‘Was Taking Way Too Many Painkillers’: Michelle Wie West on How Tiger Woods Comparisons Indirectly Devastated Her Career

Holding back tears, Michelle Wie West battled through a broken wrist at the 2007 U.S. Open. As she was struggling with pain, a fan shouted, “Play through it.” This perfectly summed up the weight of expectations West carried for years after bursting on the scene as a 10-year-old. But the decision to hide her injuries and continue playing eventually caught up with her as she revealed in an interview.

West was destined to be golf’s next big star. At the age of 12, she became the youngest player to qualify for an LPGA Tour event. A year later she made history at the Kraft Nabisco. When she turned pro in 2005, lucrative deals with Sony and Nike followed. The golf believed it had its next icon, its new Tiger Woods. However, a persistent wrist injury derailed her career and she never dominated the sport like everyone expected her to do.

In a recent interview with YouTuber Pablo Sison Torre on his channel, Pablo Torre Finds Out on July 25, West revealed the details behind the slump in her career when she was being touted as the next big thing in 2007. “I was actually on a visit to Stanford, ended up working with the golf team, and did some workouts that I do with my trainer,” West said. The golfer never would’ve anticipated that juggling college and golfing would cost her this much pain. According to the golfer, the injury happened while she was working out and doing a backward run, without her trainer.

“I remember doing something like a backward run, and I fell on my hand and then broke three bones in my hand when I was 17,”  she continued. Talking about how the presence of her trainer might have saved her from the plight, West said, “I should not be working out unsupervised.” This injury hampered her career throughout. The golfer had to withdraw from the 2018 Women’s British Open, mid-round citing a hand issue and had a rough time at the 2019 KMPG Women’s Championship. 

In the YouTube interview, West admitted that after her injury, she went back to the greens way too soon. She said, “I came back from my injury way too quick; I was taking way too many painkillers to go out and play.”

When she was 15, she became the youngest female to compete in a PGA Tour event, teeing it up at the 2004 Sony Open. She turned pro in 2005, shortly before her 16th birthday. Her driving ability meant that many thought she might become the first woman to make the cut at a PGA Tour event since Babe Didrikson Zaharias in 1945.

Reflecting on how people expected so much from her in her early days, she said, “So this is like a year after I turned pro, in the biggest hyped event ever, everyone saying, I’m the next Tiger Woods whatever, I went through like the two toughest years,” she said.

In 2007, Wie experienced a slump, including a four-month hiatus, due to injuries to both wrists, a disqualification, and several missed cuts and withdrawals. But she kept coming at times much to the cost of her health and even hid injuries from the media. In a 2022 interview with Nike’s No Off-Season Podcast, she said, “I remember not telling the media really honest answers about my injuries, kind of hiding it, just because I didn’t want to feel weak.” 

Wie West finished her career with five LPGA Tour wins, one major title, and the highest world ranking of No. 2. This was a far cry from her early promise and fell way short of the achievements of Tiger Woods or that of women’s golf icon with Annika Sörenstam, to whom West was compared early in her career. Woods has 82 wins and 15 majors while Sörenstam has 72 wins and 10 majors to her name.

West retired after the 2023 U.S. Women’s Open at the age of 33, citing her daughter’s birth in 2020 as a reason for her decision. She was content with her decision.

Tiger Woods and Michelle Wie West are good friends on and off the course, and unsurprisingly, their injuries happen to give the two golfers a common ground to strike up conversations. West told Golf that whenever she and Woods meet, they first talk about the improvement of their injuries, and then the other things come. The two have also been in car accidents, yet another unfortunate common thing they have.

The world knows about TW’s near-fatal car crash in 2021, but West also was involved in a threatening car accident in 2017. Talking about the accident, she said in 2019 to the LPGA Tour, “I was in a car accident two years ago which kind of created this whole thing. That’s life. Things happen. You stumble across things that don’t go your way, but there’s still a lot of things I want to accomplish.”

While the cheerful conversations with Woods might give her some relief now, she couldn’t seem to get over the injury and the hardships it brought upon her. And it had a longer impact on the golfer’s mental health. 

How did the injuries take a toll on Michelle Wie West’s mental health?

One can only imagine how much an injury and an overdose of painkillers can affect someone’s mental health, but West has been through it and knows the consequences. “It ruined me mentally, emotionally, and physically, and it was really tough,”  said the former professional golfer.

But while West was struggling on the golf course, she was having the time of her life in college. She emphasized it by saying, “Having that double life, I was also having the best 4 years of my life versus the worst years on the golf course, so it saved me.”

College took her mind off the sport and helped her focus more on the present. After witnessing the struggles she has faced over the years, perhaps her decision to retire from the sport last year was a good one.

The golfer may have retired, but the fans will always remember her as the awesome golfer that she was. Are you a Michelle Wie West fan? Let us know in the comment section below!