The weather seems to finally be warming up just a bit though, alas, the golf game isn't going along for the ride... Is this the new normal people keep speaking of?
Valspar Variations - It was pretty clear that this guy was going to break through soon:
Coming into this final round, Burns wasn’t quite in why-hasn’t-he-won-yet territory. But he wasn’t far away, either, thanks to his consistently excellent play—Saturday evening marked the eighth time that Burns had led or co-led after a round in the 2020-21 season, two more than any other golfer.
Before this week, the most recent time came at the Genesis Invitational, where he played preposterously good golf to lead a star-studded field by five at the halfway point. He started the final round that week at Riviera with a two-shot lead, shot two-under 69 on a major-ready golf course, and lost.There was also the 54-hole lead at the Vivint Houston Open last November, where he finished T-7, and the brutal 75 he shot from the final group at the Farmers Insurance Open in January.Burns doesn’t say much, a laconic Louisianan who says more with his eyes than his mouth. The few words he does offer suggest a steadfast belief in the Law of Averages—that if he continued to put himself in position, one of these days it’s going to happen.“You have a better understanding of what it takes,” Burns said of the near-misses. “And I think having those past chances that I wasn’t able to convert, I think it got me ready for this moment. Going into the back nine [caddie], Travis [Perkins] and I just really wanted to stick to our game plan, stick to the process of just being really engaged on each shot. And we were able to do that.”
Of course, the key shot wasn't struck by the winner:
Sam Burns and Keegan Bradley had traded blows for 30 consecutive holes, seemingly glued to one another at the tip-top of the Valspar Championship leader board. They shared the 36-holelead, shot matching 69s in the final pairing on Saturday and had both taken 46 shots through 12 holes on Sunday, three clear of third as they headed to the 13th tee on a feisty Copperhead Course at Innisbrook.The par 3 measures 182 yards on the card but played far less—a 9-iron for the bombers, an 8-iron for the mortals. Burns played first and his 9 came up well short, on the dance floor but a solid 60 feet from the band. So Bradley pulled 8, ostensibly to fire away from the water and toward the middle of the green, content to let the decisive blow in this two-man battle come a bit later.
What followed was his worst shot of the week, a fanned cut that found the drink—the type of break Burns had been waiting for in an annoyingly long quest for PGA Tour win No. 1.
Never been much of a Keegan fan, but this reaction seems far more genuine than, say, Xander's comparable explanation at Augusta:
“I just hit a terrible shot,” Bradley said. “I hadn’t really hit a really bad shot all week, and you just can’t hit it there, obviously. But you can’t hit it right of the flag. And I just came out of it a little bit, it got gobbled up by the wind, if it goes another yard, it might have been in that bunker, but it was a bummer.”
Apparently Keegan didn't get the memo that he's supposed to tell us he flushed it... I do like his version better, though.
You might think that the purpose of a weekly roundtable of golf writers would be to discuss the major events contested that week, though employing CTRL-F: Burns on this week's Tour Confidential yields zero results. They do cover a couple of aspects of this event, first that feel-good story of the week:
4. This week, Michael Visacki Monday-qualified for the Valspar, and the video of his tearful reaction afterward, which included a call to his father, has garnered well over a million views. Visacki would miss the cut, but what is it, do you think, that causes stories like Visacki’s to pull at the heartstrings so much?
Bamberger: Because the game is hard, Visacki looks like us, and the dream will never die. Because of what Visacki did. I read something astonishing today. There have been 17,000
Americans to make it to the bigs. Millions playing Little League and even high school ball and only 17,000 have made it. The dream is one of the most powerful things there is in this world. Visacki let us see it unfold. Wonderful.
Sens: Long before there was Rocky vs. Apollo Creed, there was Hector vs. Achilles. Things didn’t work out nearly as well for Hector, but everyone rooted for him anyway. Who doesn’t pull for the underdog and cheer when they get their due? It’s a timeless story. It’s not unique to golf, but it makes great theater on whatever stage it happens.
Zak: I think they pull at the heartstrings because we know these people exist. And we pay them such little attention. And we know their lives are not easy. And we can much more reasonably put ourselves in their shoes. We all struggle with things related to work and our lives and make sacrifices. But Jordan Spieth winning the Valero doesn’t hit quite as hard as Visacki just simply qualifying. It has everything to do with being closer to Visacki in reality.
Berhow: For every pro we see throughout the long Tour season, there are thousands of ridiculously good players out there who can absolutely destroy golf courses with such ease — and yet they never make it this far. It’s nice to see it happen.
True enough, but there was also the Father-Son aspect to it as well. Of course, it's a nothingburger without the poignant video...
But if we're looking for a story with legs, it might just be the one involving Talor Gooch:
Golf Twitter can be its ugliest when gamblers—angry about their losing bets or fantasy lineups—tweet at a professional golfer for struggling in a particular tournament. Talor Gooch was a few messages on social media after missing the cut at the Valspar Championship, but he smartly (and graciously) turned the moment into a positive.Gooch shot 73-74 to miss the cut by four at the Valspar, but three bogeys in a row through the difficult stretch at the Copperhead course secured his fate to heading home for the weekend. It also sealed the fate of a gentleman’s DFS (daily fantasy sports) lineup, which prompted him to tweet at the former Oklahoma State golfer:
😂😂 did you bet on me? https://t.co/4YcxcAiAgd
— Talor Gooch (@TalorGooch) April 30, 2021
This is at least the second such story in the infancy of legalized sports betting, as back at Torrey we had one of the sports books reimbursing losers in light of PReed's tainted win. At the least, this seems a problematic business model, since the suckers are supposed to just shut up and take it. But they have Twitter, and no one on Twitter has ever shut up...
It's a bit comical, as the Twitter troll challenges Gooch to a $50K mini-golf shootout. Gooch was prepared to accept the challenge, pending confirmation of the availability of funds. Though, wouldn't you think this would be sufficient verification?
Gooch does get off a good one here:
3. Talor Gooch, after missing the cut at the Valspar, got into it with an online heckler who appeared to have bet on Gooch. To his credit, Gooch would actually Venmo a few Twitter users who showed they wagered on him. Should we be worried about the combination of social media access and the increase of golf gambling?
Bamberger: I try to avoid the word should. But yes. I think we should worry every time we see the phrase “social media.” But I do like email.
Sens: As someone who still communicates mostly by carrier pigeon, I’m in Mr. Bamberger’s camp on social media. But I don’t think the social media/gambling combo is any more fraught than social media combined with anything. The Tour is aware of potential gambling-related threats to the integrity of its competitions. It is doing what it can to guard against them. Those threats would be there with or without social media.
Zak: 1. Don’t read your mentions. 2. Especially don’t read them if gambling is involved. Really, I think the PGA Tour doesn’t want players to be considering players’ bets at all, but there was Jon Rahm telling people to not bet on him at the Masters when his wife was due with their first child. It’s an impossible line to strike. Really, DraftKings should be chomping at the bit. They sponsor Bryson. They should do some sort of free bet on Bryson to win, a la what Gooch did. Pay back users with credit if their bet on Bryson doesn’t hit. Or maybe they should do it with Gooch!
Berhow: If I were a pro golfer, or a pro athlete — which I’m not — I would let some agency run my account for me. Sounds like bliss! It’s not worth it for these guys, unless you are Max Homa, who is very good at sending tweets and golf balls.
Given the current news cycle, what do you think folks have assumed about Gooch's "engagement"? Yup:
To which Talor had this response:
Ummmm, Talor, you're not helping yourself here. I'm pretty sure you weren't consciously pimping for PIP, but your logic leaves a bit to be desired. Tiger is currently No. 93 in the OWGR, so I see a bit of a conflict between Nos. 1 and 3 above...
The message from Fortress Ponte Vedra Beach is that the actual golf is insufficient to hold our attention, so we need to be cauterized with gambling and other Live Under Par™ nonsense... Doesn't show much confidence in the product, though perhaps they're correct.
All Exemptions Are Special - Two stories relating to special exemptions have been in the news, and in both cases the reactions have been curious. The first concerns another moment of Phil being Phil:
1. Phil Mickelson missed the cut at this week’s Valspar Championship, then cited a lack of focus as the reason behind some of his struggles. Mickelson has yet to qualify for the U.S. Open in June, and he told ESPN that he was unsure if he would accept a special exemption if he didn’t. Do you think he should accept the invite if asked?
Michael Bamberger: My guess is that Phil’s focus issues have less to do with age and more to do with his resume. If he makes the cut at Tampa — if he wins at Tampa — does it change his life in any meaningful way? Playing good golf requires immense self-absorption, whether you’re a Ryder Cupper or good enough to keep your card for five years. It requires OCD for golf. At some point, life being life, you get worn out by it. Should he play in the U.S. Open if the USGA offers him a spot? When I was half the age I am now, I would have had an opinion. Now I would only say this: it’s completely and only up to Phil.
Josh Sens: Is it focus or hunger? Sounds more like the latter, and after all he’s accomplished — and all he has in the bank — that’s understandable. I don’t know about should but I’m guessing I’m not alone in hoping that he does. With his deep roots in San Diego and at Torrey Pines, he’s as natural an exemption as you could find.
Sean Zak: Phil should accept that hypothetical invite, if only for the fact that it would be rather offensive if he declined it. He hasn’t played nice with the USGA throughout most of his career, but if they’re trying to make a good note out of his storied career, then he should be a big man and accept.
Josh Berhow: I think he should and will accept an invite, if offered. Shaky relationship with the USGA or not, grudges or hard feelings start to mean less and less as you get older. He’s beloved everywhere but especially in San Diego. I think he’ll want to be there.
So much talent, so little to show for it...
First, note that this was the lead question, indicating a belief that this is the most important subject to be discussed at this juncture in our game. A ceremonial invite to a man who won't make the cut? Really?
Second, I'm not buying Mike and Josh's focus on hunger. Sure, I get it in a general sense, but do they really think Phil doesn't hunger for a U.S. Open win? After Winged Foot? After Shinny? Should I go on? I've got at least four more of those...
First and foremost, I don't take Phil's equivocation too seriously. It's easy to say now before qualification has been finalized that you want to earn your way in, but I expect he'll accept it in the end. But, more than anything, I take his reaction as an indication that he knows his time has passed and he'll just get beaten up for a couple of days should he play. The good news being that Phil and I have finally found common ground...
The second exemption item is Rickie's pass into the PGA Championship. Eamon Lynch, fresh off rationalizing that double-secret PIP slush fund, informs us that Oceana has always been at war with Eastasia:
Lynch: Bellyachers begone — Rickie Fowler’s free ride into PGA Championship is a good thing
At the very least, this should be interesting:
Like all professional golfers, Fowler is accustomed to criticism. The slings and arrows of Strokes Gained statistics will draw blood from even the very best, much less someone struggling withswing changes who has managed only four top 20 finishes in the past year. But whereas Spieth was scrutinized almost exclusively for his on-course performance, judgments on Fowler seem less about play than perception, the chaffing sense among golf fans that he is coasting down Easy Street.
Aspects of Fowler’s career certainly deserve auditing, such as his swing progress and the amount of time he devotes to servicing an apparently endless roster of sponsors. Yet he is popular among his peers, is unfailingly polite with fans, and his slump hasn’t been accompanied by churlish outbursts. He’s simply too vanilla to be polarizing, so it’s odd that it appears to be open season on Fowler for social media criticism.
Vanilla? The man that invented the color orange?
That seems a distinction without a difference, no? There's a reason that he was famously voted the most over-rated player on Tour, because his results were out of whack with both the talent level and PR buzz.
But here's where things start to get confusing, as Eamon muddies the waters greatly:
The composition of the field at major championships is always problematic—too many knackered old warhorses cluttering up the paddock; too many quality players sidelined for a no-hoper who got hot for 36 holes on a wet Monday in Columbus, Ohio; too many slender résumés playing thanks to out-of-the-way qualifiers. Special exemptions into the field are particularly fraught. The USGA has granted dozens of free rides into the U.S. Open since Ben Hogan received the first in 1966, but the criteria for such an exemption has remained largely unchanged, if unacknowledged.
I do agree in part with Eamon, as the inclusion of former champions at the PGA is a rather new and tired attempt to mimic the Masters. It's hard to contain my excitement at having Rich Beem and Todd Hamilton in the field, so no argument there.
Special invitations to majors typically have more to do with sentimentality than competitiveness, honoring an aging veteran with a lap of honor. The record books show one outlier: Hale Irwin, who won the ’90 U.S. Open as an invitee. He was 45 years old, a two-time champion in the ‘70s, five years removed from his last victory, in middling form and with a world ranking in the high 90s. Like Hogan and Snead and Palmer before him, Irwin was thought a ceremonial figure when the week began. Of the 34 invites handed out by the USGA since ’90, just one went to a man who could realistically have been considered competitive: Michael Campbell, in 2000, a year during which he won twice overseas.
This would seem to be the crux of his argument:
The two special invitations extended for the PGA Championship—to Fowler and John Catlin, an American who has won three times on the European Tour since September—represent a welcome break from the ceremonial convention. These aren’t past champions in the sunset of their careers or men with a nostalgic history at the venue. Catlin and Fowler, even with his current struggles, are both better bets to contend at Kiawah Island than dozens of players already in the field. These exemptions acknowledge the fluctuating ebb and flow of form among still-competitive players, and while a case can be made for others equally deserving of the free pass, it’s at least a better use of invites than letting a now-lame former thoroughbred canter around for a couple of days with no chance of making the weekend.
I don't if I'm being inconsistent, but I'm far more open to Catlin's invite than to Rickie's.
The question being ignored is, to me, why they think they need to correct their own qualification system. Rickie hasn't been injured, he's just not played well enough to meet the criteria. If said criteria have been shown to be lacking, they should be corrected. Otherwise, all we can conclude is that the PGA of America is running a popularity contest, and those usually don't end well.
The TC panel took a moment for Rickiegate as well:
2. Speaking of exemptions, Rickie Fowler, Golf Channel reported, will receive one into the PGA Championship later this month, as will John Catlin “based on their performances, playing records and OWGR position.” Are you good with Fowler, ranked No. 111 in the world, getting into the PGA through this route?Bamberger: Sure. Why not Rick? People like to watch him play.
Sens: Yep. It’s entertainment. And he has every bit as good a chance of contending as another fan-favorite (John Daly) did when he rode around in a cart at Bethpage, packing cigs and Diet Coke. I was okay with that, too, though everyone knows that real Coke, with sugar, not corn syrup, pairs better with tobacco and tar than that diet bleach.
Zak: Eh, I’m not totally bothered. But his OWGR position isn’t great, his playing record in the event isn’t spectacular, and his career record is starting to get litigated in a truly negative way. But are we really going to get upset about this? No.
Berhow: No issues here. Two top 5s in 11 PGA Championship starts, although this invite is obviously based on popularity just as much as previous results. But still, these organizations can invite whoever they want. You can do a lot worse than Rickie Fowler.
Sure, Josh, John Daly as just one example... Of course, as a former champion, he was already in the field, so we presumably get the tingle of watching him bounce around Kiawah (like Bethpage, a place that doesn't allow carts for paying customers) in a golf cart.... On Thursday and Friday, in any event.
The Important Stuff - Announcer Sean McDonough appeared on the Subpar Podcast with Colt Knost and Drew Stoltz, and dished on the golf games of his fellow members of the commentariat:
He can talk a good golf game. And McDonough eventually said he can walk a good one, too, though he told Knost and co-host Drew Stoltz that his “snarky little hooks” have “a little lessaltitude sometimes than you’d like.” Still, he said, his game holds up well when compared to his contemporaries.
Mike Tirico? “I’m better than Tirico, for sure,” McDonough said.
Al Michaels? “Oh way better than Al Michaels,” he said.
Jay Bilas? “Bilas is a vanity handicap — he says he’s a 6 or 7,” he said. “I play him even and win money and have.”
Joe Buck? McDonough said he’s never played with the broadcaster, but “from what I understand, Joe was low, single-digits and pretty good.”
Jim Nantz? Another announcer McDonough has never teed it up with, but “he’s one of those people who’s good at everything. He really is.”
McDonough rattled off a few more ESPN colleagues. John Buccigross is a 4 or 5 handicap. Michael Eaves is a 4 or 5, but “I might be selling him short actually.”
Always fun to talk inside baseball, though this veers far into TMI territory:
“I tell you who’s not at your place — Chris Berman,” Knost said. “I got paired with him one year at AT&T. Doesn’t have the smoothest game.”
“No,” McDonough said.
“But he is a blast to play with,” Knost said.
“He is a blast to play with,” McDonough said. “I played in the Deutsche Bank pro-am with him one year, and I think Padraig Harrington was our pro. Talk about a fun guy to play with in a pro-am. And the one thing I remember about that day is I’ve never seen anyone sweat like Berman.”
“I was literally about to bring that up,” Stoltz said. “He’s the only guy that brings a sweat rag around Pebble Beach when it’s like 50.”
“Yeah, he had on tan khaki pants, and it looked like he had jumped in a pond,” McDonough said.
Heh. Not the least bit surprising, but still funny...
A Deep Dive on Omar Uresti - File this with the Rickie exemption. We may not know exactly where to draw the line, but we can all see that the process by which the PGA Championship field is set could use a rethink:
There’s a touch of romanticism to earning a spot in the field at Kiawah: the club pros, the guys who fold shirts and give lessons all year, getting a chance to tee it up alongside the Rorys andDustins and Jordans for a week. Which is why there was a healthy chorus of blowback when Uresti first won this tournament in 2017. Why was a guy who played 11 full seasons on the PGA Tour—and who is not currently on staff at any golf club—competing in an event created for guys who spend their weekends buzzing around in carts waving to members?The answer is twofold: Uresti isn’t breaking any rules, and a lot of the guys he’s playing against don’t exactly do what you think they do.
OK, it seems to be straw men all the way... No one has accused Uresti of breaking any rules, though those rules are not above discussion, are they? Hold that answer until you read this:
The PGA Professional Championship was known as the PGA Club Professional Championship for the first 38 years of its existence after its first playing in 1968, and that old name (gone since 2006) certainly plays a role in the criticism. But the tournament is not limited to club pros. Any PGA of America member who is a Class A PGA professional is eligible, so long as they have made less than 10 starts on professional tours (including developmental and senior tours) during the last 12 months, not including majors. Uresti is indeed a Class A, a title he earned, in a stroke of irony, by being a member of the PGA Tour for 20 years. And he’s played just four events on pro tours in the past year—three missed cuts on the PGA Tour and a T-63 on the PGA Tour Champions.
So, let me see if I follow... The man is a legitimate member of an organization devoted to the promotion of teaching professionals, and his membership was earned by his success as a touring professional? And you think this makes any kind of sense? I don't care, as it quite obviously doesn't affect my life. But can we not understand why those actual club professionals are a tad miffed?
As Uresti himself notes, there's some grey area here:
“A lot of people don’t know what I do on the side,” Uresti said after his 2017 victory. “Not that I’m a full-time shop guy. But I have some kids and juniors who I teach on the side. I give free pointers to members at Onion Creek where I play and practice. I host a fundraiser for The First Tee of Greater Austin, the Omar Uresti Invitational. I play in other fundraisers.
On the side of what?
As for that bit about the guys not doing what you think they do, this is the payoff:
Which brings us to our second point. Would it be nice to have a tournament limited to guys who do run member-guests and don’t have time to practice like tour pros? Perhaps, but this simply isn’t that event. While the majority of the competitors do, indeed, have an affiliation with a club, several aren’t there working on a daily (or, in some cases, weekly) basis. The PGA Professional Championship is the crown jewel of the “club pro” circuit—there are tournaments year-round, and these guys play in them, and their employers understand that having a great player representing their course brings a certain cache. So they grant them time to work on their game with the hope that they will play their way onto TV or into news articles, with their name attached to the course’s.
Take Alex Beach, who entered this week as the defending champion after winning in 2019 (last year’s edition was canceled due to the pandemic) and finished tied for sixth. Beach is 32 and represents Westchester Country Club in New York, but told Golf Digest last year that his “goal is definitely to earn full status on tour, and play full time.”
It's for sure a bit of a mess. As I noted previously, the bigger issue would seem to be that Uresti's success in his 50's would seem to highlight the inferiority of the level of play, and question the logic of allocating twenty precious spots in the field to them (which issue also ties into the Rickie exemption discussed above).
That's all for today kids, but there shouldn't be any issue with our traditional Midweek Musings on Wednesday. See you then.
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