Weekend Wrap

Slim pickings on the golf front, so we'll cover those with dispatch.

Lanny's Second Major - The PNC Father-Son is golf's version of the Era of Good Feelings.... who can be cynical about elderly golf legends pegging it with their adult spawn?  Well, I could...nah, even I'm not that curmudgeonly.  

They had a fairly dramatic ending for this type of event:

Lanny and Tucker Wadkins won the PNC Father/Son Challenge on Sunday with an eagle 

Strange seeing Lanny in a Nike cap, no?

on the first hole of a four-team playoff.

Tucker Wadkins made the 40-foot eagle putt on the par-5 18th at Ritz-Carlton Golf Club.

The Wadkins closed with a 9-under 63 to match Davis and Dru Love, Larry and Drew Nelson, and Fred and Taylor Funk at 20 under in the scramble tournament. The Nelsons and Funks shot 62, and the Loves had a 63, with all four teams birdieing the 18th in regulation.

This is the kind of event that puts the silly in Silly Season, but in a good way... the guys love being out there with their kids, so we smile and move on.

The Dude Duf Abides - Also golf of a silly ilk, though somewhat more serious:

It's been a rough go for Jason Dufner in recent years. 

Off the course, he got divorced in early 2015. On the course, his product has slipped since his seminal PGA Championship victory in 2013. In fact, Dufner hadn't won anywhere coming into this week since that triumph and had dropped from eighth to 125th in the Official World Golf Ranking. 

But Saturday, though, there was finally some good news. 

Dufner and teammate Brandt Snedeker fired a final-round 61 at Tiburon Golf Club in Naples, Fla., to earn a two-shot victory at the Franklin Templeton Shootout. Their 11-under last 18 holes in Saturday's better-ball format contributed to a 30-under total that left them two clear of Harris English and Matt Kuchar. Second-round leaders Charley Hoffman and Daniel Berger posted a final round 7-under 65 to finish three back.

It would be nice to have Duf back, I'd just be a tad cautious about over-interpreting this event.  Shack thinks the truncated off-season (what, there's an off-season?  Who knew?) has diluted the field:

I can't think of a better example of how much the world has changed than to look at the Shark Shootout field. Once an event that drew some pretty incredible field, it was hard not to notice some of the names who got into Greg Norman's once-prestigious annual event. Now, it's a rare silly season week that elites can use to rest.

I'm fully on board with his concern about the field on the West Coast swing?  The Shark Shootout, not so much...Geoff throws in this Luke Donald tweet for emphasis:

Some of my best years on tour I took 6 weeks off, very hard to do that with the current wrap around season

No doubt.  

Open Sesame -  Probably the most significant golf of the weekend was played in Thailand, where, spoiler alert, Jaime Donaldson won.  That's pretty insignificant, but here's where the import is to be found:

The victory also means Donaldson can pack his bags for Royal Troon in 2016. The

Thailand Golf Championship is part of the Open Qualifying Series, meaning the leading four players who finished in the top 12 and ties this week who weren't already exempt for the 2016 Open earned entry to Royal Troon. 

Along with Donaldson, Lee Westwood – who used a 64-67 finish to reach 18 under and T-2 – captured an Open spot. The Englishman will likely keep a longtime streak alive then, as Westwood is now qualified to play his 22nd consecutive Open Championship.

This is part of the so-called Open Qualifying Series, where those not yet exempt for Royal Troon can earn a tee time.   One assumes that Donaldson would have qualified in any event, and one doesn't bristle at Westwood gaining entry as a lifetime achievement award.  But there's this as well:

The final two qualifiers from this event for the year's third major championship were Clement Sordet and Phachara Khongwatmai. The former held the 54-hole lead but could only muster a final-round 70 for T-2. Khongwatmai – a 16-year-old prodigy who, two years ago, became the youngest player to ever win a pro tour event – finished sixth at 13 under thanks to a Sunday 66.

That youngster is immediately granted a place in the pantheon of great golf names, but as to whether he deserves a spot in The Open, color me skeptical.

Worlds Colliding -  My two favorite golf bloggers, David Owen and that other guy, provide this morning's GMTA installment.  First comes David with a kinda-sorta book review:

Michelle Wie once told Guy Yocom, in an interview in Golf Digest, that if she ever got bored with golf she'd take it up again, left-handed -- one of many reasons to join her fan club. A few years ago, Mike Zimmerman, a reader in Glendale, Wisconsin, decided to try the same thing, mostly because he thought switching sides would pose an interesting challenge, especially for a guy in his late forties. He has now written a book about his experience, called The Wrong Side of the Ball.

 While the book is moderately of interest, David gratuitously sprinkles in some facts that might amuse:

The book, which Zimmerman published himself, contains slightly more autobiographical detail than people who don't know him are likely to be fascinated by, but there's lots of interesting stuff, too, including the fact that, of the four left-handed players who have won majors -- Bob Charles, Mike Weir, Phil Mickelson, and Bubba Watson -- only Watson is a natural lefty. There's also the even more surprising fact that six other natural lefties have won majors, but all while playing right-handed: Johnny Miller, Greg Norman, Curtis Strange, Nick Price, David Graham, and Byron Nelson.

And with apologies for my technical limitations, Shack has fun video from the aforementioned Thailand event of Shingo Katayama warming up by pounding drivers left-handed.  As you know, these guys are good!

You Can't Please Everyone -  Loyal readers have no doubt grown tired of my plugs for this book detailing the development of the Bandon Dunes Golf Resort.  The reason I find it so interesting is that the forces of "Progress" that control The Peoples Republic of Oregon made such a project impossible.... except for the tenacity of Mike Keiser and the gorse.  Sorry, if you don't understand that latter reference, but I don't have the time to cover that ground again.

So now comes this story of Mike Keiser getting into it with...and this is good, the Boy Scouts:

True to their motto, a group of Boy Scouts is prepared all right -- to fight a golf course project proposed by Bandon Dunes owner Mike Keiser. 

As reported in The Oregonian, some Scouts are fuming over the prospect of Keiser building an 18-hole course on Scout-owned land in northern Oregon.

Having recently abandoned plans to build a course on state parkland in southern Oregon, Keiser has turned his sights farther up the coast. He is now in talks with the Portland-based Cascade Pacific Council of scouts over 200 seaside acres in Tillamook County, along a coastline that is home to two scout camps, Camp Clark and Camp Meriwether.

That Keiser can be so predatory... why would he pick on the defenseless Boy Scouts?  Well, there was this:

Already, though, Keiser said he saw potential upsides in a project that would "create a good deal of profit streams" for the financially pinched Scouts on land where there are no hiking trails and where buildings have gone decades without much-needed repair. 

In addition to revitalizing existing buildings, Keiser has pledged to create a caddie program through which Eagle Scouts could earn their merit badges. Keiser said the Scouts council has also expressed interest in having a kid-friendly par-3 course on the site, which he is prepared to build if the proposed project comes to fruition.

Yes, by all means fight him with every weapon you have.  Maybe you can interest Trump in the parcel?

Trump Reax -  The Tour Confidential panel took on the Trump issue and the results are unimpressive.  But Josh Sens gets to the heart of the issue despite an excessive reliance on metaphors:

Josh Sens: No. Trump may be the grotesque embodiment of a lot of repugnant things, but the second you start drawing black and white lines like that, you quickly enter the gray area of hypocrisy. Some of the best players in the world peg it regularly in China, hardly a bastion of political freedom. Should that stop? If the game is going to sever ties to Trump, it should also probably pull up all its connections to countries in the Middle East with oppressive regimes. On it goes. If Trump goes on to win the oval office, that would be alarming. But at least then golf would have an unassailable to cut ties with him.

Pot.  Kettle.