Tiger Woods left the door open on Tuesday for a possible comeback to play in next month’s Masters tournament.
Have you ruled out a return for the Masters?
“No,” Woods answered with a sly smile afterward.
The five-time Masters winner, who turned 50 in late December, has not played competitively since the 2024 Open Championship as he has battled back and Achilles’ injuries the past couple of years.
“It’s just one of those things where it’s each and every day, I keep trying. I keep progressing. I keep working on it, trying to get stronger, trying to get more endurance in this body and trying to get it to a level at which I can play at the highest level again,” Woods said Tuesday during a news conference ahead of this week’s Genesis Invitational in California, a PGA Tour event that is operated by Woods’s foundation.
cc: @TheMasters 👀 pic.twitter.com/4QN6P11KCU
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) February 17, 2026
Woods has not made a cut at a tournament since the 2024 Masters — he finished in last place among the players to make the weekend — but will that stop bettors from wagering on the world’s most recognizable golfer if he returns? Oddsmakers currently have him as an extreme long shot should he tee things up this year at Augusta National.
“I’ve had Tiger listed to win the Masters at 500-1 for a while now and not many takers as we’ve always seen in previous years … Tiger usually represents one of our larger liabilities in the outright market, but his lack of competition over the last couple years has finally caught up with the betting public.”
Johnny Avello, DraftKings sportsbook director, told The Athletic that he also has Tiger around 500-1.
The shortest odds we could find for a Woods win were at BetMGM, which currently sits at +17500. To put that into context, that’s an implied probability of less than 1 percent.
Scottie Scheffler, the two-time Masters winner and the world’s top-ranked golfer, is the favorite to win this year’s Masters at +275 at BetMGM. Those are better odds than each of the past two tournaments at Augusta National, with Scheffler entering as the favorite at around +400 each time. The short odds shouldn’t surprise many, as Scheffler has started off the season on fire. In three tournaments this year, he has a win, a tie for third place and a tie for fourth.
After Scheffler, defending Masters champion Rory McIlroy is the second favorite at +750, though it should be noted that only three players — Jack Nicklaus in 1965-66, Nick Faldo in 1989-90 and Woods in 2001-02 — have repeated as the winner at Augusta National. LIV golfers Bryson DeChambeau (+1200) and Jon Rahm (+1400) follow McIlroy, and Ludvig Aberg (+1600), Xander Schauffele (+1600), Tommy Fleetwood (+1800), Justin Rose (+2500), Collin Morikawa (+2800), Patrick Reed (+2800) and Hideki Matsuyama (+3000) round out the top of the odds board.
Rose fell to McIlroy in a memorable playoff at last year’s Masters and already has a win under his belt at this year’s Farmers Insurance Open. Morikawa won last weekend at Pebble Beach, his first victory in more than two years, while Reed and Matsuyama are former Masters champions who have played well to start the season.