Tiger's Indefinite Leave, Vol. I've Lost Track
Even TMZ sounds skeptical about the latest report that Tiger is shacked up at the Trump International Plaza and thankfully no major media outlets picked up on the...wait, what is that, reader Tom? Oh, CBS reported it during halftime of the Cowboys game?
Maybe they saw the flight data posted by Stephanie Wei? Or they just really, really trust TMZ nowadays?
Thanks to reader Mel for David Paisie's calm, cool and collected analysis of Tiger's muscle gains and association with Dr. Anthony Galea. No new revelations and only a basic grasp of the facts, but it is a plausible explanation why it's fair to ask questions about what transpired over the last few years.
Most reactions by both fans and media to date regarding this subject matter, in my opinion, have not been very rational and, in most cases, totally biased.
Further stated in the article, Tiger’s Las Vegas-based trainer, Keith Kleven, said Tiger was working out five to six days a week with weights.
I read elsewhere at about the same time, I think in Golf Digest, that Tiger also runs, hits practice balls, and plays at least 18 holes of golf, as well, on these five or six days.
Kleven went on to say in the article that Tiger’s lifting was “off the charts” and that he had a much higher endurance to high reps then seen in most golfers.
Kleven would not mention specific amounts lifted, but did share that Tiger had recently reached new highs. Kleven went on to say the following: “Pound for pound, I put him with any athlete around.”
Most weight lifters don't lift anywhere near six days a week. Tiger's trainer, in the article, basically admitted that much by saying he didn’t know why most other athletes only lifted two or three days a week.
Playing golf, hitting balls, running, and lifting weights that much in a week would certainly lead to sore muscles and sore joints.
I am amazed if Tiger or anyone could do this constantly without seeking something to help to ease the soreness and swelling and to increase recovery time.
Harvey Araton in a front Sports page NY Times "analysis" says "Digitalization is the watch word for sports industry power brokers and planners" who worry that "a fast-changing home viewing experience — 3D television, in particular — could make pro sports more of a studio event than a public spectacle. Others wonder if sports could be the new decade’s print news media, reconditioning consumers with online alternatives that diminish traditional revenue streams."
The general topic of the future and athletics pushing the edge led to this summation:
Assuming athletes are better protected, will they continue to surreptitiously endanger themselves in the interests of seeking an edge? Irvin and Hiemstra agree that by 2020, the steroids scandals of the decade past will be history as we move toward the age of biogenetics. The first decade of the 21st century will have served as a performance-enhancement primer, the term becoming less of a pejorative, as advancements in technology fundamentally change the discussion.
“By 2020, people will think of performance enhancement the way we look at Lasik eye surgery or a hip replacement,” Irvin said.
Will history, then, be kinder to those now shamed? Will future fans even have the time or inclination to emotionally invest themselves in celebrity athletes, or will Woods’s fall from grace be recalled as a breaking point?
Richard Lapchick, a University of Central Florida professor and longtime sports industry watchdog, said no matter how technocratic the world became, past would always be prologue.
“There’s no question that O. J. Simpson was revered on television and in movies, but after the death of his wife, people said, that’s it, athletes can’t be heroes anymore,” he said. “We always seem at some point to come back.”
That’s the good news — or the bad news — for Tiger Woods, provided he’s still in our 3D 2020 purview.
Kevin Robbins reports having seen ESPN's first Masters preview and guess who isn't prominently featured?
Can you say Cuba Gooding to play Tiger Woods in a TV movie?
And finally, in yet another sign this story has hit rock bottom, windbag extraordinaire Brit Hume weighs in on how Tiger can rehab his life and image.
Sunday, January 3, 2010 at 09:06 PM
Reader Comments (52)
(PS - I couldn't agree with you more.)
Very good.
Putmedownfora6,
You're right.
Not that it is going to change anything.
Some people spout nonsense not because they have thought deeply about the matter at hand but because they think they are being fashionable and their peers will approve. That seems quite commonplace among "liberals."
Indeed, Hume has a right to suggest Tiger seek redemption (or whatever else the mystical Wizard of Oz can do for him). However, his pulpit for such a recommendation IS NOT NETWORK TELEVISION!!! While the right to practice whatever religion one chooses is sacrilege and constitutionally protected, the right to spew your "brand" and your "advice" on federally-dissemenated airwaves is not and, as such, should relegated to a blog, a column, or another venue.
Hume used to be a decent reporter, but like so many over the past few years of willful ignorance and cable stupidity, has strayed here.
FWIW...I think Tiger will need much more than the advice of "good Christians" and other god-fearing evangelists. He's going to need really good lawyers and eventually doctors.......men of arts and sciences!
The Emperors' remarks were hardly the type to be described as "fashionable," nor seeking "peer approval." I know this man and he's anything but impetuous or shallow of thought. He truly believes Brit Hume is a babbling........
In fact, I suspect there are as many people who agree with him as there are those who decry liberals for any disbelief in their system of philosophical upstanding and right-wing civil thought. Get used to it that the truth and consensus lies somewhere much closer to the middle.
The FCC does retain regulatory control over the cable and network broadcasting spectrum. The mere fact that your receive your signal by cable or satellite doesn't remove certain forms of federal jurisdiction.
Big K,
Don't forget how well it works, at present, for John Ensign, Larry Craig, or David Vitter!!!
if hume is truly interested in being closer to god and being forgiven, he should abandon his christian faith and try buddhism. my impression of christianity is that doe not offer the closeness to god and forgiveness that buddhism does. how's that?
even if hume's advice was in good faith, it's ridiculous. he is advocating that a person who has a religion and finds himself in trouble should shop around until he finds another religion that offers the most of whatever it is he seeks. speaking as a kid educated in jesuit schools, to my mind that's not faith, it's consumerism. would hume counsel tiger to switch back to buddhism once he has gotten all that christian forgiveness, in order to partake of buddhism's meditation practices to sooth his troubled mind?
Who knew that disliking Brit Hume's style--which I'd lump in with other windbags like Tom Brokaw, Dan Rather and Peter Jennings--was political? You guys need to get out more.
A brief review of history demonstrates the millions of deaths and destruction it has caused. . .
What is the weather forecast for Kapalua this week? Call Rolfing and see if the "trade winds" are up or down?
I was Tom.
I see that now somebody else is Tom. That's the Tom that got Geoff's attention.
I thought of changing my moniker to avoid confusion. But now I think it might be fun to have a split personality on these comment boards.
Who knows, maybe one of us Toms is a liberal and the other a conservative. We could have our own inter-Tom flame war.
Why didn't Hume suggest Tiger to read the Koran and convert to Islam? Tiger wouldn't be able to keep his head or his pecker, that's the best reason why!
What loads of crap.
Theological belief can get so strong that religious people want to impose their theories in matters that should be secular. I like the idea that we are free to worship as we please but can't let it intrude in state matters. For many examples of what happens when the two are entwined, just cruise the Middle East.
Oh, and dbcooper, the entire right wing of American politics "spouts nonsense not because they have thought deeply about the matter at hand but because they think they are being fashionable and their peers will approve." Examples: Bill Kristol, Newt Gingrich, Dick Armey, Rush Limbaugh, Tom Delay, John Boehner, Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage. But then "truthiness" is their stock in trade. As for the other side, I'm right proud to say that we in the reality-based community do have our lunatic fringe. But we have yet to give them the keys to the car. Not only are the above driving the GOP bus, they have driven it, and the rest of us along with them, into an abyss.
So, who's going to win at Kapalua this week? I predict it will be Phil. Oh, wait...
i think it'll be ak. he plays well every other year, right?
There is no FUN in Fun-damentalist Christianity or otherwise. hahahahaha
Yeah, that was my reaction too. Its great that Hume thinks Jesus is the answer and if wants to encourage someone to find Jesus, then whatever. But, making random blather about other religions is perhaps a bit too far. What if he had said "Tiger needs to hang out with more white people because they win more golf tournaments", I think we would agree that kind of statement would be over the line. Bashing his belief system (or perceived system, since I've never until this thread thought about Tiger's religion for even two miliseconds), is over the line as well.
Just kidding... :-)
I guess the question that I liked was one that I saw repeated in a number of comments throughout the blogoshpere; "Would it have been more acceptable/less offensive for Brit Hume to have suggested to Tiger that he needs psychiatric care, or sex addiction counseling? If so, why?"
My response to that question would be:
If someone is proposing to get out the crystals and 'heal' him then it's equally pontifical, irrelevant and insulting, but if someone is proposing to work within a physiological dimension using experience and skill then it's pretty acceptable to me.
That still leaves the unanswered question, however, of how the hell we got onto this in a sports panel round table.