PGA Tour’s Saudi sellout LIV Golf deal a slap in the face of 9/11 families

Can’t shake it. Not that I’d even try. It would be a waste of thought.

I still see them. Every day. When I’m stopped at a red light, walking down the street and always when driving toward the Manhattan skyline.

I see images of falling, hideously splayed people having chosen to leap to their deaths from 80 floors or higher of the World Trade Center rather than burn to death. I think of the options they had to consider before they decided. I wonder what their last, terrified thoughts were. I’ve read that an estimated 200 people leapt to their ends.

And I think of the nice, polite words we still choose to describe the 3,000 dead, words such as “killed,” “perished,” “lost” and “died.”

But we don’t hear or read the stark, unfiltered and indisputable truth. They were murdered.

And I wonder if Phil Mickelson, Brooks Koepka, Greg Norman, Sergio Garcia, Dustin Johnson, David Feherty and the rest of the Saudi money golf tour, and the PGA, which just sold out to the Saudi government, have seen these images.

Do they close their eyes to them or quickly look away? Or have they been blinded by all that money, as if they’d otherwise be homeless?

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I wonder if they even give a damn. How can they genuinely care when they’re attached to a price tag to ignore the murder of 3,000 on American soil?

The rationalizations start there: “You wouldn’t be moved by that kind of money?” “Don’t we buy oil from Saudi Arabia?”

It always swings back to money. Let the families of the murdered grieve, but quietly and unobtrusively.

I wonder how our last two Presidents square it, whether they’ve lately seen images of innocents falling to their incomprehensible ends or does their oath of office prevent them from viewing such a grotesque reality perpetrated on America and Americans.

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As President, Donald Trump unequivocally blamed Saudi planned and financed terrorism on the same Saudi government that funded the LIV golf tour into a proposed PGA merger.

Now “Sportsman Donald” celebrates the deal with the Saudis as a marvelous happenstance, a way to have his eponymous golf courses to serve more Saudi-attached pro events for his cut of the events.

Joe Biden doesn’t seem any more willing or even able to see 9/11 for what it was and remains. He has made the U.S. a petrol patsy of the Saudi Royal Family while opening our borders to tens of thousands of God-knows-whoms en route to God-knows-what in and around large American cities.

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Then there are new-breed politicians such as Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar, who succinctly explained the 9/11 Saudi attacks as “some people did something.”

Was she unaware or uncaring that Muslim extremists throughout the Arab world expressed their naked joy after the attacks? Did she know that 3,000 Americans of all religions were murdered by those “people [who] did something”?

And the next time Bryson DeChambeau excuses his two-fisted Saudi government golf money grab with “Nobody’s perfect,” I’d like to show him the photo of what’s now called “Falling Man,” a soul falling head-first to his death from what’s believed to have been his workplace within Windows of the World, the restaurant on the top floor — the 107th — of the North Tower of the WTC.

That photo was taken by AP photographer Richard Drew who that morning was on assignment to shoot — imagine — a maternity fashion show.

And so the PGA’s righteous public indignation and patriotic posturing in standing with the friends and families of 9/11 murder victims wasn’t worth the sand it was scratched in.

What could PGA boss Jay Monahan have done instead? He could’ve retained his dignity, credibility and the courage of his conviction by resigning. Instead he took the money way out.

A greater betrayal of humanity and exploitation of mass American murders may never be equaled in the name of a sport, a “game of honor” that sold its soul for buckets of money and buckets of blood.

Let the record show that the PGA played the 3,000 9/11 murdered and their survivors as center-stage chumps.

Arcangelo isn’t the one who ‘doesn’t belong’

The Belmont: First and foremost Mike “I’ll Never Host a Podcast” Francesa, still has it. On his pre-race podcast he authoritatively declared that Arcangelo “doesn’t even belong in the race.”

And the winner is … Arcangelo!

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As for Fox’s production, it was a mess, a calamity culminating with the loss of legendary Tom Durkin’s entire call of the race. Durkin, summoned by Fox out of retirement, was heard only in a scratchy background muffle.

The commentary was strained, as well. Host Curt Menefee referred to highly suspicious, sanctioned and perhaps corrupt trainer Bob Baffert as the Bill Belichick of horse racing.

Don’t know how many players Belichick has been forced to euthanize, but even if it were one I imagine we’d have heard about it.

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The two players a manager would insist devote their full, unfettered attention while on the field are the pitcher and catcher.

But bullpen speed-dialer Aaron Boone allowed ESPN, Sunday night during Boston-Yanks, to attach catcher Jose Trevino to a live microphone.

Naturally, Trevino was heard hollering an expletive, after which play-by-play man Karl Ravech apologized to ESPN’s audience.

Ravech instead should have blamed Boone and ESPN’s producer for the absurd idea.

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Then again, as reader Norm Rosenfield suggests, there’s no better way for ESPN to prep its audiences for the addition of Pat McAfee, who apparently was hired because he’s vulgar rather than in spite of it.

Manfred: You dads better be sleepin’ in

Father’s Day weekend on Rob Manfred’s watch: Yankees have a three-game series in Boston. All night games for maximum TV money. Grandfathers, fathers and their kids can go to hell.

And reader Kenny Kaplan points out that in addition to having been off this past Memorial Day, the Mets and Yanks are off Labor Day.

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Not enough gang violence in Baltimore, now the Orioles want to contribute to the dress code with their new, all-black Nike uniforms. Or is that just another same-color coincidence? …

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Gimme that ol’ time religion: Watched Oklahoma’s softball team win another NCAA championship on ESPN. Tough to miss — and stomach — were OU’s incessant team and individual showboating. Then in a championship news conference they credited their success to their deep religious faith. I don’t get it. …

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Nice to see Aaron Rodgers and Sauce Gardner practicing their elaborate post-play handshake. Modern priorities. …

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Reader Mark Yost sent along a picture of the individual-size bag of Cracker Jacks purchased at a Padres game for a mere $16. Heck, the profit began after one handful. And you can wash it down with a $5 bottled water or a $14 cup of Budweiser. …

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Name of the Week: The course superintendent for last weekend’s Canadian Open was Patrick Greenman.