AI golf analyst Duff Foreman makes his dreadful debut

AI may have the capacity to kill us all and wipe out humanity as we know it, but one thing it can’t do yet is provide interesting golf analysis.

AI leaders around the world are offering apocalyptic warnings that the end of the human race could be near as the technology develops recursive self-improvement. This could trigger AI systems to take over laboratories and release a perfectly manufactured virus to eliminate humankind. It could mean AI launching the world’s fleet of nuclear weapons and turning our planet into dust. The kinder, gentler versions entail economic and societal collapse that would send us back to the Stone Age.

But judging from the debut of AI golf analyst Duff Foreman, the rapid advances of AI technology don’t apply to sports television.

If you have not heard of Duff Foreman before now, sincere apologies. But he debuted at the New Mexico Open as the first AI golf analyst alongside legitimate golf media personalities Ryan Burr and Notah Begay III. According to Forbes, Foreman was “created by Gopher Hole Productions, an artificial intelligence, media, entertainment and technology company that develops AI-powered personalities.”

And as Foreman made his debut at the top of the YouTube live stream, it was clear that he wasn’t quite ready for primetime.

Duff’s social media videos don’t provide any more confidence in his abilities. In true AI fashion, he speaks in manufactured inaccuracies, talking about golfers at “minus five under,” a nonsensical repetition of how humans actually talk about the sport.

If you scroll through the live stream from Day 1 of the New Mexico Open, the limited times Duff Foreman appears make it look like the MS-DOS version of AI. They all seem like pre-planned segments that are poorly executed and offer little substance.

There’s nothing there that’s interesting in any way, unless you count his different accents across segments, which range from Scottish to none at all. A bad AI video about probabilities, a commercial for Turtleback Mountain, and wishing Notah Begay a happy birthday isn’t going to be a threat to Trevor Immelman or Kevin Kisner anytime soon.

A live stream of a regional golf tournament is about as low-stakes as it gets in the sports broadcasting world. But hopefully Duff Foreman’s debut sends a message to networks and media companies everywhere: AI can’t compete with human beings when it comes to talking live sports.

Public opinion has turned sharply against AI as the industry has done a terrible job of explaining its benefits and so far only offered threats of taking everyone’s jobs and destroying our way of life. So far in sports media, the times AI has been implemented have bordered on the ridiculous and the absurd. Duff Foreman is no exception.

Sure, AI may develop the capacity to do great and terrible things that humans could never imagine. But there are some things that humans can do that AI can never replicate. At least we have live golf analysis as one of them.

Of course, if Duff Foreman self-improves and is ready to bring the entire sports world crumbling down at his feet like Thanos dressed to play Bandon Dunes, then we will have to concede he gets the last laugh.

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