March 14, 2010

Weekend Highlights

A quick couple of blurbs, recapitulating the weekend.

1) Turns out David Beckham - one of the darlings of this blog, it seems - won't be going to the World Cup after all.  During a game on Sunday, Goldenballs broke his achilles tendon, ruling him out for the next five to six months.  This means that the 34-year old will most likely miss the entire 2010 MLS season, for which will be paid roughly $6.5 million, as part of the 5-year, $32.5 million contract he signed in 2007.  A tough break, no pun intended, for Beckham, England, and MLS.

2) Most people are aware that Tiger Woods will soon return to competitive golf.  According to various reports, Woods has been putting in some time with swing coach Hank Haney at the Isleworth Golf Club where Woods resides.  When he actually resumes play, however, has been a hot topic recently: will it be the Masters (April 8th), or the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill (March 26th), or even the closed-to-the-public Tavistock Cup (March 22nd)?  Interestingly, the Tavistock Cup is a match-play event between Isleworth, Tiger's club, and Lake Nona, another highly-exclusive private golf club in Orlando.  As Darren Rovell notes, if Tiger does participate in the Tavistock Cup, he'll need a very particular wardrobe. Check the rules for both participants and invited guests:


That's right.  Only the colors of Isleworth Red or Lake Nona Blue constitute acceptable attire.  I hope Norway's curling team doesn't show up.

3) Apparently, Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi still don't like each other.  Over the weekend, they used a 45-minute charity match - with current pros Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer - which raised $1 million for victims of the Haiti earthquake to give us a glimpse of their relationship.


4) Finally, even though this is an old commercial - December 2009 - it is now my favorite 'This is SportsCenter' advertisement of all time.


Simple, understated, brilliant.  And normally, that would be enough.  Except that there is this tiny bit of footage - shot around the same time as the above ad - from ESPN's backyard on the sprawling Bristol campus.  Would it blow your mind to see Arnold Palmer hit a golf ball into an Arnold Palmer?


Yes, it would.

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