Chasing Tiger not successful

Tiger Woods is undoubtedly the most famous and sought-after golfer, and an extremely private and elusive one at that. Thousands of stories have been written about him since he was a child prodigy—his first media exposure came over 20 years ago, when the three-year-old Woods competed with Bob Hope in a putting contest on The Mike Douglas Show—yet we still wonder whether or not we have the complete picture of Tiger Woods the person as well as Tiger Woods the professional golfer.

Many scribes continue to write about Woods, and renowned sports journalist Glenn Stout, who edits the annual The Best American Sports Writing series, has put together 21 newspaper and magazine articles on Tiger from 1991 through 2001 in an aptly titled anthology Chasing Tiger: The Tiger Woods Reader. If Stout’s intention was to provide the audience with a better sense of Woods, however, then he enjoys only a mild success in that regard.

There’s no denying the quality of writing here. If the book isn’t the collection of Woods articles that best provide an in-depth look at Tiger, then Chasing Tiger is certainly the compilation of the best writings up on Woods to 2001. Some of the featured writers, Frank Deford, Dan Jenkins, Jim Murray and Gary Smith, are who’s who in sports, not just golf, journalism. However, the majority of the stories suffers from unnecessary hyperbole and even fawning, or swoon in the case of Erin Aubry Kaplan’s “Falling for Tiger Woods” from a 1998 edition of Salon. For example, after Woods’ record-breaking 1997 Masters victory, Deford, in “The Lost Generation” from Newsweek, readily considered Woods the world’s best golfer—this only after one major victory, no matter how overwhelming it was. This kind of overstatement shows just how much of an impact that Masters win had on the sporting world at the time. Little did these writers, or many others for that matter, know Woods would only get better in years to come. Similar hyperbole can be found in stories that followed Woods’ magical 2000 season, in which he won three majors and completed the career grand slam, and his fourth consecutive major championship—dubbed Tiger Slam—at the 2001 Masters.

Of course, not all articles glorify Woods. Robert Lipsyte, with his New York Times article “One Writer’s Tiger Woods Problem,” wondered aloud why he couldn't love Woods, and his colleague Maureen Dowd, in “Tiger Woods Goes for the Green,” criticized Woods for turning down President Bill Clinton’s invitation to join him at Shea Stadium for a tribute to Jackie Robinson, who broke the colour barrier in baseball.

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