Money, Money, Money.....Money

Why should professional golf be any different than most of what goes on in this country. Is it now just about the money? As a pro, you can make a darn good living and never win a tournament. Tim Finchem now thinks there should be tournament with a $10 million first prize, $1 million isn't enough for 4 days of work. Maybe in five years he can up that to twenty or fifty million. If a Wall Street hedge fund manager can make a billion a year, what's wrong with a professional golfer having a shot at a measly $50 million. It sure would create some drama - if you think golf is good only when there's obscene amounts of money on the table. I can hear the commentators now, 'that putt just cost him a million bucks'! Take that Roger Clemens, who may only get a wimpy 10 grand per pitch this year.

But not so fast! It's also going to change your viewing experience! In case you haven't noticed, the most prominent thing on TV is commercials. At one point in last Sunday's golf telecast I counted 2 minutes of actual golf coverage interspersed among 12 minutes of commercials. Sometimes all you saw was one putt before the network cut to another 3 minutes of commercials.

But what's not to like about commercials in the land of the world's greatest consumers. I lived in Europe for awhile and was shocked to find out you could watch sporting events on TV without commercial interruptions and even, dare I say it, without hardly a word from a commentator. Be still my beating heart! Almost makes me thing of taking a hotel room on the continent to watch this year's British Open in TV viewer heaven.

It's a tough job being the world's biggest consumer nation, but someone has got to do it and we Americans have never shied away from doing the heavy lifting. If the world needs 30 minutes of commercials for every minute of programming, then we'll just have to dig in and gut it out for the sake of future generations.