With the just-finished final round of the AT@T Pro-Am up at Pebble Beach, the winner being Dustin Johnson for the second consecutive year, it's fairly obvious that the PGA tour is progressing along nicely without a certain superstar.
That person being Tiger Woods, who was rumored to return later this week to the Match Play championship in Arizona, but missed the entry deadline and is nowhere in sight. The prediction still holds here that Tiger will not play in 2010. As recently as of two weeks ago, Steve Williams, Woods' caddy, was reportedly quoted in an Australian newspaper saying that if the No. 1 player in the world does tee it up for real, it won't be anytime soon.
Today at Pebble Beach, the sun shone brightly, the waves crashed on the rocks and the sand just a few yards from the Del Monte Lodge, Clint Eastwood was interviewed in the CBS broadcast booth at the 18th green with Jim Nantz, David Duval made a run at the leaders on the back 9 and Phil Mickelson had a nice four-round tournament.
The final round at Pebble Beach was a perfect example of why golf can survive without Woods, and the longer he stays away the more obvious this will become. The tournament, with a chance of a three-way tie and a playoff holding the audience, will surely bring CBS good ratings.
Last week, going against the opening of the Super Bowl, Steve Stricker held on to win the Northern Trust Open on a glorious day at Riviera Country Club.
With or without Tiger Woods, golf will survive. Let's hope the hand-wringing media types who know little about the sport, will wake up to that fact.
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