Remember when some days it looked like Tiger was playing a completely different, easier version of the sport than everyone else?

Brian Lara, man.  I've had the West Indies/South Africa test on in the background all morning, and Lara is not only single-handedly keeping the Windies alive, he's often slapping the South African bowlers silly.  His teammates have averaged about a dozen runs each before being retired; Lara is on 93 and counting. 

Wait, while I was typing... make that 97.

Hold on, now it's 98...

You get the idea.

UPDATE from Day 2: Lara eventually lost his wicket at 176.  The other ten guys on the team totalled 120, combined.  So without his efforts, the West Indies would have all but lost the test on the very first day.  Unfortunately for the Windies, both of South Africa's opening batsmen scored centuries as well, and South Africa has a commanding position going into Day 3.  Sigh.  Reminds me of watching Andre Thornton hitting all those home runs for crappy Cleveland Indians teams...

UPDATE from Days 3 and 4: South Africa's batsmen almost doubled the Windies' score in their first innings, finally declaring (which is saying "we've kicked your ass enough, thanks") with 548 runs.  So forget about the Windies winning this one; they began batting on the fourth day needing to improve simply to have a chance to draw.

And then the opening batsmen fell apart completely, the first three men scoring only 16 runs combined before being retired bang-bang-bang in the space of exactly four balls.  This is only one more ball than would be needed to retire three empty wickets.  You could have sent dead people in to bat and barely done worse.  Tourists from Iowa who had never even seen cricket could conceivably have done better in this stretch, simply by swatting at the ball randomly in terror.

And so now Brian Lara is again batting, with an even steeper uphill climb and only a degree of dignity left to play for.  He and his partners will need to bat flawlessly for about eight or nine hours, well into tomorrow's play, if the Windies will even have a chance at a draw.

This is like being a 1970s Cleveland Indians fan, squared.  I've never seen such heroic futility.  It's fantastic.

UPDATE final: Lara was retired for just 13 by his nemesis Andre Nel, and the rest of the Windies followed shortly.  The Africans didn't even need to bat a second time, and the test ended without reaching its final day with South Africa winning by an entire innings and 86 runs, a victory margin which resembles less a sports result than your average invasion of Poland.  Sigh.