I’ve actually written this ahead of time, so I’m patting myself on the back for not screwing up like last time.
Today, I want to talk about the LIV Golf thing.
This is a very controversial and emotionally-charged subject, so I want to make sure I handle it correctly.
I want to preface everything by disclosing that my best friend lost his aunt on 9/11. She was on the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. He is also the person that introduced me to the sport of golf. It is thanks to him that I play and care one bit about the sport.
I completely understand people’s feelings about how this competition is being funded.
I do think that the same level of scrutiny should be applied to how other organizations are funded. Dirty money is everywhere and the same level of outrage should be directed at corporations, politicians, and other groups taking money from questionable sources.
But that whole thing is complicated as you can see here:
Not to mention this.
Throw in the fact that Trump is deeply involved in LIV Golf and it is very easy for many people to dismiss it and deride it. The PGA pushes the negatives to the max because it doesn’t want the competition.
It’s to the point that all anyone talks about is the money and nothing is being said about the actual competition.
Which is what I want to focus on.
I watched quite a bit of the second tournament and a little of the third. I’ve seen some things that I liked, some things I didn’t, and I have some questions that I have not seen answers to.
THE GOOD
I like the shotgun starts that ensure everyone plays during the same time frame. It’s easier to watch and doesn’t require a gigantic time commitment like regular PGA Tour events. It also gives more exposure to all players as opposed to just the leaders.
I like them playing only 54 holes. I have no idea who, if anyone, watches the first round of PGA Tour golf on a Thursday. There’s no need to play an extra day unless it’s a major. For a regular routine event, 54 is fine.
I also like that there are no cuts. If you have a favourite golfer, you are guaranteed to see him during the entire competition.
THE BAD
The team format is confusing, specially since players can switch teams every event. I feel there is a big missed opportunity here. The team concept itself I like. It would be improved if you could have a preseason draft and then the players stick with that team all year. Hell, you could have a mid season trade period if you wanted to. I like that team members can split prize money even if they don’t place high on the individual leader board. They should have set teams with a backup player on each team in case someone gets hurt or falls ill. You could even have the captain make a substitution during the 54 holes if a player is playing particularly shitty. That would be compelling.
THE QUESTIONS
With 3 players per playing group and 48 players in the field, that’s a shotgun start on 16 holes. Why not add another 6 and start on all 18 holes simultaneously?
For that matter, why restrict the playing groups to 3 players? 4*18 equals 72 players. That is a decent field size.
The field size is currently 48 yet the LIV Golf website lists 61 players. What happens to the 13 that don’t get picked each event? Do they get paid anything? Do they have to rely on their signing bonus? Are people really leaving and getting banned from the PGA Tour for a spot on LIV that’s not guaranteed?
THE BOTTOM LINE
I like the fact that the PGA Tour has competition. I like that LIV Golf is attempting to change how competitions are structured and presented on TV. I hate monopolies. I hate dirty money. I hate that Trump is involved. I don’t mind professional athletes being professional whores. To pretend they are heroes and role models is an insult to real heroes and real role models.
So, I have mixed feelings. I think the idea and the concept are interesting, challenge the status quo, and could develop into something great. But Americans crave hypocrisy and this is just a little too obvious about what it is.
Why did you think “The Girlfriend Experience” is a thing?
Anyways, those are my thoughts. I welcome yours in the comments.
And now, a dead pervert gets an erection:
Nice ladies with good hair
Those shoes… Gurlfren!
“I tried to assemble this as ended up with an art career instead of a dining room set” -MC Escher
His office furniture was so clunky, everyone snarkily called him MC OSHA.
Just amazed you found a shot of pre-boob job Holly Sonders. She looks like an anime fuckpumpkin with a Newport in her talons these days.
Just looked her up and that is as good a description as possible.
There’s another hot golf lady now. I saw it on the internet. She’s nice as well.
That would be Amanda Renner nee Balionis.
There are many actual talented golfing ladies on Insta, though most swing opposite.
Chicago is horrible at lots of things, but one thing it is good at is weird-ass weather. I am lucky enough to have experienced thundersnow. This is a rare enough phenomenon that wikipedia does not have a picture. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thundersnow
Brothers and I were flying back a few years ago and they had one of those “haboobs?”
Blew the goddamn windows out of the Sears Tower and I’m still glad I didn’t book the ground tour that day.
Stuck at O’hare for hours and formed the always interesting “Drunken travelers club.”
To this day I can’t tell you the final score of the Cubs game that we were at but I can tell you stories of drunken travelers stuck at O’Hare during aN “Haboob.”
I would have some local news footage to send you if I had access to such things. I wonder if it was the same day they closed a bunch of bridges because of glass getting blown off construction sites. Was this maybe around 7ish years ago? Don’t know if it was the same as a haboob, but wind shut shit DOWN that day
It was. We took TAJ to Wrigley for a milestone birthday.
I’ve never seen the sky that dark at 4:00 PM in June.
You were super unlucky, that was unusual even for Chicago, or maybe lucky cause it’s kinda awesome to be able to say you were in historic winds
But the sky being super dark whenever isn’t unusual in the midwest, that’s just normal storms, they are fun
I saw a real live tornado when I lived in Moline Illinois. For years we had the warnings of the affected counties on the TV but there were only 2 times when the civil alert sirens went off.
The last one had bad intent.
We were on the front porch just tripping balls when the sirens went off.
We had just came from a RUSH concert at the RKO Orpheum in Davenport Iowa.
Pops came out on the porch and said “What are you idiots doing?!”
We pointed across the Mississippi River and there was this huge fucking funnel cloud.
Pops said “Oh Shit!”
Ma grabbed some canned goods and headed to the basement and screamed at Pops “Get those idiots in here!”
Pops said “You should see this!”
Long story short the tornado blew up a trailer park in Bettendorf Iowa as they are want to do.
It was awesome.
Well done, idiot!
That’s seriously kinda badass though
I’ll wear that as a badge of honor!
That seems so wrong. I can’t think of anything that strange. It’s like hot snow.
This was a dynamite read. I loved it, warrants Eva Green
Was a modern classic.
There are very few things which aren’t better when viewed from an airplane, but lightning deserves a special mention. Most lightning just rolls around in clouds, you see it when you fly by and it’s spectacular. Every few seconds, and mostly within a smallish cloud formation
Sharks.
When we went to South Africa we were flying at 39,000 feet and went over a thunderstorm off the east coast of Africa and it was one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen.
Also there was a kid on the flight that kept whining and wouldn’t let anyone sleep. She finally went to sleep about 3 hours before we were supposed to land and her mother drifted off right up until I went up the aisle and kicked her foot to make sure she stayed awake for the whole flight like the rest of us had to because of her shitty kid.
But the lightning seen from above was really cool.
An anti-aircraft missile
My golf interests are pretty specific.
I’m pretty jazzed on putting grips, too. Went down the rabbit hole on the golf channel the other night.
Do you think it would be possible for pudding pops to make a comeback, despite the rapey Cosby spokesperson taint?
If Choco Tacos couldn’t make it, what chance do Puddin’ Pops have?
I just asked my dog if I should get another beer and he didn’t say no, so whatever happens the rest of the night is on him.
Ask him if I should have more wine
He stretched and went back to sleep, which I think means “absolutely”
Good dog!
I’m gonna have his license revoked.
Politics stuff: If I go expat it isn’t likely to be for political reasons. While I may not be happy with the increasing partisanship and threats to democracy in the US right now, it doesn’t make sense for me to leave, even if things continue to deteriorate. I’m a relatively financially secure middle-aged white woman with no dependents, so while my sense of justice and equity may be outraged by political happenings, short of the Taliban coming to power here, it’s not really personal for me. The people who are directly affected have far less ability to leave than I do, and if I emigrated in an ideological huff there would be incrementally less money and support for those people. So no, if Trump somehow gets another term in 2024 I won’t try to flee to Canada. It’s entirely possible I may move to another country for other reasons, but if that happens I will still do my best to keep whatever minor influence I have from voting and donating in the US
Trump running in 2024 is literally the only way Biden could get re-elected. Trump is a hero to a very loud faction of the GOP, and they’ll come out of their slimy little hovels to use their webbed hands to color in a dot for him, (they’re certainly not going to write his name out), but Trump running, again, will motivate Dems and independents to come out in greater droves just to make sure that asshole doesn’t get a second chance.
I’m in the same boat as you. White, decent income, straight, male, (OK, not completely like you), so nothing in the GOP platform directly affects me. Indirectly, however, I do enjoy clean drinking water, breathing air not filled with benzene, and would love to see my children have a chance to raise children of their own in an environment that isn’t a dystopian hellscape. But moving to Canada doesn’t change any of that.
So I’m gonna move to Belieze!
Pfft, Belize is just bougie Guatamala
Currently reading ‘The Lost City of the Monkey God’, which is enough to put me off ever wanting to go to Honduras, and Guatemala is supposedly worse.
Anyway, not my fault.
/eats banana from Dole Fruit.
I would be totally down with a colonial horror movie with a killer called the Tallyman who tallies the bananas of those who deserve it
We love our benzene-soaked air up here. If you don’t like, go suck on some balloons. That’s our saying.
Brava. You’ve got it made Doc. The reality is America is a great place to be successful. I’m no white woman but I wouldn’t be making it as well anywhere else. In part because other places value on math skills and merit versus being a white guy but, honestly, because of culture. I’m not worldly but I’m not without consideration for my fellow being. I know how to exist here. I understood what I was getting into at an Oakland Raiders game and that made it fun. I don’t want to go to a fucking soccer match with hooligans or whatever.
I think it’s just like everything else in life. Prepare for the worst and hope for the best.
I mean, I got the math skillz, but everyone else with the maths comes here anyway, and I don’t need visa sponsorship which is a pretty good tradeoff for my laziness and mockery of authority perhaps!
You’re good at math though, yeah? I think Americans sometimes lose sight of the whole reason everyone wants to go there is that it is merit-based. More than anywhere else I think. Folks in other countries are constrained by class or background but America makes people rich if they can be great at anything valuable. It’s a wonderful country. Just wonderful. We all have issues but the American values are beyond reproach.
Aw shucks, here I go again being un-Canadian and praising the U. S. of A. Just can’t help it.
This is some silicon valley bs. TheUS may be more of a meritocracy than China or whatever, but that’s not saying much. Smarts get you a stake, you still have to roll the dice.
I’m fine at math (no zymm but no indian kid). To your point though, we have loads and loads of opportunities. Thia is the place that qualifies most nearly any market. If you honestly bring something to the table, we’ve probably got a seat for you.
And I’m sorry I can’t open up the patio tonight — this is where the owners who were born here like to watch Penn State games.
I just bought a $500 toolbox. I’m going to keep the tags on it overnight to see if I still “need it” tomorrow morning. But it’s a hell of a toolbox, modular & stackable, and I have a hell of nice tool collection (engine, electrical, and plumbing; there ain’t no wood on a submarine so I don’t know shit about carpentry). Plus I filled the individual boxes with stuff and they never looked inside at checkout, so there’s always that.
Nice rack
This toolbox has your name written all over it
It does. There is a Milwaukee tool dealer right here in our town. Homies be world wide.
American made, too. At least I hope they still are
“Engineered by Milwaukee Tool
Professionally Made in Israel”
Speaking of that, my new refrigerator has Wi-Fi, a 50 page instruction book, and a “Sabbath Mode” which I can’t even imagine what that actually entails and the book doesn’t say. The Wi-Fi part reminds me of the show Silicon Valley.
Does it say how many Palestinians were harmed during production?
All of them
Genocide aside, that’s a nice tool box. You should reward yourself for being such a professional with those things. I’m rough as hell on my tools but that’s probably because I don’t do enough because I don’t know enough to be using them. You’re a masterful tool handler (to the point that everyone is like, “I don’t even care if he has beer in there. Shoot I hope he did because I’m gonna be cool about it.”
Besides, it’s not like sending back the veal is returning to the fields Little Miss Destiny the [Golden] Calf.
Genocide? Pfft. Pulling ahead in a holy war, I call it. Gooooo team gentiles for Jews!
The Sabbath setting opens the door for you and ejects cheese.
How can I make my other storage containers give me free cheese?
The current Red Sox pitcher is nicknamed ‘Big Fudge.’
Do with that what you will.
Not pictured: Eric Clapton’s cat
https://twitter.com/Gabriele_Corno/status/1555470958625972226
This came across, (giggles like an 12-year-old for 4 straight minutes), my Twitter feed, and this might be the best photo I’ve ever seen. I’ll give it the benefit of the doubt and take their word that it wasn’t enhanced.
https://twitter.com/IntoTheShitter/status/1555434621965283328
Might want to try linking that again buddy
Twitter links are weird. It’s the same link I clicked before, but this time it decided to show up. It’s like 50-50.
Somehow this is Elon’s fault.
I refreshed and it works now so whatever. I hope Elon is ruined with the Twitter deal and has to try and live off his wits. Then he will die penniless and we can all point and laugh at the withered fruits of apartheid
Hey, Elon is a true hero who made it all on his own, and his Daddy’s apartheid emerald mine empire is a mere coincidence!!!
This is one of my favorite memes!
Terrifyingly accurate.
Ok, that kicks ass, note the classic anvil shape
Goddamn, the larger version is really something
My big hot take about golf–and I like golf– is that 99% of the golf courses should be seized by the state and turned into public parks and affordable housing communities.
Every golf course west of the Mississippi should have their irrigation systems turned off.
But we just paid a lot of money to replace our pump. We deserve at least another 2 decades to recoup our investment.
That’s George Carlin’s solution to homelessness – get rid of golf courses and cemeteries.
If we emptied all those coffins, we would have all the beds we need.
But I sure as shit wouldn’t sleep in one. Unless my name was Nandor.
Or we turn the golf courses into cemeteries for the homeless. And since the homeless won’t be camping in our cemeteries, we can play golf on them!
The counterpoint in the US, we actually have shit tonnes of open or underdeveloped land. The reason we don’t have enough housing is because of structural regulatory and economic issues that disincentivise the building of housing far before the point where supply meets demand.
Counter-counterpoint: No one wants to live in Wyoming.
No one does live in Wyoming, because Wyoming is fake
JUST LIEK THE SUN!!!
Touche’
This is partially false. I spent many hours driving through a “Wyoming”, so it does exist. But there was no evidence of actual human life there.
It’s a lovely simulation, but whether it’s VR or chemically induced, they don’t have the tech to simulate things like mobile phone service or gas stations. Maybe they’ll update it one day, but I think/hope the days of illegal domestic CIA slush funds are over
Billionaires want to live in Wyoming. They’re buying it up at a frantic pace.
As long as it’s not my country club or wherever Col. Duke LaCross is working these days, I might agree. But probably not. Golf rules.
Golf’s a fun way to kill an afternoon, but an even more fun way is to hunt golfers for sport.
Which courses make the 1% cut?
This is another ostensibly sexy Arsenal fan. Now, I am by now means disparaging the attractiveness of this lass, who is indeed lovely, but she has the same look on her face as I will on mine when Arsenal cocks it up against Brighton Hove Albion Shire Gondor Whateverthefuck in Week 18 to make it clear that they will once again not be progressing to the Shempions League.
I also feel compelled to point out that she’s actually a West Ham fan, and that the internet has lied to me yet again.
You’ve been drunk for hours now, haven’t you?
I just finished my first beer, but I have been outside a lot in the heat.
Does it show?
“first beer” was actually a children’s swimming pool.
That’s the kind of ass that pretty much requires yoga pants.
She has to mow that unibrow twice a day
Personally, I like a bitter woman.
I would love to disappoint her even more.
She looks like that porn star, no? But clothed.
Only Liv Tour I want is of Liv Tyler’s pants heyoo
I mean, she’ll probably age better than Steven did, what with not doing cocaine for breakfast, meth for lunch and heroin for dinner.
She’s just lucky her rockstar dad fucked a model. What’re the odds?
I’ve done the calculations, and it turns out the odds are 1:1.
So just speedballs all day? Whatever works.
If it’s not drunk amateurs playing minigolf, I’m not interested. I would probably enjoy playing golf, but I’m already overbooked on hobbies and golf will have to wait its turn
Travelling around the world and sitting in white hot tubs is what I like to call kilogolf or possibly megagolf.
Hard to find those kind of hot tubs unless you’re in the south. I’m assuming it’s because they already have the water lines separated for the drinking fountain infrastructure.
Are there pro mini golfers? I can’t see how that isn’t on television yet.
There should be, and I see no reason we can’t be the corrupt assholes who start the league!
I’ll chop up a newsman and you find a trillion dollars. We’ll split the profits 50/50.
You’re my kind of cynical
You don’t think there will be profit?
Fine. You can have the extremities but I’m keeping the parts with holes.
Arsenal is currently in first place in the Premier League. That rates a ‘sexy Arsenal fan’, who is not actually me.
What does “Fvy Emirates” mean? Gonna stare til I figure it out.
It means “slave laboUr built our airports, so you get the same quality from Saturday’s work as you do for Sunday’s work.”
Because the work week never ends, you see.
Stupid unions, ruining everything
That’s Good Gooner Hustle!
/and y’all looked pretty dangerous today
I wish I knew. Didn’t realize they were playing until well after it was over.
And yet that flag flies proudly outside our house.
I mean, at least you made it tonight for gloating. WHERE IS GOV. RHODES??
I read in The NY Times recently about some ‘unpleasantness’ in the Congo, so I suspect there’s your answer.
That empire isn’t gonna build itself.
The good thing about female Arsenal fans is that you know they’re loyal. Batshit crazy, but loyal
I should probaby put another bottle of fizzy wine in the fridge…*just in case*
Planning ahead? We don’t do that here. Wtf
My opinion about the LIV Tour is the professional golfers are all slightly to the right of Adolf Hitler and I do not give a fiddler’s fuck about any of this.
Whilst I agree that purity tests for any sport (or business for that matter) are stupid and useless, well, there are degrees.
Sorta like shrugging and saying “All politicians are lying criminals.”
In the case of this golf thing, the new tour is nothing but terrible people. Seriously. Everyone involved with this enterprise sucks. And while the PGA Tour is no bastion of morality and equality, again, it’s a matter of degrees.
In short, the LIV Tour can fuck off and DI. (what I did there? see it?)
The PGA tour can also fuck itself. I guess, they can just do it with their dominant hand. LIV has to go lefty.
Probably should’ve made it more clear that the PGA Tour sucks all the hairiest of balls. The other tour just upped the ante.
To be fair, PGA Greece sucks the hairiest balls. Their slogan: golf is for those who like to stroke it.
No kidding. They made Tiger Woods look like a paragon of virtue.
Turning down 7-800M is pretty cool though. Of course only he could and not notice. Still should get credit. Like how he cheated on his wife but out of all the tail thrown at him he only did it a tiny percentage of times. Some guys get one chance to cheat and take it.
Lets see my choices for tonight:
Stay in a hot apartment with a whiny 6 year old and a 2 year old inexplicably full of piss and vinegar, or do some cardio at an air conditioned gym and listen to some newly “discovered” K-Pop songs.
See you soon, Hyuna
https://youtu.be/oTXCgR93zC8
Ok could there be like a third thing?
I gotta get my cardio up, but I could listen to something different
To talk myself out of shame pizza, I have been drinking a metric fuckton of V8 Carrot Ginger juice. Just remember no matter how much you hate your life, there’s a Hippo lower on the Best Lyf Food Chain.
You, Sir, held your own at Harry’s Bar and therefore, like those who fought beside Henry V on St. Crispin’s Day, need never hang your head in shame, pizza-related or otherwise.
(shouldn’t living in any of the carolinas require shame?)
adds to shame checklist!
Harry’s Bar can be our Mecca now. Everyone should make a pilgrimage before they dies.
Or before Harry dies.
I suggest the rest of you hurry.
No women or pork allowed?
I wouldn’t risk pork ingestion or women companions around that terlet.
Eh, my wife was there and enjoyed it. As for pork products, if you’re in Baltimore you’re there for crabs, Old Bay, and mallets.
I’m so proud of you all for having proper Baltimore bar shenanigans!
Harry’s is, no kidding, in my Top 5 all-time bars. Just outstanding, right down to the bathroom that couldn’t pass a health code test if you gave it 19 tries.
May I recommend popscicles? They are cold for summer, tasty, and very satisfying! Also some of them have vitamins and such!
You’ll be watching Everton this season. You have already earned that pizza. Nothing to be ashamed of there
We were one bad foot away from that flag.
What is the Most Disappointing we can be? I’ll be genuinely excited if the Onana signing happens. But we’ll find a way to fuck that up, somehow. Is what we do.
The Athletic had a “team selection” guide for Ted Lasso fans, this was the Toffee blurb:
Everton: Do you love pain? Pick Everton. In the show, the Liverpudlian club is a formidable opponent for Richmond, with a 60-year success streak against the Greyhounds. But in real life? There is only pain.
Pinhead’s favorite squadron!
House of Saud should make the LIV golf balls out of the ground up bones and teeth of their ded slaves/prisoners. Let’s go ALL THE WAY here.
Probably simpler to use the bonemeal as fertilizer for the putting greens or something. They could go full Nazi and melt down the gold fillings of their victims into the trophy
See, we gots some GOOD GODDAMNED IDEAS here.
Can we blame Scotland for Trump since they invented golf?
I say YES. Another plus is that I have enough Scoot blood to rationally hate myself a little extra.
I’ve disliked Scots for years now. It just seems natural.
Prairie Scots especially. All that wheat and mustard and rapeseed and Scots all over it. Ruins a good fried mustard sandwich.
Been a hell of a week, but it’s over now and I have a nice bottle of Princesa rose cava open. It’s 80% trepat and 20% garnacha! Cause cava is Spanish!
Fuck Phil Mickelson.
In any context, not in just this one.
FIGJAM!
PEW PEW PEW!
The equipment manager for the Stamps is working for his 1,000th game. 51 years of doing it. Wow.
Not gonna lie-I’d expect a promotion after 35 years.
He’d probably prefer getting a living wage
COMMIE!!
Tonight on a very special episode of DFO Sexy Friday:
https://www.businessinsider.com/alex-jones-phone-leak-intimate-messages-with-roger-stone-lawyer-2022-8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_asNhzXq72w
Slimy billionaires paying criminal millionaires to play children’s games in equipment manufactured by slave labour in stadiums paid by the public at the end of a relocation gun. It’s the pro sports experience! Now with blatant come-ons encouraging fans to lose money on bad odds parlays from the comfort of their own homes.
Not to mention the interminable goddamned soul-sucking, fun-killing replay reviews that replace a best determination with a second guess.
Go to a minor league game and save the hassle. Or a minor pro league, even. Lacrosse and the CFL where they mostly work off-season jobs.
End of Friday old man rant.
At the World Cup, the stadiums will be the things built with slave labor!
ahem…laboUr
🤣
The giant lady parts in the desert. The ones who live will be so proud.
The people who found W.A.P. offensive are also very satisfied with the design
2 b FARE, them giant desert vajayjays will stay pretty dry
That was offensive. With that and all the shoot-em-up video games it’s no wonder the kids these days are gunning each other down every chance they get.
Hey fellow Star Wars geeks, this is some pretty good shit. (on Vice network)
‘Specially the interviews with Georgie’s ex (she edited Hope, Empire & Jedi). She has some interesting details and insight, IMHO.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOaRJo-lqqg
“The movie ‘Tremors’ is on. I can’t not watch it. The more times I watch it, the more brilliant a movie it becomes.
That is spot-on. That and several other movies are must-see whenever they show up on TV.
And with that, the Monday Mock Draft topic is conceived.
And then aborted, because why not?
RIP Fred Ward
The issue here ain’t pussy. The issue here is monkey.
Have never seen, does this negate Spirit Animal statUs??
You should watch it; it’s pretty good in a totally demented sort of way.
Well in the realm of more PURE sports, I got tix booked for Hot Wheels Monster Trucks tomorrow night. Gonna take blaxito while the Mrs friend is in town.
Baseball game Sunday but I’m not about to lay my personal integrity on the line for that monopoly.