Friday, January 26, 2001
Golf notes: Players reject
Miller's plea to trash-talk Tiger
By BRIAN MURPHY
San Francisco Chronicle
Johnny Miller is not here in the idyllic
climes at TPC Scottsdale, where the Phoenix Open is underway.
But something he recently said is here,
hanging over the talent-rich field of golfers the top 16 money
winners from 2000 are entered like a cloud you can't find in the
January desert sky.
The topic: The elephant in the living room
that is the golf game of Eldrick (Tiger) Woods. Miller's take:
Somebody challenge this guy. Pronto.
“Golf is a gentlemanly game,”
the former U.S. Open champion and current NBC golf analyst said
earlier this month. “But one to two percent of it needs some
WWF ... we need some guys to say: “I'm gonna whip Tiger.'
Nobody's got the balls to do that. We need that instead of this
submissive stuff, this “Oh, Tiger, I'm sorry' stuff.”
Here, Miller is feigning a head bow, ever
the ham looking to stir things up.
And yet, a tour of the plush driving range
and perfectly manicured putting greens at TPC Scottsdale found
no samurai headbands, no chairs smashed over Woods' head, no seizing
of the microphone at the first tee followed by a brazen shoutout:
“Tiger, you will be mine!”
Instead, Swede Jesper Parnevik amiably chatted
on a cell phone between swings. Paul Azinger worked on some knockdown
iron shots while discussing alignment tips with Gary McCord. Ernie
Els, the man who would be king if it weren't for this kid out
of Stanford, lived up to his Big Easy reputation by gladhanding
Diamondbacks pitcher Randy Johnson before a pro-am, gawking at
Johnson's 6-10 frame.
A few feet away stood New Zealander Grant
Waite. Waite, 36, is one of Woods' most agonized victims from
Tiger's World Tour 2000, when Waite lost the Canadian Open by
a stroke after shooting 66 in the final-round pairing with Woods.
Woods shot 65 to win, birdying No. 18 with that unforgettable
218-yard, 6-iron, out of a bunker and over water to a landing
area the size of a narrow-margined newspaper.
Waite won $356,400 that day, a payday which
helped him to a top-40 finish on the money list. Which is exactly
Miller's point: When you're hauling in that much dough for a non-winning
performance, what's the stress in losing?
Els, a two-time U.S. Open champion, endured
the frustration of five second-place finishes last year, then
endured the not very frustrating feeling of winning a cool $3.4
million for his efforts.
“They're all playing chicken golf,”
Miller said. “Too many guys go in and say 'I'll go quietly,
win my $200,000 and leave.' I hope we get more confrontational
guys. We need some different golf.
“I came up with a group with Lee Trevino,
Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Raymond Floyd . . . about 12 guys
who were super confident, who would say after a day of golf: 'Let's
go gamble for your money.”
To which Waite answered: Times have changed,
baby.
In a PGA Tour enjoying spikes in ratings,
attendance and prize money, the suits in Ponte Vedra, Fla., Tour
headquarters, don't want anyone to rock the boat. Taking on water
when you're sailing along beautifully, see, isn't part of the
plan.
“The way the Tour is, with the commissioner,
you've got to be so politically correct,” Waite said. “For
fear of offending people. If you come across as brash, it is frowned
upon . . . you really can't do that. If we say anything controversial,
the Tour monitors what we say.”
Waite also wondered why golf should seek
such a sullied path. A game that demands control of emotions,
thoughts and swing planes doesn't suit any Namathian guarantees,
he said.
“Our image is different than football,”
Waite said. “And really, is that what we want? Is that the
direction we want to go?”
Woods concurred. Though the 25-year-old's
competitive flame is a veritable bonfire of passion, he thinks
golfers would not honor the history of the game by turning into
early 1970s Ali figures.
“That's not necessarily part of our
sport,” Woods said this week. “I think if you get someone
who is very outspoken, like you find in other sports — I
know you media guys would love it — but I don't think it
would be great for the sport. It's not what our game was built
on.”
Remember, this is the guy who, upon playing
New Zealander Michael Campbell in the 2000 Match Play Championships,
shook Campbell's hand on the first tee and whispered: “I
heard you wanted a part of me. Now you've got me.”
Hey, we should just be thankful the field
has a chance to challenge Woods this week. He said Wednesday he
wouldn't have played the Phoenix Open, “if my team had made
the Super Bowl.”
Who is his team?
“Raiders,” Woods said. “Diehard.
Born and raised in L.A., man.”
Now we'll get to see if Tiger puts the rest
of the field in another Black Hole this season.
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