Tiger Woods

Now, I haven't been alive for many years, but I would say that no one has ever transformed a sport as much as Tiger Woods.  Jordan did tons for basketball...making it cool to play defense, making it cool to wear shorts below the knees, making it cool to wear Nike, making it cool to win 6 championships...but considering where golf has come from pre-Tiger and where it is now, there's no question Tiger is responsible for the single biggest change in the American sports landscape.  Who knows what I would have done with my summers for the past 10 years had I not picked up a club.  Moreover, who knows what I would have done with my summers had my brother not picked up a club, which was in also large part due to Tiger.  And that's what we did.  Kids do things that they think is cool, and for the first time, golf was cool.
But, here we are again.  Idling those superstars who we sit in front and watch and, dare I say it, get to know? It's kind of hard to think we don't know these people, right? Of course now it's bordering ridiculousness, with guys like Chad Ochocinco (or Johnson or whatever the hell he is nowadays. Who gives a s&@#, the Bengals suck anyways) tweeting so often you literally wonder how he has time to do anything else.  Which brings me to my next point, I follow him and he's pretty entertaining (BTW I'm @tstaff9 on Twitter).  But, seriously, there is so much transparency in the world of sports, you form relationships with these people.  You watch them every night, then on Sportscenter the next morning, to the point where you even know what they're going to say at the postgame press conference because you already watched it the night before when it was live.  Then you're reading articles about them online and following their myriad tweets about God knows what.  Thing is, they're always there, and when you have familiarity with someone like that, you start to feel like you know them and trust them. You look up to them.
I loved Tiger.  He made my summers a bi-sport marathon, with golf now complementing baseball.  How many times did you stare at an 8-footer and first thing that came to your mind is a vision of Tiger walking after his putt right after contact 'cause he knows he just made a huge par save on a crucial hole in any of the 14 majors he has won?  That 'Tiger Woods PGA' video game, or I guess I should say whole franchise of fantastically entertaining Playstation and XBox games.  Oh, he wears Nike, too?  Yeah, that's a guy I'm going to like.
Well, then we find out about the absolute trainwreck of a Thanksgiving night anyone could ever imagine.  (I take away from those news reports that it's imprudent to mix Ambien with a wife who just found out you've cheated on her and has access to your golf clubs).  Then more and more stuff came out and it was instantly just laughable.  ("He slept with how many different women?"  "....geez").  The more and more that came out, the more and more I realized that to think these people are like us is ludicrous.  The guy grew up winning every big amateur tournament in the U.S. and then goes on to rack up 14 majors at a neck-breaking pace and with relative ease.  He's got a franchise.  He's Tiger Woods.  Let's just say, kind of intrinsic to the whole aspect of being a 'worldwide phenom/superstar', he had some opportunities that the common man doesn't.  He took advantage of those opportunities, just as any great champion would.  Unfortunately for him, his wife, his family, and his millions of fans all over the world, those "opportunities" were extramarital affairs.
And we watched it all. In awe! But that was it for me and Tiger Woods.  Growing up watching a guy at the absolute top of his game, I fell victim to liking and knowing that man.  I was wrong (like 18 times worth).
I've got a bet open with my brother about Tiger's prospects of reaching Jack.  I don't know if I've ever liked my odds in a bet more than the what I have with this one.  I say there's no way he wins 19.  No way he wins 18.  I don't even think he's going to get to 16.
It wasn't a popular bet to 'take the field' in a tournament that Tiger entered during his supremacy.  But it is now, and I'm in that corner, cheerin' loudly.


Long live 18.