As the ramifications of Tiger Woods’ rollover crash and DUI charge on Friday continue to unfold, more questions present themselves.
While a week ago, all focus was on whether Woods could physically play in the Masters, which starts on April 9, there are now complicating factors. Augusta National Golf Club wields more unilateral power than most professional sports leagues. And it has a long history of using it.
So what does this all mean for Woods, the 2026 Masters and what could happen next week? Let’s explain.
When is the deadline to enter the Masters?
There isn’t one. Unlike PGA Tour events, where players must formally commit by 5 p.m. Friday the week before a tournament, players are simply invited to the Masters and are considered in the field unless otherwise noted. In theory, a player can take their decision up until Thursday before the first round.
Normally, there’s a common courtesy for players to notify Augusta National as early as possible. For example, there are already 15 past champions confirmed as not playing.
But Woods has taken advantage of the flexibility before. In 2022, just a year after he nearly lost his leg in a car crash, he made a surprise appearance in the days leading up to the Masters. He decided on Tuesday to play.
What were the chances he was going to play before Friday?
Pretty slim. He refused to rule out a return when asked in February and said he was hitting full shots, but he also acknowledged his focus was more on his responsibilities with the PGA Tour’s Future Competition Committee.
Woods then increased intrigue when he played last Tuesday in the TGL Finals, but Woods, a co-founder of the simulator league, hit just five shots outside of putts and didn’t play any of the full singles holes. He didn’t look sharp, but he still had some of the goods as he hit a nice stinger and put an approach near the pin from 279 yards out. Still, the gap between being able to hit five shots on a simulator and playing multiple rounds at the extremely hilly Augusta National is hard to put into words.
“I’ve been trying. Just this body is — it doesn’t recover like it did when it was 24, 25,” Woods said Tuesday. “It doesn’t mean I’m not trying. I’ve been trying for a while. I’ve had a couple bad injuries here over the past years that I’ve had to fight through, and it’s taken some time. But I keep trying. I want to play. I love the tournament. I’ve loved being there since I was 19 years old. It’s meant a lot to me and my family over the years.”
Does the Masters have character rules for its participants?
This is a tricky one, and the answer is unwritten and takes some reading between the lines. There is no published set of character rules, but there is a history of players sitting out (or perhaps being politely nudged to do so) while dealing with off-the-course issues.
There are on-course examples too, like defending champ Frank Stranahan getting kicked out of the 1948 Masters for playing two balls during a practice round, but even then, there were also rumors of it really being about an inappropriate fling with a woman who was in a relationship with a member. Or there are plenty of times Augusta National will quietly “ask” a past champion to stop playing the tournament when they’ve overstayed their welcome.
Broadcasters like Jack Whitaker and Gary McCord stopped covering the tournament after using terms like “mob” and “bikini wax,” respectively, on the broadcast. Wayne Player, Gary’s son, was banned from Augusta National after an “ambush marketing” stunt during the ceremonial opening tee shot in 2021.
And then there are examples like Phil Mickelson, who took a quiet “leave of absence” in early 2022 after he was quoted describing how he was using Saudia Arabia’s Public Investment Fund as leverage on the PGA Tour, despite the Saudis being “scary mother——-.” Publicly, Mickelson said he decided to do so, and ANGC Chairman Fred Ridley maintained Mickelson was invited. But questions were raised (and reported) about how much influence the tour and the Masters had over that decision.
Similarly, 2009 champion Angel Cabrera didn’t play for five years while dealing with legal issues from a domestic violence charge, but there was never a formal suspension. After Cabrera’s 2 1/2 year prison sentence, Ridley said he’d be welcomed back once he straightened out his visa situation. Cabrera returned in 2025 and is in the field again this year.
Tiger Woods celebrates winning the 2019 Masters. (Andrew Redington / Getty Images)
If Tiger won’t play, will he still go to Augusta?
This is likely the main question right now. The plan was indeed for Woods to, at the very least, be in Augusta for next week’s opening of The Patch, an 18-hole municipal course the club has renovated, as Woods and his firm designed a 9-hole short course called The Loop on the site.
Woods also planned on attending the annual Champions Dinner. Now, it’s less clear as Woods deals with legal issues from his DUI charge and greater scrutiny of his off-course life. He was not at the Masters in 2025, citing his recent surgery for an Achilles issue.
What is Tiger’s relationship with Augusta National like?
It is perhaps the most complicated relationship in Augusta National history. Woods is, along with Jack Nicklaus, among the club’s greatest icons and ambassadors. From his runaway win in 1997, as a 21-year-old becoming the first player of color to win the tournament, to 2019, when at 43 he authored perhaps the greatest comeback story in golf history, Woods has created more iconography here than anyone. His 2001 win completed the Tiger Slam, the first golfer to win the four modern majors in a row. His 2005 win included his chip-in on No. 16 that will go down among the most famous moments in golf history.
But he’s also been scolded by the club. In 2010, after Woods’ cheating scandal, former ANGC Chairman Billy Payne unleashed an unprecedented public scolding in his annual pre-tournament press conference.
“It is not simply the degree of his conduct that is so egregious here,” Payne said. “It is the fact that he disappointed all of us, and more importantly, our kids and our grandkids. Our hero did not live up to the expectations of the role model we saw for our children.”
Perhaps the pure reverence from his 2019 win and Woods’ involvement in The Loop showed the relationship has been mended, if not becoming stronger. But there’s a history of Augusta National punishing Woods for his private life, and that’s worth remembering in the coming days.