Tiger Woods' Humbled in Public Apology

Tiger Woods did what he had to do -- and one thing he did not have to do -- in his carefully staged and manipulated mea culpa on ESPN Friday afternoon.

He apologized all over himself about a dozen times for his sexual binge during which time he deposited his seed over all four time zones in North America and possibly all 24 time zones around the world. He turned planet Earth into his personal brothel. It must have been hard for Tiger, standing in front of a national TV camera and saying, for the first time in his life that he was wrong, shameful, selfish and an embarrassment to himself, his family, his friends, his sponsors and the game of golf. It was the most humbling 13 1/2 minutes of his life. In an emotional sense he had to crawl on his belly like a snake. He must have felt like a piece of dung. For a guy like Tiger, it must have been agonizingly difficult. I wonder what was his most compelling motivation to do that, his sponsors or his family. He was a businessman before he was a family man.

It was good that Tiger's wife was not there, unlike the wives of miscreant politicians who follow a script and stand next to their tawdry husbands when they plead for public forgiveness.

Tiger seemed honestly chastened, but there was one inconsistency. He took a jab at the media for propagating untruths, such as: 1) his wife hit him with a golf club, and 2) he took performance enhancing drugs.

It's nice that he finally addressed untruth No. 1. The world waited four months for Tiger or Mrs. Woods to clear up the golf club attack. He's one of the most famous people in the world and he went into seclusion for four months. He should have known that allowing the drama to percolate for four months invited speculation. Do you mean that none of his advisors suggested that he try to gain control of the story? I'm sure they did, but he was too arrogant or ashamed to follow their suggestions.

As for performance enhancing drugs, that's a rumor that kept a low profile.

He also chastized the media for hounding his wife and children at their home and at their school.

Listen, pal. Tiger left them out to dry. While he hid, they became media targets. It is the natural law of things. So don't scold anyone for that. Don't look for scapegoats. He neglected to apologize for his own cowardice.

I can understand why he did not take questions from the mainstream media. After he made it clear, over and over, that he was sorry for everything he did, here's what we wanted to know: Sordid details about every tryst with every trollop, about miscarriages and abortions, about times, dates and locations.

We'll save that for next time. See you in four months, Tiger.

Oh, by the way, one of Tiger's babes went on TV later Friday afternoon and demanded that he apologize to her. Huh? What's with that? Maybe Tiger should shut her up with a dozen roses and a $50 gift certificate to Best Buy.

Cavs Shorthanded without 'Z'

The Cavs' overtime loss to Denver can be rationalized because they were shorthanded. Zydrunas Ilgauskas was gone and his replacement, Antawn Jamison, wasn't in uniform yet. It will actually take a few weeks for Jamison to fit into the scheme of things. Obviously, the Cavs are willing to risk a few losses now for a stronger playoff team later.

There remains, however, another consideration -- home court advantage in the champonship series. The Cavs currently have a two-game lead over the Lakers in the loss column after both the Cavs and Lakers lost at home Thursday night. Boston beat the Lakers, 87-86, and the Cavs fell to Denver 118-116.

However, the lead actually is three games because the Cavs took the season-season series from the Lakers which will be the tie-breaker.

(That's all for now.)

This article reprinted from CoughlinUnplugged.com, through a partnership between Dan Coughlin and The Cleveland Leader. To read more of his writing, visit his website.