On Friday, I found myself unable to escape the media feeding frenzy otherwise known as the Tiger Woods press conference. There was wall-to-wall coverage on pretty much every network; everyone had their own opinion about the press conference that wasn’t a press conference. Good grief! In the spirit of non-stop Tigermania, I felt it would be proper to give our TYAC readers my perspective on the situation. Appropriately, we have a forum for just such an occasion – our Jackleg section of this blog. I hereby pronounce Tiger Woods jackleg of the day, week, month, year, decade, century, and possibly of all-time.

Let’s state the obvious first. Cheating on your wife sucks, and it makes you a jackleg. If you aren’t mature enough to handle a marriage, don’t get married (I know this is profound). The option is always there to go Shawn Kemp for awhile, father a bunch of illegitimate children, and continue to “play the field.”  Although this also makes you kind of a dick, it is inarguably better than going behind your wife’s back and screwing everything that moves. Marriage, in and of itself, implies an immense amount of trust and respect for your significant other. If you can’t handle it, you’re better off not doing it. Doing it before you’re ready, or worse yet, doing it while whole-heartedly knowing that you will not ever be able to handle it (which is how I see Tiger) really makes you a jackleg.

All of that moral stuff aside, what makes Tiger’s situation even more depressing/reprehensible/selfish/ insert demeaning adjective here, is that this is Tiger Woods we’re talking about. Until recently, Tiger’s life consisted of getting paid to play golf and endorsing Nike products. The dude is worth a bajillion dollars, and all he has to do is hang out on the golf course all day. When he’s bored with that, he gets to go home to his supermodel wife, his huge house (I’ve driven by it several times in Orlando and it is enormous) his kids, and his cars, and everything else he calls his own. Yeah, his life sucked, I really felt for the guy. Tiger gets paid to hang out and play golf. He has enough money to last him and all of his offspring forever. He never has to do anything he doesn’t want to do. He never has to go to work in the morning, sit in a cubicle, and listen to mission statements from an idiot boss (not that I do either, but I know a lot of people who do).

He just plays golf. That’s it. Cue Justin Timberlake and cry me a river.

So, Tiger’s life was so bad that he had to develop an “addiction” to sex and start screwing people that weren’t his wife. Let’s be clear. This isn’t just a sordid affair that Tiger had. I understand that although inexcusable, sometimes affairs happen. The people involved convince themselves that they are in love with the person they are having the affair with, it messes with their head, it messes with their spouse’s head, it messes with their kids’ heads, and everyone ends up worse-off for it (a la John Terry, Wayne Bridge, and the lady involved in that mess or Harkes and Wynalda and their female). Inarguably, this is a mistake for all parties involved, but still it happens, I get it. Tiger, on the other hand, was basically screwing everything that moved for seemingly his entire life. To Tiger, marriage was just a word. It didn’t affect his behavior at all. All it did was make him a little worried about getting caught. His behavior was like the behavior of a 20-year-old frat guy except Tiger is not a 20-year-old frat guy. He was married, and he was a role model!

You can make the argument that athletes are held to higher standards. That argument does not apply here. Behavior like Tiger’s for anyone – athlete or civilian – is inexcusable. The way he acted was reprehensible. I don’t know Elin, I’ve never talked to her, and I probably never will. I still feel terrible for her; no one deserves to be treated the way Tiger has treated her.

So then, Tiger gets caught, Friday happens, and he has the gall, nay the audacity, when he’s finally caught to hold a press conference that wasn’t really a press conference where he took that opportunity to bash the media and their coverage of the event. Something doesn’t compute with this guy. Of course everyone wants to know what he was thinking. The dude plays golf, and for some reason our society finds this fascinating enough to put him on a pedestal. Let me be clear. I am not a golf fan. I see golf as a silly game where you hit an object with a stick. To me, it’s a hobby, like stamp collecting. It seems like a nice leisure activity; hence people spend thousands of dollars every year playing this game. I mean c’mon…you walk around, hit a little ball, chase after it, and then hit it again. You can disagree with me regarding golf’s validity as a sport…that’s fine…but it still baffles me that you can make billions of dollars doing this thing and Tiger has all that!

Tiger has fame, money, a hot wife, kids, and he still feels the need to behave like a little kid. Instead of addressing all this on Friday, the only thing that struck me as sincere about the presser was his criticism of the tabloids. Gee Tiger, of course the tabloids are going to cover this! Your behavior is insane, and for better or worse, this society wants to know what goes on inside the heads of insane individuals. As rational human beings, we find this fascinating. This is why people read the Unabomber’s manifesto and why Mein Kampf still sells copies. Tiger, you hit the jackpot, you blew it, and now you don’t understand why everyone wants to know what you were thinking? What don’t you get about this?

So, instead of addressing all these questions like Kobe did when he cheated on his wife, or like Giambi, McGwire, and others did when they were busted for steroids, Tiger orchestrates a controlled setting where no questions will be asked and you are allowed to read a prepared statement that sounded like a Rachel Alexandra-sized pile of crap (except for the media bashing part. That was sincere). What is the point? Did he think Elin is going to buy it? Good God, I hope not! Did he think the public is going to buy it? I really hope not! Tiger looked like a pathetic little brat on Friday, and he looked genuinely confused as to why on earth people are gobbling up this story.

Tiger had it all, and it’s clear to me that he effectively pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes for several years. He manipulated the media, the public, his fans, and most importantly his family into believing that he was something that he is clearly not. He is a conniving little brat who is unappreciative of everything that has been given. Sometimes, you have to know when to just call it like it is. Tiger Woods, you are a weak individual who couldn’t keep your Little Tiger in your pants. You are a spineless charlatan of the worst variety. You’re a reprehensible prick who deserves everything that is happening to you right now. I feel sorry for Elin, your kids, and anyone who was dumb enough to hold you on a pedestal for the past decade because you, sir, are the definition of a jackleg.

Raf Crowley is a contributing writer for The Yanks Are Coming. He can be reached at raf@yanksarecoming.com.