Now-repentant golfer Tiger Woods held court in two TV appearances last night—one with ESPN and the other with the Golf Channel—and admitted, "I've done some pretty bad things in my life," and that he's "disgusted" with his own behavior, adding, "I tried to stop and I couldn't stop -- It was horrific." (You can say/sext that again!) These were his first interviews since his Bimbogate erupted.
ESPN says, "The interview was offered to ESPN with no restrictions on questions, but with a five-minute time limitation, plus an agreement to hold it for airing on television beginning at 7:30 p.m. ET," and it's reported a similar offer was made to the Golf Channel. In spite of the unrestricted questions, Syracuse media studies professor Robert Thompson points out "If you limit to five minutes, when you account for structure, there's not much time to get into anything, which is probably best."
The Post is also outraged that the interviewers asked "softball questions" and didn't ask follow ups. Woods didn't get into the details of the confrontation he had with wife Elin that sparked his car accident, which led to his many affairs being revealed, "Well, it's all in the police report. Beyond that everything's between [wife] Elin and myself and that's private," but did offer up what he's learned in rehab, "I was living a life of a lie -- I really was. And I was doing a lot of things that hurt a lot of people. And stripping away denial and rationalization, you start coming to the truth of who you really are, and that can be very ugly."
The Daily News has some excerpts—Woods said of his wife's and his mother's reactions, "When asked how he told his wife Elin and mother, "They both have been brutal. They've both been very tough. Because I hurt them the most. Those are the two people in my life who I'm closest to and to say the things that I've done, truthfully to them, is ... honestly was ... very painful." As for heading back to golf, by playing in next month's Masters, Woods said, "I'm a little nervous about that to be honest with you. It would be nice to hear a couple claps here and there."
