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Tiger, Phil, OU, Texas and Aquaman?
Published: 4/7/2007 7:28 AM
Last Modified: 4/7/2007 7:28 AM

From this moment on, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson will remind me of a Texas-Oklahoma football game.
Back in the day, the press conference room at Texas-OU games was so small that you had to have a lead blocker just to enter an overpacked room. Heard of the term "sea of humanity?" This was the Red River War of humanity and folks were crammed against each other so tight that it's a wonder tempers didn't flare.
If Woods or Mickelson had shot a round worth a darn during the first two days of the Masters, they would have been taken to a big interview room for a question and answer session. Because they are struggling, they just stopped at a designated spot near the 18th green -- it's called the quick quote area -- and answered a few questions.
Every player except the leaders is asked to make a pit stop at the quick quote area and, in most cases, only a few reporters are on hand to ask questions.
That changes when Woods or Mickelson are on deck. Media folks swarm the quick quote area for Phil and Tiger and create a mob scene much like the one mentioned above. Ideally, everyone would be polite and not stampede each other, but -- in the quest to get a tape recorder close enough to pick up audio -- reporters nudge and lean on each other. If someone ever leans too far, the pile could crash (think dominoes) and bring all new meaning to the term bentgrass.
I was way back in the pack for a Thursday session with Mickelson, but arrived early enough to stake out a spot for Woods on Friday. I was in the third wave of people, but still was plenty close enough to hear what he was saying. (And the good folks at the Masters transcribe bits and pieces of quick quote conversations for reporters to use). In the process, I made way more physical contact with other reporters than I ever wanted to make. I think the guy whose elbow was in my pancreas was wearing Aqua Velva.
Speaking of Aqua, Woods did an Aquaman imitation Friday when he put balls in the water on consecutive holes. Is this Eldrick Woods or Arthur Curry?
Hopefully, Woods will put together the kind of round Saturday that will get him out of the quick quote area and into the interview pavilion. My pancreas would appreciate it.








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Tulsa World sports writer Jimmie Tramel is a former class president at Locust Grove High School. He graduated magna cum laude from Northeastern State University with a journalism degree and, while attending college, was sports editor of the Pryor Daily Times. He joined the Tulsa World on Oct. 17, 1989, the same day an earthquake struck the World Series. He is the OSU basketball beat writer and a columnist and feature writer during football season. In 2007, he wrote a book about Oklahoma State football with former Cowboy coach Pat Jones.

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