He spoke of being barred from golf clubs as an up-and-coming junior player because he was Black. He paid tribute to his parents, who took out a second mortgage on their home to pay for his junior golf expenses. He alluded to his well-chronicled problems once he reached the pinnacle of golf — his divorce, addictions and injuries.
With Woods’s son, Charlie, and mother, Kultida, looking on, Woods’s 14-year-old daughter set the tone, speaking of the 2021 car crash and his lengthy recovery.
“Recently, Dad had to train harder than ever,” Sam Woods told the audience Wednesday at PGA Tour headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. “About a year ago you were stuck in a hospital bed at one of your ultimate lows and one of the scariest moments of your life and ours. We didn’t know if you’d come home with two legs or not. Now, not only are you about to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, but you’re standing here on your own two feet.
“This is why you deserve this, because you’re a fighter. You’ve defied the odds every time, being the first Black and Asian golfer to win a major, being able to win your fifth Masters after multiple back surgeries and being able to walk just a few months after your crash.”
Once he took the stage, Woods quickly grew emotional. “I just lost a bet to [Steve] Stricker I wouldn’t cry,” he said.
“I didn’t get here alone,” Woods continued, speaking of unimaginable successes and failures off the course. “I had unbelievable parents, mentors and friends who supported me in the darkest of times and celebrated the highest of times.
“It’s actually a team award. All of you allowed me to get here, and I just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart.”
His voice caught as he spoke of his parents. It may have seemed as if he was always destined for success, but he revealed what lay behind it, saying he wouldn’t have succeeded “without the sacrifices of mom and dad, who instilled in me this work ethic to fight for what I believe in, to chase after my dreams.”
“Nothing is ever going to be given to you. Everything is going to be earned. If you don’t go out and put in the work, the effort, one, you’re not going to get the results, and two, and more important, you don’t deserve it. You didn’t earn it.”
The first thing he did as he started winning and getting sponsorship deals, he said, “was to pay off that mortgage.”
He remembered having to search for lost golf balls to practice with as a child, and his father, who died in 2006, telling him to stop putting against other golfers for quarters. “I come home a week later,” Woods said, “I had a pocket full of dollars.”
His father instilled passion and love for the game in him but couldn’t open the doors to golf clubs for him. That took success.
“You had to be twice as good to get half a chance, [so] I made practice so hard, hurt so much, because I wanted to make sure I was ready come game time. I was not allowed into the clubhouses. The color of my skin dictated that. … As I got older, that drove me even more.”
At 46, Woods has said that the crash has essentially ended his competitive career. His golf appearances since the crash have been limited to events with Charlie, and Sam couldn’t resist poking a little fun at her dad.
“It’s been at the soccer fields and golf tournaments over the years that Charlie and I have begun to realize how famous he actually is,” she said. “I mean, how can a guy who still FaceTimes his friends to discuss Marvel and DC [Comics] timelines and who goes to Comic-Con dressed as Batman be one of the greatest golfers that ever lived?”
