3/30/26

Yesterday, Gary Woodland won the Texas Children’s Houston Open for his first victory since he took home the 2019 U.S. Open. Woodland dealt with a brain lesion that he needed to get surgically removed in 2023, putting his golf career and life in jeopardy. On the Netflix series Full Swing, Woodland let the world in on what he and his family were going through on his attempted comeback to play professional golf again. During the week of The Players Championship, Woodland opened up about his struggles with PTSD and the mental and emotional stress that comes with his post-surgery life. Three weeks later, Woodland blitzed the field to cruise to a five-shot win.

Woodland’s inspiring comeback should be up there with some of the greatest comebacks in sports history. Golf is largely a mental game, and having severe challenges mentally can make golf that much harder. Woodland took years to deal with and is still dealing with those struggles, yet he still got the job done. Woodland talked about a stretch during the tournament where his PTSD became so severe that after his round on Friday, he bawled his eyes out in the scoring area.

Most players can barely handle playing the game, let alone all the hoopla that comes with being a well-known professional golfer. Winning a major changes the life of a golfer in ways that they didn’t conceive. There is added pressure to perform at that major-winning level every time they tee it up. There are extra sponsorship opportunities that take time away from practice. The media writes and talks about and to those players more, creating more buzz around them than they’ve ever experienced. The crowd galleries become larger, and more eyeballs tune in to every shot. All while competing roughly 20 times per year in a sport where it’s you and only you who is responsible for the results. Add in the personal life of raising kids, maintaining a healthy relationship with family, friends, balancing time off, and choosing a schedule, the pressure of keeping a PGA Tour card, corporate outings that are required through sponsorship deals, and more, and it’s a strenuous lifestyle. Throw in what Gary Woodland had to deal with in terms of his health, and it’s nothing short of inspirational.

Just 48 hours after the news of another disappointing saga in the life of Tiger Woods, it’s a perfect dichotomy of how to handle fame, physical issues, and the stress and demand of playing high-level golf. Woodland is one of the most genuine and great gentlemen in professional golf. It was shown on the 72nd hole, where his playing partners of Min Woo Lee and Nicolai Højgaard both let Woodland and his caddie, Brennan “Butchie” Little, walk ahead and soak in the greatest walk of Woodland’s life. Both Lee and Højgaard joined the Houston fans in applauding Woodland, a move that NBC broadcaster and former caddie Jim “Bones” MacKay said he’d never seen in his 35 years of being around the PGA Tour.

There’s no harder sport in the world to be a successful professional at than golf. The act of playing golf is a measly few minutes, while rounds can surge over 5 hours. The amount of focus and concentration required to play at a winning level is impossible to quantify. There’s a lot of time between shots where the mind can wander into dark places. What Woodland deals with just to get through a normal day requires incredible mental strength. For him to compete weekly against the best players in the world is inconceivable. His message to people watching was that he hopes to inspire them to open up about their struggles and to show those struggling that they, too, can be successful. Pretty telling for someone who hadn’t won in seven years and whose professional golf playing days might’ve been over to immediately think of helping others moments after victory.

It was an emotional roller coaster of a week for the golf world, but Gary Woodland’s win was the positive spin golf needed. Woodland played his way into the Masters and said his game is in as good a spot as it’s ever been. This year has had a theme of comebacks, with Anthony Kim winning earlier this year on LIV Golf, and now Woodland’s triumph.

Perhaps the fairytale isn’t over for Woodland, and there’s another major title in his future.

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