A few hours after it was announced Tiger Woods would make his first public statement Friday at 11amET since his Thanksgiving night…incident, he was spotted jogging in a widely circulated Getty Images picture.

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But on closer inspection, the image, and the public statement, is vintage Tiger – and that’s not a good thing.

The image (larger below), shows Woods jogging with his trainer, looking fit, wearing Nike. But as TMZ reports, the fact that it was taken by Sam Greenwood of Getty Images is telling.

It feels like this was a photo op … taken by Getty Images. It’s not a paparazzi agency. If it were, it could have been worth millions. The photo was taken by Sam Greenwood, a Getty sports photog who’s pretty famous.

It’s all about controlling the message and a sense he’s above everyone. It’s what got him in trouble in the first place – and as mistresses started coming out of the woodwork by the dozen, Woods retreated. But if he’s planning on re-

entering the public spotlight while trying to, once again, control the message, he’s going to find it far more difficult. “This has been all along played like nobody has played anything,” said CNBC correspondent Darren Rovell today on Morning Joe. “What’s weird about this is you would think at some point he is going to have to address what the media wants to address.”

Rovell is hearing that there may not even be video coming out of this supposed press conference tomorrow. And the Star-Ledger reports the whole sit-down is expected to last 5-7 minutes. Think this is shaping up to be a tremendous let-down? Here’s part of ESPN’s statement on their coverage:

ESPN’s SportsCenter, ESPNEWS, First Take (ESPN2), ESPN.com (streaming live), ESPN Radio (during The Herd with Colin Cowherd) and ESPN Mobile (streaming live) will present live coverage of Tiger Woods statement Friday, 11 a.m. ET at the TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., home of the PGA Tour.

A lot of coverage – of what? Millions of interested viewers could be left wondering what next. And Tiger Woods may need to take a mulligan. (Golf puns – finally back!)

Here’s a bigger version of the image. Let’s play “I Spy”:

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Tags: Darren Rovell, Star-Ledger, Tiger Woods, TMZ