The Good Guy Wins
I am not as much a golf fan as I am a “human story behind sports” fan. As much as the media tries to separate golfers, b-ballers, and sports icons from morality - it can’t be done. Basketball does not say as much about a man as pulling a gun on a teammate does. Birdies do not say as much about a man as faithfulness does.
How ironic is it that as much as the media, the tournament directors, and Tiger tried to avoid it happening, the Masters became a morality play. How would Tiger be portrayed by the media and received by the audience? In the end, amazingly, his story was trumped and a greater story prevailed. A man whose wife is suffering from breast cancer won a major. His wife able to get out of the bed only long enough to see her husband birdie the final hole and win The Masters. She watched her husband win. He has watched her suffer. Tiger played Augusta markedly alone. Mickelson played Augusta with a pink bow on his hat. Mickelson walks to the 18th green, to get his jacket, with his family. The people at Nike scratch their head, trying to figure out why everyone thinks they and Tiger have no class for using the voice of his dead father to inspire us. Both men are golfers, but carry with them metaphors of home. Morality and sports cannot live separate lives. We do what we do being who we are. We cannot be separated from our secrets. We wear our character.
What will be interesting for me is to see now which story the media will amplify. Will they celebrate faithfulness, marriage, and morality - that the good guy won - or will they continue to demonstrate that they don’t get it. Good guys win. We should celebrate those men, those stories, and and encourage people to be good.
How ironic is it that as much as the media, the tournament directors, and Tiger tried to avoid it happening, the Masters became a morality play. How would Tiger be portrayed by the media and received by the audience? In the end, amazingly, his story was trumped and a greater story prevailed. A man whose wife is suffering from breast cancer won a major. His wife able to get out of the bed only long enough to see her husband birdie the final hole and win The Masters. She watched her husband win. He has watched her suffer. Tiger played Augusta markedly alone. Mickelson played Augusta with a pink bow on his hat. Mickelson walks to the 18th green, to get his jacket, with his family. The people at Nike scratch their head, trying to figure out why everyone thinks they and Tiger have no class for using the voice of his dead father to inspire us. Both men are golfers, but carry with them metaphors of home. Morality and sports cannot live separate lives. We do what we do being who we are. We cannot be separated from our secrets. We wear our character.
What will be interesting for me is to see now which story the media will amplify. Will they celebrate faithfulness, marriage, and morality - that the good guy won - or will they continue to demonstrate that they don’t get it. Good guys win. We should celebrate those men, those stories, and and encourage people to be good.
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