A longtime sportswriter for the San Francisco Examiner, who worked for Tigerwoods.com from 1997 through 2018, Soltau says that “at most tournaments, I would spend time with Tiger … and wish him well. The first time I said, ‘Good luck,’ he glared at me. ‘It’s not luck,’ he said. From then on, I have always said, ‘Play well.’”
Tiger “did a surprise video when I was inducted into the Chico State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2007.”
Soltau covers his five decades in sports writing with an exuberant memoir, “Right Place, Write Time: A Lifetime Of Memories With Sports Legends” ($19.95 in paperback, independently published; also for Amazon Kindle). No stranger to football (“I covered the NFL for almost 25 years”), Soltau “spent much of my childhood attending games with my mother at Kezar Stadium…. My father, Gordy, was an all-pro end and place kicker for the San Francisco 49ers (1950-58) and led the NFL in scoring in 1952 and 1953.”
Soltau’s book, loaded with photographs, includes chapters on Bill Walsh, Steve Young, John McEnroe, Barry Bonds, Walter Payton (at Laguna Seca Raceway), and Joe Montana (who used the sideline phone, meant to connect with coaches, to call his wife: “I’m just sitting here on the sideline and thought I’d call and tell you I Love You”).
In 1977, as a Chico State senior, Soltau’s father gifted him two tickets to Super Bowl XI, pitting the Oakland Raiders against the Minnesota Vikings at Pasadena’s Rose Bowl. He and a buddy managed to get there and found their seats “were on the 50-yard line on the press box side in the middle of American Football Conference owner’s section.” The Raiders won, 32-14. The two made it back to Chico the next day, “tired and euphoric.”
The book is not a tell-all, but a “let me tell you about my friends.” Well played, Mark.