LARNED — Can’t you just hear Buck Owens singing the words to his famous song “I’ve Got a Tiger By The Tail?”  
I am constantly amazed — no, make that dismayed — by the infatuation of our sports media with Tiger Woods.
It borders on obsessive!
Every PGA Tournament weekend the headlines are about Tiger Woods.
“Can Tiger Win Another Major?”
 “Tiger’s Back Injury May Slow Tiger”
“Can Tiger Reclaim His Magic?”
The headlines go on ad nauseam.
To quote Shakespeare it is “Much ado about nothing.”
Egads!
The guy is not even one of today’s top professional golfers and has not been for some time. Give it a rest!
A quick perusal of the Top 40 money winners this year on the PGA tour shows his name  “missing in action.” Instead you will find names like Bubba Watson, Rory McIlroy and Sergio Garcia.
Tiger has been replaced by a new generation of terrific shotmakers but the press just can’t let him go.
Don’t you wonder why?
The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche might have grabbed the tiger by the tail some 150 years ago when he said, “Undeserved praise causes more pangs of conscience later than undeserved blame, but probably only for this reason, that our powers of judgment are more completely exposed by being overpraised than by being unjustly underestimated.”
This behavior by the press is not new, of course. They pick their heroes and put them on a white steed and ride them forever.
The Kennedy clan falls into that category along with the Clintons and Princess Dianna.
How many Americans REALLY care about the semi-annual trotting out of the Princess Dianna stories?  
Tiger has been placed on that horse.
Isn’t it time to stop beating a dead horse?
 
CHALK TALK — Oh Happy Day! Football season is here with a full round of exhibition games this weekend in professional football. You Chiefs fans shouldn’t get too excited about the guys from Arrowhead making it back into the playoffs. Early in this season the Chiefs get four of five road games. An 8-8 season looms on the horizon! ... Kudos to the Larned American Legion boys baseball team. They grabbed a surprising fourth-place finish at the state AA tournament this past weekend ... Don’t you just love the growing relationship that Kansas State Athletics has developed with Fort Riley? In this time of renewed respect for our military, Kansas State has done a great job of involving the soldiers from the nearby base. Their special presence at K-State football games is terrific! ... How special was Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Seaver of the Mets? Mr. October, Reggie Jackson, said, “Blind people came to the ballpark just to listen to him pitch.” ... A lot of folks think KU football coach Charlie Weis is on the hotseat as Jayhawk boss. I’m not in that camp. I think Weis has established his legacy. Of course it was in the pros, not college football. Still, I think Weis will leave of his own volition if he’s not getting it done in Lawrence. All that said, this is an important year for the Jayhawks ... This football season brings a lot of change for the Great Bend Panthers, Hoisington Cardinals and Larned Indians. New coaches, new leagues, new quarterbacks. That’s what is special about high school football! ... Keep the faith Royals fans. Despite a crummy losing streak to start the second half of the season, the Boys in Blue are still over .500 and only 4-5 games behind division leading Detroit. The playoffs are still dangling out there, possible, very possible ... Boxing promoter Dan Duva on Mike Tyson going to prison, “Why would anyone expect him to come out smarter? He went to prison for three years, not Princeton!”
 
Charles Tabler is a contributing writer from Larned.