Not yet out of the Woods!

The latest scandal to hit the sporting world concerns Tiger Woods and his tumultuous private life.

With all the salacious details of his secret trysts and rendezvous with a bevy of beauties making the press rounds and bar-room conversations, Tiger is just one among  the long list of heroes (our modern day demi-gods)  who have been shown to have feet of clay. Like many before, (e.g. Beckham and Shane Warne), once the shit hits the fan, the fan keeps whirling and soon the whole room is full of crap!

But before we dwell on Tiger’s indiscretions, let us first note his sporting prowess! Together with Federer, he is the among the best sportsmen of this generation, in any individual sport. With his 14 Slams and Federer’s 15, they both epitomise sporting excellence at its very best. There are perhaps, arguably other contenders but those are in team sports; individual sporting excellence belongs in a separate category and is of a superior pedigree.

Perhaps, there is an argument here that team sportspersons are better family men! But Shane Warne and Beckham are posits against that argument! So no, there’s no likelihood that that hypothesis is ever going to be proved true! Sounds more like a canard to me!

The latest news flash states that Elin, his wife, insists that he now spend more time with family and put golf on the back-burner. That would be an immense shame because we are unlikely to see such grace and power on a golf course for a very long time. Before Tiger, golf was the white man’s last sporting bastion but Tiger with his powerful driving stormed this citadel and crowned himself the unchallenged prince of the sport.

Tiger is said to have numerous trysts with long-legged beauties and also solicited ‘ladies of the night’. For some weird reason, it seems to be less of  crime or sin to have been a solicitor ; its just a transaction and then its done with no complications. Anyway, that does not , in my opinion, make it less of a reason for censure. It just seems a weird distortion of justice that something transacted so casually and coldly is a more pardonable offense! Maybe that’s just my middle class morality or my Catholic upbringing, but it just seems a warped sense of values there!

So what next for Tiger? Will we see him on the golf links again? I certainly hope so! If any golfer in history deserves to go past the ‘Great Bear’, Jack Nicklaus, it is certainly Tiger Woods. No , Tiger may not be out of the woods, but for the glory and beauty of golf, he should be soon!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/12/sports/golf/12woods.html?th&emc=th