Believe Woods' apology? Drop the nickname to start

Random inklings concerning Tiger Woods' media event Friday:

• Sorry, didn't believe him. Too scripted. Too choreographed. Too robotic. Too many purposeful stares into the camera. Too many calculated inflections to emphasize particular points. Too many pauses for effect.

As mom used to tell us, "It's not what you say it's the way that you say it." Woods' words were all right but the delivery all wrong.

Categorize the performance as bad acting from someone the tabloids exposed as a bad actor.

• Just to clarify, sir: Sorry for cheating or for getting caught? Trying to save a marriage from collapse or half a fortune from divorce?

• Here's a 3-step program for Woods to follow if he really wants to rehab his lifestyle.

First: Drop the nickname. Along with playing a kids' game for a living, the "Tiger" persona is license for an adult to remain a child.

It's time to grow up, Eldrick.

Second: Pledge to be invisible everywhere but the golf course and family room.

Watch TV with the kids instead of appearing on it with product in hand. No more commercials for golf balls, soft drinks, razors, automobiles or anything else.

Enough money always is enough; enough family time rarely is.

Third: Fire the enablers who built your false image and now are trying to rebuild it. They were co-conspirators in your downfall.

The cure is as easy as 1-2-3: 1. Faith; 2. Family; 3. Finally, fairways.

• How many husbands watched Woods and thought, "But for the grace of God, there I go."

• Here is one question that could have been asked if any were allowed: Eldrick, sir, would you settle for being No. 100 in the world golf rankings if it would save your marriage?

• Here is the first paragraph on the Woods foundation Web site: "From early childhood, I dreamed of being the world's best golfer. I worked hard and applied my family's values to everything I did. Integrity, honesty, discipline, responsibility, and fun."

If only Woods had applied that to life off the golf course.

• A little comic relief would have been refreshing Friday. Like, how about a few of Woods' women performing pole dances and singing backup?

The lyrics interspersed at appropriate moments of Eldrick's revised script could have included everything from Brenda Lee's "I'm sorry, so sorry" to Britney Spears' "Oops, I did it again" and Rod Stewart's "Do you think I'm sexy" to Luther Ingram's "If loving you is wrong, I don't want to be right."

Bill Clinton, Michael Jordan, Mark Sanford and John Edwards could have done the mambo with a couple mistresses apiece. Hillary, Juanita, Jenny and Elizabeth could have started a dance hall brawl by trying to break in.

Now that's a media event!

• How about Elin not standing by her man during Woods' state of the scandal address? You go, girl!

• What does all this do to Michael Jordan's status as a mentor to young phenoms? Puts "be like Mike" in a new light, that's what.

• OK, so the tone of all the above is cold.

But if Eldrick Woods doesn't owe us an apology, we don't owe him any slack.