Weekend Wrap

We're back and refocused on our core business, yanno, making fun of Patrick Reed.  But first, some cursory thoughts on the weekend's golf.  Though, we'll lead with a non-action story:

Tom Weiskopf, RIP - Golf has lost one of its most intriguing characters:

Accomplished major champion, broadcaster and golf architect Tom Weiskopf died Saturday from pancreatic cancer. According to an Associated Press story, Weiskopf passed away peacefully at

his home in Big Sky, Montana and was working on design projects as recently as ten days ago. He was 79.

Weiskopf recorded 28 wins worldwide, including 16 on the PGA Tour. His major career was highlighted by wins in the 1973 Open Championship at Troon and the 1995 U.S. Senior Open over his longtime nemesis, friend and fellow Ohio State Buckeye, Jack Nicklaus.

Along with work in golf architecture and a memorable run as a broadcaster at the Masters, this would be the place where I reference to his World Golf Hall of Fame induction. But the Ohio native, known as “Terrible Tom” in his more temperamental years, was on the wrong side of someone important. I’m picturing a little man almost a foot shorter than him. Ironically, a strong case could be made that Weiskopf’s omission is a driving force in the Hall’s diminishing stature.

Given the moment in golf, my immediate reaction is to note the obvious parallels between Weiskopf and Mickelson, not least that goofy thumbs up.  At the midpoint of each, they'd be competing to be golf's greatest underachievers.

Interestingly to me, Phil achieved far more on the golf course than Tom, winning a gaggle of majors and performing well against his GOAT (Tiger).  Tom only won that one biggie at Troon and never did much against his GOAT (Jack), but I would argue that he matured more interestingly, making notable contributions behind the microphone in in golf course design.

But perhaps more telling, He was known as the Towering Inferno, versus Phil's FIGJAM.  But Tom was able to harness his anger (and got himself sober, as well), whereas Phil's seething rage has been on public display for the last year.  I know which model I prefer...

Geoff takes on the Hall of Fame exclusion angle, though also throws in an admission against interest:

It’s a mystery to many that he was so worth keeping out of the Hall despite such a rich life in the game. Especially as he could be delightful to interact with, was respected by his peers and, for whatever faults he had in his younger years and battles with the bottle, carved out a body of work that spoke to his talent, wisdom and respect for the sport.

As he told Matt Adams in one of his final interviews, Weiskopf felt he’d be remembered most for his fluid and fundamentally beautiful swing. Weiskopf believed it was important to play the game “correctly” but that he was a “bit misunderstood” because he “told it like it was”. He expressed just one major regret: skipping the 1977 Ryder Cup for his annual hunting trip.

To care about that you'd have to care about the Hall, though I'd like for him to have received that affirmation while alive.  Their failure to do so, and Tom is hardly the first, is why I can't bring myself to care about the Hall.  But while his playing career is marginal for enshrinement, those non-playing contributions are, you'd think, enough to tip the scale in his favor....  On the other hand, Tillinghast had been dead for seventy years before the Hall could find a place for him, so no hurry, guys.

That 1977 incident is hard for the kids of today to understand, because the Ryder Cup was still a sleepy exhibition.  That said, the man was capable of looking back at his actions and expressing genuine regrets, so there the parallels to Phil collapse in on themselves.

The Tour Confidential Panel had some thoughts, although none of them are likely old enough to know much more than the name:

5. Tom Weiskopf died Saturday at the age of 79, and he leaves behind a legacy as a major champion, course designer and announcer. How will you best remember him?

Sens: The beautiful swing. The close calls in majors. I didn’t get to watch him in his prime, but I interviewed him many times in his later years. He was smart and funny and frank. He had a reputation for orneriness, but by the time I met him, he seemed to have softened. He came off as a bit wistful about some of those near-misses. But also content with where he stood. And a terrific designer — with a special knack for short par-4s

Hirsh: Pardon my youth here, but I will remember Weiskopf most as the architect who brought us the venue for arguably the most electric atmosphere in golf, TPC Scottsdale. While he obviously didn’t erect the grandstands that would become the stadium hole, more people follow golf because of that event and it wouldn’t have been possible without Weiskopf.

Dethier: He loved golf. And he played the hell out of it, too. His run at the majors in the ‘70s — 18 top 10s, seven podiums and an Open Championship title — was incredibly impressive.

Piastowski: The swing. Fluid and effortless. And four Masters runners-up, which is damn impressive. And the lifetime in the game, from player to announcer to designer. So I guess a lot.

That first link includes links to a number of reads on Weiskopf for anyone that wants to dive deeper.  

R.I.P.

Walking The Walk -  They say it's not bragging when you back it up, but I did catch the last five holes of the highly-entertaining final round of the U.S. Amateur:

Sam Bennett had a lot to say at the U.S. Amateur, and he backed up every single word

Specifically, these words:

"A little bit at first, for sure," Bennett said when asked of his underdog mentality. "But I mean,

everybody knows who I am, I know who I am. I said I had something to prove, but I mean, in a way, not really. I mean, I guess, but here we are. I guess my comment, I backed it up."

The comment that Bennett is referring to, specifically, came after he had secured a spot in the semifinals on Friday. To that point, Bennett had beaten in order Nick Gabrelcik (ranked 13th in the World Amateur Golf Ranking), Fred Biondi (27th), David Puig (10th) and Stewart Hagestad (ninth). Bennett, who earned first team All-American honors with the Aggies in the spring, was asked what it said about his game that he was able to run through all of them with relative ease (only one of those matches reached the 18th hole). Without skipping a beat, he said "they're great players, but I'm a better player."

OK, FIGJAM!   

Bennett came within a whisker of blowing a 5-up lead, so that home stretch was quite entertaining, not least when Carr made a 15-foot birdie putt on No. 17 to send the match to the 36th hole.

There was a sequence on the 14th green, though, that had me jumping out of my chair.  Carr is 2-down at this point, yet agrees to a good-good with both guys facing short par putts (hard to judge on TV, but maybe 2 1/2 - 3 feet).  What was he thinking?  Yeah the guy's likely to make it, but you're quickly running out of holes, as two down with four is almost a death sentence.

But I haven't even mentioned the major reason that it was such a strange move....  Bennett had shown his first sign of nerves on the prior green missing a putt no longer than the one he had on No. 14.  Your opponent has just gagged on a shortie, and you concede the next one to him?  I'm sorry, I was under the misguided notion that you were trying to win...

Patty Ice, Redux - Yeah, I did actually turn it on for the last hole, but only because the final match in the U.S. Amateur had concluded:

Patrick Cantlay’s year had been fine — 10 top 10s, a victory at the team event with buddy Xander Schauffele — when Patty Ice appeared again. You remember him? He was the dude who froze

everyone at last year’s BMW Championship, then won the next week, at the Tour Championship, and here he was again, again at the BMW, stone cold, opening with rounds of 68, 68 and 65 and starting Sunday’s final round with a one-stroke lead.

All of which begs this question:

How does Patty Ice turn up — or is it turn down? — the thermostat?

“I think maybe in the bigger tournaments it’s easier to kind of narrow your focus, and I’ve done a good job of staying in the moment and trying to get in the right frame of mind and good attitude,” Cantlay said.

OK, but shouldn't one of us break the bad news to him that the last important tournament was in mid-July?

 I think about the only minimally interesting bit was that had his buddy Xander made that birdie putt on the finishing hole, that Cantlay, not Scheffler, would begin the Tour Championship with the lead.  Of course, that necessitates a brief respite from making fun of the LIV shotgun starts to remind ourselves that the FedEx Coda has a staggered start....

LIVing It Up - Kind of a surreal feeling to see the LIV stuff unfolding quickly, yet not blogging it.  We'll circle back I'm sure and catch up on the antitrust lawsuit and all that, but for today I'll just riff off the TC gang:

1. Both the Fire Pit Collective and Sports Illustrated reported Saturday some of the details of this week’s Tiger Woods-led players-only meeting that addressed LIV Golf’s threat to the PGA Tour. Among the reported items discussed were the creation of ‘a tour within a tour,’ where there would be 18 no-cut featuring 60 players playing for $20 million purses. Could this work?

Josh Sens: Sure. The super-rich get richer. That pretty much always works. Is it good for fans? Doesn’t sound exciting to me. If you want to fend off the kind of threat the Tour faces, why make it an economic arms race you can’t win? How about differentiating the product? Golfweek on Sunday reported plans for Tiger-and-Rory-led one-day events in non-green-grass arenas. Details to be revealed soon, apparently. It already sounds awful to me, but even as I type that, I can hear the kids saying, ‘OK, boomer.’ On the plus side, at least it’s different. My preference? Roll back the ball for some events and scrap the cookie-cutter bomb-and gouge courses in favor of more interesting designs. Make the players hit more creative shots. Enforce a shot clock. I know, it doesn’t involve trillion-dollar purses. But it would be more compelling than a lot of the same-old. And you might even turn a profit. Though I realize that several lifetimes of wealth isn’t enough for some.

Jack Hirsh: Sure, it could work, if the guys who are staying on the tour now aren’t jumping to LIV by 2024. But I also agree with Josh: Why basically copy LIV’s format (save for a three-round event). I’ll add to the suggestion of playing more alternate formats (but not the non-grass arena idea) like alternate shot or a team event with the LPGA. Players seem to love the Zurich Classic; why not have a mega-purse team event? All the limited-field stuff does is alienate the mid-level pro.

Dylan Dethier: I’d argue that by stealing some of the things that LIV got right, the PGA Tour is adopting some overdue changes — part of what made it vulnerable in the first place. I have slightly mixed feelings about the no-cut aspect, because we’ve seen some relatively lifeless WGC events over the years. But the fact that we as golf fans would know when we should be watching would be extremely helpful. And because the Tour has built-in advantages — TV deals, decades of history, Tiger Woods, etc. — it wins most tiebreakers.

Nick Piastowski: It works for the players’ bottom line ($$$) and the Tour’s (survival), which, like it or not, is the goal. But I have questions. It would create a tournament tier, and go ahead and laugh about the fate of some events, but they mean a lot to those cities and fans. It also creates a player tier. Can others move up to the big events? Or are you stuck with those 60 players, who, obviously, can slide over time? Which leads to my biggest question, and one that Tiger himself has mentioned — if the cash is guaranteed across now an entire season, is that incentive still great to dig it out of the dirt? Let’s hope this doesn’t trickle into the major

Seriously, haven't we suffered enough?  The LIV formula is a horrible model for golf, as proven over the years by the lifeless (relatively, Dylan?) WGCs.  The PGA Tour is better positioned here, as Nick did hit on a major weakness of LIV.  The Tour, because of its bevy of lesser events, as well as the entire tier of feeder tours, is far better positioned to accommodate the emergence of new talent (although those that are relegated out tend to be better known) .  

But Josh's comments are interesting as well, because the biggest impediment to making events actually more interesting is....wait for it, FedEx.   The Zurich almost didn't happen because the guys won't show up if they don't get FedEx Cup points, and they're harder the award in a team context.  That's contributed to the calcification of tour formats to a regrettable degree.

But, perhaps more importantly, they seem to be ignoring an important factor.  They presumably have to fight the awarding of OWGR points to LIV events, though they seem more focused on the 54 holes than the small field size, which to me is as big an issue.  But it undermines your legitimate objections when you imitate them, although I keep reminding folks that awarding OWGR points for Tiger's 18-player field was a really bad call...

To be continued....

2. A group of LIV golfers last week filed an antitrust suit against the Tour alleging that the Tour is unlawfully sanctioning them for signing on with the rival circuit, and this week, a handful of legal documents were unsealed, including player contracts. Having seen some of the details, what stood out to you?

Hirsh: For me, the limitations on media availability are the most shocking, considering Phil wanted the rights to his highlights. What he gains in that, he loses in freedom to communicate with the media. These players seemed like they wanted more freedom, but it’s fairly obvious that the price of the millions of dollars from LIV is their freedom to talk to the media. Also wasn’t that Bryson-Brooks feud staged to help them win the PIP? No more of that.

Sens: Agreed on the compromises on the media front. One clause that caught me was the prohibition against saying anything that might bring any person of note into ‘disrepute.’ How are we defining disrepute? What are the new boundaries of decorum? Will a lot of what used to be considered honest and acceptable talk become punishable?

Dethier: I was intrigued by the apparel talk! LIV guys are going to be wearing LIV gear like, all the time? At majors, even? It was interesting to read about LIV’s hold over players’ sponsorship decisions and displayed logos, which require approval for something as small as a coffee cup. These contracts are all different, so we don’t have a complete picture, but getting a little window into how LIV will exercise control was telling.

Piastowski: Dylan, why aren’t you wearing your GOLF shirts and hats? But yes, the apparel bit is great. As is this, which may cut into ‘family time.’ This is from Zephyr Melton’s story: “One of the stipulations indicates that players must ‘participate fully in up to 7 additional Service Days’ in 2022, with ‘12 additional Service Days in each following year.’ A Service Day is defined in the contract as ‘any day during which the Player is required to participate in and assist the League Operator and/or the Team Operator with meetings, negotiations and/or other activities with corporate sponsors or other business partners of the League.’”

And to think I had been reliably informed that they were jumping to LIV solely to spend more time with their families....

I do think that's a rich lode to mine in future posts, though I'm of course shocked, shocked I tell you, that Phil might have misled us on the media rights bit....

And this on my single favorite bit, to which I can assure you we will return:

3. In more court news, Patrick Reed has filed a defamation suit against Brandel Chamblee and Golf Channel, alleging they “have conspired as joint tortfeasors for and with the PGA Tour, its executives and its Commissioner Jay Monahan, to engage in a pattern and practice of defaming Mr. Reed.” The lawsuit uses quotes from Chamblee from his time on the air for Golf Channel and Sky Sports as well as on podcasts to allege damages in excess of $750 million. What are your takeaways to Reed’s move?

Sens: That pro golf is taking on a whiff of the Jerry Springer Show. Maybe the actual courts will see it differently, but in the court of public opinion, I think the verdict would be that any damage to Reed’s reputation has been largely self-inflicted.

Hirsh: No matter what becomes of all the other suits, I just can’t ever see Patrick Reed playing on Tour again after this. Should he win, and most seem to agree the lawsuit has very little legal merit, would that then mean no media person could critique a player? That’s part of sports. Interesting he chose not to tee it up in this week’s International Series event in South Korea, which he committed to a few weeks back.

Dethier: I think it’s a sham and a shame. Brandel Chamblee is polarizing, sure, but he does a ton of homework, tries to get it right and generally does. Imagine an athlete in any other sport suing an analyst for offering takes on television. LeBron James might not care for Skip Bayless, but he would never sue the guy. I’m not sure how far this will end up going, but I’m sure there would be some interesting documents that would come through if we reached the discovery phase…

Piastowski: Fan reaction is part of the game. Reed shouldn’t expect to be cheered. He has to earn that. I’ll leave it at that.

This might be the single funniest lawsuit ever, as I think discovery could be worthy of paid admission.  The model here might well be an ill-considered defamation lawsuit filed by John Daly, which unfortunately for him resulted in his PGA Tour disciplinary file becoming public.  Do we think PReed's file might have some comedy gold contained within?

But one issue I look forward to revisiting as this story continues to unfold, is the effect of the Tour's coddling of players, specifically their policy of omertà on disciplinary actions.  Most notably, in allowing DJ to hide a series of failed drug tests and concoct a fantasy jet-ski accident, but which seems to have failed to generate any loyalty in those whose reputations were so protected

Nurse Ratched, care for a mulligan on that policy?  How's about letting in a little sunlight and showing us those files?   

I'll need to leave you folks here, but we will be flooding the zone as we move forward.