A look fore-ward for a change
Been getting a crick in my neck these days from looking over my shoulder all the time.
Not that it isn’t understandable, given we’ve gone two months without a major sports event. Without live competition to enjoy and look forward to, sports fans have mostly been getting their fix by looking back at past events. From “The Last Dance” to “F1: Drive To Survive,” documentaries have been trying to fill the void. TSN and Sportsnet have broadcast one event from the last 50 years after another. Anniversaries have been amplified and legends retold, like this weekend with the 50th anniversary of Bobby Orr’s flying-through-the-air goal to capture the 1970 Stanley Cup.
Many enjoy these walks down memory lane during normal times. These days, well, sometimes they’re discussed on social media like they’re actually happening again in real time. That’s how desperate we are. It’s fantasy sports at a new level.
The good news is that we do have a sporting event to look forward to. Well, an exhibition event for charity. But it comes with the uncertainty and a drizzle of the intrigue we like in our sports, and the guess here is that it’s going to draw some major television numbers. When Tiger Woods and Peyton Manning lock horns with Phil Mickelson and Tom Brady in two weeks, it will be the first competition outside of the UFC that we’ve seen since mid-March, enough to drive many to their couches, golf fans or otherwise. The NHL and the NBA are trying to devise ways to get their 2019-20 seasons restarted, but that won’t be until June at the earliest. Same for the 2020 Major League Baseball season. The CFL season may not happen at all, but we’re hopeful Randy Ambrosie can convince his rich owners to pony up and keep the league in business.
Pro baseball in South Korea is already up and running and Germany’s Bundesliga will resume activity on this coming weekend. And here in North America we’ll have the two-ontwo golf match on May 24. Given that golf took us into this weird pause — The Players Championship was cancelled after one round, and then everything shut down — it seems fitting it will be this exhibition on the links that brings the business of pro sports gently tiptoeing toward normalcy.
We’re all familiar with Messrs. Woods and Mickelson. Neither was having a very good 2020 season when the world stopped, but they are who they are. The abilities of Messrs. Manning and Brady, on the other hand, are almost completely unknown, which is the variable that could make this fun and potentially interesting unless you’re already cynically dismissing it out of hand.
Manning was last seen in a golf competition in February at the Pebble Beach pro-am, when he and brother Eli both sank long birdie putts on the same hole. And Brady? Well, he’s still got this football career thing going. Last time he was seen in public with a club in his hand might have been in the 2015 “Entourage” movie, playing with partner Mark Wahlberg against fictional brothers Vinnie Chase and Johnny Drama. And Brady wasn’t actually filmed swinging a club.
How will these two superstar quarterbacks make out at the Medalist Golf Club in Hobe Sound, Fla., with all those eyeballs watching? Who knows? But for all of us wannabe players, it’s a lot easier to measure yourself against those two than against PGA pros, that’s for sure.
This is the second in a series of Tiger-Phil matches, with the first taking place with just the two of them back in 2018. To many, it’s remembered as somewhat of non-event because neither player had their best day and there were far too many gimme putts allowed. Without a gallery, and with a lot of air time, there was also too much forced banter between Woods and Mickelson. Mickelson won the $9 million prize on the fourth extra hole.
The most significant news that day was Turner Broadcasting’s attempt to make it a pay-per-view event was a complete disaster, and the match was eventually streamed for free. But a lot of people watched, and that was in late November when the NFL, NHL and NBA seasons were all in full swing. This time around, this foursome will have the stage pretty much to themselves. And not on pay-perview.
They’ve played with the rules a bit, making it a four-ball match on the front nine and a modified alternate shot on the back, which should be the entertaining part. If you’ve ever played alternate shot with a superior golfer, you know saying “sorry” over and over as you put him or her into the woods or a sand trap can be a humbling experience.
Of course we’d all rather see something meaningful, like the Leafs against the Canadiens or the Raptors in hot pursuit of back-to-back NBA titles. That goes without saying. But we don’t have that option right now.
The PGA Tour is slated to resume in Texas next month, while the LPGA is looking at mid-July. Formula One is looking to be back in Austria July 5. Professional tennis doesn’t have a date to resume competition, but it’s looking like August, if at all.
The bottom line is WoodsManning vs. Mickelson-Brady is all we’ve got at the moment, so we might as well have fun with it.
If they don’t all try to be comedians — only Manning is actually a funny guy — and compete with each other to some reasonable extent, it could fill an afternoon and meet a need.
Really, anything that gets us looking ahead should be welcomed. My neck is sore.