Tiger team rips report linking him to doctor

ORLANDO, Fla. -- Tiger Woods' team moved swiftly Tuesday to discredit a New York Times report that linked the embattled golfer to a physician whom the newspaper says is under criminal investigation in the United States and is suspected of providing athletes with performance-enhancing drugs.

The Times wrote that Anthony Galea, a Canadian doctor who says he uses human growth hormone himself and prescribed it to patients 40 and over, had treated Woods with a legal blood-spinning technique called platelet-rich plasma therapy to speed up Woods' recovery from reconstructive knee surgery in 2008.

Mark Steinberg, Woods' agent at Cleveland-based International Management Group, said in a statement: "The treatment Tiger received is a widely accepted therapy and to suggest some connection with illegality is recklessly irresponsible."

The rapid response from Woods' team contrasts sharply with the way it handled rumors stemming from the golfer's bizarre car accident outside his Isleworth home on Nov. 27. Public-relations experts faulted Woods and his representatives for not immediately addressing reports that the golfer had sexual relationships with numerous women outside his marriage.

"There's reactive public relations and there's proactive public relations," said Mike Paul, the president and senior counselor of MGP & Associates PR, a firm based in New York City. "This is a key example of proactive public relations. You are reacting to the initial incident... but you're proactively describing what it is before others do so in their view and in their tone."

There would be reasons why Woods' team moved so quickly to address the Times' piece. Unlike the continued reports about Woods' infidelity in his marriage, any report that ties Woods to a physician suspected of providing performance-enhancing drugs potentially would threaten Woods' reputation as the world's greatest golfer.

Woods' prowess on the golf course is the one aspect of his public persona that hasn't been assailed the last few weeks. He has won 71 events on the PGA Tour. That figure includes 14 professional major championships, just four shy of Jack Nicklaus' all-time record of 18 professional major championships.

Yet nothing can destroy an athlete's image as quickly as a tie to performance-enhancing drug use. Mark McGwire, once celebrated as the man who broke Roger Maris' single-season home-run record in baseball, lost credibility after an appearance before a congressional hearing in which he would not directly answer whether he used performance-enhancing drugs.

Woods' team had its response ready to the Times' article shortly after it was published.

Kevin Sullivan, a former communications director in George W. Bush's White House who has founded his own communications firm, said Woods' team made the right move to respond so quickly.

"The first misstep in this thing was letting so much time elapse before they said anything," Sullivan said.

The PGA Tour also chimed in.

Ty Votaw, its executive vice president of communications and international affairs, told the Orlando Sentinel, "We have read nothing in the published articles about Dr. Galea that would suggest a violation of our anti-doping policy as it relates to Tiger Woods and Dr. Galea."

The Times reported that human growth hormone and a drug extracted from calf's blood was found in Galea's medical bag at the U.S.-Canada border in late September.

But the newspaper did not write that Woods used HGH.

Instead, it reported that Galea said he flew to Orlando at least four times and administered the platelet therapy in Woods' Isleworth home in February and March. The paper wrote that Woods was referred to Galea by the golfer's agents at IMG because they were worried that Woods' rehabilitation was going slowly.

Steinberg refuted that aspect of the article.

'Flat wrong'

"The New York Times is flat wrong, no one at IMG has ever met or recommended Dr. Galea, nor were we worried about the progress of Tiger's recovery, as the Times falsely reported," Steinberg wrote in his statement.

Meanwhile, in recent days, reports have linked Woods to two more women, Theresa Rogers and Julie Postle.

According to the website RedCarpetMonday.com, Postle, 26, lives in Orlando and started a company called Purple Events & Marketing in 2007.

There's no question Woods' reputation has taken a significant hit recently. A USA Today/Gallup poll conducted this week revealed that Woods' "favorable" rating has dropped to 33 per cent. It was 85 per cent in the last poll about Woods in June 2005.

Sullivan said that Woods has two choices about the general crisis he faces: he can either do a one-on-one interview with someone such as Larry King or Oprah Winfrey, or Woods can hold a press conference. Sullivan doesn't think that Woods will want to submit to a one-on-one interview because such interviews carry an expectation that the subject will disclose private details.

"I don't think there's any question that he can rebound from this," Sullivan said. "The American people are extraordinarily forgiving and sports fans even more so. We love comeback stories. We love second chances... if they take responsibility for whatever it was they did, I think we do like a comeback story."

One comeback story involves baseball pitcher Andy Pettitte.

Pettitte held a press conference before spring training with the New York Yankees in 2008 in which he apologized for using HGH.

"We'll always accept an apology -- once," said William Sutton, a sports marketing professor with UCF's DeVos Sport Business Management Program. "Once. If it becomes habitual, we don't care."

-- The Orlando Sentinel

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition December 16, 2009 C1