Steinberg leaves IMG; will Tiger Woods follow?

Tiger Woods' agent Mark Steinberg leaves sports-management firm, IMG

In what amounts to a bit of inside baseball, CNBC’s Darren Rovell reported Tuesday evening that Tiger Woods’ agent, Mark Steinberg, had left IMG. Rovell tweeted that Steinberg’s contract with the sports-management firm would have expired in June and that he “can take Tiger & Annika [Sorenstam] w/him. Non-compete clauses likely prohibit him from taking other IMG athletes.”

It’s not exactly a shocker, as rumors had been circulating for a while that Steinberg might exit the company. Talk has been about IMG’s chair and chief executive Ted Forstmann steering the firm away from golf into other areas he considers more lucrative.

The timing is somewhat interesting, in that Woods addressed just that issue during his Tuesday press conference.

“I’m committed to both, with IMG and Mark’s my agent,” Woods said during a media gathering to promote the upcoming AT&T National tourney. “It’s been a great relationship. I’ve been with him ever since I turned pro. I had a chance to go through a lot of — basically my entire professional career and learn a lot about the business.”

More to come, no doubt, but until then, you may now return to your regularly scheduled lives.

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