PGA Tour Coverage Of Charlie Woods' Every Move In A Pre-Qualifier Is Overwhelming, And Honestly Pretty Weird
Charlie Woods, Tiger Woods' 15-year-old son, competed in Thursday's pre-qualifier for the Cognizant Classic, next week's PGA Tour event in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. Thursday's qualifier is the qualifier to get into the qualifier, which will be held on Monday and will be made up of a field of mostly professional golfers, many of whom will have PGA Tour experience under their belt.
The odds of Charlie getting through Thursday's qualifier - the top five players and ties advance - were incredibly low. Finishing inside the top five would undoubtedly be Woods' greatest accomplishment in the sport to date and placed one round between him earning his first start in a PGA Tour-sanctioned event.
Charlie shot a 16-over 86 on Thursday, a round that featured a 12 on the Par 4 seventh hole.
The leaderboard for the Cognizant Classic pre-qualifier can be found here.
The chances of Charlie making it through Monday's qualifier, if he had earned a spot, would have been close to 0.00%, but reality is tossed aside when you are the son of Tiger Woods, and the PGA Tour milked the moment for everything it was worth.
The first post from the PGA Tour's official X account on Thursday was a video of Charlie arriving at the course. The video would have been awkward if Charlie was an adult, it's even more awkward when you remember he can't drive himself to the tournament and likely arrived with his mom, Elin, who was on site to watch him compete.
The next post from the PGA Tour was a video of Woods striping his opening tee shot and noting his club twirl.
It's worth noting that this coverage of Charlie is coming at the same time that the Mexico Open at Vidanta - this week's actual PGA Tour event - was getting underway south of the border.
A couple of videos of Charlie on social media are innocent enough, plus reach the younger demographic looking to keep up with his round, but the live blog the PGA Tour elected to put together and display on its homepage on Thursday morning was a bit over the top.
The Tour elected to go very in-depth with its early-morning write-up following Charlie.
"Woods arrived at Lost Lake Golf Club more than an hour before his 7:39 a.m. tee time. He began work on the putting green, utilizing two mechanical pencils and a string, mainly focused on lag putting, before a quick range session," the Tour wrote. "Sporting a blue pullover, black pants and black cap, Woods competed in a twosome with longtime mini-tour pro Olin Browne Jr., son of three-time TOUR winner Olin Browne."
Nobody needs to know, nor does anyone care, what putting drill a 15-year-old kid was using ahead of a pre-qualifier round. The note about Charlie's attire is teetering on creepy as well, but is noteworthy given Tiger's recent launch of Sun Day Red. Many speculated he would be wearing Sun Day Red head-to-toe, but that wasn't the case on Thursday.
Charlie posting a number and getting through Thursday's qualifier would have been nothing short of epic, but no matter how he played, this is all just a preview of what's to come regarding the coverage the young Woods is going to receive anytime he tees it up in an event in this capacity.
Charlie is clearly showing serious interest in attempting to follow in his dad's footsteps and play golf at the highest level. But hopefully, the spotlight doesn't get too overwhelming. The son of Tiger Woods was never going to have a ‘normal’ life, especially if he decided to pick up a golf club, and it's going to be interesting how Charlie handles things from now, through a potential college career, and the grind of earning a spot on Tour.
But hey, that's years down the line, he's just looking forward to getting his driver's license these days.