Deer Antler gate saga

There must be a thread on this somewhere but I couldn't find it.

May as well start one as this could go on for quite a long time.

I guess we all know the story up to this point.

Vijay takes deer antler spray

Deemed as PED by PGAT

VJ suspended, pending investigation.

tour eventually take no further action

VJ now suing PGAT


The latest twist is a "fishing" expedition from VJ's lawyers to uncover documentation on previous drug policy violations.

http://blogs.golf.com/presstent/2013/12/pga-tour-denies-vijay-singhs-request-for-drug-test-documents.html?sct=hp3

Dustin Johnsons response to being implicated in deer antler spray gate

http://www.weiunderpar.com/post/dustin-johnson-says-he-says-no-to-drugs

We did alude to it in my this week's thread, but this is good!
Assume Verplank has been taking something to deal with his wrist but he'll be off to the Champo Tour shortly and, like Calc, he won't be subject to the same drug testing rules.

DJ is a bit of a puzzler except that he was the subject of rumours last spring before he came back from a lot of time away and won Memphis!

All a bit of a mess for the Tour who will probably get sued for violating US "anti trust" regulations - i.e. running a monopoly.

PS: Yup, also Jason Sobel's Q&A: http://www.golfchannel.com/news/golftalkcentral/d-johnson-paulina-drug-related-accusations/

Good to see DJ not going down the legal route, I just hope it doesn't mean he is an easier target for the sleeze bag that is VJ.

theres not much rattling around up top its fairly safe to say!

Don't know why you don't like VJ, Mac. He's no more surly than your poster-boy Woods. I'd have thought you'd lap him up.

If he actually has been been maltreated by the Tour over this cf. other, how shall I say it - white, God-fearing American players - I hope he hangs them out to dry.

Would anybody be surprised that DJ likes a toke. He has that languid style of a stoner it seems. I bet he has been to colorado (??) a couple of times.

There have been loads of under the radar rumours, conjectuer, arguments and fallings out with team VJ, and its gone on for a few years. VJ has been exceptionally lucky in many peoples eyes, as he is a major winner and therefore has had some protection. However he has also upset a fair few top players in this time and many of the newer/younger tour players dont hold him in the same respectable light as some did in the past.

Many actually fell out with him a few years ago, when he ridiculed lady golfers and wouldn't have anything to do with the worlds best lady player, who had won more events and majors than any other player of either sex. You remember it ......

The man is arrogant, greedy, disrespectful and maybe a cheat

VJ has caught the scent of a lesser stag in his nostrils. It should be quite a spectacle if they are paired together in any future tournaments, no doubt they will be walking in parallel and posturing in an attempt to establish dominance. If neither backs down then a clash of antlers is sure to occur. I can't see past DJ in this event, meaning he will have sole mating privileges with the harem of females.

Doc wrote:

The man is arrogant, greedy, disrespectful and maybe a cheat

I love him!

Doc wrote:There have been loads of under the radar rumours, conjectuer, arguments and fallings out with team VJ, and its gone on for a few years. VJ has been exceptionally lucky in many peoples eyes, as he is a major winner and therefore has had some protection. However he has also upset a fair few top players in this time and many of the newer/younger tour players dont hold him in the same respectable light as some did in the past.

Many actually fell out with him a few years ago, when he ridiculed lady golfers and wouldn't have anything to do with the worlds best lady player, who had won more events and majors than any other player of either sex. You remember it ......

The man is arrogant, greedy, disrespectful and maybe a cheat

I remember the women thing. Can't recall the details though - was it about Sorenstam or someone similar playing in men's events?

Arrogant - so what? He's hardly alone in that if that's the case.
Greedy - how do you know?
Disrespectful - maybe, if you're referring to the women golfer thing above.
Cheat - nope, I don't buy it and it's just something for discriminating so-and-sos to bang on about.

Hardly the World's worst rap sheet is it?

Don't forget he has actually been banned for being a "C" word ..

VJ was found to have cheated earlier in his career. A tournament in Malaysia or somewhere I believe. And he was probably right about the Annika thing, it is a bit silly to have women playing in the men's events imo.

Ok, recent cheats in golf:
Dyson
Monty
Tiger
VJ
Saltman

Personally I cannot believe that anyone would cheat in golf (unless no-one finds out)
These people are either barstewards or innocent. I don't know which. Either way they should be shot. They're not that bad. They are the scum of the earth. I quite like them. Meh.

Navy rather than be an apoligist for VJ, why dont you do a bit of research and I dont mean the rumour pages. Check out the amount of problems he's had over the years regarding suspicious actions on the course. see how many players he's wound up because of it. And yes the Aneka thing was unbelievable, when in fact he was a lone voice gobbing off about it. He then stated that if women were allowed to play in mens events it would mean increasing the odds against him and his earnings. GREEDY I'm afraid and if that was his only valid reason for gobbing off then it also shows him as not being bright. There are any number of reasons to keep ladies out of the mens game, but he was angry because she was getting a huge appearance cheque and he wasn't.

Doc,
To be fair (and Vijay's clearly no angel) he was hardly the only one to resent Sorenstam at Colonial, just the most outspoken . . . . .
He had just won the Byron Nelson and made a big show of expressing disdain and then withdrawing from Colonial. But, as I say, he wasn't the only offender, just the most well known.

He still has plenty of respect from others on Tour, one of them being, surprisingly enough, Jason Dufner who he kinda mentored.

kwini, I haven't really been following the court case.  Unsure as to what he's trying to achieve here.  Is it greater transparency from the PGA on the question of drug use?  Level playing field and all that?

gael,
It seems he and his people feel he's been made an unnecessary example of, what with the disruption to his schedule, the ridicule incurred and potentially loss of earnings for something that should apparently not have been made an issue of in the first place.

I'd say both Vijay and the Tour have been in error:
The Tour apparently shouldn't have included the nostril tickler on its list of banned substances.
And;
If it WAS on there, Veej was an idiot to indulge without securing Tour clearance.

As it is though, the Tour apparently leapt before they looked.

Thanks kwini.  Seems to me, the only winners are going to be the lawyers.

As usual.

incontinentia wrote:VJ was found to have cheated earlier in his career. A tournament in Malaysia or somewhere I believe. And he was probably right about the Annika thing, it is a bit silly to have women playing in the men's events imo.

He was 'found' to have cheated was he? Where are the accusers? Go on, have a look. There's nothing on his accusers anywhere and VJ claims he was set up as it involved the son of some dignitary in Indonesia. Where are these pros who were playing with him on that day and claim he cheated? In this internet age, don't you think it's a little odd that no-one can be fingered as his accusers? I do.

Doc wrote:...but he was angry because she was getting a huge appearance cheque and he wasn't.

What the Hell's wrong with that position? If he has problems with people, big deal. Perhaps he doesn't join the right cliques. Maybe they have an agenda because he is a hard worker and doesn't get why others aren't. Maybe he's blunt and some don't like that. Maybe a black Fijian winning loads of $ on the PGA Tour wound a few people up a bit too much...

The cheating allegation was that he amended his score after he completed the second round by one stroke, thereby making the cut, presumably after his marker had signed the card. In those circumstances the pros that played with him would not necessarily remember what he scored, even his marker might not recall that detail.

Navy

Do you really think race comes into it with VJ and it is not just because he is well known to be an arse hole?

I have no doubt a lot of the animosity tiger receives is because he is the black guy that crashed the all white guy bonanza, so I should consider the same possibility when it comes to VJ. I am definitely interested to hear what you think.

As the reaction to sergio's comment showed, the golf world is not one in which discrimination is well understood, so you could well be right.

Nothing to do with both Nine Chins and VJ being hateful Mac?

For the record, I've an equal dislike of many of the white players on the tour, and possibly a lot more contempt for them.

golfermartin wrote:The cheating allegation was that he amended his score after he completed the second round by one stroke, thereby making the cut, presumably after his marker had signed the card. In those circumstances the pros that played with him would not necessarily remember what he scored, even his marker might not recall that detail.

That may be so but you'd think we'd at least know the names of those he was playing with wouldn't you? They should be easy to find but guess what? They aren't.

McLaren wrote:Do you really think race comes into it with VJ and it is not just because he is well known to be an arse hole?

Who knows Mac? I'm not convinced he gets a fair crack of the whip as I don't get the impression he's into larking around and cliques.

There's a lot to admire about VJ and his career. He might be past it now, but he was incredibly hard working and achieved a terrific amount in the late stages of his career.

He might not have been very likeable, but at least he had a personality, and even though we might not have liked what he said, he had the balls to express his views.

If only Nine Chins etc were so candid and opinionated, then golf (and all other sport) interviews might not be quite so boring as they currently are.

I struggle to think of 10 top sportsmen who you could describe as being able to talk in an interesting and open way.

I don't know why you expect sportpeople to have such great personalities? You don't get it in day to day life do you? Even you with your crackling repartee could be construed as a miserable so-and-so by some

What I mean Monty is that it's better to have a personality, whether it's one you like or not is irrelevant.
Most sportsmen are so infuriatingly insipid and deliberately drab and guarded that it's hard to feel any interest in any of them.

So, whether you're a miserable Bar Steward like VJ or a bit of a joker like Fernandez Castano doesn't really matter, at least you are showing some sort of emotion.
Too many are just wooden robots.

I think about the people at my work and there are a couple who have a personality like that (or rather lack of personality) You can still be good at your job and be a person of opinion and emotion. You don't have to be so soul-less all the time.

It is better to have personality of course. But you shouldn't deride those without one. For me it's on a par with mocking disabled kids  

MontysMerkin wrote:It is better to have personality of course. But you shouldn't deride those without one. For me it's on a par with mocking disabled kids  

I'm not really deriding them for having no personality, I'm deriding them for consciously being boring and afraid to express their actual opinion.

That in turn makes them sports men I'm not interested in, similar in regards to people at my work who don't put any effort into being a decent and friendly person.

But how do you know that it isn't just with the press (who lets face it are imbeciles) Bet Tiger has a great time while snorting coke of whores thighs in the casinos of Vegas and i bet all his mates do too.

I don't, but if I was a pro with a daily mouthpiece with the same dreary questions day in day out I think I'd have a bit of a laugh with them, take the urine, tell them to think of more interesting questions, provide stupid answers etc.

If they don't want to be asked the same questions all the time, they should stop answering them in the same way.
The journalists/interviewers have got to take the blame too though, they're too sycophantic and not worth their journalistic name 90% of the time.

super_realist wrote:I don't, but if I was a pro with a daily mouthpiece with the same dreary questions day in day out I think I'd have a bit of a laugh with them, take the urine, tell them to think of more interesting questions, provide stupid answers etc.

Think I would too, for the first maybe 10 years? After that it would be get it over as quick as poss, got some waitresses to train  

Quite a lot of them are just trying to protect themselves from being hung out to dry. There are 2 main ways I see in the press of doing that. By being the wooden robot (then you really do get hammered when - not if - you do say/do something "wrong"). Or by appearing/being open and affable each time and then either the desire to hang you out to dry is lessened or when you do make faux pas it tends to be a storm in a teacup and the public response for example is "oh, it's just Phil being Phil".

For any/all of them it must be trying with the same questions every day.

I think a lot of them simply don't have the wit or articulation to give anything other than a "paint by numbers" response.

I'd like to see a golfer adopt the Gordon Strachan style of being interviewed.

Ahhh the old Frak style of interview?

Assuming no one has been out on the beers or is a close friend with a top 100/200/300 ranked golfer then its very hard to judge whether said person has a good personality or bad personality or no personality at all. You only tend to hear from golfers when giving press conferences or being interviewed. This is probably the part of the job they do not enjoy doing. But the main thing is, it is them doing their job, not everyone is on form when working. Most of us, go to work do a job and go home. And most are different away from the office anyway.

Which makes them very hard to be interested in them. If someone comes across as a braindead moron who can't even show a bit of spontaneity in interviews or who doesn't appear to enjoy what their doing then I'm unlikely to give a toss as to whether they play well or not.
Players and interviewers are equally culpable for making it a dreary sport to watch.

Mind you, compared to footballers and football presenters golfers are a virtual David Niven of raconteurship.

Santa, all I want for Christmas is Rudolf - in a can.
- Vijay, 50