In the Year of the Tiger, a Tiger apology seemed a good reason for me to come out to play.
I admit after trying to watch some fat middle aged guys on TV trying to hit a white ball into a small hole , I am especially ready for Tiger to come back.
But now after seeing his controlled media statement, I’m convinced of his contrition.
I never bought a TW hat, a watch, or a product he pimped. But I bought his statement.
I’m responding to his plea. I have room in my heart to believe in him again.
Mostly what did it was his mother.
I can’t recall seeing Tida, Tiger’s Thai mom, ever being featured in any of the coverage since that fateful Thanksgiving night.
We needed to see her.
Perhaps there was a breakdown in the cameras that gave us that cutaway shot from the back for the latter part of his statement. But it was great because it made us see Tida.
In my published columns, I’ve said Tiger coming clean would have to be a toal spiritual reawakening.
I’ve said he should bypass the Sharptons and the Jesse Jacksons and embrace someone like Thich Nhat Hanh.
Maybe after Obama, maybe it’s Tiger who should check in with the Dalai Lama.
So it was heartening to see him acknowledge his Buddhism. During Tiger’s media void, Fox’s Brit Hume said Tiger should embrace Christ and essentially be born again. How missionary like of Hume. But Tiger did need to do something to recognize the source of his core values.
And now we’ve seen Tiger publicly declare how he was raised a Buddhist as a young boy by his mom and drifted away in recent years.
“I lost track of what I was taught,” Tiger said.
Tiger has rediscovered his roots.
That’s why the most important person in the room was his mother Tida, and her long loving embrace.
Whatever Tiger’s transgressions, it will be his Asian American side that will redeem him. 

And for those who consistently see him as black and black only (how many people like to refer to him as the first black this or that, while not recognizing he’s also the first Asian American in many cases?), perhaps now this public display of “Asian-ness” will show how Woods truly reflects a different, modern multicultural world.