DATE: Monday, May 26, 1997                  TAG: 9705260158

SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Column 

SOURCE: Bob Molinaro 

                                            LENGTH:   58 lines

TIGER LOSES? NEXT THING YOU KNOW THEY'LL BE AN ELVIS SIGHTING

The Houston Rockets win on a last-second jump shot.

The Indy 500 is postponed by rain.

The Great Gretzky and his New York Rangers are put on ice by the Philadelphia Flyers.

And the Big Sports Story of the Day is? You guessed it. The Big Story of the Day is Tiger Woods.

The Big Story is Tiger Woods NOT winning a golf tournament.

Yes, the rumors appear to be true. All the major networks have confirmed them. Tiger reportedly failed to pick up the winner's check at the Colonial. Finished tied for fourth, in fact.

Naturally, some will find this impossible to believe. Can you blame them? Tiger finishing tied for fourth in a field of bland, beige bashers is as suspicious as an Elvis sighting.

If the government can hide the news of alien landings in the New Mexico desert, how can we be sure about anything we're told? Mere mortals have been known to lose golf tournaments, but Tiger? Tiger Woods? Some of us need to see the video tape.

And what will the tape show? That he found water? That he flew the green? That he bogeyed when he usually birdies?

Yes, yes, yes. But video can be doctored. Some clever person at ESPN's SportsCenter could superimpose Woods' head onto the body of Fred Funk and most people would be none the wiser.

Besides, the results of the Colonial fly in the face of golf reality in the Tiger Woods Era. After Woods breezed to the Masters title, then won last week's PGA stop with his ``C-plus'' game, we were led to believe that he would never lose again.

It must have been that Barbara Walters interview last week. Barbara asked Tiger if he had a girl friend. It distracted him. That's what must have happened.

Wood's attempt to win his third consecutive title and fourth PGA tournament of 1997 has been undone. I hope Barbara is happy. I hope golf is satisfied.

If we can believe recent ratings figures, most of golf's new, growing audience is rooting for Tiger. What, you thought they were hanging on every David Ogrin shot?

This Tiger Woods phenomenon is great for golf if you're the network televising the tournament, the people who sell equipment or the companies that have Tiger as a spokesman. I'm not so sure, though, that Woods is helping the image of the rest of the tour.

Woods, as we all know, actually looks like an athlete, which immediately sets him apart from the usual PGA player, who looks like an accountant in a visor.

The problem for golf is that Tiger is such a vigorous, dynamic, captivating presence that, by comparison, the rest of the field could be a team of Sunday-afternoon softball players.

Let's put this another way: Woods makes Greg Norman look like Drew Carey.

In any case, a pro by the name of David Frost supposedly won the tournament.

I say we place an asterisk next to his name.

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