It’s Lonely at Top-and Under Par

Tiger Woods’ 10-foot putt curled wide left.

“Eat your Wheaties!” came a voice from the stands.

“He eats chicken wings, man!” came another voice.

Tiger Woods didn’t hear it. He didn’t hear any of it Saturday as he marched through a southern canopy of pine trees, sweet breezes, and people who don’t want him to win the U.S. Open.

“Sometimes you’re going to get into places you never thought you’d be,” he said after spending a messy afternoon dangling within two shots of the lead entering today’s final round.

He was talking about the balls that are skiing down the sides of the turtleback greens at Pinehurst No. 2

But he could have been talking about himself.

Two years ago, he won the Masters and hearts of a nation.

On Saturday, he wasn’t even the most popular player in his twosome.

If Tiger Woods is going to win this tournament today, overcoming leader Payne Stewart and second-place Phil Mickelson, he is going to do it alone.

For one of the most popular athletes in the world, a strange place indeed.

When the second-to-the-last group stepped out Saturday afternoon, thousands who lined Pinehurst’s soft green fairways were given a choice.

They could cheer louder for the young stud with the cocky grin . . . or the veteran with the sheepish smile whose wife is about to have a baby.

Turns out, it was no choice at all.

Mickelson was embraced with constant standing ovations and cries of, “Go Daddy” and “Happy Father’s Day.”

Woods was also cheered, but mostly politely, and never consistently, and sometimes it went the other way.

At the second hole, one fan pleaded for him to hit the ball into one of the fairway sand traps.

“Dump it, Tiger!” he shouted.

Woods didn’t dump it, but his approach shot rolled off the green, and he finished with a bogey.

“I told myself I just had to be patient,” he said. “That’s something I am still working on.”

His play improved, but his support did not.

At the 13th tee, one fan shouted, “I hate you, Tiger,” and then gave him the verbal raspberry.

Later, on the green, as Woods lined up a 10-footer, one fan looked at his photographer entourage and shouted, “Y’all better get the shot when Tiger misses that putt, now.”

Woods indeed missed the putt.

Not that he heard any of it. During these sorts of big-time battles, Woods has proved he hears only himself.

“This is a pressure situation, and I absolutely love the pressure,” he said. “In times like these, you have to think.”

He amazingly didn’t even hear something that typified the entire afternoon.

While he putted for birdie on the 18th hole, nearby church chimes filled the air with “Battle Hymn of the Republic.”

He missed his putt.

Then Mickelson stepped up for his birdie attempt.

And the chimes stopped.

And Mickelson made his putt.

“What chimes?” Woods said afterward. “Honestly, I didn’t hear any chimes.”

Considering the crowd tittered throughout the song, he was the only one.

There was one time when Woods shut everybody up, although perhaps it was Tiger who should have been quiet.

On the 14th hole, his comeback was stalled when he lipped a 30-foot putt that would have been a birdie.

He was so furious, he screamed an expletive, then stomped his foot into the fringe of the green, then wiped his mouth on his arm while shouting another expletive.

With the crowd watching in stunned silence, he then stormed into the Porta Potti on the 15th hole.

When he came out, he was still angry. But moments later he put his tee shot four feet from the pin for a birdie and finished the match strong.

“You look at how straight that putt [on 14] was going, I still don’t understand how it didn’t go in,” Woods said. “I got angry, yeah. It got me going a bit.”

He is expected to keep going today. After going double bogey, bogey to begin the round, he played the final 16 holes in one under par, not bad on a day when only one golfer--Steve Stricker--broke par for the entire round.

“This is why we play,” Woods said. “If you don’t like feeling the heat, you shouldn’t play.”

The question is, will the fans turn it up with him?

The answer is probably, no.

As long as there is a chance that Mickelson will flee the course to be with his pregnant wife, he will be the favorite.

And Payne Stewart, well, those ridiculous plus fours and cap are as fashionable in these parts as Richard Petty.

To say that Woods is being victimized by the sort of ignorance revealed in that chicken statement is unfair. That was one person, one thought, and it should not necessarily represent the feelings of an entire region.

It’s probably not that folks don’t like Woods.

More than likely, they are just tired of him.

We’re like that, you know. Our microwaved society wants everything quick, and then trashed.

We’re desperate for good stories, but we don’t want them lying around the house. We want to read them, enjoy them, and then pitch them.

In one way or another, this 23-year-old golfer will be part of our world for years.

But as perhaps Saturday showed, he may never again have such a universal hold on our attention. Or affection.

In the final round of the awesomely inclusive U.S. Open, it is always fun to cheer for the underdog, the outsider, the interloper.

Who would have thought that for four hours today, that person will be Tiger Woods?

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Bill Plaschke can be reach at his e-mail address: bill.plaschke@latimes.com.