By Pete McDaniel
Freelance Writer
They said he was washed up. They said he would never win again—not even a regular PGA Tour event; forget about a major championship.
They said he should retire, put away his Nike swoosh and terminate his quest to surpass Sam Snead’s record 82 Tour wins and Jack Nicklaus’ 18 major championships.
Of course, they were talking about Tiger Woods, who this past Sunday captured the season-ending Tour Championship by two strokes over a field that included most of the highly-ranked Europeans and Americans competing in the Ryder Cup in Paris this week.
The victory, Tiger’s 80th on the Tour, was his first in five years. During much of that time, he struggled not only with health issues (four back surgeries, including a successful spinal fusion) that facilitated the use of potent painkillers but also with a perceived dependency on the pain meds.
In addition, there were the ever-present demons that dogged Tiger’s life inside and outside the ropes; among them a sex scandal that tarnished his reputation and precipitated a costly divorce.
In the interim, they (talking heads, writers, swing coaches, golf legends and social media pundits) piled on. Shamefully, some of them were formerly on Tiger’s payroll.
Et tu, Brute?
It’s one thing to base your criticism on knowledge and insight. It’s another to use it to settle a score. It’s called pettiness. Believe me, a lot of Tiger’s most ardent critics secretly applauded his fall from grace and the potential end of his career, viewing them as a comeuppance for his arrogance and inaccessibility.
Ironically, some of these same folk benefitted financially from Tiger’s success. Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.
Ever wonder why, through all of Tiger’s various adversities, you rarely if ever heard a fellow player currently lining his pockets with the Brinks truck of cash that Tiger’s success has brought to the Tour, criticize Tiger? Because Tiger is not only the G.O.A.T (greatest of all time) he’s the goose that laid the golden egg. And the other players know it.
As I walked inside the ropes with Tiger this past week at East Lake Golf Club, I was reminded of our first meeting. It was in 1994, a little more than a year after I had left the Hendersonville (NC) Times-News for Golf World Magazine. Tiger had won the first of three consecutive U.S. Amateur Championships and taken his talents to Stanford University.
Tiger was being named the magazine’s “Man of the Year,’’ and I had been dispatched to Stanford to interview the golf phenomenon.
We met at Stanford’s golf course. Tiger greeted me with a huge smile and a firm handshake. Reluctant to provide detailed answers to my questions, he simply replied “yes’’, “no’’ or “what do you mean by that?’’ After reading me like a putt and deciding he had the correct breakdown, Tiger began to give me very insightful answers.
From that interview and subsequent cover story, I landed a gig as the co-author of Earl Woods’ bestselling book “Training A Tiger.’’ As we celebrated the book’s success, Earl said with a smile, “Young blood you’ll forever be connected to the Woods.’’
He was right.
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I am blessed to have traveled the world following Tiger and recording his history-making career. I’ve been there through his successes and failures; his rise and fall and rise again. I’ve held my tongue when colleagues criticized him. I’ve also battled them verbally in his defense.
Through it all, I’ve learned never to be amazed at Tiger’s ability to amaze. He is that exception to the rule.
His comeback from the depths of depression, humiliation and fear of finality is not surprising to those of us who know the depths of his resolve.
I’ve also learned about “them.’’ Most critics never take into account the measure of the man or woman.
The moral of this story? Never take what “they’’ say as the gospel, for “they’’ know not of what they speak.
ABOUT PETE McDANIEL
Pete McDaniel is a veteran golf writer and best-selling author. His blogs and books are available at petemcdaniel.com
Comments on this topic may be emailed directly to Pete at: gdmcd@aol.com or visit his Facebook page.
