Late Week Logorrhea

Just noticed some downgrading of the snow forecast for the weekend and early next week....  If there's a God, he's a nasty sort.

Scenes from Scottsdale - I watched an hour or so of the coverage, and this about sums it all up:

Justin Thomas, Rickie Fowler share early lead and rental house at Phoenix Open

They both played early, which seems a shame to me.  Couldn't the Tour put them on opposite sides of the draw, so they could have some privacy at home?  Is that too much to ask?

Amusingly, Alan Shipnuck, the man whose 2017 prediction of an era of U.S. Ryder Cup dominance, had this just yesterday:

Is this finally Rickie’s year? -William (@VolHawk411)

Alas, no.

 OK, it's only 18 holes... On the other hand, Alan, would you let us know when you think the stock market is over-valued?

Yanno how our Phil always acts like he's the smartest guy in the room?   Mark this date on your calendars, because here's something actually smart from the guy:

But Mickelson did let one dirty secret slip out of the bag. Something that's been, well, a non-secret regarding most professional athletes and their social accounts. 

"I have to be careful, I do have a buffer if you will because we all know that I say and do things that sometimes are just stupid and so I have to have a buffer where I send it to -- do all the stuff myself, send it to somebody, have it checked to make sure that there's no, there's nothing in there that shouldn't be," Mickelson said. "And so it's not the easiest thing, it's not like I just get on and send something, I have to send it to somebody else, have two people check it just to make sure that I'm not making some of the mistakes that I made in the past as a way of trying to protect myself from the negative of it. 

"And it's been a really positive experience."

 Can we put that guy on the Ryder Cup Task Force?  

Shack plays aggregator-in-chief on the Johnny Goodbye Tour, leading with this video from an NBC co-worker:

Theory of Feherativity: Johnny Miller's legacy

You'll not be surprised that the clips include some God-awful wardrobe choice, though surprisingly the worst of the bunch come with Johnny sitting in the broadcast booth.

Eamon Lynch with some memories:

It’s testament to Johnny Miller’s enduring appeal that he’ll be as much the focus during his final event in the booth for NBC Sports as he was during his first. 

That was 29 years ago this month at the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic, and from the beginning Miller came off the top rope. Most fans don’t remember Peter Jacobsen won that week, but plenty recall Miller musing aloud on whether he would choke, a startling departure in a sport where commentary is often a masterclass in hagiography and excuse-making. Even guys at home weren’t safe from Miller’s missiles. 

Mike Ditka competed in the pro-am, and when NBC showed footage of Coach ranting on the sidelines of a game, Miller likened his histrionics to Curtis Strange after a three-putt. Watching from his brother’s couch, Strange was angered by what he saw as a slap below the Sansabelt. “Now I laugh. At the time I was really pissed off,” he admitted. “He’s been good for the game. He’s been good for TV. A lot of people like him, but there’s some that don’t.”

And for all the talk of Johnny's 63 at Oakmont, this might actually be his most memorable win:

Miller was almost 47 years old in February 1994 when he went to Pebble Beach for the AT&T National Pro-Am. It was just his fifth event since entering the booth. He was far removed from the glory days of plaid bell bottoms and persimmon drivers. He hadn’t won in seven years and had just a single victory in 11 years. He was crippled with putting yips, and everyone knew it. 

And yet Miller beat ’em all one last time. He needed to two-putt from 20 feet for the win. Standing over the first putt he told himself, “Don’t hit it fat!” He closed his eyes on the second one, a short tap-in that gave Miller his 25th PGA Tour title. 

Brad Faxon, now an announcer for Fox Sports, finished nine shots behind Miller that week. “I remember being so impressed that he could be in contention at his age having been in the booth for so long and not practicing,” he said. “Incredible.” 

Brandel Chamblee missed the cut and left Pebble Beach feeling more disgusted than awestruck. “It’s the only time I ever left an event and felt embarrassed to be a Tour player,” the Golf Channel analyst recalled. “He came out of the booth, past his prime, with the yips, and still beat us.”

I remember watching it and the shock involved....  Johnny was incredibly yippy, but who thinks about hitting a putt fat?

Remember the guy that asked Shipnuck why Johnny was signing off at a gong show tourney?   Jim McCabe has the skinny on the Desert Fox, including these back-to-back routs:

Desert win No. 3 

Jan. 9-12, 1975: Phoenix Open

67-61-68-64—260 (24 under)

Wins by 14 shots over Jerry Heard 

If there were fears of complacency following his eight-win ’74 campaign, they were dashed when Miller touched desert sand to kick off his ’75 season and met a large contingent of golf writers. 

“I just always felt really good at the beginning of the year. The beginning of the year were big tournaments and a lot of attention was on them. The folks back East were snowed in, so a lot of people were watching,” he told the media. 

What they saw on this week was more head-shaking dominance, Miller’s second-round 61 especially so. It moved Frank Gianelli of the Arizona Republic to write: “Johnny Miller did everything but pick up the clubhouse deed staking claim to Phoenix Country Club.” 

Leading by six, Miller bumped the lead to seven with a third-round 68, then buried the field with a closing 64, an overpowering wire-to-wire performance.

Desert win No. 4 

Jan. 16-19, 1975: Dean Martin Tucson Open

66-69-67-61—263 (25 under)

Wins by nine shots over John Mahaffey 

Two weeks before he would host his annual TOUR event in Palm Springs, Bob Hope stopped into Tucson to play in the pro-am and got the levity going when he told reporters, “I’m thrilled to be here for the Johnny Miller Benefit.” 

Unlikely that competitors laughed. “I didn’t come here to finish second,” said John Mahaffey, who hit all 36 greens in regulation for the first two days – and still trailed Miller by one. “He’s only human. I have to believe he can be beaten.” 

Not at this moment in history. Miller scorched Tucson National for 67-61 on the weekend to leave Mahaffey second, a robust nine back. Back-to-back wins, a cumulative 49 under to win by a total of 23 strokes.

Got that, Mr. Gong Show?   Wins by two touchdowns, makes the short drive to Tucson, and wins by nine....  

Golf Digest editor Jerry Tarde has some great Johnny stories here, the best of which is a demo of a new Spalding ball in which our hero shows Stads and the Shark what ball-striking is all about, though you might well wonder whether Mormons play fro money like I did.  I've had that story for you previously, so I'll excerpt this one instead, perhaps more amazing because of his age:

Another story Geertsen told me that has resonated all these years later occurred in the

1966 U.S. Open at Olympic when Johnny was 19 and a sophomore at Brigham Young. He planned to caddie in the tournament until he qualified for it. On the last day, in contention, Johnny overshot the par-3 15th green and was in the thick USGA rough. As Geertsen told it, from my notes: “His ball was two feet in front of a gallery rope, and the marshals laid down the rope so he could play the shot. But on his backswing, somebody accidentally pulled the rope, and it came up and caught Johnny’s club. He hit the ball only six inches. He just walked away from the ball calmly, looked at the shot again—and splashed the ball out of the rough and into the hole for a par! That clinched low amateur for him.”

“The crowd, instead of cheering, fell mostly slent, mesmerized.

Enjoy your grandchildren, Johnny.

Direct From My Twitter Feed -  I haven't actually tweeted even once, but I do so like to say that.....  Amid all the fuss of that Haotong Li penalty from Dubai is a story that until now had basically been ignored by the golfing press.

But first, another revisit of Alan Shipnuck's mailbag, specifically his proposed rewrite of the rules of our game:

Why are the rules of golf so terrible? -@PaigeSpiranac 

It really is amazing that so many dedicated and presumably smart people spend so much time cogitating on the rules and tweaking them endlessly and yet the pro game remains engulfed by endless b.s. I really think golf needs only three rules: 

1. Play the ball as it lies.

2. If you a lose a ball, drop it where you think it disappeared, one stroke penalty.

3. If something weird or unprecedented happens, talk it over with your playing partners, apply common sense, do the right thing and move on. 

That wasn’t hard, was it?

It's witty and pithy, but the serious point I wanted to make is that in a world where backstopping seems an appropriate thing to these kids, how could you assume that the field would be protected?  But then I find this horrible story that no golf journalist seems to want to touch, finally today breaking through:

European Tour player Lucas Herbert is facing criticism after committing a rules infraction at last week’s Dubai Desert Classic. Herbert shared the 36-hole lead with Bryson DeChambeau, who would go on to win, and the two played together in the third

round when the penalty occurred. 

Late on the front nine, rules official Andy McFee informed Herbert that he was being handed a penalty from his play in a waste area at the par-5 third. Herbert had used his wedge to move loose impediments as well as some sand from behind the ball. 

Rules 12.2a and 12.2b allow players to touch or move loose impediments and will be generally allowed to touch ground or sand with a hand or club. Still, it is forbidden to improve your lie or test the surface of the sand. Herbert was deemed in violation and accepted his two-shot penalty, which led to a third-round 72. He finished T7 after a final-round 69.

We're always told that golf is a game for gentlemen, and now we're further informed that many rules issues will be adjudicated based upon the intent of the player....  Herbert, to his credit, went on the Inside the Ropes podcast to discuss the matter.  Less to his credit was his explanation:

Herbert joined the Inside the Ropes podcast to defend the move. “A bad brain fade, I guess,” he said. “In my heart of hearts, it didn’t affect the actual golf shot. I went back and looked at the lie, even recreated a similar lie later on. It was still a horrible lie. I would have loved to have hit a different shot if the lie was a lot better. At the end of the day, it was still a horrible lie and it was still a long way away from the ball.”

Herbert, No. 73 in the world, said he hoped the moment wouldn’t stick with him. “We needed to take the penalty because it was sort of the right thing to do in the end. I didn’t want to be labeled as someone who doesn’t play the game fairly.”

Go watch that video and see if you're willing to pass it off as a brain fade... You know what's a really good way to avoid being know as a guy who cheats?  Yeah, not cheating.  An idea so crazy it just might work.

But he can't even bring himself to admit that scraping sand away from his path to the ball twice improved his lie?  I try to be slow to invoke the "C-word", but as with Vijay an others, the path to forgiveness runs through contrition....and I think this guy agrees:

Former European Tour pro Gary Evans captured the moment the penalty was awarded on camera and criticized the move. “If I ever witnessed a playing partner do this, a 2 shot penalty would be the least of his worries!” he tweeted.

Well played. 

Strick, Strock - Is it possible that there's second thoughts about Wisconsin Nice?

It also keeps Stricker focused on his results instead of, say, a likely spot as U.S. Ryder

Cup captain for the 2020 matches at Whistling Straits in his home state of Wisconsin. Stricker insisted he hasn’t been given the green light yet, despite widespread belief that he’s the man who will lead the Americans on the heels of last fall’s loss in Paris. 

“I would love to be a part of it,” Stricker said Tuesday ahead of the Waste Management Phoenix Open. “It’d be a huge honor and being right there in my home state would be super cool. To try to bring the cup back right there would be a great opportunity if they give it to me, and that’s the part I’m still waiting on. It’s not up to me and hopefully I get the opportunity. It’d be fun.” 

Stricker is undoubtedly popular with fellow players and would fit well in that regard. Recent U.S. Captain Jim Furyk checked all those boxes too. It wasn’t enough for the Americans to overcome a stellar European showing, particularly from Tommy Fleetwood and Francesco Molinari. The fact that Patrick Reed criticized his decision to split up the usual pairing with Jordan Spieth didn’t make things easier in the aftermath.

 Shack tells us why this might be intriguing:

Steve Stricker’s still the overwhelming favorite to lead America in 2020 at Whistling Straits, but given that Jim Furyk was announced on January 11th, 2017 and Europe has already made Padraig Harrington their captain, could the PGA of America be considering another option? Did the task force reconvene to rethink the master plan? Or is there simply a better announcement date in mind?

I'm guessing that that would be too much an admission of failure, and that Strick is the man.   

Taking The Fifth - As expected, the poobahs at Augusta National are using their new land acquisition to lengthen the fifth hole.  Geoff has a geeky but interesting discussion thereof:

With no Instagram posts from Augusta National—not even a random post-Daniel Field takeoff photo—the Masters Media Guide provides our first look at the extended 5th hole. The addition of 40 yards will get most of the attention, but the question fans of Bobby Jones and Alister MacKenzie’s design most want to know: has the original Road hole-inspired strategy been restored? 

To recap: Bobby Jones described the hole as a reverse of the Road with a carry over the left bunkers and flirtation with the lefthand forest shortening the hole and opening up an ideal angle to most hole locations. The fairway bunkers Jones-MacKenzie answer to the Roads’ Station Master’s Garden. (Here’s an old Golf World piece I wrote on the ties to St. Andrews and in particular, this hole.) 

So as today’s modern heptathletes finally stopped downing Jagermeister shots and moved to Cauliflower smoothies, the club pushed forward the fairway bunkers in response. They also planted pines and essentially created a pinched landing area to offset the surge of athleticism. The left risk/reward option of Jones’s day was erased in an attempt to maintain certain distances for the approach.

Going from 455 to 495 in 2019 and our first look at the depiction suggests fairway bunkers have been repositioned. That’s backed by the description of a 315 yard carry in 2018 and a 313 yard carry in 2019. This is very exciting news, though until we see what kind of tree planting and earthwork took place, we should reserve judgement about the potential for a strategic revival.

That old piece linked above is well worth your time, as both Mackenzie (duh!) and Jones revered the design features of The Old Course.

Here's more on the change:

Geoff's been extremely harsh about so many of the changes to the course over the years, but this one may well return us to the original Mackenzie-Jones design concept. 

Have a great weekend.