Saturday Night Live Attacks the PGA

The recent skit on Saturday Night Live wasn't the first attack I've seen on golf and the PGA regarding the sport, the organization and its alleged exclusivity or supposed lack of diversity but it was certainly the most vulgar. Did I miss the joke? Not hardly given the quality of SNL recently and the relative sophistication of the humor sans Lorne Michaels. They shot a sharp arrow, it just didn't hit the right target.

If you didn't see it, the skit showed a PGA executive trying to come to grips with the idea that Tiger Woods will be missing for a while on tour. The executive, who becomes more anxious in each installment of the running bit, liquors himself up to calm his distress about potential lack of interest in the Tour and denigrates the remaining players on tour by suggesting they are very bland fair indeed as a substitute for Tiger. The players shown on the screen behind him all happen to be Caucasian in a possible attempt to paint the PGA sans Tiger as a forlorn monochromatic gaggle of no names. No big deal, not offended in the least. It was their intent to make a contrast but it is definitely not my point. I am however, deeply offended at the suggestion that without Tiger the PGA lacks diversity and worthwhile content.

America is almost perpetually preoccupied with its popular culture and sports heroes, the rest of the world be dammed. As an American, put yourself in someone else's shoes just for a moment, say someone from another country, perhaps a small relatively poor country. Pretend your from Thailand and you are a big fan of Thongchai Jaidee. If he is playing in a tournament, say the PGA Championship with Tiger and he is in the hunt you probably won't see him. In the hunt or missed the cut you get the same result, no coverage. What can you do? Most of the media from the Tour originates in the U.S. and now the Americans are suggesting that your hero just doesn't matter at all because Tiger can't control himself and needs a little time out. Its ok, you can save up what little disposable income you can manage, take you son or daughter out to play golf and tell them about your hero and how he does matter. Where you come from and where you've been in this instance has probably taught you that you don't need predigested content regarding your heroes.

The skit seems to single out the PGA for an over reliance on the Tiger product without suggesting any culpability on the part of their network or any other for that matter. I suggest the PGA is at little or no fault and the networks and other media outlets are the ones who are actually addicted to Tiger.

The PGA Tour web site has highlighted dozens of players over the last season even when Tiger was in or near the lead. It was CBS and NBC that showed never ending coverage of their product, Tiger Woods, to the exclusion of players from dozens of other countries. Imagine people from these countries waiting to see their fellow countryman/golf hero make a crucial shot in a tournament and upon tuning in to an NBC broadcast they see Tiger Woods merely standing around waiting for his next shot while Johnny Miller drones on endlessly about some aspect of Tiger's game, like his new golf glove perhaps. Meanwhile off camera the golf hero from somewhere far away makes his shot and those fans can only read about it in the paper or on the PGA Tour web site.

Am I overly sensitive regarding a skit on a TV show that is way past its prime? Maybe, but there has been a constant barrage from the PC crowd that insists golf is elitist, exclusive and lacks diversity. Perhaps they pick on golf because they lack the fortitude to attack institutions that actually represent such things. Their lack of intelligence and sensitivity doesn't mean we shouldn't try to point out a few things to them anyway.

First regarding relative diversity in major sports. The three U.S. golf majors this year were won by people from three different countries, Argentina, the United States and South Korea. The Super Bowl, World Series, NBA Championship and Stanly Cup were won by one country, the U.S. Two of those sports had no possibility for a country other than the U.S. to win, the other two had only the U.S. and Canada as possibilities. But what we really should look at is the diversity in the make up of the participation in the Tour in general.

Countries currently fielding players who qualify for the PGA Tour:
ARGENTINA
AUSTRALIA
CANADA
COLOMBIA
DENMARK
ENGLAND
FIJI
GERMANY
INDIA
IRELAND
JAPAN
NEW ZEALAND
NORTHERN IRELAND
NORWAY
PARAGUAY
SCOTLAND
SOUTH AFRICA
SOUTH KOREA
SPAIN
SWEDEN
THAILAND
ZIMBABWE

Scotland has its own parliament again, they invented golf and they are the country of my people so give it a thought before you write me on that one.

Then some additional countries represented in events in the PGA Tour schedule:
AUSTRIA
CZECH REPUBLIC
CHINA
FRANCE
ITALY
MEXICO

If you know of a major U.S. sport that beats that, please write me.

Second I like to point out some content that I feel is a PC tumor growing in the body of the media coverage of this sport. In one instance J. Brady McCollough of the Kansas City Star reported after Angel Cabrera's Masters win that inside Butler cabin "Cabrera's family, friends and countrymen are pouring into the main room. Waiting for their beloved "Pato," which means duck in Spanish, they clink their drinks and feast on fine cheeses. An old white man in a green jacket stares down from a portrait on the wall as an Argentine man in a green jacket fields questions on a flat-screen TV."

Not bad writing as far as conveying the scene, but I would like to know the significance of the inclusion of "white man" in the description of a former Masters winner, especially since it was juxtaposed with "Argentine man". I imagine the "white man" has or had a nationality and nationalities must be of some significance to the writer in as much as he identifies Angel's nationality. Now that Tiger is gone though, it has been suggested to us by the same inane PC movement that yearn for that kind of tripe that Angel and his fellow Tour players are now just a poor substitution until Tiger returns . The PC tide ebbs and flows and it apparently doesn't care who it offends (or drowns) as long as the offence is in vogue.

In the end, with or without Tiger or mindless attacks on golf, the PGA and its members are one of the most charitable organization in the world and I will take my family to the local Deutsche Bank Championship this year at TPC Boston, like I have for the past four years. We meet people from dozens of different countries, races, religions and financial situations. There are people wearing diamond studded Rolex watches and people wearing old sneakers and pushing ragged looking strollers. Young, old, black, white, speaking languages I don't recognize and some I do. We meet golfers and fans from all over the world and I don't have to get on a jet and increase my carbon footprint to do so, although I imagine this kind of brotherhood must be worth the carbon. Most of us come for the love of golf. I imagine that many of those faces in Butler cabin would smile about that.