Soporific Sunday

The golf world is as quiet as a mouse this morning.... they must have been watching football deep into the night.  But that Patriot-Ravens game was a good one, wasn't it?

Kapalua Komprerssion - I saw none of it, as the humbacks lost out to fullbacks and their ilk.  But that is one compressed leaderboard, isn't it?

Zach Johnson putted for birdie on every hole, the fifth time in his career that he didn't

miss a green in regulation. Jimmy Walker got in the mix with five birdies in eight holes. Russell Henley and Bae Sang-Moon held their own on another gorgeous day at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions. 

They were part of a four-way tie for the lead Saturday, the largest log jam at the 36-hole mark in the 17 years this winners-only event has been played at Kapalua.

Can we please decide if his name is Bae Sang-Moon or Sang-Moon Bae?  The four tied at -11 seems less notable than the fact that there are another ten players within 2 shots.   And a few of those guys can play...

Golf Photography - This is not a particular field of knowledge for me, but the folks at The Loop had two posts that might be of interest to some.  First related to a new Nikon camera:

Nikon's AW1 ($750), which is on display this week at CES, comes with all the bells and whistles of today's best DSLRs (it's WiFi enabled, it captures full HD video and shoots images at 60 frames per second), but two of its features really stand out from a golfer's point of view: First, it's waterproof and shockproof (oh, you submerged it under 49 feet of water? NO PROBLEM.); second, its "slow view" feature allows you to capture, say, an entire golf swing, then slow down the clip to select a perfectly timed shot. Gone are the days when you fall short of snapping a perfect photo because you pressed the shutter either too prematurely or too late.

This looks like a pretty darn cool camera, though I'm not completely sure what the "Slow-view" feature does.  But it takes 15 fps in burst mode, which is pretty impressive.  Though to be fair, the video capture on the new iPhone is also quite remarkable, as I saw one of our pros using it in lessons.

This second device seems targeted at a microscopically small market segment:

It's nearly impossible to convey the brilliance of a golf course in just one image. Every

hole is a 360-degree experience, and part of that experience HAS to get cut out of a traditional two-dimensional, square photo. Enter, Ricoh's Theta ($300).

The camera, which is on display at CES this week, has two 180-degree fisheye lenses, one in the front and another in the back, that take high definition images at the same time. Those images are instantly stitched together to offer a 360-degree panoramic image. The WiFi-enabled camera also captures high definition video, which means you can watch multiple views of just one golf swing. The jury is out on whether you're prepared to watch that kind of footage.

For what it's worth, I take quite a few golf photos and just upgraded (the flash died on the prior version) to this Sony travel zoom.  It's now got a 30x optical zoom, which is overkill to a certain extent as it's difficult to hold the camera sufficiently still at full zoom.  But I've been very happy with it and its predecessor for golf, as the 10 fps burst mode is perfect for a golf swing (yes, 15 fps could well be more perfect) and its Sweep Panorama feature gives about a 180 degree view.  Not bad for a device that still fits in a back jeans pocket.

This brings the camera blogging portion of our program to a conclusion.

Phoenix On My Mind - Not sure about you, Dear Reader, but I've always had mixed feelings about the Tour's Phoenix stop.  Though those reactions have trended more positive in recent years, as I've become increasingly thankful for anything that relieves the mind-numbing sameness of week-to-week life on Tour.  

This AZCentral.com item on the history of the event is a tad self-congratulatory, but it does cover some interesting history:

The Waste Management Phoenix Open is just another golf tournament in the same way

Mardi Gras is just another happy hour. 

Our PGA Tour stop transcends golfers and galleries. It's more than vodka, vanity and the clickety-clack of high heels on a cart path. 

It's a tournament that overcomes anarchy and alcohol issues. 

It's a tournament Tiger Woods couldn't diminish with his 13-year absence, a hiatus that comes to an end this year.

Overcomes or embraces?  Whatever... But no Tiger has been the death knell for others, see for instance The International, so one can't deny that the event has prospered in his absence.  And some more background on Tiger passing up this event:

Even worse, the PGA's golden boy was in the crosshairs. In 1999, authorities arrested a drunk heckler that was following Woods, later finding a gun in his fanny pack. Two years later, an unruly fan threw an orange on the green where Woods' group was putting. That's when Tiger took his talents elsewhere.

I knew there has been a second incident that involved more than a loose orange peel from a Tequila Sunrise, but couldn't quickly find an account of it through Google.  I also like the accounting of the pushback from the Ponte Vedra Family, which is really quite rich considering how Commissioner Ratched treats his sponsors.  But this conclusion is justified:

The return of Tiger Woods will bring everything full circle. And here's the best part: 

We don't even need him. The Waste Management Phoenix Open is the rare non-major golf tournament that survived a 13-year absence from the biggest draw in golf. 

Better yet, it thrived without the big cat. No other PGA Tour stop can say that.

This year they get the Big Cat and the Super Bowl.  There might be some partying going down.

Orange is the New Black Ten is the New Twenty - Per Doug Ferguson, golf has its own version of grading on the curve:

There was a time when 10 victories was good, but not even close to great. 

The PGA Tour awards a lifetime exemption for 20 wins. Four active players on the PGA Tour have at least 20 victories — Woods, Phil Mickelson (42), Vijay Singh (34) and Love. But there are 33 others from previous eras who are in the 20-win club. 

Maybe it's time to lower the bar.

I was actually unaware of the lifetime exemption for twenty wins, which explains how Davis and Vijay can still tee it up.  I'm unclear whether Doug is speaking of general standards of greatness or specifically of the exemption, but since you'll ask here's the answer:

It's not that long of a list. Ernie Els has 19 and Jim Furyk has 16. David Toms and David Duval are at 13 as they wind down their careers. Steve Stricker and Justin Leonard are at 12, while Zach Johnson and Adam Scott have won 11 times.

Ernie with four majors and a gazillion worldwide wins is the only guy on the list I'd even consider for a lifetime exemption.  The others are all nice players who have had good careers, but I only want them sucking up valuable tee times if they earn it with recent play.

But at a more basic level, do we believe Doug's premise that it's harder to win on Tour these days?  I do accept that the talent pool is far deeper than in prior eras, though I'm not sure that's much of a distinction over the last decade or two.  But there are mitigating factors, such as the increasing number of events, including easy to win (on a relative basis) limited-field and off-field events.  The schedule is so stretched out that many events, likely much of the West Coast swing, will have relatively week fields.

Additionally, we may be in a period with no dominant golfer.  No offense to Rory, who can play a little, but isn't as consistent as peak Tiger and won't be skimming 7-9 wins a season off the top.  At least I don't think he will, but stay tuned.