Putter Boys

This game that we love is actually two completely separate endeavors, the first being golf and the second being putting.  I've always considered myself a decent putter, though far too inconsistent and streaky.  And while those that actually watch me putt have on occasion expressed concerns, who are you gonna believe, me or your lyin' eyes?

So I was intrigued when the Willow Ridge golf shop announced an opportunity to spend an hour with Dr. Robert Neal, who is the founder (along with Karen Harrison) of Golf BioDynamics (golfbiodynamics.com), 

Karen and Robb strapping me in.  Theresa was quite pleased that
the purple straps matched my shirt.

which provides biomechanical feedback on your golf swing or, in our case, putting stroke.  Rob and Karen have been doing this since 2000, and their base of operation is at Jim McLean's highly-regarded teaching facility at Doral (Ooops, excuse me, Trump Doral) in Miami.

The session begins with Rob and Karen strapping the victim subject into a full-body harness, and calibrating the computer to read body and putter movement.  The equipment is bulky, but a few practice putts is all that was needed to acclimate.  Perhaps the strangest part was the sensor attached to the shaft of the putter, but no worries with a silky smooth stroke such as mine.

With the client sufficiently anesthetized, the work begins.  Rob had me make ten putts to a cup some 10-12 feet away, measuring the slightest movements of your body.  The results are then shown on an oversized monitor and Rob identifies the salient issues to be addressed.  For me, his first concern was excess body movement, which was not a bolt from the blue for me.  Most of my issues in this game are the result of too many moving parts, and just that morning playing partner (and loyal Unplayable Lies reader) Phil Drogin had told me every part of my body was moving as I "calmly" made a 2-footer.  

Here's how Rob delicately phrased it in his report:

Improve the stability of your body movement throughout the stroke (i.e., no sway of the head and pelvis; no thrust forward and backward of the pelvis, reduce the amount of rotation of the pelvis).

Maybe it would be easier to simply list the body parts that weren't moving? 

To address this, Rob had me widen my stance and concentrate on being really stable over the ball, which is good advice for any of us.  Tish Certo, with whom I take lessons, was laughing at this point, as not a session goes by without her pushing me to to widen my stance on full shots, so this made complete sense to me.  As a humorous aside, a couple of days earlier there was a small outing at the club, and one of the players was putting on the practice green with his feet completely together, literally touching each other.  It looked incredibly awkward, and I could barely make a short stroke with that stance.  Funny how these things go, isn't it?

And, as the reader will no doubt guess, once I widened my stance I was rolling the ball beautifully and felt like I knew where it was going.  Whether that will still be there when I go out later today, who knows, as that's the crazy game we've gotten ourselves hooked on.

Next up, Rob focused me on the graph below, which as per the title is a top-down view of the putter path.

  

You'll notice that there's a consistent slant from top-right to bottom-left of these lines, which indicates that I was pulling the putter to the left.  Rob had indicated that my original aim was not the issue, it was the path of the putter that needed to be released more down the target line.  We spent a little time working on this, using some readily available putting aids that would prevent the putter from going to the left.

This diagnosis came as a surprise, and it will no doubt be a difficult fix.  Rob had some practical advice as to how to utilize the putter path aids, but we all tend to revert back to our bad habits out on the golf course.  But since everything affects everything else, I find myself wondering whether a wider and more stable base will make it easier to release the putter down the target line.  Or not...

Lastly, Rob found my backstroke to be too short, and urged me to lengthen it.  He placed a tee at the point he wanted my putter to reach for our short putts, and I didn't have much success there.  I've always been conscious of keep the back-swing short as a means of ensuring acceleration through contact, and old habits die hard.  Rob also encouraged me to use a metronome while practicing putting, so I suspect I'll work on lengthening the stroke in conjunction with that.

I was the last paying customer, but Rob and Karen were good enough to spend some time with Kent St. Charles, our young masher and my principal caddying client.  Kent had some issues I'll get into in a sec, but first let's have some fun with the data.  One of a plethora of graphs is of horizontal displacement, i.e., where on the club face the putter is making contact.  I've placed the corresponding graphs for Kent and myself below, can anyone identify which is the young professional's and which is the aged but still spunky amateur's?

 

Yup, it's all about consistency, and nothing like a scatter diagram to expose a pretender.  But a more stable stance and a corrected swing path should pinch those data points.  At least that's my theory and I'm sticking with it.

Kent, under the microscope with head pro John Reeves
in the background.

As good a player as Kent is, Rob identified two significant issues.  the first was really an alignment issue, as Kent was lining up approximately 3 degrees closed (to the left).  Kent uses a solid line on his ball, but notwithstanding that he has a bias to the left.  Rob suggested some good common sense ways of making sure the line is, in fact lined up, including looking at it from further back.  Once he gets the line on target he'll have no further issues, as he lines up the putter to the line without issue.

Secondly, Kent was actually adding loft to his putter through excessive lead wrist extension.  But that which he does is done with consistency, so if he can successfully make these subtle adjustments he should see quick results.  Tish and I were speculating that he probably adjusts his swing length for the added loft, so it would be logical if he blew a few putts long as he implements these suggestions.

That last point might be a short-term revenue opportunity for your humble blogger in our evening matches, but clearly I'll have to raise my game as well.  Or, in the alternative, we could simply make Kent play as a +3 instead of at scratch.

I found the process quite interesting, as Rob and Karen do quite the good job of explaining the process and results.  The feedback was focused and helpful, as like any good teachers they understand the limitations on our ability to absorb information.  But like any instructional process, the burden remains squarely on the player to implement the changes.  Damn that!

Huggan Kisses

John Huggan is the longtime golf writer for the Scotsman and a man with delightfully strong opinions.  John Strege, a colleague of Huggan's at Golf Digest, links to his Friday column and it's a cracker... covering just about everything of note in golf with the blessed exception of Dustin Johnson.  Shall we have a look?

The PGA Championship - Not a fan thereof, it turns out:

THE runt of the litter, fourth of four both chronologically and in the minds of just about

everyone in the game, the USPGA Championship can brag all it wants to about the statisticalstrength of its field, but there is no doubt that the PGA of America’s annual pride and joy is the least anticipated of golf’s premier events. Some of that has to do with the nonsensical date it occupies on the calendar. A mere three weeks after the Open Championship is no place for any major tournament. But, mostly, its place – just off the medal rostrum – is the result of a lack of any kind of distinct identity. 

The Masters has its permanent venue in Augusta National. The US Open is (although not this year) supposedly all about the rough and the narrowness of the fairways. The Open Championship is always played on a links. What does the USPGA have? Miserably humid weather and no easily discernible resonance.

Fair enough, but it of course used to have a distinct identity as a match-play event, but that couldn't survive in the age of television.  So yes, it's unquestionably the fourth of four, though as tired as I am by Glory's Last Chance™ I do think the fact that it's the last major for eight months has some salience.  But John is spot on about hot and humid weather, as the PGA has an inexplicable fondness for Southern venues (Atlanta Athletic Club, Kiawah, Southern Hills, Quail Hollow) that seems unwise given its August date unless, of course, seeing Tim Herron in a soaked golf shirt sends a tingle up your leg.

But in this excerpt I think he misses a fairly significant change:

So, while the other three majors are easily recognizable, what Uncle Sam’s nieces and nephews

like to (erroneously) call “the PGA,” is not much more than a jumped-up PGA Tour event. It looks pretty much the same. It sounds pretty much the same, bar the ever-dwindling band of foreign journalists in the media centre. And it asks pretty much the same questions that we see week after week after week on the world’s biggest, richest and, sadly, most homogenous circuit.

No, it's not a weekly Tour event, the PGA has morphed into what the U.S. Open was in the dreadful days of Tom Meeks.  The U.S. Open has actually shown great imagination in the Mike Davis era, both in the choice of venues and in the course set-ups.  They have and will continue to introduce new venues, think Torrey Pines, Chambers Bay and Erin Hills, not to mention going back to the future in bringing the Open to Merion.  But even more substantively, Davis has introduced a number of set-up innovations, such as graduated rough and driveable Par-4's, forcing the players to make risk-reward driven decisions.

The PGA of America, in contrast, seems to be doing little more than recycling traditional U.S. Open venues such as Oak Hill, Southern Hills and Baltusrol.  Their set-ups display no imagination, and the logo of the PGA Championship could easily be the silhouette of a golfer holding his wrist in pain after hacking out of 6" rough.

Now the PGA of America does talk about doing interesting things with its flagship event, but it's only talk, something at which Mr. Bishop excels. 

Tiger - Most of John's remarks were written before Tiger's desultory play and back injury, so we'll just skip over.  But there was this:

Woods, of course, could do the right thing and play a couple of European Tour events to warm up for what would be his eighth appearance in the biennial contest against the Europeans. And, if you believe that is even the remotest of possibilities, take a look outside your window. There may be a pig or two flying past.

Not.  Gonna.  Happen.  Evah.

Euro Ryder Cup Picks -  Forget the Langer boomlet, per this:

Equally outlandish is the notion that European captain Paul McGinley will “burn” one of his picks on the newly minted Senior Open champion, Bernhard Langer. That isn’t going to happen, especially if the current situation remains in place a month from now. Does anyone seriously imagine McGinley will leave out Ian Poulter, Graeme McDowell, Stephen Gallacher or even an out-of-form Lee Westwood in favour of a man who last played a Ryder Cup match in 2002? Me neither. As McIlroy diplomatically pointed out a few days ago, the estimable two-time Masters champion may be dominant on the geezers circuit but that is a far cry from what goes on amongst the under-50 set.

Well, Gallacher isn't the strongest way to make the case, but I do agree that it won't happen.  And of course Westwood showed signs of life last week.

U.S. Ryder Cup Picks -  Here's John on our Phil:

Then there is Phil Mickelson. Depending on the make-up of his nine automatic qualifiers come next Sunday evening, Watson will have a decision to make regarding last year’s Open champion. Should he show faith in a man who has played on every American Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup side since 1994? Or should he pay more attention to the sad lack of form displayed by the five-times major champion over the last few months? For what it is worth, it says here Watson will do the right thing and make sure “Lefty” is on the plane to Perthshire.

And that was written before Phil's Sunday 62, making it a mortal lock.

Valhalla -  After stating that it has no business holding a major of any kind (and parenthetically noting the PGA's ownership of the club), he does throw it this sort-of bone:

As for the final counting event for the US side, one thing Valhalla does have going for it is some (brief) history. Back in 2000, Woods and Bob May put on a memorable display down the stretch and into what became an epic play-off. It was one for the ages, with perhaps the only jarring note lingering questions over just how Woods’ wild drive (some things haven’t changed) off the 18th tee came to somehow reappear from the oblivion to which it appeared to be headed. Like the Loch Ness Monster, Bigfoot and Jim Furyk’s backswing, it remains a mystery to this day.

Does anyone else remember that as being particularly controversial?  

Ryder Cup Venues -  He takes his side to task in this last excerpt, though our guys are admittedly just as bad:

So, a bit like the Ryder Cup that manages to be the most watchable event in the game despite a string of execrable venues (the last time, for example, the matches were played on a top-notch course on this side of the Atlantic was in 1981 at Walton Heath – since then, unremitting mediocrity) there is hope for the USPGA. The field, as we will no doubt hear over and over again during the coming days, is statistically well endowed. Barring withdrawals, it will be the first time that the top 100 players on the world rankings will gather in the one place at the one time. How very, very exciting.

And the Nicklaus course at Gleneagles will give John little reason to reassess that record.

So what did everyone thing of John's piece?  You have to admit it, it's more snark per gallon than you typically get anywhere else except....well, Unplayable Lies. 

DJ, The Remix

The reviews are in and no one is coming out looking to clean from the Dustin Johnson story.

When last we visited this sordid mess, the Tout had taken the unusual step of denying that DJ was, in fact, on suspension at the time of his "voluntary leave of absence."  Unusual in the sense that the Tour has a policy of not commenting on disciplinary actions, and a denial meets any known definition of the word "comment".   

Gary Smits, who writes for Commissioner Ratched's hometown paper, was surprisingly able to get PGA Tour Executive Vice President Ty Votaw on the phone and received this clarification:

“We reserve the right to correct misinformation or reports that are inaccurate,” Votaw said. “That is what we did. The policy hasn’t changed.”

Got it Ty, you don't comment on these matters, errr....except when you do.  And you do presumably

understand how this logic thing works, right?  The denial of one rather trivial detail of a story is effectively a confirmation of all of the other details in the story.  

Before we move on, Votaw dug himself in further with this, which I won't pretend to understand:

“We differentiate because we think it’s appropriate,” Votaw said. “Substance-abuse is about personal conduct, We think it’s appropriate to treat substance abuse in that manner.”

OK, but which do you consider the more important and how does your treatment of each differ?  And get this from the same Smits article:

Votaw declined to say whether Johnson had indeed tested positive three times, as the golf.com story reported, or has been suspended in the past — only that he was not currently under suspension.

I'm completely baffled as to how, from the perspective of Fortress Ponte Vedra, that mealy-mouthed drivel is better than a simple no comment.  Here's how Shackelford reacted:

So say a media entity not of golf.com's stature reports a player suspension but the tour does not acknowledge the report perhaps because the entity in question is not widely seen, should we assume the report is accurate? Or say the PGA Tour does know of an inaccurate report, but simply finds the player not to their liking as an individual or as marketable?

The first point is no doubt valid, but not of great interest to me.  But as to the second point, does anyone think the Tour did DJ a favor here?  From where I sit, they confirmed the three drug test failures, use of cocaine and every other salient detail in the story.  And what, pray tell, did they gain?  

 Not surprisingly, Golf.com, which had broken the initial story, then responded to the Tour's denial with this addendum to their original story:

The difference may be seen as semantic. Faced with a suspension for a failed drug test, a Tour

player has the right, under published Tour guidelines, to appeal his penalty. The Tour was preparing for Johnson to lodge such an appeal. But Johnson waived that right and decided to take his self-described "leave of absence." 

The Tour’s one-sentence statement did not address Johnson’s drug test results or say whether Johnson's 11-week absence in 2012 was also a "voluntary leave of absence." In that period, when Johnson said he was not playing Tour events (including the Masters) because of bad back, he was seen hitting balls regularly in South Florida, where he lives. The Tour's policy of releasing no information on failed drug tests or resulting penalties essentially allows a player and his advisors to characterize an absence as they wish.

In general the Tour has been taking it on the chin in the press, in the Matthew Rudy piece we previously linked and on espn.com as well.  But this Mike Lupica rant, in which he thoughtfully adds to the Commish's available orifices has been the most widely linked:

No, the joke here, clearly, is the PGA Tour’s drug policy, and the way the sport’s high

commissioner, Tim Finchem, administers that policy without anything resembling the transparency about drugs you get in other major sports; and the way the people who run the sport are dealing with a story from Michael Bamberger and Mike Walker at Golf.com, that Johnson has effectively been suspended from the Tour for multiple positive tests for marijuana and cocaine, the most recent one being for cocaine.

In other words: I did it. The idea that it somehow matters in the whole grand scheme of things whether he walked away or got shoved is irrelevant, unless your concern is merely damage control. By the way? If Johnson has a drug problem, it is not the crime of the century. But it is the PGA Tour’s clumsy and obvious cover-up here that now becomes the problem for the people who run the sport.

OK, I'm in agreement on the merits, but I still don't see the damage-control merits of the Tour's denial.  The disgrace this go-around is the first two failed drug tests, which begat No. 3.  And I'm certainly in agreement with this bit:

But sometimes guys like Finchem forget that they’re supposed to be caretakers of a public trust. Finchem forgets that in this case, and something else much more basic about the sport he oversees: 

You either ran the red light or you didn’t. There is either strict liability for drug penalties, whether they are for performance-enhancing drugs or a drug like cocaine, or there isn’t. If there isn’t liability for somebody like Johnson after a series of positive tests, then what sort of deterrent is there for the next frat boy?

And here's his rousing climax:

You know why they look like they’re hiding something? Because they are. Not in the interests of protecting Johnson or his reputation, but because they think that the truth about how everybody arrived at this moment is really, really bad for business. You can only imagine the hand-wringing from Finchem back in the day when they found out Tiger Woods had been treated by Dr. Anthony Galea. 

These guys somehow think they can protect the Tour’s brand and image by acting this way. Only now they do the opposite. This is a sport that loves to talk, often incessantly, about its honor and its adherence to the rules, and how players routinely call penalties on themselves for infractions only they see. 

How about Finchem does that to himself now?

This begs the bigger question.  I know they think they're protecting their business interests and, being awfully charitable here, the integrity of the game.  But DJ snorting Bolivian marching powder up his nose is a personal failing, one that doesn't reflect in any way on the game.  And right now, as Lupica and others have made clear, Tour management has assumed responsibility for the mess.

And Jason Sobel makes his own contribution to the cause with a recap of Johnson rumors past and present:

When one caddie here at the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational received news of Dustin Johnson’s purported self-imposed leave of absence for the remainder of the PGA Tour season, he crowed, “What, did he hurt himself lifting another Jet Ski?” 

That response was a not-so-thinly-veiled reference to Johnson missing three months of the 2012 season, which he explained away at the time as a back injury after that theoretical dockside incident.

Heh, that's a good one.  Sobel also recounts these fairly well-documented stories:

When he was 16, according to a Golf.com report from 2011, Johnson was coerced by a

friend’s older brother into buying bullets for a gun that had been stolen in a robbery. That man later used it in a murder and while Johnson was pardoned, the incident still left an imprint.

“I sat down with myself afterward, looked in the mirror and realized, ‘This is not who I am, not what I want to be,’” he told the website. “I wanted to go to college. I wanted to play golf. It was an easy decision, getting back on the right path. I didn't want to throw all this good stuff away.”

In 2009, his second full season on the PGA Tour, Johnson was arrested for driving under the influence. A dashboard video from the arresting officer’s patrol car shows Johnson unable to walk a straight line or listen to the officer’s instructions.

And Hank Gola had this comment in a Daily News story:

“It was probably just a matter of time before [news of Johnson’s drug use] came out. It was pretty widely known.”

And there were other signals, such as this:

Swing coach Butch Harmon split with Johnson in 2011 because of what he called his “extra-curricular” activities at the time. Reached Friday, Harmon had no comment on the latest developments.

Similarly, I thought it was highly significant when caddie Joe LaCava dumped DJ so quickly to take Tiger's bag.  LaCava was clearly there to provide adult supervision in the aftermath of the Whistling Straits bunker and a missed tee time, a job almost any caddie would take based on DJ's potential.  But the choice to jump to Tiger wasn't that clear cut at the time in view of his injuries, and I took it to mean (accurately it seems) that Joe didn't like what he saw i his short time looping for DJ.

 And we don't take a back seat to TMZ or any other news organization in pursuing the FULL story, so we'll need to refresh everyone's memory on these rumors, as sumed up by Kevin Casey at golfwrx.com:

The first rumor to surface was that of the Tour wife whose marriage was allegedly broken up by her affair with Johnson. The name that bubbled up was Alli MacKenzie, the ex-wife of Tour pro Will MacKenzie. As with any rumor like this, some instantly believed the affair on exactly zero evidence. The rumor remains wholly speculative, as no proof has surfaced that a Dustin-Alli tryst occurred. Actually, speaking to the unimpeded and accelerating spread of this gossip, Alli MacKenzie already denied the unsubstantiated intel.

If that wasn’t enough, the name of the alleged second Tour wife came into the open: Erin Walker, the spouse of the current leader in the FedEx Cup standings. Again, her name was conjured up out of thin air. At this point, we’re getting into Salem Witch Trial territory, where any name listed by any single person seems to warrant further attention for some reason.

Considering Mrs. Walker is a fierce advocate of her husband, it’s rather unlikely that her name is correct. At the very least, she is no more likely than any other Tour wife, and she appears to be the victim of latent gossip grasping at straws.

So our hero has lived quite the fast life, regardless of the truth of some of these rumors.  Let's hope he understands the magnitude of his problem and truly seeks help, or we'll expect another relapse.

Monday Mishegoss

The Bridgestone required its own post, but there's always more going on to cover... though first some follow ups on that earlier post.

Mouth, Soap - The best efforts of Tour suits notwithstanding, Mike Walker has the video of Tiger dropping the F-bomb on the cameraman here.  Walker does think the camera gets too close, but that obviously doesn't let him off the hook, there being children and all...  There's little doubt that being Tiger Woods has its challenges and frustrations, but he chose this career and he might exert a little self-control and avoid about a half-dozen words, no?

These Guys Are Really Good - I'm sure most caught news of Sergio's second-round 61 on Friday, including his seven straight birdies and Mini-golf back nine score of 27.  But in case you have a life or some such other excuse, Alex Myers tells us that was only the third lowest round of the day:

Sergio Garcia's Friday performance at Firestone was incredible. Garcia tied a course record 

Brady Schnell, but you knew that.

with his 61, which included a back-nine 27 and 11 straight one-putts to close his round.

But even more incredible? It wasn't the lowest round shot on a North American professional golf tour that day. In fact, it wasn't even the second lowest. 

On the Web.com Tour, Fabian Gomez fired a 60 in the second round of the Stonebrae Classic. On the final hole, he had a 25-foot birdie putt for a 59, but left it short. That hurts. 

And on the PGA Tour Canada, Brady Schnell didn't even need a putt to shoot golf's magic number. Instead, Schnell holed a wedge from 122 yards on his finishing hole for an eagle and a 59 at the ATB Financial Classic.

Wow, a hole-out eagle for 59, that's pretty sick.   As the marketing slogan says, these guys are good!  Even, it seems, the ones not good enough to play on Tour.

Barracuda Bits - Off-field events, those played the same week as limited-field invitational, get almost no press and meager television ratings.  They're widely considered a small step up from Web.com events, but they play an important roles for those struggling to gain or retain playing privileges.

In an event, last weekend was the sixteenth edition of The Event Formerly Known as the Reno-Tahoe Open, now re-branded as The Barracuda Championship.  The event now utilizes a modified Stableford scoring system, a smart move in my book just to mix things up a bit.  The Tour suffers from a mind-numbing sameness from week to week, and this is one way to make an event stand out.

The reason I bring it up is that one of the genuinely good guys in our game, a man for whom the game has been a struggle recently, won the event:

Geoff Ogilvy won the Barracuda Championship on Sunday after nearly skipping the event following another disappointing finish last week in the Canadian Open. 

"I was 50-50 on coming here this week," Ogilvy said. "On Monday night, I had like a really long trip back from Canada and I was tired and over it and frustrated. Everyone talked to me into it. Said, `Come to Reno. You'll like Reno. You're playing well.'" 

Ogilvy won his eighth PGA Tour title and first since 2010 at Kapalua, scoring five points with a 25-foot eagle putt on the par-5 13th and pulling away for a five-point victory in the modified Stableford event.

Ogilvy is one of the players for whom I can't help but root.  He has a great interest in and knowledge of the history of the game and golf course architecture.  It's no surprise that he's joined forces with the highly-regarded Mike Clayton in a golf design firm, but it's a pleasure to hear him speak on the subject.  You'll never hear the words "It's all right in front of you" pass his lips, and for that he has my thanks.  

Ogily made these comments after the win, summing up his long period of frustration:

“People watch the TV and see all the fun and happiness of the PGA Tour, but it can be pretty

desperately depressing as well, spending time away from home, beating your head against the wall and just getting frustrated. Depressing is a bit strong a word, but really frustrating. It doesn’t feel like a first win, but it’s a very satisfying win. Maybe one of the most important wins ever. Hopefully I can build on it.”

I'll bet it can, and it's a side of the game that people should see more of.  There's far more failure than success in our game, and it does make the successes that much more poignant.

So Much For Two Weeks Notice - The relationship between a player and his or her caddie is endlessly fascinating, from the obviously synergistic relation ship between Phil and Bones to the War of the Roses divorce of Tiger and Stevie.  Only rarely does the bad marriage aspect spill out in public, but we're all guilty of loving a bad train wreck a little too much to be healthy.

It happened on Saturday at the PGA Tour’s Barracuda Championship (formerly known as the Reno-Tahoe Open), when Michael Lawson, who has caddied for Brian Stuard for three years, “dropped the bag and walked off the course,” the Reno Gazette-Journal’s Dan Hinxman reported.

Lawson and Stuard apparently were arguing for several holes before Lawson suddenly quit on the 12th hole. A woman in the gallery, Christy Atencio, wearing a dress and flip-flops, stepped up to carry Stuard’s bag for the final six holes. Chad Munoz, an assistant pro at Montreux Golf and Country Club, caddied for Stuard on Sunday. 

Earlier this year, Stuard told Jackson Citizen Patriot writer Josh Olson that “he knows my game really well, and we have a nice working relationship. He knows what to say and what not to say. It’s been really good, and I enjoy having him on my bag.”

It's like a scene out of Tin Cup, but sometimes a divorce is better for all.

Gotta Hurt His Lifestyle, No? - We've previously touched on the tortured path of the BackNine Network, a golf lifestyle channel that has sucked $5 million from the taxpayers in Connecticut.  Now this from the Hartford Business Journal:

James L. Bosworth has resigned as CEO and chairman of the golf-lifestyle media company

Back9Network just over a month after the fledgling network inked its first television deal, the company confirmed to The Hartford Business Journal. 

The company is expected to officially announce this afternoon that Bosworth, who co-founded Back9Network in 2010 after running his own sports marketing and branding firm in Simsbury, resigned to pursue other career opportunities. No further details were provided as to why Bosworth is leaving the company.

Here's more background on the con network: 

Under Bosworth, Back9Nework raised about $30 million in startup funding and nabbed a $5 million incentive package from the state to add jobs and help build out its production studio in Constitution Plaza. 

In June, Back9Network said it signed its first TV deal with DirecTV, a multi-year agreement that will allow the company to distribute 1,100 hours of original programming in its first year. The network's downtown Hartford TV and digital studios will be fully operational in September.

Sigh.  Private investors can do as they please, but the state has no business being a venture capitalist with the taxpayers' money.  

 

Firestone Forensics

Wow, that kid might end up having a pretty good career...

Bob Harig summed it up this way:

And it's a thing of beauty when McIlroy is on, his drives soaring into the sky, landing out of

sight. McIlroy led the field in driving distance this week, averaging 317 yards off the tee. And he was tied for first in greens in regulation, hitting 57 of 72 for the week.

I'm not sure where Harig got his 317 yard figure, as The PGATour.com statistics page has Rory's average drive at 334.8 yards, a non-trivial difference seemingly more consistent with the numbers bandied about by the CBS crew.

I had to head back over to the club shortly before 4:00 yesterday (Teaser: It was for an event I'll be blogging about later), and with the 90-minute rain delay was only able to see the leaders play the first hole.  Rory hit a crooked drive and found himself partially blocked by trees.  After he punched a low shot under the trees that bounded up to about 3-feet, I knew that Sergio was in trouble.  I didn't know until later that he also birdied that second and third holes, dismissing Sergio's three-shot lead in minutes.

This creates a bit of a dilemma for me.  I had previously suggested that Rory should be watched at Valhalla, both because of the anticipated course conditions as well as the fact that Rory, while not the most consistent player out there, tends to win in bunches.  But how much is enough?  In fact, in the midst of writing this 'graph a missive arrived from our good friend and died-in-the-wool Ulsterman Lowell Courtney, who in the midst of his justifiable pride at his countryman's success had this note of realism:

Rory: it comes, it goes, it comes again. Bet you he doesn't land the PGA. No-one can keep it going like that these days, not even a reincarnate Byron Nelson.

So, pace Lowell, why did it come now?  Two theories out there this morning, the first from Harig:

For the true golf geeks, for the ones who follow the intricacies of a golfer and his equipment

and the sometimes maddening twists and turns of what goes in and out of his golf bag, Rory McIlroy's run of recent excellence may be traced to last fall.

That's when he settled on the Nike driver and ball combination he is using now, no small aspect of his impressive game at the moment.

Yeah, I'm thinking he'll stick with that for a bit... But Karen Crouse, writing in Pravda, had this moment as well:

In May, at a tournament that Nicklaus hosts in Ohio, McIlroy’s second-round score had been 15 shots higher than his opening 63. Nicklaus thought he might be able to help with what had become a troubling pattern, and in the course of their conversation, he made a few swings to demonstrate how McIlroy’s hips were getting ahead of his hands on his downswing.

Others had commented that McIlroy seemed to be getting stuck, but none of them had won 18 majors like Nicklaus. Whatever Nicklaus showed McIlroy, it clicked — literally and metaphorically. 

“It’s so funny,” McIlroy, 25, said Saturday. “He got up out of his seat and started giving me this lesson, and his hip creaked.”

Rory, that's uncalled for.  We don't take cheap shots at the old guys on this blog... I don't want to have to remind you of this again.

Sergio continues his streak of exceptional play resulting in high finishes but nothing better... There have always been guys whose careers are defined by near misses, Tom Weiskopf comes immediately to mind, and the Spaniard's career seems in that mold.  He obviously still has time to change that perception, but it might behoove him to make his move soon.

It's not helpful that odd stuff seems to seek him out, as per yesterday's ring incident:

When I picked up the broadcast on Tivo later, the guys were making all sorts of jewelry jokes that went over my head.  But the story has a happy ending, and Sergio comes off as a mensch for making sure he had contact information to follow up.

Now, shall we deal with Tiger, for whom the plot sickens?  Here's the shot that apparently sent his back into spasms:

From the after-action accounts, it was the landing that he failed to stick that caused the distress, and of course that's a mandatory points reduction from the judges.  And here's the final straw, the drive on No. 9 and the wincing in pain that's become an all-too-familiar scene:

And lest you think Tiger was having a good week, Shackelford had posted video of Tiger dropping an F-bomb on cameraman who made the mistake of getting a bit too close.  Keep it classy, Tiger!  As Shack predicted, the Ponte Vedra Family took time out from parsing whether Dustin Johnson is actually on suspension to scrub the video from YouTube.

And the golf, it wasn't particularly Tigeresque either...On Friday he hit all of four fairways, and one wonders how many of those were with the driver.  And on Saturday he hit all of seven greens...  As of last night, Notah Begay, a chum of the Striped One, was reporting that playing in the PGA is not yet out of the question.  But if he's going to play as he has in his three events since returning from back surgery, it's not clear that anything meaningful is being accomplished.

Do we think at this point that Tom Watson is happy he took the job as U.S. Ryder Cup Savior Captain?  Well, at least we have some modest good news for Tom as relates to another Cup stalwart.  Phil Mickelson was in the midst of a lost week when he had these comments after his Saturday round:

Asked whether he felt there was enough time to put things together, Mickelson said: "We'll see.

It would be out of nowhere for me to play well. You just never know."

All of this came on a day when Mickelson broke par at Firestone Country Club for the first time this week -- and for just the third time in his past 14 rounds here -- but still found himself languishing in a tie for 44th at the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational. 

"I really thought after the Scottish [where he tied for 11th] and British [T-24] that I was on to something," Mickelson said. "I didn't get a chance to work much the last week and a half. I didn't hit any drivers or 3-woods. I just hit short irons and stuff."

Of course he goes out Sunday and lights it up with a 62, including ten birdies.  Is this a crazy game or what?  Of course one round means exactly nothing in the cosmic scheme of things, but when you're clutching at straws one can't be particular about things.  If there were any lingering doubt, I suspect that the combination of Tiger's travails and Phil's pyrotechnics have likely secured Phil a Gleneagles tee time.

As an aside, CBS showed a graphic of the Ryder Cup points list during yesterday's broadcast, in which they scrubbed DJ out of it.  Now we all understand that he's not available for entirely personal reasons, but it had a Soviet-era feel to me, akin to when they scrubbed disgraced party officials out of the photos of the May Day parade viewing stand.  Would they have done the same if it was, say a back injury?

Lastly, did you catch Bubba's drive on Saturday, that clocked in per Shotlink at 424 yards?  That's the longest on Tour this year, blowing by a Webb Simpson drive of 397 yards at Kapalua.  And did I mention how soft it was in Akron this week?

 

He's Bubba-long indeed, but he's also unfortunately Bubba-churlish.  As we've previously noted, the PGA is doing a retro-cool thing and holding a long-drive competition at the PGA Championship.  I'm not crazy with the format, as it's limited to one shot on the tenth hole during Tuesday practice rounds, because you have to be sensitive to Tour players' packed schedules and all... but even that is too much for the delicate flower that is our Bubba:

“I’m not going to do it,” Watson told GolfChannel.com after his round.

“I’m there to play golf, not to hit it far,” said the namesake of BubbaGolf. “I’ve got to practice. I’ve never been to the course. I don’t need to worry about a long drive on the 10th hole.”

Sheesh!  DJ's out having his nostrils sewn shut and Bubba can't be bothered to swing for the fences on one practice hole?  Because that's something he never does.  Almost makes me happy that he made bogey on the 424 yard drive above, proof positive of the existence of a higher being.

Somewhere Vijay Is Smiling

I tread lightly on the DJ story yesterday, suspecting that shoes would be dropping shortly.  With Club Championship qualifying cancelled due to heavy rains, shall we unpack this mess?  

First, let's review the bidding.  As we covered in a post yesterday, a press release from Team Johnson alerted us to the fact that DJ would be taking some time off to deal with a personal issue.  Obviously the reference to "Professional help" and the deleted picture with drink in hand led us all to conclude that he's dealing with a substance abuse issue, either alcohol or drugs.

Around midday came this Golf.com report, indicating that DJ was, in fact, under suspension:

Dustin Johnson is serving a six-month suspension from the PGA Tour after testing positive for

cocaine, a source has told Golf.com. 

According to the source, Johnson has failed three drug tests: one for marijuana in 2009 and two for cocaine, in 2012 and 2014. He was previously suspended for the 2012 failed test, but that suspension was never made public. Under the PGA Tour’s drug-testing policies, the Tour is not required to announce any disciplinary actions against players who test positive for recreational drugs.

Hmmmm...there have long been rumors about DJ's love of the fast life, so no shock value here.  Though it needs to be said that this wealth of very specific details comes from only one anonymous source, and the reporting gives no information on how the source has access to this information and the source's interest in having it widely know.

Regular readers know well my frustration with Commissioner Ratched on this subject, as to the best of my knowledge there is no other sports league or organization that considers disciplinary actions to be a tightly-held state secret.  The Commish tells us that the Tour is populated by gentlemen that comport themselves in a manner consistent with rules and its drug policies, but in refusing to reveal the miscreants he acts like he has something to hide.    

In 2012, Johnson played the Cadillac Championship at Doral in March and then did not play again for 11 weeks, until the Memorial in late May. Johnson said at the time that he was not playing because he hurt his back while lifting a jet ski. However, Golf.com’s source says that Johnson was actually serving a suspension for failing a drug test for cocaine. The PGA Tour had no official comment at that time and Winkle denied that Johnson had been suspended.

So we're making up fictitious injuries to cover for coke heads?  Really Commish, don't you think you're kind of, you know, enabling him, by eliminating any consequences for his actions?  While I think the strongest case is that fans have a right to know, do we also think that perhaps TaylorMade might like to know before signing DJ to a large endorsement contract?

Now I'd be just as happy if the Tour didn't test for marijuana, as it's performance-enhancing properties elude me.  Cocaine is a tougher case, as the libertarian in me thinks the Tour should stick to actual PED's, but I can see the other side of the argument equally well.  And before rejecting pot-testing out of hand, I have to acknowledge that I was quite surprised by this story from the way back machine:

PGA Tour player Robert Garrigus, best known for his long drives and knee-high putter, said he 

-- along with other unnamed players on the Nationwide Tour -- smoked marijuana during tournament rounds in 2002, according to an interview published on Golf Digest's web site.

"Oh yeah, there were plenty of guys on the Nationwide Tour who smoked in the middle of the round," Garrigus told Golf Digest in a story headlined "The Reclamation of Robert Garrigus." The PGA Tour did not institute drug testing until six years later. 

"We always talked about it. You could go in the Porta John and take your drags," he said.

Color me surprised, as after firing up a doobie the last thing in the world I'd want to do is play golf.  Especially in front of other people...  Though I'm wondering if Ben Crane has been tested, as it's as good an explanation as any for his glacial pace of play.  But I digress...

Then last night we heard from the Ponte Vedra Family, which kinda-sorta violated their strict Omertà policy:

“With regard to media reports that Dustin Johnson has been suspended by the PGA Tour,” the statement read, “this is to clarify that Mr. Johnson has taken a voluntary leave of absence and is not under a suspension from the PGA Tour.”

Oh what a tangled web we weave.... So the Tour has a strict policy of not disclosing suspensions or other disciplinary actions, but will, when it suits the suits, disclose who hasn't been been suspended.  So Commish, how abouts you just tell us every player that's never been suspended, and we'll guess at who's missing from the list.

And, most significantly, they don't deny any other aspect of the story, just the micro-technicality that Johnson is not under suspension.  It seems they've inadvertently confirmed all the important details of the story, leaving us to conclude that Johnson agreed to the "voluntary leave" one small step ahead of the posse.  

Matthew Rudy gets to the crux of the matter in a column titled  The PGA Tour's pretend drug policy:

It took less than a day for Dustin Johnson's announcement that he was taking a leave from tour

golf to work on personal problems to be followed by reports that the PGA Tour actually suspended Johnson for six months for his third failed drug test -- once for marijuana in 2009 and twice for cocaine, in 2012 and 2014. Johnson was reportedly suspended before, for the failed 2012 test, but maintained publicly than he missed time for a back injury (the tour has refuted the published reports by maintaining Johnson has not been suspended).

The timing of the reports about an official suspension only matters because the Tour doesn't disclose player conduct violations or suspensions. Johnson could be the only player who failed a test since 2009, or he could be one of 100 who did. The Tour is content to stand by its statement that it forbids the use of (certain) performance enhancing and recreational drugs, and that it will punish players that violate the rules.

But this is where my blood starts boiling:

Tim Finchem told me in 2007 that he believed in golf's culture of integrity and rule-following, and that "the notion that a player would cheat in this sport is an anathema to the athletes."

If that's really true, the Tour's policy should be complete transparency in its drug program. If cheating (or recreational drug use) is so rare, the occasional player who is announced to have been suspended would only serve as more of a reminder about how dedicated the Tour is at preserving fair play and protecting the health of its members.

So we should just take Nurse Ratched's word for it?  And please remember that prior to this story the only known Tour drug suspension was of journeyman Doug Barron for an elevated level of testosterone caused by legally prescribed medication.   

So, pay no attention to that man behind the curtain... But every time that curtain gets pulled back an inch, we see the Tour proactively protecting its business interests.  But how profoundly cynical it all is.  The Tour speaks to its concern for its players, but it in fact throws them under the bus to protect the Family.  Let's try a little contra-factual, shall we?  Do we think a player such as DJ is more or less likely to suffer a relapse when he's protected from any consequences from his first two failed drug tests?  

This is is why I've been cheerleading Vijay's lawsuit.  I've little use for the man and think his use of deer antler spray comically desperate, but anything that lets the sunlight in is to be encouraged.

This and That

We'll take a short break from our golf history curriculum and cover some items related to, you know, living humans...

Girls Like the Bad Boys - I'm sure you'e heard this news by now:

Dustin Johnson announced on Thursday that he will be “taking a leave of absence from professional golf, effective immediately.” 

“I will use this time to seek professional help for personal challenges I have faced,” Johnson said in the statement which was issued by his management company. 

“By committing the time and resources necessary to improve my mental health, physical well-being and emotional foundation, I am confident that I will be better equipped to fulfill my potential and become a consistent champion.”

Besides the obvious personal implications, this of course affects the Ryder Cup.  DJ, who is currently fifth on the points list, has notified the PGA of America that he will not play in the event.  They will simply go one slot lower on the points list, and that lucky individual is....Patrick Reed.  Doesn't quite get him into the Top Five, but there's still time.

The Interwebs are buzzing about this photo posted by Paulina Gretzky earlier in the week, that has suddenly been removed:

I do like the bib, but the issue is more what's in his right hand.

I Got There First - Marla Ridenour, writing in The Akron Beacon Journal, catches us up on players utilizing the increasingly available statistics to fine tune thier play and practice, and likens it to....wait for it, Moneyball.  C'mon Marla, don't you have a Google subscription?  I deserve at least a link, but I shan't be bitter:

More numbers became available to players on the PGA, Champions and Web.com tours after ShotLink was conceived in 1999. It replaced walking scorers with volunteers equipped with lasers — with about 350 needed at each event — to measure Bubba Watson’s booming drives and Tiger Woods’ tap-in birdies. The PGA Tour teamed with CDW in 2008 to sponsor a data program known as Shot
Link Intelligence. 

Now some players, including Jason Day, Zach Johnson and Brandt Snedeker, rely on a person in their inner circle to crunch those numbers as adeptly as Oakland A’s General Manager Billy Beane did in the baseball movie Moneyball.

Marla, you do know that Moneyball was a book long before it was a movie, right?  Just checking...  We were on this trend back in February, but there's some good detail on how individual players have utilized this data to their benefit.

A Worthy Recipient - John Strege tells us of an important award to a most worthy recipient:

Dave Anderson, a Golf Digest Contributing Editor and long-time New York Times columnist,

has been named the recipient of the PEN/ESPN Lifetime Achievement Award for Literary Sports Writing. 

“I put that right on the same level as the Pulitzer Prize,” Anderson said via telephone from his New Jersey home. Anderson, whose career has spanned more than 50 years, was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1981.

I first met Anderson at the Metropolitan Golf Writers Association meeting at Knickerbocker Country Club, which I posted on here.  He's a wonderfully engaging man with no shortage of great stories about our game.

I next saw him at the MGWA Annual Dinner last month, when he introduced John Feinstein to receive his award for golf writing.  Which provides the opportunity to share the photo below, in which Unplayable Lies Employee No. 2 finally gets off her duff:

The bride pressing an Unplayable Lies business card on Pulitzer Prize winner Dave Anderson.

Congratulations are due for sure, but do we think he ever checked out the blog?  I'm guessing not.

Where Have I heard This Before - Golf Digest's Mike Stachurs tells us that reports of golf's demise have been overstated:

The bad-news cycle started last week with the announcement by Dick’s Sporting Goods that it was essentially firing its 478 PGA professionals. While no detailed explanation was provided, the company’s dismal first-quarter earnings report (a $34 million loss) cited declining golf sales as a major contributing factor. As DKS chairman and CEO Ed Stack said in May, “We really don't know where the bottom is in golf. ... The industry has a real issue.”

So when the leading off-course retailer of golf equipment, a publicly traded company, essentially projects a lack of faith in the golf business, it was only natural for the story to take on a globalized life of its own. ESPN, The Wall Street Journal,Forbes and the television networks all jumped on the opportunity to write golf’s death sentence.

We were on this a couple of days ago, and it really is thin gruel.  Here's a sample of data points that ESPN, the WSJ and Forbes chose to ignore:

Has 2014 been a down year for equipment sales and rounds played? Certainly. Is there an oversupply of golf courses (fueled by unsustainable real-estate projections) and golf-equipment inventory (driven by overzealous manufacturers who were primed by unrealistic sales forecasts from certain large-scale retailers)? Unquestionably. But that’s a relative and limited point of view. First, let's remember this: There were about 5 million golfers in 1960. While U.S. population has increased only some 75 percent since then, the number of golfers has more than quintupled to around 25 million.

Recent data from golf-retail research firm Golf Datatech show that the sale of hard goods (clubs, balls, bags, shoes and gloves) through the first six months of the year are higher than or equal to 12 of the previous 17 years. Is the trend line down from the somewhat freakish highs of 2006-'08? Yes. But there are unquestionable categories of enthusiasm this year. Iron sales, the largest purchase a golfer makes, have been up this year. The wedge market, thought to be dead after the USGA rolled back groove performance, has been consistently up this year. Even the footwear market has been an important, steady source of revenue. Callaway Golf just announced its second-quarter earnings and noted its sales for the first half of 2014 were up 9 percent, with growth in all categories, including woods (up 8 percent), irons (up 14 percent), putters (up 9 percent) and golf balls (up 7 percent).

As Stachura and anyone writing responsibly on this subject make plain, there's no shortage of challenges for the game.  But this concept that the game is in free-fall is just way overblown. If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times, it's a niche sport.  But it's not a bad niche at all...

The Striped One - Lot's of chatter about our Tiger as he begins his two-week, make-or-break push to salvage the season.  Tiger continues to put a brave face on it, as per Doug Ferguson at AP:

"I would like to win these two events and not have to worry about anything," Woods said Wednesday. "That's the plan. That's the mindset. That's the focus. We'll see how it falls after these few weeks. I'm so far out of it right now that I need to play well to ... get myself into the playoffs and ultimately -- hopefully -- play all four weeks."

I was channel flipping last night and  came across the rebroadcast of last Year's Bridgestone on Golf Channel.  It was quite the shock seeing Tiger decked out in red with a large lead.  As Michael Bamberger wrote in his Sports Illustrated Open Championship game story, "It was only last year that Tiger won five times.  It only seems like ten years ago."  Ain't that the truth.

Dave Shedloski informs us that, despite impending doom, Tiger has maintained his finely-honed sense of humor.  See what you think of these comedy stylings:

On his backswing getting shorter: “We've been trying to shorten it up over the years. I think a perfect way to do it is just have back surgery. All those geniuses out there, there you go.”

On whether Jack Nicklaus’ record of 18 majors seems as obtainable as it did in 1997 (the year he won his first Masters): “I'll tell you what, it's a hell of a lot closer now than I was in '97. These 14 weren't easy. “

He'll be there all week, folks, unless, you know, he misses another cut.

And Luke Kerr-Dineen gives us the most substantive take-away from Tiger's recent Fox News exclusive interview:

In his one-on-one interview with Fox Sports, a portion of which was published online on

The Hairline: 1997 vs. 2014.  

Wednesday, Tiger Woods gave the world an extraordinary admission about something that has been weighing on people's minds for quite a while: his hair loss.  It's not something that Tiger hasn't noticed, but he seems in good spirits about it.

"I'm comfortable with it, but my hairline isn't," Tiger said, after being asked by host Colleen Dominiguez if he was comfortable aging. "I have a nice skylight [at home] and I'm at the point where if I don't wear a hat, I can feel the heat."

We're all getting older, I'm just lucky that the Simpson genes don't include male pattern baldness.

This post was begun before play at Firestone began.  Dave Shedloski had this on Tiger's 2-under 68:

"Yeah, I feel like I made some progress," Woods, 38, said of a round that included six birdies against two bogeys and one double bogey. "As I said, this is only my seventh round back, so it's just going to take a little time. I'm starting to get in the flow of things. If you look at my iron shots into the holes today, a majority of them were pin high. So I'm starting to get the feel back in my hands and get the ball, my trajectory under control. I'm starting to get the shots hitting the ball the correct numbers again."

He also is showing signs of scoring. After each of his three holes over par, including a three-putt from 10 feet at the first, Woods answered with a birdie. He got up and down for par on four of the six holes at which he missed the green, including all three on his inward nine.

There was some good news, no doubt, but let's see if he can maintain this level of play.  Everyone got all excited over his opening 69 at Hoylake, and that turned out to be the high-water mark.

Firestone's Firewall - Turns out it's a guy named Bob Dyer writing in the Beacon Journal:

Are the pros bored with Firestone? 

One longtime national golf writer certainly is, and he has made no effort to stifle his yawns.

Get a load of Alan Shipnuck in Sports Illustrated’s Golf+ magazine:

“Those World Golf Championships in Tucson and Akron are stuck in such uninspired venues. I’d move those ... to places that are more dynamic.” 

That was merely his latest salvo. In 2011, Shipnuck wrote of Fire­stone South, “If there’s a more boring tournament course out there, I haven’t seen it.”

The debate about the architectural merits of Firestone can be settled rather quickly, it has none.  Glad we got that out of the way...

Dyer cites favorable quotes from noted golf architecture critics Rory McIlroy and Sergio Garcia, and that's fine as far as it goes.  Though the cynic in me wonders if, just thinking out loud here, the limited field/huge purse/no cut dynamics might affect their outlook just a tad....

Shackelford is, of course, on the case, linking to this Jack Nicklaus quote.  

It's a boring course. You can fall asleep on it because you're always hitting the same kind of shots--woods (cont) 

And when Jack complains about boring golf architecture....well, you can fill in the rest.

Sly as a Fox -  The Peacock has had better success at filling out their announcing team than many of us anticipated.  While most had focused on the babelicious Holly Sonders, this is far more significant:

Fox Sports continued to build its golf broadcast team with the addition of Brad Faxon as a studio analyst and hole announcer and former USGA executive director David Fay as its rules analyst.

“Long-known for his smooth putting stroke, Brad's transition to broadcasting has been just as easy,” Fox Sports’ coordinating golf producer Mark Loomis said in a news release. “He still has great relationships with, and knowledge of, today's tour players, and that insight will prove invaluable to our telecasts. David has been synonymous with the USGA, its championships and history for decades, so adding him to our team was a no-brainer."

I thought Faxon was pretty good in his limited tome with NBC and Golf Channel.  I'm actually a bit surprised that they didn't lock him up.  Now we'll see if The Shark plays well with the other children.

Mongrel Hoard - Shack has an amusing item at The Loop that the bride needs to read.  Seems she considers your humble servant to be a bit of an hoarder:

Thinking maybe you had a hoarder streak after keeping a few too many old clubs laying around

the garage? Think again! 

Placed in the Orange County section of Craigslist and updated since, the seller lists just about every conceivable brand as available from the, uh, collection. There is a catch: the buyer must take it all. That's 20,000 clubs for $7,500, which, as the seller notes, amounts to 38 cents a club. The 50 bags mentioned are thrown in as part of the package based on the seller remarks.

Sweetie, it's only 38 cents per club!  Wouldn't be prudent to miss out...