Tiger Woods announced Thursday that he will not play the 2017 Arnold Palmer Invitational due to his back injury. Woods hurt himself at the Dubai Desert Classic at the beginning of February and has not played since.
“Unfortunately, due to ongoing rest and rehabilitation on my back, I won’t be able to play in this year’s Arnold Palmer Invitational,” Woods wrote on his website. “I’m especially disappointed because I wanted to be at Bay Hill to help honor Arnold.
“This is one event I didn’t want to skip. Arnold has meant so much to me and my family; I thought of him as a close friend, and Sam and Charlie were both born in the Winnie Palmer Hospital for Women & Babies. He will be greatly missed and can never truly be replaced.”
Woods then added that he presently has “no timetable for my return to golf” but said his “treatments are continuing and going well.”
After winning at Bay Hill in 2013 to go back to number one in the world, Tiger will go a fourth straight year without playing there.
— Bob Harig (@BobHarig) March 9, 2017
This move for Woods, who has won the Arnold Palmer Invitational a record eight times, is not surprising, but it is significant. This tournament was expected to be a tune-up for the 2017 Masters, which starts one month from today.
Woods has now missed over a month of competitive golf since Dubai. His agent, Mark Steinberg, said in February that Woods skipping a press conference at the Genesis Open was “precautionary.” That was a month ago. Of course, he also said Woods “has again been advised by doctors to limit all activities.”
So who knows what’s going on at this point. The behind-the-scenes whispers are not great. Heck, the in-front-of-the-scenes whispers are not great either.
The one thing that remains is that an appearance at Augusta National is now in serious jeopardy. Woods could show up there without having played in two months, of course. He did that two years ago and played in the third-to-last group on Sunday.
Still, you have to think Woods is doing pretty bad to skip a tournament he’s won eight times the year after Palmer passed away. Woods does not qualify for the WGC-Match Play Championship and does not play the Houston Open the week before the Masters, so the next time we see him, if we see him, will likely be down Magnolia Lane.
And if he doesn’t show up for the azaleas and pimiento cheese? Well, then you’ll know the long-term prognosis is as bleak as it gets.
