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Loving Greensboro

An elected official called me today and left an angry message that ended with this question: "Why do you hate Greensboro?"

And he was serious.

He was upset because he thought the newspaper was disrespecting the Wyndham Championship. He didn't like a story we wrote praising the caliber of the field because, he said, it implied that previous fields weren't good. And he didn't like the illustration of Carl Pettersson dressed in paper-doll clothes with the story about how golfers choose their outfits. (Hey, with no one playing golf yet, we have to write about something.)

"He's the past champion of the Wyndham and you put him in that? Everyone in the clubhouse is making fun of it," his voicemail said.

I like the idea of publishing a story and illustration that catches people's attention and creates buzz. The Sports section, after all, is one of the places in a newspaper where you should be a bit provocative; people like to trash-talk sports. True, some things we do appeal to a certain sensibility. But having some fun with -- not making fun of -- a local guy made good to illustrate a story on fashion doesn't seem out of bounds. (He goes through 250 shirts and 40 pairs of pants a season.) To be fair and even funnier, we could have used John Daly, I suppose.

In the end, I think we have been pretty gung-ho on this year's Wyndham. We've published a great deal about the tournament over the past week and obviously have more to come.

But really, why do I hate Greensboro?

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lexalexander

August 19, 2009 - 5:17 pm EDT

Well, obviously, you hate Greensboro for the same reason that people who insist on upholding the Bill of Rights hate America.

Dawn in NC

August 19, 2009 - 10:36 pm EDT

Lex, that is EXACTLY what I said to John this morning when he told me this story. Scary.

ascensions

August 20, 2009 - 12:17 am EDT

Welcome to my club....

Yeah... sure... "I hate it"... that's why I bloody spend all my paychecks in Greensboro... shop, work.... people are idiots....

Greensboro's infamous underground tag line "If you can't say something nice... you're not one of us."

John Robinson

August 20, 2009 - 8:35 am EDT

Oh, that sort of comment isn't unusual by itself. It was just the anger contained in it, particularly given that we have given the Wyndham so much publicity and most of it has been positive. That, and the goofiness of it coming from an otherwise sane elected official, surprised me.

I returned the call by the way, got voicemail, left a message with no editorial comment. Haven't heard back yet.

Mialamasoul

August 20, 2009 - 10:42 am EDT

Liked being on the career panel with you a couple of weeks ago Mr. Robinson. There are a couple of hypersensitive folks on either side of the fence around these parts. The comment is unwarranted. Thank you for having (and displaying) a sense of humor. We'd do a lot better and live a lot longer if we "officials" in government learned how to laugh at ourselves. Levity never killed anyone.

Mialamasoul

August 20, 2009 - 10:37 am EDT

Ha, haaahahahahahahh haaaaahahhahhaha.

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