STICKIN' IT TO MICK
Fox not afraid to criticize Phil, course
NEARLY a week after Phil Mickelson’s shocking galloping polo putt in the third round of the U.S. Open, the debate, rationalizations, criticisms of Fox’s coverage of it and farcical takes continue.
My take? On the largest stage of the sport, Mickelson committed a contemptuous, flagrant violation of the rules. He should’ve been disqualified on the spot, no matter whether he were Phil Mickelson or Krusty the Clown.
And it was Mickelson who appeared in USGA image ads encouraging all golfers to know, observe and respect the rules.
The next day, Mickelson could’ve preserved some of his rep — already shaded by a $2 million gambling debt to a shady character — by withdrawing. Was his defiance a sense of entitlement or a matter of no sense at all?
And Fox, for all its failings during the Open and criticisms for having overdone its coverage of and the fallout from the incident, did a superb job in placing the sport above the popularity of the player.
When Fox’s Curtis Strange asked former USGA executive and telecast contributor David Fay what he thought of the play-on, two-stroke penalty, Fay called it a “friendly” decision.
That demanded the next question, which Strange asked: What would Fay have done? Fay flatly said he would have DQ’d Mickelson.
Strange further asked if this would be similar to a player, his ball about to roll into the water at the Masters, running down to swat it in the other direction. Fay: “Exactly the same.” Strange confronted Mickelson at the end of his round, not settling for Mickelson’s politely defiant answers — thin rationalizations — as to why he so intentionally and conspicuously violated the rules.
Mike Francesa, who knows Mickelson as “Phil” and has come up with some doozies to excuse, explain and exculpate his own conspicuously transparent egregious mistakes — for start- ers, see: Al Alburquerque — Monday on WFAN explained:
“It’s hard for some public figures to stand up and admit they made a mistake. So they come up with crazy answers.” Satire-proof!
And when caller Bob Competiello — “Bob from Summit” — tried to explain why Mickelson was way out of line, Francesa, naturally, wouldn’t let him complete a sentence. Choosing an absurd analogy, Francesa shouted/ asked Bob if he would be equally outraged if Mickelson “threw a club and hit your kid?”
“As the father of three,” Bob said, “which kid?”
Yet, among the funniest lines ever delivered by a caller flew undetected past Francesa, a pompous jackass who was far too busy marinating in his own juices to have heard it.
But bottom line: Fox not only didn’t run from this stunning story, having run into it, the network didn’t run away from it.
Zach Johnson’s testimony after Saturday’s round that playing con- ditions had become so absurd that the USGA “has lost the golf course,” was aired and discussed, though it wasn’t even a Fox-conducted interview. It belonged to U.K.-based, Fox sister network Sky Sports. Fox’s contract with the USGA easily could have dictated that the broadcast truck ignore it.
On the flipside, we again learned that host Joe Buck’s casual-slick, Hugh Hefner-like latenight talk-show host presence is no less annoying or transparent on golf as it is on baseball and football.
Buck’s contrived tightness with big-name players — “Phil,” “Dustin,” “Rory” and “Tiger” — was an affront to both the better senses and broadcast journalism, or what’s left of both.
Too many post-round interviews, for which we were pulled from the course to hear and see, were wastes if time.
Scott Piercy’s second round ended with him still among the leaders despite an excruciating three-putt — birdie to bogie — from about four feet. Yet Fox’s Shane O’Donoghue, unless he didn’t even know about it, impossibly didn’t bring it up.
And Fox should not have pandered to the coterie of loudmouthed louts in the gallery who made every shot an opportunity to enjoy their verbal vandalism later on DVR. “Hear that jerk? That was me!”
Such conduct has destroyed the Ryder Cup as a feel-good
sporting event, yet golf ’s TV voices are more inclined to salute it than condemn it.
But when the heat was on — both on the course and on Mickelson — Fox came through.