Nike did its best to absolve its golden child for his affairs in a recently released ad, but it is going to take a lot more than staring pitifully into a camera for Tiger Woods to earn my forgiveness.
Released on April 7, one night before the Masters, the commercial features a mute Tiger with a sorrowful stare—are we supposed to feel bad for him?—while the voice of his deceased father, Earl Woods says, “Tiger, I am more prone to be inquisitive, to promote discussion. I want to find out what your thinking was.”
Although many interpret the setup to be Tiger reflecting and summoning the voice of his father, many find it an unnerving exploitation. Wieden and Kennedy, the advertising company that created the commercial, drew the audio track from a 2004 interview of Earl for the documentary DVD “Tiger: The Authorized DVD Collection.”
This skewing of Earl’s words attempts to address Tiger’s own marital issues. I find it quite ironic that the company chose to have Earl state, “I want to find out what your feelings are. And did you learn anything?”
In fact, Tiger did learn something from his late father, whose record of marital fidelity was far from perfect.
In a commentary in AdWeek, Barbara Lippert states, “Going to that shocking place of resurrecting Earl hardly adds credibility and, even worse, it opens up a whole new can of worms.”
However, many people praise the commercial, calling it a stroke of advertising genius and applaud Woods for addressing the scandal.
I’ll admit the ad is quite powerful as well as provoking, but it says nothing about Tiger’s morals, the thing he has to work on most. One has to ask where Tiger’s heart was in condoning the release of this commercial.
With the scandal barely five months past and a possible divorce looming, Tiger’s family has hardly had time to heal its emotional wounds. It seems that Tiger is okay with pouring salt in them at the thought of selling more Nike apparel. After all, he is sporting a Nike cap and vest similar to the one in his collection in the commercial.
There are countless other, more tasteful ways Tiger could have portrayed himself in his first ad since the scandal.
Tiger was nowhere in sight at the Augusta National Golf Club on the same day that the commercial aired. The event showcased family-oriented competitors like Jack Nicklaus and Phil Mickelson. Making an effort to show up at this event with his kids would have made me believe him more than the commercial that aired that night.
Nike got the attention and provocation it was obviously aiming for and, sadly, all Tiger has to do is start winning again for most to forget the scandal.
The commercial only proved one thing to me though—Tiger hasn’t changed. He’s let his fame and self-interest take priority while the relationships that he supposedly cherishes take the backseat.
I’m sure his family would join me in saying spare me a sad and sorry-looking Tiger. It’s going to take a much grander gesture for those wounds to heal.
Madison Eberenz is a sophomore CCPA major. She can be reached for comment at [email protected].
