Saturday Stuff

I'm getting a bit of a late start here, but as always there's misguided souls needing a firm hand to find the right path.  So, who's first for their just desserts?

• Cock of the Walk - The Irish Golf Desk has determined that their young man has reclaimed his rightful place in the golf firmament, as follows:

Rory McIlroy might have walked off last year but for much of yesterday it looked as though he was about to turn the Honda Classic into another of his triumphal processions.

So comfortable is the 24-year old Co Down man with his game again — he reckons he hasn’t hit it as well since he won the US PGA and two FedEx Cup events in a magical four-week spell 18 months ago — that he looks all but unbeatable on a demanding PGA National track that is tailor-made for his high-octane game.

I've watched a bunch of the Honda and agree that Rory looks very relaxed and comfortable out there.  But these kinds of projections based upon 36 holes of golf in calm conditions are just tempting the Gods.  If he shoots 78-80 on the weekend, he'll know who to blame.

• Little Miss Rainsuit -  The IGD also lets us in on happy news in Portrush and at Lake Nona:

Graeme McDowell revealed some big news at the Honda Classic on Friday — his wife Kristin is expecting their first child, a girl. The baby is due to arrive during the FedEx Cup play-offs, a month before the Ryder Cup at Gleneagles, at the end of August.

 For anyone still unfamiliar with the rainsuit reference, the background is at the end of this post. 

• Haven't We Suffered Enough - Shackelford links to this item from something called Wave News, in which PGA of America President Ted Bishop shoots himself in the foot yet again proposes the following:

"I think one of the great visions for Valhalla would be, maybe there's a day down the road where Valhalla becomes the permanent site of a domestic Ryder Cup," said Ted Bishop, president of the PGA of America. "Where you can go in and you can do the kind of infrastructure that they have done at Augusta National, with the Masters. Think what you could do here, if you knew you were going to play the Ryder Cup every four years."

I agree wholeheartedly that that would be a great vision for Valhalla, it's the rest of us I'm concerned about.  Shack takes comfort in the fact that the first available date is the 2028 Cup, and that in the interim we can scream "Belfry" enough to scare him off.  But isn't this the guy who took a PGA away from Valhalla when he needed it to keep the USGA from hopping into bed with Kohler/Whistling Straits?  

 Perhaps Ted could get back to important things, such as ensuring that the anchoring ban doesn't affect amateurs until the middle of the 22nd century.

•  Siriusly Speaking:  John Paul Newport's weekend Wall Street Journal column is about the success of SiriusXM PGA Tour Radio, its channel devoted to golf.  Now I've listened in the past to some of its tournament coverage, principally Sunday coverage while driving home from Vermont, and  I can assure you that its live coverage is every bit as bad as one would expect.  But the surprise is what seems to be working for them:

The instruction shows have been getting "crazy numbers," Greenstein says. Hank Haney on a recent show offered a fearless critique of the swing of his former student, Tiger Woods ("He's not practicing enough"), then answered listener questions about increasing club-head speed and overcoming social distractions on the course.

Golf instruction on the radio?  The jokes just write themselves... What else?

Of the new talk shows, my personal favorite is "Ben Crenshaw on Golf." The offer to host a show "came out of the blue," the two-time Masters champ told me this week. "I have said many times that television just never did suit me. I was terrible! I did a little work for CBS in the late '90s and, gosh, I was just not cut out for it at all. It was very quick, in and out." Crenshaw's style is more conversational. He is self-effacing, deeply knowledgeable and likes to tell stories. 

Radio suits Crenshaw perfectly. If you have ever wondered what it would be like to sit in the 19th-hole grill room with a table of golf legends shooting the breeze, this is your chance to find out. Guests so far have included Crenshaw's boyhood friend and rival Tom Kite—they spent most of the hour talking about their common mentor, Harvey Penick—and writer Dan Jenkins. The conversation there was mostly about Ben Hogan, about whom both have a wealth of anecdotes. A new show airs every other Tuesday at 1 p.m. Eastern, with periodic repeats.

That might be worth a listen...  This plays into one of my recurring themes, understanding that golf is a niche sport and utilizing opportunities where a mass audience is not required to support a business.  A guy like Ben Crenshaw, with sufficient time and a modicum of resources, can do the sport more good than all of the Ted Bishops of the world with their grandiose schemes of global dominance.

• That was Quicken -  Tiger has no shortage of sponsorship issues, both personal and for his events, but it appears he can cross one item off his to-do list.  The AP reports that Quicken Loans is in negotaitions to assume the sponsorship of Tiger's event at Congressional Golf Club, an event previously sponsored by AT&T.  In other Tiger-world news, the head of his foundation has announced that he is leaving to join the PGA Tour:

Greg McLaughlin announced Tuesday that he is leaving after 14 years as president and chief executive officer of the Tiger Woods Foundation. McLaughlin was the tournament director of the AT&T National and did well to keep AT&T on as title sponsor through 2014 after the upheaval in Woods' personal life.

One suspects that the euphemism "upheaval" was focused-grouped to death before its usage was permitted.

• Honda Happenings - Every week on Tour brings surprises, because the game we love is so inherently unpredictable.  My favorite contrast thus far is that 53-year old Mark Calcavecchia made the cut, while the 5th-ranked player in the world, one Phil Mickelson, has his weekend free.  No crocodile tears for Phil, as Monday he'll be teeing it up in the Seminole Golf Club Pro-Member.  Speaking of Calc, Guy Yocum share's his ten rules here.  He starts strong with "Don't Fear the Paunch."  And surprisingly he actually brings up his infamous collapse against Monty in the 1991 Ryder Cup singles.  His swing on No. 17 remains the absolute worst swing I've ever seen a professional golfer make, but good on him for dealing with it.

• Chambers Redux - John Strege informs us that both a large resort hotel and second golf course are in the works at Chambers Bay, site of the 2015 U.S. Open.  

A Los Angeles development company, Sonnenblick Development, has entered into a preliminary agreement with Pierce County, which owns Chambers Bay, to build a 220-room hotel there, according to the News Tribune, which also reported that a second 18-hole golf course is included in the agreement.

Chambers is on a beautiful reclaimed site overlooking Puget Sound, but the 2015 Open will be a complete wildcard.  It's clear from these comments that the second course will be completely different:

"There's a whole resort golfer community who won't play [Chambers Bay] right now because they don't walk 18 holes," Sonnenblick told the News Tribune.

It's none of my business, but this seems entirely misguided to me.  It's better to appeal strongly to a specific market segment than to try to be all things to all people.  People who want to play Chambers will have no interest in the second, family-friendly golf course, and the folks who need carts and want an easier course have way too many other options.  Mr. Sonnenblick should have a drink with Mike Keiser.

•  Best.  Photograph.  Ever.  -  I caught his before coming home from Park City and assumed that everyone else had as well.  But a number of folks had missed it, so just in case:

There's not the slightest relevance to golf, but funny is funny!