Favre, Lions, Bears win; Tiger only kinda does

^

The Bald Truth

Oh, so that's what all the Favre fuss was about.

Break Up ...

The Lions!

The Balder Truth

The one thing I don't want to hear is this team "shoulda won" a game or that team "shoulda lost." It's stupid.

One thing I've learned over the years is that, regardless of the sport, teams usually win the games they shoulda won over the course of a season.

Take the Bears. If you're not a fan, you just might claim that the Bears shoulda lost to Pittsburgh and Seattle. OK, but then do you allow that they shoulda won their opener at Green Bay? Can't have it both ways.

Same with Notre Dame. A relatively weak 3-1 team? Sure. But the Irish no more shoulda lost to Michigan State and Purdue than they shoulda won against Michigan.

At the end of the year, the shouldas balance out quite nicely.

But don't get me started about the postseason. I mean, everybody knows Marquette shoulda made it to the Final Four!

Look Who's All Grown Up ...

Heck of a game for Devin Hester, who reached down to make catches, jumped high to grab the football, ranged right, dove left, scored the winning TD and did everything within his power to make Jay Cutler look good all day.

Hester ... he's not just for punt returns any more.

THE BALDEST TRUTH

Really, how satisfying was the 2009 season for Tiger Woods?

He proved he could return from knee surgery and still be great ... and he won six tournaments ... and he finished in the top 2 in more than half of the 17 events he entered ... and he won the FedEx Cup, the pseudo-playoff championship that might mean more if it weren't completely overshadowed by pro and college football.

Yep, it's been one heck of a year for The Greatest Ever. Still ...

He repeatedly has said he measures success only by number of majors won, and he won as many as you and I did (unless your name is Y.E. Yang, Stewart Cink, Lucas Glover or Angel Cabrera) ... and he missed the cut in the British Open ... and he had the PGA Championship in his grasp until he - gulp! - choked it away ... and he captured the FedEx Cup for the second time in three years despite not winning its premier event, finishing second to archrival Phil Mickelson in the Tour Championship.

"It feels certainly not like it did a couple of years ago when I won the tournament," said Woods, who had to work very hard this time to force a smile when accepting the FedEx trophy.

Hey, the rest of us should have only those kinds of disappointments in our lives, right?

Well, yeah. But then again, the rest of us aren't Tiger Woods.

Triple digits, zero worries

^

The swing that launched a thousand "Yikes!"

If you love golf but you've never walked a course while a caddie carries your bag, go ahead and treat yourself at least one time to playing the way the pros do.

I recently got to play in an Evans Scholar Foundation benefit event at Flossmoor Country Club. (Evans Scholars are young men and women who earn college scholarships through their academic achievements, their character and their work as caddies.)

My caddie at Flossmoor was Matt Banks, an engineering major at Illinois who is in his eighth year working at the course. He was a big part of one of the most enjoyable rounds of golf I've ever played.

I almost always walk when I golf but I use a pull cart, so I have a full-sized bag. Had I known I was going to employ a caddie at Flossmoor, I would have switched to something lighter.

Poor Matt. Not only did he have to watch me take lots and lots (and lots) of, um, unique swings ...

Well, at least my

practice-swing followthrough

wasn't (terribly) ugly.

... but he also had to lug around my heavy bag. Not talking Judge Smails heavy here, but heavy nonetheless.

Matt did so with a smile on his face for four-plus hours. His advice on the course, especially reading the greens, was most helpful. And he was a pleasure to get to know - polite and intelligent, with a good sense of humor. His parents should be proud.

Combine all that with ideal weather (80, sunny, light breeze), great playing partners (Tribune sportswriter Teddy Greenstein and club member Jimmy Lund) and the real star of the show (an exquisite renovation, performed by architect Ray Hearn and his crew, of an already pristine, esteemed course) ... and no wonder I had a sensational experience from beginning to end.

In fact, I challenge any other semi-avid golfer to have more fun shooting 103 than I did.

Jimmy and Teddy joined

Yours Baldly at The 19th Hole.

Pretty sure we solved

all the world's problems!

Hoping Erin Andrews gets justice

^

The Bald Truth

I am disgusted by the pervert lowlife who videotaped a naked Erin Andrews through the peephole in her hotel room and then posted the crapola on the Internet last week.

Although I wrote a column about the ESPN reporter last year that caused quite a stir in the blogosphere - if you google my name, dozens of posts relate to that column and its aftermath - I have no animosity toward her and certainly wouldn't have wished this upon her or anybody else.

Through her attorney, Andrews has said she will bring civil and criminal charges against this sick creep, if he (or she?) is ever identified. Here's hoping this scumbag gets caught and goes to jail, because this is nothing short of sexual assault. 

Unfortunately, one of the major downsides of the Internet is the damage that nameless, faceless idiots can cause.

By the way, I haven't seen this video and I don't intend to try to find it.

The List

In honor of the 10-year anniversary of Jean Van de Velde's epic choke (and the one-day anniversary of a somewhat less epic gag job by Tom Watson), here are the five biggest chokes I've covered during my 27-year sportswriting career:

5. The University of Minnesota football team blows a 31-0 second-quarter lead and loses 41-37 to Ohio State in 1989.

4. After Scottie Pippen tells him, "Remember, the Mailman doesn't deliver on Sundays," Karl Malone misses two free throws with 9 seconds to go in a tie game. The Bulls go on to win Game 1 of the 1997 NBA Finals (and, eventually, the series).

3. The 2004 Cubs, preseason World Series favorites, lose seven of eight games down the stretch - including five by one run - turning a 2 1/2-game lead over Houston in the wild-card race to a 3-game deficit.

2. Arizona blows a 15-point lead with 4 minutes to go and loses to Illinois in the NCAA Regional Final. Bruce Weber's Illini do just about everything right ... thanks in great part to the utter panic of Lute Olson's Wildcats.

1. Five outs away from their first World Series appearance in 58 years, the Cubs throw away a 3-0 lead over the Florida Marlins in Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS. It's known as "the Bartman game," but the choking Cubs players - not any fan - conspired to create the most amazing, surreal half-hour of sports I've ever witnessed.

THE BALDEST TRUTH

And speaking of the Cubs, they're not playing the Nationals any more ... and so their four-game winning streak is history.

This is looking like a team that's nowhere near good enough to be in position to choke away a playoff spot at the end of the season.

Then again, is there any NL Central team good enough to win this thing?

Sentimental favorite gags ... and bald dude rules!

^

The Bald Truth

Tom Watson choked!

He choked on No. 18, when he cost himself the championship by never giving his 8-foot putt a fighting chance. And he choked so many times during his four-hole playoff with Stewart Cink that paramedics should have been called to Turnberry to remove the blockage from his throat.

This doesn't erase the 59-year-old Hall of Famer's accomplishments over the weekend and, especially, over his glorious career. And it certainly doesn't discredit the victory by Cink, a grinder who took advantage of his opponent's mistakes and therefore deserved to win The Open Championship.

But to ignore the obvious - or to couch it in kinder terms - just because nice-guy Watson was the sentimental favorite would be as silly as it would be disingenuous.

Tom Watson choked away the Claret Jug, choked away his shot at history. It wasn't a choke of VandeVeldeian proportions, but it was a choke nonetheless.

There. I said it.

The TV Exchange

Paul Azinger: "For Stewart Cink ... this has to be difficult for him because he's a fan of Tom Watson as well."

Curtis Strange: "Oh, he doesn't care right now. Tom Watson's standing between he and that trophy."

Bravo, Curtis! I like Azinger, but jeesh ... what a dopey thing to say.

The Balder Truth

After Cink sank his 12-foot birdie putt on the 72nd hole - and followed that clutch shot by kissing his golf ball in celebration - I found myself rooting for the guy whose infamous missed bunny of a putt cost him dearly at the 2001 U.S. Open.

Admittedly, part of it was because Cink removed his cap to display a shiny dome that's almost a mirror image of my own: totally bald except for a ring of stubble just north of the neck region. (CHECK IT OUT!)

A bigger part of it, however, was contrarianism. 

If everybody else - including (especially?) the sickeningly non-objective folks at ABC - was rooting for Tom, somebody outside the Cink family needed to root for Stewart.

Tee It Up!

After spending much of the last four days watching the action at Turnberry, I am totally psyched for the round of golf I'm going to play Monday with my buddy (and former Copley colleague), Gene Chamberlain.

We're playing Settler's Hill, a links-style course built on the site of an old garbage dump in the Western 'burb of Batavia. 

Mounds ... tall grass ... high winds. Cool.

Not a penny will be on the line, just pride ... and I expect I'll choke often. 

I'll probably even fail to advance the ball out of the fescue a couple of times, just like Watson did during the playoff.

THE BALDEST TRUTH

See? Even though Tiger was back home with his tigress and cubs, a major golf tournament turned out to be utterly compelling sports theater.

The lead changed hands often, the shotmaking was incredible (and sometimes incredibly bad), the storylines were dramatic and mounds of memories were created.

As usual, championship-level sport provides all the reality TV anybody ever needs.

Very human Tiger gets weekend off

^

The Bald Truth

I love watching any golf tournament in which the scores are close in the final nine holes and Tiger Woods is a legitimate contender.

That being said, I also think it's a good thing the very few times Tiger misses the cut, as he did at the British Open.

Yes, I know it costs the network viewers and, by extension, money. And I know it automatically makes Sunday at least a little less interesting.

But I'm a big fan of anything that works against the deification of any human being.

Woods is a great golfer. Probably the greatest ever. But he doesn't always win. Neither did Jack Nicklaus or Michael Jordan or Muhammad Ali or Martina Navratilova or Wayne Gretzky or Babe Ruth.

How boring would it be if the greatest always performed greatly and always won?

It's good for the rest of us - and a wonderful lesson for us to teach our kids - that even Tiger Woods fails sometimes.

Now get out to that practice range, young man, and work on that driver!

The Balder Truth

This is Example No. 773 why you should always take The Field over Tiger Woods.

Yeah, he amazingly has won 14 of the 49 majors he's played as a professional.

Hello! That means he has not won 35 of them - 71.4 percent!

This is the biggest no-brainer out there. Yet before every major, the experts and talking heads always, always, always pick Tiger to win.

Dumb.

THE BALDEST TRUTH

Frankly, it was sickening the way the TNT folks openly, desperately pulled for Tiger to make the cut. It got to the point where they were rooting against others in the field, hoping the non-Eldricks would miss shots just so the cut line would come down to Woods at +5.

I mean, nobody really expects TV types to be objective, but this was ridiculous.

And TNT won't even be televising the final two rounds!

That means it was hero worship as much as it was rooting for ratings.

Pathetic.

Hey, TNT: A little more new Tiger, a little less old Tiger

^

The Bald Truth

Some international golf experts have called 17-year-old Ryo Ishikawa, "the Japanese Tiger Woods." It sure would have been nice if TNT had let the rest of us judge for ourselves.

You'd have thought the Royal & Ancient's decision to pair The Japanese Tiger with The American Tiger (as well as Lee Westwood) for the first round of the British Open would have perfectly set up the cable network's Ryo-vs.-Eldrick coverage. 

You'd have thought wrong.  In TNT's camera eye, Ishikawa barely existed.

Even though young Ryo outplayed old Tiger just about all day, the fine folks at TNT seemingly went out of their way to avoid showing anything Ishikawa did.

On No. 16, after Woods and Westwood sent their approaches into the drink, did we then get to see Ishikawa expertly avoid the same fate? Nope. TNT switched to No. 1 for a look at has-been Ernie Els.

On No. 17, after Woods messed up to remain at 1-over, did we get to see Ishikawa make his birdie putt to go to 2-under? Nope. It was time to take a look at American Anthony Kim on the first hole.

Finally, on 18, after one more Tiger miss, the TNT people let us see Ryo make his par putt ... but probably only because network honchos knew they'd get a shot of Ryo and Tiger shaking hands.

Same pairing again for Friday's second round. If the results are anywhere near the same - or even if they aren't - it sure would be nice to get a decent look at this 5-foot-7, 140-pound kid's game.

The Choice

1. John Daly's green-and-yellow picnic tablecloth pants.

2. Ben Curtis' pink shirt.

3. Ian Poulter's Union Jack ensemble.

4. Miguel Angel Jimenez's ponytail.

I think I'll choose none of the above and go with Stewart Cink's delightfully shiny dome. 

The classics never go out of style!

The Balder Truth

TNT must stand for Tiger 'N Tom.

Given Tom Watson's incredible play while shooting a bogey-free 65 Thursday, it was easy to understand the second half of that.

It looked like the only mistake Watson - just two months shy of his 60th birthday - made all day came after his round: He predicted the dry, wind-free conditions at Turnberry would ensure that his 5-under score wouldn't be the low for the day.

Watson's mark held until right near the end, when Jimenez made a bomb of a putt at 18 to finish at 64. So Watson turned out to be accurate there, too.

The Quote

"The course is obviously defenseless." - Tom Watson

Obviously. 

Right, Tiger?

THE BALDEST TRUTH

Had to chuckle at this exchange between TNT's Ernie Johnson, one of the top announcers in TV sports, and Peter Alliss of the BBC ...

EJ: "Ian (Poulter) had been on Twitter and tweeted a picture of his outfit. You were twittering earlier today, were you not, Peter?

PA: No, I confess I was not. We've only just got gas at my house, so I'm not ready for the Twitter.

Hey, I'm with you, Peter. I'm not quite ready for the Twitter, either!

Bo-ring!

^

The day after the MLB All-Star Game is the worst day in sports.

No major league ballgames. 

NFL training camp hasn't opened yet.

It's offseason for the NBA and NHL (and well after the opening of free agency in those leagues, so there isn't even much news).

Wimbledon is over and The Open Championship hasn't started.

When WNBA games, Brett Favre silliness and speculation about Allen Iverson signing with the Clippers are the day's big-ticket items, well, we might as well have slept in.

The beautiful thing: The siesta is a short one. Even as I write this, Tiger & Friends are mere hours away from teeing it up over the pond. 

Baseball will be back, too, replete with folks talking about their team being only x games out "in the loss column" and y games out of the wild-card lead. (Or, in the case of the Nationals, zzzzz games out of fourth place.)

Soon enough, the All-Star festivities will be but a distant memory ... and humidity will descend upon St. Louis with enough force to curl those porn-star 'staches the Cardinals are growing.

Yes, all will be right with the world.

In the meantime ... hey, how 'bout that Chamique Holdsclaw, huh? With her putting 28 points on the board for the Dream, those lamentable Lynx never had a chance!

Green is the color of the day

^

The Bald Truth

Just days after paying AC Milan $92 million for Brazilian midfielder Kaka, Real Madrid agreed to fork over $131 million to Manchester United just for the right to work out a contract with Portuguese midfielder Christiano Rinaldo. Wow! That's a lot of green just to increase the team's goals-per-game average from 1.04 to 1.05.

And this just in: Sources say the Yankees contacted Real Madrid to see how much the soccer club would pay for Alex Rodriguez. 

"We can't promise he'll come through with the season on the line," Hank Steinbrenner was overheard saying. "But at least he'll supply his own syringes."

The Balder Truth

The Eagles have given Donovan McNabb a new contract, and the deal is unique to say the least.

It contains the first per-boo incentive clause in sports history.

THE BALDEST TRUTH

Gotta give John Daly credit: The man has style.

He's charitable, too. After the St. Jude Classic, he's donating his pants to the Sad Clowns Society.

Tiger vs. Roger: It's a win-win proposition

^

Tiger or Roger? Well, it's kind of a trick question. 

And depending upon how it's asked, there really is no wrong answer.

By winning the French Open, Roger Federer pulled even with Eldrick Woods in the Majors Won Dept. at an incredible 14 apiece.

If you're asking which player has had the better career in his chosen occupation, it's Woods - and he likely will continue his dominance long after Roger has put his racquet in mothballs.

Such is the nature of the two games. Woods won his first major - the 1997 Masters, by a record landslide, as a 21-year-old - before anybody even knew who Federer was.  And Woods has kept winning and winning and winning.

Meanwhile, after dominating tennis for several years, Federer has been overshadowed and overwhelmed lately by my good son, Rafael Nadal ... to the point where some respected observers were wondering out loud if Roger's best days were done. 

Tiger? He's been No. 1 for so long now it's hard to remember when he wasn't. He was No. 1 as an amateur, he was No. 1 in college, he established himself as the No. 1 pro as a 21-year-old kid and he's still No. 1 as a 33-year-old father of two even after undergoing major surgery that kept him out of action for nine months. 

Sad to say, tennis pros simply don't have that luxury of longevity.

OK, but whose run of 14 majors has been more impressive? 

That's a different question - and one with a different answer.

Woods is nearly six years older than Federer. Nevertheless, if Tiger wants to keep winning well into his 40s, he surely will. Roger can have all the want-to in the world, but he simply won't be able to compete with younger players.

So Roger had neither as much time nor as much room for error to get to his 14. Roger won his 14 in a six-year span - twice as quickly as Tiger got his 14.

And then there's this: 

Tiger never hit a drive only to watch Phil Mickelson or Sergio Garcia or Ernie Els slam the ball back at him. There is no way to defend Tiger because golf is the ultimate me-against-myself game. 

There is, however, a way to defend Roger. Nadal has been doing it quite well for a couple of years now. Before that, Federer had to get the ball past Andy Roddick. Before that, Andre Agassi. 

You can make a great shot in tennis ... only to see your opponent return it for a winner anyway. Tiger has never had to worry about a great putt being kicked out of the cup by Vijay Singh.

Hell, Tiger goes ballistic if he hears the slightest camera click. Imagine how he'd react if his opponent was charging the fairway the way Pete Sampras used to charge the net.

So yes, Tiger has had (and will continue to have) a wonderful career. And yes, he deserves props-a-plenty for being the most accomplished athlete in all of sports. 

But I'm giving props for Best Major Achievement to Federer, who has had to both psych out and physically whip his opponents.

Still, when Tiger gets Major No. 15 - very likely in two weeks - I reserve the right to change my mind.

Putting more "dread" in Dubsdread

^

The Bald Truth

Played the new, angrier Cog Hill Dubsdread on Tuesday. 

It was quite a stern test of golf. 

I failed.

When I was assigned No. 9 as my starting hole in the shotgun format for the Media Day event, I knew I was in trouble. It's now a nearly 600-yard par-5 through a narrow corridor of trees - the toughest hole on the course.

I turned to the SouthtownStar's Tim Cronin (who literally wrote the book on the Western Open) and said: "I'll be playing it like it's a par-7."

His reply: "OK then, you might manage a bogey."

Or not. I shot a 10.

I won't go into my round's gory details, partly because I stopped keeping score pretty early in the proceedings. No use ruining a beautiful day on a beautiful course by counting all of my, um, birdies. Despite my wayward irons and far too much quality time getting familiar with the nasty bunkers, I enjoyed my afternoon.

Among the changes at Dubsdread: Many holes were lengthened and the bunkers were made far more penal. I thought owner Frank Jemsek simply was trying to Nadel-proof the course, but he assured us that the goal was less dastardly. He wants a U.S. Open in Lemont.

Rees Jones, the architect who oversaw the redesign, believes Cog Hill deserves to host the big event in the not-too-distant future. In the meantime, Dubsdread will offer a sterner test for the top pros at the BMW Championship in September. Jones also said the changes would help make the course "more playable and fun for the average golfer."

Hmmm. I hang out with a lot of average golfers, and few if any of them will be forking over the $150 greens fee to play Dubsdread. 

As an average golfer myself, I can vouch for the fact that our kind is probably better off playing one of Cog's three other more user-friendly (and far more affordable) courses.

The Quote

"I don't think so." - Camilo Villegas, defending BMW champion, when asked if his famed "Spiderman" green-reading style would benefit the rest of us.

The Balder Truth

Also in attendance at Cog Hill were former Blackhawks great Stan Mikita and Mr. Cub, Ernie Banks.

Banks was wearing a cap with three Hebrew letters on it. At first glance, I thought the letters were Qof-Bet-Mem. That would have been phonetic for "Kaboom," which would have made sense for Bulls announcer Neil Funk but not for Ernie.

But the Mem looks quite similar to the Samech - the letter that sounds like "s." That made it phonetic for ... CUBS. Of course.

Despite my scorecard woes, I actually had driven the ball well most of the day ... until Banks greeted my group and chatted us up for a little bit. I guess I was nervous, because when I finally took my hack, I hit a grounder that Ernie probably would have turned into a double play.

I'm going with nervousness, because there wasn't a black cat anywhere around.

Happy Anniversary

Thirty-nine years ago Tuesday, Banks hit career homer No. 500 off Atlanta's Pat Jarvis.

Only 490 to go, Ryan Theriot.

THE BALDEST TRUTH

I was in at least one bunker on 13 holes. Several times, I went from bunker to bunker. 

What a blast. (Get it? Oh, I'm so freakin' funny!)

Here's the deal: Choose the wrong iron on your approach or misjudge the wind even a little bit, and you're on blood beach without a shovel. Then there are the greens; they already seemed plenty hard, fast and tricky for the pros, but I'm sure they'll be even tougher come September.

Having said all that, Dubsdread was a pleasure to play because of the way it suits the eye and because of the challenge it presents.

I'm grateful that the Western Golf Association and the other fine folks involved with the tournament saw fit to invite me and my media colleagues.

Getting thoroughly humbled is good for the likes of us.

Of Oscar errors, stupid rules and Joe the Twin

^

The List

Ten random observations from the weekend that was:

1. Not rooting for the Twins to beat the White Sox (or for the White Sox to beat the Twins, for that matter), but I hope good guy Joe Crede has a healthy, productive season for his new ballclub. 

2. To the press-conference inquisitor who got Jim Calhoun all hot and bothered: Successful major-sport college coaches deserve every penny they are paid. Nobody at any university - and that includes the school president - works harder or faces more scrutiny than the head basketball or football coach.

3.  Interviewing is easy if one can do it in the setting in which Baba Wawa always gets to ask questions - one-on-one with the subject, with the camera rolling and with millions of viewers watching (or about to watch). She'd impress me a lot more if she got anything substantive out of an angry jock in the corner of a crowded locker room.

4. Late in Sunday's Bulls-Pacers game, Stacey King identified 17 games the Bulls "should" win before season's end (including Sunday's contest). His team promptly lost. Hey Stacey: The Lakers or Celtics are good enough to say they should win a game; the Bulls aren't. Fact is, opposing teams - including the Pacers - think they should beat the Bulls every time.

5. As outstanding as Sean Penn was in Milk, even he gave a shout-out to deserving Best Actor winner Mickey Rourke. I'd like to thank the Academy ... for missing the obvious.

6. Rutgers receiver Kevin Britt told reporters at the NFL Combine that he wants to be drafted by the Bears so Devin Hester can be his "mentor." That's a good one. Were Britt at receiver for the Bears, he'd have to tell Hester where to line up on half the plays.

7. Wow ... 70 points for the Illini. Just like a big-boy team!

8. Not a single day will go by in 2009 without one of the New York papers coming up with some dirt on A-Roid.

9. Smart of Phil Mickelson to squeeze in a victory before Tiger returns to the tour.

10. The Bulls have told all recent acquisitions that they're still enforcing their no-headband mandate. Brilliant rule! Very important to a team's success! Thank goodness they won't let a headband-wearing loser like LeBron join the team when he becomes a free agent next year.