Lots to cover to prep you for the weekend at Riviera...Though, bear with me, as we start elsewhere.
On Obi-Whan Kenobi - It turns out that Alan Shipnuck's "little bird" did, in fact, have the goods. While I had a few late-term quibbles with Whan's stewardship of the LPGA Tour, there's no qualification to my praise of his performance there. And yet, I'm strangely puzzled by this move, as I have this nagging sense that he's not the right horse for this course.
Let me lede with some press-release snippets, first this making the case for those eleven years with the LPGA:
Since joining the Ladies Professional Golf Association in 2010, Whan increased the number of tournaments on the LPGA Tour’s schedule to 34 from 24, increased purses from $41.4 million to $76.5 million, and grew television hours from 125 hours per season, to over 500 hours. Under his leadership, the LPGA became a truly global business – with players, tournaments, sponsors and fans coming from all over the world. Currently, the LPGA Tour is televised in over 170 countries each week. Whan’s leadership resulted in the expansion of the LPGA to now include both the Symetra Tour, the recently announced joint venture with the Ladies European Tour, as well as a nearly 50% increase in LPGA’s teaching division. Whan’s focus on growing the game for junior girls has led to a significant expansion of the LPGA-USGA Girls Golf Program, which had 5,000 members when he joined the organization to 90,000 girls now engaged in the program.
That probably doesn't do his term justice, though he did benefit greatly from the lowered expectations of the Carolyn Bivens era... It's this background that has me a bit worried:
Whan started his career at the Procter & Gamble Company in 1987, where he rose to Director of Marketing for Oral Care before leaving to pursue a passion for sports. Whan’s sports business career began at Wilson Sporting Goods as a Vice President and General Manager in the golf division. He joined the TaylorMade Golf Company as Vice President of Marketing in 1995 and later served as Vice President of Sales and Marketing and Executive Vice President/General Manager for Taylormade-adidas Golf. In 2002, Whan became the President and CEO of Mission Hockey, a hockey equipment company.
He's a P&G marketing guy, and he can sell the hell out of whatever widget you're making... But is that the job of the USGA's CEO? Partially, for sure, but therein lies the rub.
Jaime Diaz, writing at the still functioning Golf Channel website, connects a couple of dots for us:
The choice of Whan comes at a time when the USGA is seeking stronger alliances with the expanding and changing entities in the golf world, as well as negotiating the revenue challenges of a non-profit sports organization. It’s become a complex, increasingly corporate job, with the most sensitive territory the ongoing debate over increasing distance, which remains contentious between the ruling bodies, who are exploring new regulations, and manufacturers and players, who tend to see that as a threat to both profits and enjoyment.
Whan’s business background, especially at large golf equipment companies, would seem important preparation for the looming landscape. The 56-year-old graduate of Miami of Ohio began his career in business, moving from executive marketing positions at Proctor & Gamble, the golf division at Wilson Sporting Goods, TaylorMade Golf Company and TaylorMade-adidas Golf, the latter three where he followed his upbringing in sports and particularly golf.
So this choice would appear to be non-threatening to the equipment manufacturers, leaving us to wonder whether that's a good thing for the rest of us. Here's more to ponder:
That reaction underlines Whan’s strength as a consensus builder who gets results. “I’m not greatat anything, but I’m pretty good at building strategic alliances,” he said. “At the LPGA, 10 of the top 10 things I’m most proud of came about when somebody else grabbed hold of the rope and pulled harder than I could. I just got them interested in the rope.”
He is also a fluent verbal communicator, comfortable in front of microphones and cameras. There’s a realistic expectation that Whan will assume a more “out front” role than any USGA leader since Joe Dey, who ruled as executive director from 1934-68.
“That was a key parameter for us,” said Francis. “We think to lead the game, you need to have charisma, you need to be an effective public speaker, you need to be a leader with other organizations. I think you’ll see a bigger public profile for the USGA. You’ll see a more welcoming USGA to lead the way, to make important decisions and get people coalesced around us. He’s been doing that, but this is just a bigger stage to do it on. Mike Whan is the right leader at the right time for the USGA.”
“I’m not shy,” Whan conceded. “Stage fright has never been a part of my life.”
You say "strategic alliance" and I say "regulatory capture", leaving us no choice but to call the whole thing off... So, where might Mike stand on the threshold issue of the day?
Shack found this issue of such import that he sent his comments to cheapskates such as your humble blogger:
The USGA wants love. Heck, they’ll settle for an air-hug these days.And Mike Whan is a well-respected golf executive who left the LPGA in much better shape than he found it.
Match made in optics heaven!
Funny times, as I'm left to fill in the background for Geoff and his long back-and-forth with the late, great Frank Hannigan. One of Frank's great insights was that the USGA had this perverse need to be loved, which I would argue is not a great look for a governing organization. But its effect can be seen in all manner of USGA action, from the Fox contract (sourced in an unnatural envy of the Masters), to the new Millennial-friendly rules to U.S. Open venue choices and set-ups.
Geoff finds these comments from Mike during his distaff days:
In his LPGA role Whan could not hide his disdain for rollback talk. The LPGA Tour’s official statement after the first USGA/R&A distance report said the organization did not see “distance as a hindrance towards the growth of the LPGA Tour or to the courses on which we can compete.”
Which bothers me not at all, because his pat stub has LPGA on it. But contrast with these comments in conjunction with the hiring announcement:
In a pre-announcement conference call convened by the USGA, he now calls distance a problem.“There’s little argument that we’ve known distance is a problem for a long time.”
Whan added, “I think change is coming and needs to — how grand that change is has yet to be determined.”
He also said what the governing bodies should have been saying all along.
“I think all the people that hear about change think, ‘Oh, no, it’s over, they’re going to put a governor on and everybody’s going to have all the same distance. Nobody has any interest in doing that to either the game or the people that make the game exciting.”
Translation: we can reign in the silliness and not harm the average golfer.
How hard was that? Not so for Whan. Good start.
So, we've known distance is a problem for a long time, and done nothing about it? Never mind, why do I bother?
Good on Geoff for including this bit, though I'm sure which way it cuts:
On the Five Family front, Whan has been unafraid to confront Augusta National at the risk of offending golf’s top importer and olive oil producer. He was not pleased when Fred Ridley sprung a women’s amateur event on the same weekend as the LPGA’s first major. (And with a network telecast while the ANA Inspiration remains on cable). Whan also openly floated a dream of seeing a women’s major at Augusta National. And you know how the Lords Of O-gusta love to be told what to do.Whan’s audacious tendencies will come in handy if he battles for the USGA’s causes. But his stubbornness in not moving the ANA Inspiration to avoid getting overshadowed by the Masters ultimately hurts the women’s first major of the year. And a focus on championships will be vital to the job.
You'd have to consider this a failure on the part of Mike, no? Mind you, he didn't have too many viable options, but the Lords of Augusta made clear that the LPGA is not one of the five families. He may have been unafraid to confront them, but he also proved himself unable to influence them and all he really did was take what they were serving.... And, by the way, any "hurt" to the ladies' first major should be credited to those L of A's....
Before we leave Geoff, let me leave you with this bit in which he sounds shockingly like that late, lamented brand lady Bivens:
“What I’m most proud of in my career is that I’ve built brands; I’ve built them globally, and I’ve left them significantly larger than when I joined them,” Whan once said after taking the LPGA job.
To me, this is the tragedy of the USGA, that they think of themselves as a brand. They're supposed to be the adults in the room, but they just want to be loved...
“The last thing I’m going to do is become the head of the USGA who is going to try to stick a company’s $100 million in R&D [Research and Development] in some box and say no more innovation,” he said. “I really believe that innovation, the investment that the manufacturers make in the game of golf, is one of the things that makes our sport better than so many other sports. So we don’t do this without the voice and the help of the manufacturers in the process. That won’t be easy. But that’s one of the things that makes me excited about it. I do like the people we’re talking about doing this with. I’ve lived their life. I know what it’s like to have a bunch of money in inventory and R&D and trying to push the envelope. We’re not going to take the fun out of the game. We’re not going to take the innovation out of the game. We’re just going to make sure that the game is just as fun and innovative in 100 years as it is today. And finding that balance, I’ll be the first to admit, won’t be easy. But I’m excited about a group that is not backing away from something just because it’s not easy.”
Mike tells us change is coming... But he's already sacrificing straw men, so I think the USGA has shown us their priorities, and the folks at TaylorMade would seem to have little to fear.
One last bit:
“I want the golf world to perceive the USGA as a partner,” he said. “In growing and protecting this game. And making it more inviting. I know sometimes we gotta make tough decisions. But I don’t just want to be the cop of the game. I want to be the person who is in this with you.”
So, regulatory capture it is. Consensus is great, but when you refuse to be the cop, your consensus is what the other guy wants...
A Day At Riviera - I watched the entire Golf Channel window and, while fun, it wasn't exactly the day I was anticipating:
BROOKS KOEPKA: It's as fast and firm as I've ever seen this place. It will be interesting to see what happens. I think scores will be a little bit higher just because you see a couple balls on the greens releasing a little bit more than they have in maybe previous years. I'll tell you what, the greens are flying, so it will be interesting to see, especially if the wind picks up, what they'll do with it; if they slow the greens down a little bit, maybe not cut them, just roll them. It will be interesting to see how the week plays out.
I thought balls would be caroming all over the joint, which they weren't...except, yanno, for Bryson.
Here's a couple of bits from the Golf.com tripartite summary:
Sam Burns leads
Sam Burns, a 24-year-old who first earned his Tour card back in 2019, birdied his final three holes on Thursday en route to a sizzling 7-under 64 — good enough to lead the field by two
shots. His closest competitors are Matthew Fitzpatrick and Max Homa, who both shot 5-under 66.
Burns is still seeking his maiden victory on the PGA Tour, but won on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2018. His best Tour finish to date was a T3 at the 2018 Sanderson Farms Championship.
Jordan Spieth is still hot
It’s been two weeks since Jordan Spieth first thrilled his legion of fans with his resurgent play, and it appears he’s picking up right where he left off at Riviera.
Spieth has finished T4 and T3 in his last two starts, respectively, and is right back in the mix this week after signing for an opening round of 3-under 68 — just four shots shy of Burns’ lead.
As the accompanying photo hints at, lets of show ponies well within reach on a very compressed leaderboard.
So, what do we need to discuss? As always at this venue, that tenth hole fascinates, and Shack has flooded the zone, first setting the table with this preview post:
Pains Me: There Is No Good Reason To Lay-Up At Riviera's 10th
This has been coming at us for several years now, but there is simply no one laying up of this tee any longer.
Here's the thoughts of one of our young stars:
COLLIN MORIKAWA: Most likely I'll be hitting driver every single day or whatever gets me to that front edge, kind of just rolls over. I keep looking at the wedge shot. I keep saying yes, we can hit a 70-yard wedge shot, we can hit a 100-yard wedge shot, but when you look at the green and how narrow and shallow it is, it just doesn't make sense in my head. Like especially how firm the greens are, that first bounce is going to bounce so far, so you're working with two yards, two, three yards. When you're on, you're going to hit that shot, but if you're off a little bit and there's wind or it's cold or whatever, that can cost you being in the short bunker, that can cost you being over. You hit driver, hit it down there, most likely you'll hopefully have a chip shot. If you don't have it at the pin, you'll have a chip shot at the middle of the green, two-putt, you know. If I'm even par, I'm not going to be sad, I'm not going to be happy, I'm going to be just okay with even par because I don't think I'm really losing any shots to the field if I'm even par through four rounds on that hole.
Q. So it's basically saying the wedge shot's no guarantee so there's no real advantage?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: Absolutely.
An elite player is uncomfortable that he can hit a green and hold it from 70 yards.... That seems an issue.
He's got a wealth of data at that link, but to me this is the only one you need:
79.52% of the field went for the green and were a combined 63-under par. The remaining 20.48% of the field choose to layup were a combined 18-over par. This marked the highest Going for the Green percentage on this hole in the ShotLink era.
Not sure I saw a single lay-up yesterday, nor do I expect to see any this weekend.
This was Geoff's summary:
I fought the good fight. I wanted so badly to believe laying up could still matter. I even argued with a few players who were good sports in at least listening to my case.
They were right. These athletes today are just too much for Riviera’s 10th. The yoga, the Pilates, the organic foods, the fiber, it’s too much for Riviera’s tenth at 315 yards. With some Santa Ana winds likely making it downwind, the one condition Jack Nicklaus would consider driving the green in, driving irons may be enough to get there Thursday.
The tenth at Riviera is just a long par-3. Still a compelling and weird one, but with its bizarre design evolution and the extra squats by today’s players, it is not the best short par-4 on the PGA Tour. That’s because it’s a par-3.
Now, don’t let me dampen your Genesis Invitational plans because we have a stellar week on hand despite the lack of fans. Perfect weather, elite field, great course and expanded television coverage. All swell as long as your electricity is working.
Well, that's just wrong. Why am I sure it's wrong?
Yes, but if it's a Par-3, it's one on which the players average 4.1 strokes.... Par is an existential concept, in many ways irrelevant, but the players step to this tee trying to find a way to make a four and move on, a task that's sufficiently difficult.
Geoff has a follow-up post after Thursday's play, in which the hole played slightly easier (it was perfect weather, after all):
Yeah, so the idea was to hit a 3-wood over the left bunker into those trees. I mean, for real. You can get stymied and not have a shot and if that's the case you just have to kind of punch it forward. And then--but that angle's the best angle to be chipping into the green from. It was blowing pretty hard so I knew I needed to kind of hook it in order to get it over that bunker. So I went a little left of where I wanted, ended up in one of those spots that was not ideal because the palm tree happened to be right in the line I wanted to go. Ended up choosing to go to the left side of it and actually kind of almost cut it out of the rough from about 60yards. That shot was the shot of the day for me. That could have easily been a 5 and it turned out to be a 3.
That's from Jordan Spieth, confirming that they're aiming for that grove of trees.
It's a great golf course, though this hole seems to have been rendered silly by the combination of distance gains and (green) shrinkage, exacerbated my modern set-up conditions. It's still pretty interesting to watch as a potential train wreck, it's just hard to make the case that it's a test of golfing skill at this juncture.
Did you catch Mr. Genesis? Submitted for your approval, Mr. Tae Hoon Kim:
Sponsor invite Tae Hoon Kim has spectacularly won his third Genesis vehicle in just over four months thanks to a silky hole-in-one in the opening round of The Genesis Invitational at RivieraCountry Club.
Kim made an ace on the par-3 16th hole at Riviera from 168 yards with a 7-iron which earned him a 2021 Genesis G80 during a rollercoaster 2-under 69 that left him in a tie for 19th place.
The 35-year-old Korean is in the field courtesy of winning the 2020 Genesis Championship on the Korean Tour last October – a result that also yielded a Genesis GV80 to go with the invitation to make his PGA TOUR debut.
The four-time Korean Tour winner also picked up a Genesis GV70 for leading the order of merit on the Korean Tour in 2020, making it three vehicles added to his garage in just over four months.
“I gave the first two cars to my parents but I’m not sure yet what I’ll do with this latest one,” Kim said through a translator after the round.
Quite a thrill for the not-so-young man....
Golf Digest has five takeaways from the day's golf, including the shockingly poor play of these two studs:
Riviera bullies Bryson DeChambeau, Justin Thomas, among othersAs we saw at Winged Foot, Bryson DeChambeau’s new wail-away-with-the-driver strategy can yield incredible results. As we saw at Augusta National, it can also yield frustrating ones.On Thursday at Riviera, another iconic venue on the PGA Tour schedule, it resulted in one of the latter for DeChambeau. As he came to find out, your misses can’t be so large at a course like Riv, which requires critical thinking and precision off the tee and around the greens. Those two areas of his game were seriously lacking in his opening round (94th in SG/off-the-tee; 113th in SG/around-the-green), and it led to a four-over 75. To his credit, DeChambeau birdied two of his final three holes, giving him an outside chance of making the weekend with a much-improved round on Friday. He’ll likely need something in the five- to six-under range, which is certainly possible provided he has one of his “keep the lights on for me, I’m going to fix this tonight” range sessions Thursday night.
As for Justin Thomas, he’s in need of a miracle to reach the weekend. The World No. 3 finished with a six-over 77, which has him near the very bottom of the leader board. Like DeChambeau, he also birdied two of his last three, but sandwiched between was a double bogey at the par-5 17th, one of his three doubles of the round. He just didn’t have it on Thursday, and you will get exposed at Riviera if that’s the case. DeChambeau and Thomas aren’t alone in fighting for the weekend, too. Rory McIlroy (two-over 73) and Collin Morikawa (73), another pair of top-10 players, have work to do as well.
Three doubles? Those two guys looked horribly out-of-sorts, though we've long discussed Rory's struggles in #firmandfast conditions.
We probably shouldn't get our hopes up here:
Let’s will a Brooks vs. DJ weekend into existenceWe could potentially lose Rory, JT and Bryson for the Saturday and Sunday, but it would all be OK if we get a mano-a-mano showdown between Brooks Koepka and Dustin Johnson.There is nothing more foolish than attempting to predict golf tournaments after one round (couldhave just stopped that sentence after “attempting to predict golf tournaments”), but with Koepka and Johnson both off to a solid, three-under 68 starts, why not dream? Ever since Koepka’s comments on Saturday night at the PGA Championship last August, DJ has been Koepka’s daddy, but Koepka finally got some swagger back with his Waste Management Phoenix Open victory. You know DJ’s Masters win and entire late summer/early fall reign of terror just ate away at Koepka, whose own struggles during that span continued to fuel the fire within (just ask his poor golf clubs). He’d love nothing more than to take back that alpha crown from DJ this weekend. OK, it’s only Thursday. Deep breaths. Deep breaths (but yeah, it’s happening).
Or we could hold that thought until Augusta...
A Litigation Update - With the unfortunate settlement of Singh v. PGA Tour, this immediately becomes my favorite golf lawsuit. Rex Hoggard has a brief, highly-speculative update of Haney v. PGA Tour:
Silence. There is a predictable ebb and flow to legal action when it comes to the Tour, and if this week’s filings were any indication, Hank Haney might be on the winning end of the recent silence.
Haney sued the Tour in 2019 after he was fired by Sirius XM Radio for racist comments regarding the LPGA. After being initially suspended by Sirius XM Radio, Haney was fired because, according to his lawsuit, the Tour had “long attempted to disrupt and interfere in Haney’s business” following the release of his book, “The Big Miss,” in 2012 that chronicled his years as Tiger Woods’ swing coach.
On Wednesday, the U.S. District Court of the Florida Southern District ruled that the docket for Haney’s case was “restricted/sealed until further notice” as the two sides continue mediation and discovery.
The Tour’s policy is to not comment on ongoing litigation, but if previous lawsuits are any indication (see Singh, Vijay) sealing the file is not a good sign for the circuit.
Were Hank's comments racist? Shouldn't there be scare quotes or the word "allegedly" in there, because that's a matter of opinion, no?
The story to me is somewhere in the zip code of bewildering or comical. Just on the surface, the PGA Tour stands accused of interfering in Haney's business arrangements with SiriusXM over comments made about a different golf tour entirely... Of course there's the Tiger book linkage, and the allegation that they've long been out for Hank's hide for dissing their meal ticket. Quite the unsavory mess, for sure.
Of course, this comes at quite the critical juncture. So, here's the exchange that results in Hank being deemed a non-person:
Steve Johnson: "Hank, the 74th U.S. Women's Open...yeah."Hank Haney: "I'm going to predict a Korean."Johnson: "Okay." (laughter)Haney: "Okay."Johnson: "Pretty safe bet." (Laughter)Haney: "That's going to be my prediction...I couldn't name you, like, six players on the LPGA Tour."Johnson: "Yeah."Haney: "Maybe I could. Well...I'd go with Lee if I didn't have to name a first name, I'd get a bunch of them right...Yeah, I don't know."Johnson: "You've got six Lee's."Haney: "Honestly, Michelle Wie's hurt...I don't know anybody...where are they playing, anyway?"
I guess it's now a crime to not be a fan of women's golf... I'm certainly not saying that Hank is a candidate for the diplomatic corp., but he might just be pointing out an issue that folks might want to hear.
That bit about there being six Lee's in the fields is very real, and the event in question was won, in quite the cosmic convergence, by the artist known as Jeongeun Lee6. ya got that? They have so many girls with the same name, that they've taken to giving them numbers.... kinda proving Hank's point, no?
The alternative to taking Hank's concern seriously is to just attribute it to systemic racism and cancel Hank, though that of course leaves the problem intact.
As amusing as I find this bit of willful blindness, it comes at an even more perilous time for women's sports. The issue of the day is even more existential, to wit, when we speak of women's sports, how are we going to define a woman? I don't consider myself an arbiter of such things, and my inner libertarian guides me to allow folks to make their own path through life.
However, there is this knotty little issue of whether biological men should be allowed to participate as women in sports, and the charges of racism and misogyny are flying. But, and this seems rather important, if your worship of the gods of diversity and inclusion require you to include said biological males in women's sports, you will be such actions kill women's sports. So, remind me again, which side actually cares about women and women's sports?
Weekend Reading - I'm going to leave you with a few items to read (or not) at your leisure.
First, we've been focused on Jordan Spieth's fall from grace, but before there was Jordan there was....
What happened to Yani Tseng? It's complicated, but she's back.
It depends what you mean by "back"... How it went bad is complicated, so much so that I'll not even attempt it, but did you know there was Yani-mania?
Add in the element of being a country’s first No. 1, as was the case for Tseng, and the pressure boils as hot as a pot at her favorite shabu-shabu restaurant in downtown Taipei.
Tseng won 12 events worldwide in 2011, and that included an extraordinary victory at the LPGA’s first-ever event in Taiwan, where more people watched her in the first round than the galleries Tiger Woods brought in at the 1999 Johnnie Walker Classic.
At a downtown press conference in Taipei, the same security guards who looked after Lady Gaga whisked Tseng from one stop to the next. Fans climbed into trees to get a glimpse of the nation’s newest icon. LPGA player Sophie Gustafson climbed to the roof of the clubhouse to take a picture of Yani-mania. She’d never seen anything like it.
When a victorious Tseng walked off the 18th green on Sunday and into the arms of her 92-year-old grandmother, Cheng-chu Yang, 20,000-plus fans went nuts.
She was so very good.... up until the moment she wasn't. Of course, she jinxed herself by manhandling the trophy at the Dinah, so maybe that's the lesson for us all.
End It, Don't Mend It - Will Knights has a well-intentioned treatise on how to fix the FedEx Cup, though all he actually accomplishes is to render it marginally less stupid:
Robhatic
Can we fix the FedEx Cup with math?
The FedEx Cup is simply incoherent, and conforming more closely to actual strength-of-field metrics does little to address that metaphysical failing. Just a reminder, the Tour Championship will start with the FedEx Cup leader at -10.... Yes, that's how it STARTS. Let me know when you have a fix for that...
I don't think there's much new in this, but it's a pretty good deep dive on the lonely lives of rules officials:
The curious life of a PGA Tour rules official
As a trio of recognizable rules officials head to retirement, we talked to them about what they've seen—and heard—in their lengthy careers.
I'll throw you a wee tease:
“It’s a bit like you’re an emergency doctor. You’re just sitting there with a radio, you have no idea what’s going to be called next. And when that radio does go off, there’s a little bit of anxiety. You think, ‘Oh my god, is this going to be the one I don’t know? Is this going to be the one that finishes my career?” said Paramour, who thought about playing professionally before caddying for a year on the European Tour and then becoming a rules official. “It can be a terrifying thing. Somebody said it’s hours and hours of boredom interspersed with complete panic.”Also like a doctor, a good rules official needs a good bedside manner. The decisions being handed down throughout a tournament, even one made early in the week, can often be worth thousands, if not millions, of dollars.
Lastly, this on Willie Mack, III:
For Willie Mack III to be seen, his story needs to be heard
Worth your time, though my favorite part was this from Torrey:
2002: Meeting cardboard cutout Tiger Woods
2021: Competing at the tournament he's won seven times
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) January 28, 2021
Rumor has it that the carboard cut-out told him, "It is what it is."
Have a great weekend and we'll gather here Monday morning.
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