A transformed Watson carries Turnberry magic to opening round at Augusta

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Tom Watson finally seems at peace. Over the years, I have probably written more than 100,000 words about Watson — the good fortune of being a sportswriter in Kansas City for a long time. I have chased him from golf course to golf course. I have seen him overjoyed and grumpy and most places in between. Anyway, I never thought of him being at peace before.

No, there was always a certain restlessness about Watson. I always thought it had something to do with the strange arc of his brilliant career. Watson was a late bloomer — he was not an especially good golfer at Stanford. He jumped on the PGA Tour, and he tore up his swing again and again as a young man. He never felt like he could hit the ball straight enough to compete with the best.

Then he found a swing that worked well enough, and for an eight-year stretch, 1977-1984, he was about as good as anybody, ever. He won seven major championships and 33 tournaments and six PGA Tour player of the Year awards, and three times he beat Jack Nicklaus, head-to-head, in one of the biggest tournaments in the world. It wasn't the swing that won tournaments for him, incidentally. It was his creativity around the greens, and his intense competitive nature, and one other thing: Watson was the boldest putter on earth. He slammed putt after putt at the hole because he knew, deeply knew, that if he missed he would make the putt coming back.

Then, just as quickly as it started, his dominance ended at age 35. He won just one tournament in the next 11 years, and he never won another major. The funny part is that he truly believes he did not learn how to really swing a golf club until after his dominance ended. He learned what he, like Ben Hogan, sometimes calls "The Secret." But by then, secret or no, those four-foot putts would no longer drop for him.

Because of that weird career narrative, I think Watson tends to get overlooked in the grand discussion of golf. When you hear people talk about the Golfing House of Lords — the greatest of the greats — they will usually throw out five names: Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, Ben Hogan, Arnold Palmer and Bobby Jones.

Then, there is a second group — a Golfing House of Commons, if you will — which will include Gary Player and Walter Hagen and Sam Snead and Gene Sarazen and Byron Nelson and, maybe, Nick Faldo and Lee Trevino and Seve Ballesteros and some others. This is where Tom Watson's name fits for people, but to be honest, people sometimes forget to put him here too. Watson's career was so odd, and his posture so Midwestern modest, that he has been easy to overlook. It is like he's golf's Stan Musial, another star of the heartland. Their greatness tends to get lost in the back of people's minds. When you bring them up, people will often say: "Oh yeah!"

But Watson is more than an "Oh Yeah" in golfing history. He belongs in Golf's House of Lords. He's one of the handful of greatest golfers to ever play this game. Take Thursday. This wasn't his day. Everybody understood, coming in, that Thursday belonged to Tiger Woods, playing in his first golf tournament since an all-encompassing sex scandal rocked his world and energized tabloid journalism. And The Tiger Woods Show sparkled. There would be planes flying Tiger-mocking banners overhead. There would be massive crowds cheering and holding back cheers. There would be ominous skies, two Tiger Woods eagles, howling wind, a few missed putts, Tiger's stirring round of 68 and a tornado watch, too.

There were other stories too on this great day — Fred Couples' sockless 66, Phil Mickelson's return to the top of the leaderboard and so on. And so, yet again, it was easy to overlook Tom Watson. All he did was shoot a bogey-free 67 at age 60. It matched the best Masters score of Watson's career. He shot 67 on Sunday in 1977, when he beat Nicklaus. He shot 67 in 1990, when he was trying desperately to find stuff that worked. And he shot 67 Thursday, when he was the oldest player in the field and he had his son Michael as caddie.

"Where would you place this in the best rounds you've played," he was asked.

"Tied for first," Watson said. "It's all about the score."

Only, maybe, this was about more than the score. I once asked Watson to tell me something about himself that would surprise me. He told me that he did not like playing golf on sunny days. It bored him. He craved wind. He needed a challenge. He longed for dare-to-be-great situations. When he first turned 50, he had mixed feelings about playing on the Senior Tour; he loved being around his old friends but he did not have the same feeling playing those tournaments. Trouble is, then he would come to Augusta and feel dwarfed by the course that he had once dominated. He missed 11 of 12 cuts. "I can't play here," he told us again and again. No, Watson did not seem happy at all to be growing older.

But, lately, something has changed. Maybe it was Turnberry. Watson, of course, created the golf story of 2009 when he went to Turnberry and played his heart out and came to the 18th hole needing only par to win the British Open at 59. He hit his second shot too flush, missed his par putt, and lost in a playoff. For a while, he saw that tournament as a failure. He did not win, and as everybody knows the whole point is winning.

Ernie Els tired of questions about Tiger Woods

Tiger's return highlights magical day at Augusta

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Tiger Woods came back from scandal, a months-long exile and a verbal spanking from the Masters Tournament chairman to shoot a four-under 68 that could've been even better.

He showed, after all the speculation and talk, that he is quite ready to challenge for a fifth Masters title. It was business as usual for Woods at Augusta, especially the way he dominated the par 5s, making eagles at Nos. 8 and 15, the first time he'd ever made two eagles in the same Masters round.

Tiger's long-awaited return would've been enough for any given Thursday, but there was more, so much more.

Fred Couples, age 50, shot six-under 66 to take the first-round lead. Tom Watson — sorry, make that The Legendary Tom Watson — wasn't all that far from shooting his age. The 60-year-old shot five-under 67. The rest of the leaderboard bore a resemblance to the world rankings: Phil Mickelson, Y.E. Yang, Lee Westwood and K.J. Choi were tied with Watson in second place at five under. Ian Poulter, Anthony Kim, Trevor Immelman, Adam Scott and Zach Johnson were among the big names a few shots back. That's serious starpower.

Two other over-50 players, Bernhard Langer (71) and Sandy Lyle (69), also broke par. Soft, receptive greens and forgiving pin locations offset windy afternoon conditions and led to a birdie-fest.

So the start of the 74th Masters featured Tiger's impressive return, big names and low scores. Somebody write this recipe down for the rest of the week along with these instructions: Repeat three more times.

Couples did his best to steal some of the spotlight from Woods. Fresh off three Champions Tour wins, Couples played like a man 20 years younger. He drove it straight and long, hit sharp irons and putted well. Amazing. What else can you say?

"It's just happening," Couples said. "Putting has become the best thing in my game. Then I can be more of an attack player. I'm not surprised but I'm thrilled. There's just something in the air that makes me feel like I'm going to play well when I come here."

Couples made seven birdies and made it look easy. He missed a short but hard-breaking birdie putt on the last hole, but his 66 was still the lowest score he's ever put up at Augusta National. His coolest play had to be saving par from the bushes left of the 10th green, where he bumped a 7-iron chip shot to three feet.

For a guy who played sockless (his comfy golf shoes feel like tennis shoes, and Fred says he never wears socks with his tennis shoes), it was quite a show.

Still, the remarkable run by Couples couldn't overshadow the sport's biggest day of 2010 — Tiger's return. You knew it was going to be special from the size of the gallery jammed around the first tee, waiting to catch a glimpse of Tiger for his 1:42 tee time. It's doubtful a bigger crowd has ever surrounded that tee.

You also knew it was going to be a unique day when an airplane began circling overhead at 1:30 p.m., moments after a wave of applause announced Tiger's walk from the clubhouse to the putting green. The plane pulled a large banner that read, "Tiger, did you mean bootyism?" The plane circled back around just as Woods got to the first tee. Woods said later that he never noticed the plane or its banner, but it would've been hard to miss.

For the record, Tiger busted a perfect drive down the middle of the first fairway, which by then had a yellowish tint from tiny tree droppings that were blown by gusty winds and covered the fairway. The assembled press corps tried unsuccessfully to describe them, but they're brown, about an inch long and kind of fluffy. Blossoms? Not exactly. But they were everywhere.

Woods tried to hit a careful cut with his driver on that first shot, just to make sure he got the ball in play. It worked so well that he did it most of the day. If he drives it this well for an extended period of time, he will be very tough to beat. Woods played a nice approach and just missed the birdie putt. For the record, his playing partners, Matt Kuchar (70) and K.J. Choi (67), did just fine despite the crowds.

At the par-5 second, his 5-wood second shot came up short and right, and he tried to use the new backstop on the redesigned second green to get his flop shot close. His ball carried a few feet too far — a little rust? — and the ball didn't catch the slope. That left him a slick downhill putt, and he settled for par.

He got his first tournament birdie of 2010 on the short par-4 third. Another perfect drive, followed by a low spinning approach shot that stopped inside four feet. He made the putt.

By this time, there was little doubt that Tiger's game was in fine form. He played a low 5-wood shot at No. 4, a 240-yard par 3, that was so good that it cut right through the wind and went just long. It was a dicey chip but no problem. Woods got it close and made par.

There were more classic Tiger moments. He hit it close in two at the eighth for an easy eagle. At nine, he was a bit more spectacular. His drive caught a branch down the left side of the fairway, leaving him blocked by trees. He sweep-hooked a 5-iron shot around the trees and landed the ball just in front of the green. It ran to the back fringe, where it caught the slope and backed up toward the cup. He holed the 10-footer for an unlikely birdie — well, unlikely unless you're Tiger Woods.

You'll see the replay of that shot over and over this week. After he hit it, Woods scissor-stepped to his right once, then four more times, then broke into a jog as he attempted to get a look at the result. It was vaguely reminiscent of Sergio Garcia's shot from behind a tree at Medinah in the 1999 PGA Championship.

"I was surprised it held the green," Woods said. "That was the first putt I made all day, just about."

He made two bogeys on the back nine, which negated some solid play and another eagle, this one from six feet at the 15th after he hit a massive tee shot. His eagle putt at the 13th power-lipped out, and he also had near misses at 10, 12, 14, 16 and 18, to name a few.

So forget about the five-month layoff. Look out for Mr. Woods.

"I'm very pleased, I hit it well all day," Woods said. "I had one loose shot on 14, then I made a sweet pitch and I should've made that putt. I didn't putt very well today or it could've been a pretty special round."

Most people would've thought a 68 after what Tiger has been through would qualify as a pretty special round, but he's right — it could've been lower.

"I was looking at all the scores; guys were tearing the course apart today," he said. "Most of the tees were up, especially on the par 5s, so if you drove the ball in the fairway, you could be pretty aggressive. You've got 30-some guys under par. I feel like I'm in the right spot, but there are so many guys up there, anybody can still win this event."

On this Thursday, Tiger answered the question. He is back. All the way back? We'll see.

At times, he did live up to his pledge to be a kinder, gentler, more fan-friendly player. He smiled and waved after he made that birdie putt at the ninth, mouthed "Thank you" to the gallery, and tipped his cap while adjusting it. He had a few tantrums, but they were minor compared to what we've seen from him in the past.

At the 11th, he didn't like his tee shot and slammed the driver head into the ground and uttered an audible "God-----t!" When he pulled his approach shot badly at the 14th, he simply let his club drop from his hands after his follow through and chided himself, "Noo!" His celebrations were subdued, too, but Tiger doesn't normally go wild in the first round. The tournament isn't at stake yet. There's no one to intimidate or scare yet. No need for theatrics.

Woods wasn't going to let on that this was anything but just another day at the office.

"It felt normal," he said. "I was pretty calm all day. I was just trying to plod along and not throw away shots."

He's wrong about it feeling like a normal Thursday at the Masters. There was Tiger. Watson. Phil. Fred. Airplanes with banners. Ovations for Tiger at tee boxes and along fairways. Birdies and eagles. It was anything but a normal Thursday. It was a day to remember.

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods

Augusta chairman says Woods 'disappointed all of us'

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Every year, on the eve of the Masters, a tradition unfolds in the Augusta National press center.

The club's chairman sits before the media and tackles questions ranging from practice facilities ("Four hundred yards long," chairman Billy Payne offered of the new range) to the makeup of the membership ("Subject to the private deliberations of the members," he said).

On Wednesday, after rattling off a number of changes to the tournament in his opening remarks, Payne took on the topic that has shadowed the Masters like no other: the return of Tiger Woods.

"We are aware of the significance this week to a very special player," Payne began. "As he ascended in our rankings of the world's great golfers, he became an example to our kids that success is directly attributable to hard work and effort.

"But as he now says himself, he forgot in the process to remember that with fame and fortune comes responsibility, not invisibility. It is not simply the degree of his conduct that is so egregious here; it is the fact that he disappointed all of us, and more importantly, our kids and our grandkids. Our hero did not live up to the expectations of the role model we saw for our children."

The room was silent as Payne continued.

"Is there a way forward?" he said. "I hope yes, I think yes. But certainly his future will never again be measured only by his performance against par, but measured by the sincerity of his efforts to change. I hope he now realizes that every kid he passes on the course wants his swing, but would settle for his smile."

Payne's words were a reminder that Woods's admitted infidelity did not go unnoticed inside the club's gates. Not only will the golf world be watching the level of Woods's play Thursday, when he competes for the first time since November, but also his comportment on and off the course. Payne said Woods had "clearly and emphatically" proved his game worthy of Bobby Jones, Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer, but that his job was not finished there.

"I hope [Woods] can come to understand that life's greatest rewards are reserved for those who bring joy to the lives of other people," Payne said. "We at Augusta hope and pray that our great champion will begin his new life here tomorrow in a positive, hopeful and constructive manner, but this time, with a significant difference from the past."

Payne and Woods were present at the Tuesday night Champions dinner in the Augusta National clubhouse.

"I had a conversation with him," Payne said, "but I don't want to go into detail about what it was."

Payne addressed several issues during the session — from Nicklaus joining Palmer as an honorary starter to a new pin position on the front right portion of the par-5 15th hole — but the specter of Woods hovered over the conversation. Among the photographs in the interview room was a picture of Woods being greeted with a green jacket from Nick Faldo in 1997, when Woods won by 12 shots.

"This year, it will not be just for him," Payne said of Woods's return, "but for all of us who believe in second chances."

Palmer thinks Woods should open up

Many questions still swirl around Tiger Woods, but one thing is certain: The police report doesn't say it all

A decade ago in the Southern California winter, Earl Woods sat in a suite at the La Costa Resort and Spa, speaking of fatherhood and death and the 24-year-old son he had raised, he was sure, better than any other man could have. "Tiger has never been punished," Earl said. "Never been disciplined. Never had a babysitter."

The windows were closed, the lights off. An endless curl of cigarette smoke drifted to the ceiling, and Earl hit full ­legend-building mode as evening fell. It came as nosurprise, really, when he mentioned how his boy ­couldn't stomach even a hint of ­falsehood.

"Tiger gets physically ill when he's not telling the truth," Earl said. "He can't sleep, can't eat, his whole body chemistry is upset. I told him: In order for your life to work, you must come from truth—at inner core. One of his pillars of strength is his integrity."

At the time this seemed cartoonish, more apocrypha to fuel Earl's idea of Tiger as social messiah. But Tiger, too, often brought up the notion. "My father has always taught me to come from truth and just trust yourself," he said then. "You'll make the right decisions if you come from truth." He sounded so grounded, so sure, as if volleying the words with Pop were enough to make them real.

That voice is gone now, its odd mix of arrogance and naiveté replaced, over the last four months, by hesitancy, weariness, a self-­loathing so fluent it borders on glib. Tiger Woods returns to golf this week a transformed figure, one quickly growing used to flagellating himself in public. In the two hyper­orchestrated, five-­minute TV interviews Woods gave on March 21 to soften up the world for his comeback at the Masters, he described his infamous series of adulterous trysts as "disgusting behavior . . . horrific . . . to stare at yourself and look at the person you've become, you become disgusted. . . . I was living a life of a lie."

Woods didn't let up on Monday at Augusta, either. In his first open Q and A since the Thanksgiving car crash outside his home at the Isleworth development in Florida touched off lingering ­questions—about his ­prescription-drug use and impaired driving; possible domestic violence by his wife of five years, Elin; his kid-glove treatment by law enforcement; and the glaring inconsistencies in a subsequent ­investigation—Woods peppered the 30-­minute parry and thrust with the media with enough vaguely brutal self-­criticism to satisfy a Maoist show trial.

"All I know is I acted just terribly, poorly, made incredibly bad decisions, and decisions that have hurt so many people close to me," Woods said. "That's enough."

Still, most of it came from a cool, almost clinical remove, insulated by ­therapy-speak about "denial and rationalization." For anyone wondering what the days surrounding the crash had been like for Woods—how he'd responded as his car and life veered out of ­control—the truth was lost. Woods and his handlers want it lost, and in his flat affect and repeated stonewalls Woods has shown how intent he is on locking that night and its messiness into some untouchable box.

But the story remains messy. The Woods camp has left details unconfirmed, undenied, dangling in a hurricane of tabloid assertions and leaked text messages and e-mails linking the world's No. 1 golfer to more than a dozen waitresses, party girls and porn actresses. Woods has admitted his involvement in unspecified affairs, admitted to undergoing unspecified therapy, but he has never admitted that as his marriage began to unravel, he became in private what he had never been in public: desperate, unnerved, trapped by his own—often ­electronic—devices.

Each celebrity scandal has its tipping point at which a famous person loses all credibility. For Woods it came five days after the crash, when a magazine website released a precrash recording of a quavery voice mail left for the perfectly named Jaimee Grubbs. "Hey, it's Tiger. I need you to do me a huge favor," said the voice, a bit rushed, but still bearing that nasally suburban tone that always left Woods—­despite 20 pounds of weight-room padding, 14 major titles and a near-billion-dollar net worth—sounding one pocket protector away from geekdom.

"Um, can you please, uh, take your name off your phone?" he went on, and now nothing sounded familiar. Tiger wasn't Earl's Jesus, not anymore; he was just another panicky schmuck burned by the Vegas fantasy: Why not hit on that cocktail waitress? "My wife went through my phone and may be calling you," he said. "So if you can, please take your name off that. And, um, whatdoyoucallit: Just have it as a number on the voice mail. Just have it as your telephone number; that's it. O.K.? You got to do this for me. Huge. Quickly. All right. Bye."

He sounded scared, like a little boy caught clutching a spent book of matches. Woods could feel it coming. For the first time in his life, he was going to be punished.

It doesn’t matter who interviews Tiger Woods, he’ll always say the same thing

Masters Confidential: Will Tiger's playing partners suffer?

Every morning this week, writers and editors from Sports Illustrated and Golf Magazine will address one pressing question about the Masters in a daily version of PGA Tour Confidential, our weekly roundtable discussion.

Jim Gorant, senior editor, Sports Illustrated: K.J. Choi said he was happy to be paired with Tiger Woods because he likes playing in front of big crowds, but getting Tiger duty this week has to hurt. How many shots do you think it will cost Choi and Matt Kuchar to play with Woods, and what can they do to combat the problem? If you had to choose between playing in Tiger's group, the group in front or the group behind, which would you take and why?

Jim Herre, managing editor, SI Golf Group: I expect Matt to fire his caddy and put Dad back on the bag. Just spell Dad's name right. He was a total ham while caddying for Matt last time — cheering, signing autographs, mugging for TV, etc.

Damon Hack, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: I'd rather play with Tiger Woods at the 2010 Masters than the 2001 Masters. That Tiger lapped fields and made opponents squirm. This Tiger? Who knows? Last time we saw Tiger in a major, K.J. Choi's countryman, Y.E. Yang, was beating him at the PGA. K.J. and Matt will be fine.

Michael Bamberger, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: Artful questions, but I disagree with the premise. For KJC, a showman at heart, playing with Tiger will be worth half a shot a side, or two shots over the course of 36 holes. Poor Matt, that's another matter. He might be a little star-struck. His play can be painfully slow, which means more time to hear more. It might cost him a shot over two days. Which is huge. I would certainly want to be playing with Tiger. For any pro, the bigger the gallery the better. Big crowds=more balls in play.

Alan Shipnuck, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: Everyone here seems to think it will be peaches and cream playing with TW. A couple early bogies and Choi and/or Kuchar will begin to feel the weight of all those extra eyeballs. The Masters is more mellow than the other majors but there will be plenty of distractions and irritations. Tiger's playing partners — and the guys in the groups around him — may wind up craving their old anonymity.

Farrell Evans, writer-reporter, Sports Illustrated: It's probably easier to play with Tiger than to have to deal with the swarms of people who move behind and ahead of his group. The Pinkerton guards are there, and it's a very controlled environment. If Tiger gets the fist pumps going, then it can be a problem, but he says he's going to scale back on that to gel with his newfound temper control. I expect Kuchar to respond positively to the moment. Remember the first time he played Augusta with his Dad in 1998? He loved the attention. As for Choi, though he is a Christian, he comes as close as anyone on tour to carrying a Buddhist aura on and off the course. He won't blink at the roars and emotional ups and downs of the Tiger gallery.

Joe Posnanski, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: Seems to me this is not as big an issue at the Masters. Press behind the ropes. Limited tickets. I don't see it as much of a problem. I think playing with Tiger in the first round could even be an advantage, especially for someone like Choi, because there's going to be a lot of energy and the pressure is really on Tiger. The tough time, I think, is playing with Tiger on Saturday. And, of course, on Sunday, though I'm sure both of those guys would take that pairing right now.

Cameron Morfit, senior writer, Golf Magazine: I agree with Farrell that it will be easier to play with Tiger than in front of or behind him. I actually think Kuchar will play well at this Masters. He's had a decent year. Same goes for Choi, whose caddie Andy Prodger told me it's Tiger who got paired with them, not the other way around. I am not assuming Woods will beat both or even either of them given the rust he's bound to have. If Tiger's first round back from this thing were at Bethpage Black, Choi and Kuchar would be in for a long day, but it won't get terribly rowdy at genteel Augusta.

John Garrity, contributing writer, Sports Illustrated: Here's another reason why Choi and Kuchar won't find it to be that chaotic: Masters spectators are more evenly distributed. The majority of longtime badge holders plant themselves in greenside chairs on the front nine, so there isn't that great churn of fans running to the next green that you see at the U.S. Open. Furthermore, both of Tiger's partners are Masters veterans, so the sheer number of onlookers won't be a novelty. If I had game, I'd definitely want to share Tiger's spotlight and be a part of — fanfare, please — HISTORY! Think of the stories they'll get to tell their grandkids.

Rick Lipsey, writer-reporter, Sports Illustrated: I'd take whatever group they give me, like Poulter said, and be thrilled to have it. If a grouping can make or break your Masters, you've got no chance to win anyway.

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods

On Tuesday, the focus shifted back to the magic of the Masters

AUGUSTA, Ga. — It's hot here, hot and sunny. Summery. The players are talking about how fast the course might get — greens and fairways both — come Thursday. The grass is growing like crazy. The club can water or not. These are perfect conditions for growing grass, which means perfect conditions for mowing it down. Welcome back to golf.

What a relief. Monday at the Masters was all about the nonsense: the wait for Tiger's press conference, the press conference, then the analysis of the press conference. Tuesday was all about the golf. That is, the golf course, and the players upon it. The golf course is Augusta National, the ultimate magic carpet ride. The golfers upon it are Angel Cabrera, who grew up in Argentina without running water. And Matteo Manassero, of Italy, who got here by winning the British Amateur at the age of 16. And Jack Nicklaus (honorary), whose father handed down to him the legend of Bobby Jones, the visionary behind the club. And Phil Mickelson, who has two green coats in the closet and his eye on a third.

Coming to Augusta is not like going back to the Indy 500 every year, or to the Kentucky Derby. Things change here. Caddies are now allowed to walk the course inside the ropes even if they are not accompanied by their players. They can do as they do at other tournaments, pace distances, roll putts, check hole locations. Billy Payne, Augusta National chairman and agent of (incremental) change, is taking a page from the Clifford Roberts playbook: solicit and consider player opinions. Players want their caddies to have access to the course, and now they do. Dave McNeely, a veteran caddie from Northern Ireland, is carrying for a young player from England, Chris Wood, "who tends to get a wee bit squirrelly at times," the looper said on Tuesday as he tossed make-believe pitch shots from the right side of the ninth green with his player nowhere in sight. That was something he never did before.

Bernhard Langer began his workday with a nine-hole practice round at 4 p.m. and Jack Nicklaus had a 5 p.m. press conference. Pro moves. Why? Because Tuesday night is when the Champions Dinner is held, at one long table on the second floor of the clubhouse. Langer wrapped up at six, and Big Jack a little before that, so they could go straight to dinner without going off-campus first. A rule-of-thumb here is to avoid Washington Road outside the front gates as much as possible. Nicklaus was told that Cabrera would be serving that great Argentinean treat, blood sausage. "I hope he enjoys it," Nicklaus said.

Woods played his practice round early, as he always does. He was off at eight bells, which means he had to make a return trip for the Champions Dinner. Guys don't miss that dinner. Sam Snead came back year after year, even when he was done playing in the tournament. He'd have the Tuesday night dinner, play in the Par-3 tournament on Wednesday, hit the ceremonial opening shot on Thursday, then get in his Cadillac and drive home, stopping on Washington Road, he once told me, "to sell my badge for $5,000." I think he was joking.

One of the nice things about Tuesday was that no one was talking about Tiger's sexting and other off-course activities. That story is so 2009. Jack passed on it several times and so did Mickelson and David Duval, among others. Tiger fatigue has set in. Not Tiger the golfer. Oh, no. People are eager to see the magic again. It's the other stuff that, at least within the cozy confines of Augusta National, seemed to disappear on Tuesday. Chang-won Han talked about staying in the Crow's Nest, the clubhouse attic room reserved for amateurs. He's 18, from Korea, and he's the Asian Amateur Champion. Every year, amateurs talk about the peculiar pleasures of the Crow's Nest. The tab's $20-a-night, or something like that.

No amateur has ever won here and first timers generally have a lot to figure out at Augusta National, the most American of golf courses, but one that requires a keen sense of the lines of attack. Fuzzy Zoeller won in his first time out here in '79, but the chances of a Masters rookie winning seems remote right now, if the course plays super firm and fast. It will just take too much guile, no matter how much looper McNeely can tell his first-timer about how to play the pitch shots from the right side of nine. If you're talking Augusta savvy, you're talking Phil, Tiger, Padraig Harrington. Phil was talking about Fred. Fifty-year-old Fred Couples, playing golf in his tennis shoes and with his long putter, still fitting, pretty much, into the green coat he won back in '92, when his ball stayed on the bank at 12 in the final round. That's the kind of thing people were talking about at Augusta National on Tuesday. How that ball stayed on the bank.

"I think Fred's got an incredible chance to win this week, because he's playing some of the best golf of his career," Mickelson said. "And he's been winning. He's coming into this tournament with championship trophies under his belt, holding those big glass crystal things, as well as huge checks. So having that confidence of winning, I think, brings an added element to his game. His hits the ball as long as anybody out on Tour still and he's putting better than he's ever putted and he knows this golf course as well as anybody. I expect him to have a great week, I really do."

Fred should have a great week, and we should, too. You got to love what Phil was saying. He was talking about Fred, and he was talkink about golf. What a relief, and what a delight.

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods

Woods addresses questions on personal life, drugs and more at Augusta National

AUGUSTA, Ga. — In his first press conference since revelations of infidelity sent him into hiding and knocked him from his perch as sports' most beloved athlete, Tiger Woods on Monday acknowledged that he needed to become a better man, and that he looked forward to playing golf with peace of mind.

"When you're living a life when you're lying all the time, that's not fun," Woods said Monday in a 35-minute question-and-answer session with more than 200 journalists in the interview room at Augusta National Golf Club, where Woods will return to competition at the Masters on Thursday. "It's fun again."

Leaning forward in his chair, wearing a thin goatee, and looking each questioner in the eye, Woods took on a bevy of queries, many about the morning of Nov. 27, when he crashed his Cadillac Escalade and set off a barrage of stories about his infidelity. Woods appeared calm as he spoke of his life over the last five months, but he revealed little in the way of details. He said the accident left him with a sore neck and a busted lip that required five stitches, and that he remained silent for several weeks because he was following his lawyer's advice.

Woods spent 45 days in rehabilitation — he would not say for what — and said his actions had caused pain and damage to his family. Of his two young children, Woods said, "One day, I'm going to have to explain all this to them."

The 34-year-old Woods also firmly denied that he had ever taken performance-enhancing drugs, despite being treated by a Canadian doctor, Anthony Galea, who is under federal investigation for supplying human growth hormone to athletes. Woods said federal agents had contacted his agent, "but they haven't asked for my time."

"He [Galea] did come to my house. He never gave me HGH or any PEDs," Woods said. "I've never taken that my entire life. I've never taken any illegal drug, ever, for that matter. I had PRP, platelet enriched plasma treatments."

The treatment, Woods said, was for both the torn ACL in his left knee in 2008 and for a torn Achilles tendon in his right leg, which he sustained at the end of that year while running."I had PRP injections throughout the year," he said. "I kept re-tearing it throughout the year and throughout the summer. I used tape most of the year to play. I also went to hyperbaric chambers after the injections. It does help you heal faster."

Woods was asked about reports that he had taken Ambien and Vicodin. He said that he had taken both medications, but that he was not addicted and had not received treatment for the drugs. He said the Vicodin was for his knee, and that he started taking Ambien in 2006 when his father grew sick with cancer and died. When asked whether the drugs played a role in his car crash, Woods said: "Well, the police investigated the accident and they cited me 166 bucks and it's a closed case."

Woods was also tight-lipped when asked about his wife, Elin. He said she was not coming to Augusta, and when the reporter pressed him, asking if he should have returned so soon, he did not directly answer the question.

"Well, I'm excited to play this week," he said.

Woods also apologized to his peers for the endless questions they have faced since he stepped away from golf last November. He said he planned on being more respectful of the game, with fewer outbursts on the course, whether they be positive or negative.

Little by little, Woods has re-entered the game in which he became an icon before revelations of infidelities surfaced in the wake of a car accident in the early morning hours of Nov. 27. On Feb. 19, after being out of the public eye for almost three months, Woods emerged at the PGA Tour headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., and publicly apologized for his transgressions and revealed that he was undergoing therapy.

"I was unfaithful, I had affairs, I cheated," Woods said then. "What I did was not acceptable, and I am the only person to blame. I brought this shame on myself."

Last month, after revealing that he would return to professional golf at the Masters, Woods held a pair of five-minute interviews with ESPN and the Golf Channel. He admitted to being nervous about how the fans would receive him. After playing a pair of practice rounds at Augusta National in recent weeks, Woods played again on Sunday with his friend Mark O'Meara, the 1998 Masters champion.

On Monday morning, Woods took to the course yet again, this time with 1992 Masters champion Fred Couples. It was his first time playing in front of fans since last November's Australian Masters, which he won. Woods was greeted warmly on the first tee by a group of a few hundred fans, and that number swelled into the thousands as he continued his round. He nearly pulled his opening tee shot into the ninth fairway. Unbowed, he teed up again and hit his second drive down the middle.

Several people in the gallery cheered Woods, who engaged them with waves and smiles.

The galleries couldn't be nicer," he said. "The encouragement that I got, it blew me away to be honest with you, it really did. ... Today was just something that really touched my heart pretty good."

After sensational coverage for most of the last five months, Woods will now attempt to piece together what was once golf's most feared phenomenon. He won 14 major championships from 1997 through 2008, but it is impossible to know how soon he will return to that dominance, or if he ever will again. In 2006, following a two-month absence after his father's death, Woods returned to the United States Open at Winged Foot and missed the cut.

But these circumstances are as unique as any. The biggest name in sports has been laid bare. This week, at the tournament that has defined him more than any other, Woods will start anew.

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods