Phil Mickelson reflects on 25-year rivalry/friendship with Tiger as Honda Classic begins | Opinion
The Honda Classic this week marks its 50th year as a mainstay on the PGA Tour, and as it does so the biggest thing in golf -- still, after all these years, even when he isn’t playing -- looms over the tournament, his presence felt. The absence of him felt.
Tiger Woods revealed Tuesday night he is back home on Jupiter Island, just 20 miles north of Palm Beach Gardens, where the Honda tees off Thursday at PGA National and will divvy its $7.2 million prize purse on Sunday.
“I will be recovering at home and working on getting stronger every day,” Tiger wrote on Twitter.
On February 23 near Los Angeles, Woods’ car careened down an embankment in an accident that could have cost him his life. He sustained traumatic injuries to his lower right leg that will require at least a full year’s rehabilitation and put in some doubt whether his game will ever be the same.
An old friend playing in the Honda this week has been reflecting a lot on the gut punch to golf. Phil Mickelson is the old rival who became the dear friend through the decades of he and Woods jousting on the course and jabbing off it.
The sheriff on the crash scene called Woods “lucky to be alive.”
Woods’ hope is to be ready to play in the 2022 Masters in 13 months, but that almost seems secondary now.
“We’re just lucky and appreciative that his kids didn’t lose their father,” Mickelson said in the buildup to the Honda. “All the guys here understand and appreciate what he has meant to the game of golf and for us and the PGA Tour. But right now that’s so far from our minds. We’re thankful he’s still with us.”
Mickelson, who tees off on the 10th hole at 8:09 a.m. Thursday, likely will draw the biggest gallery among a Honda crowd that will be limited to 10,000 spectators per day (20 percent of the typical number) by COVID-19 protocols and cautions.
It is not a gold-gilded lineup, this 144-man field. Rickie Fowler, setting out at 1:04 p.m. Thursday off the first tee, may be the next-biggest fan draw.
The Honda boasts only six of the top 50-ranked players, none higher than Daniel Berger at No. 15.
Star Brooks Koepka, a four-time majors winner, withdrew last week because of right knee issues. The 2019 U.S. open champ, Gary Woodland, was one of three golfers forced out of the event by COVID test-positives.
Most of the Tour’s stars — Rory McIlroy, Bryson DeChambeau, Justin Thomas, Jordan Spieth, Dustin Johnson — simply chose not to include the Honda in their strategic buildup to The Masters April 8-11.
That’s a pity, because PGA National, with its famed 15th, 16th and 17th hole “Bear Trap” named in honor of Jack Nicklaus, is the most challenging and difficult non-major course on Tour. It has been the hardest to par three consecutive years and five of the past six.
“I absolutely agree with the people saying this is one of the toughest courses,” said South Korean defending champion Sungjae Im this week, through an interpreter. “It tends to get really windy here. Even without wind, the greens are are really firm and so much water is everywhere.”
Glamour field or not, the Honda chugs on as a South Florida sports institution — now longer in PGA Tour history than even Doral and the Blue Monster, which hosted a Tour event 45 years from 1962 through 2006. (Tiger won the final two tournaments there).
The nomadic Honda ran 1972-2002 on four different Broward County courses before moving north to Palm Beach. PGA National has been its home since 2007. (This is the 49th Honda Classic in those 50 years, because in 1976 the event’s original course, Inverrary in Lauderhill, hosted The Players Championship in place of the Honda).
This week brings the PGA Tour to the midpoint of its 2020-21 schedule, the September-to-September “super season.”
What amazes about the state of golf is how the two beloved old warriors past their prime, Mickelson, now 50, and Woods, 45, still have such a grip over the sport and its fans.
You saw it in the international outpouring of prayers and best wishes that flooded to Tiger after his accident.
You’ll see it this week in the adoring galleries following Lefty across PGA National, willing him another hurrah.
Golf is not ready to let them go. Fans are not ready to say goodbye.
Tiger fans dream that a miracle recovery will lead to his somehow still winning three more majors to catch Nicklaus’ record of 18.
Lefty fans who saw him win his first two Champions (nee Senior) Tour events dream he has more wins in him, perhaps even another major, on the main tour.
Phil and Tiger. Tiger and Phil. For 25 years it has been so.
“We were opponents. Then we started working together to try to get the Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup team events, to get our players to play their best,” Mickelson recalled. “Then we became partners in developing a couple of [one on one] matches. It’s been fun to be able to work with him.”
Mickelson credits Woods for getting golf “off the back page and onto the front page.”
But it has been more personal than that.
“It really has evolved,” said Mickelson, “from competing against each other to working with each other to becoming real friends.”
THE HONDA CLASSIC
▪ When: Thursday through Sunday.
▪ Where: PGA National Resort & Spa in Palm Beach Gardens.
▪ Spectators: A limited amount of spectators will be allowed because of Covid. No tickets will be sold at the site. Masks expected to be worn both inside and outside.
▪ Format/Player field: Stroke play. For the first two days 144 golfers competing, followed by a cut after two days.
▪ The course: Champion Course, par 70, 7,110 yards.
▪ Purse: $7.2 million ($1,296,000 to the winner).
▪ Defending champion: Sungjae Inn (72-66-70-66—274).
▪ Television — Thursday: 2 to 6 p.m., Golf Channel; Friday: 2 to 6 p.m. Golf Channel; Saturday: 1 to 3 p.m. Golf Channel, 3 to 6 p.m. NBC; Sunday: 1 to 3 p.m. Golf Channel, 3 to 6 p.m. NBC.
This story was originally published March 17, 2021 at 11:34 AM.
