Weekend Wrap - Dog Days of April Edition

With my own golf rained out and the Yankee offense on life support, I watched more golf than I'm comfortable admitting publicly.  As I scanned the Zurich and Chevron leaderboards in vain for a familiar name (also factoring in the Talor Gooch juggernaut), I had an amusing thought.  If golf handicaps come in both +'s and -'s, do Nielsen ratings as well?

Where to begin?

We Gave up Dinah For This? - Got text from a friend who moved to Hawaii last year, bemoaning the move from Mission Hills.  When I responded that he should direct his opprobrium to Fred Ridley, he didn't know the backstory.....  Gee, if only there were a place he could go on these interwebs to stay apprised on such subjects....

The winner does at least have an appealing history:

When you look at Vu’s resume, it makes sense that she adds her name to the Dinah Shore Trophy. She’s a former No. 1-ranked amateur in the world. She was once named Pac-12 Player of the Year.

She won a whopping eight tournaments at UCLA. Her list of amateur accomplishments is on par with some of the biggest stars in the game, and a successful pro career would be the next logical step.

But the road to success is rarely linear.

In her first year on the LPGA Tour in 2019, she made just one cut and netted only $3,830. She felt lost playing the game she loved. Away from the course, things were no better. Her grandfather died early on in the Covid-19 pandemic, and she even contemplated giving up her pro-golf aspirations and going to law school.

“I was just in such a bad place,” Vu said. “Everything was life or death. I just saw everybody that I’ve competed with being successful, and I just compared myself all the time.”

If she’d quit, Sunday at the Chevron would’ve been much different.

Let me see if I follow Zephyr Melton's logic here....  If you take the winner out of the mix in some It's a Wonderful Life fever dream, then Sunday would have been different.  I can only hope Zephyr's parents didn't pay too much to send him to journalism school.

Strangely, Melton missed the best part of her background, not that almost giving up the game isn't also noteworthy.  But why leave this on the cutting room floor?

Lilia Vu felt an unusual amount of anger bubbling up inside this week over little things. Upset by

the way she handled that anger, there were times during the final round of the 2023 Chevron Championship that Vu thought about her grandpa, Dinh Du, and how disappointed he’d be if she didn’t get her act together.

Standing at the podium soaked in champagne and cloaked in a white robe and slippers, the shiny Dinah Shore trophy by her side, Vu told the story of how her grandfather built a boat to help his family escape a war-torn Vietnam. How he’d go off in the countryside for months at a time, trying to literally build a better life for their family with his bare hands.

Vu’s mom, Yvonne, and her siblings ran through the forest the day in 1982 her father told them it was time to go. The boat was meant to hold no more than 54 people, but as others swam out to meet them, the number swelled to 82.

“He took them all,” said Yvonne.

After two days, the boat sprang a leak. They shot off a flare and were. soon rescued by the USS Brewton, a Naval ship that was decommissioned in 1992.

The back story of how they got a flare might be even better, but I doubt we'll ever hear it.

The Tour Confidential panel has one of their ADD weeks, yanno where they fixate on that one guy, but managed to work in a question (we're back to avoiding numbers for the questions, because...) this event that used to be of interest:

Lilia Vu beat Angel Yin in a playoff to win the Chevron Championship and claim the LPGA’s first major of the season, which took place at The Club at Carlton Woods in The Woodlands, Texas, the first time since it began in 1972 it wasn’t held at Mission Hills following Chevron’s new title sponsorship. What are your thoughts on Year 1 of the new host venue?

Berhow: As someone who is not always big on change, I liked a lot of what I saw. Sure, the leap into Poppie’s Pond is no more and the alternative they cooked up on Sunday was fine, and word is the spectator shuttles took a little longer than desired, but it’s hard to find negatives about a sponsor that wants to invest in the women’s game. If I’m Chevron, it makes sense to move this event to their backyard. That’s their right. I also saw on Twitter there was a HBCU Career Panel taking place on site, and this was also the first time in this tournament’s history players who missed the cut received a $5,000 stipend. We’ll get used to the course in time, but seems like there’s lots of good to build on here.

Hirsh: While I’d love to see more events played at more interesting golf courses, I’m kind of indifferent on the venue change. I agree with Josh about it being great Chevron wanting to inject money into the LPGA, but it does suck it requires moving the event from where it’s developed a history at. I also hope the alligator netting actually works!

Sens: This was a tough, long course, with small greens and all sorts of trouble, and I loved Vu’s composure on it during what was a pretty packed race for a while. As for breaking with tradition, as my colleagues note, a small price in exchange for a solid sponsorship. I’m sure every player would take that guarantee over a jump into a pond.

I love that Jack Hirsh cold open, because you can see the effort necessary to avoid brutally trashing just another featureless Nicklaus design.  Of course, you can admit it, once you heard that this event was decamping to Houston, the writing was on the wall....

I do find Josh Berhow's comments interesting, because there's much effort expended to avoid that 600 pound elephant in the corner.  All that stuff he cites is good, well excluding the dreary backyard Chevron happens to inhabit.  But Jack avoids any thought of what's been lost (even though we understand the LPGA didn't start this chain-reaction), the severing of any connection to the history of women's golf and the chaotic, borderline tawdry, origins of this event.  

If I could make a suggestion to the LPGA Commish Mollie Marcoux Samaan, it would involve the LPGA's forthcoming Founders Cup event, which is to be held in May at Upper Montclair Country Club.  That's a nice homage to the LPGA's founders, but I'd be in discussion with the folks at Mission Hills and try to get the LPGA back there with that specific event.  I know, it makes far too much sense to ever happen in this lifetime....

One last bit about this date from Geoff.  As I noted above, the Dinah was a dead lesbian walking (Yeah, you knew I'm a hater, but I do actually like that part of the history) once Augusta National announced their amateur event, which concludes the Saturday of what used to be Dinah week.  The first thing you'd expect is that the Dinah would change dates, but they were jammed in by the Coachella Festival and the end of the season, so there was nowhere to move.

But this new date has to be better for everyone, right?  Because we want to maintain the tradition of amateur participation, right?  

While everyone is going into this one blind, a few of the amateurs exempted into the Chevron will tee up Thursday without benefit of a practice round (Nichols/Golfweek) after playing their conference championships. Admirably, World No. 1 amateur and recently Augusta National Women’s Amateur winner Rose Zhang passed on the Chevron to compete for Stanford in the Pac 12 Championships. She set several records in winning Wednesday including the lowest score in relation to par (-12), lowest overall score (204) and largest margin of victory in conference history (seven strokes). Zhang has also now spent 136 weeks as the world’s leading female amateur golfer, surpassing the record total of 135 weeks set by Leona Maguire of Ireland.

So, we really want the kids here, but not enough to figure out a date when they can actually make it....

But this is perhaps the harshest bit about that venue:

Someone forgot to tell a pair of southern California natives that Chevron moved the local major championship 1451 miles east to rural Houston. And in a vibe-free setting that made the final Mission Hills years seem like a Beyoncé set at Coachella, SoCal’s Lilia Vu (Fountain Valley) and Angel Yin (Arcadia) finished in a playoff to decide the season opening major.

Vibe-free?  Yeah, that's gonna leave a mark...

NOLA Witness Protection Program News - There were a few show ponies in the field, though they mostly failed to show.  I think it's always fun to watch these guys play alternate-shot, but I can't imagine Nielsen finding a measurable audience for this event:

At last year’s Zurich Classic, Nick Hardy’s rookie PGA Tour season was derailed.

He suffered a left wrist injury, forcing him to miss two months and eventually have to re-earn his PGA Tour card at the Korn Ferry Finals.

In contrast, his partner this week, Davis Riley, had a tremendous rookie season in 2022, nearly making the Tour Championship at No. 36 in the FedEx Cup standings. But he didn’t get a win.

This week though, Riley and Hardy each collected their first PGA Tour title after the pair shot 65 Sunday in alternate shot to finish at 30 under and win the Zurich Classic by two strokes. Riley and Hardy are the second and third players to win their first Tour title at the Zurich since it became a team event in 2017 when Cameron Smith did in the format’s debut.

I was bouncing among the Chevron, the Yankees offensive futility and this, and missed their tear on the back nine that sealed the deal.

That Tour Confidential panel did at least acknowledge the face plant this week, but the sequencing of their Q&A's can't improve Jay's mood.  Let's reverse the order and get their view from 30,000 feet first:

Speaking of the Zurich Classic, Davis Riley and Nick Hardy won, closing with a seven-under 65 in alternate shot on Sunday to best Canadians Adam Hadwin and Nick Taylor by two. But you’re in charge next year. What tweaks are you making to the event, either with how teams are picked, the formats played or both?

Berhow: Since it’s a team event that’s not the Ryder Cup or Presidents Cup — and honestly if we are inviting aging sponsor’s exemptions — we might as well embrace the weirdness and go all out. Fourballs is boring. Let’s go four days, four formats. Make one day a scramble, but if you go three holes without a birdie you are eliminated. Make the next day a worst-ball scramble. Round 3 you get only four clubs. Then, for the final round, alternate shot. Wait a few years and this is the formula for a fifth major.

Hirsh: For starters, I’d move it to a different part of the schedule. Maybe toward the end of January or February so it doesn’t get swallowed by the Masters. I could also see an argument for the new Fall series, but I kinda like the idea of this event counting for the FedEx Cup. It really is great to see the unique format and I’d love to see it get some more big names regularly. Next I’d drop fourball. Make the whole thing alternate shot, the true team format that doesn’t allow you to hide a poorly performing partner. That would really make things interesting with the added bonus of speeding up play.

Sens: I’m with Jack: make it all alternate shot. On a more outlandish note, I’m still waiting for the team event where each team gets one opportunity during a round to pick a fan from the crowd to hit a shot for the opposition. I suppose you’d have to institute a Really Silly Season for that to happen. But I would watch.

OK, that got silly in hurry....

First and foremost, the format to me is OK, as I particularly like that they play alternate shot on Sunday (and on cut-day as well).  I do agree that fourballs is slightly boring, they're just so damn good (not to mention playing a soft, easy-for-them venue), but at least it's medal play and big numbers can be in the mix.  The real problem with fourballs is in the cup events, where match-play renders them mere putting contests, albeit extremely slow putting contests.  But, hold that thought for September, shall we?

There may be scheduling issues, but I certainly would not overreact to this year, where it's jammed into a stretch of four weeks where it's the only non-designated event.  Next year we're led to believe that there will only be eight (including, I think, the Players Championship), so I thin they'll have a reasonable chance at landing some of the guys that enjoy a week featuring camaraderie with a side of Etouffee.

But now the weeks beclownment, first the TC gang:

John Daly, 56, and David Duval, 51, received sponsor’s exemptions into the Zurich Classic and missed the cut at 14 over, which was 12 behind the next-worst score. While it’s an event’s right to use its exemptions how it pleases, do you have an issue with this one in particular, given both players are well past their primes and rarely play competitively anymore?

Berhow: It really was a tough look when those guys struggled so much in alternate shot, but the truth is the majority of these pros make that format look so easily when it’s in fact so incredibly hard. In a way inviting them did exactly what it was supposed to by drawing attention to an event that lacked star power, but it’s unfortunate they didn’t play better.

Hirsh: Yes, this was a joke. It was likely born out of a necessity to help fill the field given the Zurich’s place in the schedule, but there were guys on the alternate list — while not the biggest names — who could have used the opportunity. The tournament typically requires one member of each team to be exempt and then the second can be a sponsor’s exemption. This was the case when 66-year-old Jay Haas made the cut while playing with son Bill last year. But Jay Haas is a PGA Tour Champions stud with 18 wins, albeit the last coming in 2016. Daly and Duval have combined for just one victory on the over-50 circuit.

Sens: I’m on the fence about this. I understand the obvious objections and the unlikelihood that Duval and Daly were going to be in the mix. But, as in Dumb and Dumber, even if the odds were a million to one, there was still a chance. It’s easy to knock the move in retrospect. But what if Duval and Daly had played out of their minds in the opening round and posted a decent score? Then the event would have had the best of both worlds: a crowd-pleasing pairing with an entertaining underdog story. And in the end, this is entertainment.

Let's be clear, I didn't wait for it to be in retrospect to trash it.....

And let's be even clearer, I have an open mind about this event giving sponsor's exemptions to 56-year old players, but my mind is long closed to PGAS Tour exemptions for THIS 56-year old:

Details from John Daly‘s PGA Tour disciplinary file were made public Tuesday -- and they’re not flattering.

According to the Florida Times-Union, which obtained the 456-page file through a libel lawsuit against one of its former columnists, Daly has been suspended from the PGA five times and has been cited 21 times for not giving his best effort. In addition, he was placed on probation six times, ordered to seek counseling or alcohol rehab seven times and has been fined nearly $100,000.

Of course, none of these revelations should come as a shock. Many of the incidents included in the file were previously reported, including Daly’s trashing of a hotel room during the Players Championship in 1997.

Can you imagine how badly you have to dog it to actually get fined by the Tour?  To do that 21 times is beyond comprehension.  But there is one thing harder to believe than that disciplinary file, to wit, that this same miscreant would be eligible for further sponsor exemptions....

Thought experiment:  What would you have to do to be permanently banned from the PGA Tour?  The obvious answer is "Be Phil", but when the day comes isn't this his best affirmative defense?  If you didn't ban Daly, how can you ban anyone?

As you might expect, Eamon Lynch has thoughts, although the gratuitous swipe at LIV in his lede seems a tad forced:

The criteria by which fields are assembled on the PGA Tour is considerably more byzantine than over on LIV Golf, where competitors require only the blessing of Greg Norman and amoral ambivalence about the abuses and butchery of their princely benefactor.

First some useful backgrund:

The Tour’s official list has 39 exemption categories, ranging from the obvious (winners of majors and the FedEx Cup) to the arcane (PGA Section champions, players with 300 career made cuts). They’re ranked by priority and not every classification is used at every event. The Zurich Classic, for example, used 20 categories to compile its field, a trickier construct than usual since the tournament is comprised of 80 two-man teams.

The most opaque criterion has always been sponsor invites, in which those who write the checks are granted tremendous latitude in deciding who gets the call for a handful of spots. As a general rule, that’s fair. Sponsors ought to have a say in drawing attention to their tournaments and not be hostage to filling tee times from a pre-determined pecking order of pedestrian pros, even if the basis for extending invitations appears parochial.

Yes, it's hard to argue against sponsor's exemptions, well, except when it is.  For instance, that D-squared team wasn't the only sketchy one:

But an exemption category intended to benefit a tournament can also be a detriment when improperly applied.

When two-time PGA Tour winner Michael Thompson was added to the field at the Zurich Classic, he chose as his team partner Paresh Amin, a 43-year-old military veteran with a beggarly record on mini-tours, and who shot 42-over-par in Q-School for the Mackenzie Tour.

“He’s become my really good friend,” Thompson explained to my colleague, Adam Schupak. “I haven’t had any success with a partner in the team format. If I was going to play a team event, I wanted to be with someone I really liked. He’s trying to play professionally and I wanted to give him a chance to experience a PGA Tour event, meet the equipment reps, meet the caddies.”

I have no specific problem with Thompson getting an invite, as the most recent of his wins was in 2020 and he finished T29 at Harbor Town.  But that the invite gives him the right to pick a single-digit handicap and the world is fine with this so the guy can meet the caddies?  Have you all lost your bloody minds?  Do you have any idea how many thousands of guys would kill for that slot?

But, good news for Paresh, the race to the bottom was extremely competitive this week:

Thompson and Amin were spared the indignity of last place only thanks to another pair of sponsor invites: David Duval and John Daly. Zurich presumably hoped the name recognition of these former major winners would draw eyeballs to an event that sits in no man’s land on the calendar, wedged amid majors and designated stops. The tournament could boast some quality names — Cantlay, Schauffele, Fitzpatrick, Morikawa, Homa — but too many others who would be recognized only by job-seeking caddies or alert process servers.

The problem is that Duval and Daly are woefully uncompetitive even on the PGA Tour Champions, much less a more demanding stage. Duval is 0-for-25 in cracking the top 10 in his senior career, while Daly has done so just once in his last 33 attempts. Predictably, their performance was execrable: rounds of 75-83 secured last place by 12 shots. Perhaps the few spectators who were imperiled by the team’s wayward shots enjoyed seeing the old timers, but there are ample reasons why some of their fellow Tour players might not.

That 83 might jump out at you, but I would argue that for two alleged professionals to shoot a 75 best-ball on that easy track might be the bigger indignity.

So I went with the caddies, but Eamon is on the same track with this:

FedEx Cup points are the currency of the PGA Tour, and have never been more valuable. Only the top 50 in points will guarantee access to all of 2024’s lucrative designated events. Only the top 70 will secure playing privileges for next season, down from 125 in years past. Fewer players have guaranteed status as more fields are reduced in size. Points are precious, and so too is the opportunity to earn them. There is less room than ever for veterans who fancy a couple of days in the Big Easy and friends Michael Thompson wants to introduce to equipment reps.

As I understand the zeitgeist, the PGA Tour is in an existential struggle for survival against the forces of evil, and is dramatically restructuring their schedule to head off this challenge.  Apparently, they think the way to do this is with John Daly, David Duyal and Paresh Amin.  Are there an adults in the room?  Because allowing Joh Daly to beclown this event tells me that Jay Monahan isn't actually up to the moment.

Tiger-Centric Much? - I understand the Tiger obsession, but I don't understand letting that obsession loose when there is absolutely nothing to be said on the matter.  In that vein, as note above, the Tour Confidential panel devoted their first two Q&A's to this drivel:

Tiger Woods underwent a procedure on his right foot and released a statement saying the surgery was successful, but it now casts serious doubt on his status for 2023. Will we see Woods make any more competitive starts this year?

Josh Berhow: From everything I’ve read, it seems unlikely he’ll be able to play any majors, and I don’t think he planned to play much beyond that anyway. Here’s hoping he can jump in a cart and play the PNC Championship with Charlie in December. Then, after that, maybe Riviera and the Masters. Baby steps.

Jack Hirsh: Does the silly season count? Maybe, but that’s a big, all caps, italics and stars *MAYBE*. Who knows what he’ll be able to do with the golf swing after this surgery, which involves fusing together a joint in the ankle. I’ve heard that if it was his left foot, the surgery would be career ending. If the issue remains walking, and his recovery goes as scheduled, it sounds like we could see him at the PNC and then maybe for the start of his virtual league with Rory McIlroy, the TGL. But I don’t think we’ll hear from him at all again until the Hero World Challenge.

Josh Sens: He’ll absolutely be back for the PNC. Unless he isn’t. That old line about people planning and god laughing applies to any of us trying to forecast Tiger’s health. Raise your hand if you saw plantar fasciitis coming? Neck. Back. Knee. Foot. Ankle. The only thing I think we can say for sure is that it wouldn’t be a shocker if some other body part gave out next.

So, he might play the PNC in a cart.  Thanks, guys, kinda had that one sussed out all by my lonesome....

Looking beyond this season, as Woods’ injuries and surgeries continue to stack up, at what point does he decide enough is enough? Are we approaching that?

Berhow: Based on his schedule prior to this setback — the majors, maybe one or two more events — he’s really already in that second (or whatever number) stage of his career. I think he’s still several years away from officially “retiring,” since in a sport like golf — and with his lifetime exemption — he would be able to take advantage of a healthy stretch and enter an upcoming event or major to try and catch lightning in a bottle. I don’t think he’s anywhere close to giving up on those potential healthy starts yet.

Hirsh: I’m with Berhow on this. Obviously, just being able to walk pain-free is first and foremost, but if there’s any chance he can continue to play at a high level, he’s going to try. Whether that’s the right thing to do or not isn’t up to us to decide.

Sens: Agreed. Let’s just hope it doesn’t become like the knight in Monty Python (It’s just a flesh wound!), where everyone knows it’s over except the guy who wants to keep on fighting. This being Woods, and this being golf, which allows for more lives than any sport, I’m sure we’ll be on Tiger-watch for a large handful of majors to come.

There are some interesting threads that we could explore here, but ones they go to pains to avoid.

First, it's silly to be asking them for their medical opinions or insights into Tiger's mind, because they know no more than we do.  The interesting threads might be these:

1.  I have no criticism of Tiger playing where he's played in 2022 and 2023, but I think it's fair to ask going forward how we feel about him using a spot in the field at those three majors (ignoring Augusta, where no one will take his slot) if he can't walk for four days.  It's a tough one for sure, but worth thinking through ahead of time.
2. Josh mentioned his lifetime exemption, but he actually has a second exemption from that 2019 Masters.  Do we feel any differently about him hogging a spot in the field under that exemption versus the former champion exemption?  

I just don't see the logic in devoting two questions to that subject, when the questions are focused on areas about which they know nothing.

I'll have to leave you here, though you might have noticed which event the TYC panel ignore tis week..... Of course, I'm ignoring it as well, at least for now.