Tiger Woods returns with an edge
By RON SIRAK / AP Golf Writer
IRVING, Texas (AP) - A year ago Tiger Woods was a college sophomore
getting ready for the NCAA tournament. Now he is the Masters champion
caught in a racial flap with another player and feeling haughty
enough to take on the president.
And he feels just fine with it all.
Make no mistake about it: He is Tiger Woods.
"I'm comfortable with who I am," Woods said Tuesday
as he prepared for the Byron Nelson Classic, his first competitive
event since winning the Masters in April. "I'm comfortable
with people taking shots at me and I'm comfortable with people
saying nice things about me."
Since his record-setting victory at Augusta, Woods has had
to take a little bit of the bad with the overwhelming amount of
good that has gone his way.
Now, after a four-week vacation, he returns to competition
- and to the questions about the controversies that swirl around
him.
There were the comments by Fuzzy Zoeller and Woods' slow acceptance
of Zoeller's apology. He took a little heat for turning down President
Clinton's invitation to join him in honoring Jackie Robinson.
And there is the fact that he now has enough celebrity status
to be considered fair game for the supermarket tabloids.
Woods made several things clear Tuesday:
- Zoeller wasn't kidding.
- Clinton had political motives.
- His personal life is his personal life.
Woods said he has yet to speak with Zoeller about the fried
chicken and collard greens remarks, but he wants to "talk
one-on-one and find out what he was thinking."
Zoeller, who may cross paths with Woods next week at the Colonial,
said he was joking and apologized. Woods waited nearly four days
and then accepted the apology. But it is clear he has some questions.
When Zoeller made his initial remark about Woods serving fried
chicken at the Masters champions dinner next year, he started
to walk away, stopped and added, "and collard greens or whatever
it is they serve."
"I have a problem with that," Woods said.
Woods was among many who noticed a nonjoking edge in Zoeller's
voice.
"I'm very good at knowing where people are coming from,"
said Woods, suggesting he is not all that certain Zoeller was
coming from a good place.
Woods, who was quoted in GQ magazine telling jokes about blacks
and lesbians, sees a big difference between what he did and what
Zoeller did.
"I said it just joking, talking to a limo driver who was
black," Woods said about the comments overheard by a reporter.
"There's a difference there," he said. "A big
difference."
As for the president, well, Woods questions the motives there
as well.
The day after the Masters, Clinton invited Woods to join him
at Shea Stadium in New York to mark the 50th anniversary of Robinson
breaking the color barrier in baseball.
Woods declined.
"I had planned my vacation already," Woods said.
"Why didn't Mr. Clinton invite me before I won the Masters?
It would have been better if he asked me before."
Woods clearly has his own agenda and it did not include sharing
his moment in the sun with the president.
Nor will he share glimpses into his personal life, other than
to say that "Mike and Kevin" - as he calls Michael Jordan
and Kevin Costner - are his friends.
"Let's see," Woods said with a perplexed smile. "I
am dating Tyra Banks and I'm engaged to Kelli Kuehne, is that
it?" he said, laughing. "I think it's kind of funny
and I can't believe people buy it."
Jordan and Costner have been helpful, Woods said, in offering
advice in how to deal with celebrity status. The advice, though,
has mostly been from the I'm OK-You're OK school of thought.
"What do they tell me?" Woods said, repeating the
question. "They say you're going to have to find your own
way, your own path."
That seems to be something Woods has shown a talent for, on
and off the golf course.
|
