The trials of Tiger

It's been a wild, wacky and rumor-filled week for golf's poster boy

By Chris Lewis, SI.com

Despite his "struggles," Tiger Woods is still the world's No. 1 ranked player. Ronald Martinez/Getty Images

For the Tiger Woods camp, this has been kooky rumor week.

The first story had Tiger's caddie, Steve Williams, being approached by the Wie family to work for Michelle. "Nothing to it," Steve said of that little bit of hearsay.

The second had wedding bells ringing for Tiger at some point during the next 10 days. "I'm going fishing next week," said Superfriend John Cook. "Nobody's getting married. At least nobody I know."

The third rumor went this way: Three weeks ago, Tiger was spotted on a driving range working with Phil Mickelson's swing coach, Rick Smith. Smith, it would figure, has some kind of non-compete clause in his contract, however informal it is.

This tidbit was so juicy I had to run it by the man himself. I buttonholed Tiger as he walked off the range at the Byron Nelson Championship on Wednesday afternoon, and the mention of Smith stopped him dead in his tracks. He cocked his head back and let out a laugh as loud as a weather-warning air-horn blast. It turned heads.

"I love this stuff," he said, after he finished howling.

Love it or not, it comes with the territory. Celebrity means living with all manner of surmise and speculation.

Indeed, the peskiest recent hypotheticals have to do with The Chosen One's golf swing -- not just who's helping to shape it, but why it's gone awry. True, Tiger finished tied for third at the Wachovia Championship in Charlotte last week, but his driving stats were gruesome. He hit so few fairways -- 24 or 56 to be exact -- that CBS at times seemed incapable of delivering a shot of Tiger that didn't prominently feature a tree.

That driving stat, combined with the top-three finish, made for some interesting early-week range talk.

"If I hit 24 fairways, I'm down the road," said Tiger confidante No. 1, Mark O'Meara, on Wednesday. "I'd have the weekend off. I don't even make the cut. But that's what's amazing about him, and not enough's being said about that. Everybody's still saying, 'What's wrong with Tiger?'"

It was an astounding performance. More than anything else, it spoke to Tiger's most important quality: his utter lack of give-up.

But that kind of praise is loaded. No matter how you word it, it always implies that he could be playing better. Something is wrong with Tiger, or, more specifically, the Tiger who used to win major championships with ease. After all, he hasn't won in (gasp!) nearly three months.

Accordingly, the swing analysts have been all over him. Remember the Players Championship, when Johnny Miller insisted Adam Scott's swing was now the best in golf, and declared that Tiger had to get on the phone with Butch Harmon, like, right now?

All the dissecting is a constant source of amusement to Team Tiger. Says O'Meara: "It's entertaining to us to watch guys on the Golf Channel critiquing or criticizing. I mean, who the hell are [some of these guys]? It's almost disrespectful.

"Look at it this way," O'Meara went on. "Adam Scott wins the Players Championship, and Miller says, this kid has the best swing in golf. Now, he has a nice swing, there's no denying it. But you get this stuff, his swing is better than Tiger's, blah blah blah. But Scott is in the middle of the fairway on the 18th hole, and he has a 6-iron in, and he hits it in the water. Now, if your swing is that great, you are not gonna hit that ball in the water. His swing is good -- I'm not trying to say his swing is bad. But you're gonna miss to the right, anywhere to the right. Then he shoots whatever he shot at the Bell South, and misses the cut. Then he shoots 80 at Augusta, and no one even says anything about it. Nobody says, oh, maybe we jumped the gun on that one. Which is a little bit unfair."

The chief problem with the second-guessers is accuracy. Exhibit A: a few weeks ago, a prominent golf weekly an a cover story, "Why is Tiger Woods Struggling?" penned by noted swing guru Jim McLean.

McLean wrote, "Without a doubt, Tiger is swinging differently [than he was in 2000].... [T]he major influence came from his close friend Mark O'Meara. Mark has been taught by Hank Haney.... Tiger began to change his swing noticeably in early 2002, often using the same swing drills as O'Meara.... Mark's swing is one that promotes a draw, and indeed it is the shot he plays almost exclusively. On the other hand Tiger, in his early years... and up through 2001, often hit the ball dead straight or even hit a slight fade off the tee. But in the last two years he has changed to an inside-out, draw-type action.... Almost all of golf's greatest drivers either hit the ball straight or play a fade. I'm talking about Jack Nicklaus, Ben Hogan, etc."

Illustrating the article were side-by-side shots of Tiger's 2000 and 2004 swings -- the kind of before/after comparison now omnipresent on television broadcasts --showing Tiger attacking the ball much further inside, below the ideal swing plane.

Let's tackle the O'Meara-Haney issue first. The notion that Tiger, under Haney's tutelage, is nowadays trying to swing like O'Meara, is according to O'Meara "a total misconception."

Tiger himself addressed the question on Thursday, in his post-round press conference, saying Haney was simply a "friend." "I love picking guys' brains, whether it's Hank or Butch [Harmon] or Lead [David Leadbetter] or anybody."

So is Hank your new teacher?

"No, no."

I asked Tiger during his Wednesday press conference whether it was true he had gone from a straight ball or fade to a draw.

"That is completely incorrect," he responded, "because when I played my best, I always drew it, and when I played poorly, I would go to a cut, but my natural shot has always been a draw. I don't know why people think I'm trying to draw the ball more now."

Later on, Tiger privately bridled at the notion that the best players always favored a fade. "Sam Snead never hit a draw? Arnold never hit a draw? How about Gary Player?"

I asked a few players to explain what Tiger is working on but even those as close to Tiger as O'Meara and Cook won't line up on Tiger's changes. In fact, they don't even agree about whether those changes are designed to (a) incorporate new elements into his 2000 swing; or (b) simply return to where he was in 2000.

O'Meara is convinced Tiger is trying to integrate a new change, though he can't (or won't) put his finger on it. Cook thinks Woods is simply trying to return to where he was when he was running up back-to-back majors.

"Why wouldn't he be?" Cook asked. "He was playing great!"

For his part, Tiger has been a little cagey about what he's working on. Asked on Wednesday whether he was trying to return to his 2000 swing, he seemed to side with O'Meara, saying, "Well, hopefully, I'll be better than that. The whole goal is to become better than what you were."

Over the past three months he's scattered a few other hints -- width, takeaway position, and so forth. But believe me, it hasn't exactly been an instruction article. And you know what? I don't blame him. That's right, I said it, in total violation of every code of sportswriter ethics. I don't blame him for not spilling. Why? Because if you're Tiger Woods, being super-specific about your golf swing-and in this case, why it's not in perfect working order-is a no-win proposition.

If Tiger says he's trying to get back to how he was swinging in 2000, and seems unable to do it, then he looks foolish for leaving Harmon.

If he says he's trying to improve on his 2000 swing, he looks foolish for trying to fix what wasn't broke (and, again, for leaving Harmon).

Don't think this kind of stuff goes through Tiger's mind? Trust me, it does. Dodging rumors is the easy part of his job. Living up to sky-high expectations, and avoiding being browbeaten when you don't, is what's hard.

Chris Lewis writes a weekly golf column for SI.com.