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Bubba Watson, least likely to be helped in a fight

Bubba Watson, least likely to be helped in a fight

An anonymous survey of PGA pros revealed that Bubba Watson is the player others are least likely to help in a fist fight. No, it’s not satire, it’s just another level of the oddity we’ve become accustomed to in golf. By ANTOINETTE MULLER.

If you were a defending Masters champion, how would you like to start your preparations? By swinging a few clubs, maybe interacting with some of your competitors? Or maybe you would like to take it easy, relax and keep a low profile? Well, if you’re Bubba Watson, there will be some of that, but you will also have to contend with the fact that you are the most unlikable player on the tour.

On Monday, ESPN published the results of an anonymous survey of 103 PGA professionals. One of the questions read “____ is in a fight in the parking lot. You’re not helping him.” Players were invited to fill in the blank and 23 of the respondents said “Bubba Watson”. Of the 23 who put his name down, Bubba himself was one of them.

I put my name on there too, because I’m not going to call out anybody. There’s nobody I dislike on tour. I dislike them if they beat me, but I don’t dislike them as a person. So I put my own name down there.” Bubba says he has never been in a fight but if he were in one, well, “[i]t was my fault. I caused somebody to get angry. So yeah, I wouldn’t help myself either.”

As far as pointless surveys go, this one is right up there with the best of them, but it does add an extra dimension to the already Technicolored Masters tournament that tees off on Thursday. And for those in the #AnyOneButBubba camp, it adds yet another reason to find somebody else to cheer for. Watson, of course, has a laundry list of characteristics that makes him less likable than say, Miguel Angel Jimenez, who reached peak levels of not giving a crap ages ago. Who else is going to walk around puffing on a cigar while playing in a golf tournament? Between saying that being gay is a sin, starring in a bizarre Christmas music video titled “Bubbaclaus” and angering people by going to Waffle House to celebrate his Masters win, Bubba has seemingly found a way to irk at least one person from each stratum of society. He has perfected the art of first speaking and then thinking, a disease which has affected many sportsmen over the years. Maybe his signature visor, clamped so tightly to his head, is cutting off the oxygen supply to the parts of his brain that supply rational thought. But the patrons at Augusta don’t seem to mind him much, and that’s their prerogative.

Here’s the thing, though: sportsmen have no duty to be likable. They win tournaments and competitions through skill, not whether they are nice blokes who will pose with a baby and maybe even kiss it, as though they are politicians. But in individual sports like golf, any inkling of being unlikable is far more difficult to hide, which is perhaps why these surveys are so intriguing. Golf, and especially tournaments like The Masters, are fascinating for the golf as much as for the characters who grace them.

The rest of the poll questions offered some more insight, with the bulk of players (72) saying Rory McIlroy wouldn’t compete a career Grand Slam and 64 backing Tiger Woods to win another major championship before he calls it a day. Just nine players said they would not compete in the Masters if it lost its major status, underscoring the allure of the course and the competition as being more than simply a major outing.

There was also some insight into how the players believes the riches of big tournaments should be shared. When pros play well and make the cut, they get some serious money. On the flip side, miss enough cuts and you’re in the red – and that’s the way the nearly three-quarters of those polled would like it to stay, with 72 saying that those who miss the cut should not get a stipend.

On more frivolous questions, Ian Poulter was the guy players would most likely take car shopping with them, while 40 players reckoned the PGA should stop testing players for marijuana use.

Of course, none of this will matter when it comes to tee-off time on Thursday, but it will be a conversation starter – should you run out of those during the tournament. DM

Photo: Bubba Watson of the USA studies the green during the round three of Thailand Golf Championship at Amata Spring Country Club, Chonburi province, Thailand 13 December 2014. EPA/RUNGROJ YONGRIT

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