Tiger vs. Phil Aftermath: It Didn’t Live Up To The Hype

No more of this, please.

Let this be the last time they try and convince everyone that a staged, contrived  Pay Per View  golf match is a good idea.

This Tiger Woods vs. Phil Mickelson extravaganza was anything but that.  It was a couple of decorated veterans looking their age, struggling to find birdies, failing to produce all this “trash talk” that was promised and by the end of this terribly long afternoon in Las Vegas, they finished in the dark in a contest that might have been used to determine the winner at your local member-guest tournament.

The only real suspense came early.  Would Phil birdie that first hole and win $200,000 in a side bet challenge from Tiger?  Truth be known, birdies were few and far between Friday at Shadow Creek.  No, Phil did not birdie that first hole.  He missed from nine feet, Tiger missed from 10 and that would set the tone for this totally unspectacular performance by the featured pair.

The pre-game was pretty bad.  Mickelson did try and set the table with this declaration:

“My game’s as sharp as it has been.”

Ah, negatory Ghost Rider.  If that’s Phil’s version of sharp, Lefty’s in trouble.  We think back to how pitiful he was a the Ryder Cup and he hasn’t played since the Safeway.

Same for Woods.  We hadn’t seen him since the Ryder Cup and it showed.

Tiger set the tone of terrible when he lipped out a three-footer for par at the second, leaving Mickelson telling his brother/caddie Tim:  “I was a half-second from giving him that putt, he never misses those.”

There were supposed to be birdies galore.  Shadow Creek was set up for them, there was no wind, the day was perfect.  No excuses.  Just sub-standard play.  Mickelson couldn’t make a putt which brought a Twitter response from Justin Thomas:

“Phil was a hot putter away from being six up after six.”

The truth hurts.

The ninth hole pretty much summed it up.  Just 391 yards, both his two-irons off the tee.  From 143 yards, Tiger ends up 60 feet away, Phil missed the green short from 87 yards.  Seriously?  Is that good golf?  Woods was one-over that side, Mickelson even.

Charles Barkley, owner of one of the world’s worst golf swings, put it best:

“I just want to tell America that this is some crappy golf.  Both these guys have played awful today.”

Spot on Chuck.  It was crappy golf, at best, no unusual banter between the players, the “side bets” looked pretty much pre-determined, closest to pin, etc.

By the back nine, with the $9 million looming, the side bets went away down the stretch, so did any conversation between the two.

By the 15th hole, it was two old guys grinding it out.

“I’m trying to be more talkative,” Mickelson proclaimed,  “but I’m just not this back nine.”

“No, I understand,” Woods said. “We got back into our old mode of trying to beat each other’s brains in.”

The only real moment would come at the par three 17th, a short hole, just 150 yards.  Woods hit yet another lousy shot that left him 21-feet long in the back fringe while Mickelson,  1-up in the match, was looked at an 11-footer to close it all out.

Then Tiger suddenly became Tiger, chipped in for birdie, gave us the day’s only fist pump then watched as Mickelson missed his short birdie attempt.

On the 18th tee, Phil shot this at Tiger:

“You’ve been doing that crap to me for 20 years,” Mickelson said on the 18th tee. “I don’t know why I’m surprised now.”

Two birdies at 18 sent them back down the par five one last time.

That’s where the door was wide open for Woods on that 19th hole.

A sloppy drive forced Woods to lay up.  Mickelson was perfect, has just 198 in but his five-iron, as Barkley might say, was totally crappy.  Came up short of the creek fronting the green, buried in a large bunker.  Tiger stuck his wedge shot to seven and a half feet.

Phil was fortunate to get it on the green.  He made par and watch as Tiger stood over the winning putt.

Miss.

When was the last time Tiger missed inside 10 feet with everything on the line?

And so it went.

They ended up duking it out on a 93-yard set-up hole from the practice putting green to the 18th green, under the lights, darkness had taken over.

Glad someone thought that out.

Neither player could get anywhere near the hole the first time.  Tiger was long again on the 21st hole, blew his putt six-feet by the hole.  Phil barely missed his birdie then in a surprise move, conceded Woods’ putt that he could have easily missed, given the afternoon’s trends.

“I don’t want it to end like that,” Mickelson declared.

Then Karma put its arms around Lefty.

The third go-around he stiffed it, Woods left himself nearly eight feet and missed again.

Easy win for Phil.

Not easy to sit through all of this, nearly five hours.

This is clearly not the future of golf on television.

As Charles Barkley put it so eloquently — it was simply “crappy.”

And to add a little more stink to the crappiness, this one also turned out to be a technical disaster as well.

And that means refunds to a lot of viewers.

What they should do is give everyone their money back and promise to never do this again.