Friday, March 4, 2022

Thursday ThreadsIs Jon Rahm … slumping?

I had actually started this post yesterday morning, but life intervened.  We'll see if any continuity issues jump out at you.  I'm intending to avoid the Saudis for the most part, though any attempt to make it Phil-phree zone won't make it past the first second item.

Bay Hill Boogaloo - back at Arnie's joint, and this Goldf Digest headline writer might just be over-interpreting eighteen holes:

Rory McIlroy (unknowingly) drums up the Augusta hype train, Jon Rahm struggles and Bay Hill bites back

There are days when Rory McIlroy makes this most vexing game look impossibly easy, when he’s swinging freely, putting like a kid and bouncing around like he owns the place. Thursday was one of those days. McIlroy opened the Arnold Palmer Invitational with a seven-under 65 on a Bay Hill track with juicy rough and ever-present water hazards, and he finds himself in a familiar position after one round: alone, on top of the leader board.

Though for Rory there are Thursdays and then there are Thursdays at Augusta, the latter of which find the Ulsterman looking like one of Jerry's kids.

At the beginning of the season (to be clear, the one in January), I thought the question of the year would be whether Jon Rahm could separate himself from the pack.  Now, given the way he's played, I'm checking his status for Augusta.  OK, no worries, he's in.

Is Jon Rahm … slumping?

It’s a patently ridiculous question to even ask, but Rahm has been on a patently ridiculous run of
consistency … until the last few weeks. The World No. 1 saw his streak of 34 straight rounds of par or better end on Friday at the Genesis Invitational and needed a nervy five-footer on his last hole just to make the cut. A six-under final day crept him up to T-21, but that’s still a disappointing week for a guy who’s been living on the first page of leader boards.

Rahm would’ve shot one-under 71 on Thursday at Bay Hill had he not stubbed a putt that couldn’t have been more than eight inches. No, seriously, that actually happened.

"I really couldn't tell you," Rahm said of the mishap. "I wish I could give you all the excuses in the world, but no, it's as simple as … you know, it just didn't feel good in my hands, and I tried to stop, and I didn't. I just simply didn't stop. I don't know. It was very odd."

I'm not going to bother chasing down that video, since you've undoubtedly seen it.  As I understand the shotlink data, the best golfer on the planet left a ten-inch putt seven inches short.  And no, the headcover wasn't still on... 

A PIP Nail-biter - Rumors aside, it came down a late push by a grizzled veteran.... in a silly-season event:

Despite not playing a single round on the PGA Tour in 2021, Tiger Woods won the inaugural Player Impact Program and its $8 million first prize.

Players were notified Wednesday morning of the results from the first year of the program, enacted at the beginning of 2021 to reward the 10 players who bring the most positive attention to the sport. Phil Mickelson claimed to have finished first in December, but tour officials insisted at the time that the competition ran through the end of the year and that no results were official until an audit from accounting and consluting (sic) firm Grant Thornton. In early December, Woods make his first public appearance, at the Hero World Challenge, since his February 2021 car accident. Two weeks later, he played alongside his son in the PNC Challenge. Both events garned plenty of attention as 2021 wound down.

Wow!  That's like a 16th major, no?

Now this program was founded and intended to exist in permanent double-secret probation, which has long been the Tour's SOP.  But, to their credit, they've actually released the computations, as opaque as they may be:

It must all be on the up-and-up, as a major auditing firm wouldn't lie to us, would they?  OK, at least a major auditing firm not named Arthur Anderson....  And you know that designation as a major consluting firm is being added to their promotional materials, though as auditors they'll know to add the second "t".

What to say about this hot mess?  Sean Zak has nine surprises, the first of course being that the Tour released the data.  True that!  Sean is not the only one to poke BAD over this:

2. Bryson DeChambeau’s low Q-Score

One of the five metrics of the PIP is Q-Score, defined by the Tour as “Awareness: A player’s general awareness score among broad U.S. population.” One might think that the 2020 U.S. Open champion, the PGA Tour’s preeminent long-driver, who made headlines repeatedly throughout the year and even competed in multiple made-for-TV matches, would register highly in public awareness. But apparently not! DeChambeau ranked 22nd in Q-Score among his Tour compadres, which ended up being his worst metric within the PIP. Luckily for him, that doesn’t matter. Players finishing 3rd-6th all reaped the same reward: $3.5 million.

He appears to have an identical Q-rating to the Number One player in the world, so doesn't seem that bad to me.  

You sure these two belong in the same sentence?

5. No Rickie or Max

When the Tour initially announced to players its intentions with the PIP, it simulated how the 2019 season would have played out. Tiger Woods won, to no surprise, but also unsurprising was Rickie Fowler, who ranked 5th behind Mickelson, Brooks Koepka, Rory McIlroy and Woods. Fowler has long been one of the Tour’s most marketable players, but in 2021, that clearly wasn’t so much the case. Fowler’s name was nowhere to be found on the top 10 results that were shared. Could he have been in the next 10? Probably. But without that information at our disposal, we’ll just have to wonder.

Similarly absent is the Twittering Golfer himself, Max Homa. Beloved on Golf Twitter and in social media circles for roasting swings and generally just being himself, Homa was definitely a surprise to see not included on the list. At least for the most ardent Golf Twitter supporters. Homa also won multiple events in 2021 and has hosted/appeared on many podcasts. Again, would love to know if he finished at, say, 14th in the ranking. Until then, Max clearly has some work to do.

 Let's see, one of those has strong social media presence, and the other wears orange.

But didn't someone else declare victory in this matter?  Trying to place the name, as he seems to have been out of the news lately.  Like I said above, can't get past the first item...

But see if you think this header over-promises:

You've been warned, so any spit-takes are on you:

Hilarious!  Boy, these guys are good.

Our friends at No Laying Up did the job American journalists won't do.  We've been hearing a lot lately about the subsistence-level compensation available on tour, so math has been done:

I get that those numbers pale in comparison to the nine-figure sums allegedly on offer, and who among us wouldn't have been tempted.  But they'll get by regardless.

I've been a critic of this program ever since it was disclosed, and Alistair Tait agrees, though his concerns seem more basic:

Imagine earning a seven-figure cheque just for being popular. How about earning $8 million even though you only worked one week of the year.

Think of the irony of fighting a proposed rival Golf Super League offering obscene amounts of money by, er, offering golfers obscene amounts of money for doing very little.

Woods took top spot despite playing just once in 2021, finishing second alongside son Charlie in the PNC Championship in December. Kevin Na uttered the question on everyone’s lips when he asked:

“How is this possible?”

In a world of professional golf dripping with money, anything is possible Kevin.

Which builds to this rousing coda:

Quite simply, it’s obscene. And before anyone accuses me of being an out-and-out socialist who subscribes to Socialist Worker newspaper, if I was offered a seven-figure cheque for posting a few more tweets and Instagram pictures than my peers, I’d grab it with both hands. But that doesn’t make the PIP any less obscene.

Imagine how $40 million could be used to – dare I say it? – help grow the game.

Still, the PGA Tour returns to reality this year: it has upped the PIP pot to $50 million!

Granted, it's objectively obscene.  It's just that I don't know how to criticize Bryson for taking $3.5 million for doing nothing, when he reportedly turned down $135 million for doing a similar nothing.

Tait raised the point about the absence of guys like Collin Morikawa, which is fair.  But the bigger issue is the dubious metrics and motivations the program necessarily involves, as it seems to me little more than a slush fund for Jay to pay off his faves.  Problem is that everyone at No. 11 and lower now has a grudge.  If I were Greg Norman, the next dime I'd drop would be to Collin Morikawa.

Don't Rush Into Things, Kids -  Apparently DJ is going to make an honest woman of Paulina, though I'm worried they're rushing into things.  But Paulina's bachelorette party looks to have been exactly what you'd expect:

Well love birds, we have some big news. We STILL do not know when or where Dustin Johnson
and Paulina Gretzky will tie the knot some nine years after their engagement, but we do know that date is inching closer. On Tuesday, Paulina Gretzky took one of the last off-ramps before Marriage Town, jetting off to St. Bart’s for an predictably glitzy bachelorette party, which, much to the delight of us Motel 6 rewards members, was documented in exhaustive detail on Instagram. If you want to know how the OG golf WAG spent her final days of wedlock-less bliss, put on your drinking boots and rhinestone cowgirl hats and check it out.




The funniest bit seems to be that no one still knows when the happy day is....

Talking Baseball -  Is this a great time of year or what?  With pitchers and catchers having reported, we'll be hearing "Play Ball" any day now....  What?  Really?  Well, that really sucks!

Just a couple of bits.  First, Geoff is thankful that baseball is beclowning itself such as to cover for our silly little game:

Just when it seemed convenient to let Major League Baseball owners take over as the sport-that-can’t-afford-to-appear-immersed-in-extreme-avarice, golf said not so fast! The PGA Tour kept the money talk going with Wednesday’s unexpected PIP reveal. Tiger Woods captured the trophy, which sources suggest is a gold-plated algorithm made by Tiffany. It seems Tiger’s no-longer-secret bonus pool win was sealed by a late surge of PNC Championship Meltwaters. Sure hope Charlie gets his fair share since he carried the gimpy old man.

Tiger’s inspiring come-from-behind win was revealed on PGATour.com to let Phil Mickelson know why he did not win after December’s premature victory declaration. And to make ensure the Lefty backlash reached Defcon Silly, Woods Tweeted an Emoji-infused jab. A closer look at the numbers revealed by GolfDigest.com shows how manufactured the whole thing is.

Meanwhile, as MLB was skewered, their Commissioner Rob Manfred broke out the golf equivalent of a lower lip-biting, mid-funeral, air-guitar solo when caught practicing his golf swing during a labor negotiations break. Perhaps he was dreaming of the Seminole Pro-Member missed to do his part in dooming the negosh. Instead, all Manfred got was unimaginably bad press, a Daily News back cover, and another black eye for his expansive collection.

Pretty much.  He stole my second bit, here's that Daily News back cover:


Yeah, Geoff, he looks like a doofus.... but I thought we were trying to make golf more, yanno, inclusive.  

Captain, My Captain - To the surprise of exactly no one, Zach Johnson got the gig in Italy.  Probably the funniest past of this that Z admitted that he's never actually been to Italy...

Shane Ryan is here to help, with ten suggestions:

1. Take as many captain's picks as … oh, OK. Good job.

Yup, ZJ is already on this one. One of the very first announcements he made during Monday’s
introductory press conference was that they'd stick with six captain's picks. This makes the first time any team in modern Ryder Cup history will start with that many picks. Stricker started with four in 2019 but seized the chance to increase to six once COVID-19 hit, and then kept the full six even after the Cup was re-scheduled. The fact that Johnson is keeping it going is a very good sign for the Americans. Statistics show that players who make the team via captain's pick perform better than those who qualify at the bottom of the list. Aside from the data, this flexibility is extra important when playing in Europe. We all saw how Jim Furyk was handcuffed in Paris, essentially forced to take Phil Mickelson and Bryson DeChambeau on a tight course that didn't suit them. With more picks, Johnson will have a ton of flexibility in what he called a "horses for courses" strategy, regardless of how the Europeans manipulate the course at Marco Simone. (It will be interesting to see how the Europeans respond here; Harrington made a tactical error decreasing his number of picks, and at the very least you'd expect them to go back to four.)

I'll agree that Jim Furyk handcuffed, though the perpetrator seemed to me more his limited intellect, given who he played in foursomes.  This may be more logically known as the PReed rule, minimizing his chances of automatically qualifying.

As for this, just shoot me now:

3. Pods work for a reason

It was Paul Azinger in 2008 who first had the epiphany: It's strange in an individual sport like golf to ask 12 competitors to suddenly become a tight-knit unit, but it's far less strange to get them to bond in groups of four. Pods foster unity and camaraderie, and require less of a complete philosophical shift from players who play an inherently selfish sport. Here, yet again, there's very little reason to worry: Though Azinger's success at Valhalla didn't catch on immediately, it's now practically dogma among the Americans.

How'd they work in Paris?  

Of course, there was one question foremost on everyone's mind:

Geoff had this take on the substantive bits:

  • The five-time Cup competitor is sticking with the same qualifying system and six
    captain’s picks.
  • He’s already appointed Steve Stricker a Vice Captain to assure everyone the Task Force is undaunted by Phil’s issues.
  • Johnson’s never been to Italy but can’t wait to get there.
  • His hair has staged a Brooklinesque comeback.


Yes, we need a Ryder Cup Task Force just to figure out what's going on with that hair.

He predictably ducked the question about a certain Vice-Captain, yanno a guy that seemed to be in line for the big chair in 2025.  

A Gracious Man - Obviously I could have included this in that first item, but I had promised a respite.  Rory is indeed a generous soul, such that at times I even feel a tinge of regret when I criticize him.  He had these comments about the PIP runner up, and my sense is that the other guy will not be nearly as happy to see him:

“It is unfortunate. I think Phil has been a wonderful ambassador for the game of golf, still is a wonderful ambassador for the game of golf,” McIlroy said at Bay Hill. “It's unfortunate that a few comments that he thought he was making in confidence or off the record got out there and were, not used against him, but this whole situation is unfortunate.”

“Look, we all make mistakes. We all say things we want to take back. No one is different in that regard,” McIlroy said. “But we should be allowed to make mistakes, and we should be allowed to ask for forgiveness and for people to forgive us and move on. Hopefully, he comes back at some stage, and he will, and people will welcome him back and be glad that he is back.”

 Eamon Lynch sees it differently:

The same lack of begrudgery is not being extended to another man missing this week, one long marketed as embodying Palmer’s touch with fans. Phil Mickelson is a former API champion but
often skipped the event. Whether he returns—here, or to the Tour at all—is the subject of intense speculation in the locker room.

Mickelson announced his retreat from the Tour February 22, part of a public statement addressing comments made public a week earlier in which he admitted he was overlooking atrocities by the Saudi Arabian government because their Super Golf League concept was providing him leverage to wring concessions from the PGA Tour that would further enrich him. On the range at Bay Hill, it is easier to find a player who has Googled schadenfreude than one willing to publicly sympathize with the embattled veteran.

“The public is finally realizing what we have always known,” said one multiple winner.

“Not a fan,” said a young star, the type who might once have been assumed to idolize a man of Mickelson’s stature.

Yeah, I think this has been building for some time.  The rap sheet is long and includes something for each and every guy out there to dislike.

Eamon explains:

The enmity toward Mickelson is layered. Few are bothered by his breezy dismissal of Saudi human rights abuses, the Tour being largely a constituency for whom injustice means being denied relief from a bad lie. Even his muscling of Tour commissioner Jay Monahan doesn’t present an issue for many, since his response to the Saudi threat has been to put more money in their pockets. A few things have rankled, however.

The first is his alliance with the Saudis, described by one player as a “failed coup.” Players are alert to anyone trying to take food from their table, and Mickelson stands accused of trying to steal dinner and burn down the kitchen. Then there is his failure to mention the Tour in his apology, which cemented a perception that he is fully on board with a breakaway group. Lastly, is the man himself.

Do we have enough time for that last bit?

In golf, competitors speak of each other in complimentary terms even when they don’t mean it, which owes to the Tour’s tendency to privately fine those who speak ill of their peers in public. It’s safe to assume that HQ won’t be levying fines against McIlroy, Billy Horschel or Pat Perez, all of whom were pointed (“idiotic,” “ignorant”) in their criticisms of a fellow player in recent weeks. Even Zach Johnson denied Mickelson succor Monday when he was announced as the U.S. Ryder Cup captain for 2023. Three times Johnson was provided an opportunity to present Mickelson as a potential member of his backroom team, and three times he passed.

What speaks volumes in this mess is not the criticisms of Mickelson but the absence of those willing to circle the wagons around him. McIlroy offered softer comments Wednesday at Bay Hill. “We all make mistakes,” he said, which generously assumes Mickelson might think he made a mistake. That statement was a rarity at the tournament. Not a day or dinner passes without a new tale being passed of behavior that ranges from the unbecoming to the unconscionable, served with a side of rumors about what might yet emerge.

Players are keeping their counsel not because of what Mickelson said, but because of what might be revealed next, because they are weary of his “figjamminess,” because his personality has grated too often for too long. Wherever he is hunkered down, it must be sobering for Mickelson to realize that a 30-year career not only produced no allies for his breakaway plot, but no friends willing to rally around amid the fallout.

I'm proud just to have helped add "figjamminess" into the golf lexicon.  For those unfamiliar with the root, which no doubt comes from Middle English, a definition can be found here.

In the interest of including all sides, Alistair Tait sees no issue with Mr. FIGJAM's return to polite society:

I had to laugh after reading a recent article asking how/if Phil Mickelson can make a successful return to the game from his latest self-induced gaffe over the proposed new Golf Super League and Saudi Arabia’s involvement in said circuit.

Mickelson will have no problem whatsoever. Recent history proves that only too well.

Golf fans are very forgiving.

Mickelson’s rap sheet is pretty detailed for a guy who passes himself off as a fun-loving, man of the people, sign every autograph sports star.

Remember, this is the guy who trashed Tom Watson in public at the 2014 Ryder Cup. A conversation Mickelson should have had the guts to hold with Watson in private, face to face, was played out in front of the world’s media. And remember, Watson is revered in Scotland for his love of the Home of Golf. Mickelson’s actions were unforgivable for many, me included, yet he’s still a draw when he plays in the Open Championship.

No cumulative effect, Alistair?  I don't think his problem is with the fans, it's with his fellow players.  That's where this one seems different, although you could well argue that if PReed is welcomed back every week, then standards would seem to be sufficiently low.

I'm somewhere in the middle.  Not willing to suggest that he'll be banished from the game, but I don't think he has many friends left among the top players and there's that torching of his hard earned Tiger bromance.  Not sure he'll ever be trusted by his peers, with the obvious venue for the fallout being the Ryder Cup.

That's it for this week, kids.  Pray for snow, as we desperately need it.

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