Talkin' trash on the golf course

ELItorial
   By Kate Moran

It was a scene straight out of Happy Gilmore.

When Tiger Woods approached the 17th hole of the American Express Championship on Sun., Nov. 7, he was nine strokes under par and two ahead of his nearest competitor, Miguel Angel Jiminez. A few shots later, however, Woods was sunk—literally. His third shot had rolled 35 feet down the green and into the water, and he completed the hole two strokes behind Jiminez. Woods' triple-bogey elicited Gilmore-esque antics from fans, who jeered at him and whooped in support of Jiminez, a local favorite who lived near the site of the tournament.

The rowdy crowds at the American Express tournament are not the only members of the golf world who have been doing Adam Sandler impersonations. Early in October, American spectators at the Ryder Cup taunted and harassed top European golfer Colin Montgomerie so viciously that his competitor, Payne Stewart, offered to call security. Near the end of the tournament, the American golfers behaved little better than their fans, erupting into ecstatics when Justin Leonard sank a 45-foot putt to give the U.S. a half-point lead. Their revelry drew complaints from the European golfers, who accused the Americans of disrupting the rhythm of their teammate, José Maria Olazabal, because he had to take his turn after the commotion surrounding Leonard's putt.

While these recent outbursts would not be remarkable at baseball, basketball, or football games, they were certainly an aberration from the atmosphere at most golf tournaments, where one usually finds more loud pants than loud fans. Like tennis, golf operates under a code of etiquette fit for the country club crowd—a code that discourages yelling, jeering, swearing, spitting, or any other loud, vulgar behavior that would be typical of a red-blooded baseball fan.

A dose of loudness and vulgarity might actually do golf some good, however. This year, the Ryder Cup attracted 30,000 fans to Brookline, Mass.—about half of the attendance at a World Series game. Golf doesn't draw as many spectators, because fans don't get as many opportunities to talk trash as do devotees of baseball, basketball, and football. Half of the fun of this year's National League Championship Series was the showdown between John Rocker and Mets fans, just as last year's Eastern Conference Finals were all the more intense because of the verbal sparring between Reggie Miller and the crowd at Madison Square Garden. Compared to these events, genteel golf tournaments are about as exciting as debutante balls.

Many golfers would argue that obnoxious fans have no place in their sport—golf is largely a mental game, and noise from the gallery can easily distract and disturb players. However, all athletics require mental as well as physical toughness, and any player who can't withstand a bit of harassment does not deserve to be called a champion. At the American Express tournament last weekend, Woods proved just how great an athlete he is by maintaining his focus in the face of belligerent fans and coming from behind to beat Jiminez.

This is not to say that spectators should be obnoxious. Indeed, fans sometimes cross the boundary between merely heckling players and seriously threatening their safety. In 1995, the San Diego Chargers had to flee into the locker room when Giants fans began hurling rock-hard snowballs onto the field at Giants Stadium. On Sun., Oct. 17, during the American League Championship Series, it was New York's turn to run for cover, as Red Sox fans pelted the Yankees with bottles and debris when their manager, Jimy Williams, was ejected from the game.

The violent behavior that fans exhibited at Giants Stadium and Fenway Park is reprehensible, but more innocent badgering of athletes does have its place in sports. Golf in particular would benefit from revising its code of etiquette and allowing a bit more rowdiness from the gallery. If clamorous cheering were not frowned upon, golf would be more accessible to those fans who view it as a stuffy, snobby sport reserved for the leisure class. Not all golf fans would have to cheer loudly, of course—there are devotees of every sport who feel uncomfortable with raucous or effusive displays of partisanship for a particular athlete or team. But those who do want to act rowdy would help enliven a sport that many sports fans consider bland and stodgy.

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