Weekend Wrap

There was some golf played this past weekend, and it only seemed that it was all off in exotic lands.  But the most significant event took part in a broadcast booth in Naples, Fl, and it wasn't pretty from all accounts.  We'll get to that later...

Lucky Seven - World No. 3 Adam Scott came up short in the Australian PGA, losing in a ridiculous playoff:

GOLD COAST, Australia (AP) Greg Chalmers made par on the seventh hole of a

playoff while Adam Scott three-putted for bogey to give the Australian lefthander his second Australian PGA championship. 

Chalmers, who shot an 8-under 64 Sunday at Royal Pines after trailing the leaders by seven strokes going into the final round, and Scott and Wade Ormsby, who both shot 71, finished with 72-hole totals of 11-under 277.

The victor is a decent player who spends most of the year playing in the U.S., and might just be the best putter on the planet right now.  So, no disgrace for him to be your champion...

What was dreadful was that the seven-hole playoff  took place exclusively on the 18th hole at Royal Pines.  Shack has a worthy rant here, as it reminded him (as it would your humble blogger had I been awake that late) of the equally dreadful (though shorter) Lydia Ko-Carlotta Ciganda playoff in the ladies' season-ending event.

There's nothing wrong with a difficult Par-4 finishing hole for a stroke-play event, in fact the USGA is rather enamored of them for U.S. Opens.  But they are the absolute worst venues for sudden-death, as there's a propensity for a Groundhog Day simulation to occur.

Fathers, Sons - You'd have to be quite the curmudgeon to not appreciate the appeal of the annual Father-Son (or Daughter, Grandson, whatever) tourney that takes place around this time every year:

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) Bernhard and Jason Langer won the PNC Father-Son Challenge on Sunday, closing with a 13-under 59 for a two-stroke victory in the better-ball event. 

The Langers finished at 23-under 123 at The Ritz-Carlton Golf Club's Grande Lake Orlando. 

Fourteen-year-old Jason jumped into the lineup Saturday when sister Christina withdrew because of back issues. He's the youngest son to win the event, breaking the mark of 15 set by brother Stefan in 2005.

I watched all of about ten minutes of it, and saw Jason drain two snakes.  Just awfully cute, especially as he was an emergency sub.  But I just have to wonder if the yips are passed from father to son...

Other Events - Lee Westwood came from behind to win in Thailand over Martin Kaymer and others, Branden Grace continued his mastery of tournaments held in South Africa with a win in the Alfred Dunhill and China's Shanshan Feng won the Women's Dubai Masters for the second consecutive year.  More than a bit of a yawn, hence the abbreviated coverage.

But there is one notable aspect of at least one of the aforementioned events, and it comes from one of the questions posed to the Tour Confidentialistas:

3. Trailing leader (and eventual winner) Branden Grace by one entering the final round of this week's Alfred Dunhill Championship at Leopard Creek in South Africa, 23-year-old Danish player Lucas Bjerregaard posted an 89 in the final round, including a back-nine 50. What's the worst final-round, 18-hole choke you've ever seen?

Tee hee.  That is quite the choke, as well as quite the last name...Wondering about the responses?  predictable in the main, with three mentions of the Shark's 1996 Masters gagfest.  Joe Passov can't do any better than Rory at the '11 Masters, andalso predictably takes about 400 words to come up with that lame answer.

Mike Bamberger shows his age by going with Ken Venturi's 80 in the final round of the 1956 Masters.  Wondering what's worse than shooting 80 to cough up a 54-hole lead at the Masters as an amateur?  That would be shooting 80 when 78 would have been good enough...

And here's Gary Van Sickle's take on this question:

How about that Roy McAvoy guy making an 12 on the last hole of the U.S. Open won by Peter Jacobsen? That was horrible. What a choke artist that clown was. That classy Shooter McGavin guy probably should have won.

Thanks for playing, Gary. 

Thoughts From Johnny - I guess Johnny Miller was watching last weekend, because he had this comment on Tiger:

On Tiger: “I’m not giving up on Tiger. Don’t write him off just yet. I saw the best swing

I’ve seen in years. Best since 2001, especially with the driver. There was nothing wrong with his irons. People talk about a slump but it had nothing to do with his 5-iron through wedges. The driver would just put him out of play and his putting is good but he seems to lip out a lot now. He’s sort of like a normal putter now.

Who knows, but that's what makes his return such fun...   Johnny was speaking into microphones because he played in the Father-Son event with his son Andy.  The high-point was Johnny rolling in from off the front of the 18th green, but at the link he has more on Tiger, as well as this:

On the Ryder Cup task force: “They are definitely grasping at straws. You have to sort of admit that Europe is a better team…Medinah could’ve turned it around. I mean, I wanted to throw up for about a week. We had that Ryder Cup. It was just brutal to see that happen. That probably still haunts guys like Stricker, Tiger and Furyk."

He also offers thoughts on Jordan Spieth and Patrick Reed... and as long as Johnny brought it up. Rex Hoggard filled us in on some details of the 4-hour Task Force Meeting conference call from former Cap'n. Tom Lehman:

“Tiger took charge. Raymond took charge, Phil took charge. We have guys who are very confident, very smart and sure of themselves. Somebody is going to step up and be the leader of this thing and that’s what we need,” said Love, the 2012 captain. 

“I can tell you that Tiger, Furyk and Stricker have been blowing my phone up since the meeting. It’s not like we had a meeting and said we’ll see you again in February. Everybody is excited and engaged.”

OK, so I'm guessing that taking charge is the key thought here.  Just like Phil took charge of the press conference...what could go wrong?

Did The Earth Move for You? - I'm reliably informed that they held an event called the Franklin Templeton Shootout and that Fox used this event as a dry run for their USGA television contract.  Good thing, too, as the notices have been rather harsh.  First, they began their first broadcast back on their heels, perhaps to mitigate some of the criticism:

“I realize one thing,” Buck said. “People at home don’t care who’s covering it. They just

want to sit on their couch and watch golf. There’s only one real way for us at Fox to start this venture and that is humbly. 

“When you get into this situation you realize how hard it is to cover golf and make it look seamless. I want to tip my cap…to the fine folks at CBS and the work of Frank Chirkinian in changing and revolutionizing the way golf is covered on television. And that’s up to present day, whether it’s NBC and Golf Channel, or ABC and ESPN or TNT. 

“Right now we are not worthy. Someday maybe we will be. We hope to innovate. We hope to have some fun. But most of all, in the promise we made at Fox to the USGA, is that we’re going to respect this great game.”

I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they're being genuine, though humility is not something for which Mr. Norman is often credited.  Shack has a long, typo-filled (sorry for the snark, but I'm relieved that I'm not the only one whose fingers misbehave) review here, including this:

Mostly though, the telecast glitches reinforced the well-oiled nature of the incumbent golf networks, with way too many jarring cuts, announcer over-talking (especially when

audio engineers picked up conversations) and a rough start for lead man Joe Buck.

Pretty much everything dreaded when USGA moved its championships to Fox Sports was evident in the initial telecast. Way too much Fox bringing attention to themselves and not enough golf. Cheesy attempts at hipster status (Buck declaring "There's some Fox attitude!" the first time rock and roll was used to commercial). And dated looking graphics employing the chunky Fox font while the Fox logo was on screen at all times yet inexplicably not given a watermark finish. (Branding baby!)

So, Geoff, was there anything innovative or noteworthy about the broadcast?

The telecast also displayed glimpses of everything golf fans could hope for with the naming of Mark Loomis as coordinating producer: some fresh efforts to use drones for filming holes more tactfully (not just flying down the center as fast as possible), some excellent rear camera views to better show off course architecture, and most intriguing of all,"Fox Labs" attempts to show green contours and hole locations better.

Geoff provided this thumbnail of that reference to green contours (the caption is his):

A high-contrast look at the 18th green contours seemed to have potential but late day shadows dulled the effect.

I didn't see any of the broadcast and this screenshot is less than clarifying, so we may have to wait for the U.S. Open to see whether it's worth the bother.  But at least the focus is on a worthy target, as anything that helps the viewer perceive the green contours is helpful.  This other innovation seems far less promising:

Wow, does that look tacky... does anyone think it helps?  It reminds me of when they traced the puck with such a similar colored beam on hockey broadcasts long before we all had HD TV's.  My guess is that the USGA will nix this before Chambers Bay.  

The Tour Confidential boys also had at this one, with these notable responses:

SHIPNUCK: For all the hullaballoo, it looked like pretty much every other golf telecast I've ever seen. Announcers only occasionally add to my enjoyment, but they can certainly detract from it. I thought Greg Norman did a nice job in his debut, but Joe Buck was trying way, way too hard. He needs to slow his roll going forward. 

VAN SICKLE: The training wheels are still on at Fox. It's too soon to rush to a snap judgment but other than Steve Flesch, it was pretty much amateur hour. I was expecting better, even on the first telecast. We'll see.

Buck is an avid golfer, a single-digit player who belongs to the same St. Louis club as USGA Prez Tom O'Toole (coincidence?).  But the rest of his resume makes him an odd fit for golf, as his Sunday presence on the Fox NFL broadcast made clear.

But while it'll be mid-June before we see how much progress they make, the important thing seems to be that the check cleared.

Travelin' Joe, Unplugged - I've had lots of fun with Joe over the last year, mostly as a result of his long-winded and nonsensical answers as part of the Tour Confidential round-table.  His answer cited above is a fine axample of the genre, as was his comment a couple of weeks ago that Tiger would be relaxed at the Hero World Challenge because there's no all-important FedEx Cup points on the line...after all, it's common knowledge that Tiger kept a poster of Jack's FedEx Cup wins on his wall as a youngster...But I digress.

So, the panel is asked about Monty's comment that Rory's best is better than Tiger's best was, and here's just the opening snippet from Joe's Tolstoy-length response:

Open mouth, insert both splayed feet -- again. Rory's awesome. Let's admire somebody with such a flawless swing, affable disposition and limitless potential. However, he can't sniff Tiger's tighty-whities.

Joe, I'm perfectly willing to recognize you as an expert in the foot-in-mouth thing, but how exactly are you sure that Tiger's tighties are white?