By Jimmy Sullivan

Let’s say that you are a normal human being with a normal life. You have kids, you’re in good shape and you have a great life.

Then, all of a sudden, your back hurts. That pain results in you having back surgery. You feel better, but you still don’t feel quite right. Then, not quite 18 months later, you need another surgery. The month after that marks another procedure. You take the next year or so to get back into your regular life, but then, just over six months later, you need yet another surgery. You have just had four surgeries on the same general area of your body in 36 months.

This would be hard enough to overcome if you were an average person. But this happened in real life, to someone who is not the average person.

This past weekend, that not-so-average guy won a PGA Tour event.

Tiger Woods notched his first tournament win in five years on Sunday when he won the Tour Championship by two strokes over Billy Horschel. Woods’ third-round 65 all but sealed the victory. The win was Woods’ 80th career victory, which brings him within two of Sam Snead’s all-time record of 82.

Is it equivalent to winning the Masters? No. Should anyone care that it wasn’t? That answer is also no.

This is a man who didn’t have a swing as recently as a year ago and had serious doubts about his ability to come back more recently than that. A man who was well on his way to becoming the greatest golfer ever (he could still get there) was reduced to a shell of himself. On Sunday, that man completed his long road back to becoming one of the sport’s elite.

But Woods’ ability to come back and look like himself goes far beyond just one player or one round. Because, as hyperbolic as this sounds, Tiger Woods embodies the game of golf in 2018.

Don’t believe me? Let me give you some numbers. Saturday’s telecast of the third round of the Tour Championship garnered a 3.14 overnight rating, which was the highest rating for the third round of that tournament in 15 years. It was also the highest-rated third round of any FedEx Cup Playoffs telecast on record (dating back to 2007). People tuned into this tournament, which usually doesn’t get a lot of buzz, for one reason and one reason only. I think you can figure out what that reason was.

There’s more evidence to support this. This year’s final round of the Open Championship, which Woods led briefly before fading down the stretch, gathered a 5.0 rating, which was the best for that tournament since 2006. The previous ratings high for a final round at the Open was set in 2000. You know who hoisted the Claret Jug at the end of both of those tournaments? Tiger Woods.

It started to tumble down with an extramarital affair that came to light in 2009, and it ended with his myriad injuries. In between, there was inconsistent play, multiple swing coaches, multiple caddies, and just eight wins in nine years. It wasn’t the Tiger Woods we had come to know over the years.

And then, this year, he came roaring back. It started with him playing in back-to-back tournaments in February, which may not seem like a big deal, but for someone in Woods’ position, it clearly was. Then, he earned back-to-back top-five finishes in March at the Valspar and the Arnold Palmer. He suffered a dip in performance after that, which included a tied-for-32nd finish at the Masters before missing the cut entirely at the U.S. Open at Shinnecock. After that, though, the Tiger awoke from his hibernation, and he tied for sixth at the Open in Scotland. His best major championship performance came three weeks later, when he finished second at the PGA Championship, two strokes behind Brooks Koepka. On Sunday, Woods’ wait for a win finally ended.

This is not just a great comeback story. This is a story about a man who was at the top of his sport, fell all the way to the bottom multiple times, and ultimately came back to something resembling his previous form.

This is also relevant because just about everyone is rooting for him to succeed, which hasn’t always been the case.

In 2000, a year in which Woods won three of the four major championships, Philadelphia Inquirer writer Bill Lyon wrote an article entitled “Isn’t Tiger Woods Actually Bad for Golf?” He wasn’t alone; several other experts expressed concern that Woods’ dominance was somehow bad for the sport. Their argument was that, much like some will argue with UConn Women’s Basketball, Woods was too dominant and people would get tired of seeing him bulldoze the field on a weekly basis.

I can say this was also true of me at a time. When I was young, I hated Tiger Woods. I don’t know what it was, but I always rooted against him up until he got hurt. It was probably based on nothing, but I enjoyed rooting for underdogs (as I still do), and Woods was always the opposite of that. However, I was always glued to the television when he was in contention at a major. Always.

Now, I’m acutely attuned to the leaderboard whenever Woods contends. This time, though, I’m on the other side of the rooting spectrum, along with just about everyone else who watched his rise, fall and eventual return to the top of the sport.