Michael Jordan enjoys some contraband at the 2009
Presidents Cup (AP/Marcio Jose Sanchez)
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The City of San Francisco is making a stink over Michael Jordan's cigar smoking at Harding Park during the 2009 Presidents Cup golf tournament. The legendary basketball player was made an assistant coach for the U.S. Team because of his affinity for golf, and his ability to relate to and inspire the world's best golfers.
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Jordan, an avid golfer himself, is also a habitual cigar smoker, something that the city of San Francisco has taken umbrage with. The Presidents Cup is being played on Harding Park, a municipal course in San Francisco that falls under the purview of the SF Recreation and Parks Department. Smoking is illegal in all San Francisco Parks, including the city's four golf courses.
According the local columnists Matier and Ross, Recreation and Parks General Manager Phil Ginsberg has contacted the PGA Tour to get Jordan to stop smoking cigars on the course.
"I've already sent off an e-mail to the PGA Tour director," Ginsburg told Matier and Ross. "It was sort of a gentle nudge reminding them that smoking is illegal and that we would appreciate their support."
The trouble is, Ginsburg is a day late and about $70 million dollars short on his request. He should have made sure the PGA Tour was on board with this decision before the city of San Francisco struck its arrangement to host the Presidents Cup. It is a well known fact that many players on Tour are avid smokers, and the Tour has long had a policy of permitting smokers to indulge their habit while playing in competitive rounds.
The PGA Tour gives players a certain amount of "off TV" time on every hole, and it is during this time that players are permitted to smoke. Anyone who has ever seen a PGA Tour event in person can tell you that Davis Love III, John Daly and Tim Herron light up every chance they get when the cameras aren't on. Watch enough golf on TV, and you'll catch someone lighting up when the cameras are on, something they are fined for at the end of the tournament.
The only surprise in this scenario is that the City of San Francisco is shocked to see someone smoking on its course during a PGA Tour event. More than anything, it is an obvious political play aimed at bringing attention to the City's no-smoking policy by leveraging the star status of Michael Jordan. Nowhere in any of today's coverage does one hear mention of the myriad course marshalls who were spotted smoking on the course yesterday. Nowhere in Ginsberg's statements does he acknowledge that the law is seldom enforced on any of the City's courses during the rest of the year, let alone in any of the city's parks.
San Francisco consistently wants the best of both worlds: to be a world-class destination city and live on the cutting edge of environmental and health legislation. If the City wants to see the PGA Tour come to town again at any point in the future, it needs to come to an accord with the Tour and its smoking policy, or kiss the $70 million in projected revenue this weekend's tournament is expected to bring goodbye.
Comments
"You're right!" Prima donnas, whether politicians or athletes have to be catered to. And if they want to sit next to you in a restaurant and smoke a cigar, I guess that's all right too! An ordinance is an ordinance! If it was wrong to pass it, it should be revoked. But to fear enforcing it because of your "threats" or those of Limbaugh, please, give us a break! Good for Ginsburg!
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