Friday, May 8, 2015

The Fight of the Century

Being a week removed from "The Fight of the Century," we can now take a calmer look at what it meant. We're not talking about the zillion dollar spectacle between Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao. We're talking about Keegan Bradley vs. Miguel Angel Jimenez.

As a youth, I was often confused by my father, the XMan, when he would watch golf on TV.

I would say: "Come on, Dad, let's go play catch."

He'd say, "After the golf."

"Why not now?"

"There could be a fight," he'd reply.

No lie. We had that same conversation, and joke, for decades. I never saw a fight on the PGA Tour — until last week.

No punches were thrown between Bradley and Jimenez. But Bradley was hard-core pissed, and so was his caddie, nicknamed "Pepsi." Honestly, I think Bradley and Pepsi were so angry because they were losing to a 51-year-old sophisticated gentleman and didn't know how to handle that.
One thing I love about the argument between the duo is that they were both 0-2 in their third match of the WGC-Cadillac Match Play Championship. In other words, neither could advance in the tournament, so the match really didn't mean anything. ... Love it!

For a golf addict, the current Match Play format was an orgy of goodness from Wednesday through Saturday. The field is 64 through Friday and then 16 and eight on Saturday. The tricky thing, though, is when the final four are left, there aren't enough players left for good TV on Sunday.

Two Match Play points: 1) We need more Match Play. 2) Somehow have more matches on Sunday.

But who cares, other than golf geeks? Two players nearly came to blows, and for God's sakes, golf needs more of this. I'd love to see Craig and/or Kevin Stadler sit on Tiger, or maybe Mickelson karate chop Louis Oosthuizen in the gap between his teeth.

Fight, guys, fight. It would be nice to see golfers getting a little more nasty. Go ahead. Take your cues from Elin Nordegren.