Ageless Wonders (Plus, Stuff WOS Hates)

Although he came up short in the final round of the British Open, Tom Watson was the talk of the sports world this weekend. Watson, in case you don't know, is a professsional golfer. Going into today's final round at Turnberry Wells (Scotland), he held a one-stroke lead in the tournament. Had he held on to win, it would have been his sixth victory in the tournament, tying a record. More notable was that Watson was accomplishing this less than two months away from his 60th birthday.

People everywhere, golf enthusiasts or not, thrilled to this story of the ageless wonder keeping pace with--indeed, outperforming--competitors half his age. While we respect Watson's feat as much as anyone, we cannot help but see his impressive run for the claret jug as support for a hypothesis that we formulated some time ago: Golf is not a sport.

Now, wait, just wait. We do not deny the skill of professional golfers. But that's all it is: a skill, something that can be learned. What makes Tiger Woods special is not that he can shoot under par at a major golf tournament; what makes him special is that he can do it over and over and over again (with the exception of this weekend, apparently). It's really just about discipline and practice. In other words, there is nothing stopping anybody, anywhere, from beating Tiger Woods. If the Solipsist started today and practiced regularly, HE could challenge Tiger.

You may object that this is true of any sport. It isn't. Consider: Do you know anyone who plays tennis? Not a pro, just somebody who enjoys the game and is in pretty good shape. This player probably beats most competitors. But could this person outplay Roger Federer or Serena Williams? Hell, could he or she return a SERVE from either of these people? Our guess is, no. On the other hand, if you know people who play golf regularly, you would have to say that, if they went to Bethpage Black and had a great day, they could conceivably shoot as low as anyone on the professional tour. Why not?

The essence of sport is competition between players, whether individuals or teams. What makes sports interesting is watching well-matched competitors trying their best to outperform each other--trying to excel while their opponents try to keep them from excelling. And it really has very little to do with the absolute skill level of the competitors. That's why it's ultimately more interesting to watch a couple of equally-skilled amateur tennis players battle it out than it is to watch a professional golfer make a spectacular tee shot, even if that professional golfer is a member of AARP. Watching sports is fascinating; watching skill demonstrations can be interesting, but more often than not it just reminds us of grading papers.

***********************************************

STUFF WOS HATES

You know what I hate? Keith Morrison! He's a television "journalist" on NBC. He's also a pseudo-literary wannabe intellectual toolbag! Who the hell does he think he is? Shakespeare? Now, I love me some real-crime TV like Dateline. But every episode narrated by that wombat makes me want to shoot myself in the head! If there were a dictionary entry for "brain-dead jack-off," his picture would be next to it! Good God! I mean, every cliche, every melodramatic metaphor, every moralistic rant, every line of his crap writing is enough to make me sick! (Ack! I just puked in my mouth!) He thinks he's some kind of master stylist, but he's more Jenny McCarthy than Cormac McCarthy, less Elmore Leonard than Elmer Fudd! You ever see a sine curve? You know how it goes uuup and dooown, uuuup and dooown? Well that's Morrison's speech pattern! Just what we need, right? An anchorman who learned his diction in trig. class! Could he BE more monotonous? My laptop has a less irritating speech pattern. Less boring, too! "TIME (rising voice) was an enemy (falling voice) for the prosecutors (leveling off)." It's not easy to lull someone to sleep with a description of a triple homicide, BUT HE MANAGES TO DO IT! It's as if Count Chocula were anchoring the nightly news! This man makes Maury Povich look like Walter Cronkite, and Walter Cronkite look like. . . .well, like God! Listen, Keith Morrison, you cereal-shilling, pseudo-vampiric, sine-curve speaking dolt: Get off the air and out of my life before I find you and punch you in your stupid ugly face!!!!

Thank you for listening.

--WOS

Better watch out for WOS, Keith

(Image from "Inside Dateline")