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Tiger Woods is firmly in the twilight of his career, and he suffered yet another setback after undergoing surgery to repair a ruptured Achilles earlier this year. He was healthy enough to walk while following his son Charlie during a tournament this week, and the skinny legs he showed off managed to cause more of a stir than they should have.
At this point, Tiger Woods doesn’t really have too much left to prove, and no one would blame him for entering a new era when he becomes eligible for the PGA Tour’s Champions circuit after turning 50 at the end of 2025.
It would be nice to see him surpass Sam Snead for sole possession of first place on the list of the winningest players in PGA Tour history (they’re currently both tied with 82 victories), and it seems safe to assume he would have managed to do exactly that if his career hadn’t been impacted by the string of injuries that help end an unparalelled era of dominance that spanned close to 15 years.
It’s been around a year since Tiger played his last event while missing the cut at The British Open, which marked the third time he failed to make the weekend at a major in 2024—a year where he also came in 60th at The Masters and withdrew from The Genesis Open midway through the second round.
He did compete in a number of TGL events after undergoing back surgery last September, but his plans to return to the PGA Tour were derailed after he was forced to undergo another procedure in March to fix the Achilles tendon he ruptured while training that month.
His son Charlie, on the other hand, has been hitting the course on a regular basis, and his dad was photographed trailing him at the Nicklaus Junior Championship at Tequesta Country Club in Florida earlier this week while rocking the pair of shorts that highlighted the significant contrast between the amount of muscle he’s still packing on his upper body compared to that below the waist.
GREG LOVETT/PALM BEACH POST / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
GREG LOVETT/PALM BEACH POST / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
The picture made the rounds online and caused more than a few reactionary fans to sound the alarm over the legs that certainly lean more toward the “Twigs” end of the spectrum than the “Tree Trunks” one while ignoring the fact he’s less than four months removed from a surgery to address an injury that takes at least six months to recover from.
There’s no telling what the future holds for Tiger, but he has plenty of time to hit the gym and mount a comeback next season if he feels he has some unfinished business.