Tiger Masters The Masters … Again! -The iPINIONS Journal

A moment was delivered on Sunday in Augusta, Georgia, that many thought they’d never see again in this lifetime. With a final round 70, Tiger Woods cruised on Sunday to his fifth victory at The Masters. …

The 2019 Masters victory serves as the 15th major win of Tiger’s career, which now puts him just three back of the legendary Jack Nicklaus (18).

(CBS Sports, April 14, 2019)

You don’t have to be a golf fan, or even a sports fan, to appreciate this historic comeback/redemption. Frankly, if you feel no impulse to hail Tiger, you’re either inhuman or have been living under a rock for the past 11 years.

But, as CBS suggests, you’d be hard-pressed to find a sports analyst who is on record declaring his belief that this day would come. This, because Tiger’s

sex scandals proved so humiliating, they sapped him of his once-invincible spirit;
approach to rehabbing his chronic back injuries seemed more fitting for bodybuilding than golf; and
dismissive treatment of close friends like Michael Jordan suggested he was suffering mental problems too.

This sad confluence of factors made winning again seem impossible.

I duly commented on his travails in commentaries like “Tiger’s Wife Serves Him a Fat Lip for Thanksgiving,” November 29, 2009, “Tiger’s Back, but His Back Won’t Let Him Play?! Puhleeze,” February 6, 2015, and “Tiger! Tiger! Driving Drugged,” June 1, 2017. More to the point, though, I laid out the path to his redemption early on in “Tiger Escapes to Safe Haven,” December 14, 2009:

I just hope he takes time out from his counseling (marriage and psychological) to practice. That way, whenever he returns, there will be more public interest in his victories on the tour than in his conquests in the bedroom.

Fans will readily forgive him of course. But winning tournaments in his inimitable fashion is the only way to eradicate bacchanalian images of his private life from public consciousness – even if not from the tabloids.

Still, I never doubted this day would come. And I’m on record declaring so as far back as “Tiger! Tiger! Losing Fight,” August 15, 2011, and as recently as “US Open: Tiger Woods Becoming the Hugh Hefner of PGA Players,” Monday, June 18, 2018.

As the latter indicates, I did so even as I mocked his historic failure to win another major. After all, Jack’s inevitable winless streak on the way to his record-setting 18 majors lasted six years. Tiger’s on the way to his record-chasing 15 lasted eleven.

The point is that I remained mindful of the great expectations Tiger had for his own career after he won his 14th major in 2008. Here is how I put this into context in that June 2018 commentary cited above:

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Tiger will win again; and not just some rinky-dink tournament, but a major. The problem is that Tiger himself made surpassing Jack’s 18 majors the standard by which we should judge his career.

Tiger knows better than anyone that he will not be able to fully redeem his professional reputation until he wins another 5 majors (i.e., from among the Masters in April, US Open in June, British Open in July, and PGA Championship in August).

(“Tiger Won…Finally,” The iPINIONS Journal, December 5, 2011)

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Apropos of which, what I noted in that August 2011 commentary – also cited above – puts today’s win into further context:

To appreciate how difficult it is for one player to dominate the majors the way Tiger did, bear in mind that 13 different players have won the last 13 major championships.

In a similar vein, bear in mind that no single golfer has won more than three majors over the past decade. And Tiger needs to win three more just to tie Jack’s record.

Well, as much as I believed this day would come, I do not believe that day ever will.