EDITORIAL - I am sick at heart. Arnold Palmer announced that he is through with tournament play after four miserable holes in a Champions Tour event in Texas. Finished; kaput.
This is how we let The King go out -- four miserable holes playing a bunch of has-beens? (For those youngsters in the audience, make no mistake: Arnold Palmer was The King long before Elvis.) This is a man who won 29 PGA tournaments between 1960 and 1963 alone and still has more charisma in his little putter than all the current crop of no-names combined.
Here is my proposal. Would it kill the PGA to give Arnie, not to mention the proud but decrepit veterans of "Arnie's Army," one final thrill on their way to that 18th hole in the sky by letting The King win one last tournament?
Mr. Palmer hasn't won a PGA Tour event since the "Bob Hope Classic" in 1973, or a Senior PGA Tour event since 1988. But what greater tribute could the cavalcade of no-names who inhabit the PGA leader board (that Woods fellow aside) give Arnie than to outright cheat and throw a tournament for him?
Granted, it would look somewhat suspicious if every contestant on the links, except Mr. Palmer, suddenly started shooting in the low 90's. And, yes, it would tarnish the integrity of the game, not to mention the fact that it probably would be a crime of one sort or another.
But if that's the price to pay homage to The King, so be it.
How about it? Are you with me? Or would you deny this trifling honor to one who has given mankind so many thrills?
I believe I can hear them, way out there, over the hill. They are old, and they are tired, but they are still the Army.
And they are assembling for one final charge.
