AUGUSTA, GEORGIA | Tiger Woods was one of the first professionals to reach out to Ángel Cabrera when the Argentinian returned to the Masters this year for the first time since 2019. As is well known, Cabrera, who won the 2007 U.S. Open and the 2009 Masters, had been in prison between 2021 and 2023 for domestic abuse.
“Tiger’s reaction meant a lot to him,” said Cabrera’s elder son, Federico, who was among a contingent watching Ángel practice at Augusta National on Wednesday. “Tiger respects him and he respects Tiger.”
It is not too difficult to understand why.
In the wake of Woods’ 2009 infidelity scandal, GGP asked Donald Trump for his views on what needed to happen for this multi-major winner to put his world to rights.
“Tiger’s had big problems,” the future U.S. president said. “He had a charmed existence for a long time but I think he could get that back.”
“How?” he was asked.
“He needs to win. That’s what he has to do.”
Which is what Woods ultimately did, most famously at the 2019 Masters.
Tiger’s wasn’t the only warm reaction. Though there were complaints about Cabrera being invited back to this Masters, one fellow professional after another – and they included Brooks Koepka and Bernhard Langer – paused to welcome him home.
Cabrera, now 55, has followed suit. Not to the extent of winning another major but by bagging his first PGA Tour Champions title, the James Hardie Pro Football Hall of Fame Invitational, the Sunday before the Masters.
Tiger’s wasn’t the only warm reaction. Though there were complaints about Cabrera being invited back to this Masters, one fellow professional after another – and they included Brooks Koepka and Bernhard Langer – paused to welcome him home. And why wouldn’t they when they themselves would have known tough times of one sort or another in what is a difficult way of life.
Perhaps the boldest thing Cabrera undertook this week was to attend the Champions Dinner on Tuesday night. Once again, he need not have worried. The reception he received was a good one.
To a man, everyone was impressed by the way Cabrera was hitting the ball on the range. Going to prison is one way for a player to force himself to give golf a break when a break of any length can cause the magic to disappear. However, Cabrera’s younger son and caddie, Angel, was quick to agree with the general view that his father was hitting the ball as well as he had ever done. Rory McIlroy’s drives may have been out on their own at the far end of the range, but Cabrera’s were not too far behind.
The practice session over, Cabrera came across to join Federico and his agent, Manuel Tagle, and Tagle’s family.
Earlier, Federico and Tagle had been talking about how, when Ángel was in prison, he had not wanted to speak about golf. Nor had he done anything in the way of training. Indeed, there had been moments when it was as if he didn’t want to play again, and that his plan post-prison was to live a regular life.
As it was, all that changed when Tagle’s father started taking him piles of old magazines giving accounts of his major triumphs.
What their grandfather did really cheered Ángel up, agreed Tagle’s two youngsters, one of whom was only tiny when he watched Cabrera winning his Masters and couldn’t wait to follow him round this week.
When Cabrera had come across, there was another Tiger similarity. Though Tiger’s old injuries have given him endless grief, he has been smiling rather more than when he was at the peak of his career. Cabrera, for his part, looks more gentle, more friendly than he did in the days when he would be shepherded round the European circuit by his friend Eduardo Romero. (Romero died in 2022 at the age of 67.) Practically every evening, you would see the two of them disappearing into the nearest Argentinian restaurant to eat steak – and never mind that that was at a time when we were being told to rely less on an all-meat diet.
He is grateful for his golfing gifts, with particular reference to his long hitting. “I am,” he laughed, “as strong as a bull.”
That Romero was something of a father figure goes a long way towards explaining why Cabrera travelled the golf world without learning more than a few words of English, just as he would stick with an unchanging game, regardless of where he was playing. When, for instance, he was competing in the 2006 Open at Hoylake, he was seemingly oblivious to the subtleties of the links during opening rounds of 71, 68 and 66. As it was, his chasing of Woods, who never used his driver the last three days on the way to winning, came to a full stop at the second hole on the Sunday when he was playing his fourth shot from some prickly rough.
Whatever people think about the rights and wrongs of forgiving a man guilty of domestic abuse, Cabrera is by no means all bad, and not least in the way he is currently pouring heart and soul into golf. Coming off victory, he opened the Masters with a 4-over 76 on Thursday. He is grateful for his golfing gifts, with particular reference to his long hitting. “I am,” he laughed, “as strong as a bull.”
Finally, it was Manuel Tagle who came up with a delightful aside about a player he has supported since the beginning of his professional career. “Ángel may have abandoned golf, but golf never abandoned him.”