PGA golfer and ESPN analyst Paul Azinger is perplexed.
"I shanked it off the last tee today," the victorious 2008 American Ryder Cup captain said in the moments after posting a 69 Thursday at the Canadian Open. "The last time I did that was at Hamilton (Golf and Country Club) in 2003. I don't know if it's a Canadian thing or not. Hopefully I'll play a little better tomorrow."
That Azinger is playing here just days removed from his broadcasting marathon at the Open in St. Andrews is unique. Only in golf can a TV analyst switch back to elite athlete status so seamlessly.
"Sometimes I think being in the booth can help," Azinger reflected. "You see a lot of players are making mistakes, missing puts and they just move on. That helped me today because I three-putted the second hole from nine feet and I just moved on from there. I put it behind me."
Azinger's understated - "I don't think I'm vanilla" - style contrasted markedly with the acerbic Curtis Strange in Scotland.
"I try to be right on the line, to be edgy, but tearing players down is a false way of building yourself up," Azinger said. "As an analyst, I don't want to make the player look bad. When an announcer says 'This is an easy putt,' you're just setting a guy up to fail.
"Occasionally you wonder what the fans are thinking [about objectivity] I try to be very candid. When I'm watching in the booth, I realize I'm watching the best players on the planet. Constantly being negative or tearing the players down is counter to the brand."
That's not to say players don't get back in Azinger's face for things he's said on-air.
"I've had players rip on me for something I've said in the booth," he said. "You know we were live on air in Scotland for about 41 hours. You could talk 5,000 words a day. But I know if you say one thing politically incorrect or a little bit off, you're going to hear about it. I'm okay with that, I'm thick skinned about. If I really was the type to ridicule the players, it would be hard on me to play at all. But I'm not that kind of guy."
Azinger is at St. George's, tuning up for his first U.S. Senior Open next week at Sahalee.
"I would like have played the British Senior Open at Carnoustie this week," he said. "But I forgot to commit in time. So I appreciate RBC getting me in. And I like it here very much."
American Voices
So why are Canadian broadcasters showing U.S. telecasts from The Golf Channel and CBS on its national airwaves? Simply, a golf tournament such as the Canadian Open carries a million-dollar production price tag. Even if the PGA Tour allowed it, mounting a competitive telecast would not be justified by the revenues, according to industry sources.
Hence, the American telecasts - which, to give them their due, did a nice job of blanketing Canajuns such as Mike Weir and Stephen Ames - as well as amateur Cam Burke and journeyman Ben Boudreau on Day 1.
Weighty Issues
Clearly, CBC News is thinking big about the Open. Host Lucy van Oldenbarneveld told viewers Thursday that John Daly had lost "150 pounds" on his new diet regime. That's almost an entire Louis Oosthuizen!
Current estimates have Daly's Toledo count at 190, down from his peak of 300 pounds.
Coming Home
Did anyone tell David Amber what's happened to the Raptors this summer? In spite of the exodus of big-name players from Hogtown, Amber is headed back to the city to host the pre- and postgame Raptors' TV show.
A Toronto native, Amber will leave ESPN (where he's been since 2002) to take the job. He's a good broadcaster, and he'll likely need all his skills to polish the Raptors' apple this winter.
Tweet Tweet
Sad news. NHL Twitter maestro Paul Bissonette has been banished from tweeting. NHL insiders know the Phoenix Coyotes knuckle-chucker had the most colourful tweets going under the handle @PaulBizNasty.
Bissonette regularly plumbed the depths of political correctness. After this week's Ilya Kovalchuk contract flap, he wrote "Kovalchuck's [sic]gana' have to give lap dance instead of getting them the next 20 years now that he got rejected. sorry communist. back to the soviet."
For reasons that are still murky, the tweet was soon erased - and his account deleted.
Who shot @PaulBizNasty? Usual Suspects will not sleep till the secrets are revealed.
Sorta' Sorry
A follow-up to our Tim McCarver item earlier this week. The FOX TV sportscaster has apologized for comparing the New York Yankees to the Nazis and the Soviets.
A vexed McCarver compared the team's airbrushing of ex-manager Joe Torre from the team's history to the eradications of non-persons in Nazi Germany and Stalin's USSR.
"Although my analogy was inappropriate, in my opinion the underlying point remains true," McCarver said in a written statement.
Tribal Council
Finally, TV eats its own. Former Dallas Cowboys coach - now FOX TV analyst - Jimmy Johnson is currently a contestant on the latest instalment of Survivor, now taping in Nicaragua.
The 67-year-old wanted onto the reality bead-fest last year but didn't pass the physical. Insert your own joke here. Johnson is expected back in time for the NFL season when he will vote Terry Bradshaw off the planet.