Woods Is Dressed for Success in a 67

Tiger Woods’ professional debut Thursday was everything corporate America hoped it would be.

Woods, who Wednesday night completed a deal with Nike that will pay him about $40 million over the next five years, drew a gallery on the first hole that was five and six people deep from tee to green.

It was a gathering veteran golf observers said was larger than any first-hole crowd they had ever seen at any golf tournament anywhere in the world. And this was the first round of the Greater Milwaukee Open, an event that features only two of this year’s top 10 PGA money winners and only four of the top 30.

Woods received a rousing ovation when he was announced--as a resident of Orlando, Fla., where he plans to move soon to “get out of California’s state income tax”--and there were more cheers and awed oohs of admiration when he smoked his drive 336 yards down the center of the fairway.

Eighteen holes, three birdies, one eagle and a bogey later, Woods finished his first round as a pro with a four-under-par 67, five strokes behind leader Nolan Henke, who fired a tournament-record 62 at Brown Deer Park golf course.

Woods hit 16 of 18 greens in regulation, nine of 13 fairways and had 32 putts.

And now the really important numbers: He was resplendent in 12 Nike swooshes--three on his cap, two on his shirt, one on his pants and six on his shoes. Each shoe had one on the side, one on the heel and one on the sole, apparently in case he knelt to scope out a putt and there was a camera nearby.

All of which will make the folks at Nike, which plans to run 30 commercials featuring Woods this weekend, feel as if they’re starting to get their money’s worth. It also prompted one member of the gallery to whisper, “He looks like a NASCAR driver.”

Woods had the pedal down from the green flag and was four under after six holes. He sank a 15-foot birdie putt on No. 3, had a tap-in birdie after just missing a 25-foot eagle putt on the 485-yard, par-five fourth hole, and had an eagle on No. 6, where he hit a 330-yard drive, a 225-yard five-iron and rolled in a 12-foot uphill putt.

“I kind of hit a dry spell after that, but overall I’d say 67 is a perfect first round,” Woods said. “That’s a good number, especially considering the conditions.”

Woods was referring to the distractions caused by the hoopla surrounding Wednesday’s news conference--he called it “yesterday’s fiasco”--as well as the spiked and bumpy greens he encountered because of his afternoon tee time.

“The greens were all dried out so you couldn’t really take a run at the hole,” he said. “And when your putts are dying up there, they’re subject to all those spike marks.”

Woods will tee off at 8:51 this morning, so the greens should be better, but the gallery might be smaller, especially if there were any Southlanders who changed their mind about coming out to see their once-favorite son who’s headed for sunny climes on the East Coast.

Will he miss his home in Cypress?

“No, I don’t like California,” said Woods, who admitted he hasn’t had time to actually buy a house in Orlando. “There’s too many people and too much smog. I’ve always wanted to live in Florida. I like the hot and humid weather.”

Thursday’s warm, windless conditions were perfect for Woods’ high, long game. The PGA measured drives on Nos. 1 and 6 and Woods’ average of 333 was 30 1/2 yards longer than the next-longest player, Stuart Appleby. Maybe more impressive than Woods’ big drives was the 303-yard two-iron he hit on the eighth hole.

He hit only good and better shots with every club, excluding his putter, until the ninth hole, when he came up short on a wedge from 117 yards, just slipping the ball onto the front edge of the green. His tee shot on No. 10 ended up in the rough on the right, but he had driven the ball over the troublesome trees on the hinge of the dogleg and came away with a par.

Woods first tasted disappointment at 12, when he was distracted by an insect on his ball, backed off and then lipped out a four-foot birdie putt. Playing partner John Elliott said Woods might have matched Henke’s 62 had he made that putt.

Woods missed his first green at 13 and then missed birdie putts of 15, 12, and about 20 feet on the next three holes. He carded his only bogey on the par-four 17th hole, when he drove into a fairway bunker, came up short of the green and then chipped within five feet. His par putt caught the edge of the cup and made a U-turn.

“If I hit my normal drive there, I fly that bunker easy, but I hit it on the heel and got it up too high,” Woods said.

He dropped to three under for only a couple of minutes, however. He split the fairway of the 557-yard, par-five 18th with another 336-yard drive, hit a four-iron on the back of the green from 220 yards out, and then left himself with a three-footer for a birdie.

He rolled that in and went away smiling.

“I felt really good today,” he said. “I’m finally back in my element. I finally got to play golf.”

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Tiger’s Day

Tiger Woods’ first round as a pro:

* Score: 67 (4 under par)

* Pars: 13

* Eagles: 1

* Birdies: 3

* Bogeys: 1

* Fairways hit: 9 of 13.

* Greens hit: 16 of 18.

* Putts: 32.

* Driving average: Led all golfers with a 333-yard average. Stuart Appleby was second with a 302 1/2-yard average.