One dark horse I like to throw out is Danny Ainge, a poor major league baseball player but a very good NBA guard. He is also, from what I’ve heard, a superb golfer. Golf, see, is the oddball sport that distinguishes a great athlete with truly mystical body control from the average great athlete.

Add another name to the list: John Smoltz. According to Buster Olney, Smoltz is a friend of Tiger Woods and “Woods says Smoltz is the best golfer he knows who is not a professional.”

Nice signing by the Red Sox especially if it turns the hapless Brad Penny into a middle reliever.

Update (25-June-09): Now I’m listening to Smoltz’ first start for the Red Sox. According to the announcers, Smoltz is also indomitable in Ping Pong.

The ancients were familiar with physical courage and the priests with moral courage, but in this over-communicated age when mortals feel perpetually addled, Woods is the symbol of mental willpower. He is, in addition, competitive, ruthless, unsatisfied by success and honest about his own failings. (Twice, he risked his career to retool his swing.)

During the broadcast of Monday’s playoff round, Nike ran an ad that had Earl Woods’s voice running over images of his son: “I’d say, ‘Tiger, I promise you that you’ll never meet another person as mentally tough as you in your entire life.’ And he hasn’t. And he never will.”

The most interesting phase of Woods’ career is yet to come. That is the point at which he gets old. And then, like the ancients – Jack Nicklaus at the 1986 Masters, or Beowulf against the dragon – he’ll need mental toughness not to augment his physical gifts, but to overcome his physical decline.