Clearly in a panic, the man kept stumbling backward until he finally bumped into a tree. His camera pressed against his face, he then tried to properly frame and snap a photograph that represented an instant family keepsake.
Utterly impromptu, Tiger Woods had stopped along the gallery ropes behind the first green and agreed to pose for a photo with the frantic mans 6-year-old son.
Tiger Woods signs for some eager fans after walking off the 18th green. (AP) A high-school cheerleader smile pasted on his face, Woods stood patiently frozen for perhaps 45 seconds as the man fumbled with the camera, trying to properly operate the zoom function. Ultimately, he blew the shot and inadvertently cropped his son out of the photo.
“I choked,” said Andy Nicholson, the kids dad.
“You think he was nervous?” Woods cracked to part of his security contingent as he walked to the next tee.
Youd think that at this point, Woods would be the one feeling the psychological heat to both frame and present his image more properly, but Wednesday marked another step in a surprisingly seamless transition back into public view when his pro-am round at the Quail Hollow Championship went off with nary a whimper or cry from the crowd.
In fact, there was little noise at all. Outside of the uncharacteristically generous photograph with the 6-year-old and an autograph signed for a young man in a wheelchair, it felt as though the past five months never happened. The crowds were strangely muted, no airplane banners taunted him from above and Woods mostly reverted to his stoic persona and didnt interact much with the fans. Honest to god, a couple of giggling teenage girls even professed their love, just like always.
It was another baby step closer to “normalcy,” as Woods dubbed it, a locale he hasnt often visited since Novembers Escalade Escapade began to dually unfold and unravel. As usual, Woods was first off the pro-am tee, at 7:30 a.m., when fans were sleepy eyed and beer sales were essentially nil. Still, the gallery vibe could accurately be described as … boring.
The conspicuously large and uniformed police security force, using Segways, bicycles and their own shoe leather to track the procession, proved practically unnecessary. There were more heretics at a Billy Graham Crusade. Pardon the career parallel, but former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards could have walked down the fairway with Woods and not drawn a catcall. Maybe theyre inured to cads in Charlotte, since Michael Jordan owns the NBA team and played college ball a few miles down the interstate, but it was almost as though the fans didnt know how to react. So nobody did much of anything.
“Just the way we like it,” one Charlotte cop said on the 16th tee box.
F mostly just to yawn. Theres plenty of acreage for the tainted world No. 1 to cover before he reincarnates his career, and the next two weeks will prove illuminating, but so far, the annoyances have been as permanently hurtful as a Thursday three-putt.
For Woods, the Masters represented a huge hurdle, psychologically and professionally. But he will play in Charlotte and at the Players Championship outside Jacksonville in consecutive weeks, two events with a large public component within their fan bases. In March, major champions like Stewart Cink and Jim Furyk were using words like circus and zoo to predict the tone when Woods returned, but outside of the media center, that has hardly been the case. With every passing day, the inflamed public temperature seems to drop another degree.
“I have to say this feels a heck of a lot more normal than the Masters did,” Woods said of the atmosphere and the shape of his game. “I just need to go out there and do a little bit of practice session this afternoon, gym work this afternoon as well, to get ready for tomorrow, and back into tournament mode again.
“I think just two weeks in a row competing is Ill have a better barometer of what normal really feels like because I havent done that in a while.”
Insert punchline here, since Woods and normal havent been used in the same sentence since last fall. In fact, 12 months ago to the day, Woods was paired in the Quail Hollow pro-am with NFL star Peyton Manning and a slew of stories were generated about the squeaky-clean and saleable reputations of the two most successful sports pitchmen of the modern era.
Oops.
The 6-year-old and his father personified the Woods dilemma as it relates to fans. Andy Nicholson, a volunteer marshal at Quail Hollow, is pastor of a church in nearby Dallas, N.C. His son has no idea about the depths of Woods alleged depravities, he said.
“People make mistakes, you know?” the elder Nicholson said. “I feel for him. I believe god gives us all a second chance. Hopefully, he will come back stronger than ever and redeem himself.”
His son, still buzzing from the photographs taken of him and Woods, interjected happily, “I have never been in a newspaper before.”
Woods surely has, and lately, for all the wrong reasons. seems well under way. Not a negative peep was heard from the throng Wednesday, other than one fan razzing Woods from afar because he was being carried by his two pro-am partners. Woods laughed and fired back, “You got that right.” Woods wasnt nearly as demonstrative or interactive with the gallery as he was at the Masters, when he seemed like the second coming of Phil Mickelson and did everything but volunteer to change diapers. He bumped fists with a few guys along the ropes, including Ken Sutton, 44, of Charlotte.
Like Nicholson, Sutton said that even though he considered himself a religious man, he can separate Woods the athlete from Woods the flawed person. He admits that Woods club-chucking and occasionally profane deportment “hasnt been the best for the sport,” but he was rooting the guy on, anyway.
“Hes the best player in the history of the game,” Sutton said.
Point made, but what about the reams of u he screwed up royally,” Sutton said. “But I dont want my daughter looking to Tiger Woods as an example of how to live right. I will tell her, Work like he does, act like I do.
“The whole role-model thing to me is different. If you are looking to him for that, you are not doing a very good job yourself as a parent.”
Sutton acknowledged the apparent inconsistency in cheering on a player whose nocturnal activities would have caused Caligula to blush.
“I am a fan because of his golf,” Sutton said, “not because of him as a person.”
That distinction was less clear elsewhere. Behind the fourth green, three teenage girls, rather skimpily attired for such a cool morning, stood along the gallery ropes and greeted Woods like he was Justin Timberlake. One of the cadre of Charlotte cops assigned to the Woods group, who watched the exchange as Woods walked past the girls, was asked if they were his daughters, whether hed let them near the guy.
“Not dressed like that,” he said.
On occasion, Woods tossed out bits of charm like candy from a passing parade float, like when one young kid with a bad haircut called out to him behind the 15th green.
“Nice mohawk,” Woods said with a grin, generating a big laugh from everybody within earshot.
That was perhaps the most telling insight into his true persona: Sarcastic and frequently biting. But at least it wasnt overly contrived. The gee-whiz Woods seen over the first couple of days at the Masters acted more like an alien abduction victim. By the weekend, he had switched back to default viper mode, full of hiss and vinegar.
As he did in Augusta, Woods heaped praise on the local galleries afterward, another seemingly pre-emptive strike to blunt any bad behavior before it happens. He gushed about the crowds at the Masters so often, it was like hed dived into a mosh pit and been carried around Amen Corner by fans. In fact, the reception was polite, but hardly raucous. Same thing on Wednesday, when, in NASCAR terms, the energy level was as memorable as an interview with Jimmie Johnson, who happens to be a Quail Hollow member.
That said, Woods is steeled for the day when hell get roughed up for his actions. Some are already looking ahead to Friday, when Woods will play in the afternoon wave and the beer will be flowing freely. Although, as two dudes toting light beers pointed out Wednesday morning, at a steep $6 a bottle, its hard to get too lubed up.
It would rank as a surprise if he doesnt hear from a loudmouth or 20 next week in Jacksonville, where much of the throng is less concerned with golf then they are the beer gardens, socializing and being noticed by the females in attendance.
“Whether they do or not, its happened before, and it happened before any of this ever happened,” Woods said of his checkered recent past. “Ive dealt with that before.”
So far, with the lens of the world focused on him, he hasnt heard a peep just yet.
