To his children and his peers, Tiger was a memory at majors, a YouTube highlight. On Sunday at Augusta, he reminded the world who he is in winning a fifth green jacket.
AUGUSTA, Ga. — Past winners of the Masters gathered upstairs in the champions’ locker room because they understood what they were watching, and knew they needed to do something special for Eldrick Tiger Woods. Bernhard Langer, Bubba Watson, Zach Johnson, Adam Scott — they all realized they could not just close up their lockers, say their goodbyes, and jump into their luxury cars for a ride back to their privileged lives.
Langer, 61, was the group elder, the leader of the band. The former winners showered after their rounds, shared a drink, and watched Woods play the 72nd hole on TV.
« We heard a big cheer, » Langer said, signaling the end of one of the greatest American sports stories ever told. « And we all said, ‘Let’s put our jackets on and go down there and congratulate him.’ And that’s what we did. »
Langer played in the 1986 Masters. Jack Nicklaus had won his sixth green jacket and 18th and final major at age 46. Now here was the 43-year-old Woods winning jacket No. 5 and major No. 15 after a drought of 14 years for the Masters and a decade-plus for the majors. Langer wouldn’t rate one feat superior to the other, but he didn’t need to. The two-time Masters champ made sure he was wearing his green jacket when he shook Woods’ hand.
« This is a very special moment in the history of the game of golf, and of Augusta, and of Tiger himself, » Langer said.
Nobody who was here on this surreal Sunday will ever forget the way the earth moved or the way the roars rose above the towering pines. Nobody will ever forget the scene of Woods’ son, Charlie, falling into his father’s arms like Tiger fell into his father’s arms after his record-shattering, barrier-blasting victory as a 21-year-old in 1997. Woods had said his children thought of him as a « YouTube golfer, » as a dynastic force on Internet highlights and video games but as something entirely different in the flesh.
The back injuries and ineffective surgeries had left Woods imprisoned by debilitating pain. He couldn’t walk, or sit down, or lay down, or pull himself out of bed. The epidurals and cortisone shots provided him no relief.
« They only knew that golf caused me a lot of pain, » Woods said of his children.
Physically and emotionally.
Only two years ago Tiger sat at Augusta National and thought he was « done. » On Sunday, he was improbably wearing the green jacket for a fifth time.
Here’s what athletes, celebrities and other notable golf fans had to say as Woods’ triumph in Augusta sent the internet into a Sunday frenzy.
Tiger Woods’ return to glory at Augusta wasn’t met with the same fanfare by sportsbooks, which took massive losses after Woods won his first major since 2008.
Sam (his daughter) and Charlie were there at Carnoustie last summer when their father — miraculously contending after a desperate spinal fusion surgery saved his career — blew his Sunday lead at the Open Championship and lost his man-to-man duel with Francesco Molinari, who started the final round of this Masters with a two-stroke lead.
« I wasn’t going to let that happen to them twice, » Tiger said.
Woods was also not about to let Brooks Koepka, another serious Masters challenger, beat him the way he did at the PGA Championship. A blind believer in his chances, Tiger woke up in the dead of night to prepare his altered body for a battle that would start at 9:20 a.m. because Augusta National’s elders wanted to beat the forecasted storms.
Woods refused to let anyone or anything rain on his parade. He suffered consecutive bogeys at Nos. 4 and 5 to fall three back of Molinari.
