SHOULDN'T FISHING REPLACE GOLF?

by The Original JD, Six Pack Sports Report

For those of you who read me other places or know me you are aware that I have been playing golf a lot lately. I spent the early part of this year in Florida where I played as much golf as possible on some of the nicest courses I have seen. Since I returned to Boston though I haven't had the desire to grab my clubs and play until this past weekend. One of the things that I have realized since playing again is that golf stinks. For someone who is terrible at golf like myself the game is just half-a-day spent miserable and hot wondering whether or not you should drive the cart off a steep incline and end it all. My biggest problem with golf is the idea that it is this great opportunity for business people to talk about things, or buddies to smoke cigars and get outdoors. I'm not Lex Luthor so the prospect of having a gaggle of evil geniuses (geniusi?) in one place at one time has never come up but isn't it reasonable to stop using golf as this socially acceptable outing and instead just go fishing?

Think about it - all the benefits of golfing are present in fishing. You're outside, you can smoke, you can drink, you can talk to your business partners and if you're lucky you can kill something that Greenpeace holds dear. Can anyone give me one reason why I should ever golf again when there is a perfectly good alternative where there is no requirement that I have to carry around a bag full of iron?

The only thing that golf has that fishing doesn't is exercise. But almost everyone who isn't a waterhead gets a cart when they go golfing so there is absolutely zero exercise going on through 18 holes. Fishing on the other hand is an opportunity to be outside and just relax - never during an afternoon fishing do you wonder whether or not you should bash your own face in with a nine iron to make the pain of the game go away. Fishing requires no extra skill sets - I'm pretty sure that the average Epic Carnival reader has the ability to sit, drink and speak.

What keeps people coming back to the golf course? Is it the misery that hitting a tiny white ball into a forest causes? Is it the pain of hearing a faint "splash?" Has anyone here who doesn't consider themselves a good golfer ever had fun on a golf course that they couldn't have had on a boat fishing? I mean when I have my SPSR board meetings I think it's much more impressive to show off my fishing boat then it would be to show off my 3 wood.

Anyone who tries to tell me that you can't replace golf with fishing because there is the chance that you won't catch anything when you fish - I wish your mother had succeeded in poking you in the face with a wire hanger when you were in the womb. You are right that not everyone catches something when they go fishing but it's still better then watching your boss contemplate suicide after he loses his third ball in two holes right?

So I throw it out to the Epic Carnival readers - why can't we as a society stop pushing everyone towards golf and instead steer them towards the wonderful and non-aggravating world of fishing?