You’ve never heard of Mark Radetic, but perhaps you should. He may be our last shot at a civilized society.
In a world filled with people who aren’t Mark Radetic, we should be thankful that an actual Mark Radetic does still exist. He may be hard to find, but he’s out there.
Back in May, when the PGA Championship came to Southern Hills in Tulsa, Tiger Woods was hitting his second shot from the spinach left of the 1st fairway. In the background, there was a picture of dozens of doofuses – literally almost everyone in the picture — holding up their phones to take a cell-phone shot or video of Woods as he hit his shot.
Except for our guy Mark.
He was standing there watching Woods hit his shot while holding a Michelob Ultra bottle so strategically placed it was as if he had been photoshopped in by the beer company’s PR firm. No phone. My man had his priorities in order.
So what were all those people (except Mark) going to do with that picture/video? Put it on eBay? Use it as part of a pick-up line on the waitress at the 19th hole?
Two weeks ago, when Arizona was playing the Las Vegas Raiders, Cardinals defensive back Byron Murphy had an impressive scoop-and-score from 59 yards out to win the game in overtime.
As he ran through the end zone, all the fans lined up in the first row were busy shooting the moment on their phones. OK, so that might be a nice thing to have if you were a fan and the winning touchdown came right by you.
But the game was played in Las Vegas. These were Raiders fans who had grabbed their phones to capture the moment. The moment their team lost.
When I say this has gotten out of control, that’s not even the half of it. Everybody wants to “capture the moment” instead of actually enjoying the moment. Or, in the case of the Raiders fans, despising the moment.
I’m sure someone missed Aaron Judge’s 61st home run Wednesday night because they were too busy making sure the aperture setting was set correctly or trying to decide whether to shoot it vertically or horizontally.
At just about any high school baseball game, you’ll have no trouble figuring out which parent belongs to which player. Just wait until a phone appears through the backstop netting. Look at the stands at a high school football game; the phones are everywhere. On every play.
All of this just in case little Jimmy hits a home run or returns a kickoff for a touchdown. Which, by the way, you probably can’t see anyway because you are too far away and the lighting is bad.
I used to worry about people who never have an unspoken thought as being a nuisance. Now I worry about sports fans who have no un-filmed moment. Capturing the moment through your own eyes is so much greater than the eye of a lens.
I know these are personal memories and that’s great. But let’s be realistic here. You aren’t going to get a picture to rival Muhammad Ali standing over Sonny Liston or Mickey Mantle throwing his helmet away in disgust during his final year with the Yankees.
I get the phone shots in life’s great moments. But in sports? You don’t have to shoot a video from the 33rd row to let me know you saw Steph Curry make a 3-pointer. I believe you.
And as we circle back to our boy Mark Radetic, it will come as no great surprise to you that literally he stood out from the crowd so much that the Michelob folks took notice. So they did another thing that should come as no surprise.
They put him in a commercial. And on social media. And on T-shirts.
Look, if you happen to shoot the modern version of the Zapruder film, I’ll be the first to come to you and apologize.
And you’ll probably film it.
Contact JJ at johnjamesmarshall@yahoo.com