"Tonight" shows. He didn't even agree to an interview with Kelly Tilghman on "Morning Drive." He got on his private plane and flew home to Florida and began to prepare with single-minded purpose for the U.S. Open at Merion, which he won by several strokes, never taking the driver out of his bag.

The marketing men said it was pure genius. Steiny couldn't book the endorsements quick enough. President Obama said Tiger embodied American values. The Wall Street Journal published an editorial praising "the New Tiger." His public perception climbed overnight. Not winning took care of everything.

At year's end he was voted the USGA's highest honor, the Bob Jones Award for sportsmanship--an award most insiders felt that he, like the rascal Sam Snead, would never win. There has alwaysbeen the impression that success in golf was tied to inner character, as in the widespread belief that you can know the measure of a man by simply playing a round of golf with him. Rarely conceived in other sports where getting away with as much as you can is de rigueur, golf is self-policing. Tiger's WD reinforced this natural order that had been handed down from Jones to Nelson to Hogan to Palmer to Nicklaus to Watson.

The decision to, in effect, disqualify himself would go down as one of the legendary gestures of sportsmanship alongside Nicklaus conceding Tony Jacklin the two-foot putt that would tie the 1969 Ryder Cup and German long-jumper Luz Long advising Jesse Owens to start his long jump short of the foul line