"The emotional toll will present a significant challenge to Woods' eventual return to golf."

Post-Tiger statement-reading, I expected Jaime Diaz's March April Golf Digest story on Tiger to not be as timely considering it was probably filed weeks before Tiger's public appearance. However, it remains a fascinating read highlighted by some intriguing conclusions from Diaz, who appears to have more access to the the Woods team than anyone else in the media.

The emotional toll will present a significant challenge to Woods' eventual return to golf. His greatest advantage as a player has long been the otherworldly knack for playing his best when he needed to most. It came with a clean mind free of baggage, serene under pressure. It was an ability he believed he earned through diligent practice on the right things. One that made him feel crucial eight-footers on the 72nd green deserved to go in, one that made him feel good about himself. "If you walk up to a mirror, look at yourself and say, with no hesitation, 'I love myself,' then everything is fine," he told me during an interview in 1999. "That has never been a problem my entire life." Now, however, it's reasonable to surmise that it is.

Alan Shipnuck offers a far different take on the statement-reading in this week's SI:

Woods said he doesn't know when he will return to golf, and judging by his fragility, it won't be any time soon. At some point he will reclaim his destiny as a golfer, but it is now an open question whether he will be the same player he was. Part of what made Woods such a relentless achiever was his selfishness. He gave nothing beyond his performance. He played the gentleman's game in a controlled rage, hocking loogies, chucking clubs and dropping f bombs. If you didn't like it, too bad. All his recent soul-searching, though, has convinced Woods that he is not exempt from golf's code of conduct. "When I do return, I need to make my behavior more respectful of the game," he said on Friday. Easier said than done, perhaps: Tiger is not Arnie, who could play with controlled fury, then throttle back once the final putt had dropped.

The Miami Herald's Greg Cote makes a strong case that the statement reading was far more humiliating than many have realized.

For circumventing a news conference he's the manipulating control freak. But if he had a news conference and chosen not to answer the most intrusive questions, he would have been decried as dodging. The majority of media -- insulted by Woods being in control, angry over the many weeks of silence or simply not wanting to appear soft -- was predisposed to blast Woods' statement as a sham before he ever uttered a word.

Get this straight: No law required that Woods submit to media interrogation as if on trial. He was perfectly entitled to handle it the way he did without the presumption of disingenuousness just because reporters were not there to cross-examine.

The biggest insult in my line of work is to be seen as soft or gullible, but sometimes you need to risk those labels to get to any place close to compassion.

For an iconic athlete of this echelon, especially one who grooms his image so carefully, the public shame alone is the greatest punishment.