Tiger Woods’ journey from phenom to dominant global star to scandal-plagued punching bag and back to Masters champion has been an incredible one. And hip hop has been there to document it in song from the start. As the first Black golfer to dominate the tour, and the first golfer period to become a tabloid fixation, Woods has given MC’s such as Jay Z, Drake, and Nas plenty to rhyme about.
Now, with Eldrick turning 50 today, we take a look back at the Best Tiger Woods References in Rap.
Drake, "In the Bible"
Year: 2021
Lyrics: "Think I'm Tiger Woods, the way I'm teed off the 17 / And you know pockets on whatever, jеans forever green"
Golf Score: PAR. Drake compares getting tipsy off Remy Martin 1738 Accord to Tiger hitting a drive on 17.
Eminem on Dr. Dre's "Medicine Man"
Year: 2015
Lyric: "In the beginning a few of the people who had a problem I was this good, scoffed, I just shook off / Probably reminded you of the first time you saw Tiger Woods golf"
Golf Score: PAR. Once again, Eminem references the circa-2000 joke about how the best golfer was Black and the best rapper was a white guy.
Young Thug, "Tiger Woods"
Year: 2020
Lyric: "Tiger Woods coat, green diamonds baby / I be whippin' white bitch call me Katy Perry"
Golf Score: BIRDIE. As a five-time Masters champ, Tiger Woods has a closet full of green jackets.
French Montana, "Gifted"
Year: 2013
Lyric: "This that Tiger Woods on his last swing / This that Jimi Hendrix on his last string."
Golf Score: BOGEY. French is a little out of his depth comparing himself to some of the greats in music and sports.
Nas, "These Are Our Heroes"
Year: 2004
Lyric: "I wanna give a special shoutout to the crew doing they thing out there repping us hard / Big up to Tiger Woods, yeah you don't stop / Big up to Cuba Gooding Jr."
Golf Score: PAR. On the outro to "These Are Our Heroes," Nas sarcastically shouts out Black celebrities who have married white women.
Ras Kass, "Soul On Ice (Remix)"
Year: 1996
Lyric: "Tiger Woods ain't even up to par in the game of survival/That's why I'm pissin' in your Cristal bottle."
Golf Score: BIRDIE. We're not sure what's up with the Howard Hughes-like obsession with urination, but Ras Kass deserves props for being the first rapper to make a Tiger reference, only months after the golfer went pro.
The Notorious B.I.G. f/ Puff Daddy and Mase, "Mo' Money, Mo' Problems"
Year: 1997
Lyric: "Mo' Money, Mo' Problems" Puffy Woods skit.
Golf Score: EAGLE. This is one of the greatest rap videos of the '90s and the Puffy Woods skit is one of the reasons why. The ultimate fear of any golfing bigot (what up, Fuzzy Bassy a.k.a. Fuzzy Zoeller) was a Black golfer coming in and taking over the sport. Tiger did just that in '97 and hip-hop was loving it.
Chris Rock f/ Kool Rock Ski, "Champagne"
Year: 1997
Lyric: "I drink champagne in the hood/I drink champagne with Tiger Woods (With Tiger Woods)/Huh! (Tiger Woods y'all, Tiger Woods y'all, it's all good y'all, Tiger Woods y'all/It's all good y'all, Tiger Woods y'all, it's all good y'all."
Golf Score: EAGLE. Fresh off his first Masters victory, it truly was all good for Eldrick back in '97.
Common, "Hungry"
Year: 1997
Lyric: "Flow at room temperature, cats is presumed miniature/Like golf, soft like Tiger Woods"
Golf Score: EAGLE. When Tiger first came on the scene, some members of hip hop nation embraced him (see, Puff Daddy), while other looked at him sideways. Common was in the latter camp.
Jay-Z, "Who You Wit II"
Year: 1997
Lyric: "Jay-Z rated A-G baby, that's all good/I sink this ball in your hole, I'm Tiger Woods!"
Golf Score: EAGLE. This slick foretelling line wasn't forced, it was just another ill sports reference from the soon-to-be sports agent known as Mr. Carter.
Mos Def, "Body Rock"
Year: 1999
Lyric: "Relax and pull a seat up, make your landlord turn the heat up/Got the opposition shook like Tiger Woods about to tee up."
Golf Score: PAR. When it comes to referencing Tiger, Mos fared much better than his partner Kweli with this simple-yet-effective jab that plays up Tiger's intimidating side-have you heard him on the golf course!
Talib Kweli on Reflection Eternal's "This Means You"
Year: 2000
Lyric: "My facts more than make up for what you lack in imagination/You more confused than Tiger Woods when he made up Cablinasian/I'm sayin"
Golf Score: BOGEY. Slowwww dowwwwwn.
Nas, "What Goes Around"
Year: 2001
Lyric: "Lightskin women, bi-racial hateful toward themselves/Denying even they blood/I don't judge Tiger Woods but I overstand the mental poison/That's even worser than drugs."
Golf Score: BOGEY. Tiger got off easy here compared to "These Are Our Heroes."
Cam'ron, "Halftime Show"
Year: 2003
Lyric: "I be with Don King, if you a fighter, good/Fuck Tiger Woods, it's tigers in the hood."
Golf Score: BIRDIE. You can be sure Cam never cared enough about Tiger Woods to even mean it as a jab, but he gets wild points for a clever nod to this news story of the time.
Fabolous, "I Usually Don't"
Year: 2003
Lyric: "And I'm white and yellow studded down/Watching pretty girls strut it round/take the birdies and put it down/Like Tiger Woods did it, but I'm hood wit it/You never seen a thug look this good wit it."
Golf Score: BIRDIE. If there's one thing Fab knows, other than how to save all his best music for mixtapes, it's birdies. We're fine with adding to the collection.
Common on Kanye West's "Get 'Em High"
Year: 2004
Lyric: "Rock clubs like Tiger, Woods in the hood/To have my own reality show, called Soul Survivor."
Golf Score: PAR. You picked us up "rocking clubs like Tiger," and then dropped us right back down with a "reality show called Soul Survivor."
Trife Da God, "Grew Up Hard"
Year: 2006
Lyric: "He coulda been the next Jordan, who knows, the next Emmitt/Young Tiger Woods or the new Arthur Ashe in tennis."
Golf Score: PAR. Or he coulda been the next Kwame Brown.
Swizz Beatz, "That Oprah"
Year: 2008
Lyric: "Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, I'm tryna get that Oprah."
Golf Score: PAR. Swizz name drops Tiger over a pretty serious Coldplay chop on the chorus.
Ice Cube, "Hood Mentality"
Year: 2008
Lyric: "I wanna be like Tiger Woods, swing that club, make you sick/(I wanna be like Pacman Jones), (I wanna be like Michael Vick)/I wanna be like Barry Bonds, (I wanna be like O.J. Simpson)/Leave this field, leave this prison, tell you motherfuckers where to kiss 'em."
Golf Score: PAR. We're not sure when golf was ever really considered a viable way out the hood or why Ice Cube groups Tiger with a handful of scandal-ridden athletes a year prior to Tiger's own scandal. However, Cube is an OG so we can look at the ground and pretend to be cool with it.
Nelly, "Warrior"
Year: 2008
Lyric: "I just wanted to sell a mil, whoever thought I'd do thirty/Hey, well maybe I did, but never this early/Every time they doubted me, like Tiger Woods/But I kept comin' back, like Tiger would."
Golf Score: TAKE A MULLIGAN, FAM. "Doubted you like Tiger Woods?" You do mean Tiger Woods the most dominant athlete in the history of sport who stormed back to the No. 1 spot. That Tiger Woods?
Maino, "Tiger Woods (Get Em Tiger)"
Year: 2009
Lyric: "I got women in the 'burbs, women in the the hood/Yeah my wifey mad 'cause she know I'm no good/Man I'm just a dog, I'd be faithful if I could/But, I'm Tiger Woods, yeah, I'm Tiger Woods."
Golf Score: BIRDIE. On the heels of the never-ending revelations about Tiger's stable of mistresses, the BK rapper was the first to flip the scandal into a decent (if predictable) ode to infidelity.
Lil Wayne, "Swag Surfin' (Freestyle)"
Year: 2009
Lyric: "Walk around like I'm 30 feet tall/Tiger Woods, all these hoes tryna birdie these balls."
Golf Score: PAR. Who's had more jumpoffs over the years: Tiger or Wayne?
Shawty Lo f/ Lil Wayne, "WTF"
Year: 2010
Lyric: "I don't play golf, let's get this understood/I ain't prejudice, got more white than Tiger Woods."
Golf Score: BOGEY. You're better than this Mr. L-O.
Ludacris, "Sexting"
Year: 2010
Lyric: (Parody of Tiger Woods' call)
Golf Score: PAR, If it weren't for the overly dramatic dialogue, we wouldn't see anything funny about telling that side chick to delete your number. However, Luda does a decent acting job on this skit from his 2010 album, Battle of the Sexes.
J. Cole, "Problems"
Year: 2010
Lyric: "There's niggas dying everyday but we don't make the news/ Instead they talking bout some thunderstorm, cyclones/ Timmy got his bike stole Top story, Tiger Woods be fucking all these white hoes/ Anchorman stop snitching Cut the commercial, he be texting all the side bitches."
Golf Score: BIRDIE. With tons of rappers cracking on Tiger's infidelity, it was refreshing to see someone give the scandal some perspective. Respect that man.
CyHi Da Prince on Kanye West's "So Appalled"
Year: 2010
Lyric: "Y'all just some major haters and some math minors/Tiger Woods, don't make me grab iron."
Golf Score: BOGEY. Yes, Tiger was chased down by his ex-wife for cheating, but c'mon folks, let's move on already.
Ludacris, "My Chick Bad"
Year: 2010
Lyric: "Now your girl might be sick, but my girl sicker/She rides that dick and she handles her liquor/Knock a bitch out/Annnd fight!/Coming out swinging like Tiger Woods wife."
Golf Score: BOGEY. OK. Elin Nordegren swung on Tiger with a golf club. We get it already.
Wale, "The Eyes of the Tiger"
Year: 2010
Lyric: Entire song
Golf Score: PAR. Some people drop one liners while others dedicated a couple bars to the Tiger Woods scandal. Wale, on the other hand, went ahead and used a whole song as a PSA on unsuccessful creeping. Thank him later.
Vado, "Large on the Streets"
Year: 2010
Lyric: "Every bar's a gun fight, get one strike/Coke like Tiger Woods, fuck with too much white."
Golf Score: BOGEY: You move kilos and Tiger loves white women. We get it.
Childish Gambino, "Bitch Look at Me Now"
Year: 2011
Lyric: "I can't do one thing, I'm just too good/I can't do one thing, I am Tiger Woods."
Golf Score: BOGEY. Whether it's side projects or side chicks, Tiger and Gambino can attest to the fact that too much of a good thing is never enough. This line and tone was corny though.
Eminem, "G.O.A.T."
Year: 2011
Lyric: "And I love when the say that Tiger Woods shit/'Isn't it ironic that the best rapper's white and the best golfer's black?'/And I'm the one who's gotta catch all the flack off of that."
Golf Score: PAR. Em clearly wasn't happy about being the one who was getting heat for not following stereotypes in comparison to Tiger, but spoiler alert: Woods gets his later on.