That's why it was so good in 2009 when he ran barefoot from his house, crashed his Cadillac into a row of hedges, drove over a kerb, smashed a fire hydrant and ploughed into a neighbour's oak tree. Things got even better when it turned out he had been sleeping with lots of other ladies. It was cool to see him completely humiliated at his mea culpa. Even better when he cried. How good was it when Elin took him for $100 million?
Tiger's fall from grace made us all feel a little better about ourselves. He may have been rich, good looking and once in a century talented. But none of us had cheated on our partners as many times as he had. We have all made bad decisions and lost a few bucks but not US$100 million.
It was okay to enjoy Tiger's downfall because we all knew it would be short-lived. It was Tiger Woods after all. He was bound to sort everything out and return better than ever in a year at the most.
But golf is a funny game. In most sports, you're playing directly against another conscious being. There's someone bowling at you or tackling you or trying to get around you or punching you in the face. In golf, it's you versus a stationary ball and some nature. Which means it's actually you against yourself. Pretty hard to win the mental game when your life has collapsed and every single person in the world is judging and laughing at you. So Tiger didn't come back immediately. Instead he busted his back and legs and got addicted to painkillers. His life spiralled out of control. People who knew a lot about golf were saying he wasn't ever coming back.
That's when we started to feel guilty. Because every filthy titbit of gossip we read and watched did its little part to fuel the fire. Our petty jealousy contributed directly to the destruction of a hero.
There he was on his back so bung at times he couldn't get up off the couch to play with his kids. The pain so bad he got wasted on Vicodin, Dilaudid, Xanax, Ambien and THC and went to sleep on the side of the road in his 2015 Black Mercedes with two flat tyres. Two years ago Tiger was ranked 780th best golfer in the world and definitely not going to win the Masters again.
Then, after so many painful surgeries, he had another and then another. It worked. He reinvented his stroke to fit and it worked and he won the Masters for the fifth time. His first major win in 11 years.
God, it was good to watch Tiger back where he belongs. Also great to be off the hook. We don't have to feel guilty anymore. He's the greatest again and this time everyone loves him. Because he's sorted his personal life and has a great relationship with his kids. He deserves all the accolades coming his way and more. We should give him Eleanor Catton's Man Booker Prize, France should give him Notre Dame when it's fixed. It's the greatest feel-good sporting comeback ever. Tiger is the greatest.
Unfortunately, many of us are still a bit crap so he might need knocking off his perch again.
