Tiger's Back

This past weekend Tiger Woods did something that he hadn't done in almost 3 years; he won a PGA tour event.  With his win at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, Woods has added a spark to the question that many people have been asking for the better part of the last 6 months.  Is Tiger Woods back?  The simple answer to this question is no.  He isn't back for 2 reasons which lye on separate sides of the argument.  The most common reason is that he isn't back because he has only won 1 tournament and that isn't good enough to say that he is fully back.  The more unconventional reason is that he isn't back because he hasn't gone anywhere.

3 years ago we saw Tiger's world blow up in his face.  His personal life was riddled with scandal and it all happened in the view of the public.  As often as we all saw Tiger on TV we were never allowed into his personal life before the night of his car accident.  It is the collapse of his personal life that makes people feel that  Tiger collapsed as a golfer as well.  I don't doubt that it had an affect on his game, but the biggest obstacle That Woods had to overcome was his physical health.  So, that mental edge that people said he lost probably never went anywhere, he just couldn't back it up with his performance on the course due to injuries.

Once Tiger Woods was declared fully healthy, meaning that he was able to train instead of rehab, his game seemed to still be a little off and the talk of his continued struggles persisted.  We were then informed that Tiger was in the middle of a swing change.  Whenever Woods had gone through a swing change before he would struggle with winning tournaments for an extended period of time.  He looked off and though he had some really good days he would be unable to put several good rounds together.  That is exactly what we have seen for the last few months.

I am one of the few that say Tiger really hasn't gone anywhere.  I understand that an almost 3 year gap between wins is significant, but it wasn't a collapse of Woods' game that was the culprit, it was his body.  Now that his body is right, and he is more comfortable with his new swing, Tiger has been in contention in the last few tournaments and finally won last weekend.  Is he back to where he was before the injuries?  Probably, but while 1 win is a good, Tiger has a higher standard.  The Masters will be a better display of the state of Tiger's game and if he is in contention then he should be labeled as officially back in everyone's eyes.