Like Father Like Son
It’s become an annual treat to watch Tiger Woods and his son Charlie play in the PNC Father/Son Challenge. Their swings are similar, their club twirls are similar, their putting strokes are similar and so is the early walk toward the hole when they are sure the ball will drop.
There’s the similar lean on the putter when they wait for others to putt out. There’s the ball flips walking from tee to green, the whiplash follow-through when they go for the big shots. And of course, there’s the trash talking that is part and parcel of such a fun event as the PNC Championship at the Ritz-Carlton in Orlando, where Tiger and Charlie finished fifth in December. This year, 14-year-old Charlie (he turned 15 in February) was moved back a tee box for the event, playing the course at 6,500 yards. That’s (a little) longer than the ’ tees at Augusta, and he played the same tee boxes as Vijay Singh, Jim Furyk and John Daly. Charlie was even able to outdrive his dad, who was playing from one tee box back, on a few holes.
When Charlie first came onto the golf scene several years ago, he looked like a mini-me version of his father, coming about up to Tiger’s chest. He’s not so mini any more, standing five-foot-eleven, according to reports, just a few inches shy of his father’s billed height of six-foot-one. And he’s still growing.
“His speed has gone dramatically up this year,” an iring Tiger said when asked to name the biggest difference in Charlie’s game. “He’s hitting it past me now.”
Tiger allowed his son to talk at the media microphone this year, the first time that has happened. He didn’t say much. “We suck at putting,” he offered, eliciting chuckles, being as tough on his game as Tiger was in his prime. He offered some insight on one of the differences between the way he plays compared to his father. “His reads are hook-bias and I don’t hook as much as he does,” he says. “So all of my putts, I miss right. So I have to for that.”
But there was no talk of where Charlie is heading, what college he might attend in the not-too-distant future (Stanford, where Tiger spent two years, is a possibility) and what his career path might be. Tiger, notoriously tight lipped, was just a little more expansive this time about his son.
“I let him go,” Woods said after the Friday round. “And you know, I provide guardrails for him and things that I would like to see him learn and address, but also, then again, I’m trying to provide as much space as I can for him. Because there’s so much of the noise in our lives that people are always trying to get stuff out of us, and my job as a parent is to protect him from a lot of that stuff.”
He also wants his boy to stand on his own. “As a teenager, I want him to try and become his own man at the same time,” Tiger said. “So it’s a challenge as a parent and to provide that, that atmosphere for him, to learn, to grow, and have that freedom, meanwhile understanding that there’s so much noise looking into our lives at the same time.”
At this point in time, we don’t really know what Charlie’s intentions are. His golf game is impressive, but he does not possess the curriculum vitae of his father. By the age of 15, Tiger had won at least 30 junior tournaments. In 1991 (when he was 15 years, six months and 28 days old), he won the USGA Junior Amateur Championship. He would go on to win three in a row, the only player to ever do so. He was already a force to be reckoned with at age 16 when he got a sponsor’s exemption to play in the 1992 Los Angeles Open, making him at the time the youngest player to ever play in a PGA Tour event. He did miss the cut.
Charlie posted two victories toward the end of 2023. He was part of his Benjamin School’s Florida High School Athletic Association Class A state championship team, his rounds of 78-76 fourth best of the five players and 26th in the individual competition. Then, with his father caddying for him, he won a Florida qualifying event for Notah Begay’s national junior tournament. He shot a career-low 66 in one round.
Speaking to the press after his win, Charlie talked about his relationship with his dad and golf.
“We just stay in our own little world,” Charlie said, acknowledging that Tiger “puts me in my place” when needed. “I’ll talk about the next tee shot, and he’s like, ‘No. This is the shot we’re going to focus on. Focus up. This is what we’re gonna do.’ ”
If trying to play the PGA Tour is something he’s going to try to do, we just don’t know.
The success rate for sons of prominent PGA Tour players is not encouraging. Jack Nicklaus set the standard for greatness in the modern era of the game with 18 major championships, a target that Tiger Woods aimed for as a kid and has thus far fallen short of matching with 15 majors, second-most of all time. But Jack’s sons—Jack Jr., Michael, Steven and Gary—never could live up to their father’s golden name in the game. Jack Jr. played a handful of PGA Tour events with little to show for it. Michael didn’t do any better. Steve was more of a football player.
Gary Nicklaus is the only one of Jack’s sons to have made the PGA Tour through qualifying school (his eighth try) to play the 2000 season. His best result was losing a one-hole playoff to Phil Mickelson at the BellSouth Classic in Atlanta. He eventually lost his playing privileges at the end of the 2001 season.
Jay and Bill Haas were by far the most successful father-son duo in pro golf. Jay had nine victories on the PGA Tour (but never won a major). He also won 18 tournaments on the Champions Tour. Bill racked up six PGA Tour wins of his own between 2010 and 2015 (also with no majors) before injuries took a toll.
Kevin Stadler, son of 1982 Masters winner Craig Stadler, won once on the PGA Tour, a win that allowed he and his father to be the only father-son duo to play in the same Masters in 2014.
There are a handful of other sons following their fathers, and a total of 10 father-sons have both won on the PGA Tour. Woods has said nothing about his son’s intentions, but he has spoken about the changes he sees going on in teenage Charlie.
“You can see how much he’s grown from last year,” said Tiger. “It’s amazing how much he has grown, has changed, and it’s a moving target with him. He’s grown somewhere near four inches this year, so his swing has changed. It’s evolved.”
The teenage growth spurt comes with its pluses, as well as its challenges. “We kept trying to adjust things,” said Tiger. “But it’s also challenging for him because each and every couple weeks, things change. He just has—he’s growing so fast.”
Justin Thomas and his father Mike are very close with Tiger and Charlie. Mike has consulted on Charlie’s swing and game, though he doesn’t talk about it. Justin and Charlie visibly enjoy ribbing each other on and off the course. Charlie once left a snarky note for Justin in a bunker. “For some reason Charlie always wants to beat me,” Justin Thomas once said with a smile. “He still talks trash just like his dad. . . . We’ll have that inner tournament within a tournament, trying to shut his little mouth up.”
Thomas spoke recently at the PNC about how Charlie has changed.
“I can’t quite give him as much grief anymore because he’s close to beating me up,” Thomas said. “It’s impressive from a golfer standpoint because he’s still a 14-year-old, but maturing in the sense of his golf game, and he’s more willing to learn and he’s open to it at all times. I’m just glad he keeps moving back tee markers. He’s leading the tournament in inches grown.”
Thomas also offered some thoughts about Tiger, who had another family member—his daughter Sam—on the course for the PNC. (She caddied for him.) “Seeing how much he cares about Charlie and having Sam out here and him doing that together with Charlie as he’s watching him grow up, it would be a very, very different kind of win that doesn’t maybe come with the record books and history.”
Tiger made it clear at the PNC that he was out to protect and mentor his son, and the man whose life and career played out in the age of media has a unique perspective on playing with such a famous last name. But even though he lives quite a different life from just about anyone else, some things are the same for every father, no matter what your last name is. “I just don’t like the fact that he stares at his phone all the time,” Woods said, a common parental peeve.
Tiger was famous for drawing the biggest crowds on a golf course, a sea of fans following him hole to hole. Now, when he’s out there with Charlie, the father-son Woods team always attracts the most attention. And unlike his dad, who always seemed to isolate himself from the crowd, Charlie reacts to their attention. “Watch out, dad,” one fan called out at the PNC.
“He’s coming for ya!”
“I’m already here!” Charlie responded.
