A Tiger's Triumph
It has been 22 years since I sat in my childhood basement and cheered on a young man – not much older than I was – as he fist-pumped his way to an unimaginable and historic triumph at Augusta National Golf Club to become 1997 Masters Champion. As many of us did today, I watched and recalled the beauty of a father embracing his son at the edge of glory; knowing the suffering and sacrifice it took to arrive there.
Tiger was my hero in my late teens. Champion Golfer. Underdog. Icon. Someone I admired and mimicked and dressed like. I wasn’t alone. (Nike created an entire industry at our expense).
But ten years ago, after slipping on three more green jackets and winning another ten majors, we watched, as the Tiger Machine came to a crashing halt. At his own hands, Woods’ life began to melt down. Addiction, mental health, promiscuity, unfaithfulness – it was broadcast widely and cataclysmically as the once beloved and iconic hero became the villain our culture loves to revile.
Frankly, I’m not so sure he didn’t deserve much of it.
He had everything a rationale person could ever hope to have, right? The beautiful family, the money, success, the fame – “How could he do this to us?” (The thought certainly passed through my head). I know many who have loved to hate him over the years and point to him as the worst of sports and celebrity. It didn’t matter how much we’d all contributed to put him up there, when that pedestal caved in, we’d all point fingers claiming, “It wasn’t me!”
Swing coaches, sports psychologists, half-started-comebacks and season ending surgeries left many of us simply thankful for what we’d seen in his great decade in sports, but I know many – including myself – who said things like “karma” and “that’s just what he gets”.
But contrary to the popular proclamation of the televangelist perversion of my faith tradition, we actually reject the concept of getting your just desserts.
Two summers ago, my heart broke when into my news feed appeared a shattered, addicted, and intoxicated man, handcuffed, and being placed into the back of a vehicle. When his mug shot was released, his eyes looked empty and void, and nothing like the competitive ferocity that had filled them in years of victory. He was a shadow of himself and my thoughts turned from “Will he win another major?” to “Will he even survive?”
It has been eleven years since the great Tiger Woods won a major championship in golf. Eleven years since he elevated a Claret Jug or defeated the rough at a US Open. But this week – and over the last year – something just started to feel different. The steely Tiger stare seemed much tamer than it had once been. The fierceness of his competition – which drove him to victory and kept his distance from the fans – was now replaced with many more smiles, and the occasional joke, and even a high-five for one of the boys or girls his own children’s age.
Augusta National. The Masters: a tournament unlike any other. And like Nicklaus or Palmer or any of the greats before him, it will always be enough just to have him there.
But not today.
Whether he has more in him or not, it’s really hard to know. But hell, he sure had this one in him today. And as a fellow brother walking a road of recovery, as someone who has been too far down the rabbit hole, I saw triumph well before the crowd gave their final Sunday roar.
Woods and I don’t share the same faith tradition, but in him I see the work of Grace. Trained to be a Tiger, he was formed to be a competitive winning machine. Trained to dominate and to excel and to never break. But I saw a Tiger filled with laughter on the practice range. It wasn’t about whether he deserved another shot, or another victory, or whether his mistakes could be excused.
He was just a man, grateful to have made it through the storm.
You are more triumphant today than you were when you fist-pumped your way to victory at twenty-one, Tiger, but not because your closet got more green. It’s not because you deserved it or earned it all by your own measure or because it was still your time. You faced your demons, brother, and if you stare down any of the same shades of darkness I’ve gazed at, I’m sure there are still some in there. I’m sure you face them down every day.
A triumphant Tiger at Augusta National. On the first day, and the last day of the week.