Phil Beats Tiger! Great Finish To A Great Masters

Darth Vader vs Luke Skywalker. At the core of the most popular film franchise in history is the battle between good and evil. Not just in Star Wars but also nearly every single drama ever written. So when it happens in real life, people take notice. I haven't seen the TV ratings yet for the 2010 Masters golf tournament but I'm sure they're astronomical. When you have a player whose wife and mother are both battling cancer trying to beat a guy who cheated on his wife with not one, but many different women, its almost too obvious. Phil Mickelson is a sympathetic figure right now and Tiger Woods is a reviled one. Both had a chance to win golf's most prestigious tournament on Sunday and the Hollywood ending actually happened: Phil beat Tiger, good triumphed over evil.

I know that's a simplistic approach. I know Mickelson has been called a phony before, a guy that most players on the tour don't seem to like. I'm not sure if that's sour grapes but its certainly short on specifics. Tiger Woods gave us too many specifics about his character in the last few months. Instead of a devoted family man he turned out to be a hooker-chasing narcissist. If that's not phony, I don't know what is!

Even before the scandal broke back on Thanksgiving, Tiger was never known as a nice guy. His sense of entitlement was well known. A leaf dare not fall from the tree in the middle of his back swing or Tiger would demand that it be cut down on the spot! This past weekend, his first time playing competitive golf in over five months, he started off smiling and signing autographs. By the end he was back to his old surly self. Dropping clubs, complaining and generally acting like a baby. I think the only way this Tiger will change his spots is if he actually lives the life depicted in another famous drama: "A Christmas Carol." Even if 3 ghosts came to his bedside, I doubt that Woods would or could transform himself into a better person.

One thing that's changed is his golf game. I haven't seen so many one handed swings since Tim Raines was batting for the Expos. He kept dropping his club after a bad swing the way Barry Bonds would after watching one of his homers going over the fence. Maybe its time for Tiger to try baseball.

Phil Mickelson played two incredible rounds of golf on the weekend and deserved to win the Masters. He had two eagles in a row on Saturday (almost three!) and then hit "the shot of his life" out of the woods and within three feet of the 13th hole on Sunday. He didn't need a birdie on the 18th to win it but he delivered on the final putt anyway.

"It's always been about the family for Phil," said a broadcaster after the golfer won his third Masters and immediately embraced his wife Amy in a tearful celebration. They weren't the only ones crying. Like any good tear-jerker, lots of people were misty eyed at the end of this tale.

I couldn't help but think of the bad guy, Tiger Woods. If he'd won the Masters there would have been no one there to hug, no one to share his triumph. That didn't happen because not even the mighty Darth Vader could ruin this Hollywood ending.

NCAA Messing With March Is Madness!

One of the most popular cliches' says: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"
Apparently the gurus who run the NCAA men's basketball tournament have never heard this one. Hoops fans all over the USA recently enjoyed what's being called the greatest tourney in history and now they're hearing it might be expanded from 65 teams to 96! Huh? What sense does that make?
None.

Unless one realizes that CBS has a contract with the NCAA which is about to expire. In case a network like ESPN is interested in making a bid to televise the tournament, how much more would they offer if they had roughly sixteen more games to broadcast? To cite another cliche': "Follow the money."
I don't think this inane idea has anything to do with the desire to help smaller schools
reach the big stage. If so one of the most obvious proposals would guarantee all teams that win their regular season conference title a spot in the big dance. Right now, teams are only guaranteed a shot if they win their conference tournament. So a team like Ohio U who went 7-9 in the MAC but won the MAC tournament made it to the NCAA's but Kent St. who went 13-3 stayed home. Yes, Ohio U scored a big upset over Georgetown in the first round. That doesn't mean Kent St. didn't deserve their chance. I have not heard any of the NCAA honks bring up this issue, perhaps the only problem with the current format.

Actually, Ohio U's big upset is one of the many reasons the NCAA tourney should be left alone.
Here's some of the others. How about Ivy League upstart Cornell knocking off powerhouses Temple and Wisconsin? Or Old Dominion besting Notre Dame? One of the highlights of my spring break trip to Arizona was coming in from the pool and sitting in my hotel room dripping wet because I could not take my eyes off the tremendous upset win by Northern Iowa over #1 seed Kansas. Only exceeded by the Michigan St. vs Maryland 85-83 thriller I listened to on my transistor radio while watching a spring training game between the A's and Reds. Everywhere I went there was a great basketball game going on!

Of course, the story of the 2010 big dance was Butler University and their steady march to the championship game. Three upsets in a row over Syracuse, Kansas State and Michigan State. Big schools who are used to playing big time teams, not losing to tiny colleges from Indiana. You couldn't have asked for a better story-line heading into the final game against 3-time champion Duke. "David vs Goliath," the media blared and the fans ate it up. Unfortunately "David" came up 2 points short of the upset that would have made history. TV ratings were huge and so was the national interest in NCAA basketball.

And they want to mess with this thing? That's madness!