Jim Brown vs Tiger

We had an interesting hour of radio this morning with Paul Thompson regarding Jim Brown's comments and the social responsibility of Tiger Woods. Brown felt Tiger waited until it was politically correct to comment on Kelly Tilghman's "lynching" remark, and said that "Tiger doesn't have a responsibility despite what he says."

I happen to think the way Tiger chose to handle the situation was much more noble and worthy of applause than Brown's proposed immediate condemnation. In my opinion Tiger realized Tilghman's remark was simply a slip of the tongue with no aimed ill will or racist intent and chose to forgive a friend and move on. Tiger could, if he wanted to, have called a press conference the next day and destroyed Tilghman's career.

It's okay that Tiger wasn't offended. It is not his job to make a social statement every time the opportunity presents itself. Tiger's job is to play golf, and anything he decides to champion above and beyond that in my opinion is gravy. What he has done through the Tiger Woods Foundation with character development programs, scholarships, grants, junior golf teams and learning centers is a worthy and valuable cause. I'm not sure a nationwide discussion about the "noose" progresses us as a society too awfully much.

Tiger's fine. Let him play.