» A Failure To Communicate

What is it about so-called “professional” sportsmen that they think they’re able to get away with anything they like?

Michael Vick thought it was perfectly fine to set dogs at each other’s throats, electrocute or drown those that didn’t live up to his standards.

Now we have Tripp Isenhour taking potshots at hawks with golf balls.

(I’m not surprised he prefers to use “Tripp Isenhour” rather than his legal name, John Henry Isenhour III … There’s a certain arrogance about those who manage to get a name with “III” in it, and he certainly seems to have displayed that kind of arrogance.)

To summarize the news, Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!) was filiming a segment for “Shoot Like A Pro”, when a red-shouldered hawk nearby spoiled some takes. So he starts firing golf balls at it “to scare it away”. The hawk disagreed with Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!)’s belief that he had the right to be on the course and the hawk didn’t, so Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!) leaves.

Only for the hawk to come closer to where they were filming, and so, according to eyewitnesses, Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!) starts firing off more golf balls, with the reported comment “I’ll get him now!”.

Eventually, he hits the hawk in the head, which falls over and dies.

Now that he’s being charged with misdemeanor cruelty to animals, his “management company” released a statement.

I want to let everyone know there was neither any malice nor deliberate intent whatsoever to hit or harm the hawk. I was trying to simply scare it into flying away.

I hate to be the one to break it to Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!), but we actually aren’t all as stupid as he seems to think we are.

He is a “Pro” golfer, he’s being filmed for a TV show called “Shoot Like A Pro”, and he really expects us to believe that hitting a hawk he was aiming “towards” was an accident??? Just how much contempt does Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!) have towards people that he thinks anyone in their right minds is actually going to buy this pile of horseshit?

Perhaps someone should take him to a golf course and start firing balls at his head from 70-odd yards away to scare him off? After all, If his aim is that bad, he has less right to be on the course than he thought the hawk did.

Worse, the 15 or so people on the crew stood back and let Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!) do this. It took him several shots before he plugged the hapless hawk on the noggin, yet no-one intervened. A sound engineer present is quoted as having said

It was one of those cases where there’s some trepidation on whether or not they should speak up and do something

It was that complicated?? There is no mystique around “professional” sportsmen that provides them a shield of immunity from common decency and common sense. If the filming crew was concerned at how “appropriate” it would be for them to prevent animal cruelty, then something is seriously awry with matters.

Unless, of course, the trepidation was whether or not Mr John Henry Isenhour (The Third!) would change his point of aim towards any of them who dared to speak up … Given his attitude towards a harmless bird that was disturbing him, I know I’d have had “trepidations” too!