How long will it take Tiger to cure his woes?

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Tiger Woods' problems began on the tee in his first round at Quail Hollow. They led to an opening 74.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- What if this is what the "new" Tiger Woods looks like? Two-way misses, rounds of 74 with the occasional Sunday charge and his game as dysfunctional as the previous six months.

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We're five rounds into Woods' comeback, so the above question is of course ridiculous right now. At what point is it going to become relevant, though, especially if Woods doesn't start winning soon because anything less is simply unacceptable in his eyes or ours.

If Tiger's pro-am at the Quail Hollow Championship was "scratchy," as he called it, what was his opening-round 74?

"Worse," said Woods, who hit two balls in the water and made as many bogeys (4) as birdies (4) on Thursday. "It wasn't the driver, it was everything. I had a two-way miss going all day."

Even Woods' decision-making was off. On the ninth hole, his last of the day, he admittedly pulled the wrong club, tried to take something off his ball, hit it over the green, barely got a flop shot to the surface and two-putted for bogey.

Rust or reason?

"I had a lot of issues out there trying to figure out where my balls were going to go," Woods said. "I hit a bunch of balls left, I hit a bunch of balls right, hit a few down the middle.

"I'm trying. But when you're fighting a miss like this and trying to piece together a round to keep myself in the tournament is pretty tough."

The last time Woods had a layoff this long was just last year. It took all of three tournaments for him to get his first victory. And one of those was the World Golf Championships-Accenture Match Play Championship, where he played fewer than 36 holes after losing in the second round.

Woods wasn't playing his best golf then, either, when he won the Arnold Palmer Invitational in what was a less-than-stellar ball-striking week. He still shot three rounds in the 60s, though, including a Sunday 67.

Of course, this comeback is different. Returning from an eight-month layoff following major knee surgery is one thing. Trying to do the same while repairing your reputation, no matter how well Woods has been received by the fans, is another.

Playing at the Quail Hollow Championship might feel a lot more normal to Woods than the Masters did, as he said earlier in the week, but nothing about his golf had to feel normal on Thursday -- even if that 74 very easily could have been a 78 or 79.

Woods has been making a concerted effort to interact more with the gallery since returning to the game, but his head was understandably down a lot more after hitting just 29 percent of his fairways and 50 percent of his greens. Of course, when you miss in some of the spots Woods did, hitting the green in regulation is pretty much impossible.

Asked if he was going to the range after his round to work out his problems, Woods said, "To hell with it."

So how quickly can Woods' game can be repaired?

That is a question that is like a lot of others about Woods these days: unanswered.