Tiger Woods Has Entered the Eye Of a Perfect Storm

Tiger Woods has got himself a huge problem, and it has little to do with text messages, cocktail waitresses, porn star, or divorce attorneys.

We all saw Woods melt down right before our eyes yesterday afternoon on the back nine at Quail Hollow, so there’s no need to go into a play-by-play of what amounted to the worst round of Woods’ professional career.

Let’s for a moment completely forget about his transgressions and look solely at a storm that has been brewing around Woods’ golf game for more than a year now.

At last year’s Open Championship, Woods would have had a hard time hitting a golf ball into the Firth of Clyde from 40 yards away let alone hitting a green in regulation; and he subsequently missed the cut at a major championship for only the second time in his career.

Several weeks later, Woods held the 54-hole lead at the PGA Championship.

In 13 years as a professional, Woods had NEVER lost a major when holding at least a share of the 54-hole lead.  However, on that day, Woods was taken down by a little known golfer named Y.E. Yang.

In his very next event—The Barclays—Woods was faced with a six-foot putt for the win...you know, the type of putt where his golf ball used to find the bottom of the cup 99.9 percent of the time.  Woods looked on in amazement as he pulled his putt left of the hole at Liberty National.  

A month later, Woods was defeated by Phil Mickelson at the Tour Championship, and a few weeks after that, Woods held a share of the 54-hole lead at the WGC-HSBC Championship in Shanghai, China, only to once again be overtaken by Mickelson on Sunday.

And then we come to the Quail Hollow Championship.

Woods missed just the seventh cut of his career yesterday, and it was the first time he’s missed a cut at a non-major since the 2005 Children’s Miracle Network Classic.  But, not only did he miss the cut, he missed the cut by eight strokes, which completely shattered his previous career worst (he missed the cut by three strokes at the 2006 U.S. Open and the 2005 Children’s Miracle Network Classic).

Woods’ second round score of 79 was the second worst round of his career.  His worst round was an 81 and it came at the 2002 Open Championship at Muirfield in hurricane-like conditions.

Woods tied his worst career nine-hole score and broke his worst 36-hole score.

The man hit just six fairways in 36-holes.  

Yesterday afternoon was without question the worst round of golf Woods has played since turning professional, but what is more concerning than just his score is that we may have entered the eye of a storm that’s been brewing for 12 months.

Although he still won six events in 2009 coming off of reconstructive ACL surgery, which is quite remarkable, we’ve seen a lot of firsts from Woods over the past year.

We’ve seen Woods hemorrhage distance faster than property in South Western United States is hemorrhaging value.

We’ve seen Woods miss must-make putts for the first time in...well, for the first time ever.

We’ve seen Woods blow a 54-hole lead at a major championship.

We’ve seen Woods’ biggest rival get the best of him on numerous occasions.

We’ve seen Woods' swing evolve into a robotic shell of what it used to be.

After missing four cuts in his first 12 years on tour, we’ve seen Woods miss two cuts in just his last 12 events.

And finally, we’ve witnessed a scene at Quail Hollow that was reminiscent of the beating Mike Tyson took from Buster Douglas in the 1990 heavyweight title fight.   

Now, add an unbelievably embarrassing sex scandal and impending divorce on top of all that, and folks we may have entered the eye of a perfect storm. 

Will he overcome this?

Probably.

It’s not a fluke that Woods has won 14 major titles.  He’s achieved this level of success by combining otherworldly talent with a Hogan-esque work ethic, and that’s unlikely to wane any time soon.

But one thing is for sure, there’s a heck of a lot more than just a sex scandal that contributed to Woods’ game falling apart right before of our eyes yesterday afternoon.

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