CATCHING UP WITH LUMPY
Sort of lost in the hubbub of the time leading up to the Masters last week was checking out Tim Herron's first Dear Lumpy columns. It certainly did not disappoint and you should check it out here.
Highlights abound in the column (including the best swing tip to fix a slice I've ever seen or heard) but the best has to be Lumpy's Masters week apparel guide after seeing media tittering over the release of various players weekend get-ups.
Great work by Lumpy and his apparel sponsor Bogey Pro which appears to be a realtively new golf-related apparel (plus other stuff) brand and infused with a bit of irreverance and fun. They are worth checking out based on this alone [for the record, that's just my opiniont because we do not provide paid endorsements of products of any kind on theteesheet.com].
They could have included the sweet jacket you get a Colonial for a win. Lumpy has one of those.
BIRD BIRDIE BIRDIEST
From the Sports Illustrated vault this week came this awesome photo of Larry Bird tweeted by Andy Gray of SI who runs its online archive.
There so much to love about this shot:
- Bird is wearing some form of zip-up boots
- Jeans!
- Looks like a persimmon driver
- Pre-ironic foam-front mesh-back hat (I bet it had those little plastic knobs that fit into the holes to change size and they eventually broke off)
Mostly, that a pretty nice looking turn.
WORST/BEST PART OF TIGER DROP ISSUE?
One of the guilty pleasures of living in NYC was seeing what the New York Post headline after some sort of scandal (that and a NYC slice of pizza, oh, and Shake Shack ... um, it must be close to lunch because all I can think of is food and the museums, culture and architecture seem to be a distant second right now).
The Post gave us the best and simlutaneously worst part of the entire Tiger Woods illegal drop at the Masters last week (while we gave the most comprehensive analysis (both legal and technical) of the rule and ruling out there). Maybe this should be the final word(s) on the whole affair but it likely will not be.
As you can see from the May 2011 headline on the right, the Post enjoys a horrible pun and sexual innuendo as much as anyone (whether it is sports or the general news although who's kidding who, they tend to be best at sex). They have certainly enjoyed the Tiger Woods scandal over the years. It certainly shows that he still sells papers despite a major drought of over 4 years.
The NY Post is cover, albeit often mean-spritited, is relatively harmless fun ... well ... unless you are a local track athlete and coach just out to watch the marathon).
THE SAD LINEUP OF UNUSUAL SUSPECTS
If you get the MSG channel on cable, you may have been excited to see promos for half-hour shows called "The Lineup: Best Sports Movies." I watched the The Lineup's golf version. There is no polite way to put this: it is a horrible show.
Granted, a 30 minute show on golf movies is handicapped to start with because of the relative lack of quality golf movies. Here's the kindest rundown I can muster.
Problem 1: No clips!
They don’t appear to have any rights to even show clips of the movies. Too add to the bus-accident of a show, they have this woman in a gold cocktail dress read the plot of the movies befire the group discussion.
Problem 2: The Round Table
The round table is hosted by Fran Healey (former Major League ball player). He seems like a pleasant fellow but his biggest contributions was choosing Happy Gilmore as the best golf movie and asking the others around the round table the penetrating insightful question, "how difficult is it to cast a movie?" The rest of the round table had potential. It consisted of:
- Chazz Palminteri: I'm not sure why he's there but I've always kinda liked him as an actor despite the fact that his last significant role was in The Usual Suspects, over 18 years ago (unless you count A Night at the Roxbury ... which I do).
- Robert Wuhl: great in Bull Durham but if you look back at Arli$$, it was not that good.
- Jeffrey Lyons: he seemed remarkably un-insightful for a lifelong movie critic.
- Spike Lee: Seemed like teh most promising member but was didn't even see all the movies ... which would seem like a minimum requirement to be on a panel discussing the particular movie. He also went into bouts where he would curl up a bit and laugh but not say anything. I suspect it is possible he clammed up because he could realized how lame the movies and the show itself were.
Even so, I don't even blame the roundtable for this train wreck.
Spike "How Did I Get Sucked Into This Show" Lee: "Screw it, I won't even watch all the movies!"Problem 3: The Peanut Gallery
The show was also interspersed with clips from other celebrities chiming in after the introduction of a movie by golden-lady-with-microphone. For the golf episode, they included Tom Watson (who mostly damned each movie with the faint praise of how it wan't horrible), Eli Manning (naturally?), Ray Knight (I guess he was at least married to Nancy Lopez ... and has a huge head) and, speaking of huge head, Keith Olberman who was at least one of the few to provide a coherent contribution, although it was to mention how one-dimentional all the characters were inThe Greatest Game Ever Played.
Problem 4: The Movies
This brings us to the major problem. Although the forced round-table discussions were cringe-inducing (to be kind), it became apparent that there are no really great golf movies.
If you must know, the panel conclluded: Happy Gilmore: a few funny moments but Healey went a bit overboard selecting it as his best; The Greatest Game Ever Played: meh (Spike Lee didn’t even bother to watch this one to show you how seriously he took the task); The Legend of Bagger Vance: pretty bad; Tin Cup: oksy, but it seemed the kindest thing anyone said was Lyons who noted it was nice to see Don Johnson acting again; and Caddyshack: everyone agreed was funny. I love Caddyshack but it has become a little like Slap Shot for hockey fans because it seems you must love the movie if you love the sport or people will look at youfunny.
It may be the measure of a sport in the movies if fans of the sport can have strongly differing views about its signature movies. In baseball, people who love baseball both love or hate The Natural or Field of Dreams. The same goes for boxing and Rocky or more recenlty The Fighter (yeah, yeah, I know, don't forget Raging Bull). If you love the particular sport, you don't feel obligated to love the top movie involving the sport if there are others good ones about the sport.
But, for hockey with Slap Shot (and to a somwhat lesser degree Sudden Death, Jean Claude Van Damme's tribute to both hockey and cinema) and golf with Caddyshack, there is a sense of obligation to like the movie if you love the sport. It is because there is so little else from which to choose. Believe me, it is the same way for tax laywers and Bringin Down The House with Steve Martin and Queen Latifah (ignore those lame tax lawyers that argue for The Firm).
Anyway, any sport that can produce the drama and passion we saw recently with the Masters can certainly be the backdrop to a great movie. It's just waiting out there to me made.
DYH
ps. in case you don't believe me about the cinematic genius of Van Damme's Sudden Death, I present to you:
Douglas Han