Golf after Tiger: Tattoos and trick shots
Dear Tim Finchem:
Golf during the demise of Tiger Woods should not be about raising the next golden-boy guru. Not about re-casting the spotlight onto the heartfelt story of Phil Mickelson, neither onto a larger-than-life personality like John Daly nor onto a spitfire like Sergio Garcia. The game doesn't need another name, it needs a rules-change makeover, kind of like putting lingerie on females and still calling it football.
From MLB, allow cheering during shots! Come on, if hitters can execute the most difficult task in all of sports - putting round bat on round ball at speeds equivalent to athletes in cars driven after happy hour - golfers can certainly hit a still ball off the ground or, ahem, off the more friendly setting of a raised tee amid cheers. No more hissy fits after a preemptive "Get in the hole!"
From the NBA, seek golfers with tattoos, not crazy pants that cover them up. Deck 'em out in 1980's-style Michael Jordan shorts, the kind that not only showed the mid-thigh of the greatest hardwood leaper ever but also his too-snug-for-comfort North Carolina underoos. Remember Dennis Rodman? He did wonders for the game with his man markings and colored hair. One Chicago newspaper even kept track of this. Talk about Web-driving news.
From billiards, add trick shots. Sure Woods made billions of dollars by deadening a ball on the green out of the rough or slashing through low-hanging branches, but who else can do that? Jeanette Lee? Make it mandatory that every duffer call at least one trick shot during a round, and if he fails, he takes a penalty stroke - or worse, he must jump in the nearest pond and finish the day soaking wet with a ball he finds in the drink. After having a drink. Of booze - a la Ron Artest's old habit.
These types of alterations would certainly add a row of people behind the ropes - maybe even a new generation of fans, the ones who awake from the couch for the final hole instead of tuning in for the full... what is it, eight painstaking hours?
Golf needs to go berserk or else risk the loss of television ratings and subsequent ad revenue. Maybe it should add physical contact?
Or maybe what golf really needs IS the successful return of Woods himself.
I've heard at least one family member say, "I'm going to watch Tiger today." Not golf. Tiger. Without Tiger, household chores and endless wandering. Unlike the NFL, golf does not have parity. Or better said, golf's parity lies in second place. Stories of Rocco Mediate and Y.E. Yang, who actually beat Tiger, are so few and far between - flashes in the pan of an otherwise singularly dominated game.
Which leads to this final thought: Golf's a game. It needs to be fun, even without Woods.
Good luck, Mr. Finchem.
Signed,
Hockey Is Now My Sixth Fifth Favorite Sport
Editor's note: Let us know your take at Twitter. Or quickly comment here.
Editor's note: Let us know your take at Twitter. Or quickly comment here.
Posted by GAG at 12/19/2009 10:43 AM 
Categories: Lingerie Football League, golf, Tiger Woods, rule changes, PGA
Tags: John Daly Lingerie Football League Sergio Garcia MLB NBA Michael Jordan North Carolina Tiger Woods Phil Mickelson Tim Finchem Rocco Mediate Chicago Dennis Rodman Y.E. Yang
Categories: Lingerie Football League, golf, Tiger Woods, rule changes, PGA
Tags: John Daly Lingerie Football League Sergio Garcia MLB NBA Michael Jordan North Carolina Tiger Woods Phil Mickelson Tim Finchem Rocco Mediate Chicago Dennis Rodman Y.E. Yang
I almost did a lingerie football game Friday, but decided that I would enjoy dinner with my wife and a movie on the couch instead. Heck, I got Cinemax! Fell asleep before I flipped to that.
Anyway, when did Rocco beat Tiger? Tiger won the U.S. Open in a playoff over Rocco. Beginning to wish Rocco pulled that one off...
Reply to this
I almost did a lingerie football game Friday, but decided that I would enjoy dinner with my wife and a movie on the couch instead. Heck, I got Cinemax! Fell asleep before I flipped to that.
Anyway, when did Rocco beat Tiger? Tiger won the U.S. Open in a playoff over Rocco. Beginning to wish Rocco pulled that one off...
Fore!
Reply to this
Right, Rocco lost to Tiger. Yang beat him. That's how that's supposed to read. Sorry for the confusion.
Reply to this