Tiger Woods free essay sample

Tiger came onto the scene at such a young age and stayed in the spotlight because of his uncanny ability to play golf at such a ridiculously young age. After his putting competition against comedian Bob Hope, after turning three Tiger went on to shoot a 48 over a nine hole span on a local course. Now for people who are not a fan of golf, the average professional golfer would shoot around a 35 through a nine hole span. Then you have your average golfer who would happily take Tiger’s score anytime they go out to play nine holes. So for him to be doing something of this nature at that age is more then remarkable. Listing his golfing accomplishments prior to attending college would take quite some time but the amazing thing is that it would not compare to the list he has piled up since turning pro and joining the PGA tour. Tiger went to play golf at the University of Stanford. He eventually turned pro after just two years at Stanford, clearly before graduating. This move by Tiger was very perplexing because from what we know his family seemed like the type that would expect Tiger to not just go to college to play golf but also to earn a degree. This is why many people believed he chose Stanford was for the reason of an education along with the opportunity to play golf at such a prestigious school. We saw though, from the moment Tiger entered his first major championship he was not meant to be spending his time in college, he needed to be out competing against the best of the best. Little did we know that the best of the best was his truly. Tiger went on to capture his first major championship in his first attempt at the 1997 Masters. The highly coveted green jacket belonged to a young Tiger Woods. This seemed to be his only accomplishment on the golf course throughout the next two years. He ended up bouncing back in 1999 to win another major but it wasn’t until 2000 when he burst out onto the scene and took the golfing nation by storm. He went on to win the final three majors of the year then in 2001 after winning the masters he became the first player in PGA history to hold all four major championships at the same time. It was then, people started to think that we may have the next Jack Nicklaus right before our eyes. Jack Nicklaus holds the record for the most major championships ever won with a total of 18. A lot of people started to put this expectation on Tiger that he was going to break this record and become the greatest golfer to have ever played. Tiger had a very interesting and dissected relationship with his father. I noted to it earlier how Earl Woods passion for the game of golf is the reason we are lucky enough to have the opportunity to watch his son Tiger dominate the golf scene. Throughout his career Tiger always talked about how his dad was his best friend, role model, mentor, all of it. He didn’t think higher of anybody. When Tiger found out that his dad had been cheating on his mom it devastated him. His high school sweetheart talks about how he would call her in the middle of night before he went off to college crying about how his dad was cheating on his mom and he didn’t know what he should do. Although his father later admitted to his acts of adultery and his parents eventually split. Tiger’s relationship with his dad never seemed to falter. His dad was still out there with him on the course just as much as he had been before all of the personal matters had taken place. Before his father passed it was hard to imagine Tiger Woods as this iconic superstar. It didn’t seem like he would be able to succeed the way he had since he arrived on the tour unless his father was there. Earl kept Tiger in line. It goes with the common saying that Earl was Tiger’s rock. After every victory he had, Tiger would walk up to his dad and the two would embrace in a hug that would make any father jealous of the relationship these two shared. With him, he couldn’t be fazed but the question was always asked, what is Tiger’s persona going to be like once his dad is gone? Will he still be the same dominate golfer that he is today that looks to have this killer instinct look in his eyes every time he steps out onto the golf course. Earl passed away in the year 2006. It was just a few years after his passing did we see the unraveling of Tiger Woods. In the 2008, Tiger suffered a knee injury that would eventually force him to put a halt on his golfing career for the rest of the calendar year. However, he did not surrender to this injury before pulling off arguably one of his greatest victories of his career. Tiger went on to win the US Open in dramatic playoff where he was essentially hobbling around the course on one leg, pulling off miraculous shot after miraculous shot. The US Open takes place in the beginning of July, yet a few months later on thanksgiving weekend it wasn’t his golf game that was grabbing the national spotlight, it was his personal life. With five weeks remaining in the aughts, pre-teens, double zeroes or whatever we end up ca lling the 2000s, the title for Biggest Sports Story of the Decade was up for grabs. Michael Vick? Tim Donaghy? The Mitchell report? The Artest melee? Barry Bonds? Pat Tillman? Eagle, Colo.? Roger Clemens? Andre Agassis admission that he won Wimbledon with a weave? You could have made a case for any of them. And then Tiger happened. It was early Friday morning, the day after thanksgiving where Tiger Woods life took a major turn for the worse. We woke up to the news that day that the untouchable Tiger Woods was involved in a minor car crash where he ran into a fire hydrant and then into a tree. This story which at the time seemed so minor and innocent was just beginning to unfold. After first hearing of this one would think that it would be a little strange for one of the country’s most polarizing sports figures to be going for a drive after 2:00 am. Once the police report became public that is when things started to seem â€Å"not right† so to speak. The report goes onto say that after Woods had ran into a fire hydrant and struck a tree he was found unconscious laying on the ground outside of his car. Then we came to hear that his wife at the time, Elin had come to Tiger’s rescue by smashing out the back window of their Cadillac with one of his golf clubs to help free him from the car. Now after initially hearing this one could think of a million reasons onto why this happened and whether or not there was an underlying factor that led to this mysterious late night accident that left the world’s best golfer with lacerations to his face and lips. This story had taken on a life of its own. As time went on it seemed as though there was more and more reason to believe that something was going on that we didn’t know about that transpired in which led to the eventual accident that night. The next aspect that seemed odd was when Tiger started avoiding his interview with local authorities. We start to think why would you be avoiding the police unless you are trying to hide something? Shortly after the rumors surrounding Tiger Woods didn’t just escalate they took on a mind of their own. Woman after woman started coming out saying that they had been having a sexual relationship with Mr. Woods. These women ranged from cocktail waitresses all the way to adult film stars. It is hard to put an exact number of the amount of women who actually came forward claiming that they had some sort of sexual encounter or relationship with the infamous golfer. In today’s world where the internet and social media tools like facebook and twitter have taken over the media it is near impossible for a celebrity or star athlete to keep their life a secret. However, for some reason the media was never really able to reach or find Tiger outside of the golf course. He was rarely seen in public besides the occasional appearance where him, his wife and two children were seen taking a leisurely stroll in the neighborhood. We spent 12 years following a guy we didnt know at all. We had little to no connection to someone who was better at golf than we were at anything. We checked tournaments on Saturdays and Sundays thinking one thing: How is Tiger doing? We invested an inordinate amount of time supporting someone who made it clear that he didnt care about us unless we were buying one of the products he endorsed. He was fine with the arrangement, and so were we. We got to watch him play golf. He got the trophies, the trophy wife and the spoils. Everyone was happy. So for a man of this stature to be able to keep something this big to a secret that almost nobody knew about besides a few people in his inner circle is unfathomable. We see famous people always getting caught doing some sort of thing that gives them a bad reputation in the public eye. For Tiger, who was apparently sleeping with more women then we could imagine and for no one to be able to find this out or capture a photo on their phone of this guy with another woman that wasn’t his wife just doesn’t seem possible with all the technology that people use today. I remember when the big incident happened and that entire week after it happened there were news crews, paparazzi, everybody in the media world, staking out outside of Tiger’s gated community that led to his home. For days all that the media could do was speculate on the situation and try to make a story out of nothing, and the last resort news outlets could make was attempting to get one of these woman who had claimed to have had slept with Tiger to do an on camera interview. The time had finally come where one of countries most polarizing figures and for the most part a popular role model for all kids had become the talk of every Christmas party, and they were not talking about his exceptional golf game. This story had grown so quickly that you would think that it couldn’t get any worse, but that was the problem after every new revelation came out it seemed as though this story was still in the beginning stages. There was so much information to find out that people tried digging as deep as they could to find dirt on America’s most beloved golfer. Everyone was aware of the story that was taking shape. Even if it was just you and a friend talking about it there was always other people chiming in with something like â€Å"did you hear about this? † or â€Å"I heard that †¦Ã¢â‚¬  and so on. The story of the decade was taking place in the last month of the decade. It was a while until we actually heard from Tiger Woods. After three months of silence form the golfer we were finally given the chance to hear the golfer speak. He held a press conference that following February, he apologized for his actions, had his mom sitting in the front row, and after he gave his written up speech he took no questions and walked away from the podium. The next big question facing Tiger was when was he going to return to the golf course. Well we found this out shortly after his press conference that he was going to make a return. In typical Tiger Woods fashion he announced that he was going to return on the biggest stage of course. The Masters, where he first burst out onto the scene in 1997. Now remember the incident happened at the end of November but due to an injury Tiger hadn’t competed since July when he had that courageous playoff victory that brought home his 13th major championship. And at that time it wasn’t a question of â€Å"if† but only a matter of â€Å"when† he was going to break Jack’s record of 18 major championships. Now the question was being asked if Tiger would ever be Tiger again after all this drama in his personal life had taken place. Nobody really knew what to expect from him once he stepped back onto the golf course. The golf experts would tell you that after almost a year away from the sport could just step back onto one of the toughest courses in the country and expect to be able to compete. But we are talking about arguably the greatest golfer to have ever lived here. So again nobody really knew what to expect. When he stepped back onto the course in mid April, he wasn’t the best golfer on the course, he was rusty but the best golfer of our generation is still one of the best even when he is rusty. Tiger eventually went on to place third at the masters. This to the public and golf experts everywhere looked at as a positive and would call it remarkable for him to be able to compete at that level. Only Tiger himself would be disappointed for falling short of the elusive green jacket. It is safe to say that 2009 was not Tiger’s best year on the PGA tour. He failed to make cuts, withdrew from tournaments due to injury although most think it was just because of how poorly he was playing. The guy had taken one of if the not the biggest falls from grace in memory. Before the scandal broke out Tiger Woods was a global icon with sponsorships all over the world. He was making usually about 90 million dollars a year in endorsements alone. Even during his best days on the golf course he usually only brought in about 10 million dollars a year from golf winnings. This goes to show you how important his sponsorships were for him. He had been the top grossing sports athlete for many years in a row now. Once the scandal hit then all the rumors that started following him after he started to lose his sponsorships by the hour. After it was all said and done and by the time he was back on the golf course Tiger had lost virtually every sponsorship he had over the past five years. His biggest sponsor Nike was one of the few who stood by their guy and kept him on as part of the team. There are several factors that I am sure led to Nike’s decision to keep him on the team but you have to imagine it is almost like they felt an obligation to keep this guy as a spokes person for their company because of what he did for Nike golf. First of all, there was no Nike golf department before Tiger Woods. For example, it would be like if Michael Jordan was to do something similar to Tiger where everyone’s opinion changed about the man for the worse. Nike couldn’t just drop the man who took their company to the level that it is today. Without Michael Jordan who knows where Nike would be today. He built their company for them. Obviously the situation is somewhat different but both athletes helped make Nike what it is today and without them their success would not be where it is today. I believe they felt a sense of entitlement to stand by him because of what he had done for the company and they knew this wasn’t the end of Tiger Woods. They knew he would be back on the course and be under the microscope of the camera every chance they could get. So maybe from the start of Tiger’s comeback it wasn’t always the best publicity but I can guarantee you there was no other sports figure at the time getting more attention or publicity from every type of media than the man himself. When the man stepped back on the golf course I know his camp and Tiger himself both were hoping that it would drive away all the negative attention that had been following him since the eerie Friday morning. But the golfer was now under the watch of public eye more then ever before. The attention he was getting on a national scale back in 2001 and 2002 when he was starting the peak of his career was nothing compared to what he was going to face after going back and returning to the golf course. His life had changed forever, as long as he was still out their competing in the sport of golf. Every time he entered a tournament he dominated the headlines of the tournament no matter how good or how bad he was doing. It would make the lead story on broadcast like ESPN. The headline would either go as follows, â€Å"Tiger jumps out to an early lead on day one. Will he be able to keep this up and grab his first victory since the accident? † Then on the other side of the spectrum if he was playing poorly the headline would read as follows, â€Å"Tiger struggles again, will he ever regain his dominate form that he has before the accident? † Tiger knew that the only way to rid this talk about whether he was back or if he would ever come back to where he use to be was to go out on the course and finally grab that first victory since the 2009 US Open. The road back to victory was not as easy as it had been before the scandal had erupted. So much speculation over those two years went into if he had just lost his competitive fire or drive that we had become so accustom to see on Sunday afternoons or if he was still not fully recovered from the scandal and he just couldn’t get his mind right to where he could play the kind of golf he had always been use to playing. Whatever the issue was we finally saw him break out of his slump, two years after his return to the golf course. But there it was again, the two questions that were asked almost every time we saw Tiger step back onto the golf course. â€Å"Does this mean he is back? † â€Å"Has Tiger regained his form that he had before the scandal? † As someone who is a big sports fan and watches a lot of sports television shows. I can reassure you that these questions were always being asked and television channels like ESPN would never take the spotlight off of this man. I see a lot of similarities in how the media portrays and dissects the two most popular and largely discussed sports figures of this era. I am talking about Tiger Woods and Lebron James. When Lebron decided to announce to the nation that he planned to leave his former team the Cleveland Cavaliers and join forces with a few buddies down in south beach. The guy came under scrutiny just as fast as Tiger Woods did during the time of his scandal. For that following season it seemed as though Lebron and the Miami Heat would take criticism on a nightly basis. They would fill up the headlines on ESPN literally on a night to night basis. In both situations although they were done under different circumstances, the question was the same. When were they going to win the big one? It took Lebron two years but now after this past year, the scrutiny that he faces is nothing compared to what he dealt with in those first two seasons on the Heat but now that he has captured an NBA championship, the nightly scrutiny that he faced has practically disappeared. I would only imagine that once Tiger is able to snag his first major since the scandal broke out that all the questions that swirl around him will finally begin to come to a halt. We are now in 2013 and Tiger Woods has been actively competing on the tour since he returned in 2009. The man has one a few tournaments here and there and has plenty of top ten finishes over the past couple years which have pushed him back into the spot of the world’s number one golfer. Yet, he is still out their chasing that much needed 14th major championship. To help Tiger’s case out he has finished in the top ten in almost every major over the past couple years. Although if you know Tiger you know that nothing matters to him besides winning. Most golfers our ecstatic to get a top ten finish at a major championship. Not only is it something to be proud of but you get a nice paycheck. Plus, sponsorships will be coming after you like crazy to get their logo on your polo for next week’s tournament. This is Tiger Woods we are talking about here though. He doesn’t keep track of second or third place finishes. The man is a born winner. Plain and simple. I guess we have Earl Woods to thank for that.