Mark Spector

Mark Spector is a columnist for sportsnet.ca

What is most amazing about Woods' admission Wednesday is that so many people are actually surprised.

What is the differene between Alex Burrows and Tiger Woods?

One still plays with Swedish twins.

OK, not fair. Let's try that again.

John Daly offered a piece of career advice to Tiger Woods on Tuesday ...

Sorry. That's almost impossible to believe -- even though it is true.

Yes, it has come to this: The Great Tiger Woods has become fodder for Jay Leno's stand-up. His name is being dragged through the same mud that has sullied so many celebrities and sports stars.

Frankly, what is most amazing about what would appear to be Woods' admission of infidelity is that so many people actually ARE surprised.

So, the question becomes why?

How did birdies on a scorecard earn Tiger a squeaky clean reputation off the golf course? How do a few majors soften the usually skeptical fans, who have been let down for decades by athletes who can't live up to the image they have created for themelves?

After Kobe Bryant, Magic Johnson, Alex Rodriguez, Martin Brodeur, Michael Jordan and countless other stars, how does Woods slip through the radar to become portrayed as this All-American father and family man?

Well, start with CBS, and by extension, the entire golf media that was presented with the most dominant athlete in his sport since Jordan or Wayne Gretzky. An African American in a white man's sport, no less.

He was so superior on his own that the only way to aggrandize his persona -- and that's what we so often do in the media -- was to deify his personal life.

His relationship with father Earl was chronicled, and the stories told and retold about the tricks and methods Earl used to train his son. When Earl passed in May of '06, television typically exploited every tear, every reflective moment. Like Tiger's loss was somehow greater than that of anyone else who loses a parent.

For Buick, Nike, the networks and anyone else who could align their product with Woods, he has been a goldmine who reaches every demographic. And the higher the sycophantic networks ramped up his persona -- the more they blatantly cheered for him over other golfers -- the more artificial it all became.

Then, the National Enquirer reports there is a mistress. Then, the (ahem) car accident.

And now, another woman. This time with Tiger's voice allegedly connected to L.A. waitress Jaimee Grubbs on a voicemail recording she has no doubt sold alongside her story to another rumour mag.

"Hey, it's Tiger," he says in the voicemail. "I need you to do me a huge favor. Can you please take your name off your phone? My wife went through my phone and may be calling you. So if you can, please take your name off that. Just have it as a number on the voicemail. You got to do this for me. Huge. Quickly. Bye."

There wasn't even time to reserve judgment, or question whether that was truly Tiger's voice. Because on his own website, tigerwoods.com, an apology appeared simultaneously.

"I have let my family down and I regret those transgressions with all of my heart," he began. Considering all the lies that we now know of, who cares what came after that?

How many more women are there? How many will watch Grubbs on her "payoff TV" tour and say, "Hey, I want some of that dough. I slept with Tiger too"?

Now the joke going around is that Tiger is going to change his name to Cheetah. And there is Daly, the Hillbilly golfer that he is, on the podium instructing Woods on how best to preserve his public image.

"Just tell the truth," Daly advises, a turnabout that would make for a whopper thesis paper at PR school.

Tiger did go on to plead for privacy in his website admission. Funny, isn't it, how a guy who thrusts his face on to your big screen in various ad platforms -- and reaps in $100 million a year for it -- now decides he wants a more private life?

Good luck, pal.

There will be plenty of fans -- both in the real world and in the media -- falling over themselves to forgive Woods, as if he has personally let them down. They should apologize to themselves.

It's 2009.

If you bought all the hokum that the golf networks fed you on Woods all these years, while athletes in every other sport were screwing up left, right and centre, then you owe yourself an apology.

You'd think that being Tiger, with a knockout wife, two small children and $100 million a year would be enough. Just hitting the ball straight off the tee would be enough for some guys.

But not, it seems, for our hero.

Surprise.