Tiger Watched With Us, Vol. 3

Golfweek's Jeff Rude looks at the Tiger fiasco and raises similar questions about the intimidation factor his presence would have had. And he has some quotes from Stewart Cink at the end, questioning Tiger's thinking.

Here's Tiger's press conference at Firestone. Notice that the assembled scribes asked some decent questions, despite attempts by a rally killer to change the subject. And then there's the point-misser who puts the exchange out of its misery.

Q. What did you do Monday?

TIGER WOODS: I was at home working, working on my game, trying to get ready for this week, make sure that everything is sound and solid.

Q. You obviously had to show up Monday. What did you do Monday morning?

TIGER WOODS: I was at home.

Q. What time did you leave Sunday night?

TIGER WOODS: After the delay.

Q. Did you look at the leaderboard?

TIGER WOODS: Yeah, there was three guys ahead of me, two guys tied and Goose at 1 with two par 5s. They're not coming back.

Q. It was a risk?

TIGER WOODS: Yeah, it was, but also it really wasn't, either. These are the best players in the world. Look at who's on that board. It wasn't like guys who have never been there before. If you have guys who had never been there before, then it might have been a different story, but each one of those guys had won major championships up there on that board.

Q. What's your favorite moment here, 21 under, playing against Furyk, finishing in the dark with headlights?

TIGER WOODS: Probably that one because I didn't want to come back on Monday, and Hal and I were racing around, and they asked us do you want to call it. We were on 17 tee, we can call it, and I looked at Hal and Hal said, no, I'm going for it. So we played quick and hit that shot, and the story behind that shot is that Stevie's favorite number is 21, and I was stuck at 20. He said when the ball is in the air, he says, "21." He knew it was the right club, and that's what made that shot so sweet.

Q. Were you watching Monday morning?

TIGER WOODS: I caught a piece of it. I caught it towards the end. I was in the gym working out. When I turned it on, I thought that Elk was hitting his second shot on 18, like, "what's he doing right there?" Then they showed a replay, and I was like, oh, he got a good break to get there. Then he ends up in a divot. Those are not very hard holes with the wind like it is. You can be pretty aggressive on those flags now, especially on 17. You couldn't get it close when we played it because it was straight downwind. Now it turns into the wind you see those guys backing the ball up. Nobody even sniffed at backing the ball up on Sunday.

Q. I'm working on a story on autographs up on ebay and things like that. What's your policy on that?

TIGER WOODS: It's frustrating.