You da Man!

Next week, the Ryder Cup will take centre stage, faces glued to television sets in the homes of golfing enthusiasts across the country.  Whether or not you’re a fan of Monty, Butch, and Ewan, the Shot Centre or detailed analysis, the coverage is undeniably comprehensive.  Between the snippets of live golf coverage it’s reasonable to assume there’ll also be an unwelcome quota of repetitive commercials, too, but there’s no escaping that.

The adverts might be frequent and annoying, but in terms of the live golf coverage I’m sure I speak for the majority when I say there’s nothing more annoying than that all-too-familiar cry from the gallery of a “get in the hole” or a “you da man”.  OK, it’s the Ryder cup and partisanship and national pride are worn on the sleeve, but this blight on the game isn’t limited to just the Ryder Cup anymore. Indeed, it’s become common place and there doesn’t seem to be much done about it unless it’s in the middle of Tiger’s downswing.  All this said, I’m personally finding a newer (if associated) trend even more irritating, but I’ll come to that in a moment.

Searching for the origins of the hollering spectator isn’t easy.  I might be wrong but back in the early 90s I seem to recall hearing quite a few players muttering phrases such as “be as good as you look” and “get in the hole” with their ball en route and it wouldn’t surprise me if that’s what set the ball rolling.  Whether that does or doesn’t account for the crowd phenomenon now, who knows?  Either way, somewhere along the line a few vociferous, over-enthusiastic (drunk?) spectators saw the opportunity to get involved and shout out increasingly inane phrases such as “mashed potato”.  The days of the ripple of applause and nod of approval seem to have gone out with the persimmon headed driver.

But what really gets my goat now is the obligatory post-shout commentary.  Yes, it’s idiotic (few 550 yard drives have indeed gone “in da hole”), yes it’s annoying, but pointing it out every time doesn’t help you ignore it.  For better or worse (surely the latter), the shouting is so prevalent now that it’s just become part of the modern professional game – at least in the US.  I don’t like it but I’m used to it now and don’t notice it so much as a result.  That is until the commentators start to bemoan the state of the game and call for the immediate ejection of the culprits. I am pretty certain the loud mouth really is an idiot (or drunk, or both), but you really don’t need to highlight it any more – it just makes it worse!

Let’s face it though, the horse well and truly bolted on this a long time ago. You can’t stop spectators shouting now.  Evicting someone for an audible “get in the hole”, assuming it doesn’t put the player off, just doesn’t carry any credibility and makes the game look out of touch. Why? Because it’s not really any different to shouting “great shot” or any other verbal encouragement, even if most of us think it’s inane. There’s nothing offensive about it, it’s just a subjective opinion on what’s acceptable and what isn’t. It’s hardly grounds for kicking someone out, so we all need to climb down from our high horses and suck it up…..as the idiot hollering down the fairway would say.

Of course, there are other annoyances with the broadcasting.  Do we really have to listen to Monty steer everything back to “HIS” Ryder Cup?  I suspect we’ll be looking forward to the ads more than we thought.

Still, I can’t wait for the matches to begin.  I for one will be watching, and listening, whatever comes our way.