Ro's Recz

Since I have begun using Spotify a lot to listen to podcasts, I have also started to find some podcasts that I did not previously listen to on the Apple Podcasts app. One podcast that I have started to listen to is a podcast by Stitcher called All-American: Tiger Woods.

While doing some research on whether I would like the podcast or not, I saw that the podcast is not getting the best reviews. A lot of the criticism that the reviewers mention revolve around the host of the show Jordan Bell, and her lack of golf knowledge. While I completely agree with them that she loses all golf credibility in the second episode when she asks “what is a bogey” and “what is a birdie”, I would argue that golf knowledge is not really essential to her role. She is more playing the role of moderator in the show, and she lets her co-host Albert Chen (who seems to know a lot more about golf) and guests tell most of the actual information.

While I definitely do not think the show is perfect, I think there are still many positives to the show. As someone who is a huge golf fan, I obviously know the entire story of Tiger Woods that the media portrays. However, Tiger won his first major before I was even born, so I don’t know a lot about his backstory and life outside of golf. Therefore, listening to this podcast has given me a greater appreciation of exactly why the way Tiger is, and how much pressure he has had to deal with in his life. While this does not change anything about past issues he has dealt with, I at least have more understanding of Tiger as a person.

Overall, I think that this podcast could be appealing to both golf and non-golf fans (as the host is learning along with the audience), and it has at least kept me listening after 3 episodes so far. If you are looking for a sports podcast, you might want to at least give this podcast a try (disregarding the poor ratings).

All-American Tiger Woods Recommendation Rating: 3.5

1: Something worth checking out if you have time

2: Something that is a hit for some people, but not a must for everyone

3: Something worth prioritizing if interested

4: Something worth making time to check out

5: An absolute home run, worth going out of your way for