These are the days Max Homa used to dread. The combination of a saturated golf course, juicy rough, swirling winds and layer-up temperatures expose any player not in full command of hisswing and his emotions. And while it might feel like another lifetime, it wasn’t so long ago that Homa had little control of either.His rebirth as a golfer started well before Sunday’s final round of the Wells Fargo Championship—he’d already won three times—but never has it been more evident than during every single second of his two-under 68 on Mother’s Day, good for a two-shot victory and his second title of the season.The player he is today, one challenging for a spot on U.S. national teams, is hardly recognizable from the man who missed 15 of 17 cuts in 2016-17 and lost his card. He is, however, wholly unchanged as a person, never taking himself too seriously. Exhibit 1A: In his interview with CBS’ Amanda Renner on the 18th green, he was asked the significance on his victory, given the recent announcement that his wife, Lacey, will give birth to the couple’s first child in November.He responded with a Golf Twitter joke: “Perspective was running rampant today.”
Would now be a good time to tell him that baby formula is the latest supply chain crisis?
Amusingly, the Golf.com game story led with this from the Tour's broadcast partner:
This has been a fun day of golf.”
Those were Jim Nantz’s choice words as Keegan Bradley reached the 18th tee Sunday evening at TPC Potomac. For Bradley, it was much more of a grind, starting the day with a two-shot lead and reaching that 72nd hole with a one-shot deficit.
I'm not sure that'll be the reaction at The Global Home. For those disparaging the Tour's product, I would think the Wells Fargo was a target-rich environment. Yeah, the weather was a big part of it, but contrast this to the show they put on at Riviera at an equally critical time in the battle for hearts and minds.
The problem for Jay is that we've now completely exhausted our interest in the event. And, this being our wrap post, we have a week featuring golf's bad boys returning to form.
Thunder Bear, back From Purgatory: Heads will be exploding:
After a pair of late bogeys on the 14th and 15th holes it seemed as if Thorbjorn Olesen’s chances
at the Betfred British Masters were shot.Then for the second consecutive day the Dane eagled the 17th and birdied the 18th holes at The Belfry in England to win his sixth DP World Tour title and first since the 2018 Italian Open.Olesen began the day with a three-shot lead and won by just one over Sebastian Soderberg, who shot a 4-under 68 to finish solo second at 9 under. Connor Syme, Richie Ramsay and Justin Walters finished T-3 at 8 under.
This doesn't quite capture his crimes against humanity, as it was quite the ugly incident:
Over his seven previous starts this year Olesen made the cut five times but earned just one top-20 finish. The win is his first since being suspended after he was charged with sexual assault, being drunk on an aircraft and assault, but the 32-year-old was cleared of all charges last December.
I'm not saying it rose to the level of criminality, but he revealed himself to be quite the ugly drunk. The funniest part of the incident was that the guy who played peacemaker, one Ian James Poulter.
Another Bad Boy Makes Good - I had almost forgotten about this guy:
Bio Kim, whose three-year ban for making an obscene gesture towards fans was later reduced to one year, won the GS Caltex Maekyung Open on Sunday in Korea.In October of 2019, Kim directed an obscene gesture towards the gallery during the final round of a Korean Tour event. The incident occurred on the 16th tee box, when a fan took a picture of Kim as he teed off. He turned to the fans and flipped them off, then slammed his club into the ground. After going on to win the event, Kim apologized.On Sunday, Kim, 31, started the day with a four-shot lead and despite a 1-over 72 in the final round, he won by two shots over Mingyu Cho, a victory aided in large part by a two-stroke penalty incurred by Cho on the ninth hole.
No, that's not the picture accompanying the linked article, that's scene of the crime stuff. But if all these bad guys are having their moment in the sun, why not Phil?
Saudi Stuff - You know it wasn't a good week when the story garnering the most pixel is Sergio counting down his departure date, admittedly elating much of the Commentariat. But it certainly doesn't help Jay that the Tour had to issue a quick mea culpa for an amateurish bit of rules making. The Bambergerless Tour Confidential took their shot at this:
Perhaps most notably was the revelation from Sergio Garcia following a ruling at the Wells Fargo Championship. There, Garcia said, “I can’t wait to leave this Tour,” and later, various outlets reported that Garcia was, in fact, looking to play in the first event. How much, if at all, do these developments alter your view of the fledgling tour’s prospects?Sean Zak: Absolutely zero change in my opinion. Players like Westwood, Bland and even Garcia are exactly who we’ve been assuming will take part in these events. The youngest and bestplayers have all committed to the PGA Tour. Older players outside the top 10 in the world seem to be considering LIV Golf. So this checks out completely.Josh Sens: Sean’s right about all of that. I also don’t think there was ever much doubt that the LIV was here for the long haul, given the financial muscle behind it. So the ‘prospects’ question is really two pronged. There’s longevity. And then there’s allure. Yes. It’s got the former. What remains to be seen is how interesting it will be for fans. Big purses alone do not guarantee interesting golf.
I've heard many versions of this point, which seems quite silly. Obviously the Wahabis have the deepest of pockets and a non-monetary objective, making them a dangerous adversary for Kubla Jay. That acknowledged, nobody likes to be publicly humiliated, so they're quickly headed for that moment when the shots get real, as per their stupid slogan. If they put on a $20 million purse event and Robert Garrigus takes the $5 million top prize, maybe that attracts more talent, but perhaps it also causes the Saudis to pull back.
Alan Bastable: Right, an archetype for LIV “A-listers” is now coming to the fore: past-their-primers who (1) are no longer regularly competitive in the majors, (2) can’t cash in on PIP money or the Tour’s other bonus structures and (3) as Westwood demonstrated last week, don’t appear fazed by the weighty moral and ethical questions before them. Question is, as these guys start to cash monster checks, how many other notables — especially those struggling to find their games — will continue to be content watching from the sidelines as Sergio and Co. fill up their Brink’s trucks. This new tour will have as much longevity as it wants, for one simple reason: it has endless Saudi capital.Josh Berhow: I don’t think any of these names being interested in that tour is surprising and it’s a group of players — late in their career, already made some good money, European, etc. — we thought might be joining this tour in the first place. So my view hasn’t changed, but it was pretty entertaining to see Sergio get upset and act childish on his way out.
I used to find Sergio's petulance amusing, but that wore me down quickly after the woleds most famous loogy was deposited into a cup.
For the record, I elided the beginning of that question just to surprise you with another Shark bite below.
2. How much should the Tour be concerned that other players could threaten to leave should they disapprove of Tour policy/governance? Remember, we heard Charley Hoffman make a similar remark in February at the Waste Management Open.
If I understand the bizarre question, they're equating rules enforcement with Tour governance, which are two very different things.
Zak: The PGA Tour has a responsibility to host tournaments played under the Rules of Golf. If that is a reason a player actually leaves, the Tour should send them on their way. In case it wasn’t clear with Hoffman, the Rules of Golf will never be the reason a player leaves the PGA Tour.Sens: The occasional rules snafu is a non-issue. Name a sport that doesn’t have the occasional rules hiccup. They all do. The concern, I would think, isn’t guys leaving over governance. It’s guys being part of an antitrust suit if the Tour tries to block them signing on to a rival. Every legal expert I’ve spoken with about this says there would be a legitimate case to be made.Bastable: Let us not forget that LIV’s rules department will be run by the very rules sharpie who used to lord over PGA Tour events: Slugger White! So if Sergio is looking for some fresh officiating blood, he best find another tour. But, no, the PGA Tour isn’t out of the woods yet in terms of managing discontent players. Its membership will continue to force the Tour to evolve and make paydays fatter. Hopefully that also means revising the endless slog of the Tour schedule. The team/F1-inspired format in play on LIV, which is exactly what the PGL has been pushing for years, makes sense on a lot of levels — most especially for fans.
Thank you, for that Alan. I've a better one below as well.
Berhow: I don’t think a few bad apples should shape what the PGA Tour is doing. It’s still the league 99% of the world’s best professional golfers want to play in, and you can’t make everyone happy. When these players complain when they are on the course it says more about them than it does the PGA Tour.
I made a point very similar to this last week:
do these guys think ... checks notes ... the Saudis are going to be pushovers and more accommodating of their every shit fit compared to their player-run organization? https://t.co/PrKVybqehm
— Brendan Porath (@BrendanPorath) May 5, 2022
Exactly. Someone should tell PReed that the penalty for improperly taking relief for an embedded ball is, checking notes, beheading. He should bear that in find as he entertains offers...
Like your humble blogger, Eamon Lynch sees this as win-win:
This isn't peak Eamon, if only because the low degree of difficulty prevents the posting of a strong score. But, some good shots at deserving targets:
Somewhere deep in the bowels of the budget for LIV Golf, well below the lucrative prize fundsand exorbitant gratuities to overlook the gratuitous, closer to the paltry media buys to induce velvety coverage, there should be a line item for diaper-changing facilities to be used by the increasingly infirm or dependably infantile who will occupy its locker rooms.Take Sergio Garcia (“please,” quoth Henny Youngman). Garcia is not entirely a one-dimensional dipstick. He can on occasion be amiable and funny, but even at 42 he is proof that age and maturity are mutually exclusive. In Thursday’s first round of the Wells Fargo Championship, he demonstrated anew his tendency to process every inconvenience as an injustice.
There's no whining in Wahhabism, but it'll be fun watching that realization hit sergio.
Here's there take on the latest revelations from their former colleague Alan Shipnuck:
3. Another player connected to the Saudi-backed tour, Phil Mickelson, was also in the news, albeit for a different reason. In an excerpt from an upcoming book, published on firepitcollective.com, Mickelson, according to source, accumulated more than $40 million in gambling debt from 2010 to 2014, or roughly the equivalent of his estimated annual income during that period. What’s your takeaway from the latest Phil news?Zak: That there was merit to anyone who called it a gambling addiction. You don’t build that amount of debt up without being addicted to it.Sens: If you’ve paid even loose attention to news around Mickelson over the years, you can only be shocked by this in the Casablanca sense. The reported numbers? Not hard to imagine either, given the kind of earnings Mickelson has pulled in and the sort of allegations that have swirled around him. Anyone who has ever been around gambling and gamblers knows how quickly it can get out of hand.Bastable: I’m not sure we can just laugh off 40 mil as “Phil being Phil.” That’s a huge sum, and another reminder that he was in deep. Remember, this a guy who the SEC alleged acted on a stock tip to pay off a seven-figure debt to notorious gambler Billy Walters. Pretty dark stuff. You have to wonder what, if any, effect losing that kind of dough had on his play. Distracting? Hard to say. He did win five times from 2010-14, including a pair of majors.Berhow: It’s a staggering number. Just yet another unsavory question he’ll have to face when he returns and meets with the media. I’m not sure if he’ll actually answer it, but wow is there a lot going on in Phil Mickelson’s world right now.
A couple of reactions. I like a good Casablanca reference as much as the next guy, but I don't think it actually first in this case. $40 million over a mere four years is startling, an order of magnitude above numbers we've heard previously. On the gambling, I'm still waiting for the fact that Phil made a habit of not paying his gambling debt to connect with folks, as I'm aware of three significant incidents thereof. That fact really undermines the image of Phil as a playah, unable or unwilling to pay up when the dice didn't go his way.
I also think that Alan's revelations about Bones are a force multiplier here, and I'm surprised none of the writers connected these dots. Bones fired Phil because he wasn't getting paid, and Phil was willing to let his partner of two decades bolt over that and, maybe the most telling bit of all, sucked his baby brother into the gig. Do we think Tim knew why Bones left?
As for the Brits?
4. The Premier Golf League, meanwhile, sent a letter to PGA Tour players asking that they “message your player representatives on the PAC and the Policy Board and tweet/retweet: ‘As a member of the tour, I instruct you to obtain and publish an independent valuation of the PGL Proposals #playerpower #transparency.’ If seventy or more of you do this, it will happen.” Can it? Will it? What’s the future of the PGL?Zak: I haven’t seen a Tour player send those tweets yet! So no, it probably won’t happen. The Premier Golf League needs this, though, so I don’t see them giving up. I see them talking to as many influential players as possible. They don’t have the various stigmas facing LIV Golf, and there’s clearly enough interest in changing something about how elite golfers get paid. I think their days of playing a passive role — letting LIV take their format and run with it — might come to an end soon.Sens: I try to steer clear of Twitter as much as possible. Life’s too short, but if Sean says he hasn’t seen it, I believe it. Seriously, though, like the Saudi-backed Tour, the Premier Golf League isn’t going anywhere. At this point, it costs relatively little to keep agitating for change. Whether they can put together a circuit that gets fans excited is another matter. The idea of elite golfers getting paid more is not especially interesting to most of us. There has to be more to it than that.Bastable: Agitating for change may cost relatively little but it does cost something, and, as I understand it, the PGL’s financial backers are getting antsy, thus last week’s letter. PGL brass is deeply frustrated that the Tour won’t give its proposal the attention they believe it deserves. As I mentioned above, there’s actually a lot to like about the team model — in particular in terms of drumming up fan interest — but the Tour seems unwilling to capitulate, and PGL can’t keep lobbying forever.Berhow: In the public eye, one of the biggest things working against the PGL is that most people think it’s the same thing as the LIV Golf league. I can hardly keep all of this straight, but no, I can’t see this league working.
If Tour reps have been contacted, I don't actually think it would be on Twitter, but otherwise the PGL has no doubt suffered from oxygen deprivation. Jay has been very fortunate to have the Saudis funding his existential threat, but I don't imagine he's sleeping on this potential threat either.
Old World journo John Huggan takes on a point of weakness for the stablished world order:
Keith Pelley is trying to keep members from competing in the Saudi-backed series, but he can't talk quite as tough as his PGA Tour counterpart Jay Monahan
Yeah, they're in a world of hurt. When they hit the wall during the pandemic, Pelley had quite the binary choice of bailout sources, eventually taking Jay's money over that of the Saudis. I find myself wondering if that was the right call for him, as being Jay's b***h will be no fun.
Here's the gist of their current mess:
As things stand, corporate sponsors like BMW and Emirates Airlines put money into the tour. Let’s say 10 of them put in $10 million each. And let’s say DP World puts up another $100 million. It is then not difficult to imagine their collective reaction when there is a competing event on European soil against one of their own.If the quality of the field in that competing event is better than in the DP World tournament, the cry from those sponsors will be that they are not getting value for money. They thought they had rights to the players. So, going forward, that original $10 million investment might be $2 million if the investment continues at all. So the tour’s $200 million will soon be a memory. Which will have consequences for the players. Prize money would certainly go down.
It's a shell of it's former status. The fact is, there's precious little reason for top talent to maintain Euro Tour membership except for the Ryder Cup, though that doesn't seem to be enough to keep them on the farm. Oh, Henrik relented and has his captaincy, but the Poulters and Westwoods of the world seem more focused, as Jay put it, on leverage than legacy.
As for that devil they know?
Still, for all that such a scenario is a real possibility, there also remains in some quarters an air of mistrust over the now three-year-old strategic alliance that exists between the PGA Tour and DP World Tour.“I worry about the PGA Tour’s long-term agenda,” says one player. “They have no need to help us really. Or do they? This is just my opinion. There is going to be a change in the landscape, but what exactly is that going to be? The PGA Tour will inevitably cherry-pick the best events on the European Tour. Ultimately, the top-100 players on the world rankings will play on the biggest tour and be able to play in all the best events everywhere in the world. But most of those will be in America.”
I'm sure Jay has your best interests at heart....Here's Huggan's take on the decision:
Add all of the above together and one can understand why, according to multiple sources, Monahan has yet to speak directly with anyone authorized to represent the Saudi proposals. That reluctance is, of course, a byproduct of the PGA Tour’s inherent strengths. It has money in abundance; it has most of the world’s top players. All of which is in compete contract to the status and strength of the DP World Tour. When, three years ago, the Raine Capital Group came close to an agreement with the European Tour on behalf of the then-Saudi-led Premier Golf League, Pelley had no alternative but to listen and seriously consider what was on the table.In essence, that was a fork in the road for the Old World circuit. Raine came with a massive proposal, one that would have re-structured the tour and aimed to re-invent professional golf. Armed with hundreds of millions of dollars, they wanted Europe to take on America.There were reservations about that aspect of the deal, however. Direct competition with the PGA Tour would have meant “world war” in the words of one insider. But European Tour officials were duty-bound to at least consider it, which they did, looking at it “up and down and inside out.” But they were also transparent. The PGA Tour was told what had been offered and asked to come back with a proposal that could align the two existing tours.
Perhaps, but at least in a world war you would have been relevant. As things now stand, their events are irrelevant as far as money and prestige are concerned, and their left with threatening their stalwarts with lost Ryder Cup captaincies.
But not only are Lee and Ian surprisingly willing to forego their Ryder Cup honorariums, but using the Ryder Cup to maintain their long-term viability comes with it's own risks, since their Lord and Master, Jay Monahan, himself has no financial interest in the Ryder Cup. Combined with a looming talent deficit for the Euros, the one event golf fans love the most could be viewed as endangered.
I'll have to leave you here due to time constraints, but I'll be watching for waiver news and will blog as that story develops. Have a great week.
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