Tiger Woods seemed to be flirting with the idea of walking away from golf last year at what was probably the most downcast press conference of his career.

“I think pretty much everything beyond this will be gravy,” he said on that occasion.

Tiger has been more hopeful recently, but more importantly, he’s been more realistic. Speaking at BlueJack National on Wednesday, the Houston-area course that Tiger designed, the 14-time major said repeatedly that he didn’t have a timetable for a return from this back injury, and that even though he’s feeling a “heck of lot better better” he’s intent on taking it slow.

Then, he proceeded to the most interesting point of the press conference:

“I played through a lot of injuries, I played through some situations I probably shouldn’t have…I cost myself some tournaments…I’ve cost myself months and years because of it. That’s what athletes do. They play through pain.”

That right there is something every golf fan would have suspected was happening to Tiger in recent years, but they wouldn’t have come to that conclusion listening to Tiger himself. He would kind of talk about his injuries, but it never really came to anything. The overriding notion coming from Tiger before this latest setback was, essentially, that everything was basically fine.

It makes sense why. To reach the heights that Tiger Woods has throughout his career demands a certain level of irrationality. You can’t make the PGA Tour, Tiger. You can’t win the Masters. No, you can’t win that many majors. Tiger did all of those things and more, so when other people tell him he can’t shortcut this back injury, it’s chalked-up as nothing more than the next wave of naysayers waiting to be proved wrong.

But this is different. You can’t win the Masters is an opinion. A spinal and nerve injury is a fact. Golfers only recover from injuries like this by getting around them, not by conquering them. You need to accept your new limitations and adapt. Rocco Mediate is the best example of this, and he did it by completely overhauling his swing. Tiger so far has done the opposite.

But he’s only 40, which means he potentially has 10 years left on the PGA Tour. He has time. Take it slow. Tiger will get more shots at winning majors, but only if he stays healthy for prolonged periods of time, not by swinging hard and rushing back, re-injuring himself and spending more time on the sidelines.

He’s finally starting to recognize that, which is good, because holding to that mindset is the only avenue he has left.