Shawn Peters: No Pun Intended

Mis(ter) Communication: Man-on-Man Coverage

(this article first appeared on The Good Man Project website on Dec. 10, 2011)

 

If you are a man, and there’s at least a fifty percent chance you are, you’ve likely experienced the following. You and a friend/co-worker/relative are talking about sports, and a conversation-adjacent woman sighs and announces, “Ugh, all you men do is talk about sports!” as if there could be nothing more trivial, useless or sad. But what is truly sad is the fact that these sports conversations between men are marginalized when they actually represent progress, evolution, and maybe even hope for the future of our planet. 

Let me explain, or, as Indigo Montoya once said, “There is too much. Let me sum up.”

On The Tee: Peters Single (May 16, 2010)

I am a golfer.   

I'm not very good, but I'm not very bad either, which I suppose is saying something. I am an average golfer, equally capable of crisp irons and skulled wedges. As such, I feel comfortable playing with all types of other golfers, knowing that I likely won't slow down better players, nor will I lose my patience with all but the worst hackers and duffers. 

Often, I play alongside people I know in a pre-ordained foursome comprised of friends and family.  But just as often, II head to courses across this nation alone, a "single" in golf parlance, and have my playing partners chosen by fate, timing, and the whims of a golf shop starter who looks down his ledger and looks for open slots to fill.

I've spent dozens of days on the course observing wonderful people with wretched swings, watching them post scores that resemble the weigh-in for a junior welterweight fighter. I've played alongside miserable sons-of-bitches who play the game like self-loathing poets, creating beauty out of shaped shots and elegant backspin, only to tear apart their masterpiece if you dare flatter them.

Most of all, what I've learned is that when you play golf as a single, you tend to remember the characters you played with long after the actual score you shot has disappeared into a scorecard-choked pocket in your golf bag. For years, I've toyed with the idea of profiling my rounds as an unplanned playing partner, painting portraits of the strangers I meet for a span of four or five hours at a time. 

After addressing the ball for far too long, this is my first swing at it.

Totally Uncoordinated

While the title of this blog post could certainly refer to the current mood in Congress or a description of me when I get dressed in the dark... or ski... or ski in the dark, it's actually a nod to the fact that my beloved New England Patriots have announced they will enter the 2010 NFL season without an offensive or defensive coordinator. In terms of the NFL groupthink, this is akin a car manufacturer debuting a new car that doesn't have power steering or anti-lock brakes. 

On most teams, while the head coach sets the tone   for the entire roster and game plan, these coordinators quite literally lead their respective units, calling the plays they run and deciding which players are utilized, and how. So why on Earth would football czar Bill Belichick possibly choose this course of team management, especially when this past year the team played with no offensive coordinator on his staff, resulting in one of the most disappointing and uneven seasons in recent Patriot history? Most media outlets are focusing on one likely answer, but I'll admit, I see several other potential reasons, and can't help wondering if one or more of those couldn't be in play. So here they are, from popular opinion to the farthest fetched hypotheticals in roughly descending order. You decide which you think apply.

Jets vs. Colts: Root for What's Right

Ring... Ring... Ring...

"Hi, you've reached Shawn. I'm not in right now because I'm in hell. The two football teams I hate more than any others are playing each other for the AFC championship on Sunday, and unless I'm going to rip open a portal in the space-time continuum and find an alternate universe where the Patriots are still a dynasty, I'll have to root for one of these teams to win. Please leave your name, number, and the address of a good massage parlor where I can work out my frustrations on Sunday night."

Beep!

 Watching the Colts and Jets duke it out for the AFC title is going to hurt either way, unless pieces of the dome's roof start crumbling and falling on both teams during pre-game warm-ups. But here in New England, there has been a lot of sports-talk radio chatter about who we, as fans of the Patriots, should be rooting for.

There are those who despise Peyton Manning, Bill Polian and the entire Colts franchise because they have been, over the past decade, our team's greatest obstacle. Manning steals Tom Brady's thunder more and more often in the "greatest current QB" discussion, while Polian's whining of how "physical" the Patriots were with Marvin Harrison (back when he was a receiver and not a shooting suspect) elevated him into full-blown "reviled" status from Connecticut to Maine. 

Day 20 - End of an E.R.A.

I spent most of tonight writing about baseball, but only sorta. I wrote about who I'd rather have for the rest of the season and why. I examined E.R.A.s and  O.B.P.s and urged my readers to make offers like there's no tomorrow.

I wasn't exaggerating. In fantasy baseball, there is no tomorrow... at least there won't be after Friday, because that's when the trading deadline will end all dealing for 2009. 

But there's also "no tomorrow" for me as a fantasy columnist for ESPN.com. This marks my last column for the biggest sports website/network in the world. 

Day 23 - Diamond Hope

Did the Red Sox's season end in the wee hours of this morning when Alex Rodriguez hit a game-winning, 15th inning homer at 12:42 AM?

Mathematically, the answer is no. Metaphorically, the answer was YES (as in the call letters of the Yankee Sports Network), at least from Red Sox Nation's point of view.

With 54 games left, the Sox theoretically have plenty  of time to turn around their latest skid, get healthy, and catch the Yankees. But there is no reasonable fan of the Olde Towne Team who can possibly look at the current roster's current play and believe this is going to be a special year for Boston's nine. They have too many injuries, too many failed experiments, and too many good teams who are playing at a high level to pass. Their loss last night wasn't a the dagger that killed them, but more of a microcosm of the fact that they aren't getting the breaks (or making the breaks) that championship teams need along the way.

But notice, I said no fan of the team can believe that the Sox are bound for glory. That doesn't mean we can't hope. There's a difference.

Day 24 - Friends Fore Ever

There are people in your life who are your family, and then there are people who are friends. There are co-workers, neighbors and acquaintances. But for people who think there is nothing more enjoyable than spending a bunch of money and several hours slapping a wee white ball around four miles of well-sodded real estate while wearing collared shirts, there is another classification for people we choose to spend time with.

Golfing Buddies.

Now to be clear, there is nothing that says you can't be golfing buddies with your cousin, the fellow next door or the gal who works one cubicle over. This is not a mutually exclusive pigeonholing thing. In fact, it's a real bonus when you have someone who you're close with off the course who also happens to be a key part of your ideal foursome. I've played golf with my immediate supervisor at two different companies, my father and I have played hundreds of rounds together over the years, and I was lucky to have several years in L.A. where one of my best friends, Jeff, was also my most frequent golf partner. Having those kind of emotional and social links when hitting the links is tremendous. But none of the preconditions that exist for any of those other relationships matter when it comes to having a golf buddy.

Day 34 - Not So Loose Impediments

At what point do you look at the signs and say, "I don't know if it's God or Nature or my wife's voodoo doll... but somebody out there doesn't want me playing golf?"

Earlier this summer, I shot the lowest round of my life at the Links at Poland Springs in Poland, Maine. It was an 82, a full four strokes better than I'd ever scored before. Improving your best round by four strokes is outrageous and statistically outlier-ish.  After all, four strokes is what a good player expects to take on an entire hole, so basically I played 18 holes in this round in the number of strokes it took me to play 17 holes at my previous best.

I tried to stay humble. I bought my playing partners dinner that night. I announcing publically that I never expected to shoot that number again. I did everything short of sacrificing my hybrid clubs to the golf gods in supplication. I mean, I remember Prometheus and know too well the punishments that await those who take something divine back to this Earth. I understood I was unworthy and felt I'd done the right thing.

Day 35 - Sounding HOF

Rickey Henderson and Jim Rice being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame on the same day is kinda like Jay and Silent Bob being inducted together into  the Suburban Stoner Hall of Fame. Definitely worthy, but an odd couple.

The sight gag works even if you don't know anything about the two players, but it goes way beyond the classic pairing of a skinny guy with a husky foil. It could be argued that no Hall of Famer, at least in my lifetime, said less during his prime than Jim Ed. My father told me just this weekend that when he was covering a young Rice, the slugger would stand in his locker with his back to the media and simply refuse to turn around. Conversely, Rickey wouldn't shut up if you paid him, especially because it's questionable whether he even understood the notion of being paid. An oft retold tale about Mr. Henderson is that he once received a million dollar bonus check from the Oakland Athletics, but then decided to frame it rather than cash it. No one would ever have known if it weren't for the A's balance sheet being off by a cool mil a year later, resulting in a little detective work for their front office.

The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Manny

I can't prove there is such a thing as "karma" or "fate," but if there were a First United Church of Poetic Justice, I'd be putting some coin in their collection plate today because there's no doubt… I believe.

Why? Because Manny Ramirez is sad. Really sad.

Whether you're a Red Sox fan or just a casual follower of Major League Baseball, you've no doubt heard about the way future Hall of Fame outfielder Manny Ramirez "shot" his way out of town last July. After years of athleticism, acrimony and intermittent apathy as a member of the Red Sox, Ramirez wanted the front office to promise him they wouldn't pick up their $20 million team option on him for 2009 because his new agent, one Scott Boras, has convinced him that there was a bigger, longer, significantly more attractive offer out there for him as a free agent at the age of 36.