Barking for Whybark!

You're 19 years old, maybe 20; a not-quite-of-drinking-age young male athlete. You're a college golfer and your team has just qualified for the national championship. You, as an individual, find yourself in a playoff to take individual medalist honors. Your opponent, a senior, may be playing his final collegiate match if you can take him out in the playoff. Like any competitive athletes, particularly two playing at the college level, at this particular moment, the testosterone levels on that tee box must be palatable.

So, what do you do? If you're Grant Whybark, you address your ball, settle into your stance, and promptly drive the ball 40 yards right of the fairway and out of bounds. Double-bogey. The opponent pars. Second place. You're crushed, right? I mean, you've spent most of your young life preparing for this moment and what do you do? Shankapotomous. Choke-a-rooney. End of story.

Except, that wasn't the end of the story. You see, young Mr. Whybark wasn't bitten by a sudden case of nerves. No, he hit his tee shot out of bounds - ON PURPOSE. That's right, folks, he did it intentionally. In yet another instance of a selfless and totally classy act that reaffirms my faith in my fellow man, Grant Whybark, sophomore golfer for the University of St. Francis, purposely hit his drive out of bounds so that his opponent, Seth Doran, of Olivet Nazarine, would claim individual medalist honors. You see, Doran was competing only as an individual. His team had already been eliminated from the Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference Championship last month, so the only way Doran could make it to the NAIA National Championship was to win his match against Whybark. Whybark knew he was going to nationals because his team had already locked up the conference team championship. For Doran, a senior who had never made it to finals and a young man known throughout the conference as a very good player AND a good guy as well, it was his last chance. So, Whybark made sure Doran advanced.

I know this is the second blog in a row in which I've referenced an incredible act of conscience and sportsmanship committed by a golfer - this time at the collegiate level - but it really doesn't matter the sport. Like the two young ladies who carried an opponent around the bases when she injured her ankle running out a home run she had just hit so that she could cross the plate in the final game of her final season; or the two high school basketball teams who colluded to call a timeout at the end of a game to allow for a substitution, a young man with learning disabilitites who had been a loyal manager on his team for many years, was in his final season before graduating and had never seen one second of playing time prior to that day. He suited up, entered the game and proceeded to hit five three-point shots in a row to end the game. He was carried off on his teammates' shoulders.

Sportsmanship. It's a term that represents respect not only for one's opponent on a field of play, but respect for the very game itself. Too often in today's me-first, 24-hour-news-cycle world, we hear of the gun-toting celebrity athlete or the philandering celebrity athlete or the steroid-using celebrity athlete. Key word there being celebrity. We bear witness to the garish, selfish, juvenile displays of celebration when a linebacker sacks a quarterback or a wide receiver catches a pass for a first down - you know, just doing their jobs! It tarnishes the word, sportsman. Then along comes Grant Whybark, and for a minute we forget about all that is bad in sports and remember the sheer joy of playing the game, playing by the rules, and the purity that can be sports when played the way they were intended - with honor, dignity and respect for the opponent and the game. Grant Whybark should be awarded an ESPY - if not the key to the city - but I have a feeling he's a guy who would be embarassed by the honor. He didn't do what he did for the recognition; he did it for the love of the game and out of respect for a deserving fellow competitor. And that's why I'm barking for Grant Whybark. Woof! Woof! Woof! . . .

. . .Wishin' I Was Fishin'