By Art Spander
Featured Columnist
The clock ticks. No one wants to hear the sound. Few pay attention, particularly athletes. They believe they’ll always be young. Until suddenly they’re not.
A golfer’s career is long, longer than careers in other sports, but it is not forever. The opportunities get fewer as the months and the tournaments go by.
Copyright © 2014 Bleacher Report, Inc.
By Art Spander
OAKLAND — Opening day is for baseball. Opening night is for the theater. But if the A’s, the defending AL West Division champions, had tried to play an afternoon game Monday they would have been rained out. After dark they merely were shut out.
Only one of 162. That’s the way major leaguers reflect on every defeat. In the major leagues if you lose one out of three you’ll have great season, a 90-win season or better.
But it hurts to lose that first one. Especially at home. Especially in front of a rare sellout crowd, 36,067.
Especially when the relief pitcher you traded for in the off-season enters in a tied ninth inning and pitches so poorly that Oakland not only loses to the Cleveland Indians, 2-0, but he is booed when pulled after three of the four batters he faced reached base.
The A’s had a reliable closer in Grant Balfour, but they — meaning GM Billy Beane and others in the front office — saw a reason to acquire Jim Johnson from the Orioles and dump Balfour. Johnson had more than a 100 saves over the previous two years for Baltimore.
He made his first appearance in Oakland’s first game. He was not at all impressive.
“I did everything you’re not supposed to do as a pitcher,” confided Johnson, who to his credit didn’t try to hide in a clubhouse packed with reporters and TV cameras.
What he was supposed to do remains conjecture. What he did was walk the first man he faced, Asdrubal Cabrera, give up a single to the next man he faced, David Murphy, and hit with a pitch the third man he faced, Yan Gomes. Bases loaded and no one out. Help!
Nyjer Morgan’s fly to center got an out but it also got Cabrera home on a sacrifice fly. Nick Swisher singled to center, scoring Murphy, and as the disenchanted gathering at the O.co Coliseum provided an accompaniment of boos, out went Johnson, replaced by Fernando Abad.
“I would have booed me too,” agreed Johnson after a debut not long to be remembered. “It’s not the way you want to start with a new team. It’s too bad after the way Sonny Gray battled. But there will be better days.”
Gray, named to start an opener for the first time in his brief career, thought there wouldn’t even be a game because of the afternoon downpour. The uncertainty had him even more nervous than a 24-year-old with only 61 days of major league experience could ever be.
“It was kind of tough mentally,” said Gray. He walked two of the first three Indians batters and needed to throw 29 pitches in the opening inning. Still, no one scored — then or in the subsequent five innings Gray pitched.
Of course, no one scored for the A’s in nine innings, including the eighth when they had the bases loaded and one out. Josh Donaldson had hit one more than 400 feet off the center field boards, but the A’s on base ahead of him, Daric Barton and Coco Crisp, had to hold up on the ball to make sure it wouldn’t be caught.
After Donaldson’s blast, reduced to a single, Jed Lowrie struck out and Brandon Moss grounded to first.
Oakland manager Bob Melvin, a stable sort, shrugged off the entire experience. The A’s had been unable to play their final exhibition Saturday at Oakland against the Giants because of a rainstorm. Maybe just the opportunity to get through game, even a losing game, was a relief of sorts.
The A’s are built on pitching, and through eight innings Gray, Luke Gregerson and Sean Doolittle provided shutout pitching. No complaints there.
The ninth undid them, but if you can’t get a run on offense then something bad is bound to occur.
“He walks the first guy,” said Melvin, a onetime catcher, analyzing Johnson’s ineffectiveness. “But he’s always the type of guy who’s one pitch away form getting a double play. It just wasn’t his day.”
At noon you’d have sworn it would be no one’s day except the groundskeepers. The rain was coming down hard, and not far away in Berkeley lightning hit a tree and split it down the middle. At 4 p.m., three hours before the scheduled first pitch, workers were pushing water by the gallon off the tarp covering the infield.
The poor A’s, was your only thought. Tickets already sold. Anticipation high. A couple of exhibition wins over the Giants at AT&T Park in their rear-view mirror. How cruel the sporting gods are.
Then, as if on cue, the sun came out. The A’s and their fans finally had a good break. Until the ninth inning.
By Art Spander
Featured Columnist
The pain is physical, a back that aches when Tiger Woods swings a golf club, which he must do if he is to play the game.
The pain is mental. The Masters is just over a week away, a tradition like no other, as we’re so often reminded by Jim Nantz, a tradition to which Woods has contributed greatly. And Tiger, winner of four green jackets, is wondering whether he’ll compete.
Copyright © 2014 Bleacher Report, Inc.
By Art Spander
OAKLAND — Not good enough to relax. The head coach said that about the Warriors. Said it Tuesday night when the Warriors proved they are very good, indeed.
Maybe as good as they’ve been in the last 20 years, tough, confident and, as Mark Jackson told us, refusing to relax, even when in another time they very well might have relaxed.
The mark of a great team is that it understands what is necessary to win. Understands there are going to be starters out of the lineup. Understands there are going to be opponents with awful records, and the record of the Orlando Magic is nothing but awful.
Understands to ignore everything but the task at hand.
There was usual obligatory sellout at Oracle Arena, 19,596, the Warriors’ 71st straight at home, and in that crowd surely there were more than a few people who remember when in another era — maybe not too distant — Golden State would have lost.
Not this team, which after losing here Friday night to Cleveland went up to Portland, fell behind by 18 points and won. That single game showed us that this group has the mental toughness to go along with the physical skill.
Tuesday night was a reiteration.
Andre Iguodala couldn’t play because of tendinitis in his knee. Andrew Bogut couldn’t play because of an inflamed left ankle. Two down out of five. And the Magic, on a five-game losing streak, and 19-48 overall, ready to spring a trap.
Except Mark Jackson teams do not get trapped. Or beaten by 19-48 teams. On the contrary. They score 18 consecutive points early in the third quarter. They get 23 points from Stephen Curry and 20 points each from Klay Thompson and David Lee. They get the usual boost off the bench, this time from Marreese Speights (13 points, 8 rebounds). They blow out the Magic, 103-89.
“It was a quality win for us,” said Jackson. “I’m really pleased the way we got after it. We handled our business and competed.”
An excellent way to describe it. The Warriors are relatively young, other than David Lee and Iguodala, and young teams, young players, sometimes lose their focus.
So many games over so many weeks and so many flights to so many cities combine to take a toll. Suddenly, everything can go the wrong way. For the Warriors, everything is going the proper way, the way they’ve been instructed, the way that champions perform.
“I thought we were very unselfish and did a great job of sharing the basketball,” said Jackson. When he played, he was a point guard, in charge of sharing the basketball. Now he is delighted to share the accolades.
“We got some good play from our bench also,” he added. “We continue to chalk up wins, and we are closing it out right.”
Closing it out by rallying against the Trail Blazers on the road. Closing it out by overwhelming the Magic at home. Playing effective defense — Orlando scored 19 points in the third quarter, 20 in the second quarter.
Closing it out by shooting 45.1 percent — which, strangely, is a bit under what Orlando shot (45.5) but the W’s got more shots and thus made more.
“I think our guys know we’re not good enough to relax,” said Jackson. What he knows is the sport of basketball. There was some question as to how he would do, how he would relate, when after several years in the broadcast booth Jackson was the surprise choice to be the Warriors’ coach. But in retrospect, it was a brilliant move by owner Joe Lacob and whoever gave him advice, from consultant Jerry West to GM Bob Myers.
Jackson’s years as an analyst for ESPN and ABC gave him a different look at the modern game that he now gets from the bench — or because he’s often standing, from the sideline. He can be critical with his players. He can be instructive. He never is destructive.
“All teams at this stage of the season are dangerous,” said Jackson. “People are playing for contracts, for jobs. Everybody’s out to prove something, even the teams far back.”
What the Warriors are proving is that they have the right stuff. We already knew they had the right people. Again without hesitation, Jackson called Curry and Thompson the best pair of shooting guards in history, and it doesn’t matter if specifically they are or are not. They’re fantastic, and that’s enough.
“It starts with Curry and Thompson,” said Jacque Vaughn, the Magic’s head coach. “It makes it tough to defend their (big men). They do a good job of playing with each other, passing the basketball.”
And, certainly, shooting it.
“You’ve got to win games at home down the stretch,” said Curry. “This is one of those situations obviously, so it's a big win for us to try to regain some momentum after two tough losses (at Oracle) and keep it moving. We got stops, and we were able to push in transition and keep that ball moving.”
By Art Spander
OAKLAND — And our name for today is, no, not Jonathan Martin, although he has to be part of the equation. Or even Barry Bonds — who belongs in the Hall of Fame — because he talked baseball with Willie Mays and Willie McCovey, who are in the Hall.
No, our subject is Jordan Crawford, one of those people in sport who keep getting dumped overboard but, in a beautiful example of how our games teach us so much about life, keeps showing his value.
Crawford has been in the NBA four years, and now, after being sent to the Warriors by the Boston Celtics some two months ago, is with his fifth team.
And if you want to add the New Jersey (now Brooklyn) Nets, which took in the first round of the 2010 draft but within minutes moved him to Atlanta, the total is six teams.
What Crawford did on a Tuesday night at Oracle Arena was come off the bench to score more than Steph Curry. More than Klay Thompson. More than Dirk Nowitzki.
More than anyone on either team.
Crawford had 19, and the W’s, after a hesitant beginning, played defense as it’s programmed, offense as the opportunity presented, and overwhelmed the Dallas Mavericks, 108-85.
That they immediately flew to Los Angeles, where tonight they face the Clippers, the team that most likely will be the W’s first-round playoff opponent and could thump them, in no way diminishes the victory, Golden State’s fifth in a row.
“You have to care of the ones you are supposed to take care of,” said Mark Jackson, the Warriors' coach, a very satisfied gentleman not only because of the success but also because of the manner in which it was achieved — with the Mavs shooting just 36.6 percent.
Having grown up in New York and played for Lou Carnesecca at St. John’s, Jackson learned early on that defense is the key to every game. It’s much easier to knock a ball out of a man’s hand, whether he’s shooting or dribbling, than to knock down a 20-foot jumper.
That is, unless Curry and Klay Thompson are in your lineup. And they were in the Warriors’ lineup.
On Tuesday night, so was Crawford, a 6-foot-4 guard, who had 14 points by the time Curry, with only 4:19 to go in the first half, got his first points.
“He was great,” Jackson said of Crawford. “I don’t think enough credit has been given to him because we went out and got Steve Blake.”
That was on February 19, a month after Crawford came to the Warriors. Blake was dispatched by the hated Lakers because they have sunk to a level no one this side of Chick Hearn’s memory ever could have believed.
Crawford arrives. Hurray. Then Blake arrives. Oops.
“I’ve seen guys fold up the tent,” Jackson said, talking about Crawford’s response to the acquisition of Blake. “And I’ve seen players hold their head down and not be ready. (Crawford) has been professional.”
Such a poignant word, no matter what, no matter whom. A professional, by definition — and he or she can be an amateur — doesn’t brood or sulk or quit but tries to do their best.
“He has the gift to score,” said Jackson. In 22 minutes, Crawford was 8 for 12 from the floor, including 3 of 6 on three-pointers. “When called upon," the coach added, "he’s been ready and deserves a lot of credit.”
So too, reminded Jackson, does Bob Myers, the Warriors' general manager. The W’s now have two legitimate NBA lineups, never missing a beat — or many shots — when the subs take over.
“I think our bench scored 59 points,” said Jackson. “We defended at a high level.”
Especially in the third quarter, when the Warriors outscored the Mavs, 24-13. If a pro team can’t get 20 in a period, it’s in trouble. And Dallas was.
“Having the Dallas Mavericks in our building with us being rested,” said Jackson, “it was important for us to take care of business.”
For Crawford, well accepted by his teammates, the business is one of enjoyment. Big salaries are not always a substitute for lack of playing time.
“It’s a good feeling,” said Crawford. “It’s fun. I think the coach has more confidence in (the reserves), and we see that. It’s easier for us to play, and you can get a little more time. To be on a streak like this heading into the playoffs and to move up in the standings bring out the competitive spirit in everybody.”
By Art Spander
Special to the Times
The old guy, Father Time, will triumph in the end. He always does. But for the moment Roger Federer is holding serve against him, which in a sport primarily of the young is no small achievement.
Federer has come to terms with reality. "If I can't play for No. 1," he said three days ago, "I'll play for winning titles."
Read the full story here.
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
TEMPE, Ariz. — He is young, gifted and unsatisfied. Mike Trout of the Angels has been described as the best player in the game, which only makes him want to get better.
"I keep thinking about putting up good numbers," he said recently. Not the numbers in a bank account. The ones in the record books.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
PHOENIX — The ballpark was quiet, and so the man's derision was easily heard. "M-V-P-E-D!" he chanted. "M-V-P-E-D!"
Ryan Braun was stepping into the batter's box and into the little world he has created, that of a disgraced user of performance-enhancing drugs.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SURPRISE, Ariz. — Such an appropriately named community for what happened to Prince Fielder in November.
Fielder was the centerpiece of a blockbuster trade that had the Tigers sending him to the Rangers. Both teams share a training complex with the Royals each spring in this western suburb of Phoenix.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to the Times
She went back to where it all started, to the wall in Sochi. Maria Sharapova, out of boredom really, as a child began smacking a tennis ball while her father played his weekly game a few feet away.
"My career started in Sochi," Sharapova said Wednesday, reviewing her trip home and to the Winter Olympics.
Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
GLENDALE, Ariz. — The man has been walked 1,246 times, but his walk Sunday night will be considerably different.
No wide ones from a pitcher. Rather, a stroll on a red carpet in Hollywood.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
GLENDALE, Ariz. — He agreed to come back for a final year, a farewell tour if you will, which Paul Konerko definitely deserves.
The Chicago White Sox were thinking about their future when they signed Cuban defector Jose Abreu for $68 million to play first base.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — The sun was shining, and the A’s and Giants were playing ball. What else do you need to know? That Sergio Romo couldn’t find his changeup pitch? That Josh Reddick twice reached over the right-field fence to steal away home runs? That 6,498 fans were living it up?
An exhibition, the opener, the two Bay Area teams. And every time they play, for real or not — although isn’t baseball the truest form of reality even when the game doesn’t count? — in our minds it’s the 1989 World Series once again.
Time passes, baseball remains eternal.
It’s all about anticipation, about the new kids on the block, about the veterans, about the players — and the plays. When baseball comes around, we’re all young again, remembering what was, wondering what will be.
Strike three, ball four, go the lyrics from Damn Yankees, “walk a run you’ll tie the score.”
Other lyrics, from South Pacific, “ . . . her skin is tender as DiMaggio’s glove . . .”
A sport, a metaphor, an ideal.
The greatest mass dream America ever had. The great Frank Deford said that of spring training, a time of myth and magic, when winter melts away and no one has a care.
There used to be an eatery near Scottsdale Stadium, Pischke’s, where the posted admonition was “No Sniveling.” Easy advice. Nobody snivels during spring training.
They cheer. They laugh. They hope. They marvel.
“I don’t think I’d seen anybody go higher against the wall here,” Giants manager Bruce Bochy said of Reddick’s superb defense. “And he did it twice. Back to back. What do you think the odds were on that?”
Mike Morse, the new Giant, the guy they signed to play left field, to hit home runs, smacked both those balls, one in the second inning, the other in the fourth.
They were over the fence. They were in Reddick’s glove.
"He's known for doing that, man," Morse said. "I'm happy to help him work on it in spring training, I guess."
Reddick even got a standing ovation from Giants fans. They know special when they see it. Those were special.
“When I looked up, it was probably two feet above my head,” said Reddick, “and I guess got lucky to throw my glove at it. I just quick-snatched it, I guess you could say. I was shocked, even being able to come close to it. No idea how I did it.”
The A’s did it to the Giants, 10-5. Four runs in the first for Oakland. Six in the fourth. “A rough day for Romo,” said Bochy of Romo who gave up seven hits and all the runs in that sixth. “He was off a little bit.”
Twenty-six players used by the Athletics, 26 by the Giants. Players with numbers like wide receivers (81, the Giants’ Adam Duvall, who homered in the bottom of the ninth). With numbers like defensive linemen (67, the Giants’ Andrew Susac).
It’s like Little League. Everybody gets in.
Before the game, Larry Baer, the Giants’ president, held court in the dugout. He said he wants to see the A’s get their ballpark. In Oakland.
“If we can help them get it, we will,” said Baer. Sharing AT&T for a while wouldn’t be out of the question, if that fits into the A’s plans.
He said he wants to see the Giants rebound after their awful 2013 season, so out of character for the franchise.
“It felt strange,” he said of not being in the race. “It was like that’s not in our DNA.”
He said he wants to see the Giants sell from 2.8 to 3 million tickets, which presumably they will do.
“Nobody has said the Giants can’t make it on the field because of money,” was Baer’s outlook. Yes, the Dodgers have billions, and won the National League West last year, but don’t think the Giants won’t spend when it’s needed — in August and September.
“Besides,” Baer pointed out, “it’s how the money is spent. Look at the A’s.”
Yes, look at the A’s, careful with their dollars, who won their division again, who in Nick Punto have a shortstop that solidifies the infield defense, who as it was shown Wednesday can be frighteningly aggressive at the plate.
The new signee, Sam Fuld, led off the game with a single to center. And away we went, without hesitation. Bang, boom, wham. In the end 16 hits, and only four walks.
The A’s weren’t waiting. The waiting was done for all. Baseball was back.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
MARANA, Ariz. — The Frenchman who not many knew kept pulling off shots that few could believe, saving pars out of the desert. But in the end it was Jason Day, the Aussie, who ended up the winner on what was one of golf's longest days.
Three holes ahead with only six to play, Day had to make a birdie putt on the 23rd hole Sunday to defeat Victor Dubuisson, 1 up, and take the WGC Accenture Match Play Championship.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
GLENDALE, Ariz. — For Don Mattingly, in Dodgers blue, the present remains linked with the past, when he wore Yankees pinstripes.
"I was around quality people,'' said Mattingly, whose entire 14-year playing career from 1982-95 was with the Yankees. "People that tried to play the game the right way and tried to be excellent in everything they did."
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
Thirteen years and a hemisphere apart, Ernie Els again is in the semifinals of the Accenture WGC World Match Play Championship after a victory over a kid not half his age.
Els, 44, took advantage of his experience and the ineffectiveness of 20-year-old Jordan Spieth for a 4-and-2 victory Saturday in their quarterfinal at the Golf Club at Dove Mountain in the foothills north of Tucson.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — Bubba Watson has always been impressed with the history of Riviera Country Club, where Ben Hogan won a U.S. Open, celebrities from Humphrey Bogart to Dean Martin were members and Howard Hughes once took lessons.
It is a tournament once known as the Los Angeles Open that began in 1937 and through the years had winners such as Hogan, Sam Snead, Arnold Palmer, Charlie Sifford and Tom Watson.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Global Golf Post
PACIFIC PALISADES, CALIFORNIA — This is how you're greeted upon entering the most unique website for anyone who plays golf for a living:
"I love taking something from nothing and turning it into an image that makes you stop and think."
Copyright 2014 Global Golf Post
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — William McGirt is one of those golfers who kept thinking of quitting the game but didn't. Three rounds into the Northern Trust Open, that decision looks like the proper one.
The 34-year-old McGirt, a nonwinner in 10 years as a pro, is at 12-under-par 201 and two shots in front going into Sunday's final round at historic Riviera Country Club.
Copyright © 2014 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — So far from Sochi, but not from reality. This is the other side of the sporting world, the place of eternal spring.
This is the other side of Los Angeles, where, contrary to traffic jams and constant change, one finds a comforting stability.
Up there on the hill, the stucco clubhouse, in the hallways, photos remind what used to be, Ben Hogan, Katherine Hepburn and a Hollywood of evening clothes and Champagne.
Out there on the course are representatives of what is, the Dustin Johnsons and Jason Dufners, the present and future — yet linked inextricably to the past.
Riviera Country Club, off the circuitous wandering of Sunset Boulevard just before the road arrives at the Pacific, is where history resides.
Where there’s a statue of Hogan on the edge of the practice green. Where Howard Hughes once took lessons. Where Humphrey Bogart sipped whiskey from a Thermos while watching Sam Snead and Byron Nelson hit shots.
Where Tiger Woods never has won.
And where Fred Couples plays on and on.
So little is permanent in southern California. Always another freeway, another subdivision.
Riviera is of an earlier time, the 1920s. Bobby Jones played at Riviera. “Very nice,” he said, “but tell me — where do the members play?”
Riviera is of the current time. “I love this course,” said Justin Rose, who last summer won the U.S. Open. “It’s got a very unique look to it.”
Fred Couples has a unique look, a unique game. He is a senior, a player on the Champions Tour. But he isn’t too old to play at Riviera in the Northern Trust Open.
“I’m lucky,” said Couples, who received an invitation. “This is my favorite tournament.”
This is the 32nd time he’s been in the tournament that in typical L.A. fashion has gone through several names, from the Los Angeles Open to the Nissan Open to the Northern Trust Open.
Couples is 54. One of his playing partners in the first two rounds is Jordan Spieth, 20, who wasn’t close to being born when Couples first came to Riviera in 1981. In Thursday’s first round, each shot a one-over-par 72.
“My goal,” said Couples, who now lives about a mile from the course, “is to hang with these (younger) guys.”
Someday Couples’ photo may hang near those of Hogan and the entertainment personalities who through the decades were as much a part of Riviera as the par-3 sixth hole, the one with the bunker in the middle of the green.
That headline from the Jan. 7, 1947, Los Angeles Times calling Hogan a “Tiny Texan” is a classic. So is the picture of Hepburn and the great Babe Zaharias, a consultant for the film “Pat and Mike,” which naturally was shot at Riviera.
“Riviera member” Gregory Peck is shown swinging a club in another photo. And a picture from 1953, taken during the production of the movie “The Caddy,” matches Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Bob Hope and Bing Crosby.
How wild it must have been at Riviera 70, 80 years ago. Errol Flynn was arrested during one dinner party for attempting to steal a badge from an off-duty policeman. The comedian W.C. Fields, a member, said the only easy shot was the first at the 19th hole.
“There are great courses that people like,” said Couples, who surely likes Riviera, where he’s won twice, “and there are some that don’t, but I don’t know anyone who would not like this course. It’s very fair, and it’s going to be, what, 80 degrees this week?”
Not quite that warm, but it was in the 70s Thursday, and the scores were mostly in the 60s, with Dustin Johnson in front at five-under 66. Johnson was second to Jimmy Walker by a shot Sunday at Pebble Beach, in the drizzle. Now he’s first in the sunshine.
“Ever since the first time I came here,” said Johnson, offering another endorsement of Riviera, “I’ve liked this golf course. It’s a great, great golf course.”
A course that, when constructed in 1926, was the second most expensive course on the planet, behind the course at Yale University. In the days when you could probably buy all of Los Angeles for the price of a Duesenberg, that is saying a great deal.
The big game then was polo, played on fields where a junior high school now sits near the course.
Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks were among Riviera's first members. Clark Gable and Katherine Hepburn rode horses and took late-afternoon walks on trails that meandered through the coastal canyons.
It’s so very Hollywood. And so very remarkable.