Tiger Woods Says Aloha, As In ‘Goodbye’ To Tournament Of Champions

Hawaii is famously  The Aloha State.

Aloha is the state’s age-old greeting.  It can mean “hello” and it can also mean “goodbye.”

For Tiger Woods, it means goodbye, as in goodbye to larger crowds this week as the PGA Tour pops the cork on its 2019 season.

This week is elite — as in winners only.  They’ll gather, those who choose to show up, at the Plantation Course at Kapalua on the island of Maui, one of the four main islands out there in the Pacific.

They had their fingers crossed out there, hoping Eldrick would show up.

Form says he wouldn’t.

There were plenty of indicators that the world’s lucky No. 13 would be staying home in Jupiter, where he celebrated his 43rd birthday on Sunday (Dec. 30).

First, all you need do is look back at the break-neck pace of Woods 2018 schedule.  It was a grind and by time the Ryder Cup matches rolled around, he was spent.  The tank was running on empty.

Second, this is a very compressed season thanks to the move of the PGA Championship from August to May.  There’s something big every month starting in April (The Masters), then the PGA (May), the U.S. Open (June) and the Open Championship (July).  Don’t forget to throw in the Players Championship in March.

Throw in a few WGC events and you can see El Tigre’s schedule gets filled pretty quickly.

Second, he hasn’t been practicing all that much.  The kids are out of school and he’s probably doing some nice things with them.

He’s been out and about around Jupiter, he said hello to my niece as he went into Starbucks two weeks ago.

Third, there’s those nasty Kona winds that can play havoc with your game out there in Maui.  One of the worst things that can happen to a player is a really, really windy Hawaiian course.  Your  swing can get totally discombobulated in those conditions.

Fourth, there’s a tournament the third week of January at one of his favorite courses — Torrey Pines.  And that would be the Farmers.

Fifth, that’s a darn long plane trip to Hawaii, even if you have one of those Gulfstream super-jets, like the one Eldrick owns.

Add ’em all up and yes, you can bet Tiger and “his team” basically agreed to pass on Hawaii.

That will give him time to round into shape for Torrey Pines, a course he knows so well.

Life in Hawaii will go on without him.  It will still be a pretty strong field with Dustin Johnson as the defending champion and the world’s No. 1, Brooks Koepka, finally coming out of his Holiday Hibernation.

You have two huge names from the European Tour — Rory McIlroy and Francesco Molinari on the island as well.

In all, there were 37 eligible to play this week and 34 are showing up.

Along with Tiger, Phil Mickelson and Justin Rose will stay at home.

Not sure anyone will miss two of those three.

Aloha 2019!