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Golf Gazette: Sometimes too much sports can be too much

This is a most interesting world in which we live. Patience seems to be a thing of the past and all things must be bigger and better. The more the merrier, the grander the greater, or so it seems. 

Some drivers today certainly don’t have patience as we watch clueless motorists making U-turns in the middle of Main Street. And don’t get me started on the knuckleheads who can’t wait for the coast to be clear and just pull right out in front of you. #$<\@>&!

Oops! Sorry about that.

Recently I overheard this: “I texted you five minutes ago. Why didn’t you get back to me?” And that word, “texted,” if it is a word, really annoys me.

Long before the Internet, automobile manufacturers would wait until January before introducing next year’s models. “Back in the ’50s car dealers would soap up their windows so you couldn’t see inside the showroom until after New Year’s Day,” said Dick Mullen of Mullen Motors in Southold.

This year you could have been tooling around in a 2016 model in the middle of this past summer.

Not so long ago presidential debates reared their ugly heads just a few weeks before the election. These days we must endure the torture, and that’s torture with a capital “T,” for more than a year before Election Day.

And in October I drove by a place selling Christmas trees. Do you believe that? Christmas trees in October! So much for patience.

The world of sports has jumped on the more-is-better bandwagon and has become saturated with far too many choices. The ridiculously long seasons are now tripping over each other, and that includes golf.

The Brooklyn Dodgers won the 1955 World Series, beating the New York Yankees on Oct. 4. This year the final game of the World Series was scheduled for Nov. 4.

In 1956 the New York Giants defeated the Chicago Bears in the NFL championship game. The contest was held on Dec. 30. This year’s Super Bowl will be played on Feb. 7.

There were six teams in the National Hockey League in 1956, with the Montreal Canadians winning the Stanley Cup on April 11. The NHL now has 30 teams and the Stanley Cup will be decided sometime in mid-June, when the baseball season is in its third month of play.

Not to be outdone, golf has managed to join the antsy pants and pile-it-on brigade.

This year the PGA began the start of the 2016 season in October 2015, shortly after the completion of the Fed Ex Cup Championship, which, by the way, no one quite understands, including some of the players.

Years gone by saw the golf season conclude in October. Fans would then hunker down for a few months, looking forward to the opening event of the season, which was, in those days, the playing of the Bing Crosby Pro-Am at Pebble Beach. This year the PGA will take a whopping three-week hiatus.

Once upon a time there was only a smattering of televised golf events. Today golf fans can watch golf competition from all over the world, including the PGA Tour, the European Tour, the Asian Tour, the LPGA Tour, the Senior Tour and the Web.com Tour. Add to that college golf, the ridiculous reality golf competitions, long-drive competitions, and you have no problem watching golf 24/7 most of the year.

Truth be told, your golf guy watches a lot of golf on television, but when is enough enough?

Of course, this overkill is about the almighty buckeroo; we all know that. But for me, bring back the days of moving the rabbit ears around on my television in hopes of finding a game or two a week on Channel 3 from Hartford or Channel 8 from New Haven.

Better yet, how about the days when I would say good night to my parents, then nestle under my covers with my Emerson transistor radio, the volume turned way down, trying to pick up radio station KDKA from Pittsburgh and catch a few innings of a Pirates game, or KMOX, the St. Louis Cardinals’ station? And WGN, the radio home of the Chicago Cubs, could occasionally be heard on the eastern tip of Long Island.

That, certainly, was a less complicated and simpler time. Give me back the good old days.