By TERRY LYONS
BOLTON – What would a gentlemen’s game of golf be without some old-fashioned controversy, bribery, back-alley wheeling and dealing and some rightful protesting?
What would Uber be without the old-fashioned deplorable service of the regular taxi-cab offerings?
What would the automotive industry be without the disruptive, upstart electric-powered Tesla?
What would the NFL be without the 1969 Joe Namath-led New York Jets of the American Football Conference and his “guarantee” of victory over the favored Baltimore Colts?
What would pro basketball be without the stories and history of the renegade ABA, complete with the legendary Dr. J, The Iceman, David Thompson, and Marvin “Bad News” Barnes?
Ladies and Gentlemen, we give you the 2022 LIV Golf tour and its most recent stop, here in Bolton, Massachusetts and some 40 miles from Government Center in downtown Boston. LIV (that’s “54” for the roman numeral challenged) snuck-up on the PGA Tour although they knew it was coming.
In October, 2021 Greg Norman – “The Shark” was named Commissioner of LIV Golf and began to recruit players to shun the PGA Tour schedule and compete in a highly lucrative, eight-event men’s golf circuit where winner’s shares of a $20 million per event purse would be $4 million. LIV Golf also incorporated a team event side-hustle which would slip another $5 million into the kitty.
LIV Golf entered the market and led with its chin, as ill-advised PR and exclusionary media tactics were put in place to deflect from the main issue plaguing the new golf league. The LIV is funded by the Public Investment Fund, the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia with some $600 billion in the bank and about $225 million dedicated to the eight individual events, nevermind significant bonus signing money to individual players jumping from the PGA Tour to LIV Golf.
The PGA Tour cried foul and began to suspend players who teed-off in LIV’s first event, held in London, June 9-11.
Most importantly, the families of the victims of the 9/11 terror attacks on New York’s World Trade Center, The Pentagon in DC and a fourth hijacked airplane – United 93 – which crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, have protested the golf events. The 9/11 families are reminding the world that 15 of the 19 terrorists were Saudi citizens and were responsible for carrying out the attack.
For LIV Golf, there is no denying the direct affiliation with the Saudi-based Public Investment Fund. Saudi Arabia, realizing the United States and the rest of the world is working diligently to reduce the need for oil and fossil fuel. In 20-years, many of the cars USA citizens drive will be battery powered. With portions of the Public Investment Fund, Saudi Arabia is investing in other future resources, like tourism. The play in sports, such as hosting golf events, world sporting events (2034 Asian Games) and ultimately, a future Summer Olympics, will fulfill the kingdom’s Vision 2030 Project, a plan to embrace the world’s sporting events for positive imaging and goodwill.
Some call that effort “sports-washing” as a deflection and diplomatic tactic, a claim denied by the Saudi officials. Some point to the inevitable crossroads of sports and politics, certainly seen before. Truth be told, it is a very small but often effective step to bridge political gaps.
The more effective measure to bride those gaping holes is TIME.
With thoughts focused on the blood-bath of D-Day and the Normandy Beach landings by American and British troops to fight against Hitler’s Germany or Pearl Harbor and the December 7, 1941 Japanese bombings of Battleship Row and the deaths of 2,403 American sailors and injuries of some 1,143 others – what would American sports look like today if the USA were banning German or Japanese sportsmen?
Germany’s Dirk Nowitzki, recently retired from the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, is well known around the world as one of the best power forwards in basketball history and certainly one of the best shooters the game has ever seen. He is a 14-time NBA All-Star, the 2007 NBA Most Valuable Player, and a 2011 NBA champion when he was presented the Finals MVP Trophy. Nowitzki was born in 1978.
In Major League Baseball, thankfully, there are dozens of excellent Japanese players who’ve enriched the game and contributed mightily. From Hideki Matsui to Hideo Nomo to Ichiro Suzuki to Yu Darvish to Shohei Ohtani to Koji Uehara, the Red Sox star reliever who won the MVP of the 2013 ALCS and struck-out St. Louis’ Matt Carpenter to win the 2013 World Series.
Hideki Matsuyama, the popular Japanese pro golfer who plays on the PGA Tour was the first-ever Japanese golfer to win a men’s major golf championship – the 2021 Masters Tournament. He was born in 1992.
What would be the sense in protesting against or banning the German or Japanese players from competing in American sports because of political atrocities of the past?
PGA Tour champion Fred Couples has been tossing the most shade on LIV Golf, its structure (54-holes vs 72 holes) and its players. But, a look at Couples record and checking account shows he was quite happy to cash winner’s checks for the Shell Houston Open in 2003, the Dubai Desert Classic in 1995 and a decade or more earnings from the silly season games of Skins and “Shark” Shoot-outs.
The take-away is to be careful with who and what is criticized in the world of sports. The hypocrisy can be astounding. Sports has and does provide for an effective diplomatic meeting ground. It always should.
LIV Golf should be judged on its performance and entertainment merits, not who is playing or how it’s funded. Otherwise, that Wall, so often talked about in 2015-16, grows taller and taller and could stop athletes, born in 2002, from competing in the United States.
Can you imagine if that stopped Ichiro from playing for MLB’s Seattle Mariners, Dirk for the Mavericks, Yao Ming for the Houston Rockets or the great Boris Becker from playing at the U.S. Open tennis tournament?
HERE NOW, THE NOTES: The Boston College football season both began and (probably) ended on Saturday when the Eagles were upset at home by the Rutgers Scarlett Knights. Entering the game, BC held an 11 consecutive game winning streak and a 20-7-1 edge in the all-time series against Rutgers along with a 7.5 point Las Vegas odds as favorites. … Boston College held a 21-12 advantage at the 8:33 mark of the third quarter but let up a 33-yard field goal with :11 remaining in the third quarter and then the game winning TD 22-yard run by sophomore RB Al-Shadee Salaam with 2:43 left in the game. … Rutgers QB Gavin Wimsatt (Top 300 recruit and No. 7 QB prospect) started but split quarterbacking duties with Evan Simon. … Rutgers faces Wagner and Temple in their next two games and is likely to bring a 3-0 record into their B1G Ten season where they’ll struggle. Boston College will travel to Virginia Tech who dropped their opener to Old Dominion.
NFL POWER: A frequent and popular feature of NFL Power rankings will begin this week – before a single regular season game is played. Here’s the WWYI Power 10:
- Buffalo Bills
- LA Rams
- Cincinnati Bengals
- KC Chiefs
- Green Bay Packers
- Tampa Bay Bucs
- LA Chargers
- Indianapolis Colts
- Philadelphia Eagles
- Dallas Cowboys
NCAA FOOTBALL POWER: There’s one Saturday in the record books for NCAA Div 1 football and here’s the best of the lot. Since the College Football Playoffs system will grow to 12 postseason playoff teams by 2026, the Top 12 power rankings will begin today:
- Alabama
- Georgia
- Ohio State
- Clemson
- Michigan
- Texas A&M
- Oklahoma
- Baylor
- NC State
- USC
- Miami
- LSU
OUT: Notre Dame with its loss to highly ranked Ohio State is out of their preseason Top 5 rating while Utah with its 29-26 upending by Florida is no longer Top 12 material.
DIAMOND DUST-UPs: The Boston Red Sox won their forth straight game on Saturday night, defeating the Texas Rangers 5-3. The Sox are 4-1-0 in their last five series at Fenway Park. … Meanwhile, the AL East-leading New York Yankees have lost three in a row and six of their last seven games. The Yankees are now only four games up on the Tampa Bay Rays and six games ahead of the Toronto Blue Jays in the AL East. … New York is 15-26 since the MLB All-Star break. On July 4th, the NYY were 58-22.
In August, Boston’s Rafael Devers struck out 22 times in his 104 At Bats which contributed to a slump of batting .163 during the month. … Four days into September, Devers is batting .545 with six hits in 11 At Bats, including four doubles and six RBI.
TID BITS: The National Lacrosse League will hold its 2022 NLL Entry Draft In Toronto on Saturday, September 10 beginning at 2pm (ET). The first round of the Draft will be broadcast for the first time on TSN.ca and the TSN app in Canada and ESPN+ in the United States. The entire draft will be covered in real time on NLL social channels. It marks the most extensive live coverage of the NLL Draft in the league’s history.
Speaking of firsts and a look back at our lead topic, LIV Golf is allowing its players to wear shorts during competition rounds. Of the 48 players in the field this weekend, 40% took advantage of the new rule and wore shorts. It’s believed to be the first time an elite professional golf league has allowed shorts to be worn during competition. … “The players asked about it,” said LIV Golf CEO and Commissioner Greg Norman. “We did a survey a couple of weeks ago. It was a pretty significant positive response about wearing shorts.” … Norman credited Phil Mickelson, for being “the most desirable to have it. … I followed his lead, listened to him a little bit.” … Mickelson was one of the 19 players who wore shorts Saturday.
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