In the Masters? – Nope. No Golf. Not This Year

Didn’t Go to the Masters

What did they tell me when I asked about playing in the Masters?  Nope. Not this year – or any.  I’m not even in the PGA.   Who was I informed by?  My old golfing boss who ran the golf driving range where I had worked.   Twice I asked him why and the third time he told me:  “Well, when you putt you are trying to putt straight, just like you are shooting arrows.” He said, “with all your practice you’d think you would be getting closer to the hole.”  But I wasn’t.  I still hadn’t learned to hook properly either on the greens or on the fairways.  At least I don’t cry after my sixth putt to the flag.  

The fairway – I don’t spend much time there.  I’m usually off to looking for my golf ball on either the left or right side of all that nice green grass.  And I walk the course, never using a caddy.  I have enough people in a foursome to laugh at my play – I don’t want to be paying for one more person to join in on the laugh track.  I lug that bag myself – with two ball retrievers – just in case I break one.

I’m not saying I don’t take my game seriously.  I do – I do everything possible to lower my scores.  I go to the driving range almost every day to hit a bucket of balls, bouncing them off of the golf picker out around a hundred and sixty yards - which is about as far as I can drive a ball.   I take lessons from a golf pro.  At least I think he is a pro because he does wear Bermuda shorts.  And the best thing I do to lower my score is to cheat.  Yeah, cheat.  Some days you’d think I was playing soccer out there, the way I can kick a ball around.  And I am good with a pencil too.  I certainly know how to add.  But I am much, much better at subtraction.

So where does all of this leave me?  Painting.  To relax I was told by my doctor take golf. It can be a relaxing hobby.  Nope.  Not relaxing.  So I took up painting.  The time lapse golf video you see here is a sample of what I do with paint.  It’s short – the demonstration is about 35 seconds and the actual sports art is about seven feet.  If you are on my blog you surely know that I am a sports artist, painting professionally for sports stadiums and arenas and other commercial projects.  I take commissions and would be happy to do a sports selfie of you playing your favorite sport.  You can reach me through my

contact pages

and I will be happy to discuss the possibilities with you.

Joe DiMaggio ink drawing NY Yankees baseball

Joe DiMaggio Ink Drawing

Yes, another sports art drawing of the great New York Yankees Joe DiMaggio.  Although, as a kid I was more of a fan of the Brooklyn Dodgers, I did like to follow Joe DiMaggio and listen to the games out of New York on the radio.  As I have said in other posts DiMaggio was such an inspiration to so
many boys and playing baseball.   This image  is an ink drawing by me, sports artist John Robertson, is 11’ x 14” ink on watercolor paper.

Joe DiMaggio’s first play – first game.

 Joe DiMaggio played in his first game with the N.Y. Yankees in on May 4, 1936.  That was 81 years ago signing out of San Francisco for $75,000.  That was a lot of money then – and to me- still a lot of money.  Yeh, he got a lot of cheers when he came to bat and even more when his first time at bat he gets a single.  It wasn’t the best of hits as the grounder to the pitcher was an easy play.  But there was a player on third so the pitcher threw to home to protect the run.  And Joe was safe at first.  That was a good way to start off his first day. 

The inning got better for Joe when Lou Gehrig walked and moved DiMaggio to second. Another great Yankee Gehrig was the New York Yankees first baseman and  played 17 years with a batting average of 340.  So, now DiMaggio is on second and Gehrig is on first and the player on third had scored earlier through a miss thrown ball.  Ben Chapman, an outfielder (and later involved in a nasty event in baseball history) comes up to the plate and hits a double, driving Joe to home.  DiMaggio not only gets a hit in his first time at bat for the Yankees but manages to score.

How Joe DiMaggio finished the game.  

 Joe DiMaggio comes up in the second inning and does it again – this time getting a dropping a hit into the short outfield for a single and later getting driven in for another run.  Joe hit a triple in the 6th inning.  He goes three for six in his first appearance and has a really good start to his pro career.

Hardball tee shirt designed by sports artist John Robertson.  Order here from Amazon.

Chicago Cubs Baseball painting art

Vintage Chicago Cubs player wearing a uniform from the last time the Cubs played in the World Series. 4 ft by 8 ft. Acrylic on unstretched canvas.


Some favorite Tweets During Chicago Cubs World Series game

World Series Game 7: Will the Cubs or Indians break their curse?   1908. 1948. A drought will end If you're not watching baseball tonight .... something is wrong with you!! Just feels like this is going to be an epic ending.  Nobody has a good reason to not watch this game!!!  Things to remember: The pitcher throws the ball to the catcher. The catcher is the one without the bat.

I have not yet decided whether I will accept the result of tonight's game. I want to keep you in suspense.

.@DexterFowler launches the first leadoff homer in a winner-take-all

Tremendous sportsmanship being shown tonight. Really refreshing with all of the craziness going on in this world.

Not even a baseball fan, but @Cubs vs @Indians Game 7 is the stuff of HISTORY! Eyes glued to the TV!!!

The announcer described Anthony Rizzo as "the most polite man in major league baseball" this is utterly delightful

@RaeBeta I don't believe politeness is an official statistic.

@RaeBeta Baseball is lots more fun the players are humanized as characters.

THIS is why baseball can be great!

Can I just say: Regardless of the result of the play, I love Lindor helping Rizzo up after the hard slide. @c_albertdeitch and the "nice play" tap, after the play on top of it @c_albertdeitch yeah the play was clean too

Kluber Clobbered.

(This is the kind of stunning Internet content only twitter writer's can provide.)

Art Boxing Sports Art John Robertson Artist

I watched a good fight on television last night.  This painting I did a couple of days ago.  I have been a boxing fan since I was a boy and really enjoy painting the boxers in action.  Although I normally paint large-scale art (50" x 70") this boxing art is 8 1/2" x 11" oil on vellum.  It is nice to paint on the flat, smooth surface of the paper.

Basketball art "The Dunk"

dunk shot, basketball art, sports image,

The dunk shot art basketball by John Robertson
48" x 60" acrylic on unstretched canvas

A few years ago I  had painted a series of basketball paintings for Fox Sports Net who then used the sports art for a commercial promoting the upcoming NBA basketball games.  Since then I get requests from clients to paint one for them on commission.  So this is one of the basketball images I painted from the series of paintings I did for Fox Sports Net.