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Thursday, March 15, 2012

Golf as a Contact Sport

     Is golf a game or a sport? I don't know, but if chess and poker can be called sports, so can golf. While it is not a contact sport, being a golfer can be dangerous--just ask Tiger Woods.

May 2011
Granite Falls, North Carolina

     While playing a round of golf at the Granada Farms County Club, a fox ran out of the woods and bit a 76-year-old golfer in the leg. The wounded man's partners beat the fox to death with their clubs. Animal control people determined that the fox had rabies. This was not good news for the injured golfer who had to undergo treatment for the disease. His defenders had dispatched the poor animal with a minimum of strokes, however. Just kidding.

May 2011
Haslingden, England

     On a Saturday afternoon, a 32-year-old man, walking to his brand new silver Audi A4 after a round of golf, was set upon by a pair of masked car thieves who had been hiding in the bushes. One of the assailants struck the golfer in the back of the neck with a crowbar. The victim cried out, and tossed his car keys into a patch high grass near the parking lot. Players from the 18th green heard the victim's cry for help and ran to the scene. The attackers escaped in a white Renault Clio. After being treated for his neck injury, the embattled golfer drove home in his new car.

August 2011
Barrie, Canada

     On August 13, 2011, 42-year-old Bradley Hubbard, while golfing at an indoor mini-putt course with his girlfriend and his daughters, aged 4 and 7, confronted three rowdy teenagers. The boys became violent, and one of them stabbed Hubbard in the neck with a broken putter. The victim died later that night.

     Matthew and Justin Spring, and their friend Jake Workman, have been charged with second degree murder. Released on bail, they are awaiting their first pre-trial hearing set for April 5, 2012.

February 2012
Fort Worth, Texas

     Clay Carpenter, an avid skier who has run four marathons, was playing with two of his friends at the Resort on Eagle Mountain Lake. At the 13th hole, the course marshal (I've heard of air marshals and U. S. Marshals, but didn't know there were golf marshals) told Carpenter and the other two to play through the foursome ahead of them. After they took their shots, a 48-year-old golfer with the other group, apparently infuriated that the threesome was moving through, charged toward Carpenter. The yelling, cursing, out-of-control golfer swung his putter at Carpenter's head. The attacked man raised his hand to protect himself, and in so doing, had his thumb broken. The next thing Carpenter knew, his shoe was filling up with blood. The enraged golfer had stabbed him in the right leg with his broken putter. Rushed to the hospital with a punctured femoral artery, Carpenter would survive the attack. But there is a good chance he will eventually lose his leg.

     The putter attacking man has not been named, or charged with a crime. Why? According to the authorities in Tarrant County, they aren't sure if the stabbing was intentional. Huh? How can one golfer accidentally stab another golfer with a broken putter? And what about the broken thumb? I'm guessing that the putter-wielding golfer is someone important. Otherwise, he'd be charged with aggravated assault. And we would know who he is.
   

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