Tiger Woods spent more than 13 years as the number one golfer in the world. As of today, according to owgr.com, the official world golf ranking, he is ranked the 780th best golfer in the world. In comparison with his rookie season, in 1994, Tiger only participated in four events and missed the cut for three of them. However, his world ranking of 743rd at the time was still superior to his current one. What happened to Tiger Woods? What specific event led to his collapse? There are many possible incidents that have had an impact on his downfall. His many injuries, the sex scandal, his constant need to change his swing or even the birth of his two children might have influenced his level of play negatively. However, athletes that crash usually have this one specific event that initializes the downward spiral. For Tiger Woods, the lost of his father in 2006 was the initial element that triggered his downfall. Earl Woods had a very important impact on Tiger’s personal and professional life. He was his mentor for several years and pushed him to become the amazing player he turned out to be. Earl Woods was very demanding, which might come from his two tours serving in Vietnam for the US Army as a lieutenant colonel. The passing of Earl Woods triggered Tiger’s downfall by following his dad’s footsteps and becoming obsessed with the military, which led to critical injuries and kept his focus away from the golf game.
Following Earl’s death, Tiger became obsessed with the military. He visited many concentration camps and participated in simulated missions. In a certain way, Tiger was trying to experience what his father lived many years ago when he served in Vietnam. In the May 9th 2016 issue of ESPN the magazine, the article “The Secret History of Tiger Woods,” informs the readers about the impact that Earl’s death had on Tiger. Wright Thompson, the author of that article and a senior writer for ESPN believes it is the main reason why Tiger Woods collapsed:
The death of his father set a battle raging inside the world’s greatest golfer. How he waged that war — through an obsession with the Navy SEALs — is the tale of how Tiger lost his way. In the 10 years since his father died, Tiger Woods lost his greatness at golf, while becoming obsessed with the military, a reflection of Earl Woods.
Thompson’s article is very interesting and provides a lot of information about the impact that Earl had on Tiger’s life. He does an amazing job explaining how the loss of Earl directly led to his son’s passion for military, which ultimately ruined his career. The use of the word “reflection” is very interesting and truly shows how Tiger was seeking to relive what Earl experienced back in the days. His addiction to the military was time consuming and also dangerous. With Tiger spending so much down time at the military camps, it kept him away from the golf course and also led to many injuries, since he was involved in simulated missions. Hank Haney, Tiger’s coach for over six years, also believes Earl’s death triggered Tiger’s passion for the military. In his book, The Big Miss: My Years Coaching Tiger Woods, Haney discusses his years spent with Tiger and shows how his passion for the military ultimately led to his ACL injury, one of his worst injury of his career. Posted in the previous blog, the video “Tiger Woods in 2008: Season of Dominance” explains how an ACL injury forced Tiger Woods to end his season earlier than expected. Believe it or not, but according to Haney, that in jury appeared during a concentration camp. In this short passage, Haney paraphrases a previous conversation he had with Corey Carroll, one of Tiger Woods’ rare friend, about Tiger’s ACL injury:
There is a strong likelihood that a Kill House is where Tiger did serious damage to his career. I was communicating with Corey when he told me that Tiger once confessed to him that the complete tear of his ACL had actually occurred in a Kill House exercise in which he had lost his balance and been kicked in the knee. (143)
Tiger’s passion for the military was a little bit too extreme according to Haney. The fact that he got injured while training for a simulated mission is unbelievable. Tiger’s ACL injury happened at a crucial moment in his career. Indeed in 2008, according to tigerwoods.com, Tiger had to stay away from the game following his surgery to his ACL after winning six out of eight tournaments and finishing in second and fifth place in the other two. Earl’s death had an important influence of Tiger’s career since it triggered Tiger’s passion for the military, which led to his ACL injury. Without that unexpected injury, maybe Tiger would have caught up Jack Nicklaus’ record of 18 major victories as of today.
Dealing with the death of a close relative is very hard mentally. Tiger was no exception. The passing of Earl meant that Tiger lost his mentor, which created a huge emptiness in his life. During his childhood, Tiger spent most of his time with Earl, practicing, playing or even talking strategy. The two of them have a similar passion for golf, but little did Tiger know, he soon developed a more dangerous passion that ultimately put his career in jeopardy. In The Big Miss, Ken Hitchcock, one of Haney’s good friends and former hockey coach in the National Hockey League describes Tiger’s sudden passion for his dad’s career as something common for athletes:
Ken has been around a lot of elite athletes and was always interested in Tiger. When I told Ken about Tiger’s military fixation, he said very confidently that it related to Earl being an ex-soldier. “It happens a lot with our players,” he said. “Their fathers die, and they have the urge to go back to their hometowns and do what their dads did: work in a coal mine, fix cars, whatever.” It made sense. Tiger had very seldom brought up Earl while he was alive, but since his death previous May, he’d started speaking about his father a lot more. (143-144)
Hitchcock says it is a common action with athletes who lose a member of their family to grasp on to something that reminds them of the person who has passed. Haney also adds that since Earl passed away, Tiger has been discussing about him way more than he usually does, which shows that he missed his mentor and struggled a lot with Earl’s death. He tried to keep his presence in his life by replicating his previous actions and hobbies. After all, this passage of Haney’s book shows how both his old coach and Ken Hitchcock perceive Earl’s death as an event that triggered Tiger’s passion for the military, which ultimately led to his downfall.
Here is a very interesting video posted by ESPN.com, describing the influence of Earl’s death on Tiger and explaining why it is related to his collapse. It also discusses about the sex scandal and the influence of Earl’s death on it. This information is also important since it will give you a quick preview of what the next blog post will be about: the impact of Earl’s death on Tiger’s sex scandal.
This video is extremely interesting. It directly connects Tiger’s downfall to Earl’s death. The commentator does an amazing job connecting Tiger’s passion for the military and his sex scandal with Earl’s death. He goes on and talks about “safe harbor”, which can closely be related to what Ken Hitchcock previously explained. When individuals lose close relatives, they remember good and bad memories that marked their relationship with the person. Tiger’s sex scandal was a reflection of Earl’s multiple affairs, and his passion for the military was a desire to experience what Earl did during his years in Vietnam. Both events ultimately led to Tiger’s downfall.