Q&A With Tom Callahan

Tom Callahan's lastest sports biography will strike readers as his least likely topic for the kind of sweeping, rich and lively book Callahan has become known for. Yet Callahan delivers with a beautifully written and compelling study of the Woods', their place in the game and Tiger's chase of Jack Nicklaus's major record.

GS: You lovingly said to Arnold Palmer that Earl was, like you, "full of shit," yet Earl wasn't exactly the most well-liked guy in his day. What is it you found so likable about him and eventually led you to devote a book to him?

TC: Underneath Earl’s bluster and braggadocio, he had saving graces and generous instincts. Any reader who makes it through the whole book will be able to see that. To Arnold Palmer I described him as “good-hearted at his best,” and I think that’s true.


GS: Who was your favorite Woods clan member to interview and why?

TC: I especially enjoyed going to see Earl’s first wife and all of Tiger’s siblings because they haven’t been heard from much; their stories are fresh and, some of them, heartbreaking. One of the most valuable sources was Royce, whom Tiger used to call “La-la,” because she was there when Earl died and she spoke beautifully of the last days.


GS: Where were you November 27th, how did you learn about his car accident, and did you immediately make the connection that this might lead to something bigger?

TC: I was in St. Augustine. No, I took it for an ordinary car accident. At first it sounded serious.


GS: Did you face any pressure from your publisher to shift the book from a study of Earl toward a book about Tiger and his personal problems?

TC: None. One of the Penguin guys wondered if I was going to interview Tiger’s floozies. I said, “I’m going to leave them to the floozy books.” I didn’t go looking for Earl’s girls, either, though I could have found them. Oddly enough, my original outline didn’t change very much. It just got a little shorter in the front and a little sadder in the back. The plan was always to let Earl and Tiger do most of the talking, and they do. Also, I wanted to put Tiger on the golf course. Or, rather, I wanted him to put us on the golf course. Through the years, even in press rooms, I’ve found him to be good at that. At the 2000 PGA, I asked him to go through Jack Nicklaus’s final hole, and he said:

“I put myself in the perfect vantage point, pin high. The sun was setting. The gallery was up on its toes on an embankment. It was kind of neat just to take it all in, the whole panorama. Jack and I both knew he needed to hole out to make the cut. When he hit it, I didn’t watch the shot. I watched him, watched him swing. I said, ‘That’s perfect tempo. That’s going to be pretty good.’ Then I saw the ball land. ‘It’s got a chance,’ I said. I don’t know how it didn’t go in, to be honest with you. I just thought, ‘Great fight, Jack. Cool.’ Then I remembered my ball was buried in the bunker and I was pissed off again.”

After Earl and Tiger, Jack is the third-string recurring character throughout the book. He’s the best supporting actor.

GS: It seems he has been poorly "handled" by his support team through the post November 27th events and perhaps, depending on who you believe, prior to that date. Did his team attempt to circumvent any of your research or interviews for the book?

TC: Had Earl been around, I don’t think they would have let the story fester so long before they lanced it.

When the word was out that I was interviewing the family, Mark Steinberg of IMG called and asked me, as a favor, not to write the book. “I’ll tell you what, Mark,” I said, “I’ll give it just as much consideration as you would give me if I called and asked you for a favor.” Then he said, “I can’t make any promises, but you’d be high on our list to write Tiger’s book eventually.” I laughed. “Stop it, Mark,” I said. “I’d be the last guy you’d want because I wouldn’t give you control.” But no barriers were put up in front of me by Mark or anyone else.

I understood why he and Tiger were worried. (Obviously, it’s the least of their worries now.) They knew I knew Earl. Our relationship began in 1997, when I went to Vietnam and found out that Tiger Woods’ namesake, Tiger Phong, had died in a Communist reeducation camp. I brought Phong’s widow and two of his children to California to see Earl, Tida and Tiger. Tiger and I were in his old room, talking. We could hear Earl’s voice coming through the wall. Unprompted, Tiger turned to me and whispered, “He’s my inspiration. He’s my conscience. I can honestly say he’s the coolest guy I know.”

From then on, Tiger associated me with his dad. Through the years, when I hit-and-run him for a question or two during or after press conferences, he was always gracious and giving.


GS:  You close the book with some pretty strong words directed at Tiger and his lack of forgiveness of Fuzzy Zoeller. You say redemption is available to Tiger, what form would that take and do you see it happening?

TC: Tiger has a generous side, or at least he had one once. That day in Cypress, I expected him only to be dutifully polite to these Vietnamese people, on behalf of his father. But he was actually very sweet to them. Tiger, who, as you know, doesn’t like to let anyone inside, brought them into his bedroom and showed them his Star Wars stuff.

Though he was, of course, responsible, Earl sometimes worried that “being Tiger” might be costing his son some human dimension. “So I’m glad he has found a wife, a great wife,” he said. “You know, it’s hard for a caveman to go out on a hunt, bring the damn food into the cave, light the friggin’ fire, do every other damn thing, and then sit there and eat alone. Thank God, Tiger’s not alone.”

But Tiger is alone, and his potential for loneliness is almost off the charts.

Sadly (and meaning it), Ernie Els wondered, “Where’s he going to put his energy now? Into fitness? More and more fitness? Tiger’s going to be a very lonely guy, I think, unfortunately.”

I believe Tiger should look to himself, not his swing, for the solution. Redemption is always possible, don't you think? That’s the way to root, anyway.