Sports

Other marshals back up Tiger in TPC incident: report

Now even the marshals are turning against each other.

After two marshals told Golf.com that no one told Tiger Woods that Sergio Garcia hit on the second hole, as Woods claimed, two other marshals have now defended the world’s No. 1 player. Both Brian Nedrich and Lance Paczkowski were marshals at this past weekend’s Players Championship and told Jacksoville.com that they were within 10-12 yards.

“It is not true and definitely unfair to Tiger,” Nedrich told the Web site. “That’s because I was the one Tiger heard say that Sergio had hit.”

The background:

On Saturday, Garcia ripped Woods during the third round for grabbing his 5 wood out of the bag, which elicited a roar from the crowd excited Woods was going to go for the green with his second shot, as Garcia was making his swing. Garcia shanked his shot on the way to a bogey.

“You have to pay attention to what’s going on because the other guy is hitting. You do something when you’re in the crowd and the crowd is going to respond,” Garcia said.

Woods responded after the round.

“It’s not surprising he was complaining about something,” Woods said. “Obviously, he doesn’t know all the facts. The marshals told me he had already hit, so I pulled a club and was getting ready to play my shot.”

That’s when the marshals got involved to defend themselves against Woods claims.

[Woods] didn’t ask us nothing, and we didn’t say nothing. We’re told not to talk to the players,” the marshal with Woods and Garcia, Gary Anderson, told Golf.com.

“Nothing was said to us and we certainly said nothing to him,” Anderson’s boss, John North, said.

“I was disappointed to hear him make those remarks. We’re there to help the players and enhance the experience of the fans. He was saying what was good for him. It lacked character.”

But the sequence of events according to these two marshals is different.

They claim that Garcia hit, causing the crowd behind Woods to stir. At that point Paczkowski, who was completely screened from Garcia said, “the other player [Garcia] hasn’t hit yet.”

“That’s when I yelled back at Lance, ‘No … he’s already hit,’ ” Nedrich said. “Tiger had already taken his club, but we did tell him that Sergio had hit.”

When exactly Woods reached for his club remains unclear, but in TV replays it did not appear that the crowd’s roar came during Garcia’s backswing.

Either way, Nedrich does not blame Woods.

“There was a lot going on, as usual, when Tiger plays,” Nedrich said. “Then, he’s trying to have the concentration he needs to win a tournament. It’s easy to get small details out of whack when things happen so fast. It was an unfortunate incident and I don’t think either player is to blame.”

And both Nedrich and Paczkowski say that at worst, Woods mis-spoke and calling him a liar is taking it too far.

“It’s disingenuous to suggest that Tiger is a liar because he got a minor detail wrong,” Nedrich said. “Basically, he told the truth.”

“Tiger Woods did not lie,” Paczkowski said. “Was there a small mistake in what he remembered? Yes. But I don’t think it rises to the level of lying.”