Weekend Wrap

Golf is the one game in which the player’s ball is not subject to the interference of the opponent. It is a question of supremacy of accurate strokes without human interference, but there exists interference, nevertheless, and its name is ‘hazard,’ which is golfese for trouble. 

A.W. TILLINGHAST

Who wants to break the news to Tillie that "hazard" has been relegated to the dustbin of history?   In favor of "penalty area".  I'm totally down with these changes as there's no value in anything created by a bunch of dead white men....

Homa At Last - The "Can't Miss Kid" that missed quite dramatically, until he didn't:

Homa is a PGA TOUR champion less than two years after he couldn’t find a fairway or make a cut. The former NCAA champion, a collegiate contemporary of Justin Thomas,

was embarrassed to go into locker rooms. He wanted to spare his peers from playing practice rounds with him.

Now he’s a winner at Quail Hollow Club, where the list of champions includes Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy and Jason Day. Homa started Sunday with a share of the lead, then went out and shot the low round of the day. 

That’s not what you usually see from players pursuing their first PGA TOUR title. Especially when their last season went the way Homa’s did. He missed 15 of 17 cuts and made less than $20,000.

Max was quite the stud at Cal, yet spent a maddening two years in the golf wilderness.  Bob Harig captures some of the lows:

He lost his Tour card following the 2015 season and had to return to the Web.com Tour. 

He got it back, then made just two of 17 cuts in 2017, playing those events in 61-over par 

and dropping outside of the top 1,000 in the world. 

Even after returning to the PGA Tour this season, he missed his first six cuts, then slowly began to find some success -- although he never contended until this weekend. He began 2019 ranked 836th in the world and was 417th at the start of the week. 

Improved driving has been a big part of the turnaround, leading to confidence. 

"Whenever I drive it well, I feel great,'' Homa said. "I went through some real lows with my driver a couple years ago out here. I don't remember what my worst one was, but it was embarrassing. I was hitting like seven provisionals a tournament.

He now gets a slot at Bethpage and Augusta, and a chance at fulfilling all those grandiose predictions of success.  Though perhaps those assumptions of success were the cause of the two lost years.

It's a brutal game we play, and it's also a hard life out there for the struggling player trying to make it.  Remember that Alan Shipnuck bit about the players respecting the grind?  This is a prime example thereof....

Clowns To The Left of Me.... - Alternative title, Dog Bites Man....  Because, our story begins with Brandel Chamblee beclowning himself again...  Stop me if you've heard this before.

Our setting is a podcast in which the estimable Jaime Diaz is interviewing Brandel in the aftermath of Tiger's Masters win, and I'll let Dylan Dethier take it from here:

Golf Channel’s Brandel Chamblee and Jaime Diaz sat down recently to dive into Tiger Woods’ Masters win in a long, thoughtful conversation on their podcast. The two

explored Tiger’s place in the game, whether his comeback was more improbable than Ben Hogan’s and much more. But perhaps their most interesting conversation topic was a question Jaime posed: Is Tiger Woods the best golfer in the world? 

“Let me ask you, just directly — is he still the best player?” Diaz asked after a long string of praise from Chamblee. “When he plays, and he’s ready, is he the best player?”

Chamblee paused, considering his words carefully. 

“I don’t know that the difference is going to be as substantial as it used to be. His putting is slightly worse, he’s not quite as long. He’s certainly there — he’s thereabouts. I think again if you’re just looking at one aspect of a fluidity, yes, he probably is.”

One aspect of a fluidity?   Commence eye-rolling....

It's Brandel so you know there's more coming:

Woods’ Masters win catapulted him to World No. 6. But Chamblee contests that of anyone in the world, only two can keep up with the 43-year-old. 

“In the aggregate, you’d have Dustin and Rory who are the likely two who could hang with him,” he said. “Jon Rahm’s still got a lot to learn. His iron play’s not as sharp as it needs to be to be the best player in the world, and it forces him to have to pitch the ball…his pitching, generally speaking, is not as good as it needs to be. And Spieth’s game has fallen off. So it’s really only two players who could challenge him. 

“Irrespective of the world rankings, I think all of us know what we need to know without the world rankings telling us, and it’s Rory and it’s Dustin Johnson and it’s Tiger Woods, but Tiger’s simply not going to play enough to get the points that he needs to get.”

This isn't a favorite discussion topic for me, because it's so difficult to know what each participant means by seemingly simple terms such as "now", a point Brandel tries to get to with that last point.  

But of course its those he omits that cause the furor, one in particular that has milked his lack of respect from the media to the point where it's become tiresome.  Fortunately, in the present circumstances that young man has taken the high road:

The Tour Confidential panel strangely leads with this mini-spat, though they seem unclear as to whether to take it seriously:

1. Golf Channel analyst Brandel Chamblee said only two players can challenge Tiger Woods as the best in the world right now — Dustin Johnson and Rory McIlroy. (Three-time major winner Brooks Koepka wasn’t fond of this opinion from Chamblee.) Did Chamblee get this one right? If not, who are your picks?

Alan Shipnuck: Both Dustin and Rory are special talents but they’ve also shown plenty of vulnerability in the biggest events. Why does it only have to be two? It’s bizarre not to include Koepka in this discussion, and Justin Thomas has as much firepower as anyone on Tour. This seems like an unnecessary construct for a debate. 

Josh Sens: Well said. I’m with Alan on the odd construct. Even odder is omitting Koepka, who has all the tools DJ and Rory bring, and seems more immune to the brain cramps that have plagued those other two from time to time.

Should anyone care, I disagree with both of Brandel's premises.  The omission of Brooksie will garner the pixels, but I would take exception with his assumption that Tiger is in the top tier.  The man has won twice in the last two seasons, and one of those was against a mere twenty-nine players and the other took quite a bit of help.  

Jeff Ritter: Brandel skipped several guys, including those above, plus Frankie Molinari, who took down Tiger at the Open before faltering against him at Augusta, and Jon Rahm, who clipped Woods at the Ryder Cup. Or, heck, Phil, who beat him at The Match in Vegas. The broader point is that Tiger is once again firmly entrenched in the upper part of golf’s upper crust, and I agree with it. 

Michael Bamberger: The whole concept is half nutty, the anointing of the best player in 

the world “right now.” The best player in the world for the week of the Masters was Tiger; at the Players it was Rory; at the Ryder Cup, it was Tommy Fleetwood; at the Open it was Molinari. Needless to say, at the U.S. Open and the PGA last year, it was Koepka. Had Molinari taken a more conservative line on 12 on Sunday at Augusta, the conversation would be can Tiger win another major, not is he the best in the world. Molinari would be the best player in the world, alongside BK and the Sunshine Band. Is Woods the best of all-time? That’s a real question. Over the course of a year, you can identify a best player, on the basis of wins and times in contention. 

Dylan Dethier: I actually like the question — who holds the championship belt?! It’s an awesome debate. But Big Game Brooks does belong in that conversation, especially as Rory and D.J. continue to show they’re hardly perfect. I think there’s an upper crust that currently includes Rory, D.J., Koepka, Tiger, Molinari and, maybe a half-step back, Justin Rose and Justin Thomas. That’s largely recency bias and gut feeling talking — but that’s partly the point, isn’t it? Side note: When Koepka retweeted a joke I made on Saturday about this take, I got dragged into Brandel Chamblee’s mentions for about 24 hours and man, that’s an unhealthy place to spend time. I think Chamblee does a great job; he researches hard and always guns for an engaging, entertaining angle. Sure, sometimes he takes things that extra 20% (i.e. Dustin Johnson’s “greatest shot in the history of golf”) but the level of vitriol has me perplexed.

I love Dylan for reminding us of Brandel's nonsense about that DJ drive at Kapalua a year or so ago,  in which he recognized the TOC has having comparable importance to majors.  We should remember at all times that Brandel is in the entertainment business, but ranking the guy that's won three of his last seven majors below the flavor of the month is just bat-shit crazy at the end of the day.... And Rory?  Why do I bother?

I Got The Horse Right Here.... - I haven't seen it yet, but I gather there was a bit of controversy about a horse race over the weekend.  Pat Ralph aggregates the Twitter reactions from the golf world, and you might notice a trend:

Why, did the Churchill Downs stewards ask for a mulligan?  Quite the show of support for the powers that be in our game....

The Jokes Write Themselves - News broke last week that Bubba has a new sponsor:

Bubba Watson announced a multi-year partnership on Wednesday with cbdMD, a company that produces products containing cannabidiol, which is credited with combating pain, anxiety and depression among other things. 

cbdMD products include hemp-oil extracts, gummies, topicals, oils, bath bombs and pet items. 

“I was taking the product, I love the product and for me, you know, it’s all about safety,” Watson said in an interview with The Street. “So for me, on a performance level, I got to have safety, I’ve got to [take] drug tests, I’ve got to do all these things and to protect myself and be able to play competitive golf.” 

The 40-year-old says he takes cbdMD products because he’s getting older and they help him deal with inflammation and allow him to sleep better. In a statement, Watson called the cbdMD products the safest on the market and said he’s “proud to partner with them to help millions feel better.”

 It's hard out there for a blogger, as reality continues its vicious assault on satire....  

The TC panel offers their thoughts on the matter as well:

3. Bubba Watson announced a partnership with cbdMD last week, which comes less than two months after the PGA Tour reportedly issued a warning to its golfers about the use of CBD, a natural compound found in cannabis. Bold move by Watson, who said he uses CBD to help him sleep, or nothing to see here? 

Shipnuck: I live in California, dude — they’re practically dispensing CBD in the school cafeterias. If the Tour is going to sanction alcohol and gambling, it’s crazy to take a stand against CBD, which has so many health benefits. 

Sens: Hold on. Let me finish chewing my gummies… Okay. Nah. A reported warning is not a ban. And I don’t see a ban coming either. 

Ritter: I just wonder if the gum might cause a PGA Tour drug test — or in two years, an Olympic drug test — to pop. Since there are apparently still some unknowns with what exactly is in this gum, I think Bubba and anyone involved with it is taking a needless risk — not to their health, but to their reputation if they eventually face a potential suspension. 

Bamberger: Bold. He’s the first in. First in is a good place to be in any growth industry. The product should be used with care. Tourgum (registered trademark) is likely coming. 

Dethier: Nothing to see here. These guys are all looking to chill out, one way or another. Carry on, Bubba.

It would seem to be a type cast endorsement, though that might actually make it riskier to the extent that Bubba continues to parade his social anxiety.  But does this stuff actually do anything?  lest there be any confusion, the cbd quite clearly doesn't have enough THC in it to have any of the psychoactive results of marijuana, though it's not clear whether the trace elements are sufficient to result in a positive drug test.  Stay tuned...

Shark, Attacked - If you've been with us consistently, you're well-versed in Greg Norman's propensity for topless photography. as well as tone-deaf self-promotion....  So we've got a twofer on offer today, first this typical over-sharing:

I know....  I can't unsee it, so why shouldn't the reader see how I suffer in amusing you?

But then there's this even more curious posting, to which you'll agree that he's got his finger on the pulse of the zeitgeist:

You have to agree that the terrain behind him screams out fr a golf course, no?

I'm actually sure of the timing of those two items, but our Sharkie continues to amuse us....  And I'll not even remind you of the pimped out golf cart that was going to save our game....  Ooops, guess I just did.

All of this is necessary to segue to a Eamon Lynch article from a few weeks ago, that serves as an epic putdown of the topless one:

Bulletproof self-belief has been the hallmark of many a Masters champion, men with the ability to temper emotion and summon clarity, even in the midst of a thrilling, chaotic shootout. That character trait is why Jack Nicklaus owns six green jackets, why Woods has five, why Nick Faldo has three, and why Greg Norman is often naked on Instagram.

We are not worthy, Eamon....  You got any more?

I'll never find anything better on which to make my exit, so I'll see you lovely folks tomorrow.