sabbatini’s
latest tirade

rory sabbatini, who got kudos for lowering the temperature on his temperament when he won the honda classic in march, found himself in a boiling pot of stew after an epithet-laden, nose-to-nose, on-course argument with sean o’hair at the zurich classic in new orleans. you may remember sabbatini for playing through his own playing partner, the painfully slow ben crane, in the 2005 booz allen classic at congressional cc. what you may not have been as aware of was a tirade unleashed at a volunteer just this past february during the northern trust open at riviera cc. the tour doesn’t talk about disciplinary matters. nonetheless, most of the details have leaked out, as these things do, and none of it reflects well on sabbatini. facing a potential suspension that one imagines could last at least 30 days, the six-time pga tour winner can appeal, a process that takes two weeks. you can debate whether or not the tour should make fines and suspensions public; not debatable is that sabbo is too good a player to have that kind of fuse. a cooling-off period should be just the beginning. —Jim Moriarty