#it Made me Nearly Cry at like Multiple points which Is a Genuine FEAT Most things tht Make me wnna cry Usuallt only

[brokentoothmarch]

Guess who jst Finished Reading th Entirety of Dungeon Meshi in a Few Days w.o Telling Anybody Tht was Wht i was Doing nd Giving any Inclination Abt it bcs i Thought itd be Funnier if i Only Mentioned it Once i was Done

[skerbango-blog]

Commentary on Tiger Commentary - by Ritty

Sports have already entered a post-photography and post-highlight package era, and soon, hopefully, we can add post-commentary era to that list as well. We have no need for professional curation. Or narration. Or pithy one-liner. The moment is the moment and it can be viewed in the highest definition instantly and repeatedly and without unnecessary interpretation.

For instance:

Jim Nantz begins by stating, “Many doubted we would ever see it…but here it is.”

Tiger Woods taps in for bogey and fulfills his epic journey. A Major victory that Tiger has flirted with for years. One that Nantz has covered for years. And yet, to exclaim this greatest of achievements, Nantz gives us sappy sentimentality.

“The return to glory!”

It sounds like the tag line for a shitty movie. Spoken by someone deplete of wit and running low on piety. Someone who no longer understands how we capture the scene.

After Tiger makes his putt, and after Nantz performs his line, both Nantz and his cohort, Nick Faldo, are silent for nearly three full minutes as Tiger transcends into the greatest of all-time before our eyes. We see the immediate, forceful thrust of Tiger’s arms as he tilts his head upward and yells at the top of his lungs. Immediately we see emotion from Tiger that we have never seen. He hugs Tony Finau. He’s gracious with Molinari. He hugs his caddie.

“WE DID IT!” he screams.

Meanwhile the roars increase in waves until an all-out “Tiger” chant becomes audible. It fuels Tiger as he walks up the hill behind the 18th green, now literally flexing, all of it made eerily surreal by Tiger’s bright red mock turtle neck. An anachronism that makes Tiger look like a very detailed hologram or some creation we would unlock on a video game. It is also a very literal connection to his past.

Tiger sees his family and has a genuine, intimate moment with each of them as random people in the immediate background awkwardly gawk. As the group moves toward the clubhouse, the crowd noise increases as new patrons catch a glimpse of their superhero and, once again, they are compelled to chant his name. Tiger raises his fist and screams at the top of his lungs, right in front of the camera, a completely bizarre move for him after so much time has elapsed after he made the final putt, but we barely notice because of the chaos around him.

“I never thought we’d see anything that could rival the hug with his father in 1997, but we just did,” Nantz says after his much-appreciated hiatus. Nantz’s connection to Tiger’s past is not the literal one (the mock), but rather an emotional one (Tiger’s hug with his Dad after winning his first green jacket).

Meanwhile, Nick Faldo completely gets it.

“That will be the greatest scene in golf…FOREVER,” Faldo says. Immediately Faldo senses this is more than one image, or one celebration, or one succinct statement. He recognizes the entirety of the scene for what it is and knows how it will be consumed in “views” online.

“That hug with his children?” Nantz chimes in, having missed the point, “If that doesn’t bring a tear to your eyes,” Nantz continues, “and if you’re a parent…you’re not human.”

You can almost hear Faldo mutter no you fucking idiot as he repeats and reemphasizes his (correct) viewpoint. “The whole euphoria of everything,” Faldo describes. “The patrons. His emotion. The chanting. We will never see anything as exhilarating as that. Fantastic. Congratulations, Tiger. Unbelievable.”

Nantz is not alone, of course. There was a lot of talk about “Fathers & Sons” at this year’s Masters. I don’t recall seeing that phrase much in past tournaments, but with Tiger in contention, it was low hanging fruit. Google traced the origin of the phrase to Jack’s Masters win in ’86 when he had his son on the bag, and then there is this Wright Thompson video essay from 2011, which is basically softcore porn for tear mongers.

Whether it’s Jack or Tiger, this is a fucked-up way to appreciate the pinnacle of greatness (And hey, what about Moms? Asks sbnation). Some mortals parse precious rarity down until it becomes relatable. It’s the only way they can process things emotionally. In Tiger’s case it was when he finally reached his family that people remembered he was human, too, just like us.

Colin Cowherd, in a pathetically melodramatic piece of theater, says the emotion we felt when Tiger won united us all at a time when the nation is more divided than he has ever experienced it. Most of America, he says, sat on their couch crying while watching Tiger’s win. An average of 13 million watched on TV by the way. For most of America to pull for the same thing with tears in their eyes, that means 150,000,00 were watching online…? Maybe being overly relatable through emotion is what is driving people away from TV, ESPN, etc.

Cowherd tells multiple stories with the same, dull, infinitely repeated character arc. Man is okay. Something bad happens to man. Man struggles then recovers. Man is good. We perceive man as being better than how he originally started (i.e. “okay) because we so desperately want to believe that we are capable of the same arc ourselves.  Michael Jordan: good + fall + struggle + rise = “family.” Tiger: respect + disgrace + struggle + rise = “We love you even more.” Tiger: healthy + injury + struggle + rise = “The greatest comeback in the history of American sports.”

Rich Eisen, calling himself the voice of reason, adds personal triumph over trials and tribulations to the list of explanations through indulgent, consumerist slogans like, “You can do it!” Can you be more demeaning of Tiger’s accomplishment than by telling the masses they are capable a similar feat if they just believe in themselves and do it? Not to mention the irresponsibility in doing so.

The YouTube algorithm for mawkishness was in control now. Skip Bayless. Random nerds on Sportscenter. Andy North. Scott Van Pelt. All felt the same emotion and all attributed it to relatable sources.

Tiger Woods represents the singularity. Objectively, undoubtedly, rare and great. The scene around the 18th green in Augusta was a portent. Nantz and the gang were correct in that we experienced emotion together, and that is unity in a sense, but not because of commonalities like family, or time, or redemption, but because it involves all of those things at once and amplified to a point beyond ordinary comprehension. A collective awe transpired that we instinctively recognized, and we knew the scene, the whole scene, was a momentous flash in time to be catalogued in our brains and on our computers forever. Just as Faldo reminded us.

Believe it or not, and however poorly I have explained the point so far, two important things are on my side. 1) Technology 2) The Masters. The latter revealed its “Track” feature on what was already the best sports event website on the Internet. Want to watch Tiger’s shot into #16 without having to hear Verne’s forced “Oh my goodness”? Or any other shot hit by anybody for that matter? Hit the play button: https://www.masters.com/en_US/scores/track/hole_view/index.html?pid=8793&round=4&hole=18

Commentary began in print because people could not experience events in any other way. It evolved with technology and as the visuals became ubiquitous and in high definition, commentary evolved into emotional depictions. Most of the time these depictions center around what divide us and that works because anger easily triggers, but in rare cases like Tiger Woods, the commentators struggle to describe why he unites us.

But soon technology will exist that will allow us to virtually experience each and every shot on the golf course as if we were seated right next to Michael Phelps behind the 16th tee. It won’t take wealth or fame to get there, either, just a headset and a virtual subscription. I hope The Masters and IBM innovate this technology in order to perfect its use in golf, and I hope they remember the “Mute Commentary” button. Should something so indescribably great happen again, something momentous that makes me feel small, and ordinary, something so unbelievably unrelatable, bizarre, and inexplicably emotional…I’ll know it when I see it and I can go back and visit anytime I like.