Woods Will Don Green When He Isn’t So Green

Tiger Woods will win the Masters.

Some day.

He probably will win several. Jack Nicklaus predicted again this week that Woods will triumph at Augusta National more times than he and Arnold Palmer combined, which is 10.

But I’m guessing Woods will wear a green jacket Sunday only if he buys one. A GQ cover subject, he fortunately has too much taste for that.

Woods has the game for Augusta. The question is whether he has the temperament, not only for managing Amen Corner but the tempest his presence invariably creates.

“Good gracious,” Nicklaus said. “When this young man came out, the first thing I see in the papers is, ‘Tiger Watch.’ Every day, you mention what his scores are. I mean, I didn’t have that.”

Tiger Watch, though, doesn’t merely watch Tiger’s scores.

History’s most scrutinized golfer, he has to have as firm a grip on his behavior as he does on his five-iron. Any lapse of judgment, whether it’s snubbing a banquet, lashing out at a photographer or telling an off-color joke, opens him to criticism.

“To be honest with you, I don’t care what anybody else says,” Woods said defiantly this week.

But on another day, in another setting, he exposed his wounds, asking that he be judged no differently than any other golfer.

He, however, is not any other golfer.

“One thing he said to me was that his public probably won’t let him act like a 21-year-old man,” Palmer said. “Well, how many 21-year-old men are in the position that Tiger is in?

“I said, ‘That’s the price you pay.’ There has to be a penalty somewhere for all the nice things that happen to you.”

It might not be fair, but that is Woods’ burden.

When he learns to play with the extra weight on his shoulders, and that shouldn’t take long for a young man with his fortitude, he will wrap a green jacket around them.

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Greg Norman says he recovered from last year’s Masters collapse with the help of Tony Robbins, the motivational guru who had Coach Barry Melrose’s ear during the Kings’ 1993 Stanley Cup run. Here’s hoping Norman doesn’t get caught with an illegal stick in his bag. . . .

“My game right now is quietly pensive,” Norman says, taking the words right out of Marty McSorley’s mouth. . . .

I suppose Corey Pavin needed Navy man David Robinson as a caddie Wednesday to help him navigate the water holes. . . .

Water on the brain. Swimmers who have combined for 12 gold medals, including Janet Evans, John Naber, Bruce Furniss, Kristine Quance and Brad Bridgewater, will be at USC’s Olympic pool Saturday for the “Swim With Mike” fund-raiser. . . .

They will make sure chairman Tom Lasorda doesn’t lose count of his laps. . . .

Local promoter Al Franken says he could have assembled a group in 1961 to buy the Lakers from Bob Short at his asking price of $400,000. But Franken’s wife, Shirley, talked him out of it. . . .

“What makes you think you can make it work if Bob Short can’t?” she said, ending the discussion. . . .

The Lakers were bought four years later by Jack Kent Cooke for $5.175 million and today have an estimated worth of $200 million. . . .

Recalling that this week, Franken was quietly pensive. . . .

Franken remained in the somewhat less-lucrative business of track and field, which has a fluttering but still beating heart in Southern California. . . .

Mary Slaney will run in the Carlsbad 5,000 on Sunday, then is expected to appear a week later in the Mt. San Antonio College Relays. . . .

Amy Acuff, a five-time NCAA champion in the high jump for UCLA, makes her final appearance in Drake Stadium on Saturday in a meet also involving Houston, UC Irvine and Cal State Northridge. . . .

Competing in the invitational portion are John Godina in the shotput and Ato Boldon, Quincy Watts and Jon Drummond in the 200. . . .

UCLA’s baseball team offers its tribute to alumnus Jackie Robinson before a 1 p.m. game Sunday against Arizona. . . .

Bill Russell isn’t happy the Dodgers’ game against the New York Mets on Tuesday at Shea Stadium will be interrupted after the fifth inning to honor Robinson. He’d rather do it before the game to spare his starting pitcher a half-hour delay. . . .

Gene Orza, general counsel for the players’ union, counters that the ceremony, which includes President Clinton, will have more impact during the game. “The message of the evening is education as well as baseball,” he says.

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While wondering how anyone could be foolish enough to predict the winner of a golf tournament, I was thinking: Shaquille O’Neal should be good at the free-throw line with as much time as he has had to practice, at least the Angels aren’t boring, Nick Faldo will repeat at the Masters.