Tiger Woods will not play in Players Championship, unknown if he will play before Masters

Tiger Woods said that his goal is to play in all four majors and a few other tournaments, but “the fifth major” won’t be one of them.

Woods did not sign up for The Players’ Championship before Friday’s deadline, so he will not be in the field.

The 47-year-old played at The Genesis Invitational at the Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles last month, and after just barely making the cut, he finished tied for 45th.

“Like I told you guys last year, I’m not going to play any more than probably the majors and maybe a couple more,” Woods said after the Genesis. “That’s it, that’s all my body will allow me to do. My back the way it is, all the surgeries I had on my back, my leg the way it is, I just can’t. That’s just going to be my future.

“So my intent last year was to play in all four majors, I got three of the four. Hopefully this year I can get all four and maybe sprinkle in a few here and there. But that’s it for the rest of my career. I know that and I understand that. That’s just my reality.” 

But if Woods is in a tournament, he’s there to win, despite very much being on the back-nine of his career.

Woods clearly has his eyes on next month’s Masters, but it’s now unknown if he will play before then.

The 15-time major champion reminded everyone before the Genesis that he isn’t ready to be simply just a golf ambassador, even though his schedule is severely limited. 

“I have not come around to the idea of being [a ceremonial golfer]. If I’m playing, I’m playing to win,” Woods told the media before he played at Riviera. “I know that players have played, and they are ambassadors of the game and try to grow the game. I can’t wrap my mind around that as a competitor. If I’m playing in the event, I’m going to try and beat you. I’m there to get a ‘W.’

“Making a cut’s a great thing. If I enter the event, it’s always to get a ‘W.’ There will come a point in time where my body will not allow me to do that anymore, and that’s probably sooner rather than later. But wrapping my head around that transition and being an ambassador role and just playing and just trying to be out here with the guys? No, that’s just not in my DNA.”

Woods is currently in the second-longest tournament drought of his career — he previously had not won from 2013 to 2018, but won the TOUR Championship to get back on top, then won the 2019 Masters seven months later.

Woods is a two-time winner of The Players Championship (2001, 2013), and defending champion Cameron Smith is ineligible due to jumping ship to LIV Golf.