Tiger And Rory Now Doing Joint Post-Round Interviews; Gym Sessions And Wine Country Weekends May Be Next
/The signs have been there but longtime watchers of Tiger looked away: he's in love!
The Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy bromance went public Thursday at the BMW Championship when the two lovebirds gave a joint Golf Channel interview after an impressive scoring duel over Crooked Stick Golf Club.
“It's fun to play with him, and he's just an amazing talent,” Woods said. “You watch him swing the club and watch him putt and play, he doesn't have a lot of weaknesses. You can see that, in the next decade or so, as he really matures and understands some of the nuances of the game, he's only going to get better, and that's kind of fun to see.”
Huh? Lions don’t share their turf, do they?
Bob Harig also noted the burgeoning romance in his round one story.
They ate breakfast together Wednesday morning, bumped into each other in the media center after their pro-am rounds, managed to poke fun at one another, and were mostly all smiles during the first round of the BMW Championship at Crooked Stick. Afterward, they yukked it up together for a TV interview.
It helps when you are playing well, as both did on a warm, humid day with a water-softened course in the opening round of the third of four FedEx playoff events.
Accompanying Harig's story is a revealing image from Getty's Scott Halleran (right).
Look at how those two gaze at each other!
Let's be frank here. Tiger does not like anyone who is a threat to his game, holds grudges and it's one of the reasons we respect him. Unlike some of his peers, who are gentlemen to the point that they will never achieve greatness, Tiger wants to win and win big. Anyone who gets in the way is the enemy, just as was the case for all-time great predecessors like Ben Hogan. (I know it's hard to believe, but by all accounts the Hawk could be a real beauty when the gates opened.)
But now as Tiger gets older and much, much shorter off the tee, he has become openly smitten with young Rory, cooing over "the kid" in a joint post round interview with Steve Sands, viewable in Golf Channel's first round highlight package.
I, not normally a cynic, have a few theories on why Tiger has taken such a liking to someone who so clearly stands in the way of reaching the much-vaunted goal of 19 majors.
- Rory is about to sign with agent Steiny (example: Stricks, Kooch...Rors next?)
- Rory mentioned that he saw the aerial videos and might be interested in buying Privacy for him and Caroline. To which Tiger, tired of the $1 million in annual upkeep, realized he's found a sucker buyer he needs to be nice to.
- Rory wondered out loud about playing at Sherwood in December and Tiger is trying his best to lure a box office draw to help save the sponsor-less event he hosts to help fund his foundation.
- Rory is about to sign with Nike (rumored but doubtful since this could eat into how much Nike pays and markets Tiger).
- Rory heard Tiger knows a lot about designing courses, wants to learn from Tiger and Tiger doesn't want to tell Rory the bad news that even the purveyor of a lowly golf blog has more design credits to his name than Tiger.
Or maybe Tiger is just setting the lad up, only to go all gamesmanshippy and glaring-stare Tiger when they meet in Sunday singles at the Ryder Cup?
I hope it's that. Because if this Mutual Admiration Society stuff goes on much longer...
The lovefest continues Friday at 9:39 a.m. ET with Golf Channel coverage at 3 p.m. ET.
**This from Golf Channel: Golf Channel will now air the second round coverage LIVE from 11:30am - 3:00pm. There will be a taped re-air immediately following the live telecast on Golf Channel from approx. 3:00-6:00pm.
