This Vanity Fair cover and subsequent article by blog enthusiast Buzz Bissinger is worth a post all on it's own but I figured I would give my two cents on Tiger Woods and the moronic decisions he recently made in his personal life which may be something that finally breaks him.
Ever since I turned 13-14 I have watched golf. At first my Dad forced me to sit down and watch The Masters with him and at the time all I could think about was getting the hell out of that room as fast as I could. Who wants to watch a bunch of overweight guys swing a stick and hit a little ball at a little hole hundreds of yards away? We would spend hours doing this together and all I could think was that it was just a waste of my time. Then came this young, energetic, fist pumping, Blasian named Tiger Woods and I was immediately hooked. He was the jet fuel for the little spark that golf was to the American Sports Fan and away he and golf went.
He was winning tournaments left and right, sponsors were forming a line to the left, he was being considered to possibly be the greatest of all time and just about every time he was playing I was watching as often as I could. I was enamored with what he was able to do but not with just swinging a golf club. The way he handled the pressure, his focus, the way he could just completely psyche out his opponent without saying a word, his mindset of one shot at a time....I mean the list goes on and on and I keep thinking eventually something has to crack him, something has to go wrong....but nothing
Years go by and I am still following him closely but I have now become a fan of golf in general. I still follow Tiger but closely watch everyone else and admire their abilities because even on my greatest day of golf I would never be able to beat them on their worst day playing one handed, from the tips, blindfolded. Tiger's legend and mystique are still climbing at an astounding rate and their are rumors he is dating Jesper Parnevik's nanny. A little Swedish blonde named Elin Nordegren. What's that? Oh you want a picture of this Elin?? Ok, if you insist.
You are welcome. Back to the story. Yeah, he ends up marrying that. Her! Could it get any better? Maybe she will be like Yoko Ono and break up his game and bring him down. Maybe she will be the one who finally breaks him. Alas, his game just got stronger. Then his father died. His father, the man who was his hero, his mentor(hmmmmmmm), the man who taught Tiger about the game of golf. Surely this is what would break him, this is what would crush his world and he would come back down to Earth. Nope. He took a month or so off and continued right where he left off. Having a kid? Nope. Having another kid? Nope. Tearing his knee up causing him to miss almost an entire year of golf? Nope he just dominated again this year. What could possibly break this man?
Apparently all it takes is a "gorgeous" woman or women that is not his wife because apparently he loves that more then golf. Now unless you have been in some 3rd world country or were doing your best imitation of Jane Goodall we all know what happened. The crash, the surgery, the golf club, the speculation, TMZ, Rachel Uchitel, abandoned press conferences, Jaimee Grubbs, Kalika Moquin, Jamie Jungers, Cori Rist, Holly Sampson, Joslyn James, Loredana Jolie, Julie Postle, Theresa Rogers, Elin kicking Tiger out, Elin taking the kids and moving to Sweden and it just keeps on going.
Yes that was 10 different women not named Elin Nordegren. As fast as his popularity grew over the years it all came crashing down in a matter of a couple of days. His perfect image is forever tarnished and he will never be viewed the same way again. His sponsors are even bailing off this bandwagon/cash cow. I sit here trying to think of words to describe what goes through my head every time I hear a Tiger Woods story. Disgust? Disappointment? Confusion? He is the reason I started watching golf. He is the reason a lot and I mean A LOT of people started watching golf. It's the same feeling I had while watching the steroid stories being dug up about McGwire and Sosa and how they cheated during that amazing chase of Maris during the summer of '98. Those two guys rekindled my love for baseball after I had lived overseas for a couple years. Just utter disappointment I guess.
I mean Elin is gone. Long gone. Content with collecting that $300 mill from him and moving her kids back to Sweden to be with her family. Now what does he do? Does he take a page out of the old David Letterman book and just go right back to what he does best? That's golf people not 20 year old pancake waitresses. Tiger should get out their and golf and win some tournaments. Get the writers, fans and sponsors talking about something else besides what happened this holiday season and hopefully his life can get back to some form of "normalcy".
In the mean time I am going to finish watching this Fiesta Bowl with these Horny Toads and the Boise State bell girl.
MORE COWBELL!!
