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theleaderdotinfo-blog · 6 years ago

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IN THE BUNKER WITH MICK THE GRIP has been published at http://www.theleader.info/2019/02/05/in-the-bunker-with-mick-the-grip-6/

New Post has been published on http://www.theleader.info/2019/02/05/in-the-bunker-with-mick-the-grip-6/

IN THE BUNKER WITH MICK THE GRIP

THE NOISIEST HOLE IN GOLF, the 16th at TPC Scottsdale. The suites and boxes sell out for up to $110,000. The Waste Management Open, formerly the Phoenix Open, is a main fundraising event and Thunderbirds Charities, started in 1932, have raised over $100 million for local causes and distressed people in Arizona. After Rickie Fowler struggled round the soggy course from bunker to lake before finally taking the trophy the most distressed people looked like the players. American golfers really don’t like being rained on. IN 1993 A YOUNG GOLFER gave a clinic in front of a devoted crowd at Jackson Park, a municipal course on Chicago’s South Side where he learned the game. 25 years later, Tiger Woods is back at Jackson Park, and looking to leave his mark. Woods, who won his 80th PGA Tour title at the season-ending Tour Championship, giving him his first victory in over 5 years, is leading the proposed renovation of 18-hole Jackson Park and nine-hole South Shore, two municipal courses at the western edge of Lake Michigan, with views of the Chicago skyline. Under the plans laid out by TGR Design (Woods’s design firm) the two courses will incorporate a 7,341-yard 18-hole championship course and a shorter family course, and include teaching facilities for youngsters. Just one problem, they may have to put a roof on it. Chicago was under 3 feet of snow last week. BRYSON DECHAMBEAU WON his first European Tour title with an 8-under 64 victory at the Omega Dubai Desert Classic. England's Matt Wallace finished second with back-to-back birdies. Dechambeau mixed 7 birdies and an eagle to post the lowest 72-hole total in the tournament's history, finishing at 24 under. In 2018 Dechambeau took three PGA Tour titles in four months, winning the Northern Trust, Dell Technologies Championship and Shriners Hospitals Open. However, he reckons it will take another five years to reach his full potential. His 66 on the Friday in Dubai worried him: “I just didn’t have the right proprioception over shots.” (Proprioception, as we all know, is your awareness of the position and movement of your body) “It’s a lot of hard work with my caddie trying to take account of all the variables: air pressure, firmness values, mph on the speed, putts and ball speed, and spin rates.” Good grief! You wouldn’t want to be the Mad Scientist’s caddie, even for the $100,000 tip. THE MYGOLFSPY REVIEW of Callaway’s new Apex irons says they have clean, stylish looks while still offering a bit of help and forgiveness. “The regular Apex 19 iron is easy to hit but has a lovely forged, blade-like feel at impact.” Callaway say both Apex models are players distance irons with premium craftsmanship. The soft feel comes from a mild carbon steel body while the ‘urethane microsphere technology’ incorporates more than one million tiny air pockets that absorb unwanted vibration. The Callaway 360 Face Cup design promotes high ball speeds across the face, while the tungsten-infused, multi-material construction allows precise location of the CG position in each iron. Better players (the ones who worry about propriowhatsit) might want to fork out for the Pro model. WORLD NUMBER ONE Justin Rose (38) held off the challenge of Australia’s Adam Scott to win the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines by two shots, with his new Honma equipment. With three bogeys in his opening five holes he recovered to card a three-under 69 and win on 21 under. Spain’s Jon Rahm, charging up the fairways like an Andalusian bull, fell away to finish in 5th place. "I haven't won a January tournament for a long time, so this feels great," said Justin. All right for him. Some of us would just like to win something, never mind what month it’s in. WORLD TRAVEL AWARDS has presented the ultimate accolade to Las Colinas Golf: World’s Leading Golf and Villa Resort, 2018. What can they aspire to next? There’s only the Universe to go now. Until next time, Happy Golfing. Contact Mick for repairs and regripping. 638 859 475.

#In The Bunker With Mick The Grip

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flauntpage · 8 years ago

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No, Gisele Didn't Reveal the Pats Are Cheaters This Week

Welcome to the NFL Underground Mailbag. Ask Chris Harris your question about the NFL, general sports or cultural minutiae at [email protected] . Follow him @HarrisFootball .

Zachary W.: Does Gisele outing Tom Brady's concussion(s) from last season confirm the Patriots are cheaters?

For the uninitiated, Brady's wife Gisele gave an interview to Charlie Rose in which she let slip that she thinks about her husband retiring because football is violent and because he suffered at least one concussion in 2016 and, she stammeringly implied, others throughout his career.

Is the potential "cheating" outrage here that the Patriots didn't list Brady on the injury report, and doing so might've changed defensive approaches against him ("For God's sake, hit him on the head with that anvil!")? Is the outrage that the Pats subverted the on-field concussion-evaluation rule, so his rightful place was on the sidelines rather than generating the greatest comeback in NFL history?

I get that some people equate Brady/Belichick/Kraft/Patriots with Trump, and view New England's fifth title as proof that there's no God. But at some point, aren't we doing the same the kind of insane dot-connecting and selective reasoning that sends us up a tree about Trump? In our hearts, we assume everybody in the NFL suffers concussions, everybody in the NFL plays whilst needle-prodded by Toradol, and everybody in the NFL does HGH. We know this. So why do some folks—not necessarily Zachary, but some folks—let this stuff make them crazy?

When the dots get connected. Photo by Greg M. Cooper-USA TODAY Sports

A quarterback who's been sacked 417 times in his career and played 9,167 career NFL snaps, like Brady has, has suffered tons of concussions. It's axiomatic. One reason Brady is the greatest of all time is he's such a maniac that he doesn't ever come off the field unless his ACLs snap.

I grew up in Boston and can't help my own Patriots fandom. I thoroughly acknowledge that if I'd had a choice in the matter, I would hate them and root against them, as we all root against dynasties and arrogant-seeming out-of-market teams and players. But the easiest way to appear an idiot is to say, "They're cheaters, everything they ever won is tainted!" rather than acknowledge they're great. I loathed the Yankee dynasty of the 1990s, but do I run around screaming about Jeffrey Maier and Chuck Knoblauch's phantom tag and Tino Martinez taking strike three? I don't, because it's obvious that Yankee team was the best of its era and one of the best ever, and I prefer not to appear a fool. The extent to which a person engages in conspiracy theories in sports is a pretty good IQ test.

Ted F.: Why is NFL in-game announcing so bad? Will it get better with high-profile former players moving into the broadcast booth?

It's not all bad. Many of the play-by-play guys are a delight. Off the top of my head, I enjoy Al Michaels, Ian Eagle, Kevin Harlan, and, lately, Kevin Burkhardt. Cris Collinsworth is an astonishing analyst. I guess some viewers just don't like smart people, but Collinsworth never ceases to amaze me: he'll see something in real time that's unique and insightful and hard to notice, and alert us to keep it in mind as we watch the replay, and damn if he isn't right a lot of the time.

But let's face it: Collinsworth is the exception, because ex-players and ex-coaches are almost universally a scourge on intelligent analysis.

When you're an exception to the rule. Photo by Tim Fuller-USA TODAY Sports

They fall back on clichés. They hammer predetermined narratives. Most importantly, they shy away from criticizing players. Jon Gruden blows so much sunshine up our national skirt on Monday nights, I'm surprised we all don't shit rainbows.

But I guess there's your answer: the average fan doesn't want insight. He or she wants comfort. How else do you explain the appeal of terminally edgeless Jim Nantz? In some quarters of our narcotized culture, appearing smart is a cardinal sin. (It was once relayed to me that, speaking about my TV career, one higher-up in production at ESPN said, "Nobody likes the smartest guy in the room.") And if the average viewer doesn't care about—or actively eschews!—learning, why not increase your broadcast's Q-rating with some lovable doofus saying, "Turnovers certainly derailed their opportunity to play at a high level on offense."

Will Tony Romo joining CBS change any of this? Of course not! Romo is universally known as a nice guy, he's friends with everyone in the league, and he and Nantz will almost certainly fall all over each other to say things like "They can measure how fast you run and how high you jump, but they can't measure your heart."

I guess I give Jay Cutler a slight chance to be better, because I'm pretty sure he has no friends in or out of the NFL.

Kyle P.: Weather-wise, what's your favorite season?

Most of the year, I live in the hellscape of western Massachusetts, where apparently we've decided we're way too hearty to need wimpy transitional trappings like "spring" or "fall." I spent the winter in Los Angeles (more on that in a moment) and returned April 29, whereupon it rained here for three weeks and never got above 50. Suddenly we got to Wednesday and it was 93. As far as I can tell, the world has menopause.

(Incidentally, those who would tell you that a native population's ability to withstand shitty weather is some indication of character and backbone are the same people who tell you The Fountainhead really kicks into high gear around page 600. Do not listen to these people.)

Fortunately, I work from home and am somewhat personally unlovable (therefore I have no wife or children), and thus I have nothing that forces me to endure what is no doubt objectively the shittiest season in northern climates: winter. Often, therefore, I go someplace warm for the winter and have a grand old time.

So, perversely, I'll say my favorite season is winter, because I can run and hide.

When you're in hiding. Photo by Timothy T. Ludwig-USA TODAY Sports

Lance A.: Why is the NFL really about to shorten the length of its overtime ? It's not actually about player safety, right?

Hm. I assume not?

After all, the entire league seems designed for the express purpose of destroying its labor force. These are the same owners who are barreling headlong toward an 18-game regular season. So this is probably evil.

Possible evil angles:

* More ties will trigger obscure stadium-finance clauses that require local municipalities to pay for chocolate fondue fountains in owners' luxury suites.

* More ties will allow Vegas wise guy with incriminating Mark Davis photos to collect on "There will be more ties this season than Pacman Jones arrests" wager.

* More ties will make Donovan McNabb cry.

Jon: LeGarrette Blount to the Eagles. Winning combo?

Hm. I assume not?

Aptly nicknamed "LB," the hefty Blount gained notoriety as a T.J. Duckett–esque fantasy football hero last season, serving as Tom Brady's goal-line caddie. Unfortunately, he's not actually very good at playing football. Heck, until his Patriots days, he hadn't even been very good at short-yardage rushing, even at 250-plus pounds:

Really, though, numbers don't do Blount's trash-baggery justice.

I've watched him with great rooting interest over portions of the past four seasons, and he's fairly certain he's Warrick Dunn. Too often, he turns his shoulders perpendicular to the play and starts lumbering toward the sideline, only to be tripped up by faster (read: every) defensive players. The dude is a frontrunner's frontrunner. If you're up by two touchdowns? Blount is your guy. But if you need him in a tight road game against Denver, he vanishes.

If I'm an Eagles fan, most worrisome is this:

There's a reason the Patriots signed Mike Gillislee, traded for Rex Burkhead, and renewed James White instead of keeping the man who just gave them 18 TDs. It's because they know Blount is 30 and not good. I don't begrudge the Eagles taking a shot. If Carson Wentz is ready to make a big leap behind a good offensive line, maybe Philly will need a close-in TD machine.

But it's likelier that Blount gets caught blazing in Wendell Smallwood's SUV.

No, Gisele Didn't Reveal the Pats Are Cheaters This Week published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

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viralhottopics · 8 years ago

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Settle in: Paralyzing March blizzard set to slam Philly, New York and Boston

Computer model projection of the blizzard on March 14, 2017.

Image: http://ift.tt/1cGCr66

So much for February’s spring-like temperatures.

A potent blizzard is gathering strength in the Midwest and Southeast, destined to combine into one major storm that will roar across the highly populated Washington to Boston corridor on Monday through early Wednesday.

The storm, unofficially named “Stella” by The Weather Channel, may dump a foot or more of snow on as many as 100 million people.

SEE ALSO: So it looks like Winter’s preparing one final insult for the East Coast

Winter storm and blizzard warnings are in effect in 13 states from Virginia to Maine, with the hardest-hit areas potentially picking up more than 2 feet of snow in less than 24 hours time.

By any standard, this storm is going to be the real deal. Strong winds? Check. Blinding, wind-driven snow? Yeah, it’ll have that. Coastal flooding? That too!

Forecast snowfall totals from the National Weather Service as of March 13, 2017.

Image: weatherbell analytics

The storm is likely to grind business in cities including Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia, Newark, New York, Hartford, Providence and Boston to a halt on Tuesday, with virtually no air travel in or out of the region as well. Power outages are possible, and officials are urging people in affected areas to prepare for the storm ahead of time.

The Weather Service forecast office in Philadelphia is telling people to “shelter in place” on Tuesday morning during the height of the storm there, and similar advice is worth following on up the coast as the blizzard strikes.

Wind gusts exceeding 50 miles per hour are expected from coastal New Jersey northward into Massachusetts, and this, combined with snowfall rates of 2 to 4 inches per hour or more, will lower visibility to near zero at times.

For this reason, blizzard warnings have been hoisted for an unusually broad area in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. This includes northeastern Pennsylvania, southern New York, nearly all of Connecticut, the New York City metro area, and parts of Massachusetts and Rhode Island with the exceptions of the cities of Boston and Providence.

To qualify as a blizzard, a storm must bring a prolonged period of three hours or more in which falling and/or blowing snow reduces visibility to one-quarter mile or less, and sustained winds or frequent gusts reach at least 35 miles per hour.

The blizzard warning indicates that forecasters believe these conditions will be met as the storm strengthens and passes nearby on Tuesday in particular.

Where will the jackpot be?

There are uncertainties in where exactly the heaviest snow will fall, but a foot or more is a good bet in Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, with blockbuster amounts of 2 or more feet to the northwest of these locations.

Parts of northeastern Pennsylvania, northwestern New Jersey, eastern New York and western Massachusetts could see more than 2 feet of snow fall in under 24 hours time. This scenario has been consistently advertised by the reliable European model, which has not wavered from this bullseye for several cycles.

All of this snow will result from a rapidly intensifying low pressure area that will move off the Mid-Atlantic coast on Monday night, to a position near or southeast of Montauk, Long Island, by Tuesday evening.

The storm track is extremely important for where the heaviest bands of snow set up. If the low pressure area moves any closer to the coast than currently forecast, then snowfall totals in the big cities would be less than current estimates. Instead, there could be a mix with or changeover to sleet and rain for a time, as warmer air infiltrates the area from the Atlantic Ocean.

Some computer models are showing the mixing line pushing into New York City, with snow falling in the Bronx, but sleet or rain coming down for a time in Brooklyn and Queens.

Questions that some folks under blizzard warning are asking: Can I walk thru 20″ of snow? And 50 mph winds? Hitting me in the face? http://pic.twitter.com/X02eL39ISL

Ryan Maue (@RyanMaue) March 13, 2017

The storm is likely to be accompanied by small-scale, intense bands of snowfall falling at up to 4 inches per hour or more, and areas that experience more of these heavy “mesoscale” bands will see the highest snowfall totals. It is possible that some spots could break daily snowfall records for March 14 with just an hour’s worth of snowfall.

The most difficult place to forecast this event may be the Washington area, where marginally cold temperatures could keep the precipitation falling as rain, sleet or wet snow, rather than accumulating snow, and heavy bands of precipitation may or may not materialize.

The National Weather Service is calling for the season’s biggest snowfall event of the season there, but that’s not saying much, since the city’s received a measly 1.4 inches so far this season.

Jaded snow lovers in the nation’s capital are familiar with the so-called “D.C. snow hole,” in which the city gets little-to-no snow while surrounding areas get clobbered. This may again happen this time around, in part because the storm will still be in its infancy as it passes near the city.

Simulation of satellite imagery on March 14, 2017, showing the major storm across the East Coast.

Image: weatherbell analytics

The key ingredients for this event include an Arctic high pressure system that is in position across southeastern Canada and northern New England. This will pump cold, dry air into the storm, helping to churn out the snow as Atlantic moisture flows into the area. Some cold temperature records were been set across New England this weekend as this air mass settled in from Canada.

Second, two atmospheric disturbances, one riding the northern jet stream out of Canada, and the other surfing the southern jet from the Gulf of Mexico, are now destined to meet up and combine forces to form a single, strong storm.

However, subtle shifts in this atmospheric mating ritual, known to meteorologists as “phasing,” can make a big difference in where the surface low pressure area forms and where it moves. This can, in turn, affects snowfall totals.

One remarkable aspect of this storm will be its speed. This just isn’t your typical, lallygagging, lazy nor’easter. Blockbuster snowstorms in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast tend to be long-lasting affairs, with snow falling for 30 hours or more. However, this one may feature a thump of heavy snow that falls during just 12 hours or less, with the ridiculously heavy snowfall rates more than making up for the time crunch.

4 terms to know

There are a few weather geek terms you’re likely to come across when following this blizzard on social media. First is bombogenesis, which is an actual meteorological term, and not a band name. It refers to a low-pressure area that sees an air pressure drop, or intensification rate, of more than 24 millibars in 24 hours. Typically, these “bombing out” storms are the most violent, and some of the biggest snow producers.

#Bombogenesis: Could Winter Storm #Stella become a weather “bomb” off the Northeast coast? https://t.co/bF8CUQ9da0 http://pic.twitter.com/Kh2kht8eZL

The Weather Channel (@weatherchannel) March 12, 2017

The second is a “dry slot,” which sounds, well, a bit off-color, but refers to an area of dry air that gets entrained into a low pressure area at the mid-levels of the atmosphere. Forecasts call for such a phenomenon to affect eastern New England on Tuesday afternoon, which could limit snowfall amounts there since it would lead to lighter precipitation for a time.

You’re also likely to hear a lot about sleet. These are the little ice pellets that sting when they hit your face, and make a pinging sound on your windows. Sleet is not the same as hail, which forms in thunderstorms.

A mix with or changeover to sleet is anticipated for the immediate coast, possibly including New York City, on Tuesday as the storm center makes its closest pass. This will lead to slightly less snow there than in areas just outside the city.

An exceptionally energetic storm, with high snowfall rates (& likely #thundersnow) and very strong #WIND #noreaster #blizzard #Stella http://pic.twitter.com/6qCOCM2e7B

Stu Ostro (@StuOstro) March 13, 2017

Lastly, thundersnow is a real possibility with this storm due to the atmospheric dynamics involved, primarily the rapid vertical motion of air. Thundersnow is essentially just a thunderstorm that occurs while it is snowing, and is often associated with the most intense areas of snow. Such thunderstorms have a different structure, however, when compared to typical summertime storms.

Is this normal for March?

March snowstorms aren’t that unusual for the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. In fact, Monday, March 13 is the anniversary of one of the most powerful storms to ever track up the East Coast, known as the “Superstorm of 1993.” It dumped a foot or more of snow from Georgia to Maine, and knocked out power to tens of millions.

March blizzards have a history of hitting New York, too. A legendary blizzard struck the city on March 12, 1888, dumping 21 inches of snow. Still, if this storm were to produce a foot or more of snow in Central Park, it would be just the fifth March storm to do so.

The upcoming storm would come in as a top 10 snowstorm for New York if at least 18.1 inches accumulates in Central Park. After this storm, winter may not be over yet, either. In Boston, it’s been known to snow all the way into April, and there are signs of another storm brewing for next weekend.

WATCH: 2016 was Earth’s warmest year on record, continuing a three-year streak