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PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — Tiger Woods isn't sure what's going to happen with next month's Genesis Invitational, the PGA Tour event that he hosts in the fire-ravaged Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles.
He's insisting there should be far bigger concerns.
Woods said Tuesday night — after his debut in the TGL indoor golf league that he helped develop — that meetings about what will happen with the tournament are scheduled, but did not reveal any decisions or suggest that the event may be moved from Riviera Country Club.
“We’re trying to just figure everything out and make sure that everyone is safe and we have meetings scheduled going forward,” Woods said. “But as of right now, we’re not really focused on the tournament. It’s more about what we can do to help everyone who’s struggling, who’s lost homes and had their lives changed.”
Woods — who grew up in Southern California — said he knows “a couple people that have lost everything.”
“It's just hard,” Woods said.
The PGA Tour has not announced any changes to its plans to play the Genesis, scheduled for Feb. 13-16. Riviera — the host site for golf at the 2028 Olympics — sits very close to areas that have been devastated by the fires. The course itself has not been directly affected.
Woods' TGL teammate Max Homa — also a Southern California native — said the golf tournament's status should be far from anyone's mind right now.
“I know that these natural disasters happen far too often. However, this was the first one I can remember where every news clip, every time someone mentioned an area, I could picture it so well,” Homa said. “It was very eerie. Fortunately, all my friends and family are safe. Houses not necessarily still all intact, but it was nice to be able to talk to quite a few people, and I think their perspective has been amazing about, ‘Hey, we’re safe, and that’s what matters most.’”
Tickets were still being sold Tuesday for the Genesis, though nobody knows what will happen over the next few weeks — or if it'll even be possible to play a tournament in Los Angeles.
“There’s so many other things that are bigger than that," Woods said. “We have subsequent meetings to try and figure all that out.”
Woods' Jupiter Links team lost 12-1 in its TGL opener to the Los Angeles Golf Club, and Collin Morikawa — part of the winning side Tuesday — said representing the city weighed heavily on him and teammates Justin Rose and Sahith Theegala.
Fires burning homes and businesses in Los Angeles for a week have killed at least 25 people, displaced thousands and destroyed more than 12,000 buildings in what might be the most expensive set of conflagrations in the nation’s history.
“You think it's over, but it's not,” Morikawa said. “Winds are picking up. Fires are still going. People are still out there, fighting the fires, protecting their houses, helping their neighbors, helping communities. That's why LA is, to me, such a great city. You see all the people coming together.”
Morikawa wore the “LA Strong” T-shirt that is being sold to raise money for fire relief efforts. Theegala, like Morikawa, has deep Southern California ties — he was born and raised in the area and went to college at Pepperdine. He said his caddie's sister lost her home in the fires.
“I was on Pepperdine’s campus during the ’18 Woolsey fire, and it just feels like an ongoing thing the last six, seven years. There’s no slowing down,” Theegala said. “Before that first fire happened, it didn’t feel real at all. You see fires happening, houses being burned down, people’s lives being destroyed, and when you see it right in front of your eyes, it’s as real as it gets and it’s scarier than any media portrayal. It’s scarier than anything that’s being described.”
Morikawa said he took pride in being able to give people in Los Angeles a distraction for a couple hours, like the Los Angeles Rams did in their NFC wild-card playoff win on Monday night — a game that was relocated to Arizona because of the fires.
“We’re probably the newest team in LA, but to get back-to-back wins with the Rams and then us ... you laugh at that, I know,” Morikawa said. “But look, we don’t take this lightly.”
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AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
