Rich Beem reflects on Tiger Woods' future after latest back surgery

Rich Beem reflects on Tiger Woods' latest injury setback and discusses whether we will see the former world No 1 return to competitive golf.

Tiger has back surgery

Woods set to miss rest of PGA Tour season after fourth back operation in three years.

I'm still trying to figure how we know if it has been a successful operation. Wasn't the last one successful and the one before that?

The more surgeries you have it just seems to be a longer process to come back from, and in Tiger's case it seems to take an infinite amount of time.

"When you take two or three years away from the game it almost seems like an insurmountable climb, but you can't ever say insurmountable and Tiger Woods in the same breath."

He's getting to that stage in his life where he is going to have to change something in his physique and how he does things in order to alleviate that pain.

I think he needs to re-evaluate all of that with his doctors and staff and go back to the drawing board. He needs to get back in to a position where he can swing the golf club at any reasonable speed, because right now whatever he is trying to do obviously isn't working.

Tiger has been so far removed from the sport in the past two years that nobody really knows how he can compete. He has got to get back and really change something up.

Do I think he can return? He obviously has a chance, but as each passing surgery goes it makes it further and further away.

Nothing short of being competitive is going to fix any of this, as you have to stay in a competitive mind and spirit to get back out there. When you take any sort of time off, trying to get back out there and doing anything isn't easy.

When you take two or three years away from the game it almost seems like an insurmountable climb, but you can't ever say insurmountable and Tiger Woods in the same breath as he has done things that nobody would have ever thought possible.

The reality is that he really has to fix what is wrong now before we can even talk about what he may be capable of in the future.

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