Easy to root for fearless Bryson
FIFTEEN YEARS ago, while I was flying with Jack Nicklaus from Calgary to Palm Beach, Fla., on the legend’s private jet, we hit turbulence at 40,000 feet. Looking distressed as a thunderstorm lit up the sky, Nicklaus grabbed his armrests and held on for dear life.
Lightning, he explained, “scares the crap out of me.”
I remember being stunned, and a bit unnerved, that the indomitable Jack Nicklaus would be afraid of anything.
With his massive thighs and piercing blue eyes, the Golden Bear was quite a sight when he pounded his golf ball into oblivion. His more charismatic rival, Arnold Palmer, also tried to land his ball on the far side of the moon with his blacksmith arms. They won a combined 10 Masters long before Tiger Woods changed the game with even greater power and speed — inspiring a younger, more athletic generation to attack the golf course with an all-out blitz.
“And we’re going to keep going after it,” promised the most imposing member of that generation, Bryson James Aldrich DeChambeau, after winning last September’s U.S. Open.
You know the 6-foot-1, 245-pound DeChambeau as the quirky hulk in the Hogan cap, the guy who had packed on 40 pounds of muscle while trying to hit 400yard drives, trying to generate a ball speed of 220 mph and, he told GQ , trying to live to 130 or 140 years of age.
“I want humans to be better,” DeChambeau said. “I want them to succeed.”
He is golf ’s answer to an interstellar space probe, exploring new worlds. Why would anyone ever root against that? We want our great athletes to be fearless, to extend the boundaries of human possibility, and no player in the Augusta National field this week represents that approach like the 27-year-old DeChambeau, once known for his brain and now known for his brawn. He was the former college physics major who drove opponents and galleries mad with his analytical pace — at least until he morphed into a bench-pressing, proteinshake-guzzling monster whose top priority is to thrill the fans.
“They’ve always kind of been my little edge … for helping improve my performance on the golf course,” DeChambeau said.
While winning last month’s Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill, DeChambeau surrendered to fan demand on the 555-yard sixth hole by defying the dogleg and blasting his drive over a large lake. He thrust his arms toward the sky as the ball traveled more than 370 yards and touched down safely on dry land. DeChambeau said the conquest — and the wild fan response to it — made him feel like a kid again.
He won the Bay Hill tournament named after the King, before visiting the home of Palmer’s daughter Amy, with her son Sam. They talked about what Arnie had meant to the game, and DeChambeau called it a moment he’d remember for the rest of his life.
Bryson has some of Arnie’s swagger, and all of his swing-for-thefences philosophy when it comes to playing to, and for, the fans. Palmer would have been proud of him at the U.S. Open, where DeChambeau defanged a beast of a course. Storied Winged Foot is the sport’s Yankee Stadium, and guests the likes of Babe Ruth and Mickey Mantle had belted their fair share of homers there. Just none quite like the 385-yard blast DeChambeau hit on Winged Foot’s first hole.
He would nail down his first major victory by half a dozen strokes. Two months later, after suffering dizzy spells, DeChambeau finished a humbling 18 shots behind Masters winner Dustin Johnson and a humbling one shot behind 63-year-old Bernhard Langer. Some felt he had that face plant coming after he spent his summer reprimanding a cameraman for filming his lousy bunker shot and arguing with a rules official over, among other things, whether fire ants qualify as dangerous animals.
DeChambeau can be a pain in the rump, no question. But for most of his career, Tiger Woods wasn’t a springtime walk in the park either. You don’t need to be familiar with Leo Durocher’s dogma to know that the best of the best are rarely the nicest of people.
And that’s OK. The Masters is not a niceguy contest. It’s a bare-knuckle battle of wills seized by the tough, the strong and the fearless.
Bryson DeChambeau is the most fearless man in the game. He is willing to try anything to gain a competitive edge and, in the process, to make humanity five yards better while making himself and the fans feel like kids again.
Do you really want to root against that at the Masters?
Kevin Durant and James Harden — a couple of MVPs with hamstring issues — are on the brink of their returns to action, and the Nets are on the verge of finally becoming whole.
Both Durant and Harden are expected to be out for Sunday’s matinee in Chicago. Harden seems to have a chance to return for Monday’s clash with the rival Knicks at Barclays Center, and coach Steve Nash confirmed that Durant even has an “outside possibility” to return from a nearly two-month absence for that tail end of the backto-back.
Even if Durant doesn’t face the Knicks, Nash called it a “high probability” that the 32-year-old would return at some point during the Nets’ high-profile homestand this week, which features all three games on national TV.
After the Nets host the Knicks, with the game on NBA TV, on Monday, Zion Williamson and the Pelicans will come to Barclays Center on Wednesday for a game televised on ESPN. The Nets will end the homestand Saturday versus the defending champion Lakers, on ABC.
“I’m not certain on Monday [for Durant’s return]. I think that’s an outside possibility,” Nash said. “But I also couldn’t say he’s by any stretch probable for Monday. I think it’s just wait-and-see. But it does look positive that this week sometime there’s a high probability he can return.”
Presuming Durant doesn’t face the Bulls, he will have missed 22 straight games, though his long-awaited return is in sight.
Durant hasn’t played since a 134-117 win at Golden State on Feb. 13. After having missed the three games prior to that due to health and safety protocols, Durant returned to the court with 20 points, six assists and five boards against is former team, only to have the hamstring injury cut his comeback short after just one night.
“Being patient is the key, just knowing that we’ve got a long season. I knew that I’ll have some time to recover and still be able to play in the regular season. So I was optimistic about that,” Durant said. “Looking forward to coming back in and jumping on the train.”
Harden’s hamstring injury is believed to be a Grade 1 strain, which is the least severe, making his return more imminent.
“We’ll see. It’s up in the air. … He’s working out right now and we’ll see how it goes,” Nash said recently. At one point, the coach said Durant returning to face the Bulls on Sunday was “very possible.
We’re also going to be very cautious if it’s at all a risk. So we’ll see how it comes out.”
Shockingly, the Nets’ Big 3 of Durant, Harden and Kyrie Irving have started just seven games together, with a promising 6-1 record.
“I was playing solid before I got injured. I felt like we were just starting to figure each other out, James, Kyrie, myself, and different lineups out there on the floor,” said Durant, who is averaging 29 points, 7.3 boards and 5.3 assists in just 19 games. “I felt like we were starting to gain our rhythm, even though I was out a week before that with protocols. But I felt like our team was gaining more chemistry then.
“That’s more so what I’m concerned about. How I play, I figure that out over time whenever I get out there, whatever position coach puts me in, I’m looking forward to trying to conquer that as best as I can. But the chemistry of the team is something that I kept an eye on and tried to help when I’ve been away. Guys have been doing amazing job.”
Trades, signings, quarantines, injuries and even personal leaves have forced the Nets to get used to ever-shifting rotations. They’ve used the secondmost starting lineups in the league so far this year, leaving Nash gun-shy about even saying they could actually be healthy by the end of this coming week.
“Well, that’d be tempting fate, my friend, because if I say yes, then someone else will get hurt, and I’m not going down that road,” Nash said. “So, there’s a good chance Kevin will return to play this week, and the rest of it I’m not going to touch. So, hopefully.”