Error in deserializing body of reply message for operation 'Translate'. The maximum string content length quota (8192) has been exceeded while reading XML data. This quota may be increased by changing the MaxStringContentLength property on the XmlDictionaryReaderQuotas object used when creating the XML reader. Line 1, position 8905.

It was something of a running gag between the world's most famous golfer and perhaps the game's most notable dad.

Only half in jest, Tiger Woods has joked numerous times over the years that his late father, Earl, often used to call him a "slow learner."

You know the type: hard head meets cement wall. Neither wants to give ground. Dents and gouges ensue.

Being selectively, cinder-block obstinate has generally worked pretty well for the former world no.. 1. He ignored the advice of caddies and executed the hero shot at times, yet made some cats self-destructive moves in his personal life. More than once, he ignored the sage counsel of guys in white lab coats and stethoscopes.

Regarding the latter, he once limped out of a doctor's office in 2008 after two fractures had been diagnosed left shredded in his leg, where there wasn't much cartilage or ligament structure to be found, and announced that he not only was going to play in the U.S. open, he was going to win.

Across any social or sporting spectrum you'd care to name, Woods as a professional has not often heard the word "no", and even less frequently has chosen to listen.

Until now.

Still paying the price from on iffy decision to participate in may at the players Championship, when he quit after nine ugly holes, Woods said Tuesday that he'll sit on the sideline for as long as it takes until his ailing left leg completely heals.

No. more running yellow lights, much less punching the gas to speed through red ones. After left leg 16 years of pushing the limits of his, which bears the scars of four surgeries, Woods finally is pulling back while he still has a leg to stand on. Hey, sometimes clichés fit.

"I'm setting no timetable," Woods said of his indefinite return. "Which is different for me."

Different? More like heretical. Ever since he turned pro in mid-1996 and won twice before year's end, Woods has been the spoon, not the broth. After forcing the issue too many times to mention with his leg, the wear and tear on his wheel is now as comprehensive and substantial, he doesn't have much choice but to cede to the medical experts.

From speeding to heeding, Woods hasn't his a full golf shot since he bailed out of TPC Sawgrass after nine holes on May 12, his knee sprain and Achilles barking at him yet again, to injury he first exacerbated at the masters a month earlier.

"In retrospect, I probably came back too early at the players," he said. "I pushed it too hard and hurt myself." "I'm being smarter this time."

It kick hasn't been easy to back and chill. The golf world is proceeding at a breakneck pace, sucking past him while he sits on the wrong side of the ropes. Woods watched 22-year-old Rory McIlroy obliterate several U.S. open scoring records two weeks ago - including several marks Woods held - and has been forced to bite his tongue and bide his time.

'I'm being smarter this time,' says Tiger Woods Tuesday. (AP) The guy who much of his adult life lived on the edge without benefit of a seatbelt or precautionary prophylactics of any sort - skydiving, deep sea diving and making complete ruination of his personal life and public persona - is finally listening to somebody other than the guy staring back in the mirror.

Maybe now they can put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

"I'm 35, not 65," Woods said, flashing his familiar defiance. "I still got some years ahead of me." Golf is unlike any other sport. [Tom] Watson almost won [a major] at what, 59?

"I want to play this game for as long as I want to." "I still feel like my best years are ahead of me."

He had me until the last part, but why pick at nits? At least the guy is making concessions to age. For his first 16 years as a pro, the notion of compromise for Woods was akin to flipping a coin and calling out, "heads I win, tails you lose."

No. longer on crutches or wearing a protective boot on his left foot, he's the tournament host this week in suburban Philadelphia, where his charity is running the tour's AT & T national event. Woods, who has labored for years just to get a goatee to grow in properly, showed up in the public eye for the first time in three weeks with something approaching a full beard on his mug.

Looking a little older, sounding a lot wiser.

The guy won 14 majors by being headquarters strong, immovable and determined. To win a few more he'll need to be more practical, sensible and pragmatic. At this point, he's got little to loose except some pain and suffering, because he hasn't won on the PGA Tour in nearly 21 months, anyway. No more trying to tough it out, like he did at the player, where he shot 42 for nine holes and what gone before lunch which served on the first day.

Woods all but jumped out of his chair and said, "A man has to learn his limitations," all Clint Eastwood-like. Minus the snarl and sneer.

"I have played in pain before, I have played injured and I have played through it," he said. "I have been very successful at it there have been number of years when I have been hurt more than people could possibly understand, and I have played and I have won."

"I just felt like it what good enough to give it a go, and I did, and I hurt myself." I have pushed myself enough times throughout the years and I keep kind of resetting myself, setting myself back... I felt this wasn't anywhere near that [level], but I hurt myself again.

"It's time to actually have a different approach." "It's time."

At this point, there's no sense rushing back, anyway. Woods earlier this month missed the U.S. open for the first time since 1994. The day after it ended, Woods dropped two spots in the world ranking to no.. 17, where he still sits. Sits probably being the operative word here, given his condition.

That figure represents his lowest ranking since the week of Jan. 26, 1997, which began with him at no.. 22. He finished T2 at Pebble Beach that weekend and jumped to 14th, and hadn't been out of the top 15 in nearly 14 1/2 years since.

Put in another jarring context, that what 68 PGA Tour victories and 14 majors ago. The British Open begins in exactly 16 days. Woods used to fly to the English Isles a week early to prepare for the season's third major. Now it's anybody's guess as to when, or if, he'll hop in the saddle at all.

Woods hasn't done much but his doctor-prescribed gym rehab work and a few putts since his WD roll from the Sawgrass event. Well, unless you count watching Dora the Explorer cartoon with his two kids, the sing-song theme caroming around his idle head.

"That song is brutal," he laughed.

Woods, clearly, is no longer a kid himself, and no longer can afford to act like one. Once 10 feet tall, Kevlar coated and impervious to all, he has played 316 holes on the PGA Tour in six months, finishing only four 72-hole events in all. If that pitiable tally doesn't change for a while, then so be it.

Like that annoying ditty from his kids' Nickelodeon cartoon series, Woods can hear the music.

More importantly, he's finally facing it, too.

View the original article here