Mike Weir has likely hit his last competitive shot of a disappointing 2010 season after discovering he has a partially torn ligament in his right elbow.
The injury was detected by an MRI over the weekend.
The left-hander from Bright’s Grove, Ont., had been experiencing pain since before the British Open in July but thought it was tendinitis. A conversation with fellow PGA Tour pro Scott McCarron at last week’s Wyndham Championship prompted Weir to seek further medical attention.
“I talked to Scott McCarron last week and he really kind of convinced me to go get an MRI,” Weir told The Canadian Press on Tuesday morning. “He told me he had done the same thing — he played with it while getting therapy on it and he kept tearing it worse and worse. By the time he went and got an MRI, it was completely torn off and he had to have surgery and take a year off.”
Fortunately, Weir’s prognosis is better than that. He plans to rest the elbow and seek out alternative treatments, hoping to avoid surgery and a long layoff.
The 40-year-old likely won’t play another PGA Tour event this season. He didn’t qualify for the FedEx Cup playoffs, which begin this week, but might have been inclined to enter some of the fall series events that follow.
“I guess there’s only two months left of the season, maybe even a little less,” said Weir. “It’s pretty fair to say (I’m done for the year). I don’t want to completely rule it out because I might respond well to treatment and start feeling better. But the guys I’ve talked to so far say you need at least a couple months off.”
The 2010 season has been one of the toughest of Weir’s career. After finishing sixth at the Bob Hope Classic in January, he failed to crack the top-10 in his remaining 18 tournaments.
He missed eight cuts along the way and only broke 70 in two rounds after May.
“It’s been a tough year,” said Weir. “It’s been a struggle to find consistency in my game. It hasn’t been a fun year, that’s for sure. It’s no fun to play poorly.”