AKRON, Ohio — Tiger Woods’s switchback comeback trail is at an impasse after he was forced to withdraw midway through Sunday’s final round of the Bridgestone Invitational, the World Golf Championships event at Firestone Country Club.
Woods, making his third start since returning from back surgery, reinjured his lower back on the second hole after hitting his second shot from an awkward stance in the grass near a bunker. With his weight almost entirely on his right leg and his left leg positioned above the bunker’s lip for balance, Woods got the ball out with a swing that made him bend his left knee into the air on the follow-through. He lost his balance and fell into the bunker, jarring his back.
“It’s been spasming ever since,” Woods said, adding: “It’s just the whole lower back. I don’t know what happened.”
His day had gone awry from the start. Woods was one minute from teeing off in steady rain when play was suspended because of water pooling on the course.
After warming up, he faced a 75-minute delay before his opening tee shot — not ideal for anyone with a back problem. Woods, the defending champion, birdied the first hole and scrambled for par at the second, a par 5, but shortly thereafter started playing loose shots punctuated by grimaces.
On the par-3 fifth hole, his tee shot traveled 147 yards, leaving him 65 yards short of the pin. He got up and down for par. On No. 6, he hit his first two shots into the right rough on his way to a bogey.
“He hit some shots that we’re not used to seeing Tiger hit even when he’s coming back from an injury like this, so obviously something was bothering him,” said Bubba Watson, the reigning Masters champion, who was grouped with Woods. [eap_ad_1] After his drive on the par-4 ninth, Woods had a hard time reaching down to retrieve his tee. At that point, Woods, who was three over on the day, signaled for a cart, and after shaking Watson’s hand, he was driven to his tournament-issued sport-utility vehicle in the players’ parking lot.
Woods was grimacing as the cart came to a stop next to the car’s hatchback. He clutched his right buttock as he slowly stood up, and he struggled to raise each leg onto the bumper to remove his golf shoes.
After slipping his feet into sneakers, Woods did not bother trying to tie them. He gingerly walked to the side of the car and folded himself into the passenger seat. His caddie, Joe LaCava, drove him away, to an uncertain future.
“We’ve seen this man win with a hurt leg,” Watson said, referring to Woods’s victory at the 2008 United States Open, which he played with a broken leg. “So he’s going to try to be a champion; he’s going to try to tough it out. Obviously it just got too tough for him.”
Watson added: “I shook his hand and said, ‘I’m praying for you.’ I hope everything turns out good, and he’s ready for next week.”
Woods, 38, was scheduled to play this week at the P.G.A. Championship in Louisville, Ky. He would be returning as the defending champion of sorts, having won the event when it was last held at Valhalla Golf Club, in 2000. He needs a victory in the tournament, the year’s final men’s major, to qualify for the FedEx Cup playoffs and improve his standing for a United States Ryder Cup berth.
But the playoffs and the Ryder Cup, which Woods had been asked about incessantly the first three days of the Bridgestone, took a back seat to the image of Woods being whisked away.
Asked about his playing status for the P.G.A. Championship, Woods said: “I don’t know. Just trying to get out of here.” (NY Times)
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