Kudos to Fitzpatrick

We are better than this

Good morning all and happy Monday!

Kudos to Matt Fitzpatrick for winning the RBC Heritage Classic, a top tier PGA Tour event. Fitzpatrick beat Scottie Scheffler by one stroke in a one-hole sudden death playoff yesterday. It is the second time Fitzpatrick has won the RBC and his fourth PGA Tour victory. He won the U.S. Open in 2022, so he can hang a major tournament victory on his mantel. Coincidentally he beat out Scheffler by one stroke in that Open, the same golfer he defeated yesterday in sudden death. Good for him. He might be the hottest golfer on the PGA Tour. So what is my beef?

I have a problem with the fans yelling “U-S-A” every time Fitzpatrick steps up to hit a shot. You see, Fitzpatrick is a native of Sheffield, England. He went to school at Northwestern University in the good old U.S.A. and his brother Alex played golf on the Wake Forest University golf team, the same team that once had Arnold Palmer as a member.

Look. I am a U.S. citizen, born and bred in this country, proud of my Italian heritage. But one of the many things that makes me proud to be a U.S. citizen is being welcoming to those who are not. Rooting against Fitzpatrick or simply chiding him with “U-S-A” chants, simply because he was born in England, I find to be disrespectful. That was the case, however, every time Fitzpatrick stepped over a golf ball down the stretch of his exciting win over Scheffler, arguably the world’s top golfer and currently second in the FedEx points standings behind Cameron Young.

Root for Scottie Scheffler, until your throat is hoarse. Scream for any U.S.-born golfer, until you cannot be heard, if that is your cup of tea. Shouting “U-S-A” every time a golfer in contention not from the United States steps over a golf ball is not what we are all about. We did not scream it when Gary Player took a shot or Seve Ballesteros, Greg Norman, Nick Faldo, Nick Price or a million other foreign-born golfers who made it big on the PGA Tour. We should not be doing it now. Why do you think Fitzpatrick cupped his ear after he clinched the victory?

This is not the Ryder Cup. Root for or against a golfer until you are blue in the face. Rooting against the golfer because he was not born in the U-S-A? You’ve lost me. We are a better country than that. It’s time we showed it.

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DAN