Tiger Woods Outraged by Tabloid Allegations about His Wife

The September issue of The Dubliner magazine contained an article that was supposed to be satirical and amusing, but instead it was infuriating. And it may just prove to be costly to them as well.

The article in question was about the wives of American golfers, one of whom was Elin Nordegren, wife of Tiger Woods. "Most American golfers are married to women who cannot keep their clothes on in public," the magazine wrote. "Is it too much to ask that they leave them at home for the Ryder Cup? Consider the evidence. Tiger Woods’ wife can be found in a variety of sweaty poses on porn sites." The article was accompanied by photos of Nordegren in a bikini, as well as a nude photograph of a woman purported to be Nordegren.

Three years ago when the nude picture first surfaced, Woods adamantly denied that it was his wife. Mark Steinberg, Woods’ agent, said that he is debating whether or not to pursue a lawsuit against the magazine’s publisher, Dubliner Media Limited. "It’s ridiculous," Steinberg said. "I can't say much now because of prejudice, because I'm not sure what we'll do in the future. Everyone knew it (the nude photo) wasn't her. It's plain as day. You can see it's not factual. It's kind of ironic they bring it up this week."

Woods is in Ireland this week preparing for the Ryder Cup, which starts Friday at the K Club. He had a press conference scheduled originally for Thursday, but he asked to move the session to Wednesday so he could address the allegations posed by The Dubliner magazine. It was the first topic he brought up. "My wife, yes, she has been a model prior, and she did do some bikini photos," Woods told reporters. "But to link her to porn Web sites and such is unacceptable, and I do not accept that at all. Neither does our team."

Dubliner Media Limited issued an apology for the article, saying that it was not intended to be taken seriously. "The publisher and staff at The Dubliner acknowledge that the satirical article was inappropriate and wish to sincerely apologize to Tiger Woods, his wife, Elin Nordegren, and other Ryder Cup players and their families for any offense they may have taken to it," said the statement.

Woods said that he didn’t think twice about sticking up for his wife and making his anger public. "You do things for the people you love and you care about," he said. "My father got ridiculed for years, and I always felt for my father and my mother the same way. My wife, we're in it together. We're a team, and we do things as a team. And I care about her with all my heart."

U.S. captain Tom Lehman told reporters that he thought Woods handled the matter extremely well. "He dealt with it first thing today. He got it out of the way so that we all move on. I think the whole team understands his frustration. Nobody likes that. But it was kind of like, 'I want to say something ... and let's get back to the business of the Ryder Cup.'"