Tiger Woods

[Don Wassall]

In ditzy Johnny Miller's book that came out a few years ago, he wrote that he thought Woods had already peaked. Many black athletes decline early; to the extent that Woods has Negro genes it's something to consider.


All I know is that The Masters is next week. Can't wait!

 

[Bart]

Don, read this column andlet me know if you think Wetzel has been reading our Nicklaus-Woods discussions.


[url]http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/pga/news;_ylt=Asrhd1hetDmNRW1gO 5nRmHY5nYcB?slug=dw-tigerrival040808&prov=yhoo&type= lgns[/url]


Tiger misses what Arnie, Nicklaus had: Rivals

 

[Don Wassall]

Bart, I like this quote from that article:


"Arnie was reckless, he gambled, his swing looked like your swing or my swing," O'Connor said. "He was the anti-Jack."


This may be heresy to some but I don't think Palmer would win anywhere near the 60+ victories he had in his day if he was playing now. He would be just another very good player on tour. Same with the rest of Jack's rivals. They would be today's Mickelson, Singh and Els. The field is way too deep in quality and quantity now. Jack would be Tiger's rival and everyone else would be significantly below those two.


I also like this quote from Shaun Powell today: "Given that Tiger is looking sharp and breathing hard on Nicklaus' career record of 18 professional majors won, this is good for golf, right? Well, yeah, in a sense. When he's making shots that we can only dream of doing, and showing up big on Sundays, and punching the sky, it's mesmerizing stuff. Folks stop and stare for a reason. He's a once-in-a-lifetime player who's probably better at what he does than anyone is at what they do. "


http://www.newsday.com/sports/columnists/ny-sppow0409,0,1061 322.column


So now he's not just the best golfer in the world but the best person in the world. That's the one fringe benefit if Woods keeps going like he has of late -- enjoying the Caste mongers trying to come up with ever more ridiculous superlatives to describe their hero. President of the World some day? Don't bet against it.


But hopefully, his 2008 and beyond doesn't come close to matching what's almost unanimously being predicted for him. Nicklaus' record for majors shouldn't be handed to Woodsjust yet.Edited by: Don Wassall

 

[Solomon Kane]

Immelman and Mickelson are looking good...let's keep them in our prayers. If Phil can get back on track with yet another major that will be an incredible confidence booster.

 

[Menelik]

I really don't follow the game but I had no idea that Tiger was this important to golf:

No golf without Tiger!Edited by: Menelik

 

[Bart]

I really don't follow the game but I had no idea that Tiger was this important to golf:

No golf without Tiger!

Quote from article:


It's one thing for Zach Johnson and Trevor Immelman to win the Masters in back-to-back years. It's quite another for the Johnsons and Immelmans of the world to carry a faceless tour of grinders from stop to stop, pulling their baseball caps over their eyes and boring everyone to tears with a mind-numbing procession of pars.

 

[White Shogun]

I really don't follow the game but I had no idea that Tiger was this important to golf: No golf without Tiger!

Quote from article:


It's one thing for Zach Johnson and Trevor Immelman to win the Masters in back-to-back years. It's quite another for the Johnsons and Immelmans of the world to carry a faceless tour of grinders from stop to stop, pulling their baseball caps over their eyes and boring everyone to tears with a mind-numbing procession of pars.

I hate to say it, but I agree with this writer's assessment. Except I find watching Tiger Woods play golf as mind-numbing as any other player. It's one thing to play it, when you can drive the cart recklessly down the sidewalk while drinking a beer and making fun of your friend's poor play, but watching golf.. that's something else altogether. Never have been able to be more than idly interested in watching people play golf, at best.

No offense to all the golf-o'files here at Castefootball.

 

[Don Wassall]

There's two large articles centered around Woods in today's Las Vegas Review Journal sports section, or one more than usual. The first is by Tim Dahlberg, who is carried nationally by AP. PGA Commissioner Tim Finchem and others want golf to become an Olympic sport beginning in 2016 (it was discontinued after the 1904 Games). Dahlberg is against it, primarily because Tiger Woods, in all his 32 years of accumulated wisdom, opposes it. Case closed.


The other article is headlined "Woods' Surgery Creates Buzz on Tour," and is filled with quotes from different players at this week's tournament on Woods' knee operation. The obvious question to me is, Is there a"buzz" among the players because they are talking among themselves about nothing else, or because this is the only thing the media is asking them about. My hunch is, to the extent they talk about Woods to each other, it's with more than a bit of sarcasm and feigned reverence.

 

[DixieDestroyer]

That "Corporate Sports Report" on the CF homepage is absolutely hilarious (yet very accurate)!

However, I'd add that everytime the camera flashes to the gallery (when Tigers up to swing/putt, etc.), all the drunken white/caste-con'd fans are swooning over their god. That has always made me sick.

BTW, speaking of Tiger worshipping caste media, a local radio station here in Atlanta (WSB) had a quick snippet yesterday on Tiger's knee surgery...basically implying he didn't win/dominate the Masters solely because of his knee.

 

[Don Wassall]

With the future President of the World now done for the year with continuing knee problems, it's a win-win situation for the Caste media. Updates and speculation on the sacred knee will be constantly discussed as the number one topic for the rest of 2008 and beyond, while the winner(s) of the final two majors will be "tainted" because Woods isn't participating, as the announcers and pundits are sure to incessantly remind everyone. Maybe Tim Finchem will decree that an asterisk be placed beside their names.


Interesting isn't it that in this revolting era of media hounding of celebrities, Woods' personal life is left totally unscrutinized. No papparazzi waiting outside his estate to follow him, no photographs of him ever except on the golf course. His wife is similarly left alone. The hounding of celebrities seems to be pretty much a whites-only phenomenon.

 

[Guest]

Yes. The sports media will complain that competitive golf is not worth watching without Woods, and that the other golfers are not good.

The more they whine about this, the less they seem to realize it obliterates their standard position that Woods is the Greatest Athlete in the History of Sports. If the guys he usually outplays are chumps (and they are), how good is Woods then, really?

 

[foreverfree]

Yes. The sports media will complain that competitive golf is not worth watching without Woods, and that the other golfers are not good.

The more they whine about this, the less they seem to realize it obliterates their standard position that Woods is the Greatest Athlete in the History of Sports. If the guys he usually outplays are chumps (and they are), how good is Woods then, really?

My mother, as I think I inferred on the U.S. Open thread, is a Woods worshiper. She won't tune into any tournament where Tiger isn't contending.

Just curious though, nevada... what iyo constitutes a "good" golfer, rather than a chump?

John

 

[Guest]

PGA golfers are the best at what they do, which is competitive golf. No argument from me there. But they aren't that good compared to how good they could be. Competitive golf is still something that almost nobody plays. It is barely even played in most sporting nations. PGA golfers continue to be mainly non-athletes from the US and UK.

I'm not saying competitive golf is a bad sport, only that the level of play is very low compared to what it could be, and compared to major sports. The best competitive golfers are not even close to being as good at golf as the best guys in major sports are at their games. There is a massive amount of room for improvement in the level of play in the PGA.

I have to think about these issues everyday while working for the US olympic sports programs. How to increase talent pools, improve training, develop sports science. Golf is very far behind 8 or 9 other sports in all of these areas. Worldwide, few good athletes for golf, which would be tall boys with good hand eye coordination, choose to play the game. Golf still gets the non-athletes, and not that many of them at that. For instance, wrestling, a sport that "nobody" cares about, gets twice as many boys as golf in the US alone. Worldwide it probably gets 10 times as much talent. Wrestling champions are easily, EASILY, better at wrestling than golfers are at golfing. That's just wrestling. Now, go up one level to something like track, another sport that "nobody" cares about, yet which gets about 7 times the participation rate of golf, in America only. And perhaps 20 or 25 times the rate worldwide.

Keep going up another level until you get to baseball, basketball, and soccer. The math is overwhelming at that point. You get to down to simple truths such as:

The backup quarterback on every NFL team, the number 2 guy on the depth chart, is better at football than Phil Mickelson is at golf. The backup has competed against several million other boys his age, all of whom wanted to be the starting quarterback for their high school, all of whom wanted to get a full scholarship to a multi-million dollar NCAA DI program, all of whom wanted to be one of the best quarterbacks in the history of that DI program, just so they could drafted, just so they could at least be a BACKUP in the NFL.

Before Woods, the US sports media was not selling the idea that competitive golfers were the athletic equals to guys in other sports. Now they are telling us that Woods (and perhaps only Woods) is not only their equal but perhaps better than all of them. This is ridiculous. For this to be true, his competition would at least have to be similar. But the American sports media is not also selling that idea. To the contrary, the are selling the opposite idea. And how could they not? Could they honestly get away with pushing the idea that every PGA golfer has a counterpart in a major sport? Wood's rival in the previous US Open - a fat guy that smokes. His rival in this US Open - a short 45 year old. Who do these guys correspond to in major sports?

 

[Don Wassall]

Hand-eye coordination is paramount in golf, not "athleticism." Hand-eye coordination is also the great under-rated factor in most sports. Given that whites are clearly better on average in that department than blacks it's easy to see why.


Nevada, what is your definition of "participation rate"? You say kids are participating in wrestling at about seven times the rate of golf, yet virtually every high school and college in America has a golf team, just as they do wrestling teams. Also, many private golf clubs sponsor and teach young players. So where does your "about 7 times the participation rate" figure come from when comparing golf and wrestling?


Also, I'd be interested in knowing what your definition of an "athlete" is, since in another threadyou wrote derisively of Phil Mickelson that "this puts him on an athletic level about equal to volleyball, tennis, and lacrosse players." Why aren't pro tennis and volleyball players athletes?Edited by: Don Wassall

 

[jaxvid]

I don't understand nevada's obsession with demeaning golfers. The arguement that they aren't great athletes is true but is also true for fat first baseman and obese offensive lineman. Here's the thing about golf. It is the only major "sport" that is also largely played by the fans watching it. Virtually no adults play baseball, football, basketball, wrestle or swim. That means that the identification with the players is strong.

Furthermore golf is a tremendous test of pressure, more then any other sport. Since other sports, especially team sports rely on teammates and flow of action, the indiviual pressure is reduced or mixed in with a series of actions. In golf you stand alone, in quiet silence, all eyes on you and execute your shot. This is compelling to watch and more so since most fans have stood over the ball in like situations (with much less then millions of dollars riding on the outcome).

Golf may not be much of a "sport" but it is a very fascinating test of manual execution under pressure. This makes it a popular sport. As Don said every school and club has teams, the nation is filled with golf courses that are busy on a regular basis.

And not all pro-golfers come from schools like ball players. I worked with a guy who was a good player and tried out for the tour a couple of times before making it briefly. The competition for spots in golf is intense.

I agree that the best athletes are not on the pro tour, but the guys who can overcome the pressure of having to beat 100 other guys that want to win that money just as bad as them ARE on the tour.

 

[Don Wassall]

Tim Dahlberg

is a golf writer for AP whose columns are carried across the country by newspapers. The piece linked below oozes with contempt and hatred for every golfer but his hero. If Woods retired tomorrow the anti-white media would instantly downgrade golf even below the demotion they gave hockey a few years back. As it is the white golfers are going to take endless abuse even as they are asked endless questions about the Caste System's godking while his knee heals.


The local paper today had nearly two full pages devoted to Tiger and his injury. Looks like this prolonged period of national mourning is going to be even more ridiculous than anyone can imagine.


Tim Dahlberg: Tiger Woods gives and then he takes away


[url]http://www.shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20 080618/SPORTS05/306180002[/url]

 

[Poacher]

Whenever the Dahlbergs of the world trash the other golfers on tour they give tacit endorsement to the argument that Woods is playing in a weak era.

 

[Van_Slyke_CF]

A Pittsburgh Post-Gazette writer puts things into the proper perspective about Tiger Woods:

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08172/891347-136.stm 

"When the story broke Wednesday, less than 48 hours after Woods' dramatic U.S. Open victory over the worthy Rocco Mediate, these were the headlines on the TOP STORIES page at Yahoo.com:

ÂÂ￾EBush to Congress: Embrace Energy Exploration.

ÂÂ￾ETiger To Have Season-ending Knee Surgery.

ÂÂ￾EIsrael Confirms Cease Fire to Begin Thursday.

ÂÂ￾EAfghan, NATO Troops Kill 36 Taliban Near Kandahar.

ÂÂ￾EIllinois Levee Breaches, Small Town's Evacuation.

ÂÂ￾EReport: Ex-Detainees from Iraq, Gitmo Still Suffer From Trauma.

As they used to ask on Sesame Street, which of these things is not like the other?

Well, you've got five national or global crises, and one wounded knee on a golfer.

To be sure, the news judgment of the Internet in general is hardly a legitimate topic in that Internet "news" is the result of millions of different sources of largely self-interest, and if Yahoo wants to slide breaking Tiger leg breakage in there between the oil crisis and Mideast violence, so what?

With the national and to some lesser extent the international sports media long since established as breathless subjects in Tiger's kingdom, the inevitable spillover of Woods' image into a space where he "transcends the sport," (even if he has meticulously avoided any topic that might provide evidence of same), it's a little less than shocking to see Tiger's status cast as a major news story.

All that said, I was hoping that by 7 o'clock an outlet such as the CBS Evening News might have at least readjusted the grip.

The Tiffany Network, the home of journalism icons Edward R. Murrow, William Paley, Walter Cronkite, Eric Sevareid, Bob Schieffer, Dan Rather, and now Whoever That Is Sitting In For Katie Couric, certainly would lead with the oil crisis, the looming Taliban offensive, the Baghdad car bomb that killed 63, the Iowa and downstream Mississippi flooding that's misplaced thousands and will soon wallop an already staggering economy, or at worst the perpetual presidential campaign, but no.

Tiger topped the CBS Evening News for five full minutes.

In literally a world full of issues, we're going with golf first, everything else being just, well, everything else, including, you know, life and death.

Perspectives are by nature eclectic and by some percentage extreme in the usual public discourse, but the temporary removal of Tiger from our weekend viewing is apparently the signal for mourning bordering on apoplexy. The AP's Tim Dahlberg, writing on our front sports page yesterday, lamented that "golf once again has been rendered meaningless."

What d'ya mean, again?

Golf is supposed to be meaningless, with Tiger or without, and the same goes for baseball, football, basketball, hockey and every other sports or entertainment entity that we've come to elevate to some cultural plateau that is beyond all reason. I like Tiger, but he's a golfer, not a nurse, not a firefighter, not a first responder, not a teacher. Dahlberg went on to refer to something he called "brutally tough U.S. Open Golf," which sounds like an oxymoron like "reality TV" and "Congressional ethics."

C'mon kids, there's a war on. It was 113 degrees in Baghdad yesterday. Then, the shooting started. Brutally tough U.S. Open golf? Please. It's not even a hockey game."







Edited by: Van_Slyke_CF

 

[White Shogun]

Great article Van Slyke, thanks for posting. Couldn't agree more.

 

[bigunreal]

During the past few days, ESPN kept running the totally ridiculous comments made by Jack Nicklaus, where he heaped glowing praise on Woods. Are there any old white guys anywhere who don't buy into this black superiority nonsense? If Nicklaus was black, and Woods was white, you can bet he'd be harping on the "lack of competition" Woods faces in comparison to the guys he played against. I don't think you can find a quote from any black ex- athlete that is remotely like the one Nicklaus spewed out in regards to Woods. Instead, we have memories of ex- black players like Calvin Murphy, passionately cheering from the stands for Larry Bird to miss a free throw, and avoid breaking his record.

This bogus, orchestrated U.S. Open victory will now become the stuff of "legend." The image of a courageous superstar, wincing in pain from his terrible knee injury, but somehow sucking it up and beating back the old, out of shape white golfer, will be burned into the minds of youngsters, like so many other disastrous images have over the past 30-40 years. It will be nice to see a few majors without his highness, but unfortunately I'm afraid that his presence will still be felt, perhaps even more than when he's playing, through non-stop references to him by the fawning jock-sniffers.

 

[GWTJ]

At least nobody can say Tiger's injury cost him the Grand Slam.

 

[GiovaniMarcon]

If and when Tiger ever does something truly terrible and unforgivable (wife-beating, killing spree, inflammatory ethnic statements) he'll become Asian and not black anymore.

As long as he keeps winning, the media will keep calling him black.

 

[michiganblkman]

If and when Tiger ever does something truly terrible and unforgivable (wife-beating, killing spree, inflammatory ethnic statements) he'll become Asian and not black anymore.

As long as he keeps winning, the media will keep calling him black.

When Barack Obama does something questionable, is he suddenly considered white?

Maybe sports and politics are different

 

[White Shogun]

If and when Tiger ever does something truly terrible and unforgivable (wife-beating, killing spree, inflammatory ethnic statements) he'll become Asian and not black anymore.

As long as he keeps winning, the media will keep calling him black.

I doubt Tiger will ever do something truly terrible and unforgiving.

It will be somebody else's fault.

 

[Solomon Kane]

I don't like the way the media teed up the open for Tiger...in the week before the open, they were saying that if he won after his surgery it would be one of the greatest accomplishments in sport. (And if he lost, of course he could blame the surgery.)

Still, the guy did win, so congratulations to him...very depressing result for me though.

I've mixed feelings about Tiger's temporary leave...on the one hand it means no more majors for him this year. on the other hand it means there will be an asterisk hovering over whoever does win them. What we need is for the same guy to win the British and the PGA...this will create a counter figure to rival Woods.

Still maybe a year's absence will throw woods off his stride...you never know...the body can change a lot in a year.

Last year I thought the chances were 60-40 that Woods would tie Nicklaus. With his win this year, those odds have improved to 70 to 30. If he had no injury you would have to increase the odds.

It's not enough to hope that tiger's game is a little off during a major...you have to hope that the other golfers improve significantly, that they *take the tournament away from tiger.*

come on guys...you can do it!