1OAKLAND HILLS
Tiger Woods squinted, incredulous. He was unable to determine the exact landing point but too furious to care as his gaze quickly turned into a sharp dagger aimed squarely at Phil Mickelson.
Woods did all he could to maintain complete ambivalence about Mickelson’s poorly hit shot as he stood on the back of the 18th tee, but his eyes betrayed him. “What the hell are you doing?” might have been an appropriate thought bubble, although the actual language a bit saltier.
The two most talented players in golf whose indifference toward each other was not lost on anyone in the game were paired together at the 2004 Ryder Cup, with the hope that differences would be put aside for the good of team U.S.A. in its biennial competition against Europe. It was a surprising and controversial pairing, given their uneasy relationship, the fact that they rarely, if ever, played casual golf together—not to mention the huge bull’s-eye placed on the backs of the two biggest names in American golf.
It wasn’t like Tiger and Phil were exchanging Christmas cards and getting together for weekend barbecues or even offering up the most benign of golf advice to one another.
And so their day as Ryder Cup teammates could not have been a bigger disaster, with the look on Woods’ face portraying a venom no words could describe, their struggles in two matches together at Michigan’s Oakland Hills Country Club epitomizing American incompetence that week. They were about to lose for the second time in a span of 10 hours, setting the tone for a European rout, with Tiger and Phil the biggest scapegoats, deserved or not.
Hal Sutton, the U.S. captain, was a no-nonsense former major champion who, in his own playing career, stood up to both Jack Nicklaus and Woods in capturing prestigious titles. Given the honor of leading his own U.S. Ryder Cup team, Sutton saw no reason why Tiger and Phil should not only get along but also prosper. Beating Jack at the 1983 PGA Championship gave Hal a certain gravitas, as would his showdown 17 years later when he held off Tiger to win the 2000 Players Championship. “Be the right club today!” is a phrase still uttered in celebration of his clinching approach shot to the final hole at TPC Sawgrass that held off Woods—who would go on to win three major championships that year. Sutton certainly wasn’t worried about hurting anybody’s feelings or how they might have viewed each other.
“When I announced they were going to be partners, the crowd roared,” Sutton said in an interview 16 years later. “Everyone loved it. That is what people wanted to see.”
And yet …
“I thought it was a very poor idea,” recalled Steve Williams, who caddied for Woods for 13 of his major championships, including five Ryder Cups, and was on the bag from 1999 through 2011. “It was just bizarre. Earlier that week, Phil was practicing at another golf course, and you can imagine what Tiger thought of that.
“Whilst I get what Hal was trying to accomplish by putting two of golf’s universal superstars in the same group, I don’t think he consulted enough people to know whether he thought that pairing was going to be good that day. And you saw it immediately. When they went to the first tee, Phil, being a left-hander, went to the left side of the tee. Tiger was on the right. But when it comes to the Ryder Cup, guys should be standing together. Right from the first tee, you could see that wasn’t going to happen.”
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Woods spent the majority of his wildly successful pro career to that point swatting away any runs made at him by Mickelson, who forged his own level of brilliance and popularity while left in Tiger’s immense shadow. Only a few months prior, at the Masters, Mickelson finally won his first major championship at age 33, a mystifying omission on a résumé that would grow to Hall of Fame stature. But his career achievements to that point were lacking to a level that Woods could not comprehend.
At 28, Woods had already captured eight major championships and dominated the sport unlike any other player. He wasn’t keen on allowing anyone to get too close, certainly not a player he deemed to be among his major competitors. Mickelson, five years older and with more than a four-year head start in the professional game, was a huge fan favorite who signed autographs for hours on end, posed for photographs, smiled, made small talk, and generally endeared himself to the masses. There are those who believe it was done purposely to counter Woods, always the cold-blooded competitor, who typically had blinders on when navigating a crowd, a stark difference from the more accommodating Mickelson. And while he was well aware of Mickelson’s talent, Woods thought “Lefty” came across soft as a golfer, his career record disappointing. Mickelson’s victory earlier that year at Augusta National only put a small dent in the imposing wall Woods erected between the two golf titans.
It also left Woods quietly seething. While he grudgingly respected Mickelson’s game, he didn’t much like Lefty stepping up to take the hardware he wanted to horde. They were about to embark on the greatest, most intense portion of their rivalry, when they would trade green jackets, and yet both experience the highs and lows that go with the pursuit of the biggest titles.
Not helping Woods was the still-lingering taste of a poor 2004 by his standards. He won just once on the PGA Tour and was not a threat at any of the four major championships as he endured the process of retooling his swing under a new coach, Hank Haney, a relationship that would not become public for months. At the Masters, where Phil prevailed with a dramatic 18th-hole birdie to edge Ernie Els by a stroke for a gratifying and electrifying first major title, Tiger finished tied for 22nd, a third-round 75 knocking him out of any chance to contend.
And now here they were, expected to get along for this lone week, work together, put any differences aside. They might have put up a good front, especially before the cameras and even to the 10 other teammates. But it was a big ask of Tiger and Phil. Especially Tiger, who was not close to his peers back then. That was part of his aura: keeping everyone at a rigid arm’s length while letting the legend build.
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Oakland Hills Country Club has a long, storied history in American golf, although neither Tiger nor Phil can count much success at the venue located in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit.
When the 2004 Ryder Cup commenced, it had been eight years since the last big professional tournament, the 1996 U.S. Open, won by Steve Jones. Mickelson won eight PGA Tour events to that point and was competing in his sixth U.S. Open, fourth as a pro. But Mickelson was not a factor, finishing in a tie for 94th after 108 players made the cut. Woods, still an amateur and playing his second U.S. Open and just months from turning pro, wasn’t much better, finishing in a tie for 82nd.
Copyright © 2022 by Robert Harig
