It’s gotten to a point now where a statement from the Tiger Woods camp should come with an eco-friendly certificate It gets rehashed again and again, after all, and features the recurring theme of an update about surgery on his back.
The other day, an official notification popped up on Tiger’s social media feed informing all and sundry of a procedure that’s become par for the course.
“After experiencing pain and lack of mobility in my back, I consulted with doctors and surgeons to have tests taken,” wrote Woods.
“The scans determined that I had a collapsed disc in L4/5, disc fragments and a compromised spinal canal. I opted to have my disc replaced yesterday, and I already know I made a good decision for my health and my back.”
Simply reading this brief summing up of affairs is probably enough to bring on a slight twinge.
This was the seventh operation Woods has had on this specific area of his body. The former world No. 1 and 15-time major winner has had so many procedures on his crumbling back, his lumbar spine is just about propped up by a gothic buttress.
A while ago, I spoke to the well-respected Gavin Routledge, the Scotland-based osteopath who has amassed an accumulation of knowledge in his area of expertise that’s so hefty, you could actually put your back out going through it.
“I honestly can’t see a way out for him,” said Routledge, who has been poking, prodding, massaging and manipulating a variety of dodgy dorsals for over 30 years.
“We have known for decades that once you have one disc surgery, then the chances of having another are substantially higher, especially if you use the fusion technique like Tiger. It’s a domino effect.”
Routledge was saying this after Tiger’s fifth back operation. Or it could’ve been his sixth? I’ve lost count.
Woods’ miraculous victory in the 2019 Masters, after all the injuries, setbacks and controversies, was one of the greatest in the history of the game, but what followed has been a deluge of cold, driving reality.
Betrayed by his body, his defiant, ambitious aspirations have remained unattainable.
Woods, who hits the milestone of his half-century at the end of this year and can at least get a buggy if he fancies the senior circuit, has not played in an official tour event since he missed the cut in the 2024 Open at Royal Troon.
A couple of years earlier, at the St. Andrews Open in 2022, many observers and commentators had suggested he should’ve savored a final, hat-waving, dewy-eyed march over the Swilcan Bridge and said farewell to championship golf there and then.
Try telling Tiger that, mind you. Woods and Woods alone will determine the point at which he can operate as nothing more than a recreational golfer. That day, though, inches closer.
While golf has moved on from Woods – Rory McIlroy’s monumental Masters win this year was Tiger-esque in the way it transcended the sport – you often wonder if the game is ready to face the ultimate reality and let him go?
For so long, Woods hasn’t just moved the golfing needle; he has been the needle. The general hoopla created by a will-he, won’t-he comeback, for instance, would send said needle pinging into the red.
In a sense, it’s been golf’s blessing and its curse. The prospect of an appearance by Woods brings exposure like nothing else. But it can also overshadow everything else.
Of course, us lot who cover this game for a living don’t help matters, do we?
Tiger’s various re-emergences tend to get rammed down your throats with such overwhelming and unhinged force, you may as well lie back on a gurney, open your mouth as wide as it will go and allow the entire golf media industry to stampede excitedly down your throat.
Woods has defied the odds before. After this latest surgery on his ailing frame, though, those odds continue to lengthen.
We await the next twist in this Tiger tale.
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