Tiger without peer may get dull

By John Feinstein ~ Special to The Washington Post

When Tiger Woods steps onto the first tee Thursday morning to begin his quest to win the British Open, the eyes of the world will be on him. If he wins this week in Muirfield,

Scotland, he will go to the PGA Championship next month with a chance to complete the Grand Slam--victories in all four major golf tournaments--a feat never before achieved.

All of which is great for golf.

And not so great for golf.

There's no denying the fact that Woods ratchets up the attention paid to his sport like no athlete in the world. When Woods is in contention to win a tournament, major or otherwise,

TV ratings double. Woods not only brings new fans into the golf tent, he draws attention from people who wouldn't know a driver from a sand wedge. He's one of those rare transcendent athletes--like Michael Jordan, Babe Ruth and, importantly, Arnold Palmer--who are so good or so charismatic or both that people who don't care about their sports care about them.

That's the great part. The not-so-great part is, to a large degree, not Woods' fault at all. At this moment, he's overwhelming his competition so completely that the lifeblood of any sport--suspense--is being squeezed out of golf. When Woods took a three-shot lead this year at the Masters with 15 holes to play, there wasn't a soul on the grounds of Augusta National Golf Club who didn't think the tournament was over. At the U.S. Open last month in Bethpage, N.Y., Woods took a one-stroke lead after the first round and a lot of people were ready to award him the trophy even though there were still 54 holes to play.

Until Woods arrived on the scene, the unquestioned greatest golfer of all time was Jack Nicklaus, who won 18 major titles. No one else has won more than 11. Woods, at 26, has already won eight, and at the rate he's going will break the record before his career is half over. Beyond that is this statistic: Nicklaus finished second in majors 19 times. That's because he was challenged constantly by great players like Palmer and Gary Player and Lee Trevino and Tom Watson. Nicklaus won often, but he lost often and it was rarely easy for him.

In winning seven of the last 11 majors, Woods has yet to finish second. If he's in the hunt on Sunday, he wins. Period. Whether this is because other players are intimidated by him (true) or because today's top players aren't as good as yesterday's (not true) doesn't really matter. What matters is that Woods winning with a lead or even close to the lead is a certainty just about up there with death and taxes.

At the moment, there's no indication that the public minds any of this. Sports fans love dynasties--the Yankees, the Celtics, the Canadiens. And Tiger Woods. Certainly this week and in August, if he's going for the Grand Slam, Woods will draw record crowds and ratings. He will be on the cover of newsmagazines and a hot topic on the evening news.

But once he's won the Grand Slam--if he wins it--what comes next? If he's leading the Masters by three shots with 15 holes to play next April or the April after that, does everyone remain rapt? Or do people begin to say, ``I'll check back when there's some competition for him?'' Or when he goes past Nicklaus. What happens to the PGA next year when Woods has only won one or two majors going into the event?

Martina Navratilova, who was once half of arguably the greatest rivalry in the history of tennis along with Chris Evert, made the point that she couldn't have become who she became without Evert. ``We made each other,'' she said. ``We made each other better players and we brought more people to the sport because they wanted to see us compete with one another. If I had beaten her every time or she had beaten me every time, it wouldn't have been the same.''

Exactly. There is also the issue of embracing celebrity. Nicklaus, at his peak, never did that. He was like a scientist plying his trade on a golf course: brutally deliberate, rarely smiling, shy with the public and the media. Palmer, who wasn't nearly the player Nicklaus was--he won seven major titles, one less than Woods' current total--was completely the opposite.

His charisma made golf popular in the early '60s. That was what made him one of those transcendent athletes.

Woods is a lot more like Nicklaus. Sure, he can flash a great smile and he's been marketed superbly, but he's every bit as tunnel-visioned as Nicklaus and still chafes at doing anything more than the minimum demanded of him as a highly public figure. All of which is part of his greatness. Nothing will get in his way. But while he is buzz-sawing through his sport, there may come a time when those who follow it and those who don't follow it decide that they want to see someone seriously challenge the dynasty that is Woods. It's never healthy, long term, for any one person to be bigger than his sport. The NBA is still dealing with the fallout from post-Jordan malaise because it became too dependent on Jordan's stardom to carry it in the 1990s.

Right now, the world holds its collective breath whenever Tiger Woods is onstage. Sooner or later though, golf will need someone to share the stage with him.