The curious case of the missing Tiger Woods documentary
After missing ESPN's initial offering, the waiting game begins for the on-demand version
Originally, I intended to provide some observations based on the Tiger Woods: America’s Son documentary initially aired Sunday night on ESPN. The one-hour film, according to the network, examines Tiger’s “complex racial identity and the meaning of the golfer’s success in America.”
Heavy stuff, to be sure. Certainly timely, though. And it’s Tiger. Like most golf types, I’m fascinated by the guy.
Alas, I did not see the show’s debut. Nor did I record it. (Am I the only person in America without some type of DVR device?). Not to worry. I had read, on multiple news sources promoting the show, that it would be accessible on ESPN+. Luckily, I have a subscription. I’ll just watch it there.
But nearly 48 hours after its initial airing, the documentary remains unavailable. I searched everywhere. ESPN+. ESPN.com. The Undefeated, the terrific content platform that explores “the intersections of race, sports and culture” and was the show’s presenting entity.
Yes, you can still find the two-minute trailers on that websites. But the documentary itself is a no-show. Doesn’t that seem a bit odd, given that ESPN generally overpromotes everything within its grasp? Why wouldn’t they want to offer up this important documentary about arguably the most heralded and famous American athlete of the last 25 years? Especially since it would drive subscriptions to ESPN+ (at $5.99 per month, if you’re wondering … and given ESPN’s recent cutbacks due to COVID-19 financial woes, it could certainly use the money).
Yet even on an ESPN.com story published Tuesday about Tiger’s son Charlie and his trash-talking ability, there was no promotion of the documentary itself attached to the file. Nor is there any mention of the documentary on Tiger’s player page on the website.
Having worked at ESPN.com, and knowing the kind of planning and thoroughness required to handle a massive amount of content and promotion, I doubt this was a mere oversight.
Certainly others were noticing too.
I was now curious. Extremely curious. Luckily I found an ESPN+ agent named John on a help chat session. We had a 20-minute text conversation.
“Thank you for contacting ESPN+ Customer Support. How may I assist you today?”
“I’m an ESPN plus subscriber. Trying to access the new Tiger Woods documentary but it's not available on ESPN plus. It was supposed to be available after its initial airing this weekend. Just trying to find out why it's not available.”
“Hi Mike! I really don't want you to miss the Tiger Woods documentary! rest assured that you have the right person to help you with this.”
At this moment, I felt very confident. After all, John was the RIGHT PERSON. Upon confirming that my subscription was active, John then asked:
“Is the content that you are looking for the 2019 Tiger Woods?”
“No. It's the new Tiger Woods documentary.”
“The Masters Films?”
“No. The new documentary. It just aired over the weekend.”
OK, not feeling as confident in John right now.
“Can you please try this?”
John then supplies a link. It does not work.
“That's not it. This is the release from the ESPN press room.”
“I see. Actually we are getting a lot of contacts regarding this.”
A minute goes by before John adds:
“This has actually been escalated with our back end team and we are waiting to hear from them. But can you please try this link.”
The link looks promising, at least with the cover image. But once I click play, it takes me to the live ESPN feed. Here’s the link in case you want to try. I report back. Responds John:
“We are actually getting a lot of reports regarding this content. We are still waiting to hear back from our management team regarding this matter. I will make sure to contact you back either through email or phone once we hear back from them.”
“OK, thanks. Do you know if there's a specific reason why it's not available now? Just curious...”
“We don't know yet as of the moment, but rest assured that we will let you know once it’s fixed. “
John then took my number and promised to call when the documentary became available. After the chat ended, I then sent an email to ESPN’s public relations team but have yet to receive a response.
The question remains: Why hadn’t it already been posted? Three potential answers came immediately to mind.
Simple oversight. (Doubtful, as I mentioned earlier).
Planned delay. (Maybe there’s a specific reason – waiting for a tie-in to the PNC Championship to be played later this month? That’s the father-son event that Tiger and Charlie are playing, but that tournament itself is not being aired on ESPN. Perhaps another internal reason for marketing or promotional purposes? Or a technical glitch? There could be a variety of reasons.)
And now the conspiracy theory – Tiger and his team didn’t like it.
OK, I have no idea if they did or didn’t, of course. I did check Tiger’s Twitter account and didn’t see any reference to it, but that’s not surprising, as he rarely promotes anything beyond his own control. And since I didn’t see it myself, I can’t begin to speculate if there was anything he might find objectionable.
But as writer Farrell Evans pointed out in a terrific commentary for The Undefeated, Tiger does have a complicated history with the issue. Writes Evans:
Since bursting on the scene with an epic 12-shot win at the 1997 Masters, Woods has been a reluctant hero for Black America, while looming as a god over the sport. His rejection of [Joe} Louis’ social and political mantle for Black athletes has been painful for many in Black America, who saw him as a source of racial pride and a champion over decades of racism in the game of golf.
Even if Tiger’s representatives asked ESPN to slow-play or downplay the video promotion, I don’t know if ESPN would acquiesce. Again, this is just a conspiracy theory – and if we’ve learned anything in recent weeks, the popularity of conspiracy theories knows no bounds, even with the highest levels of our leaders.
What I do know is this – I’d like to see the documentary. I have the necessary subscription but alas, I do not have access to it. And I’m still waiting for John to call me. If he doesn’t, I might ask for a $5.99 refund.
#3 - Team Tiger Terribly Teed (off)