Fore please: The 2021 Masters thread

At least Ike was in the European Theater of Operations.

 

I was rooting for Xander hard; great comeback from +3 after 6 but I've never seen anyone in contention hit it into the water off the bank on 16. That was almost as ugly as Spieth at 12 in 2016. Dammit, he had a great chance, only 2 down with honors on 16 (of course then Hideki leaves on the top shelf with almost an impossible 2 putt.) At least it was a tournament for like 10 mins. Aside from Xander, disappointed that no one made a charge on back 9.

 

Rahm did, but he was too far back to matter.

 

No argument here, though I like Duncan a lot.

 

It's why golf is the greatest game ever devised. You never know what kind of shot is going to come off the club face, even for the most talented of players. I was out following Phil and watched him miss the green on consecutive holes, once from 10 yards out and once from 20 yards. I expect that from my weekend foursome, but not at Augusta.

 

The Masters was one of the last tournaments to break from the old, rigid cover only 15 through 18 routine golf telecasts had in the 60s
Showing an entire round, and all its ups and downs, improved telecasts dramatically

 

In case you haven't seen it, this was wonderful:

 

Technology had a lot to do with that, too. Television cameras up until the late 1970s were cumbersome beasts attached to thick cables that had limited range because of signal degradation over distance. And remote production vehicles were still science fantasy, so behind-the-scenes staff either needed to borrow a local station's equipment or have a very simple setup that could be uplinked to a network facility. They might only have video capabilities for up to eight cameras, which would have been quite complex to produce in that era.

So trying to run cables over a huge area like a golf course or racetrack wasn't truly feasible until the technology caught up. If you watch old baseball or football games, you'll notice no more than three or four cameras, usually one at field level (football usually had a movable crane) and two high around the 20s or along the baselines.

Even the 1968 and 1972 Olympics were usually filmed or taped segments from each of the venues that could be edited at a central ABC video compound in Mexico City or Munich, then bounced off the satellite. The attack on the Israeli athletes was an amazing piece of "live" reporting, given that police had cordoned off that section of the athlete's village and ABC only had one or two film/videocams they could get close to the scene, let alone to the airport where the firefight took place.

Smaller market stations were still transitioning from film to videotape when I graduated, and we were lucky to have an actual digital tape editing machine to use my senior year. I think the camera, tape recording equipment, battery packs and wooden tripod weighed over 60 pounds, and that was a big improvement over the original videocams. We were assigned as three-person crews, probably as much to help carry all the stuff as to have talent, audio and video.

The addition of handheld cameras and lighter coax cable, integrated circuits and computerization, plus being able to do the entire production on-site (in purpose-built trailers with built-in satellite dishes) was a huge leap forward for the industry. It also helped that CNN and ESPN were spending huge amounts of money to help fund third-party production houses.

Now, does CBS really need a "magnolia cam" on a wire? That's more to do with trying to win an Emmy than actually improving the telecast. But it is way better to see all 18 holes at Augusta National, even if I have to mute the sound most of the time.

 

I don't know if I posted this last November, but IMO CBS did a creative job of dealing with the issue of no spectators. They used it to show angles of the course no viewers had ever seen before, like from the left of the 18th green. Gave fans who'll never be at Augusta much more visual information about the place.

 

Fuck Gary Player and his son.

That is all.

 

I love the tradition of the caddy getting the flag on 18th. Not sure if its a thing with other tourneys. Imagine an August 18th would probably go higher on the secondary market than a run of the mill player's Super Bowl ring.

 

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