CBS broadcaster was removed from Masters job after | Sports News

During CBS’s 1994 Masters protection, Gary McCord made a joke about how fast the greens had been at Augusta National.

While viewers at home discovered it amusing, the comment did not sit properly with Augusta National’s management – or with two-time Masters champion Tom Watson, who despatched a letter demanding McCord be removed from the printed. Several months later, McCord’s Masters task was terminated.

The incident occurred during the ultimate spherical of the 1994 Masters, as McCord supplied commentary whereas Jose Maria Olazabal lined up a putt on the seventeenth inexperienced. Trying as an example simply how slippery the surfaces had been, McCord quipped: “I don’t think they mow these greens, I think they bikini wax them.”

It was traditional McCord – playful, irreverent – however Augusta National, steeped in custom and decorum, wasn’t amused.

Initially, there was no official backlash. Neal Pilson, who ran CBS Sports on the time, was seated instantly subsequent to McCord and appreciated the humor. However, the dynamic modified when Watson bought concerned.

The eight-time main winner and two-time Masters champion wrote a handwritten notice to CBS golf producer Frank Chirkinian.

“I get called into Frank’s office and he goes, ‘Close the door.’ So I close the door, and he throws me a letter, and it’s written in pencil,” McCord recounted on the most recent episode of Kostis and McCord: Off Their Rockers. “And I look at the letter, it says addressed to Augusta National. And it says, ‘We need to eradicate this lesion on golf. He is the Howard Stern of golf and we need to pay attention to this and what he said,’ signed Tom Watson.”

Once Chirkinian known as McCord in and confirmed him the letter, his destiny was sealed.

Augusta National – famend for its fierce safety of the Masters’ popularity – was allegedly contemplating its choices, whereas CBS supplied no backing for its skilled broadcaster.

Several months later, McCord was quietly dropped from all future Masters broadcasts, although he remained a common presence on CBS’s golf protection by 2019.

The controversy did not finish there. At the next yr’s Pebble Beach Pro-Am, McCord confronted Watson over the letter, feeling betrayed that Watson had gone straight to Augusta’s management fairly than addressing the difficulty with him instantly.

Despite the strain, the 2 ultimately patched issues up and now share an amicable relationship. Looking back on the incident, McCord concedes it unexpectedly boosted his profile as a broadcaster.

“I got more publicity for doing this than anything I ever did in golf,” he disclosed in a later interview.

Nonetheless, the episode stays one of probably the most notorious moments in televised golf historical past – a cautionary story about pushing the boundaries of humor at Augusta.