Sports Columnists Think The Unthinkable

The revelations of Tiger’s twelve thirteen mistresses seems to have freed sports writers to go where they previously had dared not. Orlando Sentinel Columnist Mike Bianchi pulls no punches:

The PGA Tour, for once in its life, should be proactive on an issue involving performance-enhancing drugs. Commissioner Tim Finchem should immediately announce a full-scale investigation into Tiger’s relationship with this controversial doctor. And if it’s found that Tiger has been using illegal PEDs, all of golf’s governing bodies should strip him of his major titles. Nicklaus, like Aaron, should not have his monumental milestone (18 major victories) surpassed by a cheater.

Remember the before-and-after pictures of lanky Bonds as a young baseball player and then the bulked-up, hulked-up Bonds after he began using that BALCO-manufactured “flaxseed oil”? Well, look at pictures of Tiger as the skinny young golfer and compare them to the thicker, bigger, sculpted, chiseled Tiger of today.

LA Times Columnist Bill Plaschke also seems to think it’s possible:

Two years ago, after following Tiger Woods down the fairway for a couple of days at the U.S Open at Oakmont, I confided to friends an observation that seemed too absurd for public consumption.

From the back, the dude looked like Barry Bonds.

His neck was oddly wide. His shoulders were absurdly broad. His biceps were busting out of a tight shirt.

For the first time, he wasn’t just better than everyone else, he was also bigger. He looked not like a technician lining up a tee shot, but a slugger getting loose for batting practice.

He looked weird. He looked stuffed. He looked dirty.

I confided it, but never wrote it, because who would believe it?

Tiger Woods in the same sentence as the most infamous (alleged) steroid user? He was too smart, too scripted, too careful.

Thought so, anyway.

Now I wonder.

I’ve thought for a long time that the virtually overnight transformation was suspicious, but dismissed it. I could never figure out how all that muscle made him a better player (and you could argue that it hasn’t—regardless of how he acquired it). But I’ve been so wrong on so many things in this saga.

No one should ever be guilty by association, but Woody’s relationship with that Canadian doctor arrested for trafficking in performance enhancing drugs was reckless at best. If I had a billion dollars, and was considering using a doctor with, say, unusual methods, I’d have the man vetted by serious investigators. My career and image would be too important to risk.

But then, carrying on with a Baker’s Dozen Bimbos also would be too risky.