English golfer Paul Casey comes out and tells the world, the European Ryder Cup team “properly hate” Americans, adds he personally thinks they’re “stupid” and everyone’s in a uproar? Suddenly, Casey’s telling reporters that he has an American girlfriend and an American coach, backtracking like one of those dimwits who says something obviously racist and then justifies it with an “I have plenty of black friends.” Please! Anyone who’s offended needs to get over it. And Casey needs to get over himself. This is what we want in sports. What sports has needed for a long ... full post »

I grew up in the Detroit area, became a sports writer in part because of the Isiah Thomas-Joe Dumars-Vinnie Johnson Pistons and spent many an argument defending the city’s dinning/entertainment options to out-of-town friends. Which makes what I’m about to say painful. It is no surprise that Detroit (or actuallyAuburn Hills) turned into brawltown. This wasn’t just coincidence that the worst sports riot in memory happened here. There is plenty of precedent, plenty of warning signs that went unheeded for years. This isn’t a bad twist of fate sulling Detroit’s image. It is a black eye well ... full post »

My new buddy Dave (also found on this page) must be going Bill Clinton on me, trying to reach out and make us see our similarities when we’re really completely opposed. Dave comes back and says he agrees with me on slow play being caused by course greed and then concludes, well that’s OK, it’s still the rangers problem. The point is that pace of play absolutely shouldn’t be reliant on a ranger solution. It’s not OK for golf courses to simply jam up their tee sheets and then throw up their hands at five hour rounds. ... full post »

My colleague Dave is like the guy who blames the bears for visting his campground when he leaves a picnic table of food out overnight when it comes to the slow play issue. Slow play isn’t a golfer’s etiquette problem. It’s a course problem. Rangers aren’t going to help this pox on the game unless they go into the clubhouse and talk to the people taking the tee times. The average guy on the course doesn’t need a lecture. The greedy folks in the clubhouse do. By grabbing every possible greens fee and stacking tee ... full post »

Anyone who doesn’t think golf runs the universe hasn’t been paying attention to South Carolina’s pursuit of Steve Spurrier. The Gamecocks have the former Florida run-and-gun genius/Redskins bust considering taking over their football program for one reason and one reason only. A membership to Augusta National. That’s right lovable Hootie Johnson is back in the news and this time he’s using his old boys network influence the best way he knows how. As a bribe of course. Reportedly, Johnson – a former South Carolina football player – has made it clear that it Spurrier agrees to ... full post »

Making the drive that so many golfers make, from the East Coast down to Myrtle Beach on I-95, it is striking how many speed traps are set up along the corridor. From New Jersey to Baltimore to Virginia, every state seems determined to grab a bigger and bigger share of ticket revenue. On one 20-mile stretch, I counted 10 different cars pulled over. Does this make any sense if you’re trying to promote travel and tourism in a still sluggish economy? We should be encouraging people to make trips, not fining them $100 for ... full post »

Notice how many golf architects are designing two to three courses on one mammoth site/housing development these days? Inevitably, at least one of these courses seems to suffer and come out as little more than a throw in. It’s like, oh well, maybe the public won’t notice. Linking a good course with a bad one, in package deals and promotion, is just another way to stick it to the average golfer. More than ever, it’s buyer beware. No matter how name brand the designer is, it sometimes seems to be all about squeezing out a few extra bucks. ... full post »

Can celebrities stop telling us how to vote now? Please. One of the more obnoxious sidelights of the 2004 Presidential Election was that every person who’s ever been deemed famous took it as their civic duty to inform the rest of us who we should vote for. Apparently, someone told them that was a really important election – as opposed to all those unimportant president picks apparently. It’s 2004. Does anyone think the celebrity endorsement does anything but annoy anymore? I don’t care if it’s Curt Schilling shilling for Bush on Good Morning ... full post »