It’s Difficult to Track Tiger’s Future

Way out here next to the corn fields, about 20 miles west of Portland, Pumpkin Ridge Golf Club sure had lots of birdies during the U.S. Amateur, all right.

And since we were sort of in the country, it’s also a place that had lots of geese honking, roosters crowing, dogs barking and birds chirping.

But the creature that made the biggest noise was a Tiger named Woods.

Right about now, the business of following the Tiger tracks from here on out would make a pretty nice new industry.

After his record third consecutive U.S. Amateur title, his record 17th consecutive match-play victory and his sixth consecutive year with a USGA championship, it would appear Woods needs new fields to conquer.

If anyone expected Woods to pick his golf ball out of the last hole, hold up the trophy and then announce he was turning pro, they were wildly overreacting.

Asked if he was going to join the PGA Tour, Woods proved to be a man of many shots and few words.

“I really don’t know,” he said. “I’ve got to think about it.”

Some of those around him already are sure. Butch Harmon, the Houston-based teaching pro and Woods’ coach, said Woods asked him if his game is ready for the PGA Tour.

“I said, ‘Yes it is,’ ” said Harmon. “But his future is what he chooses. It’s his choice and his family’s.”

Earl Woods will only say that he expects his son to get his degree at Stanford, where he is an economics major.

All week at the Amateur, the Woods gallery was like a traveling carnival, a moving three-ring circus that shifted from hole to hole en masse.

Unlike most events, the course was not roped off to keep the gallery in place. Instead, thousands charged down fairways and across tees like a cattle drive, only with the herd wearing shorts.

The attendance for the week was 65,363, including 14,722 for Sunday’s final.

Of course, everybody wanted to walk close to the Tiger, even a billionaire such as Phil Knight, the founder of Nike.

Like everyone else who would like to sign Woods as a client, Knight has high hopes.

“If he likes Nike, I hope he turns pro right away,” Knight said. “If he doesn’t, I hope he goes to medical school.”

The USGA certainly reaped the benefits of having Woods in the Amateur. Mark Carlson, director of communications for the USGA, said he expects Sunday’s NBC ratings of the U.S. Amateur to equal or surpass the World Series of Golf on CBS.

Carlson said the highest-rated golf event on ESPN the last two years was the U.S. Open. The U.S. Amateur was second.

No matter what happened Sunday in Oregon, Woods is changing his geographical location to suburban Wisconsin this week.

Woods is entered in the Greater Milwaukee Open and then in the Quad Cities Classic on Sept. 12-15 in Coal Valley, Ill.

They are either another project to gain some experience and also measure how he competes on the PGA Tour before he enrolls again for his junior year at Stanford, or it’s a preview of a soon-to-come professional career.

“Those tournaments were my idea,” Harmon said. “They were just to get an idea where weare.”

And where is that?

“Tiger Woods is special in that he possesses qualities that I’ve never seen in a player of his age other than Jack Nicklaus,” Harmon said.

There are enough Woods’ amateur-pro scenarios to launch a dozen daytime dramas.

His dilemma is that if he decides to become a professional, Woods doesn’t really have a place to play, at least if where he wants to play is the PGA Tour.

After school starts, there are only five more tournaments that count on the official money list toward an exemption for 1997. The top 125 players on the 1996 money list are exempt for 1997 tournaments, which basically means they can play in any tournament they choose.

The last player to make the money list cutoff in 1995 was Keith Fergus, who made $146,359, but played 26 events.

If Woods should win a PGA Tour event, he gets a two-year exemption, which he could defer until he decides to turn pro. That’s what Phil Mickelson and Scott Verplank did when they won as amateurs.

Woods can’t just see how he plays at Milwaukee and take the money if he finishes high. He must renounce his amateur status before he plays in order to be seen as a professional.

Woods may decide to return to Stanford, but turn professional in January after the end of the fall quarter.

Or Woods could wait until after the NCAA tournament in May and then turn pro. Then he would have the comfort of more than four months of tournaments to build up his earnings on the money list, finish in the top 125 and avoid qualifying school.

If Woods has grown weary of answering questions about his future plans, he seems to have had at least a small part in adding to the confusion.

Last week, Woods committed to a World Amateur Team competition Nov. 7-10 in the Philippines.

USGA officials were concerned enough of a potential conflict they urged Woods not to accept the invitation to play if there was any question he would turn pro.

Woods also asked the USGA this week about the site of the 1997 Walker Cup, an international amateur team competition. The event will be held at Quaker Ridge Golf Club in Scarsdale, N.Y., on Aug. 8-10.

Steve Scott, who lost to Woods 1-up in 38 holes in Sunday’s final, said he’s convinced Woods ought to know his place already.

“I wasn’t getting in the way of history, I was attempting to stop history,” he said.

“He’s going to give those pros all they can handle there too when he goes out there. I don’t know how much more he has to prove around here, though.”