Was Augusta the Right Place for Tiger’s Comeback?

By Garey Ris

Finally, after months in which the sordid details of his private life became fodder for late-night TV, gossips shows and the tabloids, Tiger Woods will try to shift focus back to his golf game. Woods might never rebuild his squeaky-clean image, but he’s more than capable of dominating the PGA Tour, whose ratings have cratered in his absence. Golf fans, sponsors and networks eagerly await his return April 8 at the Masters, the site of his first major triumph, a mammoth 12-stroke victory in 1997.

Tiger’s place among golf’s greats isn’t debatable, but his return is. Only a month ago Woods said he needed time away from golf, hoping to save his crumbling marriage after admitting to numerous infidelities. The Journal’s John Paul Newport asks lots of questions about Tiger’s return to the limelight, but says returning at Augusta National makes the most sense. “One reason Mr. Woods must surely have chosen the Masters for his reappearance, apart from a love of green jackets (he has four in his collection already), is that no tournament provides better control of the crowds and the media,” Newport writes. “The Masters is a private tournament hosted by the secretive and august Augusta National Golf Club. That organization is under no imperative, implied or otherwise, to credentialize any media outlet it doesn’t wish to, just as the club is under no imperative to admit women as members.”

Sports Illustrated’s Joe Posnanski agrees with the venue for Tiger’s return. After all, it’s where Tiger’s won four majors. “Tiger Woods knows the golf course better than anyone else,” Posnanski writes. “He handles pressure better than anybody. He is the best in the world — maybe the best ever — at the 10-foot par putt. And he’s motivated like never before. Sure, it’s possible that he will come out rusty and nervous, will not look like himself, will miss the cut and go home and leave everyone wondering. But, I doubt it.”

It’s hard to pick against Tiger on one of his favorite courses, but CBS Sports’s Steve Elling notes that only one golfer, Ben Hogan, has won at Augusta when making it his first tour stop of the season.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Bryan Burwell likes the statement Tiger’s making by starting at Augusta. “The man I saw a month ago apologizing for his indiscretions was fragile and defeated. The man I watched last month apologizing was stripped bare of any pretense of the arrogance that once made him the most feared and dominant athlete on the planet,” Burwell writes. “A month ago, I was thinking, ‘Uh oh, that ain’t Tiger anymore.’ But the man who decided to make his return to golf at the Masters has to be the old Tiger, because nobody else would be crazy enough, competitive enough or athletically arrogant enough to think that after all the commotion of the last five months, he could just show up at his sport’s most significant major tournament and tell the world, ‘I’m back.’ ”

The Washington Post’s Michael Wilbon isn’t sure the Masters is Tiger’s best choice to resume playing golf. “It’s like Kobe or LeBron deciding to skip warmup games in March or April and just report to work for the playoffs,” Wilbon writes. “Skipping Arnold Palmer’s Bay Hill, where a member of the Mount Rushmore of golf could put his arm around Tiger and help usher him back into the fray, is wasting an enormous resource of potential strength, not to mention goodwill.”

Filip Bondy thinks Tiger’s return at Augusta is a slap at women, who are still barred from membership at the storied club. “Woods treated his wife in a similar fashion, barring her from membership in his real life while objectifying other women in the worst sort of way,” Bondy writes in the New York Daily News. “He was playing. Elin was watching, never fully informed about the rules of his game.”

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The adage that there’s no such thing as a sure thing in sports doesn’t apply to the opening round of the men’s NCAA basketball tournament. Not when the No. 16 seeds are 0-100 all-time against No. 1s. So here’s a tip if you’re entering the Fix’s NCAA tournament contest at Yahoo Sports: Go ahead and pencil in top seeds Kansas, Kentucky, Syracuse and Duke into the second round. There’s almost zero chance they’ll lose. The rest of your picks might not be so easy.

While the big programs normally dominate the water-cooler chatter, and will again soon enough, the Fix will give the 16th seeds their fleeting moment of fame. The Jayhawks, the tournament’s top seed, face Lehigh University of the Patriot League in the Midwest Regional. Sounds like a cakewalk to this longtime Jayhawk fan, but the Daily Oklahoman’s Berry Tramel reminds readers that Thursday is the fifth anniversary of a major upset when No. 14 Bucknell became the first Patriot League school to win an NCAA tournament game by ousting No. 3 Kansas, 64-63.

Vermont was a surprise 60-57 winner over Syracuse five years ago in another 3-vs.-14 battle, although no one is giving the Catamounts any chance of beating the Orange in the West Regional. The best storyline then is the Joseph brothers, Vermont’s Maurice and Syracuse’s Kris, Bucky Gleason writes in the Buffalo News.

East Tennessee State’s in tough against powerhouse Kentucky in the East Regional, but just reaching the tournament has to be a blessing for the Bucs, a team that lost its best player to injury before the season not long after another player died in a car accident, Jerry Tipton writes in the Lexington Herald-Leader.

In the South Regional, Arkansas-Pine Bluff earned a date with Duke after defeating Winthrop, 61-44, in the play-in game Tuesday. The Golden Lions’ appearance in the tournament is all the more remarkable considering they lost their first 11 games — all on the road. In the Dayton Daily News, Tom Archdeacon looks at how the historically black school rallied from its horrendous start to earn its first spot in the tournament.

If you need help with your picks, take a few seconds to read how little time Sports Illustrated’s Joe Posnanski spends making his selections. As in barely a minute.

The Awl’s Abe Sauer crunches the numbers — tuition costs — to fill out his bracket. His pick for the championship game? Let’s just say it isn’t the Kansas-Kentucky matchup so many are choosing. Far from it.

Some Web sites are offering $1 million for any fan lucky enough to pick all 63 tournament games correctly. Good luck overcoming the odds of one-in-9,223,372,036,854,775,808, Matt Severance writes at Doc’s Sports.

At U.S. News & World Report, Ben Miller and Marc Isenberg debate allotting tournament bids based on graduation rates.

Finally, the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Frank Fitzpatrick suggests 10 ways to improve the tournament.

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Mike Lowell’s baseball career has seen better days. He’s been with Boston for the past four seasons but at 36 faces a much reduced role with the Red Sox. The Miami Herald’s Greg Cote thinks it’s a good idea to bring Lowell back to Florida, where he played with the Marlins for seven seasons, and could help the team earn a playoff spot this season.

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When I was a young boy, I aspired to be either a sports journalist or a forest ranger. I’ve been in journalism for the most part since the mid-1970s, when I began contributing to a couple of small-town papers in high school, became a copy boy for the Canadian Press, went to college in the St. Louis area in my mid-20s and earned my B.A. in political science, writing for the school newspaper and spinning records on our 10-watt radio station.

I returned to Ottawa in the late 1980s and soon began freelancing for the Ottawa Citizen. I complained enough about all the grammatical mistakes in the sports section that I was thrown on the copy desk. Sports was one of many departments I worked in before taking a voluntary buyout two years ago after 17 years. I thought my journalism career was over, but then I was offered the Fix gig 18 months ago.

It’s been a great ride blogging for one of the world’s best newspaper Web sites, but today is my final Fix appearance. It’s tough to leave, as everyone has been great to work with. Most notably I want to thank my editors Carl Bialik, who offered me the Fix job, and Adam Thompson. Fellow Fixer David Roth, whose columns always are an interesting read, brings a lot of flair and nice turns of phrase to the Fix. We have different styles and strengths that I think serve Fix readers well. Speaking of readers, Don Hartline has been a savior more times than I can count by serving up lots of links to share. Thanks to the many other readers who have sent kind notes, and chided me when I messed up. It’s humbling writing for such a knowledgeable audience.

With so many staff cuts at newspapers around North America, I’ve found it increasingly difficult to find Fix-worthy links, spending much more time than I’d prefer to devote to the column. As much as I love reading about and watching sports, I’m also passionate about politics and economics. I’ll cherish having more time to devour all the books that have been piling up for too long — and sleeping in a little longer in the morning.

Sports fans have never had it so good — instant access to box scores, game stories and columnists’ opinions, not to mention a smorgasbord of viewing options for your favorite sports teams. In other words, change for the better. For me, it’s time for a change. Who knows, maybe I’ll become a forest ranger after all.

– Tip of the Fix cap to reader Don Hartline and fellow Fixer David Roth.

Found a good column from the world of sports? Don’t keep it to yourself — write to us at dailyfix@wsj.com and we’ll consider your find for inclusion in the Daily Fix. You can email Garey at ris84rap@gmail.com.