COMMENTARY
European press should lay off Open Champion Hamilton
By Tim McDonald,
Contributor
(July 22, 2004) - America is a strange country. We love underdogs, but revere superstars.
What happens when the two meet for our sporting pleasure? What happens when a 250-1 longshot beats up on the world's best players in golf's starchiest major?
Sorry to say, but we tend to whine a little bit. Nitpick. Get a little uppity.
Todd Hamilton, the American who just won the British Open - sorry, technically it's called "The Open," as if we should all know it's British - is being called all sorts of things, mainly vaguely unflattering.
To be fair, it isn't just the American press. The European press is just as perplexed and irritated. Especially when it became apparent Colin Montgomery wasn't going to win.
Just a few nicknames Hamilton earned for winning: The "unheralded journeyman." The American outsider." The American dropout." The "Nowhere Man."
True, Hamilton is from Oquawka, Ill., which is just south of Nowhere.
But hey, they have about 1,600 people who live there, and they all have to be somewhere. And they have Class C campsites there - that includes tables and grills, thank you.
They have absolutely zero foreign-born residents in Oquawka, and the biggest news before Hamilton's stunning win was a circus elephant named Norma Jean who was zapped by lightning. Question: where does an elephant hide during a thunderstorm?
Anyway,
small-town hero wins big, puts nowhere on the map. That should
be the story.
We should be embracing this guy's amazing Horatio Alger story of perseverance, rags-to-riches, whatever you want to call it.
He's one of those blue-collar golfers heretofore lost amidst the superstar shuffle, a guy who's traveled hither and yon, and then hitherer and yonner, to get to this point. Hamilton earned his stripes all over the world. He played on the tour in Canada, which is generally referred to as The Big, Cold Nowhere.
Then he competed on the Asian Tour, winning in Singapore, Thailand and Korea, which earned him entree to the Japan tour, where he won four tournaments.
This was after he made the decision not to quit, and presumably become head pro at the Hend-Co-Hills Golf Club and Largemouth Bass Country Club in Biggsville, Ill. That's where he would have pulled down a decent living organizing twilight scrambles for the Osquawka "We're Named After Indians But We Don't Have Any Actually Living Here Society."
Certainly, the Asian press doesn't like being called "nowhere." After an Associated Press story described Hamilton's toil in Asian "outposts," an Asian paper sniffed: "Outposts, indeed!"
He finally got his PGA Tour card last year after eight tries, tying for 16th in a qualifying tournament. So far these credentials, in terms of being considered a contender in the British Open are like a foreign-born, Hollywood palooka being elected governor of California. Oh, right. Forgot about that.
Hamilton showed a tiny glimpse of what was to come by beating Davis Love III to win the Honda Classic this past March. And then - like lightning striking a circus elephant - came Royal Troon.
If
Hamilton had been the one to wilt, he would have been a minor
sidebar and we'd all be reading stories about Ernie Els and South
African beer. But Hamilton didn't wilt. He took on the world's
No. 2-ranked player hombre to hombre and beat him in a nerve-racking
playoff.
The other superstars tumbled, victims of the Troon Swoon. No. 1-ranked Tiger Woods was felled by the back nine. No. 3 Vijay Singh's putting cost him. No. 4 Phil Mickelson played brilliantly the last day, but finished a shot back.
And while we're on the subject of Mickelson, can we finally come out and say it? He choked at the U.S. Open. There, that feels better, doesn 't it? Now let's move on.
Personally, I think most of the world press was pulling for Els, Mickelson, Singh and Woods et al because the story line was sitting up there nice and pretty, like a good lie in bad rough. Those stories were already written, almost. Fill in the blanks.
But, with Hamilton, we all had to do a little digging.
So here's what we're finding: Hamilton is a 38-year-old rookie who was born in Galesburg, Ill. Umm, actually I can't find much more than that.
Suffice it to say Hamilton's win shouldn't come as a surprise. Ben Curtis went from qualifying school to win the Open at Royal St. George's. For a historical perspective, look at Jack Fleck beating Ben Hogan at the U.S. Open.
Favorites win most of the time in business, politics and five-card stud. Not in golf. It's a testament to the depth of the game that a Todd Hamilton can beat Ernie Els on any given Sunday.
Me, I like the underdog. Then again, I also pull for the Yankees.
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