Sunday, June 18, 2000
Wave the white towels - Tiger
surrender almost complete
By TIM DAHLBERG
AP Sports Writer
PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. (AP) - Won't somebody
please stand up and take on Tiger Woods?
It's not likely to happen this week at Pebble
Beach, where Tiger's would-be challengers all but waved white
towels in surrender before the third round even began.
It might not happen for some time, as dominating
and intimidating as Woods is every time he steps up to the first
tee.
"He's the show pony," Paul Azinger
said.
While Woods threatened to make a mockery
of the U.S. Open, the players who were supposed to rise to the
occasion at major tournaments appeared ready to pack their bags
- even before the tide came back in Saturday morning at Stillwater
Cove.
They hoped for wind, perhaps even silently
prayed for a Gil Morgan-type collapse. What they got was another
whipping they were helpless to stop.
"The sad thing is you can't control
him," Azinger said. "It's not like boxing - unless you
want to fight on the first tee, which we don't because it's a
gentleman's game."
Fighting Tiger may not be an option, but
playing better than Woods is. The trouble is, no one has figured
out just how to do that.
The big names weren't even close Saturday
at Pebble Beach, with Ernie Els and a gaggle of European Ryder
Cup players the only ones who deemed a chase worthwhile.
Only Els - helped by an early windless stretch
- managed a more than respectable 3-under-68. And even Els was
not exactly nipping at Tiger's heels, or brimming with confidence.
"I have to believe that anything can
happen," Els said. "I'd like to think I'm in it."
Among the notable missing:
- Greg Norman shot 82 Friday and wasn't
around to answer.
- Davis Love III, who was the playoff victim
in Woods' first pro win, but had long left since left the Monterey
Peninsula by the time the third round began.
- David Duval, who hasn't won since Woods
deposed him as the world's No. 1 player last year, struggled once
again.
- Phil Mickelson, making saves from everywhere
but still over par for the day.
Jesper Parnevik saw that for himself up
close while playing with Woods the first two rounds. Unfortunately,
he didn't play well enough to make the final two rounds.
At least Parnevik went out with a bang,
trying to hole a 3-wood second shot on the 18th hole early Saturday
which would have gotten him on the cut line and into the final
two rounds.
"He's good enough to shoot under par
even when he's not playing well," Parnevik said. "The
way I see it, he should win it pretty easy. The only thing that
can stop Tiger from winning is Tiger."
That certainly held true as Woods' pursuers
teed off two-by-two Saturday afternoon.
Any thoughts Sergio Garcia might have had
about reprising his dual in the PGA championship last year with
Woods evaporated with a snowman 8 on the eighth hole.
Colin Montgomerie was already 13 shots back
when he teed off, had a quadruple bogey of his own on No. 8, part
of a stretch of six holes he played in a total of 9 over en route
to a 79.
Duval and Mickelson were hanging around,
playing well enough to contend in the "B" Flight, but
nowhere near Woods.
And these are supposed to be the best players
in the world?
"He's playing spectacular, and no one
else is," Duval said.
That left only the wind that began gusting
around the time Tiger teed off Saturday or a total collapse between
Woods and his first U.S. Open title.
It's happened before - Gil Morgan was up
by seven after a birdie on No. 7 in the third round of the 1992
Open, only to lose the tournament to Tom Kite. Morgan followed
his birdie by playing the next seven holes 9 over.
"Gil Morgan and Tiger Woods are not
the same players," Justin Leonard reminded would-be historians.
In the end, players may just be coming to
the revelation that Tiger Woods can only beat himself.
"There's not much the other players
can do," Parnevik said.
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