Golf Videos of the Week (6/18)

DO GOLFERS GO PLAY HOCKEY AT THE END OF THE SEASON?

There's an old saw in hockey that you don't want to playing golf this time of year because it means you are out of the playoffs. Maybe golfers aspire to play hockey in the off-season (I mean aside from Jerry Kelly).

A little thing that I didn't notice at first in the ubiquitous new Tiger Woods ad is that his shadow is holding up the Stanley Cup when he makes the winning putt at the end of the commercial.

Tiger's shadow is holding the Stanley Cup [click to expand]

Granted, Nike essentially got out of hockey after 2008 but they obviously still appreciate the greatest trophy in all of sport, the Stanley Cup (with respect to the Claret Jug and the World Cup, it's not even close). Here's the ad if you were somehow able to miss it in some parallel PVR-controlled universe over the past week.

More interesting that this ad was a good piece yesterday by Charles Pierce in Grantland on Tiger Woods. Pierce was the writer of the original then controversial piece on Tiger in GQ back in 1997. It's worth a read about how Pierce feels Tiger's father Earl would feel about Tiger being ordinary now and generally about the human condition and what Tiger's journey tells us about ourselves.

Ultimately, the parody on Jimmy Kimmel the prior week best sums up where Tiger is now and the realities of the human condition.

MAKING IT SNAPPY

The USGA videos over the U.S. Open weekend were surprisingly good. The "While We're Young" videos encourage us all to play faster. The USGA should be given credit for continuing to push this initiative. It is win-win-win-win (being players-course owners-industry-nonplaying family members) if everyone can play faster. Forget about 4 hours, let's aim for 3.5 hours! We all know 5 hours at a muni or daily fee course is just too common and probably discourages us from playing more. 

The USGA brought out the big guns with best versions being Tiger and Arnold/Clint.

We could all could learn a lesson from this guy Christopher Smith who completed a round on foot in 53 minutes and 48 seconds last year at Bandon Dunes last year. Oh yeah, he shot four under par. Hell, the camera guy deserves credit for keeping up.

SOME US OPEN CRAZINESS

It was a dramatic and wild couples hours down the stretch leading to Justin Rose's win. There were a lot of odd happenings including: the first hole-in-one at a U.S. Open at Merion (although is it just me or was Shawn Stefani a bit too excited for a fluky pulled/hooked shot hitting off the bank 60 ft left of the green going in?); Tiger never in the hunt; numerous shots banging off the steel flag sticks; shanked hosel rockets from 12-time PGA Tour winner Steve Stricker (don't look if you think you might get infected with the shanks ... although NBC hilariously put the pro-tracer on Stricker's shank out of bounds and amazing and impressive was that Stricker hung in the rest of the day); and Sergio Garcia with a moose.

Yet none of those things was as amazing as Carl Pettersson on the fairway on Friday and a tee shot from another fairway came along and hit his ball while he was in his backswing! Surely that must be infinitely rarer than a hole in one.

Less rare is Johnny Miller stirring things up a little bit. Love him or hate him (I'm in the former camp but I realize there are a fair number in the latter), Miller always has something to say. Among his many gems at this year's U.S. Open, the best may have been one that a lot of people may have missed because it was on Friday. While talking about the Hogan plaque on the 18th fairway where Hogan hit his famous one iron, Miller goes on to say Hogan's shot was not that great and it was the photograph that made it famous!

Miller may have a point but only Johnny could add, "I never got any plaques for [leaving iron shots with putts that are] 40 footers!"

I GUESS I DO TOO

Maybe I'm getting softer with fatherhood (my little guy hit a plastic ball and club on purpose for the first time this week), because I actually watched this whole video that dangerously combines white people and rapping.

This gets a pass because even professional comedians have a tough time pulling off fun/funny rap (never mind combining rap with golf because even respectable efforts are tough to watch for more than 30 seconds). Maybe the closest in the white-dudes category to pull it off in a fun way is Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon ... barely.

Most attempts end up like this disaster at a golf course in the middle of Mexico last week.

A LOT OF PEOPLE ASKED WHAT?

In the science and golf category, we bring you this odd little video dealing with the density of mercury and buoyancy of a golf ball. The funniest part of the video is in the first few seconds in which the creator claims, "A lot of people wanted to know how much force it would take to submerge a golf ball in mercury..." Wait ... what ... who?

Well, at least he didn't try to rap.

On the opposite end of the spectrum ...

DOES HE HAVE "BAD MOTHERF**KER" ON HIS GOLF BAG?

As proof that we all eventually get old, the baddest of them all Samuel L. Jackson was found on YouTube this week flirting with a young lady on the golf course under the guise of lessons (I believe nobly promoting an charity golf event for Alzheimer's). Even the baddest MFer can ultimately end up making us a little uncomforatble like the older drunk uncle hitting on the beer cart girl.

We'll give Samuel L a pass on this. He may be 64 years old but he actually has a decent turn.

Jackson is truly forgiven he labelled his golf bag is labeled like his did his wallet when he first burst into our cinematic consciousness (before grossing the most in ticket sales of any actor of all time). On that note, it seems only fitting to leave this week's videos in honor of Jackson and his most underrated role of all time. This is how I imagine Jackson selects what golf clubs to buy [NSFW].

Who wouldn't love to win a nassau against Jackson and demand the payoff in a Raptor bag.

Douglas Han

@theteesheet