Rosaforte: The many sides of Steve Elkington

[mvmac]

http://www.geoffshackelford.com/homepage/2015/8/11/video-20-years-after-steve-elkingtons-riviera-win.html

Video: 20 Years After Steve Elkington's Riviera Win

Hard to believe it was 20 years ago this week, and while it's certainly not remembered fondly due to the greens or one of the last tough tickets to sell prior to Tiger's arrival, the 1995 PGAat Riviera was a great week for many of us who attended or volunteered. But most of all, it was a career defining win for Steve Elkington, whose final round 64 allowed him to beatColin Montgomerie in sudden death. (Brad Faxon's final round 63 to make the Ryder Cup team was pretty sweet too.)

In a Tim Rosaforte-helmed report that also got into Elkington's recent Twitter run-ins (andnot appreciated by Elkington, who appears ready to bolt at one point), we see some great footage from that week in 1995, including some of Elkington's swing which, for me, is one of the best of all time.

[RGoosen]

I never liked Elkington ever since his "feud" with Bubba at Zurich years ago. I know that Bubba is a polarizing figure on this board, but I find nothing intriguing about Elkington. He stirs the pot a lot, has a boring game, and I do not like his elitist attitude towards people in general. If you don't like either player as an individual, at least Bubba Watson ' s swing is extremely unique and interesting. Just my opinion...

[jbishop15]

Elkington is an *******. Cant stand the guy. Makes me mad that such a douche has such a beautiful swing.

[RGoosen]

^ You make envy his swing but I doubt you envy his double chin. :)

[jbishop15]

^

You make envy his swing but I doubt you envy his double chin. :)

If it comes with the swing, I'm cool, lol

[RussUK]

If it comes with the swing, I'm cool, lol

yep, buy one chin get one free

[THException]

Am I the only one who thinks that Elkington is not a bad guy?

The two tweets I read did not offend me. Rosaforte reported that Elkington was unaware of the death toll in Scotland.

Secondly, how exactly is the Michael Sam tweet offensive? Don't think it is at all...

[RGoosen]

I don't think he is the antichrist, but he does not come across as likeable in general to me. Words that come to my mind when I think of Elkington are....dull, stubborn, ugly, annoying, etc. Anyway, I don't have a problem with people defending him. However, I don't see him winning the Payne Stewart award any time soon. :)

[colin007]

I don't think he is the antichrist, but he does not come across as likeable in general to me. Words that come to my mind when I think of Elkington are....dull, stubborn, ugly, annoying, etc. Anyway, I don't have a problem with people defending him. However, I don't see him winning the Payne Stewart award any time soon. :)

Why not? I thought Payne was widely known to be a dick.

[iacas]

Am I the only one who thinks that Elkington is not a bad guy?

The two tweets I read did not offend me. Rosaforte reported that Elkington was unaware of the death toll in Scotland.

Secondly, how exactly is the Michael Sam tweet offensive? Don't think it is at all...

There have been others. He made fun of Stephanie Wei's breasts, I believe, or something like that. Called her short, too.

The Michael Sam tweet was offensive.

[THException]

There have been others. He made fun of Stephanie Wei's breasts, I believe, or something like that. Called her short, too.

The Michael Sam tweet was offensive.

Quick internet search shows that the Wei tweet was a cheap joke, slightly sexual. And he described her as short, yes. Really not offensive at all, IMO, just PG-13/R rated.

Please tell me how you believe the Sam tweet to be offensive. Maybe I'm not considering something...

[colin007]

Please tell me how you believe the Sam tweet to be offensive. Maybe I'm not considering something...

Why don't you tell us what you think it meant.

[newtogolf]

Quick internet search shows that the Wei tweet was a cheap joke, slightly sexual. And he described her as short, yes. Really not offensive at all, IMO, just PG-13/R rated.

Please tell me how you believe the Sam tweet to be offensive. Maybe I'm not considering something...

Please tell us what the purpose of those tweets were if not to be controversial and offensive?  I probably hate PC more than most here but even I agree he crossed the line.  He's a golfer, who's not very well liked to begin with, he'd be best served by shutting down his twitter account and focusing on golf.

[THException]

Please tell us what the purpose of those tweets were if not to be controversial and offensive?  I probably hate PC more than most here but even I agree he crossed the line.  He's a golfer, who's not very well liked to begin with, he'd be best served by shutting down his twitter account and focusing on golf.

I believe the purpose of those tweets was to be funny. I believe he was trying to be funny, in all three situations.

Joke 1: Scot's drink a lot.

Joke 2: I'm actually not even sure where the punchline is in this tweet, it's really just a bad joke from a writing standpoint. Still, despite my best efforts, I cannot isolate a single piece of that tweet that is offensive to the homosexual community. (I heard on Rosaforte's report that Elkington claims he was making a joke about how much ESPN was covering Michael Sam. This actually sounds like a plausible explanation to me. In fact, I've heard this joke before. People make the same joke for Tiger, LeBron, and Brady...its like: hahaha, look how much ESPN sucks up to ________, so much so that we now know what he ate for breakfast, wears for underwear, or e.g. how many times LeBron dribbles the basketball per second.)

Joke 3: Stephanie, you are short and have small boobs. Probably the funniest of Elk's jokes, although the humor is cheap and Seinfeld certainly wouldn't put it in his set.

Alright, you're right he's not well liked to begin with so it might be wise for him to just abstain from tweeting to avoid all confusion.

But, when we look at his comments from an objective standpoint it is illogical (and unfair) to conclude that Elk is : A) apathetic towards death by heli crash, B) a homo-phobe or bigot, or C) a sexist or "heightist" ;).

[THException]

Why don't you tell us what you think it meant.

I believe Elk when he says he was making fun of ESPN's incessant coverage of Sam.

[newtogolf]

I believe Elk when he says he was making fun of ESPN's incessant coverage of Sam.

The joke wasn't about ESPN covering Sam, it was about Sam being gay.

[THException]

The joke wasn't about ESPN covering Sam, it was about Sam being gay.

I know you're new to golf, but are you also new to logical argumentation?

You can take that position (i.e. that Elk's joke "was about Sam being gay") but your have to form a logical argument to back it up.

The only reason I'm keeping on this is because a few of you guys have made matter-of-fact claims about Elkington without employing any textual, empirical, observational, etc. evidence. These claims are unfair and harmful.

How do you know the joke was a gay joke? Did you talk to Steve Elkington? Were you there when Steve wrote it?

Again, is there something I am not considering (that you are considering) that makes this tweet offensive to homosexuals? Because right now there is no evidence to support the idea that Elkington's tweet was a jab at homosexuals.

Ok, I'm done. To the adversaries: read some [more] philosophy.

How 'bout Lingmerth though, huh?

[iacas]

I believe Elk when he says he was making fun of ESPN's incessant coverage of Sam.

How do you know the joke was a gay joke? Did you talk to Steve Elkington? Were you there when Steve wrote it?

So the offended party has no say in whether something is offensive if the person makes an excuse?

Steve Elkington can just say whatever he wants… including something about the "handbag toss*"… and later claim that he wasn't talking about the thing everyone else takes it as, but instead, was talking about something else entirely?

It does not work that way, and the extent to which you're willing to go to excuse Elk's behavior - Michael Sam, commenting on a horrific accident (where one could assume the pilots were dead or seriously injured if nothing else), the size of a reporter's breasts - make you look bad by association.

Specifically as it relates to the Michael Sam tweet, since you seem to think you have a case to be made there… one can look at the content of the post to figure out the intent:

* MIchael Sam was specifically mentioned. Why? If his claim that he was responding to ESPN's coverage was over-saturated, why not say someone else's name leads something else?

* Men really don't often carry "handbags." It's not like he said "the caber toss" or "the truck pushing competition." (events which are also not football activities). He made a specific gender-based comment.

* "No one else is expected to throw"? - clearly singling out one player. The player named earlier in the tweet, and the ONE openly gay active NFL player in history.

Add them up.

Elkington is either lying through his teeth about the intent of that tweet, or he's a complete idiot.

P.S. There have been a LOT more. We used to add his twitter stream to our live chats during the final round of major coverage. He made a ton of insensitive, rude, off-color tweets even during those events. They're not "handbag" level… but they make clear he's not on Twitter to be a polite golfer and a gentleman.