This is a new twice-daily feature I’m starting over here today, in my effort to both cover more news and cover more in one post. The morning version, “The First Five,” will cover the five biggest stories from the night before. In the evening version, “The Final Five,” I will cover the five biggest stories from that day, Monday through Friday. The five stories can be from the topic of anything, whether it be in sports, politics, entertainment, or whatever. Today, I’m only covering two topics, seeing as I didn’t actually plan this out very well, and didn’t take notes about three other stories I wanted to cover. They are, however, two of the biggest stories we will hear about for quite a while. S0 here goes, the first edition of “The First Five” on a Monday, July 20th, 2009. The stories are not in any order, just in the order I find them in, and thus, decide to write them in.
1. Tom Watson loses British Open, allowing Stewart Cink to win.
Notice the wording. More people will remember this as the major that Watson lost than the one that Cink won. And that’s because of the way he lost. He was back and forth, lead, tie, behind, most of the weekend, especially Sunday. But going into the 18th hole, the final hole of the British Open, he was leading by one stroke. All he had to do was par that 18th hole to win. But, of course, you probably know all of that by now, and you know that he bogeyed that final hole to force a 4-hole playoff, that he would later lose by a staggering 6 strokes. Dan Levy siad it perfectly On the DL Podcast today: “The saddest part of watching Watson miss the putt on 18 and fall apart during the playoff is that we knew — and he knew — this was his last chance at something like this.” He had a chance to make history, to become the oldest player to win a major, and by a wide margin. The current record holder, Julius Boros, was 48. He had a chance to do something amazing. And he will probably never have that chance again.
2. Walter Cronkite Dies at 92.
A great anchorman, Cronkite had been sick with cerbovascular disease for a few months, the New York Times reported almost a month ago. Frequently considered “the most trusted man in America,” he reported on the Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. assassinations, the Vietnam War, and moon landing, to name a few, as NPR noted. In fact, it’s kind of ironic that Cronkite died when he did, on Friday, three days before the 40th anniversary of the moon landing. The Museum of Broadcast Comunications mentioned that “Cronkite was on the air for 27 of the 30 hours that Apollo XI took to complete its mission.” But one thing that really pisses me off about this, or rather the coverage of it, is that some people have the nerve to call him the “World’s Most Overrated Reader of the News.” And then there are the 85 commenters, most of whom are agreeing with the author. Come on, dude! The guy’s dead, and he was a great newscaster! At least show a little respect!
Some choice comments:
“Good riddance to a liberal hypocrite.”
“[Michael] Jackson, love him or hate him, had enormous talent — Cronkite, not so much.”
“As for me, I cannot find it in myself to mourn his passing.”
The author himself said, “The adulation that has greeted his demise is as unearned as it is emetic.” No, Roger, it’s you and your post that’s emetic. And that’s the way it is.
Filed under: First Five | Tagged: british open, First Five, golf, newscaster, obituary, stewart cink, tom watson, tribute, walter cronkite | Leave a comment »
As you can tell, this is the 
By now, I’m sure you’ve heard that great, infamous TV infomercial pitchman Billy Mays passed away on Sunday, likely due to a heart attack caused by hypertensive heart disease.