Not sure I see the distinction

So.

On Monday, Scott McCarron said he wanted to make one thing perfectly clear: He never called on Phil Mickelson a “cheater.”

He merely said that what Mickelson was doing — using clubs with grooves that no longer conform to to USGA and PGA Tour standards — was cheating.

Oh.

The same day he denied calling Mickelson a cheater, McCarron bravely insisted he wouldn’t be silenced on the issue.

By the middle of the week, though, McCarron apologized to Mickelson — for whatever it was he said.

Friday column: Competitive drive vs. perspective

Phil Mickelson was excited.

Kenny Perry was gracious.

Tiger Woods was pissed.

All of which helps explain their relative positions in the golf universe.

After a brilliant front nine Sunday at Augusta, Mickelson frittered away his opportunity to complete a comeback for the ages and win the Masters.

First, he put a ball into the water on 12. Then he missed a 4-foot eagle putt on 15. Then he blew a 5-foot birdie putt at 17.

Yet he was smiling when he came off 18.

“It was fun,” he said.

Perry, 48, bidding to make history as the oldest man to win a major, took a two-stroke lead with him to 17, only to bogey it and 18 to fall into a playoff, which he lost.

“I’m still proud,” he said, before going on to warmly praise the man who beat him, Angel Cabrera.

Woods started the day — like Mickelson — seven strokes back. He, too, made a run at the lead — only to bogey the final two holes.

“I was just terrible,” Woods told a TV interviewer, anger evident in word, tone and body language. “I don’t know what was going on. It was just frustrating.”

Then he stalked off, smileless, joyless.

Woods isn’t into fun. He isn’t into moral victories. He’s into winning — period. His hyper-competitiveness is one of the reasons he’s so good.

No one becomes a successful pro athlete without being competitive — and Mickelson is quite successful; Perry, too, for that matter. But Woods’ competitiveness is of a different order. He doesn’t just love to win — he absolutely hates to lose.

When I’m rooting for an athlete, I prefer he or she be steely eyed. But in real life — and no, sports isn’t real life — it’s a little more complicated. In a February column about CEOs who helped lead us into recession, Sally Jenkins of The Washington Post noted, “many of the men who have lost other people’s money describe themselves as sportsmen, and operate with an absolute win-loss mentality.”

Wrote Jenkins: “Edward Bennett Williams called it ‘contest living,’ the unrelieved striving in which ‘every effort is marked down at the end as a win or a loss.’

But in real life, not everything is a clear win or a clear loss. In real life, results are often mixed, and their ultimate legacy has a lot to do with how they’re viewed.
This is how Perry viewed the Masters:

“I will look at this as a special week. It wasn’t perfect, but I’ll go home tonight with my family and we’ll have fun.”

There’s a word for that — perspective. I don’t know that that helps Perry in sport, but I’m quite certain it does in life — real life.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

In a bit of rough

There’s class — and then there’s … well, shave off a couple of letters.
Tiger Woods has class. His caddie, Steve Williams? Ehhh … not so much.

Williams, who has a reputation for thuggish behavior and stupid remarks, reverted to form recently by calling Woods rival Phil Mickelson a word that rhymes with stick (no, it wasn’t trick).

At an event in New Zealand, Williams also told the press that Mickelson, after being heckled by a fan, fell apart on the 17th and 18th holes at this year’s United States Open at Torrey Pines.

Mickelson said that Williams’ account was an “absolute fabrication” and that the story was “grossly inaccurate and irresponsible.” And the facts back him up. Mickelson played with Woods in the first two rounds, but did not struggle on the last two holes in either round.

“I don’t particularly like the guy,” Williams was quoted as saying. “He pays me no respect at all and hence I don’t pay him any respect. It’s no secret we don’t get along either.”

Williams also indicated Woods and Mickelson are less than friends. “I was simply honest and said they don’t get along,” he was quoted as saying. “You know what it’s like. You’re at a charity event and you have a bit of fun.”

But Mickelson didn’t see the humor, and neither did Williams’ boss.

“I was disappointed to read the comments attributed to Steve Williams about Phil Mickelson, a player that I respect,” Woods said in a statement. “It was inappropriate. The matter has been discussed and dealt with.”

Woods might not like Mickelson, but he was raised too well to take pot shots at him in public — or to let his caddie do it.

It’s not in his nature, but Williams might want to tread carefully for a while. The last time a Woods’ caddie disappointed his boss, he quickly found himself seeking new employment.