Let’s face it, sports fans are suckers for a good comeback story. Give us Hoosiers over the undefeated New England Patriots in the Super Bowl every time. Lance Armstrong actually got America to care about bike racing because of his own brush back of cancer. Heck, Armstrong had half of the U.S. wearing cheap yellow braclets, including about 95 percent of our golf pros.

At one point, you couldn’t be a golf pro without a Livestrong bracelet and a killer pair of shades. Even if everyone in France still thinks Armstrong was as juiced as Barry Bonds, Lance will never receive the Mark McGwire treatment in the U.S. Because he’s a comeback king, a heartwarming success in the battle against cancer.

Which should make Trevor Immelman feel even a little more sheepish today.

Immelman has everything you could seemingly want in a sports story. He’s a huge underdog Masters winner. He came back from surgery to remove a very rare tumor (benign but still a tumor) lodged near his rib. A tumor that Immelman said looked like a golf ball on a tee. That’s scary and the stuff of epic sports comebacks.

And still just about nobody outside of South Africa is down with Immelman as the Masters champ. One green jacket on his resume and he’s still carrying less buzz than many never-major winners. Sure, Immelman did David Letterman, will sit with Regis & Kelly to hear Regis tell some ridiculously lame personal golf story this morning and received front row seats at a Knicks game.

OK, that last one sounds more like punishment. Even Knicks coach Isiah Thomas doesn’t even seem to really want his front row seat at Knicks games anymore.

Immelman’s appearances seem more due to custom than any great excitement from sports fans though. I don’t think you can chalk it up to him being a non-American either. If Ernie Els won this Masters, there’d be a joyous jolt through sports. And if Rory Sabbatini somehow didn’t throw up himself in a major and secured a green jacket, sports writers like myself would be dancing in the streets at the stories begging to be written.

No, this is just a Trevor Immelman thing. It turns out that sometimes winning and coming back from cancer isn’t enough to make people interested in you. Now that’s a major bummer.

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