It seems every year I write that the Masters cannot get any more dramatic than the one that just concluded, the next one takes my breath away to an ever greater degree than the previous one. Case in point was Adam Scott’s historic victory yesterday after a nerve-tingling two-hole playoff in a downpour with Argentinian Angel Cabrera.
A zillion players in contention the last nine, all with a chance to win, but they all stumble one one way or another, including Tiger (thankfully), and, with the heavy rain, Scott and Cabrera make amazing birdies on the last hole, Cabrera barely misses a chip-in birdie to win on the first extra hole, leaves his putt on the second extra hole for birdie on the lip, and Scott cans a 12-foot birdie putt right after to become the first Australian to win a green jacket. Couldn’t happen to a nicer person. Here’s a young man with Hollywood looks, gobs of money, a Swiss home, private jet and , well, he even makes his caddie, Steve Williams, likable.
Most remarkably, these two competitors played marvelous golf when all the chips were on the line despite the wettest finales in recent Master memory. It was really coming down from the 72nd hole for both onward, and they played impeccably.
One of the greatest Masters of all time.
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Jerry Remy rarely has anything insightful to say these days.
Wishing lifetime chum Pat Yanchus a perfect 33rd and final season as St. John’s Prep baseball coach hopefully with his third state championship. Then wishing him and wife Kathy an enjoyable retirement when he steps down as a member of the Prep Mathematics Department after he leads the Class of 2013 into Commencement.
I’m rather ashamed that the Town of Danvers has failed to properly recognize the most successful program in Danvers High athletic history, the boys basketball team that just won a second straight state championship. Where were Town manager Wayne Marquis, Schools Superintendent Lisa Dana and Board of Selectman Chairman Mike Powers (a former Falcon cager himself) when the entire community should have come together and honored the team in some form or fashion??? Baffling.
Farewell to two of Boston sportswriting’s greatest: The Associated Press’s Dave O’Hara and The Boston Herald’s D. Leo Monahan, who recently passed. I learned a lot just from reading them. And Channel 5’s Bill O’Connell was another.
Is Rob Gronkowski ever going to smarten up???No one made my father laugh harder than the comedic improvisor supreme, Jonathan Winters, who just left this earth as well. Maude Frickett, we’ll miss you.
Won’t be easy for Danvers sophomore senation Vinny Clifford to match or surpass next winter the 74 three-pointers he made for the the state champion Falconsthis season, but he’s got two years to try.
Yes, that was Andover resident and former Salem News reporter Glenn Johnson following his new boss, Secretary of State John Kerry, on the tarmac as they boarded their plane in Baghdad on page 3 of the March 25 Boston Globe. Glenn’s a senior advisor to our former Massachusetts U.S. Senator globetrotting the world to assist in trying to keep the world safe for all of us.
Belated congrats to Peaboidy girls’ basketball coach Jane Heil and Danvers baseball coach Roger Day for being elected to their respective Massachusetts CoachesHhalls of Fame. And best wishes, too, to North Shore hoop legend Sean Connolly aftyer five smashingly successful years as the Prep basketball coach, a tensure that included winning the 2011 Division 1 state championhip.
Classy gesture by the folks at St. Louis-based Anheuser Busch to place a full-page ad in Sports illustrated earlier this year marking the passing of Hall of Famer Stan Musial, who played his entire career for the Cardinals; a worthy contemporary of Ted Williams.
Had a marvelous time in Fort Myers/Naples the last week of March, not only playing three terrific golf courses in glorious southwest Florida weather in River Hall, CC Naples and Naples National, but also in soaking in all the Florida Gulf Coast University hysteria as they prepared to play in the NCAA Sweet 16. The school is located in Fort Myers. Also that week read a marvelous column by Dr. John Agnew in the March 29 local paper, The News-Press, about retirement. Google it and read it.
Didn’t take long for former Salem State basketball coach Tom Thibodeau, now in charge of the Chicago Bulls, to move up the ladder of top-notch NBA coaches, at least in the estimation of Sports Illustrated’s Chris Mannix. A nice local flavor to his top 4: 1. Gregg Popovich, San Antonio; 2. Doc Rivers, Celtics; 3. Rick Carlisle (former Celtic, steered into coaching by Larry Bird); 4. Thibodeau.
Belated sympathies to nationally-ranked golf instructor Jane Frost, now with her own golf academy on the Cape, on the passing of her dad, Ray, at the age of 93. A wonderful father, humanitarian and devoted jogger to the end.