Weekend winners
Sergio Garcia. The wunderkind who left us wondering, Garcia has long been the biggest golfing name among his generation not to win a major. It’s staggering to understand really. He’s one of the first – along with David Duvall – that was pegged to be a major rival with Tiger Woods, especially after Garcia’s inspired rally at the 1999 PGA Championship at Riveria that fell just short. Winning Sunday’s AT&T Byron Nelson is far from a major, but it was Garcia’s first PGA Tour win in four years. Good for him.
Toronto. With its season on the line, the Raptors delivered an inspired defensive performance before its home fans, especially on the defensive end in a 99-84 Game 3 win over the Cleveland Cavaliers. They also opened a possible long-term avenue for derailing the Cavs’ recent offensive overhaul. The Raptors never left Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love, and those two were a woeful 4-of-28 from the floor. It will be interesting to see if they follow this through the rest of the series by allowing LeBron to get his and try to limit the second and third options for the Cavs. (It still won’t work long-term in this series, but it will be an interesting blueprint for either of the Western Conference teams still playing.)
Jim Mora. Dude rightly raised the point that his quarterback Josh Rosen would have been among the top overall draft picks if the sophomore had been eligible for the NFL draft. Then, the story circles this weekend that Mora gave Rosen a firm talking to after Rosen was filmed on a golf course with a “F@#$ Trump” hat. Mora’s message was pretty simple: “Do you want to be Tom Brady or Johnny Manziel?” It’s a fair point. This side of the head coach, is there any other sports star that we crave boring and predictably benign actions and answers from than our quarterbacks? Think about the very good and better quarterbacks on the NFL level, and what do you really know about them. Not much, and that’s not by accident.
Game of Thrones. Yep, this is a weekly appearance here, but any TV show that can make grown men tear up with a simple act of courtesy/valor like holding the door, well, well-played folks. Well-played indeed.