Chamblee says he 'went too far' in Tiger Woods remarks
Los Angeles (AFP) - Golf Channel analyst Brandel Chamblee, under fire for a Golf.com column accusing Tiger Woods of bending the rules, said in a televised interview he "went too far".
In a column written for the Golf.com website, Chamblee pointed to several rules gaffes involving Woods this season, and compared them to his own cheating on a fourth-grade math test.
In an interview on Golf Channel's "Golf Central" program on Wednesday -- his first televised comments on the matter -- Chamblee said it was wrong to insinuate Woods cheated.
"Cheating involves intent," Chamblee said. "There's no way that I could know with 100 percent certainty what Tiger's intent was in any of those situations. That was my mistake."
In the article, Chamblee gave Woods an 'F' grade for his 2013 campaign. While Woods won five times in 2013, Chamblee said he was "a little cavalier with the rules".
Woods was hit with a number of penalties this year, most notably at the US Masters, when he flirted with disqualification over an improper drop.
He was penalized for an improper drop at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship and incurred a two-shot penalty for moving his ball at the BMW Championship.
Woods's manager Mark Steinberg had raised the prospect of court action soon after the article appeared.
Chamblee did nothing to soothe the situation when he took to Twitter to apologize -- but then said he stood by the accusation.
Woods broke his silence on the matter on Monday, when he said he was ready to move on and it was up to the Golf Channel to deal with Chamblee.
Woods spoke in China, where he played an exhibition against Northern Ireland's Rory McIlroy.
McIlroy weighed in on the affair this week in Shanghai, where he was preparing for the WGC-HSBC Champions tournament.
"People wouldn't know who Brandel Chamblee was if it wasn't for Tiger Woods, so I am completely against what he said and I think he should be dealt with in the right way," McIlroy said.
Chamblee said that although he works for Golf Channel, the Golf.com article didn't involve the US cable television network.
He said his editor at Golf.com asked him to rewrite the ending of his column and he declined.
"I wished I would have listened to him," Chamblee said.
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