Every week of the 2010 PGA Tour season, the editorial staff of the SI Golf Group will conduct an e-mail roundtable. Check in on Mondays for the unfiltered opinions of our writers and editors and join the conversation in the comments section below.
TIGER'S BUSY SCHEDULE
Damon Hack, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: What a week in Harbour Town, our annual Masters chaser, a sweet departure from all that major championship pressure. While we all hail Jim Furyk and his second victory of the season, I can't help but start with the surprising early commitment from Tiger Woods to Quail Hollow. Where is this coming from? Is this a favor to the PGA Tour? (Quail Hollow has now sold out its daily tickets for Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Don King would appreciate that kind of hype.) Is this the continued evolution of Tiger Woods, now channeling his inner Jay Haas?
Cameron Morfit, senior writer, Golf Magazine: Tiger knows he is in for a circus largely of his own making any time he tees it up. And when the circus comes to town, there are a lot of moving parts. Early notice gives him the best chance of being adequately protected, security-wise, with the happy byproduct of selling advance tickets. Thought it was interesting that Phil chose to commit immediately after Tiger did. Not sure if there was a message in that or not.
Hack: I thought the same thing: Tiger vs. Phil, part deux. It also seemed to indicate that Tiger is back for good. You know, Quail Hollow, The Players, Memorial, U.S. Open, etc.
Jim Herre, managing editor, SI Golf Group: Good move by Tiger from a golf perspective. He's heeding the advice of many of his peers — Brad Faxon's in our pages for one. (Next we'll see if he gives up the first tee time for practice rounds.) Plus, Woods needs to play, although I'm not sure doing so does his marriage any good.
Morfit: All I know for sure is I have no idea what Woods needs. Those pop-ups he was hitting on Sunday at the Masters were unlike anything I've seen from him. Very odd.
Gary Van Sickle, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: It's got to be Tiger throwing tournaments a small bone by committing early. Since he now apparently requires extra security, events may need a little extra notice to make preparations. Once the tourney knows, it's going to leak to the public that he's coming, so he may as well make everybody happy (well, everybody who wants him to play) by committing earlier.
Charlie Hanger, executive editor, Sports Illustrated: I don't think it'll be a circus this time. He's returned to the public eye already. I wonder if there's much left to work on at home. May just be that he might as well play as sit around the house alone.
Morfit: I think we don't know what it'll be like at Quail Hollow. It isn't Augusta, which is sort of like the make-believe world in that movie "The Truman Show." The only thing Augusta National lacks is a bubble over the whole place, and I'm still not sure it's not there. (The "Bootyism" plane may have been a clever special effect.) Quail Hollow exists in reality, and reality may hurt for a while.
Van Sickle: The tabloids (who still can't be trusted) seem to indicate the marriage is irrevocably broken. You hate to rely on People magazine for the news, but if they're right this time, Tiger may as well get on with his golf career.
Jim Gorant, senior editor, Sports Illustrated: I think it's more evidence that Tiger is trying. Obviously, we saw at Augusta that it's hard for him to change his stripes (sorry), but he's making an effort — waving to fans, signing autographs, answering questions.
Morfit: I said it in last week's Confidential, and Peter Kostis wrote a column about it. You can't just wake up a totally different guy after getting to be your previous self over the course of 34 years. Woods does seem to understand people want him to reform, and he does seem to actually want to reform. When he's able to stop and think about it, he'll be able to do it. But the visceral reactions to crappy golf shots will take the longest to change.
Farrell Evans, writer-reporter, Sports Illustrated: Wow! How bad a character is this guy that we give him credit for making an early commitment to a tournament? This is still his way of stealing the show and being a distraction and being a tour of one.
Van Sickle: I totally disagree. By committing early, he's helping the event market itself. How is that possibly a negative?
Gorant: It's not so much that we're giving him credit as we're recognizing this is a change from his normal mode and debating what that change means. I'll mark you down as unimpressed.
IS GOLF HAVING ITS ALI-FRAZIER MOMENT?
Hack: What about in terms of the golf? Tiger commits to Quail Hollow and Phil right after. When was the last time the sport was teeming with so many stories? Anybody else seeing this as the summer of Ali-Frazier, er, Tiger-Phil?
Alan Shipnuck, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: Quail Hollow is a big week for Tiger, golf-wise. He has to show he can control his swing after his rocky performance at the Masters. Right now Phil knows he can beat Tiger, and Tiger knows it, too. It's never too early for Woods to reassert his dominion.
Van Sickle: For Ali-Frazier in golf, you need two guys playing their best at the same time. Phil's play is pretty spotty, and a primary reason he and TW haven't had a face-to-face duel in a major. It may never happen. And Tiger is still a question mark, although you have to think the Masters was a positive sign for him — some terribly sloppy play and he still finished fourth.
Shipnuck: This Masters was the first major Phil has won with Tiger in contention, and that was barely so. If their rivalry is going to really pop, they need to go head-to-head at Pebble and/or St. Andrews.
Hack: Well they did square off at the '01 Masters, but Phil wasn't Frazier yet. Maybe Ingemar Johansson?
Morfit: I'm going to have to see more from Phil to be convinced that this will be some kind of monster year from him. He's a different guy at Augusta. Will he be the same guy at Quail Hollow who did absolutely nothing coming into the Masters? I don't know. I hope not.
Evans: Phil probably checks out until Pebble Beach. Emotionally, I don't think he can sustain the momentum for an entire year. I don't think he cares that much about winning at Quail Hollow or anywhere else except at the majors. It's no accident that Amy was at the Masters, where Phil needed her to be when he wanted to play his best.
BEST PLAYER IN THE WORLD
Hack: Well, let's just have at it then. Who is the best player in the world today? Is it Tiger? Phil? Y.E. Yang? Furyk?
Morfit: There is no obvious No. 1 at the moment, but Tiger's as good a place-holder as any.
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