Long drought seals San Diego State’s fate in title game against UConn

• April 4, 2023

By KRISTIE RIEKEN AP Sports Writer

HOUSTON — A magical journey put San Diego State in its first Final Four.

A thrilling buzzer-beater by Lamont Butler landed the Aztecs one win away from a national title.

Hot early shooting on Monday night helped them race to an early lead against the mighty UConn Huskies.

Then things fell apart.

For more than 11 tortured minutes in the title game, no matter what they tried, the Aztecs could not make a field goal in their 76-59 loss.

“It’s difficult to play like that,” Butler said.

Fighting against a stifling defense, they missed hook shots, had layups blocked, badly missed wide-open 3-point attempts and saw easy jump shots fall short.

The Aztecs (32-7) took shot after shot – 14 in all as the clock ticked and ticked – but no matter what they tried nothing would fall.

“We were talking about it for sure,” Butler said. “And we were trying to figure out what we can do to stop the scoring drought and create advantages for ourselves. We tried but things weren’t working.”

By the time Darrion Trammell mercifully made a jump shot with about 5½ minutes left in the first half, the Aztecs had seen a four-point lead turn into a 26-17 hole.

A team that got here on the strength of its vaunted defense was in the end done in by an offense that went cold at the worst possible moment.

“It’s the national championship game, a lot of things had to go right on our end in order to win,” guard Matt Bradley said. “And when you’re missing shots and turning the ball over and even when you’re playing hard on defense, it’s not going to be enough. So we learned that tonight for sure.”

The Aztecs rallied from a 14-point deficit to beat Florida Atlantic in the national semifinal, with Butler’s game-winner at the buzzer marking the first time in Final Four history that a buzzer-beater took a team from trailing to a victory.

This time there would be no such heroics. They did go on a second-half run to make it interesting, though.

San Diego State used a 14-4 spurt, with the first four points from Jaedon LeDee, to get within 60-55 with about five minutes to go.

But Jordan Hawkins made a 3-pointer seconds after that to start a 9-0 run that shut the door on any designs the Aztecs had on another remarkable comeback.

Though their defense had been the star of this Cinderella’s tournament run entering Monday night, their offense had done plenty to complement it.

Through their first five games in the tournament, the Aztecs shot an average of 42.48%. In the biggest game in school history Monday night, they shot a tournament-low 32% – a number significantly lowered by their 28.6% first half.

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It was their second-lowest shooting percentage of the season, behind the 31.7% they shot in a 62-57 victory over Utah State in the Mountain West Conference tournament title game. Their 24 first-half points were the second-fewest they’d managed all season.

There were no tears in San Diego State’s locker room after the loss that snapped a nine-game winning streak, but rather a bunch of guys who were proud of how far they got, even if they came up short.

“We were the only ones who believed we could get here,” Trammell said. “We surpassed our expectations honestly.”

Added Keshad Johnson, who led the team with 14 points Monday night.

“I’m sure we put our school’s name on the map and I’m proud of that,” he said.

​ Orange County Register 

Dodgers explode for 13 runs in victory over Rockies

• April 4, 2023

LOS ANGELES ― Five days into the new season, the Dodgers’ offense has demonstrated a feast-or-famine quality. On a cold and windy Monday night at Dodger Stadium, they feasted.

Most of the Dodgers’ runs in their 13-4 victory over the Colorado Rockies scored with two outs in the fifth inning. Rockies starter Ryan Feltner (0-1) was one out away from leaving in line for a win when he loaded the bases on two walks and a double by Freddie Freeman.

Valencia native Jake Bird took over on the mound, and the floodgates opened. Four straight hits led to seven runs against the former UCLA standout, capped by Jason Heyward’s first home run as a Dodger.

Will Smith and Chris Taylor also hit home runs into a whipping wind, and James Outman became the first Dodger to hit two triples in a game in seven years.

The Dodgers’ 13 runs and 13 hits were both season highs. They scored eight and 10 runs in their two wins against the Arizona Diamondbacks and only one run in each of their two losses.

The beneficiary of their latest outburst was starting pitcher Michael Grove, who was in line for a loss in his 2023 debut until the Dodgers’ big two-out rally. Grove actually exited the game with a 2-1 lead in the fifth inning, but consecutive walks followed by an Elias Diaz double ended his night and left Yency Almonte with two runners in scoring position.

Harold Castro belted Almonte’s first pitch to right field, scoring two runs and giving the Rockies a 3-2 lead. The Rockies scored once more before the inning was over to take a 4-2 lead.

Grove was charged with three runs, all earned, in four innings. He walked two batters and struck out four. After Almonte finished out the fifth inning, the Rockies couldn’t muster a run against Alex Vesia, Phil Bickford, or Shelby Miller.

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The offense did the rest. Freeman went 3 for 4. Outman, Heyward and J.D. Martinez collected two hits each. All nine Dodger starters reached base at least once.

Outman became the first Dodger to triple twice in one game since Yasiel Puig did so on July 25, 2014. The rookie outfielder has collected the Dodgers’ first home run, stolen base and triple of 2023.

Dodgers second baseman Miguel Vargas was hit on the right thumb by a 92 mph fastball from Connor Seabold in the seventh inning but remained in the game. He suffered a hairline fracture of his right pinkie finger fielding a ground ball in February, an injury that left him unable to swing a bat in games for much of spring training.

More to come on this story.

​ Orange County Register 

Villa Park vs. Servite, Cypress vs. Foothill in National Classic

• April 4, 2023

Cypress, Foothill, Servite and Villa Park won their first round games Monday in the first round of the National Classic.

Their victories set up these two quarterfinals games Tuesday: Cypress vs. Foothill at El Dorado High at 10 a.m.; Servite vs. Villa Park at Fullerton College at 1 p.m.

The Orange County top 25 has Villa Park (13-3) at No. 5, Cypress (13-4) at No. 7, Foothill (9-8) at No. 8 and Servite (10-8) at No. 9.

Villa Park on Monday beat Utah’s Jordan 12-1. Spartans senior shortstop Gavin Grahovac homered and drove in four runs and senior first baseman Zack Brown homered and had two RBIs.

Servite beat South Hills, the No. 2 team in the CIF Southern Section Division 2 top 10, 4-3. Kyle Buchanan had two RBIs and Roman Martin homered for the Friars.

Abbrie Covarrubias and Matthew Thomas drove in two runs each for Cypress in a 6-2 win over Liberty of Arizona.

The tournament semifinals are Wednesday at 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. at El Dorado. The championship game is at Amerige Park in Fullerton on Thursday at 7 p.m.

​ Orange County Register 

Production throughout Angels’ lineup creates cushion for bullpen in victory over Mariners

• April 4, 2023

SEATTLE — The Angels’ 7-3 victory over the Seattle Mariners on Monday night provided a tidy summation of what they couldn’t do last season.

The bottom of the order strung together a couple of rallies to produce runs early in the game, and they scored three late insurance runs on a Taylor Ward two-run homer in the eighth inning and a Brandon Drury RBI double in the ninth.

After Angels relievers had held a one-run lead for seven outs in the fifth, sixth and seventh, the Angels suddenly made the lead big enough that the Angels didn’t even have a save situation for Carlos Estévez in the ninth.

“We keep coming at you,” Manager Phil Nevin said. “There’s a lot of guys, top to bottom, who are going to give you a good at-bat, and we did that tonight.”

The Angels improved to 3-1, with enough encouraging signs throughout the night to pick up starter Reid Detmers when he wasn’t at his best.

Shohei Ohtani gave the Angels a 4-2 lead on a 431-foot two-run homer in the fifth, his second homer in as many games. Too often last season the Angels’ only offense came on homers by Ohtani or Mike Trout.

This time, Ohtani’s homer came after the Angels had scored single runs in the second and fourth, both times with rallies produced by three hits from the bottom five hitters in the lineup.

Drury, who was batting sixth, had hits in the middle of both rallies, part of a three-hit night.

“Obviously the top of the lineup is as good as it gets, and I feel the lineup is real deep, one through nine,” Drury said. “It’s definitely a special lineup.”

No. 8 hitter Luis Rengifo, who was not in the lineup until Anthony Rendon accepted his suspension about two hours before the game, drove in both runs with singles. Rengifo, who said his approach has improved since he spent so much time with José Altuve in the World Baseball Classic, also drew his fifth walk of the young season in the eighth. He was aboard for Ward’s homer.

Just before that inning, Nevin said he turned to hitting coach Marcus Thames and said: “You give me two more, we’re winning this game. He said ‘Alright, I’ve got you.’”

Suddenly there was breathing room for an Angels’ bullpen that last year was regularly pressed to get nine or 12 outs with a one-run lead. Ryan Tepera, Matt Moore and Jimmy Herget each held the one-one run lead on Monday, and then José Quijada and Estévez worked with the added cushion.

Estévez, who had started warming up before Drury spoiled the save situation by padding the lead to four, finished what Detmers started.

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Detmers has improved the velocity of all of his pitches, giving reason to believe that he might be primed for a performance even better than his 3.77 ERA in 25 starts in his rookie year.

Detmers was throwing harder on Monday, with a fastball that averaged 95.3 mph and a slider that was 90.0 – up from 93.2 and 86.3 – but his command was lacking.

Detmers walked three and he gave up four hits, including three doubles. The Mariners scored three runs.

It wasn’t all his fault, though. Third baseman Gio Urshela made an error on a routine throw, leading to one of the runs being unearned. One of the doubles Detmers allowed was on a well-placed slider and another was softly hit. Detmers also struck out seven.

“I felt good but I just gotta get ahead in counts,” Detmers said. “That was the main thing tonight. I felt like I was fighting pretty much every at-bat. Just gotta get ahead, work ahead and life’s a lot easier. But other than that, I felt good. Just have to get the fastball command down and should have better outcomes.”

​ Orange County Register 

Man gets 26 years to life for killing stepmom with pickaxe in Lake Forest

• April 4, 2023

FULLERTON — A 30-year-old man was sentenced Monday to 26 years to life in prison for killing his stepmother with a pickaxe in Lake Forest nearly a decade ago.

Oscar Luis Morlett III was convicted March 2, but because he pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, jurors had to determine whether he was sane at the time of the crime. If he had been found insane at the time of the killing, he would have been committed to a state mental hospital for an indefinite period. Jurors found March 15 that he was sane at the time of the killing.

Morlett was convicted of first-degree murder, with jurors finding true a sentencing enhancement for the personal use of a deadly weapon.

Morlett was convicted of killing 66-year-old Jeanne Ellen Morlett on Aug. 9, 2013.

She was living with the suspect and his father, Oscar Morlett Sr., and brother, Alex, at 21 Blazewood in Lake Forest at the time, according to a trial brief from Senior Deputy District Attorney Seton Hunt.

The defendant had been living with his mother, Lisa Powell, before that, but she kicked him out of the house in June 2013, Hunt said. So his father and stepmother took him in, Hunt added.

The defendant was unemployed and used a bicycle to get around at the time, Hunt said.

Morlett’s father and stepmother told the defendant that they planned to “downsize” and were moving, so they suggested he move out and into a rescue mission, Hunt said.

“Defendant felt the victim was pushing him out of the house,” Hunt said.

On Aug. 6, 2013, the defendant told a neighbor, “I hate my (expletive) stepmom,” according to Hunt. He also said, “I wish she was dead,” the prosecutor added.

The next day the defendant attempted to poison his stepmother by putting patchouli oil in her water, Hunt said.

On the morning of Aug. 9, 2013, the defendant’s father and brother left for work, leaving Morlett home alone with his stepmother, Hunt said.

About 10:45 a.m., a neighbor heard three loud screams or moans, Hunt said.

About 11:18 a.m., the defendant dialed 911 and reported his mother was the victim of a home invasion, but he managed to run out the back door, Hunt said. The call got disconnected and when a dispatcher called back it went to voice mail, Hunt said.

Deputies responded to the home and found the victim’s bloodied body, and she was pronounced dead at 11:42 a.m., Hunt added.

Morlett went to Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, where he again called 911, picking up the phone with a bloody hand, Hunt said. He again said his stepmother was attacked by gardeners, Hunt said.

Morlett later told investigators he attacked his stepmother with a pickaxe when she was in her bed, Hunt added. She sustained 17 puncture wounds, including one to the lung, Hunt said.

Morlett’s attorney, Ed Beckett, said in court papers that his client had been on anti-psychotic medications for years and was attending group meetings for substance abuse at Saddleback Church. As the defendant was awaiting trial, he was committed for 15 months at Patton state hospital until his sanity was restored and he could again assist in his defense, Beckett said.

Beckett argued during trial his client had schizophrenia that prevented him from understanding what he was doing was morally wrong.

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​ Orange County Register 

UConn smothers San Diego State to win 5th national title

• April 4, 2023

By EDDIE PELLS AP National Writer

HOUSTON — After six games and 240 minutes of pure dominance that ran through March, then part of April, it finally became clear there was only one thing that could stop the UConn Huskies.

The final buzzer.

The team from Storrs, Connecticut, topped off one of the most impressive March Madness runs in history Monday night, clamping down early, then breaking things open late to bring home its fifth national title with a 76-59 victory over San Diego State.

“We knew we were the best team in the tournament going in, and we just had to play to our level,” said Dan Hurley, who joined Jim Calhoun and Kevin Ollie as the third coach to lead UConn to a title.

UConn’s lanky star forward, Adama Sanogo, won Most Outstanding Player honors, finishing with 17 points and 10 rebounds in the final, and Tristen Newton also had a double-double with 19 points and 10 boards.

The Huskies (31-8) became the fifth team since the bracket expanded in 1985 to win all six NCAA tournament games by double-digits on the way to a championship. They won those six games by an average of an even 20 points, only a fraction less than what North Carolina did in sweeping to the title in 2009.

UConn built a 16-point lead late in the first half, only to see the Aztecs (32-7) trim the lead to five with 5:19 left. But Jordan Hawkins (16 points), – whose cousin, Angel Reese of LSU, won MOP honors in the women’s tournament – answered with a 3-pointer to trigger a 9-0 run. From there, the only drama left was whether UConn would cover the 7½-point spread and go six for six with double-digit wins.

Yes and Yes.

Keshad Johnson scored 14 points for San Diego State, which came up one win shy in this, its first trip to the Final Four. Darrion Trammell and Lamont Butler had 13 apiece.

UConn, the favorite and best-seeded team at No. 4 for this Final Four, set the stage for this win over an 11:07 stretch in the first half during which the Aztecs didn’t make a single basket. Unable to shoot over or go around this tall, long UConn team, they missed 14 consecutive shots from the floor.

They went from leading by four to trailing by 11, and when they weren’t getting shots blocked (Alex Karaban had three and Sanogo had one) or altered on the inside, they were coming up short – a telltale sign of a team that was out of hops after that draining 72-71 buzzer-beater win over Florida Atlantic two nights earlier.

UConn fan Bill Murray was one of the few celebrities on hand to watch the Huskies make it five for five in title games in one of the most unexpected Final Fours in history. This one marked the last that Jim Nantz would call after 37 years behind the microphone.

He’s had a lot of UConn stories to tell, though this certainly wasn’t the most dramatic.

Even with that brief bout of uncertainty midway through the second half, UConn never truly let the fifth-seeded Aztecs, who overcame a 14-point deficit in the semifinal, start thinking about any more last-second dramatics.

This was a team built strictly for 2023 – replenished by Hurley, who didn’t get much love in the preseason, even after he went to the transfer portal to find more outside shooting after back-to-back first-round exits in the tournament.

“We weren’t ranked going into the year, so we had the chip on our shoulder,” the coach said. “We knew the level that we could play at, even through those dark times.”

Despite the new-age roster building, there was something decidedly old-school about the way the Huskies took care of business in the early going.

They didn’t even think much about 3-point shooting at the start – didn’t make one until more than 13 minutes into the game – instead skipping passes into Sanogo on the post and wearing down SDSU while building the early lead.

The Aztecs were too good a team to cave, and an over-pursuing defense is what triggered the late run to within five. But team built on defense finished the game only shooting 32% from the floor.

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And after its late run, the Aztecs started getting burned and Hurley and Co. were hugging it out on the bench before the buzzer.

UConn’s latest coronation makes Hurley the third coach to bring a trophy home to Storrs. He joins Calhoun (1999, 2004, 2001) and Ollie (2014).

“We have the four national championships coming in, right?” Hurley said. “We were striving for No. 5. Now we’ve got our own.”

And Sanogo – make that Adama – adds himself to others on a first-name basis up on that campus – along with Huskies legends like Kemba (Walker), Rip (Hamilton) and Emeka (Okafor). He averaged 19.7 points and 9.8 rebounds over UConn’s six-game cruise through the tournament.

Much more to come on this story.

​ Orange County Register 

The Masters: Jordan Spieth in search of elusive 2nd green jacket

• April 4, 2023

By DAVE SKRETTA AP Sports Writer

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Jordan Spieth was caught in such a whirlwind after winning the Masters eight years ago, whether it was winging his way to New York for television appearances or throwing out the first pitch at a Texas Rangers game, that he never bothered to find a tailor for his green jacket.

Leave it to Augusta National, where every piece of the property is finely tailored, to take care of such details.

“I just had it everywhere and I never got it fixed,” Spieth said Monday, “and I think they have done it since here, because the arms certainly fit a lot better. I left a little room just in case I put on a few pounds over the years.”

That’s some forward-thinking.

Of course, a better solution would be to keep winning new ones.

There was a time when that seemed inevitable. Spieth was just 21 back in 2015, when he became the first wire-to-wire Masters champion since Ray Floyd nearly four decades earlier, tying Tiger Woods’ then-record of 18 under along the way. He went on to win the U.S. Open that summer, and everything portended greatness for a kid who fell in love with the game watching the Masters on TV and then racing out to the chipping green at Brookhaven Country Club.

Spieth kept winning, of course. Prestigious monuments, too, like the Tour Championship that fall and the Tournament of Champions the following January. A year later, Spieth won his third major at the British Open at Royal Birkdale.

Yet winning a second green jacket has been an exercise not in futility so much as frustration.

In 2016, he led from the first round until the back nine on Sunday, when he blew a five-shot lead by losing six shots to par over the first three holes. The coup de grace came at No. 12, the picturesque par-3 over Rae’s Creek in the back corner of the property, where Spieth hit not just his approach into the water but his next shot as well.

It was perhaps the lowest Spieth has ever felt at Augusta National, on the lowest spot on the course. The quadruple bogey cleared the way for Danny Willett, whose bogey-free final round earned him a green jacket instead.

In 2018, Spieth again led after the first round before fading on Friday and Saturday, and only a blistering final-round 64 got him within two shots of winner Patrick Reed. He matched that third-place finish with another two years ago, when he hung around the first page of the leaderboard but never threatened winner Hideki Matsuyama.

“When I look back on the times where I’ve had real legitimate chances, I look at the middle two rounds of 2018 – I really could have, should have won it that year,” Spieth said. “Like, I’ve backdoored some of those top finishes, and I’d love to get in the mix because I feel like right now, I feel better about my game than I’ve felt since probably 2017.”

It hasn’t been easy to reach this point.

Spieth would go through periods when his swing was out of whack, and his solution was to grind harder, which often led to more problems. So he would back off, and that would lead if not to more problems then at least to different ones.

“I tried working really, really hard without really knowing what I was doing, and I think that put me more in a hole,” he said. “I got to the point where I was like, ‘OK, let’s figure this out. Stop trying the same thing and overworking it, thinking something is going to click and it’s all over.’ Instead, I started to really re-engineer backward what kind of made me so successful.”

It’s been a process, Spieth said, yet the progress was evident last year at Augusta. He was 1 under in his second round, and 1 over for the championship, before a triple bogey at No. 12 – he splashed another shot into Rae’s Creek – and a double bogey at the 18th caused him to miss the cut at the Masters for the first time.

The next week, Spieth won the RBC Heritage in a playoff with Patrick Cantlay.

The good results kept coming, if not the wins: second at the Byron Nelson, top 10 at the British Open at St. Andrews, sixth earlier this year at the Phoenix Open, fourth at Bay Hill and third at the Valspar Championship.

Those results are why oddsmakers put him behind only defending champion Scottie Scheffler, four-time major winner Rory McIlroy – still needing the Masters for his career slam – and major winner Jon Rahm heading into Thursday’s opening round.

And why Spieth would be wise to have a tailor on standby come Sunday.

“It’s exciting,” he said, “because when I go to the range, I’m confident by the end of the day I know what to improve. That seems like it would be standard every day for a golfer, but there were a lot of years in a row where I would go to the course and I would be uncertain if I would come out that day feeling better or worse. That’s tough to go into.”

“You know,” Spieth added, “I don’t feel I have all the weapons right now. But I have enough, and I’m continuing to work on the ones that I don’t have, and I get a little better each day with them.”

LIV’S CAM SMITH HAPPY TO GET HUGS, HANDSHAKES

Cameron Smith returned to the Masters on Monday with a small measure of trepidation, an unusual feeling for someone who has contended two of the last three years and who refers to Augusta National as his “happy place.”

Smith is with LIV Golf, the last big name to defect to the Saudi-funded tour. And having heard so much noise and sensed so much acrimony, he didn’t know what kind of reception he would receive when he walked onto the range.

To his relief, it was the usual dose of hugs and handshakes.

“And it was nice,” Smith said to the largest gathering of the day in the interview room.

The British Open champion was the only LIV golfer on the interview schedule, a courtesy Augusta National affords all the reigning major champions regardless of where they play.

What was he expecting?

“I wasn’t really sure, to be honest,” Smith said. “I was just kind of letting it all happen naturally – went out to the range and did my stuff and yeah, it was just a really nice experience. … There’s a lot of stuff going on at the moment that doesn’t need to be going on, especially in the media. I think it’s definitely wound up a little bit too much.”

This Masters has a full plate of activity, and LIV Golf would appear to be the main course.

Smith has not competed against the best of the PGA Tour since the Tour Championship last August. For the likes of Dustin Johnson, it’s been a little longer.

It didn’t take long for the mix of players from two tours to cause a stir. The practice round tee sheet listed a most tantalizing foursome of Woods, Fred Couples, Tom Kim and Bryson DeChambeau, who complained only last week that Woods had cut him off ever since the former U.S. Open champion went to LIV.

Turns out it was a Masters mix-up. The fourth was Rory McIlroy, the loudest PGA Tour supporter over the last year.

Couples has made his thoughts clear, recently saying at a PGA Tour Champions breakfast in Newport Beach that Phil Mickelson was a “nut bag” and Sergio Garcia a “clown.”

Couples, the 1992 Masters champion and still immensely popular, says he has no personal beef with either and would have no trouble sitting with them at the Masters Club dinner on Tuesday night or playing in the same group.

“I have no problem with any of them,” Couples said. “Just please do not bash a tour that I have 43 years invested in. It bothers the hell out of me. They don’t bother me. They really don’t. They’re golfers. I’m a golfer. I respect them all.”

The Masters typically releases tee times on Tuesday afternoon, and that has become an event to see which LIV players – 18 of them are at the Masters – will be in the same group as PGA Tour loyalists.

Shane Lowry played with two LIV golfers – Mickelson and Louis Oosthuizen – at the U.S. Open last summer. Adam Scott played with Johnson and Marc Leishman at St. Andrews.

“Look, obviously there’s going to be some pairings that are going to be interesting this week,” Lowry said. “I always say this about professional golfers. We all work in the same office. If you work in the same office, you’re not going to like everyone in there. Same way as this. I met Dustin on the range – I always get on well with Dustin. It was good to see him.”

“There’s a lot to hype,” Lowry said. “But if you’re paired with whoever, you don’t really care about what they’re doing. You’re just trying to win the tournament.”

One question about LIV golfers is how much they’re playing, as the new circuit has had only three events in 2023. Smith played five times going into the Masters last year, and he briefly challenged Scheffler until the Texan pulled away to win his first major.

This year he has played four times – the only 72-hole event was the Saudi International on the Asian Tour, where he missed the cut. That was followed by three 54-hole LIV events, the last two finishing out of the top 20.

Smith is not in peak form, which he attributes to a long break at home in Australia during the offseason. But Augusta National tends to bring out the best in him, and he’s hoping the good vibes will lead to a great performance.

If not him, then Smith would love to see another LIV player with a shot at the green jacket.

“I think it’s just important for LIV guys to be up there because I think we need to be up there,” Smith said. “I think there’s a lot of chatter about these guys don’t play real golf, these guys don’t play real golf courses. For sure, I’ll be the first one to say, the fields aren’t as strong. I’m the first one to say that.

“But we’ve still got a lot of guys up there that can play some really serious golf, and we compete against each other hard week-in and week-out and we’re trying to do the same things that we did six months ago.”

Brooks Koepka is coming off a one-shot victory last week in LIV Golf-Orlando, where the greens were crusty and brown and fast. It was played on the Crooked Cat course at Orange County National, where the PGA Tour used to stage Q-school.

Johnson was asked about any similarities between Crooked Cat and Augusta National.

“I don’t think you could have those in the same sentence, other than I played there last week and I’m playing here this week,” Johnson said.

CROWE TAKING FLIGHT

Harrison Crowe was having a couple of pints last summer at The Dunvegan, a pub just around the corner from the Old Course at St. Andrews when a golf podcaster challenged someone to hit a ball off the pavement and onto the 18th green.

That would be over the buildings, across the street and onto the 18th green.

Crowe doesn’t remember how many drinks he had in him. He does remember the shot. With his left foot on the corner of the sidewalk, his right on the street, Crowe took a mighty swing and sent the ball soaring over the buildings.

The video of the successful shot went viral, turning the amateur into something of a celebrity at his first Masters.

“I think hitting that shot just kind of shows the person that I am, that I’m not really afraid to give everything a shot,” Crowe said after a practice round on Monday. “And it kind of shows a little bit more of the Aussie culture a little bit, that we are pretty laid back and we are ready to do things.”

Crowe’s victory at the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship last year put him in select Aussie company: Adam Scott is back on the 10th anniversary of his Masters triumph, British Open champ Cam Smith is among the favorites, Jason Day is rising through the world rankings now that he’s healthy, and Min Woo Lee is a trendy pick to do well.

“The course is definitely longer than I expected,” Crowe said, “but more so the aura around the players is so mesmerizing. You go down Magnolia Lane, it’s so special. Driving the car down there, it’s a life-changing experience. And then being here today, especially seeing how many people are out there, it’s nerve-wracking. But it’s more so exciting.”

DECHAMBEAU AND AUGUSTA

Bryson DeChambeau was a beefed-up, big-hitting U.S. Open champ when he came to the Masters in November 2020 and called Augusta National a par 67 because of his length. He only broke par two days, and only once did he break 70 – a 69.

“Because of that statement (some people) think I don’t have respect for the course,” DeChambeau said. “Are you kidding me? This is one of the greatest golf courses in the entire world, and if anybody thinks I don’t have respect for the course, they’d better go check out who I actually am because it’s not accurate one bit.”

DeChambeau said he regrets not clarifying that he needed to be at the peak of his game, and that wasn’t the case. And while he said a 67 every day is unlikely to happen, with the distance he was hitting the ball in 2020 it was possible.

“But that’s only with your ‘A’ game, and I should have rephrased that,” he said.

YOUNG SARGENT

Gordon Sargent received a special invitation to play the Masters as the NCAA champion. He’s a sophomore at Vanderbilt but looks even younger, and that made it difficult to get around the grounds when he arrived Sunday.

In fact, a few employees figured he was one of the kids in the Drive, Chip and Putt competition.

“I’m walking around and no one is with me. I don’t even know if I had my badge with me; I think I probably still had it in the car or something,” Sargent said. “I was like, ‘Can I have player dining?’ They’re like, ‘I don’t know. Player?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, I know, I’m an amateur or whatever.’ Then thankfully a couple guys from when I came last month from inside remembered me, and they kind of guided me along. But yeah, it was pretty funny.”

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“They’re like, ‘Where are your parents? Like, did they send you by yourself?’” Sargent added with a smile. “I was like, ‘No, they’re coming in. I can travel by myself sometimes.’”

HOLE IN ONE

Sepp Straka already has a memorable Masters moment: He aced the par-3 12th during his practice round Monday.

The winner of the Honda Classic a year ago, Straka was playing with Abraham Ancer, J.T. Poston and Chris Kirk and had 155 yards to the hole when he hit an 8-iron over the bunker fronting the green and watched his ball disappear.

Straka won’t get one of the crystal bowls that Augusta National awards players who have a hole-in-one during the Masters; there hasn’t been one of those at No. 12 since Curtis Strange in 1988. But that didn’t seem to bother Straka one bit.

“Every time you come it’s a special event, and then obviously this year, the one thing that’s going to stand out – I don’t think you can top that hole-in-one,” Straka said. “That’ll be a memory I’ll keep forever.”

AP Golf Writer Doug Ferguson contributed to this report.

​ Orange County Register 

Dodgers’ Max Muncy is done taking chances with bouncing balls

• April 4, 2023

LOS ANGELES ― It’s been several years since Max Muncy wore a protective cup on the field before Monday, when he returned to the Dodgers’ lineup two days after a ground ball hit him in a sensitive area of a man’s body.

Just as there was a strong impetus for Muncy to wear a cup upon his return, there was a specific reason he stopped wearing one midway through his career.

“Back when I played first base, I felt like I got too comfortable wearing (ground balls) off the chest and tossing (the ball) to the pitcher at first base,” he said. “When I started playing other positions, I started doing the same thing and I wasn’t very good. So I talked to someone and they said, ‘you have to trust your hands more.’

“I said, ‘how do you do that,’ and they said, ‘stop wearing a cup.’ The second I did that, I immediately started getting a lot better in the field.”

The lack of a defensive position was an issue for Muncy as an amateur. Steve Smith, who coached Muncy at Baylor, once recalled, “I remember one scout was asked where Max would play and he said, ‘As far away from the ball as possible.’”

Muncy played five different positions, as well as designated hitter, during his two partial seasons (2015-16) with the Oakland A’s to begin his major league career.

With the Dodgers, Muncy grew comfortable moving from first base to second base to third, sometimes alternating positions within the same game. With more regular playing time, his bat took off. He made the National League All-Star teams in 2019 and 2021, and became a fixture in the middle of the Dodgers’ lineup.

“It became a thing where (not wearing a cup) forced me to trust my hands, let my hands work in a natural way,” Muncy said. “It just got to a point where over time I was feeling better on defense without it, so I never went back to wearing one.”

Until now.

Muncy is optimistic that the muscle memory he developed without the cup is retained, and that he still trusts his hands – not his chest – to make the play at third base. But he won’t take a chance playing baseball unprotected, even though the injury caused him to miss only one game.

“You see the guys who wear elbow guards that never wore them before– all it takes is one time and then you start wearing it,” he said.

GONSOLIN UPDATE

Speaking to reporters for the first time since he sprained his ankle in spring training, pitcher Tony Gonsolin said he will need only a few minor league rehab starts before returning to the Dodgers’ starting rotation.

“I feel fortunate enough that last year’s spring was a little bit shortened, so I know that I don’t need so many (starts) to feel comfortable going into the season,” he said. “Maybe no more than four at the most. Whatever gets me built up to the five innings, 60, 75 pitches, whatever it is.”

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Gonsolin will head to the Dodgers’ Camelback Ranch facility in Glendale, Arizona to pitch to teammates Wednesday. He will remain in extended spring training until the Dodgers are comfortable enough with his per-inning pitch count to assign him to a minor league affiliate.

The right-hander didn’t expect the injury to cost him more than a week or two at first. Now, nearly three weeks later, he has enough perspective to crack a joke about the injury, which he suffered during a fielding drill.

“It was a freak thing. I was trying to throw a ball across my body, like, be a little athletic,” Gonsolin said, “and my body was done being athletic for the day.”

UP NEXT

Dodgers (LHP Julio Urías, 1-0, 3.00 ERA) vs. Colorado Rockies (RHP German Marquez, 1-0, 3.00 ERA), Tuesday, 7 p.m., SportsNet LA, MLB Network (out of market only), 570 AM

​ Orange County Register