Not Everyone Is Ecstatic Over Tiger Woods’ Win

Tiger Woods’ Masters victory was justifiably front-page news just about everywhere. He is simply the straw that stirs golf and no one, I mean no one in the sport possesses the rapt attention Woods attracts–even the other top-10 golfers combined. Thus, at least for us in the golf biz, a healthy and competitive Tiger is the best possible scenario for all.

However, not everyone is celebrating Tiger’s mind-boggling return to the major winner’s circle. The win is not a necessary strength deodorant to wipe away the stench of his reckless indiscretions. ESPN’s Sarah Spain writes a thought-provoking article about her mixed feelings regarding Tiger’s 5th Green Jacket. Thank you to the Ticket’s Craig Miller for the tip.

I made it all morning keeping my qualms to myself, until right around Tiger’s tee shot on the 16th hole. He’d just taken over the lead, and supporters were out in full force on my Twitter timeline. What struck me was not the happiness they felt in watching him pull off a miraculous return to the top — that was to be expected — but rather their demand that everyone else feel the same way.

“If you’re not pulling for this guy today, you are heartless,” one user tweeted at me.

This all felt very familiar. Every fan thinks his or her team’s win is the greatest achievement on earth, but Tiger fans have been uniquely unforgiving when it comes to dissenting opinions about their guy. For years, I’ve been shouted down for even mentioning that a return to the top of the leaderboard might not be as wholly redemptive as some would suggest. The injuries, surgeries and doubts about his future are a massive part of Tiger’s comeback tale, but there are some people, myself included, who won’t easily forget the rest of his downward spiral.This all felt very familiar. Every fan thinks his or her team’s win is the greatest achievement on earth, but Tiger fans have been uniquely unforgiving when it comes to dissenting opinions about their guy. For years, I’ve been shouted down for even mentioning that a return to the top of the leaderboard might not be as wholly redemptive as some would suggest. The injuries, surgeries and doubts about his future are a massive part of Tiger’s comeback tale, but there are some people, myself included, who won’t easily forget the rest of his downward spiral.

Ever since his tabloid-fronting heel turn from beloved superstar and family man to troubled philanderer in 2009, I’ve struggled to separate my feelings about Tiger the man from my feelings about Tiger the golfer. Plenty of professional athletes cheat on their wives, but rarely do we have the intimate details of the ways in which that marital trust is broken. In the case of Tiger, we heard reports about an array of women, including sex workers, a VIP host in Las Vegas, an adult film star and a server who used to wait on him and his wife at Perkins diner. We learned of unprotected sex, prescription drug abuse, a rehab stay for sex addiction and, as recently as 2017, an arrest on suspicion of driving under the influence of Vicodin, Dilaudid, Xanax, Ambien and THC.

People deserve second chances, and the ability to recover from rock bottom and find success again is admirable, but a return to the winner’s circle can’t erase the pain and suffering of the people hurt along the way. I find myself feeling deeply empathetic toward his ex-wife Elin Nordegren, imagining what those months and years must have been like. Knowing how some of my own friends have been affected by infidelity in their parents’ marriages, I wonder what Tiger’s children may face in their own future romantic relationships. Some don’t care about these things when they choose which athletes to root for, and I try not to begrudge them that, but I won’t accept the directive that we all must feel that way.

After Tiger won, one Twitter user wrote, “If you’re not crying, you’re not human.”