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Donald Trump insists Tiger Woods will not play at The Masters 2026 despite a late push to recover from multiple operations last year.
Woods has overcome surgery before, but his status for next month’s Masters remains unclear, having admitted he got his “a*** kicked” after returning to golf in the virtual league with his team Jupiter Links, who lost in the TGL Finals.
After recovering from back surgery last October, months after rupturing his Achilles tendon, Woods is now in contention to return to competitive golf for the first time since The Open in the summer of 2024.
The 15-time major champion has lifetime eligibility to play at The Masters, as a previous five-time winner of the green jacket, but Trump has suggested a decision has already been made.
“I love Tiger, but he won’t be there,” Trump said while appearing on “The Five” on FOX News. “He’ll be there, but he won’t be playing in it.”
Woods, switched in for Kevin Kisner, couldn’t help his side in a second-straight loss to the Los Angeles Golf Club, confirming an overall loss after Monday’s initial defeat in the best-of-three series.
The 50-year-old looked in good shape physically as he hit a couple of drives over 300 yards, but was unable to prevent a 9-2 defeat as Los Angeles, featuring English pair Tommy Fleetwood and Justin Rose, secured the best-of-three series with a game to spare.
“It was fine physically,” Woods said afterwards in a press conference broadcast by Sky Sports.
Tiger Woods hits a practice iron from a grass pad before the TGL Finals (Reinhold Matay/AP) (AP)
“I had a couple of drives I had to hit and a couple of putts… it was a lot of fun to be a part of it.
“We got our a*** kicked at the end. Three eagles in a row, we didn’t respond. I missed a short one to kind of get it started and give them momentum and we never got it back.
“I’m frustrated that we didn’t get it done, we had opportunities like last night – we should have won that match – and they steam-rolled us at the end.”
On his chances of playing the Masters at Augusta National, which starts on April 9, Woods, who has been plagued by back issues in recent years, while he also ruptured his Achilles tendon last spring, added: “I’ve been trying, this body doesn’t recover like it did when I was 24, 25.
“It doesn’t mean I’m not trying; I’ve been trying for a while.
“I’ve had a couple of bad injuries last year that I’ve had to fight through and has taken some time. I keep trying – I want to play.
“I’ve loved the tournament, I’ve loved being there since I was 19 years old so it’s meant a lot to me and my family over the years and I’m going to be there either way.
“We’ll see how it goes. I’ll be practising, playing, and keep trying to make progress.
“It feels good to be back but I would have liked it to be better circumstances. That’s the way sport is – you put yourself out there and sometimes you win, sometimes you lose and you deal with it.”
Jupiter Links had gone 2-0 up in the second game of the finals, but Woods missed a three-foot putt on the seventh, and Los Angeles seized the momentum with three eagles in a row from the eighth.
That run culminated in Rose, who lost a play-off to Rory McIlroy at Augusta last year, hitting a five-wood to four feet on the par-five 10th, prompting Jupiter to concede the hole and tournament.
Rose said: “They got off to a good start, fair play, but we were doing nothing tragic to second guess ourselves.
“You’re not always going to go three eagles on the bounce, that’s an insane way to finish and we’ve even taken ourselves by surprise there. It finished in a hurry which was good for us and a shame for everyone else here today.”
PA contributed to this report
