Thursday Threads

Slim pickings out there, so I'll have to trust you to not blame the messenger.

Was This In The Mission Statement? - The PGA of America seems determined to confirm its critics' indictment, with this exciting announcement regarding its marquee championship at Bethpage:

PGA of America and Bell announces helicopter program for the 101st PGA Championship at Bethpage Black 

The PGA of America today announced, in collaboration with Bell Helicopter, a Textron Inc. (NYSE:TXT) company, a new and innovative transportation solution to the 101st PGA Championship at Bethpage Black. The partnership between Bell and the 2019 PGA Championship will offer an unparalleled flight program that will transport key stakeholders - including C-Suite executives, corporate hospitality clients and PGA Officials – from multiple sites in Manhattan and surrounding New York Metro corporate centers to/from an on-site landing zone located at Bethpage State Park, just minutes from the PGA Championship.

As you know, Bethpage bills itself as The People's Country Club, so what better way for The People to get there....Alternative take:  Having failed to successfully address pace of play issues on the golf course.... Well, you can fill in that last bit.

Shack has some good fun with his righteous Fisking here, but he's positively speechless when it comes to the locations form which one can avail oneself of this premium commuting opportunity:

As an LA hipster, Geoff is sometimes slow to pick up on this corporate synergy game....What you have there is an effortless promotion of a future PGA Championship venue.  And how fortuitous that it will come smack dab in the middle of his second term.... Who doesn't like the sound of heads exploding in the morning?

Exit question: What's the over-under for the number of actual PGA Professionals that can afford such a service?  But the organization is all about serving the needs of their 29,000 dues-paying members...

A High Threshold For Pain - Dylan Dethier has a nose for stories, though I would think that small doses would be indicated:

ORLANDO, Fla. — What often gets lost in PGA Tour coverage, what you don’t see on TV, is what transpires from Monday to Wednesday. Three days of warming up,

schmoozing, shooting the breeze. It’s prime time for media members seeking interviews, too. On these days, whenever I have a spare moment by the practice area, I find myself drawn to Bryson DeChambeau range sessions, arguably the most fascinating spectacle in golf.

On this occasion I come upon DeChambeau Wednesday mid-afternoon at Bay Hill, doing work after his pro-am round. The movement of 90 percent of pros on the range is casual, languid, inscrutable. There’s none of that in Bryson. There was nothing casual on the range last June, when he hit balls past sunset on Saturday at the Memorial, the night before he won the event. He was hardly inscrutable during a complete range meltdown at the British Open. He has said he’d have to “shoot 54” to skip a range session after a round. 

Even Wednesday, when he’d made some time to mess around with Bubba Watson, he had a purpose: watching the FlightScope numbers of intentional shanks, plus mastering this ridiculous trick shot. Now, as DeChambeau pounds wedge after wedge, there is still nothing casual. He lifts the club up to his eyes to study the face and shakes his head.

Intentional shanks?  Please tell me he's pimping us....

Not long ago we were bemoaning the cookie-cutter nature of Tour pros, so I find Bryson a breath of fresh air.  That said, I worry about his long-term survival, given how tightly-wound he is.  I mean, have you seen that range meltdown above?

But there's lots of good bits in Dylan's piece, including this nugget:

He is wearing a set of black earpieces; it’s not clear if he’s listening to anything. Perhaps the buds factor into his extensive brain-training regimen (which involves, among other things, watching Deadpool while hooked up to a machine that will automatically stop the movie if his brain’s electrical current gets too active).

Trust me, Bryson, it's way too active.

Not This Week! -  I don't think Golf Digest is doing him any favors with this:

Our weekly advice also includes the ultimate inside sources at every PGA Tour event—the caddies. Every week, thanks to our partnership with The Caddie Network, a rotating, anonymous PGA Tour caddie is offering their analysis and insights—what they're seeing on the range and putting greens. This week, our caddie says to "chalk up a victory for Justin Rose." There's no such thing as a certainty in golf, but in terms of a prediction, this is almost as strong as you can get. And our caddies know: There's no prize for finishing second. We want the gold.

Do players even want to win at this point on the schedule?  If you were Rory last year at this time, probably....  Still far enough in advance of The Masters, and it had been too long for the lad.  But if your JR?

Anyway, here's their full toteboard for the week:

Hmmmm, so you're saying that I can bet on Luke List to beat Adam Hadwin this week?  Is this a great country, or what?  Is there actually demand for such action, and who are these people?

But as Alex Myers informs, Rosie's mind is elsewhere these days:

At his Wednesday press conference at Bay Hill, Rose was asked whether he changes how he practices leading up to the Masters. Here was his response that involved him talking about talking to his "guys at Albany," Rose's home club in the Bahamas: 

Not so much. It's obviously on the mind for sure. It's about how do you kind of keep your game fresh and sharp and ultimate he will how do you peak there. You want to play well

every week and I think it's really important to try to be in contention once or twice heading into the Masters to see if you feel like everything is where it needs to be. Putting is the one area that you do try to find surfaces, I'll be sort of talking to my guys at Albany and saying okay, are there a couple of greens that you can pretty much brown out and 50 percent kill so they're fast enough to practice on heading into the Masters and they will do that. They do a great job of trying to replicate as best they can. So when I do go home on my weeks off I have opportunities to practice as similarly as possible. I'll ask them to find pin placements there are two and a half, three percent slope. So I really start to see the ball breaking into the cup. Its some of those visuals that are tricky to just click right into if you haven't prepared for.

I get it, though Augusta's greens are bent, and I'd guess that Albany's aren't.....  I picked JR last year as a karma play, and it failed miserably.  

Earlier in the week JR had this at his own website:

I love playing in two-balls, but we don’t really get that experience until we move away

from the West Coast on the PGA Tour. It’s amazing the difference that makes. When you play your first two-ball of the year, it feels like you’re running round. 

I tend to watch the crowd when certain players get over the ball and see their reaction to how long it takes them to hit a shot. It can be quite funny to see the reactions, looks of disbelief and sometimes chuckles in reaction to a guy taking so long. I try to use it as amusement and a diversion rather than letting it frustrate me.

That's amusing, as Shack notes, because JR isn't exactly one of the quicker players, though he does keep up for sure.Mores the pity that he tales his amusement from the crowd, as opposed to from the rules officials tormenting the slow pokes....

Dog Bites Man - getting so very old, folks:

Tony Romo accepts third PGA Tour sponsor exemption, will tee it up later this month

This might be an actual story were he to, you know, decline an exemption....  or were his amateur status to be revoked for making a golf shoe commercial.

Ulike former Dallas Cowboys teammate Jason Witten, Tony Romo seems happy to keep his day job as a TV football analyst. However, that doesn't mean the ex-quarterback isn't also going to continue pursuing his pro golf dreams. 

The PGA Tour announced on Wednesday that Romo has accepted a sponsor's exemption to compete in the Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship later this month (March 28-31). This will mark the second consecutive year Romo has played in the event. Romo had previously accepted a sponsor's exemption to play in the AT&T Byron Nelson in May.

Or, dare I suggest it, he proves himself competitive.  So, how did he do last year?

Romo missed the cut by 16 shots in his PGA Tour debut in the Dominican Republic last year. Overall, though, he had a pretty successful year on the golf course. Romo won the American Century Championship—the Super Bowl of celebrity golf—in Tahoe, won an amateur golf tournament in Wisconsin by nine shots, and made it out of Q School pre-qualifying.

Sigh.  And for this we take a slot away from a struggling professional.....

Quick Takes - Just a few loose ends before I get on with my day:

First, are you the sort that thinks golf needs more head butts?  Got you covered....

He says this like it's a good thing: Keith Mitchell’s caddie is the real life version of the caddie in 'Happy Gilmore'

The best golf-related bubble bath since Jan Stephenson - Can be found here.  And yet, it seems inadequate to cause DJ to keep it in his pants.... Just sayin'.

Now the Sixth of Four - Like your humble blogger, you've no doubt often thought that the one thing holding The Players back from Major status is....well, it's theme music.  Silly me, I thought it was a damn golf tournament.