Tiger Woods never backs down. Even with a bad back and various surgeries halting his way to the top, the 48-year-old still plays the game and has the spirit to win it once again. And once upon a time, he conquered the worst injury to win the biggest. In the 2008 US Open, Woods entered an 18-hole playoff even with a bad knee. He was visibly struggling, using his club as a cane, and no one expected him to win.

However, despite the hurdles, the 82-time PGA Tour won the US Open for the third and last time at the sudden-death playoff against Rocco Mediate. The man from Pennsylvania had one close chance to win a major in his life, but Woods’s charge couldn’t be stopped and Mediate eventually lost and never won again. Although it was an enjoyable experience for Mediate, unsurprisingly, there was always criticism about what he could have done better or what he shouldn’t have done. So, how does Mediate deal with such criticism?

The 6-time PGA Tour winner was asked about this recently on the PGA Tour Champions. Answering, Mediate explained that he never fit in anywhere else. He went on about not dressing normally and would never do so. So, with people making fun of his style, it pushed him to dress weirder and be himself. But why he doesn’t take the criticism?

Mediate said, “I do not care. I never did, and you can’t. People are going to always say things.” Criticism has followed him his entire life. If Mediate paid attention to each word uttered against him he probably would have made so many changes in his swings that he would not have been the ‘Rocco Mediate’ everyone knows.

And that’s the one principle he taught his daughter over a game of volleyball.

How Rocco Mediate passed his values to his daughter

Golf is not the only pursuit in his life. With his family, he indulged in the joy of volleyball too. And behold, his volleyball throw is not conventional either, just like his golf swing. Mediate was once playing volleyball with his only daughter, Francesca Mediate, in the backyard. In the middle of the game, she stopped and tried to tell him the widely accepted way of hitting the ball as he hit it over the net without using the proper technique.

At that moment, Mediate told his daughter, “If I had to conform to what everybody, we wouldn’t be here.” Throughout his career which has been nearly 40 years, which is funny for the 5-time PGA Tour Champions winner to think about, Mediate knew how people looked at him and doubted his game. But he always proved them wrong with his skills. And he was well aware that he was no prodigy and people never expected him to make it.

Even his father, at times, although in a good way, told him that he would never be good enough. Mediate liked that pressure though as it pushed him harder. When his former coach, Charley Matlock, told his golf team at Florida Southern College, that they were lazy, it made Mediate use it as a motivation and prove him wrong. “I like to be beaten up. I don’t care. A lot of guys do care,” the 61-year-old reiterated to show that whatever is thrown at him, he would always face with an unfazed demeanor and prove the haters wrong.