It’s cemented now.

Woods has gone an entire year without winning a tournament for the first time in his professional career. In foregone years, the mere thought would table scrap fodder for some late night comedian. A year without winning a Major, perhaps. A year without at least five tournament top finishes, possibly.

But 12 months with but a doughnut in the victory column? For a man who has won 14 Majors already, a man who has torn through the Professional Golf Association with 71 total wins, and a man who has captured eight of the last 10 PGA Player of the Year crowns?

No, for a man with these credentials, a winless full calendar seems like something that should be sealed in a flask and sent to some secret laboratory for testing.   

But it happened. And in a way that it typically never did. Woods led the Chevron World Challenge through three rounds this past weekend, and had a comfortable four shot lead going into the final day. The former No.1 player in the world ran out of gas, though, and Graeme McDowell came from behind to topple Woods in a sudden death playoff.

If nothing else, the events that have transpired in 2010 have proven, well, that Woods is a man, with or without the nearly impeccable playing history.

And it offers insight into a discussion that’s not gotten as much attention as Tiger’s struggles. And that is that the PGA, not often noted in the topic of most difficult sports, may actually be the stiffest identifier of an athlete’s talents - yes, more challenging than hockey, baseball, basketball, and even football.

What’s taken place with Tiger is perfect illustration. Michael Vick, Brett Favre, Kobe Bryant, Ben Roethlisberger, and Ray Lewis all had to battle back after enduring damages to their reputations, most notably their personal characters. Woods is on a similar journey. The nature of each of their setbacks is irrespective to the point that the perch was lost.

Though the journey is familiar, the roads are drastically different. And for Tiger, that has spelled doom.

Unlike Vick, Tiger couldn’t come back to the Tour and play behind David Duval for a year, coming in for a hole or two during a tournament before returning to the sideline where he could demonstrate how improved he is as a teammate. He couldn’t, like Kobe, defer to Charles Howell if he were having a difficult night and still get a victory. And he’s not able to, like Favre, swap teams for a more polished backfield and defensive front. And unlike Roethlisberger, he can’t coast through a season invisibly while his counterparts, Lee Westwood, Jim Furyk, and Phil Mickelson, shoulder the spotlight.   

Instead, he’s on an island, much like the greens that he sometimes targets. Tiger has no counterparts. For 72 holes, he is alone, though he’d probably be the first to point out how that assessment is a sad oxymoron in itself. The overflowing galleries on each hole, the still image and broadcast cameras behind and in front of each shot, the millions of viewers that tune in only when he’s competing – all are locked into Tiger’s every move and reaction.

And within this proverbial glass house, Tiger’s attention has to be on the sport. That’s not completely what one might deem a daunting task. After all, he is a professional. Take into consideration though that Woods’ competition is vastly different than Bryant’s, Lewis’s, or Roethlisberger’s.     

Even individually, Bryant was still superior to opposing defenders when he came back on image recovery. He could always out jump, out hustle, and out shoot most would-be defenders. And when he couldn’t do that, he could sometimes intimidate his opponent through sheer will and attitude. Moreover, Lewis was without question more tenacious than anyone attempting to block him and Roethlisberger could pick apart a defense based on its weakest players and their mistakes.

Woods’ competitor looks a bit different. Never confuse the other Tour players as his competition. He’s not lined up against Mickelson’s short game or Robert Garrigus’s driving exploits. No, the force that Tiger works against when Thursday morning arrives is much more dominant because it’s not human.  

His opponent is the course – it’s the unyielding greens, unpredictable wind conditions, and fickle fairways that Woods is trying to overcome. With them, he has to consider ill-placed bunkers, wide bodies of water, and treacherous tree-lines when approaching a shot. Unlike shaky shooting guards, inexperienced blockers, or blown secondary assignments, Tiger can’t wait for the course to buckle or concede.

There was a time when he appeared to tame the course rather easily. Right now, he looks tamed by it. And what has been taken for granted is that Tiger’s mental toughness prior to his recent fallout was beyond anyone competing in American sports in the past decade.

That mental toughness has been battered though. In discussing his return, he claimed to want to show the game more respect. The irony is that it was his complete disrespect of the course and his peers that made him special.

But as noted, Tiger is on image recovery, and playing golf, his road will be more rigorous than any other.

It would be great if he could take a page from Michael Vick and ease back into action slowly, take time to work himself back into condition, focus more on his kind qualities, and demonstrate his respect for the game. Then after a year, come back in full stride, as Vick has done. It would also be nice if he could take the route of Kobe who could rely on Pau Gasol or Lamar Odom when necessary.

But he can’t. The battle is Tiger’s and Tiger’s alone.

It’s not to say that he has been ostracized. It’s quite the contrary, truly. At this juncture, the NFL, NBA, and MLB have no one player that they truly need for the viability of the sport. The PGA, however, wants the old Tiger back. The Tour players wish to see the old bully as well. They all recognize how valuable he is to the sport. It speaks volumes that even with all the allies, Woods can rely on none of them to pick him up.

Tiger, though, doesn’t live in a completely different world. What he does have in common with the other image bruised stars is that it’s not particularly his amicable personality that is going to win over the American public and with them the coveted sponsors. No, Woods will win over the American public when he starts to win tournaments. Time and time again, our society has proven that nothing cures an ailing reputation like hoisting trophies.