A healthy Tiger Woods can contend at the 2018 Masters, says Justin Thomas

Justin Thomas expects to see Tiger Woods make a solid run for his fifth green jacket come April at Augusta.

That is, Thomas said Monday, assuming the 14-time major winner who’s on the comeback trail can stay physically fit.

“If he’s healthy, there’s no reason he wouldn’t [contend at the Masters],” the 2017 PGA Tour Player of the Year told SB Nation during a teleconference ahead of his title defense at January’s Tournament of Champions. “If he plays healthy, I really do think he’ll have a great year. You just don’t know.”

Thomas had a front-row seat to Woods’ return to competition at the Hero World Challenge earlier this month when the two teed it up together in the first and final rounds in the Bahamas at the end of November and early December. The event marked Woods’ most recent bounce back from injury — this one after four back surgeries in three years — and first competitive round since February.

While Woods looked pretty good at the Hero, where he finished T9, Thomas expressed cautious optimism about Woods’ immediate future.

“He hasn’t played that much competitive golf for a while, so it’s hard to say,” said the reigning FedEx Cup champion. “It’s hard to not hype it up or not talk about this or that but in reality, we just need to let him do him and see what happens because in the end no one knows and we’re just going to have to wait and find out.”

Thomas has spent time with Woods over the past couple of years and noted he had never seen the former world No. 1 “having so much fun and grinding it out and playing well” as at the World Challenge.

With a number of older players continuing to play well at the men’s first major of the season, Thomas believes the familiarity the soon-to-be 42-year-old has with Augusta National will serve him well assuming he makes his first Masters start since 2015.

“There’s a reason Freddie [Couples] played so well there for so many years, and Bernhard Langer, and Larry Mize has had great rounds there the last couple years,” Thomas said, referring to the winners of the 1992, 1985/1993, and 1987 Masters, respectively. “It’s just such an advantage in knowing the course; the more you play it, it really just makes a world of difference.”

As for that mock controversy Thomas sparked when he said he wanted to “kick his ass” prior to playing with Woods at the Hero, the game’s third-ranked golfer doubled down on that challenge on Monday when he issued a challenge to a different part of Woods’ anatomy.

“I want to beat his brains in like I want to beat everyone’s brains in on tour every week I play,” Thomas said. “I still am and always will be a huge Tiger Woods fan … It’s been a dream of mine since I was a kid to be coming down the stretch with Tiger Woods and hopefully it happens and hopefully I can come out on the other side.”

What true golf fan would not love to see Woods playing for another Masters title on April 8? Fingers crossed we get Woods and Thomas going head to head (brain to brain?) in that Sunday finale four months hence.