A new era in Cal football really has begun.

For months, the talk has been about how open new Cal coach Sonny Dykes is. How he’s committed to transparency. How he wants to instill a sense of community in the team. How he wants to revitalize academics.

My response?

“I’ll believe it when I see it.”

Well, I’m ready to make it official. I see it, and I believe it.

It starts with the fall practices that are currently under way. They’re unbelievably open. Not only is every single one of them scheduled to be open to the public, but the amount of access could not be greater. The media is allowed to take videos and photos during nearly all of practice, save for certain short periods when nothing is allowed to be filmed. In all, something like half an hour of every practice — each of which is two and a half hours long — is closed. The rest is all fair game.

That’s amazing. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the most open program in the Pac-12.

And even during that closed period, people are still allowed to be in the stands. We are still allowed to watch and write what we see.

I’ve been skeptical for months that Dykes’ rhetoric of openness and values was all talk. Call me a pessimist, but I think that wins on the field can mask any deficiencies in other areas. And I figured that Dykes knew that too — and that once the season came closer, wins would be the only thing that would matter to him, with all those other values he proclaimed in the fall taking a hit.

Boy, was I wrong.

I’m ready to drink the Kool-Aid. This open access thing is the real deal. The team really feels like a community. And the academics really do seem to be a priority.

And that openness isn’t even close to the only thing that makes this team a new era for Cal. Let’s just go down the list: new coach, new quarterback, new uniforms. Heck, the university even has a new chancellor. And the team is the second-youngest team out of 126 Division 1 FBS programs.

When you really think about it, there hasn’t been as much excitement surrounding the team since at least 2009, when Jahvid Best had Bear fans thinking the team could make a deep bowl run (spoiler alert — that team finished unranked).

But the excitement now is completely different. Cal fans don’t think the team can make a deep run next season or even the season after that. It’s possible — after all, Jeff Tedford took a     1-10 team and went 7-5 in his first year as coach — but it’s not likely.

The excitement now is based around long-term optimism.

The fact is, no one knows just how good or bad this team could be. With a new system on both sides of the ball and so many new players, this team could lose all but one game (sorry, Portland State). Or this could be the year Cal finally knocks off USC for the first time since 2003. No one knows.

This is the most up-in-the-air team in the entire Pac-12. There’s an expectation that teams like Oregon and Stanford will be good next year. There’s an expectation that teams like Washington State and Colorado will continue their mediocrity. But with Cal, it could go either way. No team has more question marks than the Bears do.

Combine all those on-the-field questions with the change in off-the-field culture, and there’s reason for excitement from fans. We don’t know which direction the ball is moving in yet, but we know for sure that it is moving. And for a program that’s felt like it’s been held stagnant for years, that’s a huge refresher.

Contact Riley McAtee at rmcatee@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @riley_mcatee

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In less than a month, Cal will finally return to the field. The season will begin with women’s soccer on Aug. 23 and continue with men’s soccer, volleyball, field hockey and cross-country until the main event: football against Northwestern on Aug. 31.

But it will be more than just the scheduled annual return to collegiate athletics for Cal. In addition to new faces, there will be new uniforms, a new logo, and — in some cases — even a new color (gray).

Last April, Cal Athletics unveiled a new “brand” for Cal’s athletic teams. I put the word “brand” in quotations because I am still uncomfortable with the idea of amateur collegiate athletic teams trying to sell themselves, which is what a “brand” does by definition.

Cal’s look should be about identity, not brand. And our identity is derived from history and tradition, not modern designs spat out by a department at Nike. I mean, for a school that hasn’t been to a Rose Bowl or won a basketball title since 1959 (coincidentally, the last year before the ASUC gave up control of Cal Athletics), all we have is our history and tradition to be proud of. There is little recent success for Cal supporters to cherish.

Before I go off on my rant, let me say that the new design doesn’t look bad. Sure, I think the new logo looks like the most generic blue and gold bear that Nike could have possibly made — not to mention the thing looks like it’s comically sneezing, not growling. But some people love it. And even I have to admit the uniforms themselves are a huge improvement.

But history and tradition were thrown out in favor of modern gimmicks. There’s no need for a new logo when the walking bear looks beautiful and dignified already and has been in use since 1896. Same goes for the block C, which is so iconic for the university that it is placed permanently in the hills. Too bad that iconic C is getting taken off the baseball caps.

And this isn’t the first time it’s happened. A few years ago the football team debuted white helmets under some flimsy pretext that no one remembers for a reason that no one could care any less about. And let’s all try to forget some of the hideous uniform combinations that have made their way onto the field over the years (please let gold-on-gold die a quick death).

Cal should stop trying to be Oregon and instead stick to something classic that works.

But this is all just my opinion. Lots of people love the redesign. And lots more people wouldn’t care if Cal Athletics changed our colors to red and white, so long as the teams start winning again.

The problem is that Cal Athletics is playing a dangerous game. Collegiate athletics exist because of alumni support. And without a record of success from the top programs to draw them back, the reason our alumni support Cal is due to a love for the university and a connection to their time as students. When Cal Athletics continually tinkers with the school’s identity (which is really what they are messing with when they talk about “brand”), it makes that connection weaker.

And when you are counting on alumni to fill ESP seats to fund 2011’s $321 million stadium renovation, you want to make them happy. Alumni are not going to buy those expensive seats to see our team go 3-9, so at least appeal to their sense of nostalgia. But Cal Athletics isn’t doing that.

Cal Athletics has built a house of cards. They’re simultaneously trying to build a global “brand” while relying on an alumni base that couldn’t care less about Cal’s national appeal to fund their ideas. It’s a dangerous combination — so don’t be surprised if the cards come crashing down.

Contact Riley McAtee at rmcatee@dailycal.org

Correction(s):
A previous version of this article stated that the “C” logo on band uniforms is being changed, in fact it is remaining the same.

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Power rankings might seem inherently pointless, but they can teach you something.

I mean, there is no need for a list of the top 10 Cal sports. It’s not like this is a recap of an event that happened, in which case we would have a responsibility as journalists to report the news.

That thought bothered me for a while, but it no longer does. Six weeks after we published our first honorable mentions, I feel like this power rankings list actually adds a lot to the discussion of Cal sports.

One thing I realized was how surprisingly top-heavy Cal athletics is.

First off, picking the top few sports was difficult. Should golf or rugby take the top spot? Good arguments could also be made for both women’s and men’s swim, which took the No. 3 and No. 4 spots, respectively.

And it goes beyond those top four. Some people were shocked that women’s basketball was only at No. 5. How can that team be fifth when it made the Final Four and won the Pac-12? That was the best season Cal women’s basketball ever had! And they only barely manage to crack the top five?

But it’s hard to make a case for it to go higher — there are just too many great teams in front of it.

Cal is already top-heavy with the five sports I just mentioned, and it could become even more so in a few years. Both tennis programs — especially the women’s team — are primed to move up. Of course, that would mean bumping out one of those amazing teams I’ve already mentioned — a task that is no less than monumental.

And there are plenty of teams that have been historically excellent but are currently in the midst of an inevitable down cycle. For example, softball, volleyball and baseball all had poor seasons last year but are each only a few years removed from deep postseason runs.

In fact when I think about it, of the 26 sports teams that Cal fields, I would say only five of them are not at least “good” and are also not in a temporary slump. These teams are football, cross-country, field hockey, women’s gymnastics and lacrosse.

I’m not naming those teams to pick on them. Look at that list again. First, there are only five there. And second, the sad truth is that even if all those sports were amazing, fans would still only care about one sport on that list.

This establishes another point — our power rankings list could have easily been 20 sports long. Heck, we could have written rankings on all 26 sports and only had a few cynical thoughts. That level of success is unreal, and i t often goes unnoticed when the struggles of more popular sports take up headlines.

It feels like now would be the appropriate time to throw in a “Go Bears!” and then wrap this column up. But I won’t do that. Yes, Cal athletics are incredibly impressive as they should be. But everything isn’t roses and sunshine.

There is still work to be done. The academic scores for some of these teams are well below what should be acceptable for an institution that considers itself among the top in the nation. Football’s academic struggles are well documented, but did you know that the much-loved women’s basketball team ranked second to last in APR scores in June? There hasn’t been as much of an uproar about that.

There’s room to improve. And Cal sports teams do face many problems. But the power rankings have made me realize that even though some of the most high-profile sports leave a lot to be desired, the overall athletic talent at Cal is incredibly high.

Contact Riley McAtee at rmcatee@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @riley_mcatee

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College football is broken.

That might sound a little sensationalist, as it’s not like football is dying, but allow me to elaborate. College football has major problems that the NCAA is failing to adequately address.

If you haven’t heard, Oregon was recently slammed with NCAA sanctions for violating recruiting rules.

And by slammed, I mean slapped on the wrist.

After a ridiculously long 27-month investigation, Oregon will lose just one scholarship in each of the next two years. The Ducks will also only be able to invite 37 recruits each year on official visits. They’ve averaged just 41 per year in the last four years.

I shouldn’t even say “slapped on the wrist.” I should say that Oregon got off scot-free. Business will continue as usual in Eugene.

Another scandal happened last year when Ohio State was handed a one-year bowl ban for allowing its players to sell more than $14,000 in autographed jerseys and memorabilia. That sounds innocent, but memorabilia from Ohio State is worth considerably more than memorabilia from smaller universities, and allowing players to sell that for cash would give Ohio State and other large schools a serious competitive advantage.

In 2010, a year before the Ohio State scandal, USC was rocked by the NCAA. The Trojans received a two-year bowl ban and a vast reduction in scholarships. They also forfeited a National Championship, and USC alum Reggie Bush had to vacate his Heisman award.

These punishments sound harsh — especially in light of what Oregon just received — but were they effective in deterring this kind of shady behavior in the future?

USC opened the 2012 season as the No. 1 ranked team in college football. And last year, Ohio State finished the season as the only undefeated team in the country. The Buckeyes would have certainly been in the national championship game had they been eligible.

This all leads to an obvious conclusion: NCAA sanctions are not working.

These teams instituted policies that gave them an unfair advantage in recruiting players. It would make sense, therefore, that punishments by the NCAA should try to correct that unfair advantage. And yet these teams are just as competitive as ever.

So why is the NCAA moving backward with sanctions? When the NCAA punished USC three years ago, it took a heavy amount of criticism from the media for being too tough.

But now, with hindsight, it is easy to see that the NCAA didn’t go far enough. USC shouldn’t be able to open the season as the No. 1 team in the country just two years removed from a major scandal, Ohio State shouldn’t be able to go undefeated and Oregon shouldn’t get off with nearly no punishment at all.

Are Oregon’s sins equal to those of USC? Of course not, and that’s why the severity of the punishments is so different.

But the message to football programs around the country is clear — if you want to win, cheating isn’t a bad way to do it.

Let’s turn the situation around. Imagine Sonny Dykes establishes a winning program here in Berkeley and then after a few seasons of success is exposed for having corrupt recruiting practices and runs to the NFL much like Oregon’s Chip Kelly and USC’s Pete Carroll. After he leaves, Cal is a perennial top-10 program, and the only real punishment would be the knowledge among fans that the program got to where it is in an unfair way. Most fans wouldn’t be happy with that now, but what if the other option is mediocre seasons for the next decade?

The point is that it shouldn’t have to be that way. Coaches shouldn’t be under pressure to cheat when it comes to recruiting. Yet in the scramble for top recruits, the challenge of building a top college football team the right way is becoming more and more difficult. And the NCAA is doing less and less to correct the problem.

Contact Riley McAtee at rmcatee@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @riley_mcatee

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After scarfing down my usual breakfast of Reese’s Puffs and an English muffin, I headed to People’s Cafe to write this column. I flew down Milvia Street on my bike toward Downtown Berkeley, weighing different column ideas in my head. I parked my bike and strolled into the Cafe. I spent $3 on a Mexican hot chocolate and walked to a table in the back. I set it down on the table, pulled my laptop out of my backpack and, in the process, knocked over the entire hot chocolate. The 10 or so patrons of the cafe managed reactions ranging from muffled laughter to quiet gasping. The liquid splashed across the floor, mostly accumulating in a muddy-looking hot chocolate pond underneath the table. Slumping my shoulders like a heartbroken George Michael Bluth, I walked over to the counter to grab some napkins.

The 2013 iteration of the Seattle Mariners should have been the surprise team of the year. Sports Illustrated said it; the stat-nerd bloggers, never without their trademark skepticism, even let on hints of believing in a Pacific Northwest Renaissance. Of course, Felix Hernandez would be his usual dominant self. The young core — Dustin Ackley, Justin Smoak, Jesus Montero — all were bound for breakout seasons. Veterans Kendrys Morales and Michael Morse would provide stability in the middle of the lineup with reliable offensive production. After years and years of futility, treading water at the bottom of one of the weaker divisions in the MLB, the Mariners would finally make their run toward the playoffs. As the weather improved and Opening Day crept closer, I knew the M’s were destined to leave mediocrity in the dust. Turns out, the Mariners aren’t mediocre at all: They’re even worse than that.

Fans of sports are inextricably tied to optimism about their team’s futures, near and far, and for good reason; practicing pragmatism in the arena of sports fandom yanks the joy out of the entire enterprise. Because what good does expecting your favorite team to finish just below .500 and miss the playoffs do? You really see the effects of partisanship in the ESPN polls, where the responses for a question like “Will the Blackhawks or the Bruins win Game 6 of the Stanley Cup?” are tallied and divided by state lines. The states where each respective team plays votes overwhelmingly for their hometown team. It’s not rational; it’s fandom. It’s fun, this type of unabashed support. It allows for good-natured arguments between fans of opposing teams and solace in the long winters between seasons. But what happens when the expectations in your mind never manifest themselves fully? And what allows us, year after year, to believe that this specific team will be different, that this iteration really has what it takes?

I don’t think it’s a conscious decision, is what I’m getting at. Just like our tendency leans toward pragmatism in most facets of life, such as eating well and exercising because it is important to be healthy, or studying for a final because you don’t want to fail out of school, the opposite holds true for our support of our sports teams. If it were rational, I would temper my expectations, not get my hopes up too high, know that the M’s are probably going to miss the playoffs again. But it’s impossible. We’re sentenced to our high hopes. Disappointment is a constant until it isn’t. In life, you can try to take precautions to make sure hot chocolate doesn’t spill all over your lap. With sports, it’s impossible to prevent and almost always inevitable.

Contact Michael Rosen at mrosen@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @michaelrosen3.

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Last weekend, I ended my yearlong stint as the men’s tennis beat writer.

I was actually pretty sad to see the year go — I had a lot of fun watching those weekend matches at Hellman and analyzing how I could bring the intense back-and-forth action to life on paper.

After reflecting on my experiences sitting and watching in the stands, I remembered the very first thing that came to my mind when I watched Cal’s first home match at Hellman: What’s up with all the noise on the court?

And why was it only coming from the opposing team?

Although the Bears had some of the most obnoxious cheerleaders on the sidelines, I barely heard a peep from the Cal men’s tennis team during play. But throughout the year, I’ve listened to hours’ worth of very loud and absurdly entertaining grunts from the Bears’ opponents.

It was a funny initial notion, but that fleeting thought prompted me to wonder: Do tennis players grunt when they’re tired? Is it something that comes out naturally, or is it forced?

Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who was curious about the shrieking noises some tennis players make when they smash the ball.

And apparently, there’s even been some debate — mostly in professional women’s tennis — over whether or not it’s legal to “excessively grunt” during a match. Last year at the Roland Garros in Paris, the WTA, ITF and representatives from the four major grand-slam tournaments announced a triple-pronged plan to drive out “excessive grunting for future generations.”

According to Stacey Allaster, chief executive of the WTA, the plan includes the establishment of a rule that determines acceptable on-court noise levels, education for the next generation of tennis players and my all-time personal favorite: the creation of a device that measures grunting levels on the court.

A grunt-o-meter — although, Allaster prefers not to call it that.

The current generation of players will not be affected by the plan, which makes sense. How could you change something that pro tennis players have been doing their entire lives — something that is ingrained as a natural part of their tennis skill set?

But, boiling it down even further, why do tennis players actually grunt?

Some people, like Alison McConnell — a professor of applied physiology in the United Kingdom and author of “Breathe Strong, Perform Better” — believes that grunting is physiologically necessary in order to strike the ball with the greatest amount of force. According to McConnell, players have to control their exhalation to maintain muscle stiffness, and grunting helps them do so.

Others believe it’s just a tactic players use to distract their opponents and cause them to lose focus on the ball. Is this an issue that should actually be charged as part of the tennis hindrance rule? Just watch a matchup between Russian pro player Maria Sharapova (101 decibels — comparable to a lion’s roar at 110 decibels) and one of the Williams sisters (85-90 decibels) and see what you think.

Whether or not that says anything about devious strategies tennis players might employ — or if it’s all just a silly problem that’s been blown out of proportion — is completely unsettled and still being debated over.

But it all seems slightly ridiculous to me, and for the issue to top the WTA’s to-do list in the coming years makes the whole thing even more ludicrous.

If grunting just happens to be an unintentionally distracting tactic players use to strengthen their strokes, then the fact that none of the players on the Cal squad grunt may just be a big coincidence. But in my mind, Cal’s quiet nature on the court just makes the Cal team all the more impressive — just because no matter what, I know they’re not using any cheap tricks on the court.

But maybe that’s also just because I’m a Golden Bear.

Listen for the silence the next time you visit Hellman.

Contact Janice at jchua@dailycal.org.

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For more than two years, basketball has been missing from my life.

I mean, it’s not like it went anywhere. It’s not like I couldn’t turn on the TV right now and watch the NBA Playoffs.

But for more than two years, I haven’t been able to enjoy basketball.

That’s because my time has been taken up with something else. You see, I’m a Sacramento Kings fan.

Ever since 2011, when the team’s current owners — the Maloofs — attempted to move the Kings to Anaheim, fans have been on red alert. Relocation rumors have persisted ever since then, and fans like myself have prepared to lose them at any moment.

And in January, the worst-case scenario occurred when the Maloofs announced a deal to sell the Kings to Chris Hansen and Steve Ballmer, two Pacific Northwest billionaires that would have promptly moved the team to Seattle to replace the SuperSonics that the Emerald City lost in 2008.

The proposal was an outrage to Kings fans, and it immediately distracted me from the Kings’ play on the court.

Instead of going to games and arguing about lineup decisions with my friends, I’ve been checking Twitter and blogs for updates on what unnamed “sources” think will happen next. I’ve been glued to every word Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson and NBA Commissioner David Stern have said over the past five months, hoping for a hint as to what would happen.

And sometime along the way, I got lost in all the politics and forgot about the fun of basketball.

When the Seattle deal was announced, my blood boiled.

How could the Maloofs do this? Less than a year before, those same Maloofs stood on center court in front of thousands of cheering fans to celebrate an agreement to fund a new arena with the city.

They backed out of that arena deal less than a month later, leaving the Kings to continue play in the old and decrepit Arco Arena. Meanwhile, whispers of relocation continued.

Throughout this saga, I could never worry about the fact that the Kings haven’t made the playoffs in seven seasons. There was no time to argue about coach Keith Smart’s nonsensical lineup decisions. Bigger issues were on my mind.

On-the-court performance — the thing that I and other fans love about the NBA — took a backseat to off-the-court politics.

When the deal to relocate the Kings to Seattle was announced, reporters immediately began acting like the move was already a sure thing. One reporter called it “first and goal on the one.” But in Sacramento, we knew better. We had been through these motions before — when the Anaheim deal looked like a sure thing. We had to save the Kings again.

Documentaries were made, rallies were organized and sellout nights were set up. More than 11,000 fans pledged to buy season tickets if the team changed ownership.

Kevin Johnson, a former NBA all-star and the current mayor of Sacramento, recruited an ownership group led by Vivek Ranadive, a Silicon Valley billionaire, to put together an offer that could compete with Hansen’s. Each group presented to the NBA, and all that was left was a vote.

In the end, Sacramento fans got what few of us are used to: victory.

The NBA rejected the proposed move to Seattle, and the Maloofs soon sold to Ranadive.

As a fan, it’s like I just won the lottery.

Maybe this is what winning the NBA finals feels like — although I wouldn’t know, because the Kings haven’t won it since 1951. Maybe this is what it feels like to seal a come-from-behind victory as an underdog with a buzzer beater twice in a row.

All I know is I’m excited for basketball again. For the first time in a decade, the Kings will be moving forward instead of backward.

Welcome home, Kings — even if you never really left.

Contact Riley McAtee at rmcatee@dailycal.org

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It took a chilly, introspective Tuesday evening in Oakland to learn that being alone is not synonymous with being lonely.

I had purchased one ticket for the second game of the A’s-Mariners series just two days prior on a spring break whim. I’d never seen an M’s game by myself before.

Waiting by myself for the Fremont train in the smelly Berkeley BART station, among throngs of boisterous A’s fans laughing and conversing, I began to regret my whimsy.

Who goes to a baseball game by himself, I wondered. It’s a social event by nature; the slow pace of the game lends to conversation and company. What would I do in the half-innings of inactivity? What are all those people with their friends and their jokes going to think of me, alone in a sea of camaraderie?

These questions ran through my mind as I boarded the train. I found a seat near the window and gazed at the sun setting over the Oakland skyline.

The train arrived, and I took the long walk down the corridor between the BART station and the Oakland Coliseum. Not content with my third-deck seat, I snuck past an usher during the national anthem and found a seat in the first deck, parallel with the left-fielder on the third-base line.

After falling behind one run early, the M’s grabbed the lead for good in the third on a three-run homer from left fielder Mike Morse. I stood up and clapped while the surrounding fans groaned and booed the lone Mariners fan.

As the game wore on and the A’s fell even further behind, fans streamed for the exits. The sun faded into the hills beyond the stadium, and those remaining in the park bundled up with blankets and heavy coats.

Lying in bed later that night, I reflected on my initial hesitancy at the Berkeley BART station.

The game ended up being fun as hell.

I enjoyed analyzing the pitching and fielding of the players without the distraction of my friends. I liked texting my dad and friends watching from home. Sure, there’s plenty to recommend about going to the ballpark with your buddies, but the experience of going to a ballgame by oneself is both vastly different and similarly enjoyable.

My hesitance, I think, stemmed from my perception of the stigmas attached to attending an event alone.

In a vacuum, doing things alone is no big deal. But in my mind, I didn’t want to be the abstract archetype of a friendless loner. Those weren’t the actual circumstances, but my idea of what it meant to go to a baseball game by myself made me feel as if they were.

It’s much lonelier to succumb to your personal insecurities, I figured.

With that thought, I turned out my lamp, laid my head down on my pillow and fell asleep, content as I’d ever been.

Contact Michael Rosen at mrosen@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @michaelrosen3.

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That’s right. Better than March Madness, the World Cup, Wimbledon, the Rose Bowl, the World Series, the Tour de France, the Kentucky Derby, the NBA Finals and the Super Bowl.

The Masters Tournament begins on Thursday in beautiful Augusta, Ga.

Alright, I will admit that the Olympic Games are better than the Masters. But they certainly are not as classy. And since the Summer Olympics don’t take place again until 2016, the Masters will be the greatest event in sports for the next three years.

This might shock some readers. For many 20 year olds, golf is just a boring sport for old, white guys. But anyone who thinks that hasn’t experienced the Masters the way I have.

I grew up with the Masters, and it has a special place in my heart that can’t be replaced by any other event or sport.

It’s just unlike any other major golf tournament. While in my adolescence I often hit the links myself, nothing got me more fired up to spend an afternoon on the course more than watching the Masters.

That’s because the Masters is different than any other event on TV. What makes the tournament so different is a respectful, relaxing environment that cannot be replicated anywhere else.

Golf is supposed to be the gentleman’s sport, and the Masters is its premier event.

The tournament has the best audience in sports. Tickets to the Masters are notoriously difficult to get, as they have stayed in the same families for generations. In 2012, the club released a handful of tickets to the general public for the first time in 40 years via a lottery system.

That exclusivity is unfortunate for fans like myself who dream of attending the tournament one day, but makes the TV experience something that can’t be found anywhere else. You will not hear rowdy fans yelling “GET IN THE HOLE” like you will at most other major tournaments. Those fans can’t get past the gates at Augusta.

The quiet, respectful audience combines with the soothing voices of Jim Nantz and Nick Faldo to create an environment like no other.

The experience of the Masters is something I’ve become addicted to, and it only happens once each year. In a world of high-intensity sports, there’s just something refreshing about the relaxing and respectful environment that is only found at the Masters. Even other major tournaments can’t replicate that unique environment.

And anyone who mistakes that relaxing experience as being “boring” has clearly never sat down and watched the Masters.

From Bubba Watson’s unbelievable hook shot out of the trees to set up his winning putt in a playoff last year to Mickelson’s shot between two pines in 2010, the Masters can simultaneously be one of the most relaxing and exciting events in sports.

And those are just the highlights from recent years — I won’t bore you with the tournament’s 76-year history of dramatic finishes.

But no matter how many highlights you look up on YouTube, the real highlight is the course — it’s breathtaking from every angle.

I have a romanticized version of the Masters brought on by my childhood.

Because of that, I don’t expect everyone to fall in love with the Masters the way I have. But everyone should be able to enjoy it.

So go ahead, turn on the TV this weekend.

With only four minutes of commercials per hour, the tradition and history will be nearly uninterrupted on a relaxing Saturday or Sunday afternoon.

There’s no way that after watching the Masters, you will not want to grab some clubs and hit the links yourself.

And with all due respect to the Olympic Games, no amount of watching Michael Phelps has ever made me want to jump into a swimming pool.

Only the Masters can inspire me that much.

Contact Riley McAtee at rmcatee@dailycal.org.

The post The classiest event in sports appeared first on The Daily Californian.

Seung Y. Lee covers men’s basketball. Contact him at sylee@dailycal.org Follow him on Twitter @sngyn92.

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