Rain has derailed the Willow Ridge Opening Day festivities, allowing us to spend some unscheduled time together....I know, but you can thank me later. But a warning, I'm in an unusually existential mode, so reader beware...
A Dissenting View - Unsurprisingly, this headline got a click from your humble correspondent:
Olympic golf growth ‘bullshit’, says Wilkie
I had naturally assumed that Wendell Wilkie was long dead, but let's read on to see who this guy might be...
Olympic legend David Wilkie has dismissed the suggestion that the Games will grow golf globally, describing it as ‘absolute bullshit’.
OK, it seems they're using "legend" in the loosest possible sense, 'cause I've never heard of the dude...
Speaking to bunkered.co.uk, the 62-year-old Scot – a winner of Olympic gold in the 200m breaststroke at Montreal in 1976 – said professional golf should not be in the Games, and called out Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus. Player recently said golf’s inclusion in Rio de Janeiro would ‘undoubtedly’ grow the game, while Nicklaus referenced the boost the sport could have in nations like China, India, Russia and Brazil.
He's a Scot so one assumes he's not intractably hostile to our sport, so what's his beef? He leads with this:
 |
| Tempting to snark about the porn, 'stache, but in all fairness it was the 70's. |
“I think it’s wrong for those players to say there aren’t enough Indians or Africans playing the game without realising the impact and environmental damage a golf course would do in those countries,” said Wilkie. “You just have to go to those underdeveloped countries in terms of golf and look at the amount of money it would take to build a golf course and the destruction it would cause of forests. It’s utter rubbish to pretend that, by making golf part of the Olympic Games, you’re going to attract a poor guy in India to play. They just can’t afford it.
OK, he's gonna go with the environmental and poverty angles, is he? I'll engage his issues in a sec, but let's dispense with some other nonsense first, specifically this about Gary and Jack's motives:
“I think they’re just looking after their own psyche in the sense that they want to build more golf courses because of the money they’ll get paid for designing them.”
Geez, do you really need to go after our Golf Gods? I'm as cynical as the next guy, but even when I disagree with the elder statesmen, there's no need to call them money'grubbers, is there? Player and Nicklaus were lucky enough to create unbelievable lies for themselves in our game, and it's the most natural thing in the world that they'd want to expand such opportunities for others. To me it's a poker tell that he needs to buttress his arguments with personal invective about their motives....
So, let's engage those arguments.... first, on the environment. Golf courses use chemical fertilizers and may use clean water that's in scarce supply in certain areas of the world. That said, environmentalism is the ultimate luxury good, and the countries he cites are very poor and, not coincidentally, environmental nightmares. Golf will not despoil the Chinese environment, because the Communist Party got there first... And if you're concerned about the effects of the Rio golf course, may I suggest that you watch five minutes of the yachting competition. Golf is the least of anyone's concern...
And this seems to be the gist of his economic argument:
“Golf doesn’t need any stimulation, it doesn’t need a wider audience, and if people in these countries are going to play golf, it’ll never, ever filter down to the poorer people so I think what they’re saying is absolute bullshit.
Hmmmmmm..... obviously there's some truth there, but to what end? Golf is inevitably an expensive game, after all it requires a rather sizable parcel of land for its play. And yet, we've always seen the emergence of players from poor countries, think Roberto De Vincenzo to Jhonattan Vegas. And not all of these world class players are from their respective elites, but rather the mere existence of a golf club exposes a wide range of people to the game.
Golf is not responsible for the ills of society, and it's a bit rich (pun intended) to hold it responsible for fixing such ills. When we promote our game in third-world countries we hope that it will enrich that society over time, but it can't change conditions on the ground in any immediate sense. But that's an unrealistic ask...
Wilkie also has a rather idiosyncratic definition of an Olympian as one that will stay the full two weeks... Odd that, given that the field size for golf is so constrained because of the absence of available rooms in the Olympic Village. It may be that the Games have changed some since his idealized involvement, but let's also remember that the good citizens of Canada are still paying the bill for that boondoggle.
It's nonsensical to criticize the powers-that-be for trying to grow their game. That's their mandate, and while I have many criticisms of their methods, the objective seems beyond reproach.
Millennial Mishegoss - We've got Shack in full rant mode for you, but first we need to backfill the story line for you. It starts with this seemingly innocuous Vice Sports video:
Apparently, shooting that video led to Kisner and his posse being suspended:
The crime? As best anyone seems aware, it was the cart racing.... the original story didn't much interest me, for reasons that seem obvious. Clubs have rules and, while the enforcement thereof is their private matter. And quite frankly, while the punishment may not seem to fit the crime, the fact that they would enforce it against a PGA Tour professional is kinda cool.
Along come Mike Buteau to over-interpret this incident in the context of golf's alleged problem with millennials:
Then somebody like Kisner goes out and makes a cool video, hanging out with his boysat the club, drinking some beer and having some fun. That leads the non-golfing public to think that maybe golf isn’t such a fuddy-duddy sport after all. Then he gets suspended for having a little fun and that fuddy-duddy image of the sport among non-traditional golfers gets validated. Yes, it’s clear that Kisner and his buddies were being a bit reckless and could have damaged club property. Everybody understands that he broke the club’s rules and there’s a price to pay for that.
To Steve Mona, CEO of the World Golf Foundation, Kisner’s suspension serves as the perfect example of golf’s “old guard” clashing with the emerging “new guard.”
“That’s a really good example of the balancing we’re trying to adapt to,” Mona said. “On one side, when you join a club you know what the rules are. I can see why they took the action they did. On the other side, when you’re talking about the need to bring this new generation into the game, that is exactly an incident where you might say ‘hey, if we’re going to be more welcoming to that generation and we’re going to change our image from a stodgy game played by upper, middle-class white males, to more of a cool game played by everyday people, then you could argue about something like that being fine.’ That’s exactly the conundrum.”
Got a little whiplash there, as it was quite an abrupt transition from "There's a price" to whatever... And he doesn't touch on the fact that there's breaking the rules and then there's breaking the rules on video to be disseminated to a wide audience....
Then there was this from a millennial lover:
He said he’d even welcome a backwards-hat-wearing-headphone-listening 20-something onto the very same fairways he plays.
“As long as they’re not slowing us up or interfering with our game in some fashion, let them do what they want to do,” he said. “I tell my friends that, too. What difference does it make if the group ahead of us is drinking beer, listening to music and having a good time as long as they’re not interfering with us. You have to be adaptable.”
OK, but what I find amusing in items of this ilk is ignoring that one of those is not like the other.... I refer of course to the music. That's exactly where they will interfere with the others on the golf course, unless they've got the earbuds in, which creates it's own issues....
Here's part of the Shack rant in response to the above excerpt:
I'd ask though, does that private club have an adaptable membership program for someone under 35 who is not the child of a wealthy parent, but who loves the game? In most major cities, such programs are rare and even at clubs in trouble, the desperation to protect existing member "value" indicates that affordable access to halfway-decent continues to be far more problematic for golf's future than suspending someone for having a cart race.
Golf's millennials have developed very much of an Us vs. Them attitude, though I'd argue the rise of Bernie Sanders' message suggests this attitude clash is an economic matter separate of golf. Though certainly some of the generational tension stems from a divide created by the dated atmosphere they find at golf facilities or or how antiquated some rules appear. But one of my favorite millennials, GolfDigest.com's Alex Myers, starts the Golf Digest podcast by noting the show originates from One World Trade Center, "overlooking dozens of courses that would never have us as members."
Oh they'll take you Alex, if you're willing to pony up $200,000 and $15,000 a year in dues. But golf now faces a generation that is eschewing the ownership society in part because of more economical ways of doing things (i.e. Uber), and in part because they simply can't afford the price tag attached to contagiously fun, satisfying golf access.
And that, I believe, is golf's real millennial conundrum.
Where to begin?
Strangely, I agree with Geoff's conclusion while taking exception to everything above cited in support thereof. There are serious economic issues underlying our game, and they inevitably do affect participation rates. As noted in the item above, this can hardly be otherwise, given the nature of our expansive venues combined with sluggish economic growth.
Geoff no doubt would disagree with me on the subject of labor costs and real estate values being driven higher by restrictive land use regulations, most notably in his coastal California locale. As for the economic issues, the irot of the appeal of Bernie Sanders seems lost on him as well. I'm sure that Socialism would work this time, because it has such a good track record.
But his criticism of the clubs seems especially misguided and really quire naive. Clubs are notoriously poorly managed, and it's no doubt fair to ask whether there aren't additional options. But he's awfully dismissive of these intractable issues, as if it's just a bunch of old white men with their heads in the sand.
Clubs are facing a hostile environment, but are acutely aware of the challenges in replenishing the membership. Most clubs do have associate membership policies for the children of members, and while those would be castigated as the kids of wealthy parents, they're far more likely to remain in the club for the long-term. I can see the appeal of finding those under 35 that passionately love the game and might in the future become full members, but there are a lot of "buts" that follow. How do you find such folks and vet their future prospects adequately, and how much of a subsidy are we talking about?
A few grand a year? That might be worth it I suppose, but at the same time I'm guessing that's woefully inadequate to make a difference.... Any more than that and you'll inevitably piss off your core membership. Clubs have been experimenting with all sorts of initiatives, and if a silver bullet had been found word would have gotten out. Criticizing the clubs for being unable to solve intractable economic issues is just off the mark. And if the 's continue to Feel the Bern, then we have far greater problems with which to cope.
Straight Down The Middle - I'll leave you with this from Der Bingle (h/t Guy Yocum) to cheer you up on this raw Sunday:
The YouTube page includes this background on the tune:
Bing Crosby's enjoyable recording of "Straight Down The Middle" from 31/12/1957. The song was written for a short 1948 film called "Honor Caddy" with Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Ben Hogan and Sam Snead. It's thought that this was the first ever song written about golf.
No comments:
Post a Comment