It's quite the juxtaposition.... my field of vision ranges from the golf in Abu Dhabi on the left periphery to the raging storm on the right. As long as the power lines stay put, it'll be just fine.
So, as long as we're here for the duration, shall we catch up on a few things? In no particular order of course...
Hualalei Happenings - No doubt the least significant professional golf being played this weekend is on the Big Island of Hawaii, a course I played in 2002 after marrying the artist known as Employee No. 2. It's quite the forgettable track in most regards, except for the rather intimidating lava formations.
In any event, I blog this event only because 66-year-old Tom Watson fired a 7-under 65 to put himself two off the lead, using what Mark Rolfing called a FIFA-ball. Here's a look:
Wacky, eh? Here's an explanation via Club Up Golf:
Tom Watson, along with Marc Lieshman, signed with Callaway this January. It’s a full equipment deal meaning he’s using the drivers, irons, and Callaway golf balls. His choice of balls, as first shown in this video, is a very interesting one. He’s using theCallaway Truvis Chrome Soft golf balls, and, correct us if we’re wrong, but we don’t know of any other professional using the Callaway Truvis in competitive play . . . heck, we’ve never even seen one pop up on the course!
The Callaway Truvis is designed to aid the golfer visually, and we don’t want to make any age or eyesight related remarks towards Mr. Watson, but this is definitely unique, and it seemed to help his stroke.
I used the Chrome Soft for most of last season, but not sure I'm up for the verbal abuse that using this one would entail.
Wassup Wazzock? - We love learning new words, even from the N.Y. Times. No doubt you heard about the online petition in the U.K. to ban Donald Trump, signed by a half-million people with nothing better to do. Here's how the parliamentary debate played out:
LONDON — They called him a “fool,” a “buffoon” and even a “wazzock” — Englishslang for a combination of the two.
Yet even as British lawmakers roundly condemned the brash Republican presidential candidate Donald J. Trump on Monday, with language that could have been lifted from his Twitter feed, they appeared to back away from the idea of barring him from entering the country.
A three-hour debate in Parliament on whether to bar Mr. Trump from traveling to Britain was set off by an electronic petition, signed by more than 570,000 Britons, which likened Mr. Trump to those denied entry to the country for engaging in “hate speech.”
OK, this is profoundly disturbing for an allegedly free country, but I hasten to add that there are far more dangerous things that a legislature could and usually would be doing.
Read the article for a full appreciation for the incredible lightness of being an MP these days. But as an exit question, do we think they could work up as much indignation for these folks?
This Is My Shocked Face - Have you heard that golf is going to be in The Olympics? I know, you'd think it would get more coverage... So, the powers that be want to hold a test event on the golf course, and it's getting complicated:
"We've got a good list of players who are, quote, interested in coming," PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem said. "But we don't have a long list of players who are committed to coming. That's the case with the guys who are currently playing on the PGA Tour, just because of the schedule, looking ahead to the summer, seeing the compaction. So I don't know."
Gee, that's a chin-scratcher... but this might provide a chuckle for you:
Every sport must have an event at the Olympic venue ahead of the Rio Games. Finchem said if golf can pull together this outing, it will count as the test event.
"We can do that with any combination of players that are being talked to," he said. "Also, I think it's probably most important to get international players. We don't know how it's going to wind up. We've got transportation issues and a sponsor the next week that's watching and saying, 'Am I going to lose anybody?'"
Concern for your sponsors? Why start now?
Read the piece for a detailed view of the scheduling complications and please bear in mind that this is for March. Yanno, what I like to think of as ski season... The summer will be insane for these guys.
Need a further laugh? Golf Channel has a countdown to Olympic Golf in the lower right-hand portion of the screen, at least on Morning Drive. For those keeping score at home, it's 195 days, ten hours and....sheesh, does anyone care?
Sponsor Shuffle - Northern Trust is a venerable Chicago institution, so their sponsorship of the event formerly known as the Los Angeles Open has always seemed illogical. Doug Ferguson brings us up to date on the musical chairs:
Northern Trust is moving its title sponsorship on the PGA Tour from Los Angeles to New York and will become the opening FedEx Cup playoff event next year, which could create a small domino effect of sponsors.
Barclays has decided not to renew its title sponsorship after 12 years in the New York area. Starting in 2017, the FedEx Cup playoff's first event will be called The Northern Trust. It will keep the previous courses, starting with Glen Oaks in 2017 and rotating among Ridgewood, Plainfield, Liberty National and Bethpage Black.
Fair enough, but does NY make any more sense for NoTrust than LA? One of my major gripes with Commissioner Ratched is that his substantive additions to the golf calendar, think WGC and FedEx events, have all put him in the position of competing with his pre-existing sponsors. I therefore view this as NoTrust choosing to switch in lieu of fighting....
Hyundai, whose U.S. operations are based in SoCal, will assume sponsorship of the Riviera event.
Disquisitions on the "C" Word - Josh Sens over-interprets the Donald Trump-Samuel L. Jackson contretemps, but who cares when there's fun to be had. First, he introduces us to the delightfully-named Puggy:
That child grew up to be Walter (Puggy) Pearson, among the most egregious golf cheats of all time. In a long and notorious life, Pearson was best known as a sharp-toothed card shark, but his skill set carried over nicely to the course. A latecomer to the game, he jerry-rigged a respectable swing while mastering the underhanded fundamentals of the foot-wedge and the surreptitious drop.
Not that he worried about getting caught.
One difference between Puggy and countless other fraudsters is that he owned up willingly to his transgressions.
“Sorry, I couldn’t help myself,” was his famous explanation for a flagrant violation he committed in a big-money match against a drug kingpin that he’d been winning handily but was forced to forfeit.
I wasn't familiar with Puggy nor was I aware of Jane Blaylock's scarlet "C":
In those same dusty archives, you also find a dossier devoted to Jane Blalock, the Hester Prynne of the women’s game. In a nearly 20–year career, Blalock won 27 LPGA Tour events, including the inaugural Dinah Shore (before it was designated as a major), yet her legacy of triumph is entangled with charges that she improperly marked her ball and tamped down spike marks during the 1972 season. A player petition led to her suspension, which Blalock fought successfully. In 1974, she notched another legal victory when a court ruled that the LPGA was in violation of antitrust regulations. The following year, Blalock’s suit against the tour was settled, so officially, at least, the black mark is long gone.
Sandwiched between those two stories are these conclusions that I think miss some obvious points:
Never mind due process, hard evidence, confessions. Unlike other sports, where a pitcherwho scuffs balls or a lineman who holds jerseys can pass as crafty, golf makes no allowances. It applies the “c” in cheater like a scarlet letter. To be accused is to be condemned.
Anyone who doubts this might spend some time sifting through the history of judgments in golf’s harsh court of public opinion. There you come upon the case of the World vs. Vijay Singh, who still bridles at questions (because people still raise them) over cheating allegations that date more than 30 years. The Asian tour slapped Singh with a two-year suspension, so he served his time. But in the eyes of some, his sentence might never end.
First, Josh seems to elide the important distinction between Puggy, a professional gambler, and a professional golfer. But of greater import, is the reference to the Veej. And your homework is to read this 1996 Sports Illustrated piece by John Garrity,
I've long believed and noted here previously that Singh has brought this upon himself. I don't doubt for a second that the golf world understands how difficult our game is and how young players struggle to make a life for themselves in the game. That such a young player would take a short-cut in the heat of the moment doesn't mean, as Josh notes, that it's a lifetime sentence.
But one has to ask for forgiveness, and that's where I believe Veej dug himself a hole. In continuing to protest his innocence, and on that subject Garrity's article is quite damning, he's made it impossible for people to move on.
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