The Solheim Cup generated more excitement over an on-air miscue rather than the compelling golf, and that's a shame. So says columnist Grant Boone who writes about the perilous duty of live television, the dominance of the U.S. women's team, Tiger's dominance in the FedExCup and why some of the best golf of the season is still to come.

By Grant Boone, Special to PGA.com

First off, my apologies to the guy in 4E on Flight 677 from Dallas to Portland Sunday night who had to sit next to me as I sobbed, sniffed, and snotted my way through 2 hours and 200 pages of the most amazing modern-day, non-fiction piece I think I've ever read. The book, Same Kind of Different as Me (click here to learn more and/or order), tells the story of how one woman unites a wealthy, lily white art dealer with a former sharecropper living homeless on the streets of downtown Fort Worth, Texas and, in the process, transforms a city.

If you can stomach the sex, violence, drug abuse, personal and systemic prejudice, the occasional four-letter word, and abject poverty, you'll discover what people can do when they don't give in to societal boundaries or their own individual bias. If you read anything today, skip this column and get that book. (And a box of very soft tissues.)

A lot of people had their noses bent out of joint over something my colleague, Dottie Pepper, said Saturday during Golf Channel's coverage of the Solheim Cup in Sweden. Thinking we had already gone to break after the U.S. had frittered away most of the lead it had spent the first few hours of the morning building up, Dottie blurted, "Chokin' freakin' dogs!"

This was a first. Usually, what Dottie says when she knows her microphone is on is enough to keep players' panties perpetually wadded. When she inadvertently let the "dogs" out Saturday, the howling soon followed. The verbal assault Pepper launched landed on the American viewing audience, then bounced back to the grounds at Halmstad Golf Club posthaste. Even European captain Helen Alfredsson was hacked when she heard, contending the remark struck a blow against women's golf as a whole. Any analyst can rankle a player with a harsh critique. Offending two sides with one shot takes real talent, and Dottie has that in spades.

I'm an unabashed Dottie Pepper fan and friend, so my reaction should be measured accordingly. But no matter what you think about Pepper's palaver, I'd like to see a show of hands from those of you who've never ever said something you hoped certain people wouldn't hear. (Is your hand down because it's cuffed, Mr. Simpson, or because of this audio disaster?)

All of us who've done live television or radio empathize with Dottie and can immediately rattle off a litany of loose-lipped zingers that we've either zinged ourselves or heard zung before a broadcast or during commercials that've been far worse. When I was working for PGA Tour Radio in the late 1990s, we used to take the raw satellite feed from whichever network was televising that week's tournament. That meant we could hear what the announcers were saying even when they weren't on the air. Trust me when I tell you that if some of the things we heard went out over the airwaves by mistake, the current broadcast teams would probably have a few different players.

I've been busted myself more than once, not for speaking off color but for singing on pitch. Moments before each Golf Channel live tournament telecast, expert audio mixer Billy Robinson spins one of the crew's favorite tunes. For years, the old stand-by was "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)" by Looking Glass from their Greatest Hit CD. (Unfortunately for the band, Brandy was an only child, their lone #1.) So one day in Portland a few years ago, just a minute or two before signing on to broadcast the Safeway Classic, Billy Rob fired up "Brandy," and I decided to try to fire up my partner, Kay Cockerill, by singing along. Before you know it, we were up out of our seats, getting somewhat jiggy with it. Little did we know, our swerves weren't the only things that were on. For one thing, they were rolling tape back at the mothership in Orlando where that clip has reportedly become a cult classic around the Golf Channel studios. Of more immediate impact was the discovery that the tournament was showing our raw feed on monitors in the players' locker room and - even better - the Safeway Classic jumbotron next to the 18th hole.

"Attention Safeway shoppers. This week, Ritalin is half off on aisle 16. We're actually still fully stocked because no one's been able to stay focused long enough to make it all the way back there."

Okay, so maybe we got a little carried away, but it was all in good fun. And as opposed to what happened with Dottie, I actually had players come up to me and say they were glad to see golf on television wasn't always so somnolent.

Dottie's slip of the tongue couldn't obscure two key facts from the weekend:

1. Regardless of how offended the Americans were, the Europeans did play better on the closing holes the first two days, repeatedly turning what looked like a lost match into at least half a point.

2. The U.S. team wiped Europe off the map in Sunday singles, erasing a one-point deficit going into the last day by taking 8 1/2 of a possible 12 points.

And that's the far bigger story from Halmstad. The U.S. has now won 7 of the 10 Solheim Cups, including the last 2, and what's even more ominous for the Euros is the same thing that doesn't bode well for the U.S. in Ryder Cups: that is, you could've interchanged 4 or 5 players and probably had the same result. Sub Christina Kim and Meaghan Francella for, say, Brittany Lincicome and Nicole Castrale, and the U.S. likely wouldn't have missed a beating. Might've actually been worse.

Meanwhile, the Euros' best players, save for Suzann Pettersen, are older. And while Linda Wessberg and Bettina Hauert may be good players, we don't really know yet because they haven't played against the best competition on a regular basis, opting instead to eschew the LPGA to stay in Europe full-time. Much like what Florida did to my beloved Tennessee football team last weekend ("Nothing sucks like a Big Orange"), you get the feeling the gap would've only widened had they kept playing. And, like with the Gators and Vols, I don't see much reason to believe the outcome of future contests between the two sides will produce different results.

They handed out another Cup over the weekend, you might've noticed. Tiger Woods won the FedEx chalice by virtue of winning two of the three playoff events he entered and finishing second in the other. For his efforts, Woods earned a $10 million retirement bonus.

The FedEx Cup: When It Absolutely, Positively Has to Be There By the Time You Turn 59 1/2.

The Tour could hardly have asked for better on-course dividends given its considerable investment in these inaugural playoffs. Woods and Phil Mickelson won three of the four tournaments, one of them being that memorable duel between the two on Labor Day and the other two featuring Woods playing nearly flawless golf in going a total of 45 under par in consecutive weeks.

Of course, we watched. You can't judge the Cup's success on that. We always do when those guys are in contention. But fewer of us watched than we would've had they not gone up against college and pro football. It was still, as it's always been, about the personalities - those two in particular - and the tournaments, themselves. Tiger even said so last week in Atlanta. His interest in FedEx Cups, Player of the Year Awards, money titles, etc. is only as high as what those gewgaws represent: specifically, that he's won golf tournaments. If you told Woods he could either take four seconds and win the FedEx Cup or win just one of the four playoff tournaments but not the Cup, there's no doubt that he'd take the latter. (And be chapped that it was only one.)

If you want real drama, check out the PGA Tour's Fall Series, a group of seven tournaments beginning Thursday with the Turning Stone Resort Championship that'll determine which 125 guys get to keep their Tour cards and, thus, keep playing for $6 million a week instead of $600,000. Or, tune in to the Nationwide Tour's Albertsons Boise Open, which I'll be hosting for Golf Channel. In addition to seeing one of the game's next great players, 19-year-old phenom Jason Day, you'll enjoy the commentary of my esteemed colleagues: Curt Byrum, Jerry Foltz, Kay Cockerill, and Brandi Seymour. In fact, if you're near a satellite dish or a jumbotron just before we sign on, you might just find out what the sailors say about Brandi. (Hint: She's a fine girl.)

Grant Boone is a husband, father, golf broadcaster, and sports journalist based in Abilene, Texas. His column appears on PGA.com each Wednesday and every day during major championships and other big events. He can be contacted at pgagrant@hotmail.com.

The views and opinions expressed here do not reflect those of PGA.com or The PGA of America.