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Tiger Woods’ loss is the sport’s gain

Tiger Woods’ loss is the sport’s gain

By RANDY YOUNGMAN

There’s always time to work on the short game, especially after the last major of the season:

Even in defeat, Tiger Woods continues to globalize the sport of golf.

Put it this way: I’d like to have a dollar for every bucket of balls that will be hit on driving ranges in Eastern Asia after South Korean Y.E. Yang came from behind Sunday to beat Woods at the PGA Championship, becoming the first Asian-born professional to win one of the four majors in men’s golf.

“It’s a great, great day for Asian golf probably our biggest day,” Asian Tour executive chairman Kyi Hla Han told the Associated Press.

“It’s always been our hope that we will see an Asian player win a (men’s) major . . . It will provide so much inspiration.”

Granted, golf already is huge in Asia, but Tiger’s loss likely will grow the game even more than if he had captured his 15th major.

Remember what happened after Se Ri Pak, at the time the only South Korean on the LPGA Tour, won the LPGA Championship and U.S. Women’s Open in 1998?

A decade later, South Koreans are dominating the women’s professional tour. And this time the revolution won’t be limited to one country.

Tiger is so shrewd. With golf one step from being approved as an official Olympic sport in 2016, he knew it was important to pique interest on the other side of the world. So he allowed Yang to upstage him Sunday on one of golf’s biggest stages.

Don’t you think that’s what happened?

As ludicrous as that scenario is, it isn’t as far-fetched as the notion espoused by some self-avowed golf cognoscenti who dared to suggest that Tiger “choked” Sunday at Hazeltine Golf Club. (”Tiger Choked” was the banner headline on the back page of Monday’s New York Daily News.)

Please. No, he didn’t play well, especially with the putter in his hands, and he did squander a two-shot lead. But he still had a share of the lead until Yang chipped in for eagle on the par-4 14th. And as Yang was celebrating his sudden two-shot lead with Tiger-esque fist-pumps of his own, Woods gathered himself and rolled in a 12-footer for birdie on No. 14 to trim the deficit to one. That’s choking?

The deficit was still one shot when the final twosome arrived at the par-3 17th, where Tiger “pured” a 7-iron that flew over the top of the flag and bounced into the deep rough behind the green. He didn’t get up and down, but his bogey wasn’t the result of a “shank” or poorly struck shot. And he didn’t 3-putt for bogey, a telltale sign of nerves, as Yang did on the 17th, sustaining the suspense.

Tiger still needed a birdie on No. 18 for a chance to tie, and he hit a driver down the right side of the fairway that settled in the first cut, giving him the perfect angle at the flag. Yang’s tee shot hit the left side of the fairway, forcing a tougher approach shot over trees, but he came through with the shot of the tournament a majestic 3-hybrid from 208 yards that stopped 8 feet from the cup.

That put the pressure squarely on the world’s top-ranked player. This time, Tiger didn’t pull off the miracle shot. His 5-iron approach wound up pin-high in the deep greenside rough, but it missed by only a foot or two of giving him a makeable, 15-foot birdie putt. That’s choking? Maybe to someone who doesn’t know golf. But it became a moot point when Tiger’s birdie chip ran past the hole, and Yang rolled in his clinching birdie to etch his name in history.

Ask Yang by how much he missed his target on the dangerous water-guarded 16th, where his approach shot faded right of the pin and settled, precariously, on the fringe a few feet from the hazard. If that balls hops into the junk . . .