SAN FRANCISCO _ The last time Tiger Woods played a tournament at Harding Park, the rollicking place was so loud he said he felt "half-deaf."
The last time he played in a PGA Championship _ on the heels of last year's stirring victory in the Masters _ his game was half-dead.
"Came to Bethpage and played awful, and felt like, what, Brooks (Koepka) beat me by like 30 shots in two days," Woods said Tuesday, recalling his ninth missed cut in 76 majors as a pro. "My game is better than it was going into that PGA, and hopefully I can put it together this week."
His game might be showing more life, but Harding Park is eerily quiet amid the pandemic. There are no spectators, and a mere fraction of the typical media contingent.
"It's different than most of the times when you go from green-to-tee, people yelling or trying to touch you. That part is different," he said.
"As far as energy while I'm competing and playing, no, that's the same. I'm pretty intense when I play and pretty into what I'm doing."
According to Elias Sports, Woods has a chance to become the first golfer to win a major in each of four decades. He won at least one in the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s.
To do so again, he'll have to snap a recent trend. In his last three, he's missed the cut twice and been over par in half of his eight rounds.
"There's probably only been, what, two _ maybe three times where I knew that all I had to do was keep my heartbeat going and I was going to win the tournament," he said. "In '97, I felt pretty good at Augusta and then Pebble Beach in 2000, and then obviously at St. Andrews the same year."
