Tuesday Trifles

A bit of a late arrival at the keyboard, though for all the best reasons.  Specifically, two guys that parked themselves in my lap.  Normally I'd stiff you, but some interesting things to cover, including a Tiger sighting.

Those Motorcycles Don't Sell Themselves - A full ten months after the car accident and suddenly Tiger is in our face.  First the time suck of that 3-second swing video, and now this:

Exclusive: Tiger Woods discusses golf future in first in-depth interview since car accident

In depth, you say?  Well, one mans Mariana Trench is another's...

In a 30-minute interview with Golf Digest, Tiger Woods opens up about a painful year, a possible return to golf, and son Charlie's progress as a player

Thirty minutes, eh?  Didn't know one could pause Call of Duty for that long...

 This seems a strange place to begin:

“I think something that is realistic is playing the tour one day—never full time, ever again—but pick and choose, just like Mr. [Ben] Hogan did. Pick and choose a few events a year and you play around that,” Woods said during a Zoom interview with Golf Digest’s Henni Koyack from his South Florida home. “You practice around that, and you gear yourself up for that. I think that’s how I’m going to have to play it from now on. It’s an unfortunate reality, but it’s my reality. And I understand it, and I accept it.”

Henni Kovack?  The man's been out of sight for ten months and his first interview is with someone neither you nor I have ever heard of.  Obviously she's been vetted and deemed safe, but she'll know what subjects to avoid.  For those thinking he might talk about what actually happened, you've not been paying attention the last twenty-five years:

Woods suffered comminuted open fractures to both the tibia and the fibula in his right leg after losing control of his vehicle outside of Los Angeles on Feb. 23. He was rushed to Harbor-UCLA

Medical Center and subsequently transferred to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where he spent three weeks and faced the possibility of amputation.

“There was a point in time when, I wouldn’t say it was 50/50, but it was damn near there if I was going to walk out of that hospital with one leg. Once I [kept it], I wanted to test and see if I still had my hands. So even in the hospital, I would have [girlfriend] Erica [Herman] and [friend] Rob [McNamara] throw me something. Throw me anything.”

One of the first memories Woods has after the accident is asking for a golf club to toy around with while in his hospital bed. Such began a rehabilitation process that included three months in a hospital-type bed in his home. Next, a wheelchair. He then progressed to crutches, which allowed him to regain independence and move around at his own will.

Now our Tiger has never shown any great appreciation for the unwashed masses, and doesn't seem to realize that this ode to the outdoors sounds like Joe Six Pack during the pandemic lockdown:

“Adding that part into my day-to-day life was so rewarding because I’d been stuck in a house. Granted, it’s a pretty nice house I’ve built for myself, but I hadn’t been able to do the one thing I love to do: I love to go outside and just be outside. Sometimes I just crutch and lay on the grass for an hour because I want to be outside. Missing the contact of a golf ball hit properly is one of the better feelings.”

He does know about Covid, no?

But compare and contrast this to that lede bit above.  I'm not clear on exactly what game he's playing, but clearly we're being played:

“I have so far to go … I’m not even at the halfway point,” he said. “I have so much more muscle development and nerve development that I have to do in my leg. At the same time, as you know, I’ve had five back operations. So I'm having to deal with that. So as the leg gets stronger, sometimes the back may act up. … It’s a tough road. But I’m just happy to be able to go out there and watch Charlie play, or go in the backyard and have an hour or two by myself with no one talking, no music, no nothing. I just hear the birds chirping. That part I’ve sorely missed.”

This is why that happy talk above annoyed me so.  He's logically so far away from knowing whether he can ever regain enough strength and speed to be competitive out there, and it would have been interesting to hear some candor about his progression.  But Tiger doesn't do candor, so he's here for his own reasons, and those reasons don't impact my life.

I'm often unable to pass up the cheap shot, and this Golf.com header is a perfect example.  Quite obviously written before confirmation that His Highness would show in Albany, it's an easy lay-up:

Tiger Woods’ tournament is this week. Here are 5 reasons why we might see Tiger.

I kind of nailed it in that header, there are motorcycles to sell....

Lee Elder, RIP -  How about we segue to a black golfer about whom your humble blogger actually cares?

Lee Elder, who broke the color barrier at the Masters, died on Sunday. He was 87.

Elder made 448 starts on the PGA Tour, winning four times. His victory at the 1974 Monsanto

Open earned an invite to the 1975 Masters, where he became the first Black golfer to play in the tournament. It was an achievement that brought out the worst of humanity, as Elder received death threats leading up to his appearance at Augusta National. The danger forced Elder to rent two houses during Masters week so that his would-be antagonizers would not know where he was. In the face of this cruelty, Elder shot 74 and 78, missing the cut. He would play at the Masters five more times, his best finish a T-17 in 1979.

In the fall of 2020, Augusta National announced it would celebrate Elder’s legacy by naming him an Honorary Starter along with Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player for the annual ceremony at the 2021 Masters. Though Elder was not able to hit an opening tee shot this April he was able to join Nicklaus and Player at the first tee and received the loudest ovation of the three.

"For me and my family, I think it was one of the most emotional experiences that I have ever witnessed or been involved in," Elder said following the ceremony. "It is certainly something that I will cherish for the rest of my life."

A class act, and an instance in which the powers that be actually paid tribute while Lee was still with us.   

Of course, the honor was marred by the selfishness of the noxious Player clan, who should rightfully be banned from Augusta in perpetuity.

Obviously many will rightfully point to Augusta's delay in allowing a black man to compete, and there's plenty to support that position.  But there's a secondary aspect of Augusta's actions that bear scrutiny as well, and for which they received much criticism. For when the Augusta Grand Poobahs decided that it would be great to have a black player in the Masters, they didn't jury-rig their qualification process, they waited for a black golfer to earn his way into the Masters, a decision with which I agreed.  

To me that was good for golf, good for the Masters and, most importantly, good for Lee Elder.  Because as we look back at the life of this worthy man, we can say with certainty that he earned his way in, and isn't that far better than if he had been an affirmative action entrant?  

R.I.P.

The Plot Thickens Sickens - We are headed for some kind of conflagration it seems.  Yesterday we pointed towards that Saudi event in February, now an Asian Tour event opposite the Crosby Clambake on the calendar.

Maintaining their ho-hum approach, the Saudi event has released its field, which is shockingly strong:

The question of who will blink first regarding a looming standoff between players wishing to compete in next February’s Saudi International and officials with the PGA Tour and DP World Tour trying to keep them from playing grew more interesting—and intense—on Monday. That’s when Golf Saudi officials sent out a press release trumpeting a list of 25 top American and European players—including 11 major champions—who they say have committed to playing at Royal Greens Golf Club near Jeddah.

The list includes several players who had previously competed or won the event (Dustin Johnson was the champ in 2019 and 2021, Graeme McDowell in 2020), which was on the DP World Tour (formerly European Tour) schedule from its inception in 2019 until 2021. But when Golf Saudi began making overtures toward starting its own golf series and trying to recruit high-profile players to be the main attractions, tour officials in Europe and the United States distanced themselves from the event. Reportedly, they told players that they would no longer be given releases to compete in the Saudi Invitational and would be disciplined if they were to play in the event anyway.

Here is that field in its entirety:

Abraham Ancer

Adri Arnaus

Rafael Cabrera Bello

Paul Casey

Bryson DeChambeau

Jason Dufner

Tommy Fleetwood

Sergio Garcia

Tyrrell Hatton

Dustin Johnson

Jason Kokrak

Shane Lowry

Graeme McDowell

Phil Mickelson

Kevin Na

Joaquin Niemann

Louis Oosthuizen

Ian Poulter

Xander Schauffele

Adam Scott

Henrik Stenson

Harold Varner III

Jhonattan Vegas

Bubba Watson

Lee Westwood

Is this the hill on which Jay wants to die?  Yeah, Bryson DJ and the X-man might be worrisome, but it's otherwise the B-list (though it might look very different to Keith Pelley).

The PGA Tour has not granted releases for members to play the Saudi International. The Tour has until 30 days before the first round to decide on waivers. Per previous reporting, players who compete without a waiver would likely only face a fine.

— Eamon Lynch (@eamonlynch) November 29, 2021

I'm sure that'll have DJ quaking... So, when will this come to a head?

It does not appear that any of the players listed as committed to the Saudi event have been given releases from their respective tours to play in the competition. A spokesperson for the DP World Tour, when reached by Golf Digest, had no comment about the status of the waivers. A spokesperson from the PGA Tour noted: "We have not granted any conflicting event releases for the Saudi International tournament. Per PGA Tour regulations, a decision on conflicting event releases can be made up until 30 days before the event's first round."

There hasn't been much to back the strong words from the two Commissioners, so we'll see the value they place on their own credibility.  But this does seem to be spinning beyond their control so, if I were laying a small bet, I'd expect that they'll be allowed to play in it this next installment but receive a strongly worded admonishment against any future commitments.  However, that would tell the world that Jay can be rolled, not that we haven't figured this out already. 

I'm going to use the next item as my exit vehicle, an amusingly scholarly take on Jay's existential angst:

Active inertia” is not a new concept, but it’s definitely newer than the concept of raising purses on the PGA Tour.

In 1999, MIT professor Donald Sull introduced the idea in the Harvard Business Review. As Sull put it, “Active inertia is an organization’s tendency to follow established patterns of behavior — even in response to dramatic environmental shifts. Stuck in the modes of thinking and working that brought success in the past, market leaders simply accelerate all their tried-and-true activities. In trying to dig themselves out of a hole, they just deepen it.”

What is the “hole” in the Tour’s case? It’s the amalgam of issues that potential “new” professional golf concepts powered by Premier Golf League and LIV Golf Investments think they can handle better than the folks in Ponte Vedra. What are the “tried-and-true activities” to keep the current stakeholders happy? Raising purse sizes is certainly one of them. But, “active inertia is insidious by nature,” the HBR included as a sidebar to the article. “Because it grows out of success, it often spreads unnoticed in corporations.” Could that be happening to the PGA Tour?

I don't actually think this fits, but I'm amused by the concept:

Taken together, the PGL and LIV Golf are a resistance of sorts that embody the “dramatic environmental shifts” as outlined in Sull’s definition of active inertia. Some of the best players in the world (or at least their agents) reportedly believe a different format of play might work better, as would guaranteed money — and a lot of it. That’s a shift. But in response, the Tour is following established patterns of behavior. Last week, Commissioner Jay Monahan alerted players to a new wave of purse money the Tour will dish out to in 2022. The Players Championship purse is rising to $20 million, the playoff event purses are up to $15 million, the entire FedEx Cup is rising to $75 million with the invitationals offering $12 million apiece. It’s a significant increase, for sure, but more money will not fundamentally change the Tour’s product.

I think it's actually a grimmer reality than this portrays, because apparently Jay feels there's little wrong with the Tour's product, at least nothing that legalized gambling and increasingly inebriated spectators can't cure.

Though I think it's pretty clear that, while Jay has this coming due to the deterioration of the product, it is much more about the money than Sean Zak seems able to acknowledge.  This is about certain egos feeling insufficiently respected, and that respect is apparently only conveyed via large checks.  But, perhaps of greater interest, is trying to understand what problems down the road Jay will create in warding off this threat.  Most obvious to me is the PIP program, little more than a slush fund fund for Jay to use to keep the children at home.  Which might be great in the short term, but for every recipient there figures to be a disgruntled player who wasn't on Jay's list and will seek his respect elsewhere.

Stay tuned, it should be good fun.

Weekend Wrap

I know I teased potential Saturday coverage of The Match, but then I made the mistake of actually watching it.... 

Is That All There Is? - We have to at the very least credit them for an unusually honest marketing effort, which seemed to be along the following lines:

1. The two genuinely hate each other, and;
2. It's only twelve holes.

Really, what could go wrong?  Well, I'd need a bigger blog....

Dylan Dethier puts his journalistic credibility on the line with his game account, including these winners and losers:

WINNER: Brooks Koepka’s mojo.

Let’s start with the basics: Koepka took a businesslike approach to the entire thing and dominated

from start to finish. DeChambeau hammed it up and handed out Koepka-themed cupcakes on the first tee. Koepka said basically nothing, went on his way, took the lead at No. 2 and never looked back.

Post-round, Phil Mickelson pointed out that it was as much as he could remember seeing Koepka smile. This was a dream scenario for Big Bad Brooks: Lock in, act like this is all pretty “whatever” and then dominate. Although he did acknowledge a couple times just how much he wanted to win.

“I’m not gonna lie, I wanted to spank him,” he said. National TV wins count extra. Big dub for Brooks.

By business-like he seems to mean no cupcakes....

LOSER: Bryson DeChambeau’s mojo.

You could see the air come out of DeChambeau’s tires as the match went from “Advantage, Koepka” to watching his nemesis close out a blowout victory. That’s the beauty of sports: When you lose, there’s nothing you can say that will redeem the moment. DeChambeau recognized that — “He beat me. I can’t say s—,” he said afterwards — but it still clearly stung. Years of back-and-forth led to this match, which is a risky proposition. Anything can happen over 12 holes! And anything did happen. DeChambeau lost five holes, he tied four holes and he won zero holes. Not how he envisioned things going.

That "I can't say s***  is the only silver lining, I'm just not sure of the relevant statute of limitations.

But you'd be forgiven for thinking there's must bea hostage involved for this 'graph to have been written:

WINNER: The Match, still.

Here’s the thing about The Match: It’s imperfect. The pacing can be awkward, sometimes it’s cringeworthy, the matches aren’t always close, the player back-and-forth doesn’t always work and on a basic level it’s tricky to only have two players on the course and base an entire show around it. But despite all of that, it’s entertaining as hell. Even the bad parts are good TV. I found myself glued to the broadcast, not wanting to miss the best exchange or game-changing shot. If they keep coming up with compelling matchups, I’ll keep watching every shot. The Match is a big-time winner, even when it doesn’t seem like it should be.

Compelling match-ups, you say?  So you're arguing for Sir Charles and Peyton to be included in future iterations?

Dylan also includes an ode to Phil's predictive abilities which seems, well, strange, considering that Lefty picked Bryson who won exactly <checking notes>, zero holes.

If you think that Dylan's piece should have come with a "Paid Content" warning label, get a load of this howler:

‘I wanna be dead broke’: Mickelson and Barkley’s 8 most hilarious moments from The Match

It was quite the laugh riot with bits such as this:

‘So, are we done?’

Kind of. That’s the question Barkley asked after DeChambeau conceded Koepka’s putt on the

9th, giving Brooks a 5-and-3 win with a couple of challenges, three holes and about an hour of air time remaining.

“So are we done?” Barkley asked as the players walked off the 9th green. “Oh, I was getting ready to tell them to crank up the plane so I can get to the Iron Bowl. I was gonna get out of here early y’all!”

Turns out Barkley had to stay as the players played on and raised lots of money for charity, but we’re guessing Sir Charles got to the Iron Bowl just fine.

Nothing says laugh riot like your announcer heading for the exit... I know this was a laughfest because all the right people say so.... the only nagging doubt is that I don't actually remember laughing.  Mostly what I remember is the four of them talking over each other, which worked the same way my noise cancelling Air Pods do...

2. The fifth edition of The Match was played on the day after Thanksgiving, with Brooks Koepka defeating Bryson DeChambeau, 5 and 3, in the 12-hole event (and announcers Phil Mickelson and Charles Barkley delivering numerous memorable one-liners). What’s one thing this match taught you about each of its two protagonists?

Well, I'd say it was more confirmatory than teachable...

Zak: It was a reminder via the smallest sample size that Bryson’s putting hasn’t been that elite in 2021, as it was in 2020. He missed some very makeable, nearly expected putts. It doesn’t matter,

but we might look back on it next year. As for Brooks, maybe we learned that he’d be a ruthless money game opponent? Idk. Didn’t feel like I learned much of anything about either.

Sens: Sorry, but I could have learned more from watching reruns of Schoolhouse Rock. Each guy played exactly to his reputation.

Piastowski: Major Brooks — or in this case, Match Brooks — is still kicking. This exchange said it all, after Brooks hit a tee shot to within about 6 feet: Bryson: “Where is this on the PGA Tour, man. I mean, you’re playing so, so good right now, my man.” Brooks: “It’s kinda like my major right now, right?” The man — still — gets up — only — for the big ones. As for Bryson, I believe him when he says the iron game is a work in progress. It looked like it.

Bastable: Brooks and Bryson may be world-class golfers, but we officially learned on Friday that they’re 24-handicap smack talkers. You knew that element of this match was going to be strained but not until Bryson broke out cupcakes on the first tee did we know to what degree. I will say I’m surprised Brooks cruised. He didn’t play lights out, but he also didn’t play like a guy who hasn’t had a top-10 finish since July. As Nick says, he appears to still be a player who can flip the switch at will.

Bamberger: I learned that, like most of us, they’ll do most anything if a payday is in the offing. The whole thing leaves me cold.

Anyone that thought they could carry such an event simply hasn't been watching and listening to date.  I'd take them to task for this second question, there there was literally nothing else to talk about in golf this week:

3. In the wake of Koepka’s convincing win, is the Brooks-Bryson feud more likely to heighten or fizzle?

Zak: Fizzle. Unless we continue to bring it up and bother them with questions about it. Thankfully, we’re all over it.

Sens: That’s a pretty big ‘unless,’ Sean. Plus, there’s some genuine dislike between them. Tensions are bound to flare at some point. Let’s just hope it happens organically, like down the stretch in a major. We don’t need to see them in another Match.

Piastowski: It fizzles. It already has been. Twice Brooks noted on the broadcast that he was in awe of Bryson’s play, and I think it’s something like that that will put this feud to bed. Until they’re paired together in the final round of the Masters and Bryson steps in Brooks’ line.

Bastable: Fizzle. Please, Lord, fizzle.

Bamberger: The whole thing is more burnt than a nine-minute Frosted Pop-Tart. You’re grown men. Act like it.

Isn't the bigger question the arc of their careers, both of which have huge question marks.  Brooks shows no signs of being able to stay healthy and Bryson simply didn't play very well for most of 2021.

Like I said, there's literally nothing else to talk about:

4. Each iteration of The Match teaches us something about how it could be refined or modified. What was your biggest takeaway this time around?

Zak: That we need them playing a Top 100 golf course. Boy, am I BORED by the courses the Matches have been played on. But I was really enamored by Seminole last summer when TaylorMade held DJ/Rory vs. Rickie/Wolff there. The names and formats are fine. Give me a course to get excited about too.

Sens: That the further they stray from traditional match play, the better. The side competitions were much more interesting than any of the holes they played. I also liked that the announcers were able to razz the players mid-stroke. If they’re going to keep concocting these Matches, the larkier, the better. Take a page from Steph Curry and go full Holey Moley reality TV.

Piastowski: I’m going to go to my gambling roots here and suggest that players’ real money get involved. Even if at the end of the day it’s given to charity, let’s see some of the heat that we hear about from Tour pros during their cash games.

Bastable: Yeah, love that idea, Nick. Players staking their own cash would be great fun — and it’s all Monopoly money, anyway (see Question 1). The more serious these matches become, the less fun they are. No one wants to see guys barely acknowledging one another and grinding over 6-footers. Give us zingers and side action and launch monitors on every shot. Love to some women players in the mix, too. Mel Reid would be great.

Bamberger: Kill it. Overexposure killed the cat. It’s not helping professional golf, or these two professional golfers.

Can I get serious here for a sec, folks?  I love Sean Zak's answer, though it's naïve to think that Brooks and Bryson would be more interesting on Cypress Point...  I mean, it wouldn't hurt.

But the actual takeaway from these spectacles is that they need the amateurs, and by amateurs I, of course, mean they need Charles Barkley playing.  Nothing else has been remotely interesting, including Peyton, Brady and Aaron Rodgers.

But, while I know these are silly exhibitions, keep this failure in mind as we read what comes below, because this is closer to the vision for golf's future that Mr. Norman and others are promoting.

i was prepared to move on from this subject, at least until I notice Eamon Lynch chiming in:

Lynch: Brooks Koepka vs. Bryson DeChambeau showdown in Las Vegas was a bust for fans, but not the PGA Tour

Eamon's got no shortage of hot takes.  And while I'm most interested in his contention that this was good for the Tour, let's let him vent his spleen on other subjects:

Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka conducted themselves as any two strangers randomly

paired for a Friday game might, piloting separate carts and saying little beyond “Nice putt” and “That’s good.” The last time Vegas witnessed two high-profile men be so taciturn about their common business, Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky were running the Strip.

As a result, Phil Mickelson was forced to work overtime in the Don King role of promoter, carnival barker, oddsmaker, antagonist and announcer. He was his typical self, alternating between delightful and insufferable, depending on how “figjammy” he was feeling. All while clad in shades that suggested he was aiming for Tom Cruise’s look in Top Gun, even as he sounded more like Cliff Clavin in Cheers.

The Clavin bit hits home, as I found Phil to be expecially forced this time, which might explain his talking over everyone else.

 But, Eamon, that bit about this being good for the Tour?

That… the PGA Tour’s legacy of prim image-maintenance is blunting its product. Tour brass have a low bar when it comes to conduct unbecoming and for months wanted the DeChambeau-Koepka feud to die. In the end, all that was required to kill it was commercialism, just enough for golf fans to suspect (wrongly) that the entire spat was stage-managed. But why did the showdown have to be someone else’s commercial boon? In 2021, eight Tour stops had both DeChambeau and Koepka in the field. Sponsors that have shown the Tour years of loyalty—AT&T or Travelers, say—could have enjoyed the exposure of pairing the bros. The Tour ensured that did not happen. Too many executives in Ponte Vedra will see this as a dodged bullet and not as a missed opportunity.

I don't actually think that the Tour should have paired them, but when does Eamon get to the part that's good for the Ponte Vedra suits?

That… the Tour was only comfortable embracing the feud when its most animated fan base had already moved on, convinced it was manufactured. A DeChambeau-Koepka pairing would have been destined to lack conflict since most rounds on Tour are five hours of silence interrupted by occasional smalltalk about football, fishing or creeping socialism. And that’s only if the players like each other. Yet the Tour chose to let the feud fester rather than risk energizing a boorish spectator element for two days. It hardly needs stating that this is not a fan-forward approach.

That… on a holiday weekend—particularly on a cold, blustery one in many parts of the country— there is an audience for televised golf, even if this one numbered more people hate-watching than usual. Millions of dollars were raised for charity, and the fact that nothing meaningful was at stake (save the egos of two prideful men) did not diminish my gratitude for the distraction, regardless of its ultimate entertainment merits.

That first 'graph seems to undermine his prior argument that they should have been paired, whereas the second seems only to argue that something is better than nothing.   But then what to make of this cheap shot coda:

And finally, that… if Mickelson really wants to deliver a golf spectacle on the Vegas Strip with guaranteed fireworks, one based on real grudges and boundless animosity, he should face Billy Walters.

That borders on funny, or it would if Eamon's golf media hadn't pulled down the blackout shades on Billy Walters.  But then we'd have to talk about Phil's unpaid gambling debts and insider trading and, do we want to harsh Phil's mellow?

Today In Chutzpah - I've no clue where to start on this continuing saga, but it's not often that Shack reverts to Yiddish, so why not drop in here?

Golf's burgeoning power struggle is set to detonate with the European Tour ready to refuse

requests from some of its top players to accept seven-figure appearance fees to play in Saudi Arabia next year.

The hardline stance will stun many big names who believed they would be released for the Saudi International after playing in the $5m (£3.7m) event since its inception in 2019 when it was part of the European Tour’s schedule.

Players even have multi-year contracts that were signed before the acrimonious split between the sheikhs and Wentworth HQ.

But Telegraph Sport understands that the Tour and its chief executive, Keith Pelley, are not willing to compromise and will sanction any member who decides to play regardless. Except, in a calculated move by the Tour, the type and the scale of the punishment will not be revealed to the rebels until after the event.

I'll let Geoff handle the tip-in:

It wasn’t long ago that Europe…DP World Tour Chief Keith Pelley was slobbering all over Saudi Arabia and it’s desire to host golf tournaments, defending the due diligence his Tour did in partnering with people who do awful things to other people on a fairly regular basis, and overall just perplexed anyone would question the decision to partner with the Kingdom even after a journalist was murdered and chopped into pieces.

But playing a competing tour? Now the hammer drops!

Sheesh, you chop up one journalist and people just can't move on... But on the larger hypocrisy count, there can't be much of a rebuttal, since that was a Euro Tour event until this year.

But tell me about that hammer, because I didn't expect double-secret probation:

The pros will not even know what they will be risking if they accept the Saudi cheque, some of which will feature numbers well into the millions. The same stringent tactics are thought to have been adopted by the PGA Tour and its commissioner, Jay Monahan.

One has to assume that Pelley and Jay are operating in lockstep, although they may well have differing levers (and inducements available).  

But it's this story from Friday, and few days better for burying stories exist than Black Friday, that should have garnered wider notice:

Lee Westwood has taken himself out of the reckoning to be Europe’s next Ryder Cup captain, deciding instead to continue concentrating on his playing career.

Westwood, 48, was considered a certainty to succeed Padraig Harrington and assume the reins for the 2023 match in Rome, where Europe will attempt to win back the trophy that they lost by a record scoreline in Wisconsin two months ago.

Yet having become the oldest player ever to qualify for a Ryder Cup team by right and having remained in the elite since his extraordinary revival from struggling outside the world’s top 100 in 2018, Westwood understandably still has his eye on individual titles.

The Worksop veteran is world No 38, with only six other Europeans above him in the rankings and it is eminently feasible that he could make a record 12th appearance in the Italian capital.

 He seems to be saying the right things:

“Of course it is not a decision I’ve taken lightly as it would be a huge honour to captain Europe and it is something I’d love to do one day,” he said. “But it’s almost a full-time job nowadays and that is something I can’t commit to while I’m in the top 50 and still competitive.

“The Ryder Cup is very close to my heart and I would only take on the role if I believe I could give it 100 percent. Whoever gets the job for Rome will obviously have my full backing and I’ll continue to do all I can for the Europe cause, as I’ve always tried to since my debut 24 years ago.”

Really?  Back at Whistling Straits the consensus was that Lee had played in his last Ryder Cup, so why would he give up a home game?  

Yes, why would he pass on a home game?   Derek Lawrenson has a thought:

Left unspoken, though, was the subject dominating too many golfing conversations these days — the Saudi question.

Westwood is one of a number of high-profile British players in their 40s who have been wooed to join this golf revolution fronted by Greg Norman. How can you be Ryder Cup captain if there’s any chance you might by swayed to join the charismatic Aussie if his proposed global tour ever gets off the ground?

‘It would be a no-brainer to join at my age,’ responded Westwood in May, when asked what he would do if offered a contract worth many millions.

Egads, but it gets even weirder:

Is it just because he was a fan of Norman growing up that Westwood will team up alongside Ian Poulter in the Shark Shootout — hosted by Norman — in Florida next month? Long way to go for a fun event two weeks before Christmas, no?

As for the captaincy, that is now wide open with Luke Donald, Graeme McDowell, and Henrik Stenson part of the conversation, although the Swede is another being pursued by the Saudis. A decision is expected before the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship in January.

OK, cue the references to thirty pieces of silver... What's the more curious aspect herein?  That Lee Westwood, a man whose middling career is only salvaged by his Ryder Cup exploits, would turn his back on his Euro brethren to cash one large check?  Or is it the Saudis thinking they can challenge Jay Monahan once they lure Lee Westwood and Henrik Stenson into the fold?    

But is there any other way to interpret Westwood's move?  And when do the Saudis land a real player?  I mean, above and beyond Jason Kokrak....

I'm going to wrap here and we'll get to the Hero World and other stories as the week unfolds.

Your (Black) Friday Frisson

 Are you ready for some of that Tryptophan-induced blogging?  Gee, where should we start?

The Match LCCVIV - You might be surprised to learn that this is merely the fifth installment, though you'd be right to think it should be measured in dog years.  This would seem to be the logical place to begin:

6 reasons why Bryson DeChambeau vs. Brooks Koepka will top your expectations

It would pretty much have to, no?  Shall we see what Josh Sens has that might suck us in?

There really is some bad blood

No one is suggesting that this is Ali-Frazier, with the prospect of first-tee fisticuffs. But these guys are also a long way from a bromance. There’s some genuine tension in their past that is bound to bubble up in the competition. The Thrilla in Manilla? Not exactly. But with each man’s chest-puffy pride on the line, someone is destined for a wounded ego. For that reason alone, we’re not ready to dismiss it as The Blip on the Strip.

I think Josh is quite right that these two genuinely don't care for each others.  It's a curious marketing initiative, though, in that most red-blooded Americans agree with both of them.

But if you thought that a curious example of marketing leverage, get a load of this:

The shortened format

In their boundless wisdom, the organizers of this Match have shortened it to a 12-hole competition. So, think of it as a televised version of a Thanksgiving visit from your in-laws: even if you don’t thoroughly enjoy it, you won’t have to put up with it for long.

If first prize is twelve holes, I guess second prize would logically be the full eighteen holes.

I'll set the snark aside for a moment to actually agree with this move.  A conventional eighteen feels like the Bataan death March (see the original Tiger v. Phil version), and this has a chance to hit the sweet spot.  The downside, though, is that it's so short that there's no case to be made for it as an authentic test of golf.  

Golf Digest has a more conventional Tale-of-the-Tape:

The Course

Wynn Golf Club on the Las Vegas strip will serve as the host venue. The course is a Tom Fazio design that opened in 2005 on the same land as the old Desert Inn Hotel golf course that regularly hosted PGA Tour, LPGA and PGA Tour Champions events. It re-opened in 2019 after a renovation by Fazio and his son, Logan. It’s open for public pay with a green fee of $550.

I love a family business.... Generation after generation of Fazios have built golf courses I hope to never play.  What's more American than that?

The Format

It’s a match-play competition between the two, but the most unusual part of the original announcement that the two would be facing each other that it would be a 12-hole competition. Really? 12 holes? Why not 18 … or nine?

Well, if you watched The Match IV in July with Bryson, Phil Mickelson, Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers, you’ll likely remember that 18 holes took, roughly speaking, a bazillion hours, which was, of course, too much for everybody involved. The simple solution: Shorten the match—our TV guide says it is only “scheduled” to run for three hours—to make it a more friendly viewer experience.

That one was merely painful, but that first one at Shadow Creek had to be timed in dog years.

One assumes they stayed up nights thinking of these off-the-wall challenges:

On-Course Challenges

Beyond the 12-hole match between Brooks and Bryson, there once again will be a handful of on-

course challenges.

On three of the four par 3s (third, ninth and 11th holes of the competition) there will be a closest to the hole challenge with $50,000 donated in the player’s name to a charity for the winner. If the winner’s ball is within five feet of the hole, the donation jumps to $150,000. And if a player makes a hole-in-one, the increase goes to $2 million.

On the other par 3 (sixth hole in the competition) the player whose ball is closest to the hole will help donate 500,000 meals to Feeding America. If the ball is within five feet, 1.5 million meals will be donated. A hole-in-one will result in 20 million meals being donated.

There will also be as long drive challenge on the seventh hole of the competition with $200,000 donated in the player’s name for whoever hits the longest drive that lands in the fairway.

Wow!  Closest to the pin and a long drive, that's not something you see at an everyday Member-Guest.... 

There's no shortage of backgrounders on The Feud, so I'll just excerpt this bit of back and forth that actually demonstrated trace elements of wit:

1. The abs jab

Believe it or not, Brooks and Bryson actually handled their initial dustup fairly uneventfully. After a bit of public venting, they met face to face, talked it out, reconciled, and even appeared on a podcast together to trumpet their settlement of the beef. Unfortunately, the cease-fire didn’t last long, because in an unguarded moment during a Fortnite Twitch stream, DeChambeau criticized Koepka’s photos in the ESPN Body Issue.

“I don’t think his genetics even make him look good,” DeChambeau said. “Did you see the Body Issue? He didn’t have any abs. I have abs.”

Uh-oh.

2. Koepka’s macho response

With his physique thus slighted, Koepka reverted to a defense that was difficult to top: Nah-nah, I have more majors than you!

— Brooks Koepka (@BKoepka) January 16, 2020

My takeaway?  The last clever thing either of these guys said predates the pandemic.... 

It is my intention to watch, as who doesn't love a good train wreck?  It would seem to me the producers have no shortage of issues ramming this down our throats, which is mostly what intrigues me.  Among their second tier problems are the fact that neither guy has played particularly well recently.  Correct that, the guy who has played has been dreadful:

Will going head-to-head with Bryson DeChambeau wake Brooks Koepka from his slump?

"I've been playing bad for so long, so I'm just trying to play my way out of this thing and figure it out,'' Koepka said. "Hopefully we come out on the other side soon.''

Koepka said that at the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba, where he missed the cut by 4 shots. A week later in Houston, he again missed the cut, this time by 3 strokes.

Which is likely only the silver medalist on Brooksie's worry list, this being increasingly worrying:

He followed that with a tie for second at the WGC-Workday Championship and seemed to be trending for a strong Masters when he suffered a freak accident at his home in March, injuring his right knee -- he dealt with left knee problems throughout 2019 and 2020 -- leading to a procedure.

He had surgery March 16 to deal with knee cap dislocation and ligament damage. The injury occurred, he said, while with family in Florida. Koepka said he slipped and it required his knee be put back into place.

The other guy simply hasn't played, though he was seen in public the once:

Bryson DeChambeau went to Topgolf. Yes, of course the results were spectacular

I'm sorry, make that twice:

Watch Bryson DeChambeau hit a 520-yard (!) bomb off the top of a casino

We can't quite make it out, but that target isn't your off-the-rack-bullseye:

On Thursday afternoon, DeChambeau dialed the volume up just a little bit louder. The shift could be heard at 2 p.m. ET, when Bleacher Report posted a video showing the big man swinging his driver from the roof of a skyscraper in Las Vegas, ostensibly attempting to hit a giant, printed version of Brooks Koepka’s smiling face.

Big deal, they've been painting clown faces around holes since I was in knee-socks....

To get serious for a moment, it does seem to me that this version of the franchise is not without peril for Phil and Tiger.  To me, they actually learned from that disaster and improved the product, the key insight being that watching the best in the world play can, irony alert, be incredibly boring.  The interest in the later matches came from the interaction of the greats with the less great, most notably Phil and Charles Barkley.

The good news, I suppose, is that those two interesting characters will be on hand.... The bad news?  Neither brought their sticks.  The grudge will likely prove sufficient to induce some of us to turn on TNT....  But watching them ignore each other doesn't sound like Must-See TV?  The real question is are either of these guys engaging enough to carry a broadcast?  I haven't seen much evidence for that premise, and I think it's far more likely that we'll see a series of pre-scripted barbs that land as flat as the desert terrain.

There's also a chance that I'd blog it on Saturday morning, though likely only if it's memorably bad (or, yanno, epically great, but that seems quite the longshot).  Of course, I've evolved into quite the lazy blogger, so no promises here.

The Rich Get Richer - Eamon Lynch has an interesting piece that riffs off of comments of Billy Horchel, one that I'm still struggling to absorb and react to.  I think we can all agree that, if you misdiagnose the problem, the solution might be problematic:

Billy Horschel was asked this week how the PGA Tour can adapt to face a threat posed by the

Saudi-backed Super Golf League, which has promised guaranteed riches to top-tier players. He suggested reducing the number of fully-exempt players each season from 125 to 100 and scaling back the graduates from the Korn Ferry Tour. The result, Horschel believes, would be a more competitive circuit.

“Guys aren’t sort of just happy finishing 90th on the PGA Tour every year and collecting a million-plus dollars, and that they’re actually striving to be the best players on the PGA Tour,” he offered. “If we would change the way the money pays out where the top 30, 40 guys get paid a lot of money and then you don’t get paid as much down below, so it really pushes guys to really do everything they can to be the best player that they can be.”

Horschel stressed his opposition to what he termed “handouts.”

“We reward for top play, for playing great golf, not for mediocrity,” he said.

There may be a case to be made for changing the allocation of purses, though this is hardly that case.  It seems to me he's arguing that the PGA Tour should be an even more closed shop, increasing the impediments to new talent making their way onto the PGA Tour, which through some sort of alchemy will increase the competitiveness of the events.  I fail to see any evidence that the current system provides insufficient motivation, as opposed to evidence that Phil wants more, of which there is no shortage.

But Eamon does see the bigger picture, if not perfectly:

Leaving aside Horschel’s allegory for the nation—those who want the top to get richer reflexively look at what might be snatched from those at the bottom—his comments point to a fundamental hurdle the PGA Tour faces as it fends off the Saudis: a member-led organization is constitutionally disinclined to put the squeeze on its own.

The Tour has two basic responsibilities: create playing opportunities for its members and deliver the best fields possible for its sponsors. It has more leeway to engineer the former than to guarantee the latter. Any reduction in exempt membership directly impacts the quality of the 40-odd fields it must deliver annually. Especially when stars stay home and the result is a glorified member-guest, as we witnessed in Bermuda last month. So the Tour understands what Horschel misses, that any strategy to better compensate top performers can’t come at the expense of the rank and file. The PGA Tour doesn’t do trickle-up economics.

It seems to me that both miss the need to allow new young talent to find playing opportunities, both mistaking the allure of famous names (can you say Phil?) with actual talent.   

The dilemma facing the Tour is not how to reduce the ranks or earnings of lesser mortals, but how to ensure greater rewards for those who move the needle—a fluid group, but not so fluid as to include Horschel, which inoculates him against any charge of self-interest in his public stance. Other than awarding bonuses that are not dictated by scores, there are only two actions open to the PGA Tour: create guaranteed money tournaments for elite fields, and boost the purses in the existing events that draw the stars. Rewarding the needle-movers does not have to mean sticking it to the rank and file.

I do encourage you to read the whole thing, because there's much of interest that I'm not able to get to, such as the fact that the Tour players on the advisory committee does include rabbits such as Peter Malnati.

My big concern, which Eamon notes above but doesn't really consider, is that bit about awarding money not based on scores, as I seem to be the only one that can see the path that inevitably puts the Tour on.  Jay will be dispensing large sums of money based upon arbitrary metrics (admit it, you'd never heard of a Meltwater Mention before the PIP program), which will no doubt make some bold-faced names happy.  But equally inevitable is the fact that others will be disappointed with Jay's decision, so now the tried and true "Play better" will be of no use....  Here's a pro tip for the Saudis, those malcontents are your target market.

What better time than the now, as we argue about the rewards of mediocrity, than to inform you that mediocrity now pays far better:

— No Laying Up (@NoLayingUp) November 22, 2021

I Saw It On TV - Just a couple of TV-related notes, including the release of next year's TV schedule, the first under the new media rights contracts:

On Tuesday the PGA Tour announced its network and cable schedule for the year, with CBS Sports set to broadcast 20 events and begin network coverage with the Farmers Insurance Open at

the end of January, an event which will feature the first scheduled Saturday finish on the PGA Tour since 1996.

NBC Sports remains the Tour’s cable partner, and Golf Channel will carry early-round and lead-in weekend coverage of every FedEx Cup event. In 2022, NBC will carry the entire FedExCup Playoffs. CBS will do the same in 2023.

ESPN+ will debut as the distributor of PGA Tour Live at the Sentry Tournament of Champions, Jan. 6-9, and will carry 35 PGA Tour tournaments.

 Hey, stifle that yawn!  I'm sure you'll be all over those four ESPN+ streams...

What could be a better segue for our discussion above of the allocation of golf's riches than this little reminder from Geoff:

The 2019 RSM Classic did not draw a rating of any kind, “surged” in 2020 with a barely discernible audience and reverted to anonymous status in 2021, failing to draw a rating for any day. Whether this is concerning to anyone at the Tours or ponying up the cash, I have no idea. But next time someone is moaning about Ray Romano getting too much air time at the Crosby, or just a golf pro who thinks he’s reinvented the game, just remember that IFC’s reruns of Everyone Loves Raymond are trouncing live PGA Tour golf. The show ended production in 2005.

Yeah, if he were listening, I'd suggest that Jay Monahan take some of his time spent allocating the spoils and reallocate it to improving the actual product....  Yeah, not holding my breath.

 Though I do have one TV note of actual interest, as this legend will be leaving the scene soon:

The newly named head of the LPGA Tour, Mollie Marcoux Samaan, presented her first

Commissioner's Award at the Rolex Awards Dinner Thursday night to longtime golf broadcaster Judy Rankin. The longevity and passion Rankin continues to display as she closes on her 59th year connected to the LPGA Tour—from playing to broadcasting—made her a natural selection for Marcoux Samaan's first time handing out the honor. Yet as Rankin commanded the room during her 10-minute acceptance speech, the veteran commentator shared for the first time publicly that she'll be phasing out of broadcasting in 2022.

"I'm coming to the end of my time," said Rankin, who turns 77 next February. "I'm not going to do a Brett Favre and retire about four times. I am seriously slowing down. I don't know how much their will be after this, at some point I will see you next year."

The LPGA has shown little reluctance to cut their ties with history recently, but I do hope they celebrate Rankin appropriately.  She's an important link back to the founders and to Dinah, though of course Father Time is unrelenting.  I'm guessing that this orphan version of the Dinah, the last before the event decamps to Houston, will be quite bittersweet.

Seriously? - You'll not be surprised at my reaction to this tribute:

Jack Nicklaus explains why, after 44 years, course design still inspires him

If only, yanno, any of his designs inspired us....

Full disclosure: Jack is my golfing God, as my early interest in the game coincided with the late stages of his career.  But his architectural career?  We did have cause to mention train wrecks above....

The funny bit is that he at least pays lip service to that which inspired the true architectural greats:

One of the things that has allowed the Old Course at St. Andrews to stand the test of time is that while it is challenging, any golfer can shoot a good score on it — a good score for that golfer, that is. For one thing, you can run the ball up on almost every green there, and the run-up is a preferred approach shot for the average golfer. When I designed and built The Bear’s Club, our family’s home course in South Florida, I wanted to do the same thing. My goal was to give golfers a chance to bounce their ball onto every green — and you can. That makes golf more enjoyable for most players.

I'm glad to hear that that message got through, though it seems to have taken most of those 44 years...I was lucky enough to play Jack's Ferry Point design before it opened to the public.  Built on a windy site on the water, each and every one of those green complexes was above the level of the fairway, eliminating the ground game as an option.  

To me, the best way of capturing Jack's overwrought approach to course design is from an anecdote from his co-design of Sebonack with Tom Doak.  years later I'm still laughing at the pairing of these two, and to me the course (admittedly from all of one loop) reflected the inevitable mismatch in their design philosophies.

When the met on site, they apparently stayed next door at The National Golf Links of America, the Charles Blair Macdonald masterpiece that is, actually, a partial homage to the Old Course.  Reportedly, in walking the museum, Nicklaus turns to Doak and says words to the effect of, "I really don't understand why you revere this course the way you do."

Jack, that you don't get it comes as no surprise to those that have seen and played your designs.  It's true that The National is no Dove Mountain.... We love our Jack, we just wish folks wouldn't let him touch golf courses.  At least not ones your humble blogger might play.

I shall leave you hear and we'll speak soon.

Tuesday Treatises

 OK, I promised I'd get to that video.....

He's Baaack - If you've scanned a calendar, the timing of this video should come as no surprise

By way of comparison:

Abraham Zapruder stood on a concrete pedestal along Elm Street in Dealey Plaza holding a high-end Model 414 PD Bell & Howell Zoomatic Director Series Camera. He filmed from the time the presidential limousine turned onto Elm Street[1] for a total of 26.6 seconds, exposing 486 frames of standard 8 mm Kodachrome II safety film, running at an average of 18.3 frames/second.

But, hey, Tiger gave us three seconds of video, so we've got that going for us.

Which of the two has been more thoroughly analyzed?  Well, one has broken out to a substantial lead, though perhaps they're not finished with the Zapruder film.

 Dylan Dethier might have been first past the post with this:

5 revealing details from Tiger Woods’ surprising swing video

Any truth to the rumor that there's a Hitchcock cameo?  

1. The shorts are getting shorter.

Is it possible that “making progress” referred not to Woods’ recovery but in fact to the length of his inseam? For better or worse, Woods has favored the black cargo short for years, but until now he liked those shorts long. This is the first instance I can remember of Woods going above the knee. A thrill to see such an influential figure joining the short shorts movement.

You see Dylan's error... He's already put far more effort into this than the subject of said film.

2. We’ve heard “making progress” before.

The Tiger Woods Comeback Range Video is an entire subgenre of the golf world. It was four years ago that we were breathlessly tracking updates from an injured Woods. He posted one driver video from Medalist with the caption “Making Progress” which set the sports world ablaze.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by GOLF.com // GOLF Magazine (@golf_com) 

 

This year? Same verbiage, though Woods ditched the capital P in “Progress” in favor of this year’s more casual caption. Whether his social media manager was making a nod to the last comeback or just has consistent taste when it comes to efficient copy, here’s hoping “making progress” still has some magic to it.

Or, and I know this is the liquor talking, this is a complete afterthought and no one gives a s**t.

But have you considered that it's even worse than my reference above?

5. He’s using a launch monitor.

The closest thing we have to a hint on Woods’ intentions isn’t the swing itself — it’s the presence of the Full Swing launch monitor in the foreground. That suggests he’s testing where his swing is, where his speed is, where his game is. The first time Woods went out to hit chip shots, we’re guessing he didn’t have a launch monitor. Now? He’s already made significant progress, and he has his eyes on the future.

[Update: Is this also some clever guerilla marketing? A couple hours after the post I received an email trumpeting the merits of the Full Swing, which counts Woods among its investors. Savvy! And even though this is playing directly into their hands, if your interest is piqued, the Full Swing KIT Outdoor Launch Monitor is available here for $3,999.]

Ummm, Dylan, it's far too obvious to constitute guerilla marketing, which you might have anticipated were you not in love-struck groupie mode.   Of course, who doesn't want to party with the band...

Geoff goes even more overboard with a full-blown Quadrilateral post, marginally salvaged by having his tongue in contact with his cheek, beginning with Tiger's timing:

Not long ago, the sight of Tiger Woods surfacing after months of silence might have been seen as a poorly-timed attention ploy. The social post appeared as the European Tour was winding down the 2021 season before restarting…this week in South Africa.

Geoff apparently didn't get the memo to ixnay "Euro Tour", but there were actually two tours wrapping their seasons this weekend, but Tiger has never hesitated to grab the spotlight at such moments.  The best example is when he held his 2010 mea culpa presser the Wednesday of the match play.  Why the Tour allows this nonsense remains an open question.

Geoff throws a bunch fof bullet points at the wall, with trace levels of humor detected:

• Why today? He saw his doctors early this week at Cedars and evidently got the clearance to hit balls. Or, the doctor green-lit a social media post. I’m going with the former.

• Was this just a late PIP play? The PGA Tour’s super-silly, super-secret bonus program was going to be won by Woods since it was a rigged cannard to stop stars from taking disruptor money. Maybe Woods sensed someone was lurking and wanted another 23,629 Retweets, 172,462 Likes and 5.7 million views (as of this writing)? The man is a PIP legend already. 

• He must be itching to play since he’s got a launch monitor out already? Or he needed to keep his friends at Full Swing happy. And feeling frisky about his rehab, too. 

• Did he hear how much the Saudis are offering middle-of-the-road stars and decide he needs to re-join the disruptor league conversation, one he could shape or kill?

Have you met Mr. Occam and his famous razor?  The timing shouldn't be much of a mystery...

Just yesterday I reminded you of my high regard for Michael Bamberger, a man I've had cause to nominate as the conscience of our game.  but this one is odd:

What Tiger Woods’ 3-second swing video reveals about Tiger Woods

Funny thing is, and I'm as guilty as anyone in this regard, sometimes we don't listen to ourselves as the words tumble out.  For instance, Mike's lede:

Tiger Woods posted footage of a single swing on Sunday, a three-second clip, and golf came to a standstill. Your first and human response had to be relief. The February car crash that could have killed him didn’t.

In terms of broad interest to golf’s masses, it wasn’t even a fair fight. Woods’s mini-doc v. Jin Young Ko’s win in Florida? Or Collin Morikawa’s win in Dubai? Or even Rory McIlroy and his desecrated golf shirt? Woods wins, every which way to Sunday.

Right.  The obvious conclusion is that Tiger is either embittered by or disdainful of the golf tours and their members, and is actively seeking to undermine them by drawing attention to himself at just the time their audience should be peaking.  Nice guy.

It gets worse:

Making progress, Woods’s Sunday release, was a savvy piece of marketing. Tiger’s life, more than any person I can think of — with the possible exception of Michael Jackson — has unfolded in front of cameras. Those cameras have enriched him almost beyond measure and cost him, too. Regardless, he’s addicted to them.

Ko and Morikawa and McIlroy had no chance because Woods — aided by his late father, by Phil Knight, by his many sponsors, past and present — has been doing this for 30 years. The selling of Tiger Woods. All those wins, all those Buick spots, all those post-round interviews. Nobody’s going to catch up to him, ever.

Savvy?  But, Mike, did you happen to notice that exactly nothing has unfolded in front of cameras since February?  

The clip from the Medalist range prepares us for a press conference he’ll likely have next week in the Bahamas, at his tournament there, the Hero World Challenge. TMZ won’t get a press credential there. In other words, it’s a good and safe way for Woods to begin his return to public life, following the devastating single-vehicle car crash he had in February. He hasn’t said a word about it. He likely never will. What’s the upside?

Gee, I don't know, Mike, it might be nice for him to explain and/or apologize for his actions which quite obviously imperiled anyone that might have been on the street.  Combined with being found drugged to the gills on the side of a Florida road, the man seems to be a vehicular tragedy waiting to happen.

But here comes a helluva fever dream:

With the possible exception of Ben Crenshaw, I can’t think of another Hall of Fame golfer who has such a powerful affinity for golf history, who knows so much about what Arnold did and how he did it. Ditto for Jack Nicklaus, for Lee Trevino, for Ben Hogan, for Sam Snead.

Let’s say other competing tours, world tours that threaten the hegemony of the PGA Tour, actually materialize. Any such tour will need name players. The single-greatest weapon at Jay Monahan’s disposal, in terms of trying to squash these other tours, is Tiger Woods his own self, and Tiger’s sense of history.

Imagine that you’re Morikawa or Jordan Spieth or Bryson DeChambeau or even Phil Mickelson, and somebody is offering you a guaranteed $50 million to sign on the dotted line. And now you have Tiger Woods on the line and he’s talking to you about how Bob Goalby and Doug Ford and Jack Nicklaus created this modern PGA Tour in the first place, the tour that you grew up on, the tour that fueled your dreams.

Who are we to cut bait from all that?

Mike, you might want to step back from that open bar.... Seriously, what is he smoking?

First and foremost, on the subject of breakaway tours, which do we think better describes Tiger:

1. Deeply grateful for the opportunities presented by the PGA Tour and devoted to ensuring its survival, or;
2. Me! Me! Me! Me!

Excuse me, but who exactly was the PIP program designed to appease?

But the second point is one I've struggled with in all our myriad discussions of the Premiere/Super/Wahabi tours under discussion.  Focus, is you will, on that last bit in the penultimate graph.  Do children go to sleep dreaming of PGA Tour stardom?  Oh my God, how silly can we be?

No, kids dream of winning the Masters...maybe the U.S. Open.  If you're Jon Rahm and grow up in Europe, maybe the Open Championship, though that likely has changed since the Seve era....Mike is just off his meds if he thinks Tiger gives a rat's ass about the Global Home.

But I'd also urge you to keep this top of mind as the Saudi/Greg Norman/Premiere League thrusts and parries play out.  Hundreds of millions of dollars are being offered to entice players to break away and form a new circuit of second tier events.  Ironic, no?

But here's the most curious bit.  Mike had a second bite at this apple in the Tour Confidential panel we linked yesterday, and his answer was quite different.  Oh, he lauded the man (not to mention his swing), but he devoted a paragraph to indicate he hasn't drunk quite all the Kool-aid:

Michael Bamberger: As Sandy Tatum once said of Tom Watson’s move, “He has a swing that will not quit.” Just replace one TW with another and the sentence holds. Even without anything like his normal speed, there’s a majesty to Woods’s swing. I think you’d say that even if he didn’t have 15 Grand Slam titles attached to his name. But he does. As Jack Nicklaus says, “Never bet against Tiger Woods.”

I’m going to guess that Joe LaCava and Charlie Woods were out of the frame but pushing him, each in his own way. The session reminded me of the spectacular footage, available through the magic of YouTube, of Hogan explaining his swing to George Coleman in George Coleman’s South Florida backyard, a feature of which is the Atlantic Ocean. (The balls were irretrievable; it was not a carbon-neutral session.) There are layers upon layers with anything involving Tiger Woods’s public life, and he reveals almost nothing about his interior one, which is what will determine most whether he can be a tournament golfer again. (Third ‘graph of the NPR — NPR! — story about the clip is telling: “‘Making progress,’ he captioned the post.”)

But I take those three seconds for what they are: the miracle of medical science, the drive of a singular man, the demands of the marketplace. He has to sell his Albany event, his Riviera event, his restaurant and all the rest. Golf clubs, golf courses, a huge educational foundation. That requires a public life and so a moment from an otherwise private session was released for the world to dissect. (Some will say the mini-clip shows his ego at work. I wouldn’t agree, but it does show that the laws of supply-and-demand require some supply.) What the clip ultimately shows is Tiger at his core. He’s a golfer.

I completely agree that the clip shows us quite a bit, though I'd widen the focus and add the entire period since the February accident.  What that shows is a range of aspects of Tiger Woods, included within is the fact that he's a golfer.  But it's also shown us many other aspects of Tiger, and those are equally deserving of Mike's scrutiny, though he'd likely fail to get it past his editors.

The Match - JV Edition - I assume I'll watch it out of shear boredom, but I don't expect anyone's reputation will be helped by the event.  OK, maybe Charles Barkley could come out looking good, but that's about all in my humble opinion.

There’s a joke going around Las Vegas that The Match between Brooks Koepka and Bryson

DeChambeau is being contested over 12 holes on Friday because DeChambeau wanted to play 24 holes and Koepka wanted to play none.

“That’s fair,” Koepka said. “Eighteen holes with him is a long time. I don’t want to be around him as much as anyone else.”

When asked to choose one word to describe the state of their relationship, Koepka said, “non-existent.”

DeChambeau described the two PGA Tour stars as having “kind of a disdain for each other.”

And I find myself agreeing with both of them...

They go on in this "Mean Girls" mode:

“I don’t hit him up every day and my phone isn’t blowing up so you can do the math,” Koepka said.

“The thing I’m looking most forward to is kicking his butt,” DeChambeau said. “For some reason, he doesn’t like me and whatever. It is what it is. I’m here to showcase and spark kids to play a game in a unique way and apparently he doesn’t like that. I don’t know what’s up with that?”

“He can continue to try to bully me,” DeChambeau added. “He’s not doing a very good job of it as of right now. I think we’re winning, personally. He’s obviously gotten his fun little jabs and what not but he’s missed a couple of cuts so I don’t know what else to say about that. You can’t say much when you miss cuts.”

Though...

The golf world had been rooting for the two to be paired together in a final round with a trophy on the line, but the televised exhibition, which will air on TNT with Charles Barkley and Phil Mickelson among the broadcasters, will have to suffice for now.

“Obviously no one would put us together so we had to do it on our own,” Koepka said. “I think the whole world wants to see it. I’m giving the people what they want. I’m a man of the people.”

Speaking for those people, would it be terribly inconvenient to just go away and shut the hell up?

Drafting On Alan -  His mailbox, that is, because I'm giving the people what they want:

Is Phil actually the greatest golfer of all time? And we’ve just been using the wrong criteria? @jjcoop007

I think we can safely say he’s the most entertaining golfer of all time, and that’s enough. Phil is the gift that just keeps giving. He has turned into a caricature of himself, but it’s impossible to look away. I’m so grateful we had him during the Tiger era—he was an excellent foil, and he always made things fun, even if slightly ridiculous. Hard to believe that for more than three decades he has been at the front ranks of the game. What a legend.

A seriously delusional question, though I'm sufficiently curious to know what criteria would yield the desired answer?

But the MEAT?  Isn't that a fun question, one I could use more time on.  Names like Hagen and Seve jump out at me, though I'm quite certain I'm ignoring all sorts of other options.  Doug Sanders, anyone?  I sense a future post...

Will Phil’s performance on the Senior Tour (4 wins in 6 starts) either save the franchise or kill it as those already on that tour have no chance at beating him? @wadster13

It is a reflection of Mickelson’s vast star power that we are even talking about the seniors, and therefore I think you have answered your own question. He is clearly the best thing to happen to that tour in a really long time. Jim Furyk and Ernie Els can still beat him in any given week, and I, for one, look forward to watching them try.

I suspect it'll bore Phil pretty quickly, but still an unqualified home run for the round bellies.

Just a reminder that these questions go back a week, competition-wise, so the questioner is reacting to that near miss the week prior, when she lost to Nelly in a playoff:

How much scar tissue can Lexi Thompson accrue before she says, I’m done with the

disappointments of golf and I’m hanging it up? The heartbreak of professional golf is hard to watch sometimes. @LaBeets50

Just as with Rory McIlroy, I think Lexi should take a year-long sabbatical. Don’t touch a club, just travel, hang out, live life and recharge the batteries and competitive hunger. Lexi, especially, projects a heavy wariness. I’m not sure anyone expected her to make those do-or-die putts on the closing holes at the Pelican, least of all Lexi. I give her credit for persevering despite all the setbacks, but, as you suggest, the toll just keeps accumulating.

Note the passive voice?  This is just all something that happens to the girl... Even Alan kinda goes along with his bit about not expecting her to make the putts.  It's not that she misses putts, it's that she's unable to make her normal putting stroke under final round pressure, what Johnny  Miller used the C-word to describe.  I know that i watched the final round of the U.S. Open and, when she walked off the tenth green with a five-stroke lead, I asked myself to guess at the manner in which she would blow it....

Golf is hard and elite-level golf is impossible, so the bigger surprise is that anyone can take the club back at such moments.  But Lexi's backstory is that she was battle-hardened by competing against those two brothers growing up, though the reality is far harder to watch.

How similar are the courses on the Bonesaw Circuit to the ones in Texas? Kokrak might end up being the Tiger of that thing if they’re close. Serious question though: It’s a bummer to see someone affiliated with the Saudis get a win. How much is the specter of that going to affect how we digest the Tour for a while? @luke_peacock

The insidious thing about sportswashing is that it works. Six months ago I registered my disdain for the Saudis’ encroachment into professional golf, and I have returned to this topic regularly in this space and on the Full Send podcast. But at some point fatigue sets in, both for me and the reader/listener. And the pablum of the Jason Kokraks of the world just further normalizes the relationship between golf and the Saudis’ blood money. We all need to keep our eyes wide open and continue to call out the hypocrisy and greed. Whether it has any effect on the discourse is unknown, but that’s all we can do.

This is truly interesting, because this little bit about the Saudis (and we can stipulate to their mendacity) has been overtaken by the Peng Shuai story (not to mention trifles like those Uighur concentration camps).   Are we going to hold the Chinese to the same standards?  it's all coming to a head with the Olympics there in February and you might want to get out ahead of this one...

How great has Steve Alker’s run been?!? One of the greatest stories and a really good guy. Think he made more money in the last six weeks than his whole career. @Elpulpo8888

As Monday Q Info recently detailed, Alker’s life-changing binge began with a successful Monday qualifier at the Boeing Classic three months ago. Alker finished seventh, earning another start by virtue of his top-10 finish. Then he did that five more times in a row, along the way earning his playing status (and $1.1 million). What a cool story, and just the latest reminder that professional golf, despite its flaws, remains the ultimate meritocracy.

In so many ways this should be what the senior circuit is about, and far more interesting than Phil's run of wins has been.  But, that's a decidely minority opinion for sure.

I'm not sure why he wouldn't have included this up top with the Phil series:

Will there ever be a day Tiger vs. Phil battling it out on the senior tour? @Squizz612

A few years ago I would have said no way, but now? I could see it happening at a few of the big events, if Tiger is able to reconstruct his game. Neither of these proud champions wants to suffer the irrelevancy of finishing 50th every week on the big Tour. They live for the adrenaline high of being in contention, and they’ll never tire of trying to beat the other guy. Realistically, the Senior Tour is where this can happen. Before his car accident, Tiger was probably too proud to ride in a golf cart during competition. But if his reconstituted foot can’t take the pounding of walking day after day, the carts of the Senior Tour might be a saving grace.

I'm still going with "No", for the simple fact that Tiger ain't giving Phil another shot at him, mostly because I don't think he'll especially like his chances.

Why does the Tour have a fall season? No one cares. @rdpatterson99

I don’t know, man, you cared enough to fire off this question. Is the fall season great golf? Not really. But I will always contend it’s better than no golf at all!

You'd think Alan would take a wider perspective here.  The real reason the Tour has those fall events is so that no one else can get a foothold, so there's a price paid elsewhere, such as Australia, whose competition season has been marginalized.

But the far bigger question is how to make the fall more interesting, and I think the answer is to make it smaller.  A season of developmental tour events where guys are fighting for their status, rather than Matt Kuchar playing to break $50 million in career top ten finishes.

If you could do anything you wanted format wise with a regular PGA Tour event, what would it be? @SteveThomsonMN

A co-ed mixed-team event is a no-brainer, and I have been assured by various powers-that-be that it’s gonna happen. How about a whole tournament as three- or four-club challenge? I would love if New Orleans was two rounds of alternate shot and two rounds of worst-ball scramble—that would destroy some friendships.

There's a far easier answer.  Jay just so happens to have an event in his portfolio that doesn't really work as originally envisioned.   It includes the Asian men, who haven't been remotely competitive.  By coincidence, the balance of power in women's golf is to be found in South Korea, so isn't a mixed Prez Cup a blindingly obvious solution?

Phil is 51 and said he expects to play both the Senior and regular tours next year. Realistically, can he compete on the big tour? @JStew68129215

He didn’t really compete this year, and yet he’s eating Cocoa Puffs out of the Wanamaker Trophy every morning. It’s unrealistic to expect Mickelson to be a regular force on Tour, but he’s clearly still dangerous on courses that demand talent and imagination, which is most of the major championship venues.

After Kiawah, who wants to stake his reputation on the fact that Phil can't compete with the big boys?  Alan nails it, the mistake would be to assume week-to-week competitiveness, but he could still be dangerous at moments.

Which caddie could jump on the sticks and not make a fool of themselves? @LiontamerStuart

OGs like Paul Tesori, Lance Ten Broeck and Damon Green for sure. Younger Bucks like Keith Nolan, Joe Greiner and Brett Waldman all have competitive backgrounds. There are many, many caddies who are good golfers in their own right.

Austin Johnson?  Lots of good sticks to be found in the caddie yard, though skills might have rusted a bit.

Should there be a senior Ryder Cup match with Phil Mickelson and Bernhard Langer, who are firing on all cylinders, both playing? @BillDonald1

A senior Ryder Cup would be riveting theater. Can you imagine how yippy it would get?! And the captains would have to collude to give us the matchups we want: Zinger vs. Olazabal, Calcavecchia vs. Monty, Irwin vs. Langer, Mickelson vs. Clarke…so many possibilities!

C'mon, Alan, what have you been drinking?  It has to be Zinger v. Faldo.... Seve would have been better, but I heard he died.

This is such a no-brainer I can't conceive that it hasn't happened yet.  I do think you'd find the Euro team a little thin at the bottom, but who cares about the details?  Of course, you might need age brackets.

That's a wrap for today, kids.  I'll be around and blogging, to the extent that there's anything about which to blog.