Weekend Notes

I had a very quiet weekend.

L scooped ice cream both Friday and Saturday nights. She had some friends over Sunday, one of whom got promposaled here. S went down to Cincinnati for M’s sorority Ladies’ Day on Saturday, spending the night. Sunday L and S went to a bridal shower for L’s “god cousin.” C even had visitors at IU, her aunt and two cousins spending Saturday afternoon with her.

But me? My excitement was power-washing the pool cover and pool deck in preparation for prom pictures next week. I watched a movie. I read a little bit. I kept tabs on the dissolution of the Kansas basketball roster. I watched a lot of golf. Nothing too exciting. At least it was a gorgeous weekend, weather wise.

The Masters

Friday evening it looked like Rory McIlroy was on the verge of something historic. He had a six shot lead after two rounds, a 36 hole lead which had never been blown in a major tournament. He was playing free and easy after finally getting the Augusta monkey off his back last year. The biggest win ever seemed in the cards.

Then Saturday, while everyone else was tearing up the course, he meandered through an even par front nine. Then the oil started leaking on the back nine. His balls went right, then left, then right, then left. He was playing like me, with the two-way miss killing him. He lost his lead, briefly fell behind, and entered the final round tied for first, one shot worse to par than he had been 24 hours earlier.

Which made Sunday’s standard Rory Roller Coaster even more tense. Again a slow start. Again the field making runs at him. He lost the lead quickly. Fell further behind as the top of the leaderboard swapped names every few holes. He was, again briefly, down by three strokes at one point. When Justin Rose birdied nine to take the lead, it really felt like he was going to follow Rory’s lead and finally win his first green jacket after decades of falling just short. Terrible shots on 11 and 12 ruined that.

Then Rory steadied himself, everyone else fell apart, and he cruised to a one-stroke win. Well, cruised is not the right word. Each time he would hit a good shot or roll in a putt, he would follow with a shot that could most charitably be described as “nervous.” On the 18th tee, needing just bogey to ensure a win, he blasted his tee shot well right. So far right he actually had a shot. Which he put in the front bunker. No problem. Escape to 15 feet, roll the first putt to four inches, tap in for a second-straight Masters title, just the fourth golfer to ever do that.

Man, I do not know how he gets through this with his nerves intact because I can barely do it. It did keep me riveted to the TV, though. I think I barely moved in the last four hours of Sunday’s coverage. To the point that my back hurt when I finally rose after his Butler Cabin interview.

CBS and Augusta get as much credit for that as Rory and his competitors. The limited commercials in Sunday’s coverage is one of the greatest things in televised sports. If you have a tight tournament like Sunday’s, are constantly showing shots, and don’t have to go sell insurance or wealth management services every 10 minutes, it is compelling to the point of addiction. I did not want to leave the coach for fear I would miss something important. So many times I told myself, “OK, after Rory hits I’m going to go check on this or that in the other room,” then CBS would cut to Rose or Scottie Scheffler or Cam Young or Sam Burns or whoever standing over their own big shot. Shame all sports can’t be televised this way.

(Edit: Not sure if I didn’t sleep well and my brain was a little jumbled this morning, but I totally forgot that CBS absolutely botched a few insanely important shots Sunday. Most notably was McIlroy’s second shot on 18. Somehow, with dozens on cameras on course, spotters everywhere, and only one hole to worry about, they had no idea where his shot went. Now, he was hitting from an unexpected location after he pushed his tee shot way right. Still, he had a clear shot at the green. Despite that it took like 90 seconds for CBS to realize his ball landed in the bunker. Then it took them another good minute before they could get a camera close to show the lie. The announcers, all of whom were watching on screens themselves, stumbled to figure out what was going on. Trevor Immelman even wondered if Rory’s second shot was buried because the first shot was from so far away. Adding insult to injury, they also completely lost Cam Young’s second shot on the same hole, seconds later. Just an amazing set of gaffes, and not the only times the cameras lost sight of the ball. Which makes it more incredible that this rarely happens. They also chose some absolutely terrible camera angles on huge shots that were more about showing off than giving the viewers at home an idea of what was happening.)

Now Rory has two green jackets and six majors overall. Perhaps this is the one that will calm him down and send him on a run where he wins three or four more majors in the next two-three years? Nah, it’s Rory, he’s never going to play that loose for that long. That will be more entertaining, though, than if he turned into 2000–2001 Tiger for a couple years.

Tiger

Speaking of Tiger…

Can this dude get some help? In every freaking way?

Get some help with the mental demons I’m assuming he is battling. Get some help with the pain that has wrecked his life. Get some help with the pain management which seems to be the real problem.

AND GET A PERMANENT FUCKING DRIVER WHO TAKES YOU EVERYWHERE!!!!

The man is worth $1.5 billion dollars. He can afford to have a whole fleet of drivers at his beck-and-call to make sure he gets everywhere he needs to get safely.

Tiger’s life is already tragic, largely because of decisions he has made and actions he has taken. He does not need to make it more tragic by killing someone else when he is “looking at his phone and changing the radio station.” Allegedly.

Artemis

We watched both the launch and return of the Artemis II spacecraft live. Each time we watched on NBC, mostly because I was a Tom Brokaw fan and have never wavered despite only rarely watching the national news for about 20 years. NBC kind of effed up both events, with weird cuts, their talking heads yapping over the NASA announcements, etc. I wish I had been keeping a notebook because there were so many choices of theirs that annoyed me.

But, anyway, the important stuff. A very cool moment, or 10 days’ worth of moments. The morning of the launch I read a piece about all the concerns about the heatshield. Which made the re-entry process a little nervy. The shield held up and the trip ended a success.

Now, I will say, I followed along with a sense of dread. Not because of the many dangers the crew faced. Rather because this is the United States in 2026. If things went well, one man would take credit for it all. If anything went wrong, that same man would immediately place blame on his predecessor. Despite the fact other than supporting the NASA budget, the president has nothing to do with the mission’s success.

I am torn on the value of a space service given the other budgetary issues our nation faces. That’s a debate for another post. For the moment I can admit it is very cool we are sending people towards the moon again.

Royals/Baseball Rant

College basketball is over. The Masters has passed. This should be the moment I start paying attention to baseball.

And I have casually been checking scores since Opening Day.

However, baseball has pissed me off again and I refrained from signing back up for MLB At Bat.

Mostly because baseball continues to find ways to absolutely rip off fans for money.

I’m not talking about spreading games across multiple platforms that force fans to pay for multiple subscriptions. That’s just part of life these days, no matter what you watch.

No, I’m talking about ESPN taking over all streaming rights for baseball. MLB At Bat was once absolutely the greatest streaming service and suite of apps for mobile devices. MLB has been messing that up on their own for years. Turning it over to ESPN seemed like a giant middle finger to fans who want to see the games. As anyone who has ever tried to watch a college game on ESPN+ knows.

Again, I know all this.

What really got me was the fucked up, back-door screw job[1] MLB and ESPN included in the At Bat package. You see, if you signed up for MLB At Bat, you were required to sign up for whatever ESPN’s latest premium streaming suite is. Only they didn’t tell you this. They signed you up automatically and gave you a free month of the service, setting it to auto-renew. You could immediately cancel the ESPN subscription and keep access to MLB, but none of this was clearly spelled out. It was a clear effort to goose ESPN’s streaming numbers and sucker people into paying for another subscription on top of the MLB one and hope it got lost on the credit card statements and kept renewing even if people weren’t watching it.

Oh, and if you already pay for ESPN+, as we do,[2] you still had to subscribe to this extra level of ESPN.

They may have corrected this after the initial outcry, or at least made a more clear pop up that explains you are actually signing up for two services. I didn’t care. I swore off MLB At Bat for another year. A likely labor stoppage next year will piss me off more, as management lies about how much revenue they generate again all while constantly cooking up ways to squeeze more money out of viewers.

Every sport does lots of things to annoy and alienate its fans. MLB gets the absolute gold medal for putting the people who want to watch its games through the wringer. Maybe I should get over it and get back to watching the Royals on a regular basis. The overt hostility I feel aimed my way keeps me thinking I have better things to do with my time and money than give it to MLB/ESPN.

Also the Royals still can’t hit and, despite their exceptional starting pitching, seem destined to win between 79 and 83 games this year. It’s better than losing 100, but it sure would have been nice if they got even one legit bat over the winter and gave themselves a chance.