Charlie Woods on the U.S. Junior Amateur at Oakland Hills on Monday.
getty pictures
Playing golf in a fishbowl isn’t straightforward.
Ask Tiger Woods.
“You get so much attention,” he as soon as stated. “It’s really hard.”
Woods was 15 when he shared that insight. The 12 months was 1991, and he was an ascendant junior expertise the likes of which the sport had not often, if ever, seen. At 2, he already had appeared on nationwide TV with Bob Hope. At 3, he had damaged 50 for 9 holes, and, at 8, he’d damaged 70 for 18. At 15, Tiger gained his document sixth Junior World Golf Championship, carding a final-round 69 at fire-breathing Torrey Pines South. In the wake of that victory, Dana Haddad wrote in the Los Angeles Times, “Don’t let his big eyes, bony arms and knobby knees fool you. Eldrick ‘Tiger’ Woods of Cypress, just a babe at 15, is the man-child of golf.”
You know what got here subsequent: the three U.S. Junior Amateur titles adopted by three U.S. Amateur victories. The 82 PGA Tour wins, together with 15 majors. Not included in that stat line is one other variety of nice significance to Woods: 2, as in the variety of youngsters he has had — a daughter, Sam, who’s now 17, and a son, Charlie, 15.
Sam by no means took to golf, a minimum of not critically. But Charlie has, growing right into a formidable expertise in his personal proper. He’s a rising sophomore at The Benjamin School, in Palm Beach, Fla., the place alongside Justin Leonard’s son, Luke, and a handful of different youngsters who might beat one of the best golfer at your membership, he performs on the boys’ staff that final fall gained the college’s fourth state championship title. (Two of Jack Nicklaus’ boys, Gary and Michael, additionally attended The Benjamin School.)
At a Florida qualifier for the U.S. Junior Amateur final month, Charlie was three over by two holes. Undaunted, he made a pledge to himself: “I just told myself not to make any more bogeys or doubles.” Charlie performed the following 16 holes in 4 beneath and signed for a one-under 71. The comeback earned him medalist honors and a spot in his first U.S. Junior Amateur, at historic Oakland Hills Country Club, close to Detroit, the place Charlie’s father, as an novice, made the minimize on the 1996 U.S. Open.
Golf has an uncanny approach of manufacturing full-circle moments; it’s one of many sport’s many charms. But Charlie enjoying in his first U.S. Junior feels particularly significant, given his father’s wealthy historical past in the occasion. For the youthful Woods, it’s additionally the most recent part in his coming-out get together: enjoying in a state championship match is one factor, as is pegging it in a nationally televised exhibition just like the PNC Championship or making an attempt to Monday qualify for a PGA Tour occasion. But the U.S. Junior is one other degree but: a nationwide championship run by the United States Golf Association. Top Gun for junior golfers. Merely qualifying is a big achievement.
Which brings us again to the fishbowl.
Charlie, at 15, now is aware of what his father knew at 15: Charlie’s aggressive rounds are totally different for him than they’re for his friends, particularly when Tiger is in attendance. More eyes. More scrutiny. More distractions. At the PGA Tour qualifier Charlie entered in February, followers spilled onto the fairways to be close to him, with some asking for autographs mid-round. “You can’t stop anyone from coming, and if Tiger’s there, it’s crazier,” Charlie’s highschool coach, Toby Harbeck, informed me final 12 months of the scene at a few of his highschool tournaments. “Trust me, there are people in trees taking pictures. Microphones in his face.”
The consideration round Charlie was evident at Oakland Hills Monday morning. As he teed off on the North Course’s 1st gap simply earlier than 8:30, a crowd of some hundred, telephones raised, circled the tee field — this at a event the place teams not often entice quite a lot of dozen followers. Standing simply behind and to the precise of the tee was Tiger, in a white hat and striped Sun Day Red polo. He was arduous to overlook as a result of he was standing on a berm, which elevated him above the remainder of the onlookers. “I’ve been in a gallery like this before,” Chase Kyes, a rising highschool senior from Alabama and one in all Charlie’s two enjoying companions, would later say, “but never played in front of a gallery like this.”
Charlie hit an iron on the par-4 1st and opened with three pars, but his regular play wouldn’t final. At the 200-yard par-3 4th, he wanted three pictures to search out the inexperienced and made double. Tiger was in tow, trying on from beside tees and greens. Charlie is used to his presence, but his enjoying companions weren’t. “I looked over at him a couple of times, but I really tried not to,” Kyes stated of Tiger. “There’s a lot of pressure with his name.”
Charlie bought a stroke again on the par-Fifth, but then completed the entrance 9 bogey-par-bogey-double to show in 40, the identical rating his father shot in the primary 9 holes on the 1997 Masters earlier than storming again to a historic win. But this spherical, for Charlie, would produce no such fireworks. On the again 9, he made three doubles, two bogies and a lone birdie to shoot 42 and end at 12 over. With 60 gamers capturing par or higher Monday, Charlie greater than possible had shot himself out of the event.
Charlie didn’t converse with reporters after the spherical, but his enjoying companions did. Two issues appeared to strike them: the load on Charlie’s shoulders, and the joy they felt enjoying in entrance of such a big gallery.
“The amount of pressure he has on him is unbelievable,” stated Davis Ovard, a rising sophomore at Baylor who was Charlie’s different accomplice. “I can’t image being in his shoes.”
Ovard, who shot 73, stated he noticed extra of Tiger throughout Sunday’s apply spherical than he did on Monday. “He was just walking down the middle of the fairways with us and on the greens with us, and we were talking about the course,” Ovard stated. “It was crazy.”
Kyes stated he beloved feeling the push of enjoying in entrance of a swell of followers. ”It’s nice for the sport, particularly for younger youngsters like us,” he stated. “Hopefully it won’t be the last time we’re in front of crowds like this. As early as you can get used to it, the better off you will be.”
Charlie’s absolutely getting used to it. Maybe he already is. What different selection does he have?
