Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Good Week, Bad Week

Kelly Shon has had a pretty good week.

Sepp Blatter has not.

Let's start with Blatter. How there ever been anyone who was more obviously corrupt and running a corrupt organization than Blatter, who resigned yesterday as the head of FIFA, the world governing body of soccer?

TigerBlog needs to see no evidence, read no reports. It's too obvious.

Blatter was just elected to a fifth term as FIFA president. The only other candidate in the election pulled out just before the voting began.

TigerBlog can't help but wonder why he dropped out? Could it be that he was given an incentive? Just wondering.

The election came just after 14 high-ranking FIFA officials were indicted for corruption. Blatter wasn't one of them, though it seems like he might now be headed down the same path at some point.

Has there ever been anything more obvious? How in the world did Qatar end up with the 2022 World Cup in the first place, through a fair and impartial analysis of the finalists?

Uh, no chance.

Forget for a minute all of the reports of slave labor and deaths of workers that have dogged the construction of the facilities needed to host the event. And forget for a minute the fact that it's a tad hot in Qatar, so hot that it has forced the World Cup to be moved to December.

Is there anyone who ever felt that this process was done fairly, without anything corrupt as part of it?

And even with all that, Blatter survived. And thrived. Even as any casual fan could tell by looking at him that he was completely slimy.

Hey, some people think they're untouchable, that the rules don't apply to them. In some cases, they're right. In others, it eventually catches up to them.

Anyway, it'll be interesting to see who replaces him. And if Qatar actually ends up hosting the 2022 World Cup.

TigerBlog was a tad surprised to see the news that Blatter resigned. He figured Blatter would never go out on his own accord and that he would fight it all the way to the end.

If you're a soccer fan and a World Cup fan, this is a good thing for the sport. It's hard to imagine any sport that more needs a complete overhaul of its governing body.

So that was Blatter.

Then, at the opposite end of "things are going well" spectrum, is Shon, who graduated from Princeton last year.

Shon was a two-time Ivy League Player of the Year on the women's golf team. She went on from Princeton to earn her LPGA tour card, and now, in her first season, she appears to be making the most of the opportunity.

Shon had her first top 10 career finish this past weekend, when she finished tied for third at the LPGA's ShopRite Classic near Atlantic City.

Shon shot a five-under for the tournament, finishing three shots back of Anna Nordqvist.

Her performance earned her $89,000, bringing her earnings for the year to $119,120 through her first 10 events, ranking 49th on the tour. She's made the cut in five of 11 tournaments, and her finish this past weekend bettered her previous high finish of 11th, at her first event, back in February in the Bahamas.

The LPGA tour continues through November.

Shon actually finished higher in the LPGA event this past weekend than she did when the Ivy League tournament was held on the same course in 2012, when she finished seventh as a sophomore. She was the Ivy League Player of the Year in 2013 and 2014, as well as the 2013 Ivy League individual champion and an NCAA qualifier.

She also shared the von Kienbusch Award as a senior.

Shon's success made TigerBlog wonder how many professional athletes Princeton produced in the Class of 2014. There's Shon, and Tom Schreiber of Major League Lacrosse (he leads the league in assists, by the way). And Caraun Reid of the Detroit Lions.

And there were four hockey players, if TB is counting correctly: Sean Bonar, Andrew Calof, Andrew Ammon and Jack Berger. And basketball players T.J. Bray and Jimmy Sherburne.

Maybe TB is forgetting someone. If he is, he apologizes.

Anyway, Shon is off to a really good start to her professional career.

Hopefully she has more good weeks than bad weeks on the tour.

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