Sports Writers Are Slow Learners

I can not get over how many sports writers are trying to add to the tidal wave of stories today where the main premise is that Phil Mickelson is a good guy who won for his family and Tiger Woods is the adulterer who got what he deserved by struggling to a disappointing 4th place finish at the Masters. Instead of talking about Mickelson's gutsy play on the 13th hole, hitting out of the trees to within 4 feet for an eagle try, writers across America are talking about how this was more than a golf tournament, but more like a morality play. Did we learn absolutely nothing from the last 4 months of revelations? We don't know these guys at all. We don't know what the Mickelson home life is like or what they act like behind closed doors. Do they have a loving, typical all-American marriage? Of course we want to hope and think that, and the Mickelsons have never given us a reason to think otherwise. But, at the same time, how many people would have guessed all the pies that Tiger had his fingers in? Just because athletes and their families put on the happy face in public it doesn't mean that is the way their life actually is.

This is the problem with all these sports writers who can so easily be duped into thinking that just because they interview a guy for 10 minutes after a round of golf that they know who the person is deep down. For all the crap that newspaper writers want to give bloggers or people like Bill Simmons, who write from the fan's perspective without going into locker room or conducting interviews, at least those kinds of writers don't let personal bias get in the way. They mostly stick to what happens during the actual event and are not going to overlook one thing or another because they are getting access to the players. And, frankly, I think that is a much better system. Why don't we all agree to go back to the day where we only praised or condemn athletes based on what we know to be true (their performances on the field) and stop trying to fill in the blanks just to make a deadline.

-I'm not sure what to do with the news that Conan O'Brien will be getting a new show Monday - Thursday at 11 PM on TBS, because that's prime Daily Show watching time. This is hard, cause it's a battle of two of my favorite comedians/nerds. Honestly, there are like 5 good shows on all of television, how hard would it be for people to coordinate it so that they aren't on at the same time?