The Masters is similar to the U.Va. of golf majors. Both the green jacket ceremony and our University relish unabashedly in championing pretentious traditions. Both were divinely intended for optimal enjoyment in early April, when the sun casts an uncannily perfect shadow on Amen Corner and the Charlottesville weather becomes paradisiacal enough that neither the specter of finals nor the 280 ill-fated construction projects around Grounds can fully dampen our spirits. And both command fervent adoration despite obvious shortcomings — including the Masters’ perceived redundancy or the University’s tendency to make unpopular decisions the last 11 months. If Jim Nantz were to airily narrate a college experience, this would be it.
Still, that tickets for the Masters have reportedly spiked upward of an unprecedented $10,000 in resale value owes less to the tournament’s genteel charm and rich heritage than to the recent torrid form of one Eldrick Tont Woods. As Tiger, fresh from wresting the world’s top ranking back from his younger Nike-clad counterpart Rory McIlroy, gears for his fourth win in five tournaments and his first major victory since the 2008 U.S. Open, the sporting world’s attention will again dwell on the number 18. The number represents Jack Nicklaus’s record for career major victories, as well as the benchmark many feel Tiger needs to reach to validate his status as the greatest golfer of all time.
Unless Bubba Watson busts out his hovercraft or 14-year old phenom Tianlang Guan channels his inner Spike Albrecht and shocks the field, the discourse surrounding the Masters will largely focus on Woods and his desperate quest to recapture another major title. But as we prepare to follow him along more meticulously this weekend than Foxfield patrons choose their outfits, I question whether we’re truly tuning in simply to watch a generational athlete chase an iconic record. Even while highlighting the tournament, watching Tiger has dwarfed the inimitable character of the Masters — and that speaks to the true nature of his legacy more than the campaign for 19 majors ever could.
Appropriately, the first hint that Tiger would evolve from precocious talent to transcendent sports figure arrived at this same tournament 16 years ago. At the major most defined by moments of arresting drama, by Sarazen’s shot in ‘35, Arnold’s embedded ball in ‘58 and Jack’s putt at the 17th in ‘86, Tiger’s 12-stroke win in 1997 foreshadowed the arrival of a golfer to whom the normal customs and platitudes of the sport would not apply. His prodigal talent; the swashbuckling, emotional on-course demeanor; his racial crossover appeal; and a relationship with his father that moved anyone with an emotion range greater than Nick Saban’s all presaged a career which would relegate the typical pillars of golf’s appeal to the background. When he told Oprah with a complacent smirk after the tournament, “Once you get ‘em down, stomp on ‘em,” he wasn’t just talking about the competition; he was referring to the conventions by which we judged the very sport.
People often credit Tiger for sparking golf’s exponential growth during the ensuing 12 years, but the sport’s TV ratings boosts and enhanced prominence resulted more from our obsession with watching Tiger than with watching golf. Whether he held a commanding lead or was out of contention, every Tiger moment in a major demanded our attention. We came to recognize the contours of his game — the booming drives and miraculous saves, the endless clutch par putts as well as the outbursts of frustration and elation — as the contours of the game itself.
Ostensibly, the focus never wavered from Tiger’s self-professed fixation with tying and passing the Golden Bear and winning his 19th major. Yet watching Tiger up to 2009, akin to watching Michael Jordan in the 1990s, became a sort of ritual in and of itself, one that both showcased and overshadowed all other golf-related rituals — including the most sacred of them all, the Masters.
Along with most of the rest of sports fandom, I initially thought the revelation of Tiger’s marital infidelities in 2009 rendered the push for 19 even more of an imperative. What truly irked us about the episode was not the infidelity, but the realization that we knew so little about the man we thought we knew better than any other contemporary athlete. By exposing a side of him that had remained hidden from the golf course and the Nike commercials, the scandal, I reckoned, had robbed Tiger of his central appeal, leaving him with only the record chase.
The cascading excitement for this Masters, however, has proven me wrong. As he maintained to Mike Tirico in a recent interview, the push to break Nicklaus’ record still consumes Tiger’s thoughts. But it does not, and will not, define his legacy. That the anticipation for this year’s tournament rivals that of Vin Diesel for a new “Fast and Furious” movie stems primarily from Tiger’s rarefied status as an athlete whose capacity for greatness compels you to drop whatever you’re doing and pay attention. Ultimately, the potential to watch a fellow mortal achieve immortal glory, as Tiger has for his entire career, supersedes all the records, rankings and sordid jokes about adultery. Tiger, in short, belongs in sports’ most coveted individual club, that of which membership is restricted to those who uplift their sport even while utterly transcending it.
So when you watch the Masters this weekend, you’ll appreciate the unique idiosyncrasies and traditions inherent to the Masters appeal. But you’ll be watching because of Tiger — the Masters’ equivalent to a living, breathing Thomas Jefferson at U.Va.
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