Cameron Morfit, Senior Writer for Golf Magazine has a terrific piece called Tiger Woods is deciding which pieces of his shattered image he should pick up and which he should leave behind. Morfit asks the thought provoking question of whether Tiger the man can be separated from Tiger the brand.
And there’s a scathing quote from Stephen Ames:
Stephen Ames once questioned Woods’s erratic long game in the press. An angry Tiger responded by throttling Ames 9 and 8. But that game is over. Tiger won. “Who really cares if he comes back and kicks our ass or not?” Ames says now. “I’m still going to go home to my wife and kids at night, and he has to worry about that. It’s tough, but that’s the way it is.”
From this quote, though, comes the larger question: Will ANYONE care about Tiger any more? He’ll likely still break Jack’s Majors record, and undoubtedly will break Sam Sneads all-time-wins mark. But it own’t be a triumphal march.
And I also want to consider this question: Have we—as a society—learned anything about the hero worship of athletes?
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The foregone conclusion that he will eclipse Jack’s major record is now gone.
It is certainly possible- no doubt. But without the prima donna kid gloves treatment by the media and fans, the question will be how does Woods handle himself?
Further, he was THREE years ahead of Jack in majors (14 for Jack came at 35, 14 for Tiger came at 32). But since then Tiger failed at 33 to win a single major while compeletely dominating the game everywhere else. The pressure of that record is getting to Tiger. That, and in addition Yang didn’t wilt in Tiger’s shadow. Few will wilt in Tiger’s shadow now, in fact, a comment here or there might just be made to get in Tiger’s head.
I think that at most Tiger could win one this year, but more likely, none.
And all of that, if he doesn’t tear up his knee again.
and even if he does manage to get to 19 majors, he will never match the Top 2, 5, 10 finishes in the Majors.
Spent the morning listening to PGA-XM on the long drive home from Phoenix. The gist of it seemed to be that the golf magazines and insiders just want Tiger to return; have him hit his opening drive at Augusta and all will be well again.
It wasn’t until the fourth hour that somebody pointed out that Tiger is now trying to repair his image with the general public. There was a brief discussion about the pitfalls of hero-worship in general – then “He’s Coming Back!”.
Five minutes of introspection, four-plus hours of tongue-bathing. Guess that sums up your last question.