Tiger Woods withdraws from competition at Safeway Open

Tiger Woods has removed himself from competition field at the Safeway Open in Napa, California this coming weekend. In his press announcement, Woods cited his game “not being where I wanted it to be,” from a competitive standpoint. Woods’ decision to withdrawal comes less than 72 hours after announcing that he would be competing at Safeway.

Whether this announcement means that Woods is increasingly closer to competing, or, darkly, a step backward in his progress and recovery from numerous back injuries remains to be seen. The seeming indecision does suggest that the surgeries and injuries have left Tiger with more doubt about his game than ever before. Stay tuned to SiriusXM PGA Tour Radio for all the late-breaking news and analysis of this decision from one of golf’s biggest name. Here’s PGA Tour Radio’s Hank Haney discussing Woods’ decision:

.@HankHaney explains why Tiger Woods decided to withdraw from his first competition in more than a year pic.twitter.com/Ec4gxuRrEc

— SiriusXM Sports (@SiriusXMSports) October 10, 2016

Safeway is the PGA’s official start of the 2016-17 season and for Woods it would have provided a welcome opportunity to prove to himself (and everyone else) that he’s still capable of being competitive with the Tour’s top dogs. Woods has not competed in a tournament in more than a year while recovering from multiple surgeries to his back. This would have been Woods’ first competitive stroke since a 10th place finish at last year’s Wyndham Championship in August 2015.

SiriusXM PGA TOUR Radio’s live hole-by-hole coverage of the tournament starts Thursday and Friday at 2 pm ET and Saturday and Sunday at 3 pm ET and runs through the conclusion of each day’s play. Each day’s live on-course coverage is immediately followed by a wrap-up of the day’s action on PGA TOUR Postgame.

In addition to the live tournament coverage, SiriusXM PGA TOUR Radio offers a daily lineup of talk shows featuring expert analysis and discussion on Tiger’s anticipated return.

Listeners can hear Hank Haney Golf Radio, hosted by Woods’ former longtime swing coach, weekdays at 10:00 am ET. Golf U, hosted by Stanford golf coach Conrad Ray, who was a teammate of Woods when they both played for the Cardinal, airs tonight at 9:00 pm ET.

The week’s schedule will also feature shows hosted by Lou Holtz, Jim McLean, Larry Rinker, Golf Channel’s Michael Breed, Pat Perez, Mark Lye, Michael Collins, John Feinstein, Matt Adams, Mark Carnevale, Brian Katrek, John Maginnes, David Armitage, Dennis Paulson, Debbie Doniger, Frank Darby, Brian Crowell, Brian Bateman, Fred Albers, Ben Shear, and Bruce Murray.

You can check out below a clip from Davis Love III’s recent SiriusXM Town Hall where he talked about Woods’ role on the Ryder Cup and Tiger’s training and comeback: