One thing that comes to mind is the timing of this. Personally, I think the Tiger we knew is gone - oh, he might back into a tournament or two over the next few years, but the day of dick-slapping the rest of the field has been over a long time. Nobody aside from Bernhard Langer ever came back from a true case of the putting yips and getting past the chipping yips is 10x as difficult. You can reboot the brain and overcome the yips in practice or playing casual rounds, but once the tourniquet starts to rotate, there is no place to hide the herpes sores.
And somewhere in the deepest recesses of Tiger's mind, far behind the black curtain, he knows it.
Trying to recover from more physical injuries than Bill Glasson (whether from 'roids or not) and then having to tackle a complete neurological breakdown ain't gonna happen. I am sorry, but nobody - not even Ben Hogan - was ever able to permanently put the yips in a little box and bury it so deep it does not pop out of the grave on Sunday at Augusta.
Rolling the ball with a putter is one action - and can be accomplished many different ways, including flipping it over and batting from the port side. But there is no way in hell - again, with a gun to your head on national television - to erase that involuntary twitch with a wedge out of an infinite number of lies and situations. Not even with Tiger's genius level I.Q.
So, what does a highly intelligent guy do when his clubs no longer can do the talking for him? Putting aside all Tiger's bullshit that he wants privacy and to be left alone and blah blah fucking blah, he's not going to slink off and play video games waiting for his designated blonde to get back from collecting another World Cup. Maybe Tiger can lobby to be Ryder Cup Captain, uh yeah.
Tiger HAS to remain relevant, he HAS to reinvent himself; the idea of living the next 40 years as a fallen colossus is also not happening. He is not particularly personable or engaging - and trying to reemerge as some kind of 1st Tee champion of racial equality isn't going to fly too well with a honky girlfriend and being a perma-target of writers like Dan Jenkins.
The easiest path to softening his image as a philandering sexual sociopath is to design fun, accessible golf courses for everyman. You know, the same schnooks who yelled "You da Man Tiger!" - or who rolled that rock out of his way as if he needed extra help with that four shot lead. If a limey prick like Nick Faldo can rehabilitate his image, Tiger can too.
That SOB is smarter than all of us and I guarantee when he was standing over that drafting table, he knew if that golf course ended up a super-difficult Nicklaus abortion it would only underscore what an arrogant twat he was when the sky was raining jewels and the ball found the hole even when he misread the putt.
The ledger almost always balances out in the end . . . . . . how ironic if the most fearsome shotmaker of the modern era designed a string of courses that did not require straight driving or a fancy short game.