One of golf's great mysteries is why so many vie to be the one who enters the cage with Tiger, seeing what has happened to others who have entered into the arena. So says columnist Grant Boone who ponders the fate of those who are brave enough to hunt the Tiger.

By Grant Boone, Special to PGA.com

First off, Tiger Woods is not God. For one thing, Woods' only begotten (to date) is a girl. Then, there's his flippant and frequent violation of the Third Commandment. Plus, with the exception of the occasional burning bush, the real World's #1 isn't usually associated with environs as toasty as Tulsa where Woods won the PGA Championship by two shots over Woody Austin at Southern Hell where temperatures spent most of the week in three figures.

But Tiger does seem to have somehow channeled one particular power from Jim Carrey's character in the movie "Bruce Almighty." Watch and enjoy. I'll wait.

Woods Almighty has a history of making his challengers eat their words. Sunday, he left the field babbling incoherently in an attempt to explain how history so often repeats itself.

Let's begin by repeating myself. In last week's GMT (click here), I dubbed Rory Sabbatini golf's new Black Knight on account of his penchant for taunting Tiger a second time, even after the competitive equivalent of having his limbs lopped off. But Sabbatini wasn't the first to give Woods a good verbal jab.

In 2005, as he prepared for a first round tussle with Woods at the Accenture Match Play, Stephen Ames said he liked his chances and that anything can happen in that format, "especially where he's hitting it." It wasn't so much where Woods hit it in their match two days later as how infrequently he actually needed to. He didn't just beat Ames. He effectively gave him an atomic wedgie and slapped a "Kick Me" sign on his back in a blowout win, the final score of which became Woods' answer when asked afterward what he thought of Ames' pre-match remarks:

"9 and 8."

After an 18th hole birdie at the PGA Saturday afternoon scooched him within three of the lead and into the final pairing with Woods Sunday, Ames again had to pay the piper. In the press conference Saturday evening, Ames insisted there were no hard feelings from the brouhaha two years prior. That Woods had actually congratulated him on winning the Players Championship a month after the Match Play.

Woods was next in the interview room. With a blue towel draped around his neck like a boxer entering the ring, Woods pulled no punches when repeatedly given the chance to downplay 9 and 8. Instead, he simply said, "It is what it is." The next day, he opened up another can of Whoop-Ames, outplaying his fellow competitor 69 to 76. Only after the final putt dropped did Woods extend his hand to Ames (if not an olive branch) and smile.

Woody's roundup in the media center each day had a slightly different tone. Austin spent the first three days trying to convince us that this video (click here) is not the default image we should conjure up when we think of him. And he did a pretty good job of it. His most salient point came in a well-reasoned criticism of the assembled scribes and other assorted golf journalists.

"He slammed his driver onto the ground," Austin said of Woods earlier in the week. "That's his competitive fire, is what it's called. If I do that, I am a loose cannon, I can't control myself."

Good point. Woods' on-course behavior is often volatile, and he largely gets a free pass from those of us in the media because: a) he's already at least one of the three best golfers of all time and on the fast track toward obviating that debate forever; and b) some are afraid he'll open up a can of Whoop-Us when we see him in the interview room later, ending any chance of being invited over to see how Elin and he have decorated the nursery.

But mostly it's because we're the same as any of you who love golf in that we're drawn like moths to Woods' competitive flame, willing to forgive him when he crosses the line from passion to petulance. And Austin is accurate when he suggests that he and lots of his peers have a similar desire to succeed, even if they can't back it up on the course as often as Woods.

Austin backed it up all week. He was the only player to shoot par or better each day. And despite beginning the final round four back of Woods, he actually had a birdie putt at 15 that would've pulled him even. It was only after a hard-fought 67 left him two shots short that Austin finally began to crack. First, he interrupted a reporter's observation that he'd been hard on himself earlier in the week because of missed opportunities:

"I was right, wasn't I?"

Whoa, big fella. After the reporter finished his question, Austin responded specifically to shooting a 70 in the second round to Woods' 63:

"Well, like I said on Friday, you cannot give somebody seven shots, especially someone who happens to be the best player in the world. And I, like I said, I went over his round and over my round, and I outplayed him from tee-to-green."

It was right here that you were telepathically giving Austin the same advice Brian Fantana gave Champ. "Why don't you stop talking for awhile? Maybe sit the next couple of plays out." But Austin kept going:

"I don't think anybody plays any better than I do when I'm on; I know that's crazy, but I think I can hit any shot anybody in the world can hit."

I was with him right up to the point that he talked about being crazy. Woody wasn't done:

"You give anybody who is really good a four-shot lead over you -- I beat him today, but it doesn't matter because he had four shots on me. So, you know, I don't care -- he happens to be the best player in the world, but if you put any great player, any good player with a four-shot cushion, their odds are going to be pretty good. Especially when they happen to be the best."

Suddenly, he was Steve Martin giving a call to arms in "Three Amigos:" "The people of Santo Poco can conquer their own personal El Guapo, who also happens to be the actual El Guapo." And then came a little Yogi Berra from the AFLAC commercial:

"He always says -- what does he always say? He always says, 'I want to be in the last group on Sunday.' If he wants to be there, and I want to be, why do I not want to be there? Why would I want to be somewhere else?"

Beats me. And finally, like a punch-drunk fighter swinging wildly before the inevitable face plant into the canvas, Austin offered this:

"Well, you said in the media, especially on Friday, that he played just an unbelievable round of golf and that he was in total control and that he was just toying with the field. We can go through our rounds. I outplayed him on Friday, but he beat me by seven shots. So, does that mean he's that much better? I don't get it. It just happens that he scored better, and like I said on Friday, can you not throw away that many opportunities when you are trying to win a big golf tournament. He took advantage; I didn't. Does that mean he played better than me or he's better than me? I don't agree with that."

It's all those ticky-tack technicalities that doomed Austin, like keeping score. He started sounding like the washed-up actor the late Phil Hartman played in the SNL skit with Jon Lovitz:

Lovitz: "You're finished, Johnny!"

Hartman: "Don't mince words!"

Lovitz: "I think you stink!"

Hartman: "Listen, Harry, if you're unhappy with my work, tell me now."

Lovitz: "You're through! Do you hear me, through! You'll never work in this town again!"

Hartman: "Don't leave me hanging by a thread! Let me know where I stand!"

Lovitz: "I think you're the worst actor I've ever seen, and I get 500 letters a day telling me the same!"

Hartman: "What's the word on the street?"

Austin proved he's a Ready For Prime Time Player at Southern Hills, and his second-place showing earned him a spot on the Presidents Cup team for the first time. If he was a bit out of sorts in his press conference Sunday evening, cut him some slack. Four days of trying to tame a Tiger in triple digit temps would make anyone a little loopy.

I mean how minny wayz kan yu say Tigre iz graet bfor yu go nutz?

Grant Boone is a husband, father, golf broadcaster, and sports journalist based in Abilene, Texas. His column appears on PGA.com each Wednesday and every day during major championships and other big events. He can be contacted at pgagrant@hotmail.com.

The views and opinions expressed here do not reflect those of PGA.com or The PGA of America.