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Word to wise: Don’t make Tiger angry

Scott Chancey

You have to wonder about some golfers on the PGA Tour. Talented, yes. But smart? Not always — especially in the way they try to challenge Tiger Woods.

Choking in the final round against Woods in last year’s Wachovia Championship did little to keep Rory Sabbatini from practically thumping his chest the next week to all who would listen.

“The funny thing is, after watching him play on Sunday, I think he’s more beatable than ever,” Sabbatini said after last year’s Players Championship at Sawgrass.

Huh?

Oh, it gets better.

Englishman Ian Poulter, whose wardrobe catches more attention than his swing, stumbled on to the revelation that maybe, just maybe, one day he will catch Tiger.

“The trouble is, I don’t rate anyone else,” he said before the Dubai Desert Classic, which Woods won.

Poulter then added: “Don’t get me wrong, I respect every professional golfer, but I know I haven’t played to my full potential and when that happens, it will be just me and Tiger.”

And yet Poulter has yet to win on the PGA Tour.

Granted, golf is as much a mental game as anything. A certain air of confidence, if not cockiness, has to be there to succeed on the sport’s biggest stage.

But some don’t seem to get it. If there’s one simple rule that has proven itself true over and over again, it’s this: Don’t make Tiger Woods mad.

Woods insists it doesn’t.

“I think it’s just funny,” he said during a Masters news conference Tuesday.

“Some of the guys, that’s just their personalities, you know. But hey, my father’s always taught me, just go out there and just play and let your clubs do the talking and that should be enough.”

He thinks it’s just “funny”? I don’t believe that for a second.

Don’t even make Tiger do a double take.

If you do, things could get bad. Very bad.

All Stephen Ames did was crack a joke about Tiger’s ball placement before the 2006 Match Play Championship and got embarrassed by Woods, 9 and 8.

Woods is motivated enough, going after his fifth Masters title and continuing his quest to break Jack Nicklaus’ record of 18 major victories (a win this week would give Woods 14).

I would find it hard pressed if any golfer would be daring (or stupid) enough to say out loud he can challenge Tiger this week. Woods even had a streak of five consecutive PGA Tour wins that ended two weeks ago with a fifth-place finish at the CA Championship at Doral.

The only golfer who can psyche out Tiger is Tiger himself. If he had not struggled at the end of the first and third rounds at last year’s Masters, he would probably be going for a sixth green jacket this year, instead.

So it goes, and if that happens again this year, the championship is others’ for the taking. (Woods, after all, has only won one Masters title in the last five years).

Phil Mickelson, a two-time Masters champion who was able to beat Woods while in the final pairing with him at Boston last year, was asked Tuesday if he should be as much a favorite as Tiger. Mickelson seemed to have learned from his fellow golfers’ mistakes

“I don't think it really matters if you're favored or not or what people expect,” Mickelson said. “I think that nobody expected, let’s say, last year’s winner, but yet we as players knew what a good (player) Zach Johnson was and he was going to contend and continue contending in majors. I think how you’re perceived heading into the tournament really doesn’t matter.”

He avoided the question. Get it?

If any other golfer strays from that line, it’s over.

Just get Woods his latest green jacket.

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