Revisiting Jim Furyk's outside game

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. — Old rivals die hard. Either that orold rivals just get old and like to talk about the old glory days. Oh yes, those halcyon days when we had more hair and could drill 20-footers from the corner...

Jim Furyk remembers those days, too, especially the part about the 20-footers from the corner, which he recalled in better detail than a pro athlete with his resume should. See, the 2003 U.S. Open champion and former No. 2 rated player in the world (he’s currently ranked No. 5) was known less for his unconventional golf swing and stellar short game when he was a student at Manheim Township High School in Lancaster, Pa., and more for his stroke from the outside on the Blue Streaks’ basketball team.

At least that’s how I remember it, though Furyk politely corrected some of those memories about his basketball career on Tuesday afternoon as he finished up a practice round at Aronimink Golf Club ahead of the AT&T National. Playing somewhat near his hometown (head out 30 west until you get to Manheim Pike and then make a right at Granite Run… that will take you into his old ‘hood), or at least close enough that fans waiting for autographs called out, “Go Blue Streaks!” at him, Furyk explained that the 20-footer from the corner against Lebanon wasn’t as clutch as believed.

It was still a pretty big shot though.

“We had to beat them once in the next two games in order to win the second-half title,” Furyk said, before calling his abilities on the basketball court, “average.”

For a golfer (whatever that means), he still looks like he could give some high school kids a good run after finishing up 18 holes. Fit and trim as he was in high school, Furyk is playing some of the best golf of his life these days. Perhaps the only things that betray his age are the list of tournaments won and a hairline that has disappeared and crawled away for good.

As for Furyk being just an "average" ballplayer, I beg to differ. Considering that he played at the quintessential suburban high school in which it was somewhat surprising to learn that John Hughes did not scout out the place in order to research some of his movies like Pretty in Pink or The Breakfast Club or even 16 Candles, they were no pushover for us at the inner-city McCaskey High. We always thought we could waltz into gyms like Manheim Township or Hempfield and just intimidate them because our team was not made up of too many white kids, but that wasn’t always the case.

Township could play and the reason for that was guys like Furyk knew their roles and were put in positions where they could rely on their strengths. For the gang at McCaskey — and every other team in the Lancaster-Lebanon League circa 1988 — that meant Furyk could not be left open.

“You guys had more talent,” Furyk conceded to me, “but we put it together better.”

It’s difficult to argue with that considering Furyk’s team went to the league championship to face Warwick, which was a juggernaut that season with all-stater, Jack Hurd. If that name sounds familiar it’s because Hurd went on to start for four years at La Salle and has a spot in the Big 5 Hall of Fame. You can see his picture hanging on the wall at The Palestra if you look for it. Because of this fact, Hurd was the real star of the sports scene back then. Chalk it up to being the guy with a full ride to play for a Division I basketball program, while the other guy was best known for a sport that doesn't exactly draw too many spectators.

To some degree, Furyk went somewhat unnoticed in those days. Oh sure, we all knew how good he was at golf considering he won the state championship by a record 12 strokes. Even for high school where the talent parity in sports is not the same as it is in higher levels of competition, Furyk was like the Globetrotters playing against the Washington Generals.

All he needed was a bucket of confetti.

“It wasn’t like he shot par and everyone else was terrible,” said a high school and amateur golf competitor of Furyk’s named Ben Miller, from Lancaster. “He shot [two great rounds] and just ran away from everyone.”

That’s kind of the way it was in the 2003 U.S. Open where he tied the all-time record for the lowest 72-hole score in tournament history. The difference there, of course, was that Furyk was beating Tiger Woods and not punk kids named Miller from Lancaster. Still, it was during his senior year at Manheim Township where his path to a career in golf first became crystal clear.

“Up until his junior year he was really, really good,” Miller said. “But by his senior year there was no one who could compete with him. He just went to a different level.”

But consider this… just what in the hell was Furyk doing on the basketball court to begin with? Considering he was the top amateur golfer in Pennsylvania probably since Latrobe's Arnie Palmer tore it up, it’s a wonder he wasn’t sequestered at Meadia Heights hitting balls all day. Or, perhaps, if he had shown such talent for golf these days he could have been enrolled in one of those special schools where kids focus on their sport all day long with some book learnin’ sprinkled in.

Instead Furyk was a regular dude who played whatever sports he could. Miller says Furyk was a champion swimmer when he was a kid and played football, too. Still, think of the time he spent playing competitive high school basketball where an injury could have ruined one of the era’s best all-around golf careers. Didn’t anyone tell him to stop?

“No, all my friends were on the basketball team, so it was a chance for me to hang out with them,” he said, adding that some of the guys from the Township hoops squad were in his wedding and he still keeps in close touch with them now. Golf (obviously) didn’t have that social aspect with all its need to shush anyone who makes even the slightest noise when shifting from one foot to another.

In Lancaster, Pa. in 1988 being on the golf team wasn’t the path to popularity.

“Playing golf wasn’t too cool back then,” Furyk said, noting that during the golf season he had to bring his clubs to school and stash them in the coach’s office. “There was no way I was going to ride the bus to school with my clubs so I used to make my mom drive me. I wasn’t going to be seen carrying my golf bag on the bus or around school.”

Ah, but times change. What was uncool in the 1980s is viewed differently these days and one has to imagine that a state champion golfer would not get picked on for dragging his golf clubs around at school. Maybe getting a ride from mom would be the wrong move, but golf — for someone as good as Furyk — nah, not any more.

Besides, it wasn’t like the cool kids or jocks were pasting a “kick me” sign on his back in the hallways as if he were George McFly. This is Jim Furyk we’re talking about… he was on the basketball team.

Here’s the really interesting part… during Furyk’s senior year Billy Owens of Carlisle High and later Syracuse University (and then six different teams in the NBA), was the best player in Pennsylvania. Fortunately, Furyk says, he never had to face Owens in basketball like some of us. But where it gets interesting is Owens is exactly 11 days older than Furyk and was the more heralded athlete during high school and for many years after, too.

But Owens has been retired from the NBA since 2001 while Furyk, at age 40, has already won two tournaments this year and has won the sixth-most number of tournaments among active players. Yes, at 40, Furyk is just getting started.

“That’s why golf is a great game,” he said.

Try to mix in a few strikes...

OK. Admit it. At the start of the season how many of the Phillies fans out there thought that on June 20 that Freddy Garcia and Kyle Kendrick would have the exact same amount of wins?

Actually, let’s rephrase that to something else…

At the start of the season how many Phillies fans knew who Kyle Kendrick was? I’m going to go out on a limb here and say, “Not many.”

Believe it or not, Kendrick might have some advantages over Garcia when taking the mound against big leaguers despite only pitching in 12 games above Single-A. First of all, Kendrick, just 22, is a mystery to the opposition. Like Phillies fans, the Tigers and Indians probably never even heard of the slender right-hander until he took the mound. That definitely gives the pitcher an advantage.

Secondly, Kendrick isn’t attempting to pitch with an injury unlike Garcia was. That makes a bit of difference, too.

Thirdly, and most importantly, Kendrick throws strikes. In his two outings Kendrick has had a 0-1 count on 22 on of the 50 hitters he has faced. As a result, opponents have hit just .239 against the young righty, compared to .318 off Garcia.

How about this one:

Garcia pitched at least six innings in four of his 11 starts. Kendrick is two-for-two.

See what happens when a healthy pitcher no one has heard of throws strikes?

***
Perhaps even more important than all of it – the health, the strikes and unfamiliarity – is that Kendrick has some fielders making the plays behind him. According to CSN resident honcho, Rob Kuestner, the Phillies were flashing the leather behind the kid. Nope, that’s not a cliché, either, because Rob introduced that bit of vernacular to our popular lexicon.

To that I say half of good pitching is good defense. Don’t believe me? How about a story proving this to be the case from the paper of record? According to a story in The New York Times by Dan Rosenheck, the statistical posse has showed that good pitchers are just as likely to be lucky as good.

How about this line from last night:

9 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 SO, 92 pitches – 57 strikes.

That’s what Johan Santana did to the Mets in a 9-0 victory last night. Is that lucky or good?

***
According to reports, 1994 called and wanted its facial hair trend back from Geoff Geary.

Come on… I kid. I kid.

***
Here’s the nicest thing anyone could say about an athlete/celebrity: “He gets it.”

Jim Furyk is one of those guys who gets it.

As one of the top golfers in the world, Furyk could very easily wall himself away from everyone and everything. He could hire an army of publicists and managers whose main job was to tell other people “no” and then be sycophants.

Certainly there are less talented and less accomplished folks than Furyk who have done just that. But the thing about Furyk is that he remembers where he came from. He knows that if it all ends tomorrow and he can’t play golf ever again, the folks who helped him on his way up will be the ones there for him on the road back down.

The guys who get it know that.

So despite the Ryder Cups and the top 10 finishes at all of the major tournaments, Furyk takes time out for the local press. He returns to the area for clinics and exhibitions and sometimes he even brings some of his famous friends. At the same time he hasn’t forgotten his friends from school, either, even though he doesn’t have to do any of it.

He does because he gets it.

It seems as if Floyd Landis, the star-crossed winner of the 2006 Tour de France gets that, too. Like Furyk, Landis appears to have a little army of friends from the old days ready to protect him. Certainly Floyd and Furyk have different issues right now, but taking care of your roots doesn’t seem to be a problem for either of them.

No, the last few paragraphs have nothing to do with anything, but sometimes I just feel like giving credit where it’s due.

***
Speaking of Floyd, the good folks at Simon & Schuster sent me a copy of his book and I should be diving in by the weekend. As promised, I will give the tome a full review.

***
If you’re like me, a good vacation would be one where you load the car up with some nice, expensive gasoline, load everyone in, tune up the iPod to the stereo and hit the road. Because of that, the Frugal Travel series in The Times has been quite riveting.

Check it out.

Another year goes by

Today is the 21st anniversary of the death of Len Bias. Last year I wrote a longer post about it which was to be published elsewhere, but Brett Myers went out and got arrested in Boston in a case that we remember all too well.

Anyway, I still maintain that Len Bias was the best college basketball player I had ever seen. Better than Michael Jordan, Ralph Sampson, David Robinson, James Worthy, Patrick Ewing, Pearl Washington, Chris Mullin or any of those guys for UNLV.

Anyone who says Bias wasn’t a bigger, stronger, meaner and more polished Michael Jordan, just doesn’t know any better.

Said The Washington Post’s Michael Wilbon: “I saw great players from both the ACC and Big East every night. Jordan. Ewing. Mullin. Sampson. Later on, David Robinson. But Bias was the most awesome collegiate player of that bunch. That jumper was so pure. I mean, Michael Jordan, at that time, would have killed for that jumper. And Bias was 2 ½ inches taller.”

Charles Barkley: “I'd have played against him for the next 14 years. I would have been in my prime and he would have been in his. I'll never forget what he looked like. He was a ‘Wow!’ player. When Maryland played and was on television, I watched. It was like, ‘I need to watch this guy; I'll be seeing him real soon.’ . . . It was just shocking. Thing is, cocaine was huge then. My brother had been in and out of rehab. . . . It was a popular drug at the time. And guys I was playing against, like John Lucas and Michael Ray Richardson and John Drew had done cocaine. I was thinking: ‘What the hell is up with this cocaine? I should try this once to see what it was all about.’ Then, we heard the reports were that Bias only used it once . . . that it was his first time. When I heard that, it scared me to death . . . scared the daylights out of me. It scared me into not trying it even once, not going anywhere near it.”

Twenty one years and it still seems like it was just yesterday.

***
Inevitably, when the Detroit Tigers and manager Jim Leyland arrived in Philadelphia for last weekend’s series, the comparisons between the two skippers would crop up. I suppose the Tigers appearance in last October’s World Series didn’t quell the argument regarding Charlie Manuel and Leyland in some circles because people talked about it.

Leyland, of course, wasn’t too interested in talking about losing out on the Phillies’ gig to Charlie, telling reporters curtly, “Don’t go there,” when the subject was broached last Friday.

Former Phillie Placido Polanco wasn’t too jazzed about comparing Charlie and Leyland either, saying, “What are you trying to say? That Charlie's no good? When you lose, it's the manager's fault, but when you win, the players play good. You have to give the manager credit, but the players have to make the plays.”

Polanco is definitely right about that, but that’s the way it goes in baseball. The manager is always looked at by the fans as some sort of Svengali, when in reality the best managers are smart enough to know to stay out of the way.

Besides, skippering a team like the Detroit Tigers doesn’t exactly take a whole lot of innovation. All Leyland has to do is fill out the lineup card with Polanco, Gary Sheffield, Magglio Ordonez and the rest of that murderers’ row or tell one of his lights’ out young pitcher to throw a no-hitter or shutout. In that regard the strategy showdown between Charlie and Leyland never really manifested.

How hard is it to manage a bunch of home runs?

Regardless, Manuel may have out-smarted himself when he decided to yank starting pitcher Adam Eaton in the seventh inning of Sunday’s game with Gary Sheffield coming to the plate. To that point in the game Eaton had a two-run lead and had just allowed a pair of the six hits he yielded. But instead of letting his starting pitcher with just 91 pitches on the odometer try to wiggle out of his mess, Manuel turned to his bullpen three different times to get the final two outs of the innings.

When it was all finished, the two-run lead had become a three-run deficit and the sit-back-and-let-it-unfold-style of managing that had marked the series blew up like one of those rubber cigars from the cartoons.

Worse, the second-guessing started.

That statistics and sabermetric folks have crunched a lot of numbers to make them prove a lot of different things about the game, but it might be worth it to see what the stats show in regard to meddlesome managers. Certainly Manuel has been criticized for being too loyal and leaving players in spots when they have long surpassed their effectiveness. Pat Burrell springs to mind in that regard.

However, after spending most of the first part of the season doing all he could to avoid his bullpen, Manuel wasn’t shy about using four pitchers to get out of the seventh on Sunday.

Go figure.

***
From White Sox skipper Ozzie Guillen on Polanco:

“He's the heart of that club. I don't know why the hell the Phillies let him go.

“To me, the key to that team is Polanco. He's clutch. He's one of the most underrated players in the game. People don't know how good he is.”

Ask Ed Wade about David Bell if you’re looking for the answer on that one.

***
If you’re watching the Indians and Phillies play this week it looks as if Cleveland is treating some familiar faces quite well. David Dellucci, Jason Michaels, Aaron Fultz, Roberto Hernandez and Paul Byrd have all landed with the Indians and have made big contributions to the leaders of the AL Central.

Meanwhile, Joe Borowski is pleased that he ended up with the Indians instead of the Phillies.

***
If you're in Cleveland and looking for a good place to unwind after the Phillies game and don't mind taking a little drive and/or want to avoid the tourist traps and post-frat boy joints on The Flats, try The Barking Spider out near Case Western Reserve University.

I spent a week there one night about a decade ago.

Anyway, it's approximately five miles from the ballpark...

***
Quick observation about the U.S. Open:

How about the dichotomy in the trio of leaders down the stretch? Jim Furyk looked lean and mean and looked just like he did when he was playing hoops for Manheim Township. Tiger Woods looked like a guy who spent all of his free time in the gym and was not to shy about showing off his newly sculpted physique.

And then there was champion Angel Cabrera who chain-smoked his way through the back nine and stopped at the turn for a couple of hotdogs and a beer.

Here’s my prediction – Furyk and Tiger will be amongst the top 10 golfers in the world for the next decade while Cabrera is never heard from again.

Either that or he joins the John Daly wing of the PGA Tour.

Tomorrow: Airports, summer travelling, Bobby Abreu, Jim Furyk and Floyd Landis.

A sort of homecoming

Hola, sports fans. There is a lot happening today from the Tigers arriving in Philadelphia for three games, to Freddy Garcia’s shutdown, to the U.S. Open, to the first reviews of author Floyd Landis’ soon-to-be released memoir, Positively False hitting the ether. Since that’s the case, enough yapping – let’s get into it…

Undoubtedly, Charlie Manuel will face some scrutiny this weekend. The reason, of course, is because the American League champion Detroit Tigers are in town for the weekend and that means Jim Leyland is here. Leyland, as most Phillies fans remember, lost out on the managerial job here when then general manager Ed Wade decided to hire Manuel instead. At the time the thinking (at least by me) was that when Jim Leyland specifically campaigns for your job opening, chances are it’s a slam dunk.

How do you pass on Jim Leyland?

Well…

Manuel is in his third star-crossed season with the Phillies, while Leyland, in just one season, turned the Tigers to a World Series team after 12 straight losing seasons. In 2003 the Tigers lost 113 games. In 2006, with Leyland in charge, the Tigers won 103 games, including the playoffs.

Leyland, in these parts, gets a lot of the credit for turning the Tigers into a force in the American League. To degree Leyland definitely had some influence on making Detroit a winner, though it is much more complicated than that. Yes, a manager has an effect on a baseball team. And it really isn’t a surprise that the Phillies have been better with Charlie Manuel at the helm than they were with Larry Bowa.

Leyland and Manuel are similar in that they make it easy for players to want to come to work and do the job as well as possible, while Bowa’s mission seemed to be one of divide and conquer. As was the adage during Bowa’s time, the Phillies are 0-76, but Bowa is 86-0.

But one thing Leyland did not do was sign and develop the players. The rotation of Jeremy Bonderman, Justin Verlander, Nate Robertson, and Mike Maroth would have been great regardless of the manager. Nor does it hurt that the offense leads the American League in hits, runs, extra-base hits, batting average, slugging percentage and is third in home runs.

Certainly the Phillies will know where they stand amongst baseball’s top teams when the Tigers leave on Sunday afternoon.

But more interesting than Leyland’s arrival is Placido Polanco’s return to Philadelphia. Polanco, as most remember, was the Phillies’ steady second baseman that allowed the team to take its time in bringing along Chase Utley. In fact, even when Utley was ready to play every day, putting Polanco on the bench was a very difficult thing to do. In order to find more playing time for Polanco the Phillies used him in left field for a few games, but not nearly enough at third base.

Third base was the position Polanco played when he was traded to the Phillies as part of the deal for Scott Rolen in 2002. But after playing 131 games at third in 2002, Polanco played just 42 games at the hot corner since then. For some reason the Phillies just weren’t willing to unseat David Bell from that spot. The Phillies definitely would have been a better team with an infield of Ryan Howard, Utley, Polanco and Jimmy Rollins, but sometimes things are as easy as simply sliding around names.

Baseball is complicated like that sometimes.

The “what if” game is the favorite past time of the national past time, and though Utley has solidified himself as the best second baseman in the National League, Polanco has done pretty well since leaving town. Currently he’s third in the league with a .343 batting average, led the Majors in the statistic in 2005 and, most importantly, took home the MVP in last October’s ALCS.

Polanco will gladly let Chase Utley and David Bell have Philadelphia if can play ball in October. The same goes for Charlie Manuel, too. As far as Leyland is concerned, losing out on the Phillies job might have been the best thing that happened.

***
Anyway, based on how things were at the time, trading Polanco to the Tigers for Ugeuth Urbina and Ramon Martinez was a pretty good deal. Then, as now, the Phillies were desperate for bullpen help and Polanco was the only real commodity the team had.

To this day I still get emails from readers asking why Wade and the Phillies didn’t trade Bell instead… OK.

Look at it this way – if you don’t want David Bell, what makes you think another team will want him and then give you a relief pitcher like Urbina? The Phillies couldn’t trade Bell for the same reason why they can’t trade Jon Lieber or Pat Burrell…

No one wants them!

Apropos of nothing, it seems as if both Utley and Polanco will be starting in the All-Star Game next month.

***
I wasn’t quick enough to think of it at the time, but Freddy Garcia could end up being the “deadline deal” the Phillies need if they are still in the hunt next month… that is, of course, if Garcia can still pitch.

There is no time table for when Garcia will even throw again, so any plans regarding his return are just a silly exercise at this point. But… he might be able to return.

***
Through the early going of action in the U.S. Open at Oakmont Country Club in western Pennsylvania, it looked as if Jim Furyk of the Bellair neighborhood in Manheim Township, Lancaster, Pa., was locked in. But then his putter deserted him over the final seven holes. Today Furyk came out and fired a not-so sterling 75 to leave him six-over par.

Despite the score, Furyk still has a shot at winning his second U.S. Open title. Tiger Woods is in it, too, at four-over par, which brings up an interesting point:

Do golf fans want to see the best players in the world struggle to get close to even par as it typically is in the U.S. Open?

Do fans like to see Furyk or Tiger hit a stellar shot near the pin and then have it roll off the green and into the rough?

I’m torn. I don’t like it when a golfer makes a good shot and isn’t rewarded for it, but at the same time I don’t really want to see them take target practice at the pins as if they were at any other course. That’s no fun, either.

Either way, the U.S. Open is the most intriguing of all golf tournaments and it will be even more interesting to see what happens to this little corner of the country when it comes to Merion in Ardmore in 2013.

For one thing, something is going to have to be done about the atrocity that is the Schuylkill Expressway.

***
The New York Times ran a review of West Earl Township, Lancaster County, Pa. native Floyd Landis’ new epic that hits bookstores June 26. In the review it is noted that there is very little new information in the book, however, it was noted that there was a contradiction in some of Landis’ statements about the consequences from the infamous testimony from former Tour de France champ Greg LeMond from the USADA arbitration hearings last month.

To wit:

In an epilogue, Landis writes that he witnessed Geoghegan’s phone call and was shocked by his manager’s attempt to intimidate LeMond by bringing up LeMond’s previously undisclosed history of being sexually abused as a child. So shocked, he writes, that he immediately decided Geoghegan should be fired.

“The only thing I knew right away was that Will needed to go,” Landis writes. “I went to his room and helped him pack his things.

Wait, did Floyd get the same guy who wrote Charles Barkley’s memoirs to work on his?

Regardless, an interesting note is that Floyd is releasing a “Wiki” defense e-book on the same day as the memoirs are released.

Also, I read the first chapter that was previewed on Floyd’s site and it’s pretty much the boilerplate jock autobiography except that I drive past a lot of the places described in the book on my way to Philadelphia. In that regard it's more interesting simply because I may have driven past some of the places described. As I've mentioned in past posts, though Landis and I grew up a short bike ride away from one another, our worlds were as different as night and day. Frankly, even though my roots have been planted in Lancaster since I was 10 years old, it is very rare for me to see an Amish buggy motor past. They don't really come to the urban/suburban area where I live and when they do it trips me out.

Come on, Mr. Stoltzfus, turn on a light already.

Nevertheless, it was interesting reading about a rube from Lancaster County travelling across the country with a cheap car and a tent and then to Europe with the simple hope of being a professional mountain bike rider.

Hopefully my fax request for an advance copy will arrive soon so I can tell everyone all about it.

***
If they have an NBA Finals and nobody watches it, did it really happen?

Apparently the NBA Finals ended this week. Really? And what ever happened to that fun league called the NHL?

After Tiger, Phil and Furyk, we take...

The Masters starts today and I haven't entered my non-Tiger and Phil selections. Any one can pick one of those two to win the whole thing so it seems much more creative to just eliminate them from the process.

In that regard I guess I should eliminate Jim Furyk as well because of personal biases. You always stick with the people from the 'hood (at least I do), plus we all know Jim is clutch after he hit that shot from the corner to beat Lebanon for the Section 1 title in 1988.

So with Tiger, Phil and Furyk out of the mix, we're going to go with Adam Scott. I wish I had a reason for why Scott is the best fourth choice to win the Masters, but I don't. It just sounds like it could be a smart pick.

Besides, is there anything better than the Masters (or golf) on TV? It's just action on top of action, and no, I'm not being sarcastic. On another note, think about all the TV action coming this Sunday... the final round of the Masters leading into "The Sopranos" and "Entourage."

Beat that.

Workin' for the weekend

Let's tie up the events from last weekend, shall we?

First, the Furyk-Woods pairing in the Ryder Cup wasn't enough to help the uninterested U.S. team from going belly-up like a well-fed puppy. The only reason Europe didn't set the record for the largest margin of victory was because they did the "sporty" thing and pulled back.

Seems as if the U.S. Ryder Cup team is about as interested in the event as the U.S. basketball players are excited for the Olympics.

Meanwhile in Berlin, Haile Gebrselassie ran to victory in 2:05:56, which is a minute off the world record, but impressive nonetheless. Why was it so impressive (other than the fact that Geb ran 4:48 per mile)? For one thing, Geb won the race by almost five minutes -- five minutes! That means he ran by himself -- the duel with Sammy Korir didn't pan out -- on a warm day with a headwind. That's not optimal conditions for running, yet Geb was still on world-record pace until the final 5K of the race.

Since we love hyperbole and grandiose statements, some are already saying that because of the conditions with the heat, humidity and win, no pacesetters and no competition, Geb's run was the best ever.

A 2:05:56 speaks for itself.

Workin' for the weekend

Let's tie up the events from last weekend, shall we?

First, the Furyk-Woods pairing in the Ryder Cup wasn't enough to help the uninterested U.S. team from going belly-up like a well-fed puppy. The only reason Europe didn't set the record for the largest margin of victory was because they did the "sporty" thing and pulled back.

Seems as if the U.S. Ryder Cup team is about as interested in the event as the U.S. basketball players are excited for the Olympics.

Meanwhile in Berlin, Haile Gebrselassie ran to victory in 2:05:56, which is a minute off the world record, but impressive nonetheless. Why was it so impressive (other than the fact that Geb ran 4:48 per mile)? For one thing, Geb won the race by almost five minutes -- five minutes! That means he ran by himself -- the duel with Sammy Korir didn't pan out -- on a warm day with a headwind. That's not optimal conditions for running, yet Geb was still on world-record pace until the final 5K of the race.

Since we love hyperbole and grandiose statements, some are already saying that because of the conditions with the heat, humidity and win, no pacesetters and no competition, Geb's run was the best ever.

A 2:05:56 speaks for itself.

Look at that!

I generally don’t like to watch sports for long periods of time. I guess that makes me weird or perhaps someone who made a bad career choice.

Actually, let me explain myself. I dislike watching sports that I’m not writing about nor have some sort of connection to. I’m like Vin Scully that way since the greatest voice in baseball history has never attended a game he wasn’t working. Ol’ Vin just refuses to go to a game just for the sake of going to a game.

My problem is my attention span. I just can’t sit still long enough to fully concentrate on sports on TV. I need to get up and walk around. Or check stuff out on the Internet. Or read a book. Or do sit-ups. Something, anything but sit and stare at a box.

But this weekend is different. Aside from the Phillies’ big series against the Marlins, the always fun Ryder Cup is burning up the airwaves. The most interesting part from these parts is that homeboy Jim Furyk from Manheim Township is paired up with Tiger Woods in team action. According to the word on the street, Tiger has taken a shine to the Lancaster kid because of his competitiveness and work ethic.

Maybe that endorsement from Tiger is not what Furyk needs? After all Tiger stinks in Ryder Cup-style play.

Then again, the last time we heard such accolades heaped on a guy from around here, he was riding his bike to Paris wearing the Yellow Jersey.

Nevertheless, the Ryder Cup is tons of fun with all of the best elements of golf. Every shot is meaningful and every putt has the chance to sway the balance of a match. Who wouldn’t want to watch that?

You want to watch people run? You mean… run?
Uh, yeah. Is that odd?

For most people, Sunday means parking it in front of the TV so they can feel their rear grow into the couch. But if I can get up (or stay up), I’m watching the showdown in Berlin where the great Haile Gebrselassie goes against Sammy Korir, the second-fastest marathoner in the history of the world, in Sunday’s 26.2-mile race.

The race won’t be on TV in the United States, but it will be on NBC pay-per-view on the Internet. Frankly, this is a great idea and is the perfect for the web – there are a few fringe sports that a few Americans are interested in. Why now “televise” them on the Web? Hopefully, broadcasting on the Web becomes the future for sports. I have the feeling that it’s already heading that way, since, as I type, I have the Dodgers-Diamondbacks game on my PC.

Anyway, the big race in Berlin is expected to flirt with the world record because the course is flat and designed for fast times and the runners are very talented. Korir lost to Paul Tergat in the classic 2003 race in Berlin with a 2:04:56. Tergat had to break the world record to beat him.

So far this year, Korir has the best time in the world with a 2:06:38 in Rotterdam.

Geb, of course, is judged by many to be one of the greatest runners in history. He has the gold medals from the Olympics, a handful of world records, but he hasn’t been able to dominate marathoning like many suspected he would. Regardless, there’s a buzz about Berlin this year and reports are the pacesetters have been instructed to hit the halfway point in 62:30 – right on world-record pace.

New York, New York
Speaking of marathons, the New York City race has assembled a deep and interesting field. Tergat, the defending champ and world-record holder, is in the race, along with Olympic and World champ Stefano Baldini. On the women’s side, American-record holder Deena Kastor should duel with Catherine Ndereba, the all-time great Kenyan who trains in Valley Forge.

But the interesting part is the Americans that are running in New York. Olympic Marathon silver medalist Meb Keflezighi and Olympians Alan Culpepper and Dathan Ritzenhein (his marathon debut), are in, along with Peter Gilmore, who was seventh at this year's Boston Marathon.

So why run in New York instead of Chicago where the Americans can get a faster time? How about money, money, money. New York has set up a special prize structure where the the top American gets $20,000, second place gets $15,000. Third wins $10,000 and then $3,000 and $2,000 for fourth and fifth.

There is no mention of bonuses for running specific times, though the Toronto Marathon is offering a $20,000 bonus for anyone running faster than 2:10.

Personally, I think that anyone who can run a 2:09 marathon should be set for life, or at least make more money than the Major League minimum salary, but that’s me.

The Legend

While the Eagles training camp and Brett Myers’ return to action in Philadelphia is the big news in these parts, the most riveting and exciting televised sporting event was Floyd Landis’ clutch performance in Saturday’s time trial in the penultimate stage of the 2006 Tour de France. From those just flipping around the dial it looked like nothing more than a bunch of guys in tight clothes riding bikes, but for those who knew what was at stake, it was sports at its best.

Better yet, it was impossible to turn away from.

Landis, the 30-year-old star from Lancaster County whose story and background is now well known, came into the time trial in third place, trailing by 30 seconds. But 30 seconds was not a lot to make up for Landis, who is known for his strength in the time trial. All Landis would have to do is ride as hard as he could, avoid any mechanical issues with his bike, and don’t crash.

Sounds easy, but think of the pressure. Anything less than the best effort would go down as nothing but a big choke – especially since the entire cycling world had its eyes glued to Saturday’s action.

Making it more interesting is the fact that Landis is headed for hip replacement surgery when the Tour ends. In fact, Landis’ degenerative hip injury is similar to the one that ended Bo Jackson’s football career. Because of that it’s quite possible that this could be his one and only shot at winning the Tour.

“I have to say that since it’s a dream of mine, and having hip replacement puts that in jeopardy, that having won the race, I’ll be much more relaxed” about the surgery, Landis told The New York Times. “I don’t feel like my life is a failure if I didn’t win the race, but it’s a dream, and I’d be extremely disappointed if that was taken away by an unfortunate accident.

“I’ll fight as hard as I have in this race to come back next year or the following year, whatever it takes to be back.”

But tomorrow’s race toward the Champs-Élysées in Paris should be just a formality with a 59-second lead squirreled away. Certainly such a lead was unfathomable earlier this week when Landis dropped from first place all the way to 11th after a seemingly monumental collapse during the 16th stage. At that point all of the cycling experts wrote Floyd off as cracked, beaten and battered. He was finished, just another rider chewed up in the Alps in the most grueling race on earth.

Then the next day the unthinkable happened. Landis had the day of his life – until Saturday’s time trial, that is – vaulting all the way to third place by making up nearly eight minutes.

Those same experts that wrote Floyd off jumped back on the bandwagon by calling him a “Legend.”

Whether Landis ever makes it back to contention in France again is of no consequence now. He is truly a legend on his way to becoming the just the third American to win the Tour de France, joining Greg LeMond and Lance Armstrong.

Imagine that – it’s actually quite difficult, actually. Floyd Landis, the Mennonite kid from Farmersville in Lancaster County, Pa. mentioned in the same sentence as Greg LeMond and Lance Armstrong.

Wow!

During the 1980s, Greg LeMond was looked at by kids like me as one of the baddest men on the planet. He won awe-inspiring Tour not once, not twice, but thrice. Americans started to race bikes because of LeMond. And then came Lance who took it all to another level by actually transcending his sport to become a celebrity and a cyclist.

Now comes Landis – from Conestoga Valley High School over on Horseshoe Road. He bought his bikes at Green Mountain Cyclery in Ephrata, Pa. just like all everyone in the know from Lancaster.

“Talents like Floyd come along once in a lifetime,” said Mike Farrington, the owner of Green Mountain Cyclery, to the Harrisburg Patriot News.

Once if we’re lucky.

Don't forget about Furyk
Yeah, that's right... Floyd Landis might be getting all of the attention in Lancaster right now, but homeboy Jim Furyk fired a 66 on Saturday to crawl to within two shots of Tiger Woods heading into the final day of the British Open.

Imagine if Furyk wins the British Open on the same day Landis wins the Tour de France... bottle up that Lancaster County water and sell it as a magic elixir to anyone dreaming of athletic glory.

He's from where?

At Foolish Craig’s, a restaurant and juice/coffee bar on the fashionable Pearl St. in Boulder, Colo., diners and imbibers halted their conversations mid sentence in order to catch the latest action from the Tour de France flickering from the TV hoisted above their heads. When American Floyd Landis was presented with the Yellow Jersey, signifying that he is the leader of the great race, there was an audible, “YESSSS!” to go along with a few happy fist pumps.

Actually, Foolish Craig’s is no different than any other establishment in Boulder. Instead of the Rockies-Reds matinee burning up the airwaves, it’s the bike race from France that has everyone’s attention during a busy lunchtime. If there were sports talk radio just for the hip and trendy folks in Boulder, all of the chatter would be about Landis, the latest on the summertime European running circuit, and the Denver Broncos.

Colorado still shuts down when the Broncos play and it’s still impossible to get a ticket for a game. Lets not kid ourselves and think that endurance sports have surpassed the NFL just yet.

Nevertheless, Boulder is crazy for Landis. So too is the establishment – the New York Times recently published a six-page feature detailing the 30-year-old cyclist’s plans for surgery to replace his broken hip following this month’s Tour de France. Imagine that – a guy is at the top of the Tour de France (the Tour de France!), riding all of those miles day after day with a broken hip. No wonder cycling crazy Boulder and the pages of the New York Times have dedicated some prime space for the guy.

Yet meanwhile, in Landis’ hometown of Lancaster, Pa. where he grew up and graduated from Conestoga Valley High in 1994 …

Crickets.

And in the Philadelphia area, where the budding superstar pedaled thousands of miles along the Schuylkill, through Valley Forge and the environs cranking out another routine century …

Ho-hum. Have two-a-days started at Lehigh yet?

This is where it gets tricky. Take away the altitude and the 300 sunny days a year and there really isn’t that much different from Boulder and Lancaster/Philadelphia areas. In fact, some in the know have suggested that the roads and trails in bucolic and wide open Lancaster County are better than the mountain cycling routes in Boulder County.

According to a story in USA Today, Philadelphia was rated as one of the best places for bike riding, though the ratings seem to have ignored smaller metropolitan areas like Lancaster and Boulder. Nevertheless, here’s what appeared in the Sept. 23, 2003 edition of the national paper:

Home to the USA's most prominent cycling race, the Pro Cycling Tour's Wachovia U.S. Pro Championship, which is run the first week of June. Need a personal challenge? "Try an out-and-back ride on the Schuylkill River Trail to Valley Forge starting at the Philadelphia Arts Institute and climbing the steep and infamous Manayunk Wall."

At the same time, stories have appeared in The New York Times and Kiplinger’s with throwaway sentences in which Lancaster is called “one of the best places in America for cycling” as if this was a given and common knowledge.

You know, bike riding in Lancaster. Of course.

Still, it’s hard to believe our region is rated so highly, especially when one considers what goes on outside of the actual athletics in both places. Though Boulder and the area surrounding Philadelphia are approximately the same size (for now… Boulder’s growth is ridiculous), running and riding are a way of life in the Colorado college town and participatory sports is serious business there. A common conversation heard in Boulder goes something like this:

“Well, I work for (Insert tech company here) by day, but really I’m getting ready to move from trail running to the triathlon.”

With 60 Olympians living in Boulder County, it’s easy to understand why playing instead of watching sports is a big deal. It’s also easy to see why the communities for sports like running and bicycling have transformed the area.

Perhaps Boulder is best summed up by Marc Peruzzi in the August issue of Outside magazine: “The Dunkin’ Donuts went out of business, but the oxygen bar next door to the gay-and-lesbian bookstore seems to be doing well.

“In most American towns, outdoor-sports aficionados are part of an elite counterculture minority. Mountain bikers and climbers have cachet. Not so in Boulder. Recreating outdoors in the norm here, and it’s in your face.”

Maybe it’s starting to get that way in our area, too. Yoga studios are springing up and are a much more mainstream style of exercise and cross-training than ever before. Actually, in my neighborhood in Lancaster, the question isn’t where you take your yoga class; it’s which discipline you practice.

Along with this come the restaurants with healthier foods, the supermarkets that cater to that set, as well as the chiropractors and physical therapists. Bottom line wise it all means higher property values and a better quality of life.

But there are still battles to be waged. Despite the 300 sunny days a year, it still snows quite a bit in Colorado. However, the first thing that gets plowed as soon as the trucks get rolling is the biking and running trails. Meanwhile, we still haven’t learned how to share the roads here.

Perhaps most telling is the way the locals react in Lancaster when the pro cycling tour rides into town every May. Instead of embracing it the way the Philadelphians have (OK, it’s another excuse to drink… who are we kidding?), Lancasterians view the top cyclists in the world coming to their little town as an inconvenience full of traffic jams and clogged streets, rather than something that makes the town special.

But personally, I’ll never forget watching the 1998 race where one rider made his return to the sport after battling cancer for the previous two years. After the race, in which he finished in second place but was clearly the strongest rider, I sat down next to the guy with our backs against the Hotel Brunswick on the corner of Queen and Chestnut streets for a little chat about the race, his comeback and his chances in France later that summer.

Who would have ever guessed that after that ride through Lancaster on a warm afternoon that Lance Armstrong would go on to win the Tour de France seven years in a row?

Maybe not Lancaster County’s Floyd Landis. He knows what pedaling on those roads can do.

Sports capital?
If Landis goes on to win the Tour de France, it will cap off a pretty interesting year in sports for Lancaster natives. On the PGA Tour, Manheim Township High grad and Lancaster native, Jim Furyk, just missed winning his second U.S. Open with his second-place finish. Furyk, the former basketball standout for the Blue Streaks (who can forget that jumper from the corner he hit to beat Lebanon in the 1988 Section 1 title game?), will finish this year rated in the top 10 again and will make another Ryder Cup team.

Must be something in the water there.

Riding (or running) in Lancaster
Looking for the best places to ride (or run) in Lancaster? Pick up Sil Simpson's Short Bike Rides in Eastern Pennsylvania. It's an excellent guidebook with all the inside info from a guy who is a riding and running junky.

As for the running routes, email me. I have a ton of them stashed away.