Triumph the Insult Comic Dog Previews the Ryder Cup

As always, it is a great privilege and a distinct honor to have an opportunity to grace this corner of the blogosphere.   I can remember the days when this space was only populated with clip art and poop jokes, but look what it’s become?  Now it’s the internet’s preeminent one stop shop for crippling insecurity disguised as bravado, guys bloviating about their love of obscure bands that they’ll abandon at the first hint of popularity, and pedantic, unsolicited advice without a hint of self-awareness…and GIFs and poop jokes.  Congrats all around.

Now, on to the business at hand: The 2014 Ryder Cup Matches, this year played at the PGA Centenary Course at Gleneagles resort, somewhere in Scotland halfway in between Glasgow and Edinburgh.  This is only the second time the Ryder Cup has been played in Scotland, and the first time since 1973.  So, we’re in Scotland, so this is a links course, right?  Wrong.  It’s a pretty well Americanized resort type course—no holes on the water, no pot bunkers (Sorry TJ), no massive greens with inexplicably short flagsticks.  It’s actually a Jack Nicklaus designed track, so as long as you like hitting a fade and guys with oddly high-pitched voices, you should be all set.  So why didn’t the Euros pick a links course so they could watch Phil Mickelson’s tits flop in the wind all week?  Because even their players hate links golf, and that’s probably because it’s generally a pretty miserable experience.

Now, to the teams.  Team America consists of the following diverse group of moneyed white males who reside in Orlando or Scottsdale (Ryder Cup records and World Ranking in parenthesis):

Team USA

Captain: Tom Watson – Eight time major winner, one of the greatest golfers of all time, who is almost equally as beloved in the UK as he is at home. He successfully captained the US to victory at the Belfry back in ’97, and he told Paul Azinger to go fuck off somewhere else when he called him up last month and offered unsolicited captaining advice.  What’s not to like?

Keegan Bradley (26; 3-1-0) – His only loss was last year’s singles match against Rory McIlroy. He’ll thumb wrestle Rickie Fowler each evening for the rights to sleep at the foot of Mickelson’s bed.

Rickie Fowler (10; 0-1-2) The hottest golfer in the world over the last six months not named Rory, Fowler’s first Ryder Cup experience involved a lot of bad golf and character building.

More of this Jim Furyk. Less of the other one.

Jim Furyk (4; 9-17-4) How the Christ is Jim Furyk the #4 ranked golfer in the world?  Do the world rankings only count rounds played Thursday thru Saturday?  Also, can we please sit Furyk during four balls this year?  He’s posted a career 1-8-1 record in that format over the years, with that one win occurring during the Clinton Administration against Jesper Parnevik and a Make-A-Wish kid, I believe.

Zach Johnson (16; 6-4-1) In addition to being an exceptionally uninteresting human, Johnson played out of his tits in the last Ryder Cup, going 3-1, only losing a squeaker in singles to Graeme McDowell.

Matt Kuchar (9; 3-2-2) Undefeated in team play, winless in singles.  Terrified of being alone.

Hunter Mahan (21; 3-2-3) Still recovering from swallowing his tongue during the 2010 Ryder Cup.

Phil Mickelson (11; 14-18-6) Phil is below .500 in all three formats, which is hard to figure out.   Maybe it’s because he hits it sideways too often, or maybe it’s because he had placed wagers on the other guys. Hard to say.

Webb Simpson (33; 2-2-0) Hasn’t really been relevant in a couple years.  Pretty sure he’s only on the team because Watson couldn’t find Brandt Snedecker’s cell phone number and Jason Dufner threw out his back banging his incredibly hot wife.  Might want to give her a follow on the ole Instagram, gents. 

DUFNER SAYS "OH YEAH"

Bubba Watson (7; 5-5-1) Expect Watson to be paired with Simpson this weekend—they were paired together twice in 2012 and won 5&4 both times.  Gives them a good opportunity to talk about growing up in the South, the pros and cons of being baptized in a river or which state has the best sweet tea/soul-crushing racism in the southeast.

Jordan Speith (13, first Ryder Cup) Speith put up some pretty incredible putting numbers this year.  There are more than 20 different putting stats measured by the tour, and he is in the top 5 in almost all of them.  He was first in percentage of holes with one putt, with 46%.  He played 1796 holes and one-putted 809 of them.  That’s not of this world.

Jimmy Walker (19, first Ryder Cup) – Was really hot this Spring, and then remembered he was Jimmy Walker. Let’s just pair him up with Furyk and send them out against McIlroy and GMac as sacrificial lambs.

Patrick Reed (27, first Ryder Cup) – He won three times on tour this year.  He’s chubby. His wife caddies for him. This exhausts all my knowledge of said person. Also, he  put up a couple rounds in the 80s over the last few tournaments, which was almost good enough to get second in the Ladies Member Guest, had  his schedule permitted him to participate in that lovely event.  

So not exactly murderer’s row.  But, an average ranking of 16.3 means we have the team with the superior ranking in this match up—and the team with the lower average World Ranking has won the last five Cups.  Additionally, the team with the number 1 ranked player in the world is 1-4 when the number one ranked players has been in the matches.

Team Europe

Captain: Paul McGinley

Rory McIlroy (1; 4-3-2) He’s good at the golf, and this time he even brought his alarm clock.  Still seems like he can be mentally fragile at times…but the results of late don’t really back that up.

Thomas Bjorn (30, 3-2-1) He’s old, and grumpy and folds faster than Superman on laundry day when the pressure is on.  

Sergio Garcia (3, 16-8-4) If you give two shits about golf and aren’t following Dan Jenkins on twitter, you’re doing it wrong.  Other than being crusty, cranky and insanely funny, he also shares my (everyone’s?) hatred of Sergio, and whenever he’s in contention, does this bit on twitter.  

A 68 by me, Sergio--not quite enough to do the full flamenco on Dan Jenkins' head, but I make more metaphors with you at the PGA. Yes? No?
— Dan Jenkins (@danjenkinsgd) July 17, 2011

Martin Kaymer (12; 3-2-1) It’s a little known fact that Martin Kaymer is secretly one of the funniest, animated and jovial guys in professional golf.  Just kidding! He’s actually a robot that Hitler commissioned from some Third Reich scientists shortly before his death. Team Europe has to plug him in next to Rory’s Nissan Leaf after each round.

Graeme McDowell (18; 5-5-2) How has Team Europe been winning all these Ryder Cups with the incredibly average win-loss records from their top players?  Oh, I know…its cause their shitty players play out of their tits in the Ryder Cup.

We're gonna lose to this guy, huh?

Ian Poulter (38, 12-3-0) Ian Poulter has the best winning percentage in the history of the Ryder Cup.  Better than Ballesteros, and Montgomerie, better than Palmer and Nicklaus.  It does not make sense. His last six finishes this year were as follows: Tied for 23^rd, Missed Cut, Tied for 58^th, Missed Cut, Missed Cut, Missed Cut. But that notwithstanding, everyone knows that this weekend he’ll go 4-0-0 while wearing plaid capri pants and a camisole.  

Justin Rose (6; 6-3-0) People sleep on Justin Rose.  His singles match against Mickelson in 2012 was the real backbreaker in that collapse, and it’s hard to kill Phil for the loss.  He shot 66…Rose just shot 64, including birdies on the last two.

Henrik Stenson (5; 2-3-2) Do we really think Henrik Fucking Stenson is the 3^rd best player in this field?  I’m pretty sure the players don’t.

Lee Westwood (44; 18-13-6) Hey, it’s Lee Westwood! When he’s not busy being a smug prick, we’re used to seeing him playing awesome golf on the Saturday of a major and then crapping all over himself.  He should sue Jim Furyk for stealing his bit.  I hope they get matched up for singles on Sunday and they can halve the match with 88s.

Jamie Donaldson (26, first Ryder Cup) I believe Jamie Donaldson plays third base for Oakland A’s, so he seems an odd captain’s pick…but I guess they do it different over across the pond.

Stephen Gallacher (34, first Ryder Cup) You might remember him as Sandy Cohen, the dad on The O.C.  He also plays golf…apparently.   Much like on the O.C., Sandy. I mean Stephen serves as a moral center, often guiding and supporting his teammates through their problems, bringing them both wisdom and a well-placed sense of humor.

Victor Dubuisson (23, first Ryder Cup) There’s a storied history of Frenchmen in the Ryder Cup…Thomas Levet, Jean Van de Velde… Frenchie Fuqua.  They all sucked it up and then sat quietly in the corner of the team room sipping port.

So team Europe, huh?  Lots of Major winners and guys with weird accents.  Average world golf ranking: 19.9

With the exception of Sergio and Rory, most of team Europe has been playing like dogshit over the last few weeks, and the bottom third of their roster is very weak—even weaker than Jimmy Walker and Patrick Reed.  The US is also undefeated in Ryder cup’s without Tiger Woods since 1997…so there’s that.   I think the U.S. takes the Cup back. So there’s some pretty earth-shattering analysis. If you want a deeper dive, go read Johnny Miller’s piece on it in golf Digest.  I haven’t read it, but I’m guessing it’s mainly about how none of these guys are as good as Johnny Miller was, and their swings are all wrong and they fold under pressure.

So, the matches begin at 2:30am Friday morning, which is an incredible ass-ache. I’m planning on taking the day off Friday and showing up on Jerry’s doorstep around 8 am, in time for the second set of Friday matches.  The Sunday singles matches mercifully start at 6:35am Sunday, and will be over before the NFL kicks off for the day.  

Until Friday morning, I’ll just be in my basement watching youtube clips of eagles soaring with Lee Greenwood playing in the background. Ok, let’s go get em.

Wheelhouse Geoff Previews the President's Cup

Geoff has some free time on his hands this week. So we asked him to write 1,700 words that only five of you will read. 'Cause page views.

So who wants to read a lengthy preview of an event you probably didn’t even know was about to occur? Possibly no one. But, here goes—tree falling in an unpopulated woods.

Tomorrow begins the 10th President’s Cup matches, more commonly referred to as “The Ryder Cup With Different Foreigners And No Tradition or Drama.” The President’s Cup pits the International Team, comprised of the world’s best players not from the U.S. or Europe, versus the American Team. In the nine previous competitions, the US has a dominant record of 7-1-1. Yes…there was a tie…due to darkness and too much gutless pathetic collegiality.

The US has won often and easily in the President’s Cup, and no one can really figure out why. Is it because there’s no history, bad blood or attention paid to the event and thus no pressure? Is it because the International Team has no identity, nothing to bond over and in some years they all speak different languages? Is it because Greg Norman spent his four years as captain off banging all the International players’ wives while the matches are going on and they all knew it? MAYBE. In several past competitions, the Internationals have had a much stronger team than the US on paper (based on World Golf Rankings) and have still lost. Interestingly, this year, quite the opposite is true.

The President’s Cup has the same format as the Ryder Cup, except when it doesn’t. It’s similar in that two man teams play fourball (aka best ball) and foursomes (aka alternate shot)matches leading up to singles matches on Sunday. It’s different in that it’s a four day event (Ryder is just three), all 20 players play on Thursday and Friday and the captains get to take turns picking the matchups (in the Ryder Cup, captains just hand in an order of players blindly and it gets matched up with the other team’s order). In the Ryder, if the matches end in a tie, the team holding the Cup keeps the Cup (because fuck you, commies). In the President’s Cup, if it ends in a tie, the teams “share” the Cup, everyone gets a participation trophy and an “I’m Special” tee shirt and our country grows weaker, softer and the Chinese laugh. In 2003, the format stated that if The Presidents Cup ended in a tie, each Captain had to pick one player and those guys played sudden death until someone won—which is an awesome idea. Captain Nicklaus picked Tiger, Captain Player picked Els, and they played an awesome couple of holes without anyone winning. And then it got dark. And someone forgot to warm up Uncle Jack’s milk and tapioca pudding and we had to call it a tie and it was the greatest moment of sportsmanship, integrity and class since Jesus himself came down from heaven and broke up a fight in the 1964 Stanley Cup Finals. In short, it sucked.

The Teams

The International Team (world ranking in parenthesis), captained by three time major winner Nick Price (Zimbabwe) consists of:
Adam Scott (AUS) (2)
Jason Day (AUS) (16)
Charl Schwartzel (SA) (19)
Ernie Els (SA) (23)
Louie Oosthuizen (SA) (29)
Branden Grace (SA) (38)
Graham DeLaet (CAN) (32)
Richard Sterne (SA) (41)
Angel Cabrera (ARG) (51)
Marc Leishman (AUS) (61)
Brendon de Jonge (SA) (63)
Hideki Matsuyama (Japan) (30)

Happy now, Shlara?

So, this is pretty much a team of some super nice South Africans who really know how to golf their respective balls and whose parents were (allegedly) vicious murderous racists…mixed in with some dreamy Aussies, a Japanese kid and a pudgy chain smoking Argentinian who will rip your heart out and eat in front of you while your children and wife watch. Also, who the fuck are some of these guys? I believe Branden Grace was one of the bad guys in Lethal Weapon 2 and I'm 90% sure Richard Sterne has never been in my kitchen.

The US Team is captained by Fred Couples for the third consecutive year, because everyone likes Fred Couples and because Ben Crenshaw and Paul Azinger and 12 other guys did not return calls.
Tiger Woods (1)
Brandt Snedeker (9)
Phil Mickelson (3)
Matt Kuchar (8)
Jason Dufner (10)
Keegan Bradley (15)
Steve Stricker (7)
Bill Haas (28)
Hunter Mahan (26)
Zach Johnson (11)
Webb Simpson (Captain's Pick) (24)
Jordan Spieth (Captain's Pick) (21)

That team is stacked. As long as Hunter doesn’t shit all over himself again like he did in 2010 Ryder Cup and Dufner doesn’t run out of Skoal Wintergreen, this should be a blowout. And I think we are all looking forward to Keegan Bradley being paired up with Phil Mickelson again so he can reenact this scene all over the back nine at Muirfield.

The Course

This year’s event will be played at Muirfield Village Country Club in Dublin, Ohio, which is a suburb of Columbus. I spent two summers caddying at MVCC, where I was taught to 1) show up, shut up and keep up and 2) how to smoke weed inconspicuously whilst fore-caddying. Muirfield Village was among the first courses Jack Nicklaus designed and is also where he still lives part time with Barbara and the kids and his insanely high pitched nasally voice. It is home to the annual Memorial Tournament and hosted the 1986 Ryder Cup, which the US lost in a pretty stunning upset, but that’s another story for another time…like the one about the hooker with dysentery.

Tiger Woods has had incredible success at Muirfield (in 17 Memorials, Tiger is 171 under par on the par 5s. Seriously) and Matt Kuchar won the Memorial this year, two things that do bode well for the Americans. Like most Nicklaus courses, especially the early ones, every hole seems to be designed with Jack Nicklaus left to right ball flight in mind. Almost every tee shot sets up nicely for a fade (or a draw if you're a lefty like Mickelson), and players who rely upon a draw are going to encounter some shots that don't fit their eye. I'm not sure Muirfield has a “signature” hole (and I never did find the glory hole I keep hearing so much about), but both 12 and 18 serve as pretty memorable challenges. 12 is a daunting par 3 over water where the golfer finds himself teeing off almost 100 feet above the hole staring down at a green that appears to run away from you towards the water. It should make for some interesting play in some tighter matches. The 18th is a lengthy par 4 with one of the tougher tee shots you’ll find. Extremely tight fairway. Miss the fairway left and you find a creek, miss it right and you are in a bunker and blocked out by trees. If you decide to hit three wood, you’re left with a long iron into an elevated, well bunkered green. Good times all around.

From the perspective of the viewer this weekend, the par 5s will provide the most entertainment as all of them present great risk/reward opportunities. Both #5 and #11 have creeks weaving down the middle of the fairway which may dissuade some from using driver off the tee. And, both are pretty easily reachable in two. The second year at worked at Muirfield, I was assigned to work the driving range during The Memorial. We had a rain delay during the final round…which meant that all the golfers went to the locker room to take cover. Except for that asshole Vijay Singh. Vijay, who was leading the tournament at the time, headed straight for the range. Vijay was on the par 5 11th when play was suspended--he had 231 yards left to the hole for his second shot. So, in a driving rainstorm, he had his caddie pace off exactly 231 yards and stand, alone, out in the middle of the range getting douched with rain while Vijay pounded 3 woods at him. This went on for almost a half hour. I would guess Vijay hit 100-150 3 woods. And then it was announced that play was suspended for the day. Fast forward to Monday’s re-start, and Vijay stuck the 3 wood to two feet, tapped in his eagle and won the tournament. But he’s still an asshole. And his caddie hates him.

Prediction

The US wins again going away. I was considering the contrarian pick here, because the US always won this thing when the Int’l Team looked stacked…but I’m just not seeing it. The average World Golf Ranking on the American team is 13.6 and for the Internationals its 35.4. That seems to make a International win seem highly unlikely.

This morning's opening matches are as follows:

Mahan/Sneds vs J-Day/DaLaet - I like the internationals here. This pits two of our emotionally shakier guys together --seems like a bad pairing. Also, Jason Day is a member at Muirfield Village--his wife is from Columbus. So, that feels like an advantage.

Haas/Simpson vs Scott/Matsuyama - I like the internationals here as well. Matsuyama is a really solid young player and Adam Scott has been amazing this year. Webb Simpson has had issues all year and Bill Haas is bald...so that can't help matters.

FIGJAM/Keegan vs Louis and Charl - I like team spazz here to get some points up for the good guys. "Charl" is not a name.

Stricker/Speith vs Els/deJonge -Speith is an incredible talent (I have his picture in my hope chest next to my Rand Paul centerfold from National Review) and Stricker's Midwestern folksiness and putting stroke will win the day here. I will refer to this International pairing as El Debarge all day.

Kuch/Eldrick Woods vs Cabrera/Leishman - This one really depends on whether or not Angel feels like trying this weekend. I don't think he does. I think he plans to duff it around, take the Marlboro train to flavor country 40 times a round and drink a gallon a brandy at lunch.

Johnson/Dufner vs Rissoli and Isles - Its actually versus Grace and Sterne...who don't play in the US much. I like the Americans here based solely on jingoistic homerism. That said, I worry about this pairing. Johnson's a big God-squader and I bet Dufner thinks he's about a much fun as a kick in the pants. Put Johnson with Mahan so they can quote scripture for 18 holes and put Dufner with Woods or Speith so they can talk about getting "strange"and hand jobs.

So, I've got it 4-2 US after session #1. Let's go get em.

Ryder Cup, Day 1: The Wheelhouse Reunites

Reunited and it feels so good...

 

So it seems Wheelhouse Geoff and Wheelhouse Jerry will be taking in the Ryder Cup from the comfort of, Jerry's couch, maybe? Not sure the local, but the fellas have the day off to watch golf, and perhaps find time to chime in here on what they're seeing on the magic television box. Enjoy the A.M. Ales, gents.

For the rest of us, treat this post as your Ryder Cup Day 1 Open Thread...at least until it gets trumped by one of the two filler items I see Statler and Waldorf have in draft.

P.S. Is Geoff "Peaches"? Making Jerry "Herb"?

Ryder Guestie: Wheelhouse Geoff Previews The 2012 Ryder Cup

Wheelhouse Geoff emerges from the rubble of, well, the wheelhouse to provide us a look at the 2012 Ryder Cup. America, F**k Yeah.

The 39th Ryder Cup gets underway on Friday at Medinah Country Club just outside of Chicago, where the European Team will attempt to continue what has been two decades of near dominance over the US.

The Ryder Cup is unique amongst all modern sporting events for a variety of reasons. First off, none of these guys are getting paid to be there and all the winners get is a modest looking trophy and bragging rights. Yet every two years, you see more passion, excitement and spastic, poorly executed high fives from the competitors than you do at any other event. Secondly, the format is unique in that its not only match play, but much of the competition is team (two-man) match play. On Friday and Saturday, a total of eight matches will be played each day, each worth one point. Half of the matches will be Four Balls matches (commonly called "best ball") wherein the low score amongst the four players wins the hole. The other matches will be foursomes matches (commonly called "alternate shot"), in that one player tees off, and his partner then hits the second shot and they alternate until the ball is holed. Low score on the hole wins. The former format is one used quite often by weekend golfers and elsewhere and the latter is never used by anyone ever except at the Ryder Cup, because its incredibly stupid.

The US has a 27-11-1 record in the Ryder Cup, but has won only four of the last 13 competitions, dating back to 1985. The lion's share of US wins came before 1979, when the Euro team was expanded from just Great Britain/Ireland to all of continental Europe. Since then, Europe has won 9 of the 16 matches. Even more troubling is that we have lost 3 of the last 5 Ryder Cups on US soil. This recent futility is due largely to the Europeans success in the Friday/Saturday teams competitions. The US, conversely, has consistently been dominant during the Sunday singles matches, just not always dominant enough to make up for the shellacking they took the previous two days.

Most experts are picking the US as the favorites this year, but that seems to be the case every year. Its true that the US squad is stacked, but historically that's a harbinger of shitty golf to come. Of the last 12 major championships, eight have been won by 2012 Ryder Cup participants, four by US players (Webb Simpson, Keegan Bradley, Phil Mickelson and Bubba Watson) and four by Euros (Rory McIlroy (2), Martin Kaymer and Graeme McDowell). The other four recent majors were won by Darren Clarke (a 2012 Euro Team assistant captain) and an assortment of South Africans with increasingly odd last names and awkward smiles (Els, Schwartzel, Oosthuizen).

Team USA is captained by Davis Love III, who possesses all the sexiness, charisma and excitement of a bologna sandwich. Davis, a strong player on tour for many years, probably underachieved by winning only one major championship, the 1997 PGA. His other claim to fame may be the putt he made in 1993 at the Belfry that won the Ryder Cup for Team USA. Historically, having a reputation as a dynamic, highly motivational guy has produced mixed results when it comes to Ryder captains. Paul Azinger and Ben Crenshaw fit that bill, and they led winning squads in '08 at Valhalla and '99 at Brookline, respectively. Corey Pavin has a similar reputation as a firery guy, as do Curtis Strange and Hal Sutton, and their captaincies were not successful and highly criticized. Davis' laid back, steady approach mirrors that of his closest friend on tour, Fred Couples, who has been hugely successful as a Presidents Cup captain.

The Euros captain this year is two time Masters champion Jose Maria Olazabal, who I would not urinate on were he on fire. Olazabal has a charming personality as long as you are endeared by aloof, self-important glowering. As a Ryder cupper, Olazabal has an 18-6-2 record, except no one can remember or find video of the matches he lost. When paired with the late Seve Ballesteros, the pair was 11-2-0 in team play. Ballesteros, who died earlier this year of brain cancer, Is largely credited with transforming the Ryder Cup competitions from a US walkover into a real (and somewhat bitter) competition. How revered is Seve by the Euros? His silhouette will be on each Euro player's bag tho weekend, Jerry West/NBA style.

Strategy

Course set up and pairings will be the two most talked about topics this week when it comes to Davis Love and to a lesser extent Olazabal. The home team captain gets to set up the course however he sees fit. This year, Davis has taken advantage of that opportunity to a more considerable extent than many of his predecessors. When Davis went to examine Medinah a couple weeks back, he left the course requesting two alterations. 1. Make it longer. It is now stretched out past 7500 yards. 2. Get rid of the US Open style rough, and at the edge of each fairway add a 20 yard second cut. This effectively widened the fairways by 40 yards and made the rough a non-factor. The US team is longer than the Euros, and they don't drive it as straight, thus this seems a smart move.

As to pairings, the Euros have ready made teams with unimpeachable recent Ryder records. Expect McIlroy to play with McDowell, Westwood with Luke Donald (they shot a reported 59 practicing four balls on Tuesday), and some combo of Ian Poulter with Paul Casey or Justin Rose.

The US pairings are harder to predict. Tiger will likely be with either Steve Stricker (a captains choice who is having a bad year) or Jim Furyk Mickelson will be paired with Webb Simpson and Keagan Bradley and God only knows on the rest. I'm hoping for a Bubba Watson/Jason Dufner "Southern Idiots" pairing, which produced great theater and great results in '08 with JB Holmes and Boo Weekley in the roles of the idiots.

Players to Watch

Tiger Woods record in the Ryder is a modest 13-14-2, which sadly makes him one of our better participants since 1995. Medinah, however, hosted the PGA Championship in 1999 and 2006. Guess who won both of those?

Ian Poulter is 8-3-1 in the last three Ryders. He has seemed near unbeatable and there's no reason to expect that to change.

Nicolas Colsarts is a new member of Team Euro and is notably the longest player in the competition and the first Belgian to participate in this event. He has a long history of being highly talented and the shitting the bed. I expect both he, and Martin Kaymer, to be used sparingly on Friday and Saturday.

Sergio Garcia is back on team Euro after being an assistant captain in 2010 because he was playing like a 13 handicap back then. His game has returned to form since then, and odds are he will play well this weekend. He has a career 14-6-4 Ryder record, so expect him to be nancing around the greens like a homosexual at a Lady Gaga concert every time he makes an eight foot putt.

The US team has four Ryder rookies (to the Euros one: Colsarts) in Bradley, Simpson, Dufner and FedEx Cup champ Brandt Snedecker. Simpson distinguished himself quite well in last year's President's Cup and as a group, if these guys don't provide a good number of our points, we're screwed. Our big name players (Tiger, Phil, Stricker, Furyk) have an average age of 42. I don't expect them to carry the load.

Prediction

I think the US wins the 14.5 points necessary to take back the Cup (in the event of a 14-14 tie, Europe retains the Cup). I'm pretty well sold on some of our younger players, especially because guys like Bradley and Simpson are such strong putters. If the US is down by two points or less going into Sunday, I think we will be in solid position to win.

Along with Wheelhouse Jerry, I'm talking the day off Friday to drink deep the aura of the Ryder Cup. The over/under on the first time Johnny Miller accuses someone of choking like a dog is set at 9:15am Friday. Take the under.

The Great 2008 G:TB Roy Hibbert Bet

In light of this news...

The Pacers are matching Portland's 4-year, $58 million offer to Roy Hibbert, according to a source
— Mike Wells (@MikeWellsNBA) July 9, 2012

I would like to bring up one of the more classic comment threads in G:TB lore. It also included a bet about the man reference above, Roy Denzil Hibbert. Jump back in time with me to January 10th, 2008...and a random clip of Yao Ming dunking on Malik Rose.

I was going to simply paste the wager here directly out of the comments, but that thread is fucking hilarious, so you need to go back through it and read it. To see that Geoff really, really, really lost that bet to Dennis.

Maybe Roy will have Dennis over to swim in his pile of money as the bet winner, a la Scrooge McDuck. Then again, swimming in a pile of gold coins sans pants seems a very sandusky thing to do, now that I think about it.

The Twelve Days of Gheorghe-mas: Day Three

On the third day of Gheorghe-mas, Big Gheorghe gave to me...

Three blogging concepts (Sports, Drinking, & Elitism)
Two Footie Stories
And a Doofus on a Pony

Remember the first week of December a year ago? Whew. It was enough to wear some folks out. What a week + Tribe playoffs.

Friends, Gheorgheans, blogophiles, lend me your eyes;
I come to praise Jerry’s Wheelhouse, not to bury them.
The blogging that men do lives after them;
The snarky snideness is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Geoff and Jerry.

Let it be taken as a compliment that, for as many epithets as G:TBers hurled at the Wheelhouse through the years, the majority of the staff continues to inquire about the extended absence / early retirement of our counter-blog. The latter half of last year saw the tandem blogcycle featuring Geoff and Jerry begin to slow, but their December 4, 2010 random-post-as-epilogue stunned the local ‘sphere. Where as Rob and I shuttered Misery Loves Company in 2009 with an end-of-the-baseball-season adieu we hoped would bookend our seven years of chronicling, you don’t often hear farewell speeches that close with:

“We might also see some wildcat with QB/WR DJ Mangas behind center.”

It certainly left some questions unanswered. While other FOG:TB blogs like What Mark Is Doing, Drunk and Stupid, Dave’s Quote of the Day, and that fortnight of vitriol Hot Action ran their course and faded out appropriately, the Wheelhouse went out on their own terms, or at least their own wives’/TV addictions’ terms. While it wasn’t exactly like the cancellation of “Arrested Development” or “Family Guy,” I’d say it was at least like “Sports Night” or “My So-Called Life.” Or “Post.” A little premature.

And so we look back and salute our blogrades. Hip, hip, hoogay. (That was from Mark.)

Jerry’s Wheelhouse began as inconspicuously as Jerry himself, conceived on a hot, drunken Saturday night in August in a sweaty, suburban apartment. In one concise, inaugural post, however, he managed to (a) reverse the Curse of the Bambino and (b) set the stage for what the next six years of Wheelhouse posts would bring: pissed off people writing about watching sporting events on television and drinking, mostly making fun of everyone involved. And being thoroughly contrarian. The formula was set, and it worked.

There were digressions from this established mean, of course. Political ramblings. Hookup stories (usually someone else’s). Pictures of hot chicks. Pictures of Wheelhousers in mustaches riding motorbikes in Greece with other guys. Attempts to start new blogs and petitions to do even more. (Aborted attempts.) There was even an attempt to form a Justice League America superblog that would team several Gheorghers (like Superman, Batman, and the Atom) with the Wheelhouse duo (Robin and Black Lightning). It was to be called DNP: Coach’s Decision, and there was even a rough cut of the new website. Like many of our endeavors, it was a dodo, flightless and doomed to extinction.

In the end, these heat of the moment side projects were nothing more than Asia compared to the regular, roundabout output of Yes that the good people of Jerry’s Wheelhouse brought us. Who can forget these classics?

• Jerry explains European soccer. In plain English.
• Geoff made the Skins fans among us laugh and wince with the Top 100 Embarrassments of Daniel Snyder. (Somewhat aped by the CityPaper years later.)
• Geoff recounts mayhugh’s wing-eating extravaganza.
• Jerry displays football genius in articulating what no football commentator pointed out.
• Then Jerry isn’t so prescient. (But he wasn’t terribly wrong in the specifics.)
• And finally, Geoff’s masterstroke, his What’s Now post.

Though we tend to rag the Wheelhouse (aka “The Birdcage”) like fraternity brothers do, that the G:TB staff compiled those selections from memory speaks to the regard in which we hold these dudes and their entertaining works. (That we went to extraordinary lengths to rattle the ‘cage, even creating a fake blog and bloggers to take them down a few pegs . . . well that says something, too, I guess.)

There were the recurring segments – the Ryder Cup previews, the counterpoints on the Mets, the anti-homerism on the Redskins, and the football picks, which we looked forward to each week. Always worth a few chuckles. And then we at Gheorghe challenged Geoff and Jerry to a picks contest, on which we had no business winning.

The comments kept us involved, sometimes too much so. In some cases, the comments were fodder for more creativity than the original post.

In the end, it was a place where relatively like-minded people kept us entertained. For me, a guy who doesn't visit that many commentary websites or listen to "talk radio," it was one of a few places where I get insight, laughter, and statistics. And fashion tips. (Brown shoes with blue suit?) Losing it was like losing CBS back in the days of the three networks, two independents, and 95 channels of static. Not good.

When pressed for quotes on our missing chums over at the Wheelhouse, Team G:TB had this to say in tribute:

"The Wheelhouse . . . canned beer taste in the bottle world of blogging. Delicious."

"I'll never have an issue with a man who personally knew Big John Studd."

"The Wheelhouse is gone??"

"One man writes on a couch, in a Giants starter jacket with Haddaway blaring in the background. And with it, the Wheelhouse begins. In comes Geoff, the Brooks Brothers-clad Felix Unger to Jerry's Oscar Madison. Magic was made, words with written (in some order). Since 2004, they have been the Ace and Gary of our blogging universe. Good bye Wheelhome, you are missed. All you did was weaken a country today, Jerry and Geoff. (well, you did this a year ago, so actually, thanks a lot for all the shit this nation has gone through in the past 12 months)"

"They're in a better place now. Buried at Arlington."

"Beneath that veneer of subtle contempt, often-brilliant analysis, and contrarian worldview, I always thought the Wheelhouse was a cry for help. I hope those guys found what they were looking for."

"As for me, you may ask how I will remember them, what I thought of them. Unfortunately there I run out of words. Perhaps you will forgive me if I turn to the words of another splendid bugger who reminds me of them in his buggery: W.H. Auden. This is actually what I want to say: 'Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone, Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone. The stars are not wanted now; put out every one, Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun, Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood; For nothing now can ever come to any good.'"

"Jumped the shark in '07, really. But oh, yes, when the writing was in their . . . uh . . . really good place for excelling at it . . ."

"Two great tastes that go great together."

"We are gathered here today to pay final respects to our honored dead. And yet it should be noted, in the midst of our sorrow, this death takes place in the shadow of new life, the sunrise of a new world; a world that our beloved comrades gave their life to protect and nourish. They did not feel this sacrifice a vain or empty one, and we will not debate their profound wisdom at these proceedings. Of our friends, I can only say this: of all the souls I have encountered in my travels, theirs were the most... human."

"Sports, Drinking, & Elitism . . . yep."

Some special words. Here's to six years of friends writing stuff about stuff.

Can The Wheelhouse Be Saved?

As many of us have noticed, our friends over at The Wheelhouse seem to be on a sabbatical of some sort. Questions are being asked: Where did they go? Will they return? What has Chip been doing all this time? Well, I was randomly emailing Wheelhouse Jerry and his colleague Craig about Michael Bradley heading to Aston Villa (I got that right?) when I also mentioned that it might be time for G:TB to send out The Wheelhouse in true wrestling fashion with a fake funeral. Jerry took that as we should wrestle for the future of the site, and then 10 minutes later Craig emails us this:

After laughing for 20 minute I sent this to Geoff, and his response?
This was time well spent. I have many questions, the first of which is: Was there some sort of wrestling match between TJ and Jerry that precipitated this? I’ll hang up and listen to your answer.

So the floor is open folks...how do we play this out? No-holds-barred steel cage match? (Step)ladder match? I'll see you in the comments....