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In Which We Mercilessly Mock Men Who Have Faced Pressure Beyond That Which Any Of Us Can Comprehend: A Video Retrospective
By Jay Busbee | March 5, 2007
Pity poor Boo Weekley. In addition to having the worst sports name since Dick Trickle, he got the yips something fierce on Sunday and missed a thirty-nine-inch putt to win the Somesuch-Or-Other National Invitational Tournament of Champions, held at the luxurious Younevahgetin Country Club in Florida. Or something. The specifics don’t matter. The thing is, poor Boo committed what we’re dubbing the “Cloke” — the clutch choke, the precise moment when you become immortal…for all the wrong reasons. It’s not a team thing, it’s an individual one…which makes it all the more painful.
So let’s begin with Boo’s boo-boo. Standing on the 18th green and up a stroke on the field, he missed a three-foot putt — which to us might as well be a mile, but to him should be a tap-in — then fell short in a playoff on Monday morning. It went something like this…though presumably without the gleeful European gang-humping at the end:
Next, let’s dip into the recent past and focus on poor Tony Romo, whose botched snap cost the Cowboys a playoff game against the Seahawks. The NFL doesn’t much like the YouTube, but fortunately we have this flawless reenactment. We dare you to tell the difference between this and butterfingered reality:
Switching over to basketball, let’s focus on the most notorious Cloke of recent vintage, Nick Anderson’s four-free-throw flameout against the Rockets in Game 1 of the 1995 NBA Finals. With his Magic up by three, Anderson could have iced the game with even one make, but he missed them all…and sent his career into a tailspin from which it never recovered. We don’t have video of Game 1, but then videos of missed foul shots are about as much fun as videos of missed putts. So here’s the final seconds of that same series. Dig Big Shot Rob’s Kid-N-Play fade…and who’s that skinny kid wearing #32 for Orlando? Anyway, Anderson also misses his last shot here, but by this point, it doesn’t much matter:
A Frenchman surrendering? That never happens! Yet it did in the 1999 British Open, when Jean Van De Velde needed to only card a double-bogey on the 18th to win it all. Unfortunately, he ended up a lot like this, over and over:
Mitch Williams went by the name “Wild Thing” — but back in Game 6 of the 1993 World Series, he was painfully accurate. Right down the middle, you might say:
Five words that still chill all of New England: “Little Roller Up Along First…”
…and finally, the Cloke by which all Clokes shall forever be measured…Scott Norwood. You know the deal — missed a chip-shot long-but-still-makeable-for-a-pro field goal that would have won the Super Bowl. What you don’t know is what he’s doing today:
And after this post, we hope we’re never facing anything more daunting than tossing a Coke bottle in a trash can.
March 6th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
[…] • Predicting the major conference tournaments. [Complete Sports] • Time for Cedric Benson to step up, as they say. [Sweet Home Sports] • Now this, friends, is a Cosby sweater. [Just Call Me Juice] • There’s some Champions League live-blogging going on over here today. [The Fan’s Attic] • Ron Artest has some work to do this offseason. [Lt. Winslow] • They’re controlling the weather at Qwest Field. [Get Untracked] • Some great chokes. [Sports Gone South] • What the Lance Briggs situation means for the franchise tag. [I Want To Be A Sports Agent] • The Phillies aren’t messing around. [Bugs And Cranks] • Looking back on the pine tar incident. [A Special Way Of Being Afraid] […]
March 6th, 2007 at 3:27 pm
I don’t think Norwood’s kick–a 47-yarder–was anything close to a chip shot.
March 6th, 2007 at 3:46 pm
I don’t think anyone would call a 47yd FG a chip shot.
March 6th, 2007 at 3:56 pm
Didn’t remember it as being that far, but indeed, y’all are right. Post edited accordingly.
That was my “missing” Super Bowl, where I was in a Colorado ski resort chasing some strange tail all through the employee housing and catching snippets of the game as we ducked into different apartments and houses. I need to write about that one someday.
March 6th, 2007 at 4:09 pm
Wasn’t there a missed extra point early in the game, too?
March 14th, 2007 at 3:21 pm
The only difference between the Romo fumble and that video was that he wasn’t wearing shoes. The playing surface, the Gramatica gestures, the fact fact that the entire city of Seattle needs to “clean their room”-the similarities were scary.