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BRIEFS
Baseball honors
Jackie Robinson
Baseball took note of one of the
greatest moments in its history
Tuesday night with an anniver
sary celebration that has gener
ated more fanfare than the actual
event. Tuesday m arked the 50th
anniversary of Jackie Robinson's
first game in the major leagues
and the baseball world fittingly
paid tribute at Shea Stadium dur
ing a game between the Los Ange
les Dodgers and the New York
Mets Robinson broke baseball's
color barrier on April 15. 1947 by
playing first base for the Brooklyn
Dodgers against the Boston Braves
at Ebbets Field. Only 25.623 fans
showed up in the 34,000-seat park
to watch Robinson go hitless in
three at-bats in the D odger's 5-3
victory. The major New York area
papers virtually ignored the sig
nificance of the event with some
writers skipping it entirely and
others mentioning the debut only
as a footnote. The scene will be
different at Shea Stadium on Tues
day night. The gam e will be
stopped after the fifth inning and
P re sid e n t Bill C lin to n and
Robinson's widow, Rachel, took
part in a ceremony at second base,
the position w here R obinson
played most of his career. Acting
C o m m issioner Bud Selig and
N a tio n a l L e a g u e P re sid e n t
Leonard Coleman are among the
dignitaries who were in atten
dance.
Top seeded
Fernandez pulls out
Top seed Mary Joe Fernandez
of the United States today with
drew from the $1.1 million Japan
Open tennis tournament in To
kyo, Japan due to lower back strain.
Fernandez hurt her back last week
during a q u a rte rfin a l loss to
Amanda Coetzer at Amelia Is
land. The 1990 champion will be
replaced in the draw by Annabel
Ellwood of Australia as the ninth
seed while a lucky loser or quali
fier takes her place. The Japan
Open is the fourth non-Grand slam
tournament to mix the m en's and
women's tours. Richard Krajicek
of the Netherlands is the top m en's
seed and is looking to rebound
from a second-round loss in India
last week.
Five seeds ousted
Five seeded players, including
two-time finalist Sergi Bruguera
of Spain, were opening-round ca
sualties today at the $825,000
Open Seat-Godo claycourt tour
nam ent in B arc e lo n a , Spain.
Bruguera, the I Oth seed, was
e lim in a te d by M a rc -K e v in
Goellner. 6-4, 2-6.6-2. Bruguera.
ranked 21st in the world, has
reached the finals of the Italian
Indoors and l.ipton Champion
ships this year. In a d d itio n .
Fernando Vicente upended num
ber 12 Jan Siemerink of the Neth
erlands, 6-4,6-3, Julian Alonso of
Spain, a wild card entry, ousted
14th seed and 1992 fin a list
Magnus Gustafsson of Sweden, 7-
6(8-6), 3-6.6-3; N orw ay's Chris
tian Ruud ousted num ber 13
Bohdan Uhhraeh of the Czech
Republic, 6-3, 6-4; and Austria's
Gilbert Schaller stormed past 15th
seed Michael Stich of Germany,
6-2, 6-2.
COMMUNITY
TIGER WOODS, CALL HIM "MASTER
Tiger dons the jacket of the elite Master's Series
has been 50 years, almost to the
thal Jackie Robinson broke
n the racial barriers in baseball.
v, a last vestige has fallen in golf,
jghtdow n in record fashion here
ic middle of the Old South, by a
ng man of color.
iger Woods, 21. who is of Afri-
and Thai heritage, on Sunday
line the youngest golfer in his-
to win the Masters at the Au-
la National Golf Club. In doing
complished, but for its social sig-
nifieanee. As the first man of color
to put on the green jacket emblem-
atic of a Masters victory, he finished
what other people had started,
"It means so much," Woods said,
"1 m the first, but I wasn t the pio-
neer. Charlie Sifford, Lee Elder,
Teddy Rhodes, those guys paved the
way for me to be here. I thank them,
If it w asn't for them. 1 might not
have had the chance to play here."
myths and broke
records and again
altered the face of
the game.
W o o d s’ final
round of 69 gave
him a total score
of 18-under-par
270. the lowest in
the 6 1-year history o f the event,
breaking the record held jointly by
Jack Nicklaus and Raymond Floyd.
His 12-stroke victory overTom Kite,
47, was the widest margin ever in
the Masters —- indeed, the widest in
any major championship conducted
in America — and it made him the
first man of African heritage to win
a professional major championship.
That it was accom plished in
Woods' third appearance at Augusta,
and his first as a pro. comes as no
surprise to anyone who has followed
his career. This is the most recent in
a long string of firsts. He was the
first golfer to win three U.S. Junior
Amateurs and the first to win three
straight U.S. Amateurs.
This one. though, means the most
to Woods, not merely for the re
markable way in which it was ac-
This old golf course has seen dis
plays of power and it has seen dis
plays of finesse. But it has never
seen anything like the combination
of both — and the added element ol
mental toughness — that Woods
showed this week. For starters, he
played the par-5 holes in 13 under
par for the week. That is the power.
He holed more than 70 feet of par
putts during the four rounds. That is
the ultimate in finesse.
And after shooting a front-nine
40 on Thursday, he played the re
maining 63 holes at Augusta Na
tional in 22 under par. No one has
ever done that. No one has ever
played the final 54 in 200 strokes.
No one has ever played the middle
two rounds in 131 strokes. That is
mental toughness.
“Let’s face it.” said Jack Nicklaus,
“ lt was quite a difference from the first
time Woods came here, when hate mail
arrived at the clubhouse and when one
letter in particular said to him, ‘Just what
we don’t need, another nigger in sports. ”
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who, until now, has played this
course better than anyone else, “it’s
his time now.”
It surely is. It was from the time
he stepped to the first tee on Sunday
morning, ready to face a challenge
almost as difficult as playing with a
two-stroke lead.
Lined up on the porch outside the
manor clubhouse to watch him tee
oil were at least 20 African-Ameri
can employees of the club. Farther
dow n the hill
were some of the
black A ugusta
caddies, people
like
Ja ria h
Beard, who cad
died for Fuzzy
Zoeller back in
1979. Watching
on te le v isio n
were Jim Thorpe and Cal Peete and
Charlie Sifford and countless other
black pros.
Just before Woods teed off, right
after he had worked on the chipping
green, Lee Elder, the lirst black
player to compete in the Masters, in
1975, approached him and wished
him luck.
“That really reinforced what I
had to accomplish,” W oods said.
"He was the first. It was because of
people like him that I was able to
turn pro, to get this opportunity.”
Woods killed the first tee shot of
the day, rilling it into the wind well
up the hill to the left of the bunker.
He hit the green and two-putted for
par. "That was big, to settle down
like that with two good shots and a
solid par," Woods said.
He birdied the second hole and
For details contact
M ichael
680-1367
showed no sign o f nerves. His lead
dropped to its lowest point — eight
strokes over Costantino Rocca and
Tom Watson
when he bogeyed the
fifth hole, his first bogey in 37 holes.
He also bogeyed the seventh after
hooking his drive into the trees, punch
ing his approach into the front bunker
and failing to get up and down.
Those were the last scoring errors
he made. After a birdie at the eighth
hole, his lead at the turn was nine
strokes, just one fewer than Seve
Ballesteros had in 1980 when he ran
away from the field. But Woods
played the back nine much better
than Ballesteros did that year.
"To me. the way l iger played this
week was really unbelievable,” said
Mark O 'M eara, his neighbor and
playing partner from Orlando. Pla.
I he cliche about the Masters is
that it is not won until the back nine
on Sunday. That was not the case
this year. It was won on the back
nine on Thursday, when Woods
changed a (law in his swing and shot
a 30 coming in that set the tone for
the rest o f his week.
He had that security in mind on
Sunday when he birdied the I Ith.
nearly eagled the 13th and then made
a 12-footerupthehillat 14 for birdie
to get to IX under. At the 15th, after
pushing his drive way right, he had
to scramble for par on the hole he
dominated all week. But his 7-footer
for par was nearly as impressive as
his driver-wedge play on the 500-
yard hole had been all week.
I, secured the record, if he could
just get past the last three holes. It
capped the coronation, and it set up
one o f the loudest, most raucous
final walks in the event’s history.
He waded through the crowd at
the last hole, looking for his ball,
which had hooked over to the same
spot where Ian Woosnam hit his
drive when he won here in 1991. A
quick finger on a photographer’s
motor drive when Woods was at the
top of his backswing caused the er
rant drive, but it gave Woods a chance
to mingle with the gallery for the
first time all week.
And as he walked down the tun
nel o f applause, he began to slap
palms with the gallery, first one and
then another, until soon they were
all extending their hands toward
his.
It was quite a difference from the
first time Woods came here, when
hate mail arrived at the clubhouse
and when one letter in particular
said to him, "Just what we don’t
need, another nigger in sports.”
Woods kept that letter. And now
it serves as a symbol o f what he has
overcome here and the way he over
came it. He was not a pioneer, but he
was the first, and a most impressive
first at that.
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