However, when you accept $80 million per year in endorsements, you are putting yourself into millions of people's living rooms on a constant basis. His performance on the PGA puts him into people's living rooms on a constant basis - to which he is also handsomely paid.
very true...but he is not in people's living rooms for his sex life...he is in for how he plays golf...nothing else.
when you watched Mickey Mantle do a TV endorsement, you watched him because he was one of the greatest of all time...not because he was a raging alcoholic, who had a wife and kids who he rarely ever got to see because they were back in Oklahoma while he lived in New YOrk 7 months of the year and spent two months in Florida for Spring Training...he was out every night partying and with countless women...fans do not love him any less.
just because you receive a check for an endorsement or appear in commercials, does not mean you owe anyone anything, other than your best performance on the golf course.
In his defense, he has never really promoted himself as a barometer on morals and he has never really made disparaging remarks about anybody else - that I know of.
true, and that is why none of this is really relevant....his private life is just that...private.
However, he made his wedding vows. He has more focus on his career and the golf course than probably any athlete since Jordan. He has the mental capacity to stay focused and disciplined.
making wedding vows is not legally binding...nor is it a promise of perfection...it is an attempt, that billions have failed at through the course of history with regards to marital fidelity
having the mental capacity to stay focused and disciplined when practicing or playing golf, is much different than containing one's libido.
hitting a small white ball is not a constant primal urge...the urge to screw, is :smile:
He chose not to on a repeated basis over a multi-year period. He is happy to put himself into our living rooms and glean adulation and adoration and cash in on that.
he is only cashing in on our admiration of his ability to hit a golf ball, not be married. Michael Jordan was a womanizer too...still did not change the "Be Like Mike" song...nobody was saying you should "Be like Mike" and bang every woman you see...it is about playing hoops like Mike, and dreaming of being great...not dreaming of marital vows.
Now he is in our living rooms because he screwed up, and suddenly he doesn't want us to comment on that? Its none of our business?
i do not see him saying "don't comment" on that...but it is in fact, none of our business. I see him saying "this is a private matter"...which it is. I see him bemoaning the fact that it is true, that if you have not done anything illegal, and infidelity is not legal, there is a pretty disgusting presumption of the public and the press these days, that people somehow are owed explanations about people's private lives...we are not.
the only time and explanation is due about that, is if there are legal ramifications.
i think people want to watch him squirm in public and have to give a press conference to say how awful he is, and what a dissapointment he is...but he does not owe me, you or the public that. I think that is why the few people upset about this are so cranky about it....there is a voyeuristic joy in watching someone successful fail at something totally not related to what he/she is successful at, and we demand, as a very foolish and obnoxious public, that they unburden themselves to us, tell us everything, sob in a press conference, admit they are failures like everyone else, let us salivate over them on Oprah, or whoever...let us have all the sleazy details in a tell all interview with Barbara Walters where you cry...
it is rather repulsive.
we can "comment" as much as we want at water coolers...but the fact is, it has no real relevance. at that same water cooler, if 10 people are there, half of them may have committed relationship or marital infidelity at some time in their lives.
Him saying this is a 'private matter' is simply him not wanting to deal with being in our living rooms when we are not giving him the perpetual hand job we've been giving him for 12 years due to his talent as a golfer.
no, it is him saying this is a private matter...which it is. it was a minor traffic accident. that is all this was.
he was not screwing a mistress in the car, he was not drunk, on drugs etc...so, as long as he pays for the damage he caused, i fail to see how his infidelity should somehow be linked in to a traffic accident, and he should somehow change the fact that it is a private matter, by saying "well i agree, this is a public matter, and you should all attempt to humiliate me and my family on top of what i have already caused"
he is basically saying "i am sorry that you are disappointed, but i owe the public no apology...the people i owe my apology to is my family"
If he's man enough to deposit those $80 million checks every year because we buy his products and worship his abilities, he should be man enough to deal with the fallout from his poor decision-making and infidelity.
well, we do not buy his products...companies attach their name to his, and pay him a fee to do so, nothing more. they do so to attach their names to his abilities as a golfer.
you do not have to be such a big man to deposit a check when people want to pay you so they can say "if you buy our gatorade, you will be drinking the same stuff that Tiger drinks when he is a crushing a 300 yard drive"
i am not aware of any products he actually produces.
and he is already dealing with the fallout for his infidelity and decision making...but that does not mean that anyone really has the right to demand knowing more about his personal life.
that is all he has said...it is none of your (the public) business...which it isn't. we can wag our tongues all we want and point a scolding finger, but tough shit, it is his life not ours, and he owes us no further explanation.
i say he is right.
if someone wanted more from me, about the private life of me and my family, i would say "tough shit"...watch a soap opera.
To your point about his wife having nannies, etc - I agree that she's not starving or pulling weeds in the garden. But when it comes to being cheated on, you can throw the private jets and yachts out the window. It is living hell - rich or poor.
indeed it is living hell...but i was simply pointing out the old Eddie Murphy joke about Johnny Carson's wife.
but with regards to Elin, yes, i feel badly for her, but let's face it...she was an F-list swimsuit model from Sweden whose big achievement in life was being a nanny for another golfer. she wanted attention, or else would not have become a model...right or wrong, she has gotten quite bit out of the relationship....and nobody has a right to expect their life will go perfectly and then be so shocked if it does not.
I feel like if Tiger is going to jump onto my TV screen and tell me to buy Nike, Gatorade, etc and cash huge checks because of his celebrity, I should have the right to be vocal about his performance on the golf course and his performance in life ...and I don't even get paid to do it...and I'm not popping up on his TV screen 20 times per day.
sure you have the right to be vocal about his performance...but you don't have the right to judge his performance in life. you have the right to talk about it, but not to judge it.
the point is, he is not saying you don't have the right to judge him. he is simply saying that his private life is none of your business, and that it is total bullshit that because you screw up in your personal life, the media can cause such an avalanche of noise and false entitlement as to what they feel they and the public deserve, that they can browbeat a person into actually having to discuss their private life when it is nobody's business. he is basically saying "yes, i fucked up and my family is bearing the brunt of this...and it is none of your business" (i applaud him for taking that line)
As i write this, ESPN is nattering on and on and on about *NOTHING*...yet it is on this topic...they are blowing this totally out of proportion as are the rest of the magazines and news outlets.
this is not *NEWS* it is tabloid and yellow journalism. it is titillating garbage for voyeurs.
Long story short....he's gotta take the bad with the good.
he is...but it is still none of our business.
IMO