For the record, I used to present the Ferrets every year on the CBS late-night highlights show from Firestone.
Ernie Els won the Golden Ferret in our fourth year, and in a memorable bedtime scene that we shot in his hotel room, the great South African cuddled up with the varmint on one side and the Open Championship trophy on the other, and uttered the immortal, "Good night, Claret ... Good night, ferret," before he turned out the light. It was TV magic, and it was cancelled.
This time, however, it's going to stick! (Or at least that's what the idiots at this magazine tell me.) For the sake of history, reality, and social anthropology, I divvied up some of the awards into two categories: one for able-bodied homo erecti, and the other for the currently crippled, non-carbon-based life form known as T. Woods.
PLAYER OF THE
YEAR FERRET
Alien Division: T. (Win One for the
Gimper) Woods.
Homo Erectile Division: Padraig Harrington. Goes without saying, he's won three of the last six majors, almost in alien style. He was a thoroughbred Irish stallion coming down the final stretch. Big Green, if you like.
Honorable mention (Resident Alien Division): Me. I didn't make a bogey all year. Never hit a shot, either.
The Player of the Year Ferret (Under 25): If we're talking age, Anthony Kim, no contest. If it's a sperm count, Gary McCord.
The Player of the Year Ferret (Over 40): Again, if we're talking age, uh...let me think...Vijay Singh. If it's an IQ score, he doesn't qualify.
COMEBACK OF THE
YEAR FERRET
Alien Division: Technically speaking, you
have to have been away to
come back, but once again,
T. (Hoppy) Woods.
Homo Erectile Division (Three-way tie): Dudley Hart, who because of his wife Suzanne's lung tumor, had to take months off to look after his triplets and needed to win about $500,000 just to keep his card. He did a whole lot better than that.
Scott McCarron, after sliding off the radar for a few years, came back strongly, almost winning at Greensboro.
Rocco Mediate, who scored points in every category, including fashion, is now wearing pants made from about a quarter of the material he used a season ago. Last year, he could have rigged an America's Cup yacht and had enough left over to mummify Bob Barker.
All three of these players are great guys, and showed great courage to do what they did this year.
INTESTINAL FERRET(UDE)
Alien Division: Smelldrick Woods. At
the Buick Open in San
Diego, Tiger devastated the
field (and this announcer)
with the most difficult of all
flatulizations, a perfectly
executed triple flirter
(degree of difficulty: 5.8)
in the full tuck position. It
was a harbinger of things to
come, taking the wind out
of the rest of the field, with
whom, for want of a better
expression, he wiped the
joint up.
Homo Erectile Division: Steve Williams. On links courses, Williams has been known to inadvertently run a supertanker aground, such is the strength and cathedral organ-like frequency of his bunghorn.
In a supreme act of anal ventriloquism, I once saw him throw a fart to the very underpants of the walking scorer, who was so gobsmacked that he actually apologized! Trust me on this one — world, Olympic, or extraterrestrial — Stevie Williams has no peers.
HAUTE COUTURE FERRET
Alien and Homo Erectile
Divisions: Camilo
Villegas, who could
wear my grandad's long
underwear with the
18-wheeler skidmarks on
the trap door and still look
like a Calvin Klein model.
Damn his darkly handsome,
sinuous and swinely self!
SHOT OF THE YEAR FERRET
Alien Division: T. (Suck On That One)
Woods, for the putt he
made on the 72nd hole at
the U.S. Open. And yes, I
did know he was going to
make it. It's what he does.
Homo Erectile Division: Paddy Harrington's 5-wood to four feet on the 71st hole of the British Open. It was bold and unwavering, like me at a Pizza Hut buffet.
