What To Expect From Today’s Tiger Woods Coverage

REUTERS/Shaun Best

The Masters kicks off this morning in Augusta, Georgia, and many a camera and news junkie will be tracking Tiger Woods’s first swings back into golf after a four-month self-imposed hiatus. Tiger tees off at 1:42 p.m. local time, and ESPN will be carrying at least some of his round in its afternoon broadcast.

The media circus actually got a headstart last night when Tiger’s other career – professional endorser – also returned to the game thanks to a new Nike ad that debuted during broadcasts on The Golf Channel and ESPN. The black-and-white spot is a somber portrayal of Tiger supported by audio of the voice of his father, Earl, discussing the importance taking responsibility of his actions. In and of itself, the ad alone generated some filler time on last night’s Sportscenter and mention in some of the sports pages across the country.

Today, though, is the “big day” for the Woods story – at some moment, weekend coverage will likely turn back to actually being focused on the game of golf as the competition and Green Jacket ceremony appear at the edge of the horizon. But today, just after the lunch hour, Tiger will have to grab a golf club and assume the defense of that “best player in the world” moniker. That tee shot on the first hole has a chance to be one of the most covered moments of his career – greater than his previous successes, and there have been many, at the Georgia course.

Hopefully, the topic of Tiger may finally turn to golf after that moment. Take a cut from Larry Dorman’s column in this morning’s New York Times and you can get an idea of what may be a trend story from Augusta about Tiger’s demeanor throughout the weekend:

The quantifying begins now, inside and outside the ropes, and Woods’s behavior will be scrutinized as closely as his scores. Measures of his success and failure this week will hinge in part on whether Woods will keep some of the promises made at the beginning of the week, including one about his widely criticized tendency toward angry, profanity-laced outbursts and thrown clubs over bad shots.

There was a fascinating moment yesterday during the annual “State of the Masters” address given by Augusta National chairman, Billy Payne. Payne did not shy away from the history – nor his displeasure with it – of Tiger’s recent battles. His comments are likely to appear in all sorts of coverage this morning, most notably a dig in which he raised Tigers’ fall from role-model-grace, saying, “certainly his future will never again be measured only by his performance against par.” In fact, Michael Witmer at the Boston Globe gave Payne’s comments the lion’s share in his preview this morning.

Finally, we may turn the corner at some point today and start seeing the “Will he win?” posts in and throughout the afternoon and tomorrow – and be prepared for Sportscenter to do a 15 minute, shot-by-shot coverage of his round if he is anywhere near the top of the leaderboard come the end of the day. Jeff Schultz at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution – given its proximity to Augusta, a great source for the week – penned a great post overnight on exactly the expectations ahead:

Then again, this is Tiger Woods. He never has experienced humiliation like this. But in 2006, he finished third in the Masters, even while his father, Earl Woods, was nearing death. After Earl’s passing, Woods missed the cut at the U.S. Open, but he followed with wins in the British, the PGA and his final six tournaments of the season. Does that say something about his mental toughness?

He’s still Tiger Woods.

He is still Tiger Woods, isn’t he?

Heaven help us if anyone from the gallery does something stupid to get Tigers’ attention – we’ll get a new infamous celebrity out of it. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that doesn’t happen, and we’ll find out in a few short hours what the next steps of this story will be. As for me, I stick by comments I made last month: let’s keep it cool, folks. Let’s make this about golf, and those who have watched Tigers’ career will come back around to being supporters. I promise.

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