The big news in golf last week was that Dottie Pepper was named as the assistant captain of the 2013 American Solheim Cup team by captain Meg Mallon. The news is big because Pepper has been shut out of Solheim Cup captaincies because of a remark she made as a broadcaster during the 2007 Cup.
On a day when Laura Diaz and Sherri Steinhauer were choking their guts out in their foursomes match against Maria Hjorth and Gwladys Nocera, über-competitor Pepper said, when she thought she was off the air, that the pair were "choking freaking dogs."
Because the American press is squeamish, we don't know if "freaking" is the exact word Pepper used. But whatever she said, it went on the air, and the roof caved in on her.
Immediately after the incident she apologized sincerely and the incident should have been laid to rest. An apology wasn't good enough for some LPGA players, though, who have carried the grudge ever since and are to this day unnamed, probably because we wouldn't want to know who it is who lacks the maturity to forgive and forget.
Pepper has been persona non grata ever since for telling the truth. Apparently she should have apologized, groveled, and begged for forgiveness, although who knows if even that would have been good enough for some people.
The mistake Pepper made was to drop her objectivity as a reporter and allow herself get caught up in the competition as if she were still in it. Reporters are observers, not participants. That's something for her network supervisors to deal with, but she was sent to golfing Siberia in addition by members of the LPGA.
Headlines in the last week's articles refer to "Pepper's penance," as if this shunning was actually deserved. Or how about, "Pepper's pardon." Were the headline writers not suspected of getting caught up in onomatopoeia, we could laugh this off.
But no, Meg Mallon gave Pepper a pardon. That, unfortunately, is exactly what had to happen.
Up to now, no Solheim Cup captain has had the courage to tell to the players that Pepper is on the team, she had a 13-5-2 record in the Solheim Cup and she can teach you a helluva lot about winning, and if her presence is offensive to you, you can stay home and watch the matches on television.
Pepper made her public apology right after she made her remarks. The players who led the movement against her should make theirs, too, now. Pepper deserves at least that much.
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Dottie did not apologize; merely, she regretted it was heard.
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