|
 |   |
|
EVENTS Fantasy Central Inside Game Multimedia Central Statitudes Your Turn Message Boards Email Newsletters Golf Guide Cities Work in Sports
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE |  |
Spinning a positive Webb
GURNEE, Ill. -- Unless you live under a rock or got sick of golf after watching you-know-who win the British Open, you know Karrie Webb convincingly captured the U.S. Women's Open Sunday. With her third victory in a major championship, she has now hopefully silenced her critics. During her 4 1/2 years on tour, Webb has come under attack by many members of the media. They have called her surly, cold, curt, emotionless, boring, apathetic, uncooperative and uninterested. You name it, Webb has become a walking thesaurus of negatives for reporters wishing that she could write their stories for them.
After some persistence, Webb agreed to do the interview, and ever since then has done basically everything I have asked of her. Through our dealings I have found her to be cooperative, opinionated, genuine, funny, sincere, dedicated to the game and most of all busy. Recently, I spent a day in her shoes, or at least walked alongside them. On the Wednesday before she won the Dinah Shore (I refuse to give that cookie company any free advertisement), Webb allowed me to spend the entire day with her. From 6:30 in the morning until just short of 9 p.m., I was a fly on the wall of her little world. From the minute she came to the course until she left around 5 p.m., she spent more time with pen in hand signing autographs than with a golf club. During the grueling six-hour pro-am, she played with Mary Hart of Entertainment Tonight fame. Since Hart, who seemed to have a smile permanently plastered on her face, reports on celebrities, I thought she would be an expert on the subject. She said Webb was full of personality and reminded her a bit of Cary Grant: "Low-key but very pleasant, easy to talk to, with a surprising sense of humor." After the pro-am Webb spent the next couple of hours being probed by reporters asking the same questions that she hears week in and week out. Last year the big news was her switch to cross-handed putting. Each week she would give the same answer about why she switched and how important it was. Over the year, we estimated that she was asked that same question at least 100 times. If she started to sound as if she was bored, who could blame her? It's an unfair characterization that Webb is emotionless and lacks charisma. If you saw the excitement in her eyes coming up the 18th fairway of the Merit Club on Sunday, you would know she isn't a robot. Then she choked up during the trophy presentation trying to thank her caddie, Evan Minster, her parents and, most of all, her coach, Kelvin Haller. By no means should the media put Webb in the same category as Steve Carlton, who didn't do interviews, or Michael Jordan, who kept his personal matters very private. On only one occasion did I ever see her refuse to answer a question; otherwise she will stand there until her ears fall off or the pens run out of ink, whichever happens first. Louder than Webb's words are her actions. In her first 110 starts she has collected 21 victories. She has recorded 82 top-10 finishes. And if you add up her top-three finishes -- 21 firsts, 19 seconds and 11 thirds -- she has been in the hunt nearly half the times she tees it up. She isn't the Tiger Woods of the LPGA -- she is, simply, Karrie Webb. Everyone talks about how there will only be one Babe Ruth or one Michael Jordan or even one Tiger Woods. Well, there will only be one Karrie Webb, and we should all enjoy and relish everything she does while we can. Tom Hanson, a regular contributor to Sports Illustrated's Golf Plus section, is a longtime caddie on the LPGA Tour. Click here to send him a question or comment. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||
