Dear Mr. Hack,
I've never much cared for golf. My reasons have always been fairly subjective, typical, and of no particular interest here.
But today I read your article in the New York Times about the frightening prospect of golfers using the kinds of performance enhancing drugs that have crippled the formerly popular sports of baseball, football, cycling, and The Olympics. It's easy to be cynical in this day and age, then, especially given the millions upon millions of dollars to be earned in the sport of golf. But when I read your article, I cried for a little while--I'm always surprised by how often that happens when I read the sports section. But they were not tears of rage or confusion--not this time--but tears of joy, for I had rediscovered the innocence I thought I had lost. And this time I don't plan on losing it again, at least not anytime soon, or intentionally, like the last couple times.
It was refreshing, you see, to read about an entire sport wherein our heroes exist on an ethereal plane above deceit and trickery, in that rareified and exalted land where the point is not cashing those checks for millions upon millions of dollars, but rather playing for love of the game itself. Or as you more eloquently put it:
"Professional golf finds itself in an unusual position on the sports landscape. Players call penalties on themselves, sometimes costing themselves strokes, victories and money. Cheating is seen as the worst possible sin...in interviews with several professional golfers and officials, none said they believed that professional golf had a steroid problem. But many recognized that their sport does not exist in a vacuum despite its being perceived as a game of honor."
Aaah, yes. Did you know that in the dishonored game of baseball they allow women into locker rooms after games to interview players? Well of course you did, David Hack; clearly, not much slips by that intrepid eye of yours. But that's where it all started, the steroid thing. That precious chapel of masculinity was invaded and perverted by female reporters; it was not long after their infiltration and subversion of the locker room that baseball players, having been so dishonored, began to juice. In golf, on the other hand, the exclusive clubs that act as nurturing caretakers for the sport continue to bar women from joining as members. That is to say, women are not even allowed to play on the most hallowed courses in our great nation. And nobody in golf uses steroids. Coincidence? Hardly. This proud Sport has weathered ninety years of women's suffrage--not to mention at least another forty years of distasteful rulings by the Supreme Court that keep getting the groundskeepers all uppity--to endure as a noble bastion of no doubt steroid-free Honor.
But you are a highly intrepid journalist, so you know that a story about how nobody in professional golf uses steroids has to be supported by
"'Maybe I’m naïve, because I have a hard time believing that anyone would cheat, I really do,' said Tom Lehman, the 1996 British Open champion and the 2006 United States Ryder Cup captain. 'The culture of golf is such that you play by the rules. If you read in the paper that Tom Lehman just won the U.S. Open and he just took a drug test and he’s been using the clear for the last two years, the guys out here would vilify me,' he added, referring to the steroid tetrahydragestrinone. 'It’d be over. For that reason alone, almost, it would keep guys clean.'"
Well, if you choose to ignore the qualifying 'almost' right there at the end, it's a pretty damn convincing argument. I also like that Tom didn't reflect glory unto himself by mentioning his own 1996 British Open win, but rather the hypothetical event of winning a US Open on THG, which is super-hypothetical considering THG had not been invented in 1996, nor does the PGA Tour test for it currently. Tom Lehman is also generally well respected by other golfers and has never won a US Open, which isn't particularly interesting, but it's also not something you could say about all golfers. Adding a contribution from noted human biodynamics smartypants and PGA golfer Bo Van Pelt seems almost like rhetorical overkill at this point:
“As far as steroids ever helping out golf or a golf swing, I just don’t see it. Just because you’re hitting it a little bit farther, your scores aren’t going to be that much different. In golf there is too much short game, too much feel, too much carving shots."
My guess here is that you'd worked strenously enough to exonerate golfers of suspected steroid use, David Hack, that you're using Van Pelt's comments as a subtle red herring to drive home the point--rather compellingly--that women don't belong in golf. Have you ever noticed that LPGA tees are closer to the hole than PGA tees? Most people assume that it's because of the physiological fact that men are generally stronger than women but, as Van Pelt convincingly argues, strength has nothing to do with playing golf well--after all, if it did, then men would be tempted to shoot themselves up with all kinds of funky chemicals, treating their bodies like dairy cattle or aging designated hitters. But golfers don't take steroids. So women's tees are closer than men's tees not because of any strength differential, but because of the even-more-of-a-physiological fact that women have no feel for the game of golf. And they have no honor. And, most importantly, they just don't have the steely nerves required to keep their hysterical natures in check.
I think that's the implication, because I'm not sure how but you managed to deftfully segue from crusading against women's lib into a discussion of golfers trying to find an edge with beta blockers--what are those, anyway? Like benzodiazepines for people who can't spell? I must have not been paying attention for a little while. Still, your argument remained no less compelling when I picked it back up:
"While there is no evidence suggesting steroid use on the PGA Tour, two players — Jay Delsing and Joe Durant — said they have heard of competitors taking beta blockers, which are often prescribed for heart ailments but can also be used to combat anxiety...Durant, also a member of the PGA Tour policy board, said...'I have heard of guys taking them and saying that they didn’t help them at all[.]'
That, right there, is when I became ashamed of myself. I realized what a pathetic cynic I've become. Baseball sold its sould to greed, avarice and the Long Ball and maybe a little bit of me died that day when congress single-handedly wiped out 63% of the value of my baseball card collection. Bastards. And that part of me is still dead, believe me. I don't have like this crazy partially re-animated Frankenstein's monster of a soul or anything. But the parts of me that aren't dead (on the inside), your story warmed them up a little, like a homeless person snuggled near a pile of burning tires. I think cockles were involved somehow.
It's almost a fairy tale, really: not long, long a ago but a pretty good while back, some wicked golfers got the idea in their heads that beta blockers would make them invincible gods of the greens. But the beta blocker bingers were beaten at their own game, which in golf sort of means they defeated themselves somehow, which kind of means they won something too. Honor, probably. With their honor restored--and fear of Tom Lehman's approbation or reprisals--they refrained from experimenting with other, actually potent drugs that are proven to improve the athletic abilities of athletes in other sports. Of course those drugs don't help you play better golf. If they did, science would go out and prove it, no doubt with grants from the PGA, who wouldn't mind a little scandal if it meant they could keep their sport pure as driven snow. Or maybe the grants would come from those companies that make all that money selling those really big titanium drivers. But there's no scientific proof that those kinds of drugs even help you play better golf, so drop it already and don't me ever catch you thinking about steroids and golf ever again. And everybody lived happily ever after.
Thanks, David Hack. I needed to believe in sports again, and you've won me over. All hail the noble sport of golf! I mean, when men play. I'd make a tasteless joke about steroids, the LPGA, and East German women here, but I think they're all actually kind of cute (East German women) so I'm going to show some restraint for once.
Yours,
Gabriel
No comments:
Post a Comment