Weekend winners
Serena Williams. What do you say when a 34-year-old steamrolls someone like Serena did Saturday? It was awesome. And historic, since Williams now has 22 major single championships - the same as Steffi Graf.
Andy Murray. Dude won his second Wimbledon and did it impressively with a straight-set victory in Sunday's final. (Man, got to tell you we were major league disappointed Roger Federer was not in that match. So it goes. For more on tennis from someone who knows way more than the 5-at-10 about tennis, here's TFP ace sports columnist Mark Wiedmer's view on Murray's win.)
Brittany Lang (and in a lot of ways Anna Nordqvist). The two women who battled for 75 holes for the U.S. Open were gracious and fierce. It was sad how the last 20 minutes played out - and even sadder how USGA president Diana Murphy butchered the post-match presentation - but each handled themselves with class.
Madison Bumgarner. Dude pitched his fourth career one-hit shutout with 14 Ks as the Giants marched into the All-Star break as the best team in baseball.
Portugal. Wow, we had no idea the major tournament drought the Portugal soccer team faced before beating France 1-0 with a goal in the 109th minute of the Euro 2016 championship. It was their first major soccer championship, and it happened improbably considering they did not win a game in pool play and led for only 73 of the more than 700 minutes of the matches in the tournament.
Brittany Lang waves to the gallery while walking to the fifth green during the final round of the U.S. Women's Open golf tournament at CordeValle, Sunday, July 10, 2016, in San Martin, Calif. (AP Photo/Eric Risberg) Weekend losers
USGA. Again. Another U.S. Open, another controversial ruling, and another awful handling of the matter. Unlike the Dustin Johnson decision in the U.S. Open when the rule was not as cut and dried and that violation did not have an outcome on the winner, the Women's Open was all-but decided when Anna Nordqvist grounded her club in a fairway bunker on the second playoff hole by nipping a grain of sand. TV replays caught it, and it's a rule every golfer knows clearly. But the USGA told the players that the violation, which flipped the score in the aggregate three-hole playoff from even to winner Brittany Lang having a two shot lead on the par 5 18th, at possibly the worst and most unfair time. The USGA informed Nordqvist after her approach found the middle of the green (if she had known she was down earlier it completely changes her approach on the hole and even how aggressive she would have been with her third shot) and right before Lang hit her third shot. Knowing she had a two-shot lead rather than being tied, Lang went bag to her picked a safer club to avoid the water, and two-putted for par and the win. To make matters worse, the female president of the USGA called our nation's champion "Bethany Lang" at least three times. War USGA.
Women's golf. What a glorious opportunity this weekend was to showcase your sport. And women's golf left it go. Think about this Sunday's biggest sporting event was either the men's Wimbledon final (which was done before lunch) or the Euro soccer championships (which was pretty boring even by soccer's standards once Cristiano got hurt). There was no baseball to speak of. No PGA since the Greenbrier was rained out. Come Sunday afternoon it was the U.S. Women's Open and informercials. And the golf from the U.S. Women's Open was pretty good. But, it was a silent tree falling in the forest.
Fox's coverage of the U.S. Women's Open. Sadly, we have to call out Fox too. And in truth we like most of their changes and coverage patterns. We think Joe Buck is improving and we like Paul Azinger. (Julie Inkster is a far cry from Dottie Pepper, but we know the deal there.) But the coverage was lacking on several fronts. First, why no yardage on the players' shots? Is this taboo like mentioning a female athlete's weight? If that's the case, then either get over that or do not complain about the shadows in which you live women's golf. That's silly. Second, the microphone in every hole turned up to jet-place decibels made the coverage sound like a video game. Finally, there was some criticism of the USGA for the timing of the ruling but the talking points from the commentators and the questions to the players after the playoff should have been entirely about that. That was the story, the last 30 minutes. (And yes, that's more on women's golf than we've written this year. So there's that - and that tells you how slow a sports day Sunday really was.)
Umpire Tim Timmons and Yunel Escobar. OK, Timmons booted Escobar - a noted gasbag and hot head - from the game Sunday after a questionable strike three call. That's to be expected. The equation is simple: Umpire with a short fuse + hot-headed player = ejection more times than not. The kicker here is that Escobar got ejected for drawing in the infield dirt. Yes, you read that correctly. And when asked to answer questions about the incident, Escobar told reporters, "F#$% that S$%&." You stay classy Anaheim.
Jonathan Ledbetter. As TFP SEC ace David Paschall tells us here, the Georgia Bulldogs had another player arrested again. Hard to see Ledbetter back with the team, don't you think?
Dana White, center, stands between Daniel Cormier, left, and Jon Jones during a UFC 200 mixed martial arts news conference, Wednesday, July 6, 2016, in Las Vegas. Cormier and Jones are scheduled to fight in a light heavyweight championship fight at UFC 200 on Saturday. (AP Photo/John Locher) Big deal
The UFC was sold for $4 billion. Wow, that's a lot of cheddar. Dana White and his partners bought the fighting organization for $2 million in 2000. Even for those of with an Auburn education, it sounds like they doubled their money.
It's an unbelievably smart move for White and Co., considering this feels like the apex of the sport in a lot of ways and there are so many variables facing it. The transition moving forward for this to become a real-life and real-violence version of professional wrestling will be how the new owners handle those. White is planning on staying in his role, but the questions really start to emerge, led by the elephant in the room: Will the athletes unionize?
There are more of course. Things like how to you keep interest when the individuals are not that interesting. Sure, right now the interest is at all-time high, but the growth of the female side of the sport was due in large part to Ronda Rousey and that's not sustainable business plan. Plus, the presence of Jon Jones and Conor McGregor, who ranks on the Rushmore of all-time trash-talkers with Ali, Bird and Deion Sanders, generates interest.
But continuing one-time or individual-generator interest is a supreme challenge for solo sports. Ask NASCAR, golf or boxing. And that has to be continued to generate long-term value.
Considering the prize - if you look at the enterprise as a single franchise, it was bought for twice as much as the L.A. Clippers and for a higher value than the estimated worth of the Dallas Cowboys - protecting value and generating bigger-sclae interest is the only way to make the sport grow beyond its current blood and guts niche
This and that
- As a reminder, we are having The Open Contest (with a side of PGA) for the two major golf championships in the next three weeks. Rules are the same: Send a list of five player - top four scorers count - but your entry will be the same for both majors and the scores will combine. Deal? Deal.
- Thought this was interesting: Reports out of L.A. have the Dodgers ready to turn the page on Yasiel Puig.
- As we head to the All-Star break, your Atlanta Braves are an MLB-worst 31-58. Yes, we have pledged to stay positive, and we are 100 percent positive that finishing with the worst record is the best thing the Braves can do in the rebuild. Remember, as they were assembling pieces in the late 1980s and into the 1990s, they had the worst record in baseball in 1989. They took some shortstop from Florida No. 1 overall in the 1990 draft. They shocked the world with a patch-work club that believed in 1991, and before long that No. 1 overall pick - Chipper Jones - was in the big leagues anchoring a lineup that contended for titles for 15 years.
Today's question
Feel free to peck away at the winners and losers from a sparse sports weekend. (For Pete's sake, we have a ton of tennis, soccer and women's golf up there.)
Also, check your Twitter - you can follow me at Twitter.com/jgreesontfp - for updates from SEC media days.
Plus, remember the golf contest.
As for a Rushmore, we'll go with a Rushmore of Baldness in honor of Yul Brynner, who would have been 96 today.
Go.