Pro Golfer to Obama: You're Playing a Bit Too Much Golf, Champ (Update: ESPN is Not Amused)

Paul Azinger just earned the hero tag. Also, the heh, and obvious tags.

Pro golfer Paul Azinger thinks President Obama might be hitting the links a bit too hard.

The author, businessman and 12-time PGA Tour winner took to Twitter Thursday to zing the commander-in-chief over his frequent golf outings while on vacation in Martha’s Vineyard.

“Facts: Potus has played more golf this month than I have: I have created more jobs this month than he has,” Azinger wrote.

Double eagle.

I have a theory about all this golf the president is playing. I haven’t fully thought it all through and it’s going to be controversial, so bear with me.

Tiger Woods notwithstanding, golf has long been seen as a white man’s game. I’m a white man, really can’t stand to watch golf on TV and can barely play it myself, but that is its public perception. I prefer football, soccer, baseball, really nearly anything to golf as a sport. Tiger Woods did a great deal to change the game’s perception, and then he self-destructed.

Beyond the pro game, there’s the perception of golf as a white man’s game because it’s a game in which business deals get proffered and made. It’s a game during which politicians decide the fate of the world while taking a mulligan on the 8th hole. Those politicians have historically been white men.

So along comes the first black president. In two years in office, he has played more golf in office than his predecessor did in eight, despite the fact that his predecessor was regularly ripped for playing golf. Obama didn’t have a particular reputation for playing golf when he came to office, but he does now. He plays golf, gets ripped for it, and then plays more golf. Mitt Romney has even turned Obama’s penchant for not working into a very effective slogan — “Obama’s Not Working.” And he’s not. He’s playing more golf than a pro golfer.

We know Barack Obama is a narcissistic, vindictive sort. We know that he likes to do all sorts of historic things, and sees everything he does in office as precedent-setting, ground-breaking, first evah, changing the game, etc.

So…is Obama spending so much time on the links as a way of sticking it to The Man, by (in his own mind) taking The Man’s power game away from him?

I give it a firm “maybe.” It’s the kind of thing a suddenly powerful, privately bitter, self-centered grievance-mongerer would do.

Update: ESPN has warned Azinger about getting political. I think they should have him on SportsNation and see what the channel’s polls say.