Tiger Woods made headlines last week when he gave a coy smile and insisted that playing in the 2026 Masters was not out of the question. Woods is back to hitting full shots for the first time since having a seventh back surgery in September 2025, and he is trying to figure out when he’ll be able to return to competing.
Given his success at and love for the first major of the season, it’s always the start of “will he, won’t he play” speculation for Woods at Augusta National Golf Club.
This year, the Masters will also serve as an important date for a different type of speculation around Woods, who is the top choice to be Ryder Cup captain for the United States in 2027. The PGA of America has told Woods it wants a decision as to whether he will lead the team in Adare Manor, Ireland, by the Masters, according to the Associated Press.
The first major championship of the year is considered a “soft deadline rather than an ultimatum,” per the AP; however, given the way the Americans played at Bethpage Black and how late the team announced Keegan Bradley as captain (July 2024, 14 months ahead of the tournament) after Woods declined, it makes sense that the PGA hope to have its leadership settled sooner, this time around.
For Woods, the decision comes down to whether he feels he can dedicate enough time to the captaincy given his other responsibilities. Tiger noted last week, ahead of the self-hosted Genesis Invitational, that the holdup for him is how much time he invests into reimagining and reshaping how the PGA Tour will look and play in 2027-28.
“They have asked me for my input on it, and I haven’t made my decision yet,” Woods said. “I’m trying to figure out what we’re trying to do with our Tour. That’s been driving me hours upon hours every day, and trying to figure out if I can actually do our team — our Team USA and our players and everyone that’s going to be involved in the Ryder Cup — if I can do it justice with my time. Serving on two boards and what I’m doing for the PGA Tour, I’m trying to figure out if I can actually do this and serve the people that are involved and serve them at an honorable level.”
The big question for the PGA of America comes if Woods declines, and they again need to move to Plan B. No one appears to know to whom the PGA would shift — in fact, many wonder how the PGA landed on Bradley for 2025 in the first place.
Phil Mickelson would have been the obvious choice, but after his LIV Golf defection, it seems his chances of being a Ryder Cup captain are slim to none. Without Mickelson in the mix, there aren’t many obvious choices for new captains.
Considering the U.S. Ryder Cup team has not been overly successful recently, bringing back prior captains may be a non-starter. Even turning to vice captains becomes tricky. At Bethpage Black, those names were Jim Furyk, Gary Woodland, Webb Simpson, Brandt Snedeker and Kevin Kisner.
Given Furyk was the captain in 2018 for a U.S. team that lost, he appears unlikely. Woodland is still active in his PGA Tour career as he continues his comeback from a brain tumor. Simpson, Snedeker and Kisner still play but are seemingly winding down their careers as they enter their 40s, and therefore would be among the more likely options. However, Kisner never played in the Ryder Cup. Simpson went 4-4-1 across three appearances but never won. Snedeker has the best Ryder Cup résumé of the bunch at 4-2-0 with a 1-1 team record in his two appearances.
Perhaps an option from outside the system would make the most sense, such as one of the best Americans on PGA Tour Champions, like Stewart Cink, who went 5-7-7 in five Ryder Cups but only won once as a player.
The PGA badly wants Tiger to accept the job by the Masters to keep it from having to make another extremely difficult decision, especially considering how much pressure the United States will face on the road after Europe just won on U.S. soil.