If you watched ESPN this morning, you’ve seen it four times in its entirety, and four straight hours of coverage. If you didn’t watch this morning’s press conference by design, you don’t get any bonus points for that.
The world’s best golfer has been essentially unheard from (besides a couple statements on his blog) for three months. He’s missed seven tournaments, including this weekend’s first WGC event. He said he doesn’t rule out a return this year, but in my opinion, he won’t be back by The Masters in a month and a half. If that’s the case, he’ll have missed 16 tournaments and 1/4 of The Majors, if not more after that. His slut-loving ways has deprived golf fans from watching the best golfer of all-time dominate holes that require a pin, not a tampon. And while I still think Tiger’s biggest mistake in all of this was getting married in the first place, today’s press conference – which aired on a billion television channels — was about as big as anything since, well, since he was in that accident the morning after Thanksgiving.
Tiger Woods, I’d say, is the biggest individual star in all of sports. He’s the greatest golfer in the world, and if you weren’t interested in hearing/seeing him speak publicly for the first time in three months and possibly mention when he would return, then you were in the very, very minute minority of golf fans. That’s all I’ll say on that.
As for the presser itself, it was blah. He didn’t really answer my one true curiosity (when will he return?) and he went back and forth bashing himself and the media in a very carefully prepared statement. I respect him for the apologies he didn’t necessarily have to give and for sounding somewhat sincere in that he desires to become a better person. Lord knows, this world needs better and more honest people. But overall, it doesn’t really change my perception of Tiger Woods one bit.
And, ultimately, who cares? We were fooled for 15 years that he was this perfect person. Do I believe he’ll go from 12-15 known affairs to zero with a little counseling and the snap of the fingers? Absolutely not. But I don’t care about him as a repenting Buddhist – I care about him as a golfer. Good for him for trying to get better, but for all we know his entire marriage was a major publicity stunt that went terribly, terribly wrong, all because the real, horny, Tiger Woods surfaced. If he lived this life unmarried a la Wilt Chamberlain or Derek Jeter, he’d still be viewed as this public figure on a pedastal — who also just happened to have a lot of hot, skanky, girlfriends. All this jazz wouldn’t exist.
I just can’t wait for the time when we can get back to this (and sex jokes may or may not be included now):
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