Video: The bizarre hot dog attack of Tiger Woods

Surely there will be jokes in the days and weeks to come about the odd incident Sunday at the Frys.com Open, where a fan hurled a hot dog at Tiger Woods. And yet don't let that obscure how unsettling a moment it actually was.

When Woods returned from his sex scandal in spring of 2010, this was the fear: the world's most famous athlete -- now also the most ridiculed -- vulnerable to verbal, physical (and apparently gastronomic) assault from the gallery around him.

Those fears had subsided the more Woods played and the more focus shifted from his moral failings to his inability to sink a six-foot putt. But as the episode illustrates, the people charged with protecting Woods can't afford to be lax.

"I guess he wanted to be in the news," Woods said. "And I'm sure he will be."

-- *Sam Weinman  *