Masters 2022: Tiger Woods won big just by playing, Bayless says
Tiger Woods left the Masters without any form of physical hardware.
He made his exit in nearly the same way that he made his entrance: With family members and beloved friends, trekking through the long and winding Augusta terrain, decked out in one of his vintage Nike polo shirts.
The noticeable difference: Woods cracked a smile as he lumbered uphill to make his final curtain call of the day and salute the onlooking crowd as they showered him with adoration and praise.
In Woods' own summation, he didn't perform up to his best standard. He finished the tournament in 47th place at 14-over par after making the cut following the second round of action.
Yet still, the five-time green jacket recipient had no reason to hang his head in his book, and after nearly losing his leg — and perhaps his life — in an auto accident just over a year ago, seeing Woods operate in any form of playing capacity was a treat for his fans to see.
And though Scottie Scheffler was ultimately crowned champion of this year's classic, for Skip Bayless, Woods was really the big winner. According to Bayless, it's a position Woods — and Woods alone — can assume.
"Tiger Woods won this Masters," Bayless said Monday on "Undisputed."
"Yesterday was the most anticlimactic Masters finish in the history of this tournament that I'm aware of. Tiger Woods was finishing with his walk up the 18 about the same time the leaders were teeing off. So, we had Scottie Scheffler and Cameron Smith going off No. 1 as [Woods] is just about walking up 18. He took over the golf tournament.
"Scottie Scheffler has done something I haven't seen since Tiger pre-scandal. He's won four of the last six tournaments. Since Super Bowl Sunday, he's won four tournaments. He's on a Tiger-ish roll. And yet, as nice as he is, he harks back to the pre-Tiger days, when golf was just golf, not personalities. Here he is, the world's No. 1 ranked player, and he basically just runs away with the Masters."
"[But] nobody cared. Everybody cared about Tiger's return. My pet peeve in life is that so often we see that notable figures in our world have to die before they get the acclaim, and get honored and eulogized the way that they deserve. Yesterday, Tiger got eulogized. It was like he came back from the dead."
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Despite not really contending at the Masters, Tiger Woods making the cut and playing all 72 holes was the bigger story after the Masters. Skip Bayless shares his thoughts on Tiger's performance.
"It was an unbelievable feeling, just the patrons and the support out there," Woods said after his final round. "I wasn't exactly playing my best out there, but just to have the support out there and the appreciation ... I don't think words can really describe that, given where I was a little over a year ago and what my prospects were at that time.
"To end up here and being able to play all four rounds, even a month ago I didn't know if I could pull this off. But I think it was a positive, and I've got some work to do and looking forward to it."
Bayless, along with a significant portion of the golfing world, and eagerly looking forward to it as well.