Ten Things I Would Tweet If I Was Still On Twitter… Volume Three

Posted on September 15, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

Aside from a few bank accounts nothing got better when Scott Van Pelt left SVP & Russillo for a midnight Sportscenter gig

Why am I listening to commercials on Sirius XM radio shows that air exclusively on Sirius XM Radio?

Why did the 49ers decide they wanted to look like Louisville?

Feel free to smack me if I ever post my golf swing on Facebook and ask strangers for thoughts/advice

Katrek and Maginness is golf radio’s best show by a mile and should replace Morning Drive on Golf Channel

End of Summer/ beginning of Fall is my favorite time of the year

I hope my friends at Golf Channel have a great Solheim Cup broadcast

It’s weird and great that the Dodgers haven’t won a World Series since 1988 and they won’t win this year

Rafa Nadal should fire every single person that made him do that embarrassing underwear ad

Who was the genius that decided Danny Kanell was a “star”

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Ten Things I Would Tweet If I Was Still On Twitter… Volume Two

Posted on September 13, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

If Green is a color for both Oregon and the NY Jets why isn’t it part of either uniform

Even though GB&I won the Walker Cup I wouldn’t change a thing about the competition

I’m rooting for Roger Federer

The NFL Red Zone Channel is awesome

Madison Bumgarner is baseball’s best pitcher

Why did the SF Forty Niners feel the need to change football’s classiest uniforms

For the most part sideline reporters add absolutely nothing to broadcasts

Way too many sports announcers state the obvious as opposed to adding insight

How GOOD is Johnny Football!

In general there is too much golf on TV but the Walker Cup should have been on real TV this weekend. Shame on ESPN

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Ten Things I Would Tweet If I Was Still On Twitter… Volume One

Posted on September 12, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

Julian Edelman seems like a punk

I like most of the voices on Golf Channel’s coverage of the Evian Championship

Why don’t tennis stats guys simply remove the word “unforced” from the errors column

Is there anybody not happy that Vin Scully is coming back for another year?

It’s time for annoying commercial spokespeople to go… Are you listening Progressive and Toyota?

Oreo Thins are awesome

More sports events on TV equals more bad announcers

Did anybody miss Colin Cowherd?

I’m an SF Giants fan but if they can’t get there I’d love to see the Pirates or Mets in the World Series

Can’t ESPN find someplace on one of their “real” networks to show the Walker Cup?

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It Was Just Better Back Then

Posted on September 1, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

I awakened this morning pensive, dare I say even a little melancholy. Not because the Giants lost to the Dodgers in 14 innings last night (though that didn’t help) but more because I realize with each passing minute, hour, day, month I am becoming one of those “get off my lawn!” guys. The more I think about things the more I want to say how much better the world was “when I was a kid”. I say this looking back on 60 years of a damn good life knowing that while I didn’t have to walk five miles to school every day, through the snow, uphill both ways; I did enjoy a childhood absent video games, hashtags and instant gratification. We played outside, mowed the lawn and made and kept friends. There were other things that were just better when I was growing up and here are, in my opinion, two of them.

BASEBALL

We shouldn’t be watching the World Series in November. When I was a kid they played more day baseball, actually scheduled double headers, the Fall Classic actually started and finished in the fall, and World Series games were played under brilliant blue skies, not bright lights. Games didn’t start after dinner or end long before any self-respecting 15 or 59 year old had to go to bed. I remember watching World Series games in elementary school thanks to teachers like Mr. Connelly and Mr. Coyle who brought in small black and white TV’s. It was better back then.

I don’t need to watch every Little League World Series game on TV. As a matter of fact I don’t need or want to watch ANY of them. I played Little League baseball and so did almost all of my friends but we couldn’t give one hoot about travelling squads, regional teams, or dreams of what Karel Ravetch, John Kruk and Curt Schilling might say about us. We played ball because we loved it and that’s what you did. When the game was over we grabbed a soda, some pizza and then went and played something else. We didn’t concentrate on one sport, we “dipped our toes” in all of them and we were better kids and people for it. It was just better back then.

GOLF

I don’t have to go back multiple decades to illustrate this point, just one. “In the old days” there was something called The PGA TOUR Qualifying Tournament or Q-School and that was the last chance PGA TOUR hopefuls had of obtaining playing privileges for the following year. Then along came the Hogan/Nike/Buy.com/Nationwide/Web.com Tour throwing out a lifeline for first 5, then 10, then 15, then 20, then 25 players. Earn enough money over the course of an entire year of tournaments and your ticket was punched for the PGA TOUR. Fail to do so and you still had Q-School on which to fall back. Now we have some convoluted mish mash of a season long effort combined with a manufactured “playoff” which resulted in the elimination of the Qualifying Tournament. In the process the PGA TOUR made what is now the Web.Com Tour a yawner, confused millions of golf fans, made it nearly impossible for some “graduates” to get a reasonable chance to even play on TOUR and eliminated two of the most drama filled, exciting, heart wrenching and heart-warming tournaments in golf. It was just better back then.

Sure a great deal is better now; ATM’s, 40 mile per gallon cars, air travel and Oreo Thins but some things haven’t improved at all, in fact they’ve gotten worse. I’m sure you have your own list so give it a shot and compile it. In the meantime, “Get off my lawn!”

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Stick A Fork In Him, He’s Done

Posted on August 11, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

One of the greatest professional golfers of his, or for that matter any, generation will never win on a PGA TOUR sanctioned event again. “Join the chorus”, you yell, “way to go out on a limb,” you cry, “people have been saying that about Tiger for months,” you chastise. But I’m not talking about Tiger Woods. I’m saying Phil Mickelson has collected his last meaningful trophy.

The last time Phil celebrated a victory was in July of 2013. Tiger, who many have declared dead an buried, won his last tournament more than a month later than Phil. Mickelson missed the cut three times this year (same number as Tiger) including The PLAYERS and trails the aforementioned “will never win again” guy Woods in several season statistics including Driving Distance, Greens in Regulation, Proximity to Hole, and Strokes Gained Putting. The last dozen times he’s teed it up “Lefty” has just two rounds in the 60’s (both 69’s one Thursday of the United States Open and the other Sunday at the British Open). Since the middle of June Phil is 20 OVER par while Woods in that same time period is 8 OVER with six of twelve rounds in the ’60’s.

So recent numbers suggest that Woods is trending one way and Mickelson the other yet article after article, talk show after talk show, and expert after expert continue to rail about the demise of Tiger’s career while never once mentioning that the more likely outcome is that, of the two, Phil Mickelson is the player that will not win again. In my opinion there are other factors that helped me get to this conclusion.

Tiger works harder than Phil. Woods wants to get back, he is grinding on his game and is clearly both focused and flummoxed on and by the pace of his progress. Phil on the other hand has always had a more carefree attitude and, throughout his career, relied on his natural physical skills and incomparable imagination. He may still have the imagination but the skills have deteriorated.

Tiger has goals. He’s four PGA TOUR victories (82-79) shy of passing Sam Snead for most all time and four major victories short of tying the only other person considered the game’s “greatest of all time”, Jack Nicklaus. Tiger believes the first goal is inevitable, the second still attainable. Mickelson on the other hand will never be the most prolific winner on TOUR, he will never earn PGA TOUR Player of the Year honors ( Woods has done it 11 times ), Phil will never win the money title ( Tiger did it 10 times ), and Phil will never win a Vardon Trophy for lowest scoring average ( Tiger has 9 ). The only professional goal left for Lefty is winning a United States Open Championship and that dream died at Merion.

Tiger turns 40 in December, Phil, born June 16, 1970), is 5 and a half years older. Both have aches and pains (physically and personally), Tiger is coming off back surgery but getting stronger and healthier every day, Phil has psoriatic arthritis which won’t go away, but he treats medically. Tiger recently split with Lindsey Vonn while Phil is on the periphery of an ongoing FBI SEC insider trading investigation. Mickelson’s three kids are 16, 14 and 12 while Woods is still years away from the demands of teenage children ( parents don’t try and tell me that’s insignificant ).

So why is the chatter all about Tiger’s demise and nothing about Phil Mickelson’s winning chances meeting an expiration date? My theory is simple; writers, pundits and so called experts LIKE Phil and they feel the opposite about Tiger. They know Tiger is the economic engine behind the sport’s boom but they don’t like the way he’s treated them throughout his career and they can now jump on any chance to bust him for it. Phil almost always had a smile, a thumbs up and a moment to answer a question or two so he gets a pass. Plus Tiger just matters more than Phil.

So you heard it here first… Tiger Woods will win again, Phil Mickelson won’t. People who know me or know about my history are well aware that I am often wrong in fact I was spectacularly wrong about Tiger in 1996 ( I shared this story in my book, Cover Me Boys, I’m Going In ) so, one way or another, take my prognostication to the bank but to me it’s clear, the great player done collecting championship hardware is Phil Mickelson.

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Why This Fan’s U.S. Open Experience was Anything but “Miserable”

Posted on June 22, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

I spent Thursday through Sunday in University Place, Washington at Chambers Bay watching American golf’s national championship, the United States Open. I wasn’t alone, in fact far from it, joined by somewhere in the neighborhood of 45,000 other golf fans from all over the country and the world every day. It was the first time the United States Golf Association had brought this national open championship to the Pacific Northwest and the sports fans in general there and golf fans specifically, couldn’t have been more excited, accepting and thrilled.

It wasn’t, as unfortunately Fox Sports said, the first time any of golf’s majors had been conducted in the Pacific Northwest (two PGA Championships had been played in the region) but it was the first United States Open Championship and the first major to venture that way since the Seattle Seahawks turned that part of the country’s sports fans rabid. The fact that the U.S. Open was there was indeed special, made even more so because local residents Michael Putnam (University Place) and Troy Kelly (Tacoma) hit the championships initial shots, off the first and tenth tees respectively. The event had been sold out for months, volunteers signed up in record numbers and in record time and the fans showed up in droves.

Chambers Bay is a public golf course and was built on the site of an old gravel mine. It is owned by Pierce County and is just a part (albeit an expansive one) of a park enjoyed on a daily basis by residents, visitors and anybody with a family member, two legged or four, that enjoys a good walk. The golf course is the centerpiece but by no means the only piece. Before arriving, and thanks to Fox Sports, ESPN and The Golf Channel I had seen the property but television, even high definition television, doesn’t come close to seeing the place in person. It is expansive, impressive and breathtaking.

I got there Thursday and immediately heard rumblings, mostly by folks who spent the entire week in an air conditioned media center, that it was a “miserable” fan experience so I headed out to find out for myself. The main criticism was that you couldn’t follow a player, whether he be your most or least favorite, for the entire round. THAT critique proved absolutely valid. In fact it was frustrating that you couldn’t follow a grouping, pairing or player down the first or tenth fairways after they had begun their round.

Another gripe was that you couldn’t get close enough to see any golf. This I found to be absolutely untrue. As I wandered around the property each and every day I found plenty of places to park myself and watch groups go through. One particularly satisfying spot was behind the par three, third tee. You could get up close and see EVERYTHING the hole has to offer. While there I struck up a conversation with a local lad who had been to the course every day since the event “started” on Monday (every day a ticket would allow him access to the grounds) and had enjoyed every minute. He was even, not so secretly, hoping for a Monday playoff so he could enjoy the experience for one more day.

As I left him I walked and watched golf on 11 for a bit. A great spot to see second shots to the par 4 and then walked some more heading this time up the hill to spots that overlooked the entire property. Along the way I overheard hundreds of voices and none of them were grouchy. As I paced along the perimeter I saw approaches to 13, T shots down the 14th (in fact from where I was I could see the entirety of that hole and many more). Further along I could see birdie putts made on 7 green, then 8 green and then the entirety of the par three 9th. And, by the way, I was never alone and it was great exercise.

Now I would be lying if I said I was right on top of the action, I wasn’t, but that didn’t stop me from seeing plenty of it. In addition the USGA had constructed more grandstands than they had at any U.S. Open in history and they were full much of the time. Vistas of the holes along the Puget Sound (15, 16, 17) were also plentiful and satisfying. The other thing I loved about my particular fan experience was the roars that you could hear from all over the golf course when Phil or Rory or Jordan or Dustin did something spectacular. Was it dusty? Yes. Was it hilly? Yes. Were there places on the golf course spectators were not allowed to go? Again, yes but did you attend the United States Open Championship at Olympic Club in San Francisco, Merion in Philadelphia or Pinehurst in North Carolina? I rest my case. Another thing that added to my, and many others, enjoyment was the excellent job done by the folks at Sirius XM U.S. Open radio and American Express providing wall to wall coverage of the championship through portable, individual radios.

Here’s the deal. The players were unhappy because their families, friends, support systems and entourages couldn’t be within eye sight every step of the way. I get it. Journalists and so called journalists were unhappy because the USGA had gotten sick of the ever growing “Inside the Ropes” presence at the national championship and scaled back on granting such covered access. So you ended up with some unhappy players and a bunch of scorned writers. That added up to “everyone” having an “awful fan experience”.

Problem is nobody really spoke to the “fans”.

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I Love Playing Golf With My Wife

Posted on June 17, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

I play golf because I love the sport. I love golf because my parents, Lee and Ginger Hirshland, loved golf. They introduced my brothers and me to the game when we were kids, young enough to be interested, challenged and excited by it yet old enough to see and appreciate the passion they had for it. That passion and love they had never wavered, good rounds or bad, birdies or bogeys, pure shots or shanks. And they played the game together, always enjoying each other’s company regardless of the number written in the tiny box. I always knew they loved golf and I could always see they loved each other.

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I had my brothers and my friends and eventually my teammates as playing companions and fellow competitors growing up but I always looked forward to playing golf with my mom and dad and enjoyed it every single time we teed it up together. They were always a part of my favorite foursome until the day they passed on to find a pick up game in whatever life awaits after this one. Now I have a new favorite playing partner and I know my mom and dad would be happy to hear that it’s my wife, Sarah.

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I have played this game for almost six decades. I played for fun, I played competitively and I played because in some, six degrees of separation, world it was part of my job. I produced golf broadcasts on TV since 1990, traveling around the country and the world, and for many of those years the clubs would travel with me. Loaded inside the bay’s of the mobile production units they would meet me at each new venue waiting to be grabbed, thrown in the trunk of a rental car, carried to the first tee and put to use without warmup, or more than a practice swing or two, after a TV show. I met some great people, got to play some wonderful golf courses and found my love of the game turn to like, then dislike, then hate. It just wasn’t fun anymore so I stopped playing. Then I met the woman who would be my wife.

She had been playing for a few years but wasn’t, admittedly, any good. I had weeks at a time off so when she would get finished with work on certain evenings she’d want to go play 9 holes. I’d grab a wedge and a putter and go with her. I would marvel at her passion and her persistence and with no one watching, under a North Carolina setting sun, I remembered what I loved about the great game in the first place and realized a whole new appreciation for the sport. Golf has been a big part of our relationship since and she is, without question, the person with whom I most prefer to play and I have at least ten reasons why that is the case.

10 – She encourages me to tee it forward- As Toby Keith once said, “I’m not as good as I once was” and she knows my enjoyment for the round will be exponentially better if I play the golf course at a manageable distance.

9- She is equally optimistic and realistic on the golf course. When she knows she has the 160 yard carry over the creek she’ll happily, confidently give it a go. When it’s just not working for her the next time we play she knows there is no shame in laying up and trying to make par or bogey the hard way.

8- She’s competitive. We almost always add to the fun by figuring out a game or two before we tee it up (points for fairways/greens hit, sandies, one putts, points deducted for three putts). She can’t beat me yet when it comes to pure score but she almost always takes my lunch money on the side bets.

7- She always wants to get better. She makes an occasional birdie, several pars and a bunch of bogies but she also makes her share of 7’s and 8’s. She wants to stop doing that.

6- She takes great pleasure in every good shot (her’s and mine). The end result might be a double bogey but she is quick to point out the great wedge I hit before we get to the next tee.

5- She likes to walk. There is no better or faster way to play this game than on two feet from tee to fairway to green to tee. It’s always our first choice.

4- She plays fast ( but slows me down) – I like to play quickly, hate to wait, but she has taught and is teaching me to be better with that. “Hang out here in the cart with me for a minute” or “What’s the rush to get to the tee box, let’s enjoy the shade for a sec” is what she’ll say and that time spent is ALWAYS better than staring at all the trouble in the fairway or waiting for the green to clear before I hit my second shot to a par five. But when it IS the right time to hit she’s ready and she hits it.

3- She respects the game and it’s rules. She knows the sport revolves around ethics and integrity and she not only appreciates that she admires it.

2- She’s my best friend. We enjoy each other’s company and can walk down a fairway talking about anything or go from green to tee and say absolutely nothing.

1- She rekindled my love for the game. Enough said.

This game is challenging, frustrating, exhilarating, wonderful, incredibly hard at times and surprisingly easy at others. It’s all that and more but it’s always better when you share it with a great companion.

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It’s Time to Put Golf Channel Founder Joe Gibbs in the World Golf Hall of Fame

Posted on May 13, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

On April 19th Jim Furyk won for the 17th time on the PGA TOUR. It was his first TOUR win in five years and immediately reignited the “does Jim Furyk belong in the Hall of Fame” discussion. I’m not here to weigh in on that (generally I believe if we have to ask if an athlete is worthy of induction, that athlete usually isn’t) but I do come before you to make a case for a non-athlete who I absolutely believe is “Hall worthy”.
He never hit a shot, made a putt or signed a scorecard to win an event but The Golf Channel founder, Joseph E. Gibbs belongs in the World Golf Hall of Fame. He belongs there because he literally changed the way the world looks at the game of golf. I don’t get a vote but I do have a voice and I’m using it to tell the folks who do have a vote that they should consider Joe the next time they decide who is worthy of admittance.
During the early 1990’s U.S. cable TV was like the wild, wild, west. In fact in 1994 the National Cable Television Association Convention saw more than 100 hopeful new channels on display including The Cowboy Channel, Ecology Channel, The Singles Network and Parent Television. None of those gained any traction. But also hoping to attract attention from cable operators that year was The History Channel, The Game Show Network, STARZ! and Joe Gibbs’ The Golf Channel.
If you are in a position to give people a bust in the building than you likely already know about the nuts and bolts, the dollars and cents and the sense and sensibilities of The Golf Channel. You know the idea was born out of a 1990 Shoal Creek conversation with the great Arnold Palmer and germinated thanks to a Gallup Poll that Gibbs commissioned, on his own dime, to discern the viability and interest of a 24-hour-a-day, seven-days-a-week, all golf, television channel. He was wealthy enough to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money, and brilliant enough, to recruit Mr. Palmer who helped convince investors to write checks and the PGA TOUR to grant broadcast rights for tournaments, not already on TV, to a network that wasn’t yet on TV.

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Gibbs then used that leverage to approach the LPGA Tour who also agreed to allow The Golf Channel to air the handful of tournaments that ESPN wasn’t paying to televise. He had already secured the rights to broadcast European Tour events in the United States. Joe Gibbs knew you couldn’t have a successful golf channel without professional golf tournaments so when TGC launched in 1995 it did so with a European Tour event (The Dubai Desert Classic won by future Hall of Fame member Fred Couples) and an LPGA Tour event (The HealthSouth Inaugural won by 1991 Hall of Fame inductee Pat Bradley). Those were just two of an impressive list of nearly 50 tournaments that first year which also included the Nike Tour and, believe it or not, a handful of PGA TOUR events. I know because I led the talented and hardworking team that produced all of the domestic telecasts.

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Joe Gibbs also convinced television and golf industry veterans and insiders including Bob Greenway, Gary Stevenson, Matt Scalici, David Manougian, Mark Oldham and David Graham to take a chance on his dream and they helped talk hundreds of the rest of us into coming along for the ride. We all knew it was a risk but we also knew it was Joe Gibbs who took the biggest roll of the dice. I worked loyally (most of us did) for Joe until the day he left the company in 2001 and I received a paycheck (all of us did) that I could cash EVERY two weeks. Very few of us knew there were some Thursday’s in Joe’s life, during which he wasn’t sure from where the money would come, so I can now make that statement. He always found a way to make Friday’s payroll and we probably wouldn’t have known to this day but Joe told the story to a room filled with employees during a festive, emotional, 10th Anniversary celebration in 2005. He had the smarts, he had the bravado and he most definitely had the heart.

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Would there be a Golf Channel today if it weren’t for Joseph E. Gibbs in the early 1990’s? Most certainly is the answer but the channel wouldn’t be the same. Some corporate behemoth would have eventually created it and called it ESPN Fore! Or Golf Channel on NBC but it wouldn’t have had a beating heart, or a soul, or a “rags to riches” story to celebrate with dedicated, devoted employees. It wouldn’t have given golf fans Tiger Woods losing a tournament to journeyman pro Ed Fiori in 1996, Casey Martin winning a golf tournament on one leg in 1998, or the birth of women’s golf’s greatest rivalry, Annika Sorenstam versus Karrie Webb, in 1997. Video probably wouldn’t exist of heart transplant recipient Erik Compton winning as a pro, or 4-time PGA TOUR winner and lightning rod Patrick Reed winning a National Drive Chip and Putt competition as a kid. Golfers might never have invited Brian Anderson, Jerry Foltz, Kelly Tilghman or Scott Van Pelt into their living rooms.

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Joe Gibbs had a dream and the foresight to see a cable television subdivision that was about to expand into a sizeable community. He also had the sense to find out what people actually wanted, then the wherewithal to give it to them. Golf is viewed, literally and figuratively, differently today than it was 20 years ago because of The Golf Channel and The Golf Channel exists as a healthy, happy 20 year old because of the parenting skills of its father, Joe Gibbs. If you ask me, that’s worthy of Hall of Fame inclusion.
Non-golfers already enshrined in the World Golf Hall of Fame include promoters Fred Corcoran and Bob Harlow, The PGA TOUR’s first Commissioner Joe Dey, U.S. National Golf Foundation founder Herb Graffis, two-time USGA President Bill Campbell, super-agent Mark McCormack and TV producer/director Frank Chirkinian. Don’t you agree the man who gave the world The Golf Channel should join them?

you can read more about the early days of The Golf Channel in my book, Cover Me Boys, I’m Going In (Tales of the Tube from a Broadcast Brat) available at http://www.amazon.com

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Is Paula Creamer a “Lock” to make the 2015 U.S. Solheim Cup Team?

Posted on May 5, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

If the Solheim Cup was next month, not this fall, and you’re Captain Juli Inkster is Paula Creamer one of your two captain’s selections to make the team? Before you holler a resounding, “Of Course!” Let’s look at some numbers.

Paula Creamer is struggling on the golf course these days, more accurately, this year. She has played in nine events and has just one top ten, barely. A tie for tenth at the Kia Classic is it for that category in 2015. She has almost as many over par rounds (13) as under par rounds (17) and the last four times she has teed it up in competition she’s hit it 310 times including two 78’s and an 82.

This year she is out of the top 40 on tour in driving distance, greens in regulation, putting average, birdies, sand saves, sub par holes and scoring average. She’s also on the outside looking in as far as an automatic qualifying spot on the U.S. Solheim Cup team is concerned. Creamer is currently 11th a full 31 points behind Morgan Pressel who is in the eighth and final spot. The next two Solheim Cup uniforms would automatically go to the players, not already qualified, who claim the highest spots on the Rolex Rankings. Right now that’s Angela Stanford and Lizette Salas, not Paula Creamer.

There is plenty of time for Paula to turn it around, everybody will play as hard as they can through The Canadian Pacific Women’s Open in August and then see where they stand. There are also like seven majors between now and then (actually three) that offer double points. But if, by then, Paula Creamer is still on the wrong side of the Red, White and Blue fence Juli Inkster will surely consider the following facts when deciding which player among “the rest” to add to her team.

Paula Creamer has played on every U.S. Solheim Cup team since turning pro in 2004. The first three (’05, ’07, ’09) were wins thanks in huge part to Paula. She went 8-2-4 overall and was 3-2-1 when paired with her would be 2015 captain. It’s true the U.S. Team lost in 2011 but it wasn’t Paula Creamer’s fault as she went 3-1-1. As triumphant as those numbers are Inkster must also pay attention to some warning signs because her most recent Solheim Cup performance have been equally disastrous. 1 win and 3 losses in four matches during the 2013 Match that included a 5&4 drubbing at the hands of Young Euro star Charley Hull in singles. It was the second straight Solheim Cup singles Sunday that saw Paula shake hands early (two years before Catriona Matthew took her to the woodshed beating Creamer 6&5 at Killeen Castle in Ireland). That adds up to 1-4-0 in her last five matches. Inkster would be crazy not to consider those numbers when considering Paula and we all know Juli is anything but crazy.

Still the overall Solheim Cup good outweighs the bad and unless Paula Creamer fails to break par between now and August (unlikely) or decides to give up the game altogether (less likely) it would be a better than even money bet in Las Vegas that Captain Juli Inkster will echo your earlier “Of Course!” And put Paula on the team.

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If You Love The SF Giants Then You Hate The LA Dodgers (and vice versa)

Posted on April 22, 2015 by Keith Hirshland

The Los Angeles Dodgers travelled 383 miles North this week to take on the San Francisco Giants and add another page to, what I believe is, the best rivalry in team sports. I know that worldwide you’ll argue Australia’s Wallabies versus New Zealand’s All Blacks (hall of fame nicknames for sure) in rugby is better. Or India against Pakistan in cricket (can one billion fans be wrong?) and Real Madrid vs Barcelona in soccer (uh excuse me football) are more compelling but I’m talking domestically and, as a lifelong Giants fan, sticking to my guns. I grew up in Reno, Nevada and despite the fact that the bay area, just a few hours away, also had the A’s, 49ers, and Raiders the baseball Giants were my favorite team. I loved them as a kid, love them to this day and that’s the only reason I need to hate the Dodgers.

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I’m ready for the dissenting voices. “What about Yankees/Red Sox?” you cry. An ESPN creation, I counter. I mean sure there is some intensity there but how much of a rivalry can it really be when, during an 86 year stretch, one of the teams won 26 championships and the other won exactly NONE.

“Give me Michigan/Ohio State,” echoes from another corner of the room. Another storied contender for sure, but wasn’t it only really good between 1969 and 1978 when Woody battled Bo?

“Carolina/Duke!” screams someone. “Packers/Bears!” yells someone else. Good ones again but, in my opinion, not up to Giants/Dodgers snuff. I have already admitted to being both a lifelong San Francisco Giants and baseball fan and because of that, or maybe in spite of it, allow me to make my case.

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For any team vs team confrontation to rise to the level of a true rivalry I believe it has to have history. Check.

The Brooklyn Dodgers first met the New York Giants on May 3rd, 1890 at Washington Park. Since then, and including last night, they have played 2,412 games against each other. The rivalry, born in New York, travelled across the country in 1957 when Walter O’Malley moved his “Brooklyn Bums” to Southern California. Giants’ owner Horace Stoneham followed his counterpart west, like Lord Baltimore chasing Butch and Sundance, settling in the city by the bay and turning what was once a cross-city rivalry into a cross-state one.

Over the course of this amazing 125-year tussle the Giants, as a franchise, have won 10,468 baseball games (the most in history) while the Dodgers can claim 10,166 victories (third all-time). In 2005 the Giants became the first MLB team to win 10,000 games thanks to a 4-3 victory over, wait for it… the Dodgers.

Both teams have to be consistently competitive. Check again.

The Giants have won the National League pennant 23 times, the Dodgers 21 and NY/San Francisco has been crowned World Champion 8 times (the last in 2014) while Brooklyn/LA has worn the crown 6 different years (the last in 1988).

Since 1901 the two teams have played more head-to-head confrontations than any other two franchises. They have battled for pennants (National League and National League West) on dozens of occasions. Perhaps the most famous of those championship fights, and some say in all of baseball, happened in 1951. That year the Dodgers held a seemingly insurmountable 13 and a half game lead as late as August 11. But the lead was anything but insurmountable for the Giants and their outstanding rookie, Willie Mays. By the end of September the, 13 and a half game lead was gone and the two teams ended up tied atop the standings, forcing a three game playoff for the pennant. NY won the first game, Brooklyn the second which all lead to Bobby Thomson’s “shot heard ‘round the world” home run in the ninth inning of the deciding game.

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Both teams, and their fan bases, have to hate each other. Check, check and double check.

Dodger great Jackie Robinson reportedly decided to retire from baseball rather than play for his arch rivals after being traded to the Giants in 1956. Willie Mays returned the favor refusing to sign with LA at the end of the 1972 season and instead was traded to the New York Mets.

In 1965, while batting, Giants pitcher Juan Marichal thought Dodger catcher John Roseboro was throwing the ball back to Sandy Koufax too close to Marichal’s head. In fact it’s said, one Roseboro throw back to the mound actually caught a piece of the Giants hurler’s right ear. Instead of asking for time and then asking Roseboro for an explanation, Marichal simply stepped back and bashed the Dodgers catcher over the head with his bat. To say benches emptied would be an understatement.

Giants and Dodgers fan know spring has arrived when chants of “Beat LA” and “Giants Suck” ring out at ball parks in both San Francisco and Los Angeles. Northern Californians think Southern Californians are smug, self-absorbed and shallow. Sothern Californians think their Northern counterparts are “crusty”, disagreeable and pompous. For the most part neither wants anything to do with the other.

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In the middle of an outstanding, 13 year, career the great Dodger pitcher Orel Hershiser took the field as a Giant for 34 games in 1998. As a Giants fan I held my nose for every one of his appearances as he won 11, lost 10 and then went back to LA. Jeff Kent, Juan Uribe and Brian Wilson (among many others) were Giants before they were Dodgers. I loved them in Orange and Black, loathed them in Dodger Blue. I would however be remiss if I didn’t mention the ONE redeeming thing about the Los Angeles team… They have the best broadcaster in all of baseball, the inimitable Vin Scully

I have colleagues (who I like and respect), dear friends who I love (one is my daughter’s Godfather) and family members (a nephew who can be forgiven because he was born and raised in LA) who are Dodgers fans. They will mean one thing to me for 346 days this year and something entirely different the 19 days the Giants and Dodgers meet on the field (not including the post season). Speaking of the post season we Giants fans can take a great deal of solace in the fact that no matter how well the dreaded Dodgers do in the first 162 games, they’ll fail miserably, then exit stage left unceremoniously, when the games decide who wears World Series rings.

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So as far as I’m concerned you can keep your Yankees/Red Sox, Wolverines/Buckeyes, Packers/Bears, Blue Devils/Tar Heels and all the rest. For my money the Giants/Dodgers rivalry is the best in American team sports.

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