.”
Anybody who has ever performed golf is aware of simply how tough it’s to remain cheery once you’re enjoying dangerous golf. It was a present, then, that Kisner produced essentially the most memorable second of the evening on the 14th gap when he bladed a bunker shot off the pin, sending his teammates ducking for canopy — after which into hysterics.
“We actually didn’t suppose that anybody may presumably get hit in right here,” Woods stated; had the ball not hit the pin it might have ended up within the stands. “However that was one of many funniest moments I’ve ever seen, Kiz hitting that shot like that. We had been simply dying.”
2. What was up with the simulators?
For those who’re on this web site studying a couple of simulator golf league there’s a very good likelihood that you’ve got performed some golf on some kind of simulator. And when you have performed golf on a simulator you understand that essentially the most irritating half is the best way the ball simply reacts a bit bit in another way than it might in actual life. (Or not less than it appears to — there may be, after all, no method to know in actual time, which solely provides to the frustration.) What can be a mild minimize in actual life can flip to a long-left pull. What ought to have carried 105 in some way carries 90, or vice-versa. That’s all good when you’re tucked into the nook of a neighborhood bowling alley with three buddies and two pitchers. However once you’re on ESPN and also you’re asking individuals to think about betting real-life money on this factor? There’s a bit extra strain on the tech to cooperate.
In equity, the TGL’s tech is generally mind-blowingly good, from the rotating inexperienced to the little highlight that exhibits gamers the place to place their ball. However at a really fundamental degree the league wants carry distances to be actually, actually dependable, and the ahead teeing floor the place they had been hitting wedges appeared to be off. Woods despatched one wedge screaming 20-plus yards over the inexperienced and into the water. Morikawa and Kisner appeared perplexed at varied factors, too.
“I do know from the entrance tee field we hit each single wedge shot lengthy,” Woods stated.
“Considerably lengthy,” Homa added.
The gamers had been understandably cautious about overt criticism on the published, however one thing was clearly up. Whether or not the cameras weren’t selecting up spin correctly or, nicely, I don’t know. That is all outdoors my talent set. Hopefully it’s not outdoors of theirs. Belief within the tech is the muse of all the factor.
3. What’ll it seem like if we get a detailed match?
Two weeks in we’re additionally two blowouts in. That’s a nightmare state of affairs for a league promising a fast-paced, action-packed two hours of golf. On the brilliant aspect, although: we nonetheless don’t know what a detailed match seems to be like!
We’ve realized from varied iterations of The Match all through the years that it’s mainly unattainable to avoid wasting a blowout golf match. Stress breaks down and banter does too and the entire thing begins to really feel a bit ridiculous. However the TGL in a detailed match nonetheless looks like it could possibly be a variety of enjoyable. Throwing hammers over high-pressure putts? Monitoring an important tee shot because it flies over an enormous pit of digital lava? Some actual, precise rigidity between among the best, highest-achieving golfers on the planet? I’m keen to see what that appears like.
Perhaps subsequent week.
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Dylan Dethier
Golf.com Editor
Dylan Dethier is a senior author for GOLF Journal/GOLF.com. The Williamstown, Mass. native joined GOLF in 2017 after two years scuffling on the mini-tours. Dethier is a graduate of Williams School, the place he majored in English, and he’s the writer of 18 in America, which particulars the yr he spent as an 18-year-old residing from his automotive and enjoying a spherical of golf in each state.
