A commentator on The Open featured groups coverage made a dark observation about Tiger Woods on Thursday. A dark observation he likely wishes he could have back.
Woods, who got off to a four-over start through his first eight holes in some trying conditions at Royal Troon, didn’t exactly look comfortable in the cold weather. He began par-par-birdie to reach one under, holing a long bomb from off the third green that produced quite the roar.
Not long after, the commentator assigned to the Woods, Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay group made this suggestion about the 15-time major champion’s eyes as he strolled up the fairway:
🎙️Featured groups announcers on Tiger Woods: “You look at the eyes, you gotta think there’s a lot of painkillers being taken.”
Thoughts on this?
— NUCLR GOLF (@NUCLRGOLF) July 18, 2024
“You look at the eyes,” the commentator said, “you’ve got to think that there’s a lot of painkillers being taken to cope with the pain. Not easy.”
It’s no secret that Woods is in pain any time he tees it up, or that Woods has uses medication to deal with his myriad injuries in the past. But this is still probably not something you want to say out loud. Naturally, Golf Twitter pounced:
An absolute crazy thing to say on air.
— NUCLR GOLF STATS (@NUCLRGOLFSTATS) July 18, 2024
I'm not a big fan of Tiger, but even if it's true, there are just things that need not be said
— Hollywood99.eth (@RussNormandin) July 18, 2024
Very, very weird thing to say.
— TheApexHound (@TheApexHound) July 18, 2024
That's a really bad take. Speculating on medical care is not his job.
— Dan Kaufman (@Kaufm020) July 18, 2024
Jeezus https://t.co/SaNHkEjyL2
— Dan Wolken (@DanWolken) July 18, 2024
Unprofessional.
— Grant Hinkle (@GrantHinkle) July 18, 2024
So we’re just accusing Tiger Woods of popping a bunch of pain killers based on ‘the look in his eyes’ nowadays?💀 pic.twitter.com/8A2ezzv9UE
— Mark Harris (@itismarkharris) July 18, 2024