Capelle On Golf

Tiger Woods is on a fast track to $1 billion dollars in career earnings. He’s filthy rich and he continues to add to his fortune, “earning” more than $100 million a year. And yet you’d think he’s on the poverty line the way he covets a buck.

And now Tiger is about to add another $3 million to his income because he’s agreed to play in the 2009 Australian Masters for his usual appearance fee.

When I think of appearance fees I think of entertainers, not competitive sportsman. I think of the Rolling Stones showing up, giving a superb performance, and getting paid for it. I don’t think of someone showing up for a sporting contest where the entrants should be competing on equal terms.

Here’s the problem: Appearance fees cross the line, creating an unfair competitive advantage. With $3 million in the bank, Woods is free to have fun and let his game out in an event that has no bearing on history. He’s a huge winner even if he misses the cut.

Meanwhile, the rank and file who play golf for a living must grind away for a fraction of what Woods is making. In short, the fees make a mockery of the competition when a winner other than Woods makes 10% as much as he does for four days of superb golf.

Appearance fees are nothing new to golf, the European Tour having used them for a long time to draw players. Tiger regularly demands fees for his annual visit to Dubai, where he is also earning enormous sums for designing a golf course. And Tiger would gladly accept appearance fees on the PGA Tour if they were allowed. They aren’t, but their rule is a minor inconvenience as he has signed deals giants like Accenture, Buick, and American Express that do, or have, sponsored events he plays in.

In these troubled times Tim Finchem asked the players to do more and play more. In response, Tiger said he was going to go some things “for Tim.” We’ll see about that. But he could also do some things for the global golf community as well, the one from which his multinational sponsors benefit so handsomely.

Take Australia, a sporting land in the midst of their own dark times. Woods has a golden opportunity to make a nation of friends by playing just for the sport of it. While it will cost him $3 million, in the long run the Aussies would buy far more Nike Sumos and drink more Gatorade Tiger. And they would not be haunted by the sting of him jetting home with their tax dollars.

In an era of enormous bonuses and corporate greed, Tiger had a chance to show he’s a different kind of cat. But his stripes are the same.

Tiger’s a fierce competitor who plays golf for the love of the game. But he’s also a golfing mercenary whose love affair with the buck might be almost as strong.