Midweek Musings - Back To The Wasatch Edition

I am back at Unplayable Lies Western HQ, to give this skiing thing another go.  That last trip didn't work out so well.... There is some snow in the forecast, though not the gaudy numbers of that prior trip.  But I know that's not what you want to talk about....

Wither Professional Golf - Peace is turning out to be far messier than those June 6th smiles would have led us to believe....  We're seeing continued aggressiveness form LIV, including this:

Tyrrell Hatton is listed among the 80 golfers in the field this week at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, the second signature event on the PGA Tour’s 2024 schedule. He was one of 11 to be playing the event for the first time.

But there’s some doubt that Hatton will join the fun on the Monterey Peninsula. According to a report by James Corrigan in the Telegraph, Hatton has left the PGA Tour and made the jump to LIV Golf, signing for $63 million. He reportedly will make his LIV debut this week as a member of Jon Rahm’s team in the season opener in Mexico. The event in Mayakoba starts Friday.

Hatton, who just five days ago committed to the WM Phoenix Open, would then be with LIV in Las Vegas over Super Bowl weekend instead of returning to TPC Scottsdale that same weekend, according to the report.

In the context of the Anthony Kim news there was commentary to the effect that LIV was being a little tighter with the moolah though, if the report above is true, we can assume there remains no limiting factor on the checks they'll write.

I don't much care about Tyrrell except for the fact that he's occasionally amusing, but I hate these signings more than anything:

One of the top amateurs in the world is joining LIV Golf.

Caleb Surratt, a sophomore at Tennessee, is turning professional and will join Jon Rahm’s LIV team ahead of LIV Golf’s season opener at Mayakoba in Mexico, which begins Friday. LIV Golf announced the long-rumored news Tuesday when it announced Rahm’s team Legion XIII.

Like Chacarra, Puig and Piot before him, I see a young man opting for the easy way out, which immediately leads me to the conclusion that they will fade into obscurity.  I actually think that the grind to get PGA Tour status makes them better players, and that those grabbing the LIV guaranteed money don't think highly of their own prospects.

More importantly, perhaps, is that Caleb Surratt apparently has no interest in playing any of the majors, the only four tournaments that actually matter.  Noted.

This hasn't gotten a lot of play, but seems kinda significant:

The future of professional golf remains uncertain, but according to a report, answers could be around the corner.

The Strategic Sports Group (SSG), an outside investment group headlined by Fenway Sports Group and comprised of several high-level U.S.-based sports owners, may begin its investment in the PGA Tour as early as next week, according to a Sportico report.

ESPN previously reported anywhere from $3 billion to $7 billion may be in play, but Sportico claims the total money for the new entity will be less than the $3 billion figure. According to Sportico, the SSG investment will cover the Tour’s domestic rights. The PGA Tour has yet to respond to Golfweek for comment. A Tour representative told Sportico the information it reported was “incorrect” but did not elaborate further.

Your humble blogger has long been skeptical that the private equity guys would invest into an active war zone, though the implication above is that they will.   

The bolding above is mine, but does anyone know what it means?  What domestic rights?  The media rights have been sold for the foreseeable future, so your humble blogger remains in the dark as to what assets will be in this for-profit Newco.

It's quite possible we'll have more information shortly:

PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan invited members of all three tours to participate in “an

important” and “timely update” during a conference call scheduled for 9:30 a.m. ET.

Golfweek also has learned that a Tour Player Advisory Council call is scheduled ahead of the larger update at 8 a.m.

A copy of Monahan’s memo also has been leaked on the internet. The memo didn’t specify what the topic of the call will be, but it is assumed it is to share details of a deal with Strategic Sports Group, a collective of several investors and firms, fronted by the Fenway Sports Group, which the Tour has been in advanced negotiations with for several months.

While the finalization of the deal with SSG might be announced, no one seems to know where the Jay-Yasir bromance stands:

It is unclear whether progress has been made in negotiations with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which is the largest investor in LIV Golf. On June 6, Monahan and Yasir Al-Rumayyan announced a framework agreement between the Tour, DP World Tour and PIF to create a new commercial entity. The Dec. 31 deadline to come to a definitive agreement was extended, with Monahan sending a memo to players that stated “active and productive” negotiations would continue into 2024 with the PIF based on the progress made to date. Monahan and Al-Rumayyan reportedly met last week in Saudi Arabia to continue negotiations.

I hear Saudi is lovely this time of year....

Wither The PGA Tour -  I love when a plan comes together.....

Of course these guys are excited:

Of all the alterations to the 2024 PGA Tour schedule, perhaps the most dramatic set of changes can be found at this week’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. The tournament once known as the

Crosby Clambake, having been started by famed crooner Bing Crosby, begins its run as one of the tour’s eight signature events, a designation not without irony. If there was one tournament that possessed its own signature, it was the celebrity-fueled golf spectacle on the Monterey Peninsula.

The field is profoundly stronger even though it has been whittled from 156 professionals (in a bygone era it had 180) to 80. Reinforcements arrive to bolster a roster that was short on marquee names beyond AT&T spokesman Jordan Spieth, though former U.S. Open champion Justin Rose was a welcome champion last year when the tournament featured just 21 of the top 100 players in the world. Probably has something to do with Instead of a three-course rotation that included Spyglass Hill and Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Shore Course, the event is confined to Pebble Beach and Spyglass. Eighty amateurs will compete for only two days before a pro-am team is crowned, whereas in the past some could play up to four rounds if they made the cut of low 25 scores. Bing wouldn’t recognize the makeup of the amateur contingent; other than a few athletes, NFL elites Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers among them, there are few “celebrities.”a no-cut format and a purse that has been more than doubled—from $9 million to $20 million. FedEx Cup points are increased, too, with 700 going to the winner.

First, this field is not stronger.  The absence of 86 card-holding members of the Tour inevitably makes it a far weaker field, notwithstanding a greater turnout from the higher players.  

More importantly, this is another example of Tour's contempt for its own history.  The Crosby Clambake has actual history that resonates with fans, so naturally it needs to be sacrificed to the Gods, sharing a crypt with the Western Open, the Match Play and other valuable assets.

But sure, they're getting more of the top players, but not because these guys are playing more, they're just playing different weeks.  We've sacrificed other events to support this one, and anyone that can't see that is urged to review the field and leaderboard last week's event at Torrey.  Hence, Farmers Insurance is headed for the exit....

How's it working out for the rank and file?

Winter is bound to feel a bit colder this month for some of the best golfers in the world, because

there just aren’t enough spots in PGA Tour events to keep everyone happy.

This week’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am kicks off a three-week stretch where the 35th-, 57th-, 88th- and 121st-ranked players in the world will have to look elsewhere to ply their trade. That’s Ryan Fox, Thorbjorn Olesen, Victor Perez and Ben Kohles, respectively. You could add No. 64 Robert MacIntyre, too. Most of the entire month of February will pass before those gents, who all have full status on the PGA Tour, can actually show up to play a Tour event. These are the trickle-down effects of the new Signature Event series.

Why does that surprise?  These guys have been sold down the river by Tiger and Rory.

But note those world rankings....  There's an 80-player field this week but they can't accommodate the 35th ranked player in the world, and a guy who was on Europe's Ryder Cup team that kicked the U.S.'s butts.

Field size matters.  If there's one point I'd like to hammer unmercifully, it is that the best events should have the best fields, and eighty players just doesn't cut it.

The funny thing is, the guy that done it now agrees with me:

Interestingly, McIlroy said that he had regrets about the plan that emerged from the player meeting in Delaware during the BMW Championship. The concept, he said, was a good one—to ensure the participation of top players in certain events. But it “weakened” the tour’s financial position, forcing its hand to seek a truce with PIF and seek out other sources of investment.

And in the end, it has altered his perception of this week’s signature event. He was asked if a win this week would be “cheapened” by the absence of Rahm, Hatton, Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and other top players who will be competing this weekend in LIV’s season opener in Mexico.

He appeared pained to answer the question, but he did so honestly. Is it cheapened?

“I'd like to win here,” he said, “and stand up with a trophy on 18 green and know that I've beaten all of the best players in the world, so yeah.”

What a tool.  And please remember that Tiger and he were so full of themselves, that they wouldn't allow any of the lower-ranked players into the room.

Rory, you need to go away and just play golf.  You've ruined things enough already....

He's also babbling on about letting the guys come back to the Tour without penalties, which may well happen, but he's the last guy whose opinion I desire on any of this.

Not All Rabbits Are Created Equal - The item above about playing privileges included an interesting assortment of players, though did you notice that the accompanying photo wasn't of one of those guys?  This is a "You heard it here first" moment, because the guy pictured is not constrained by his low world ranking, for the simple reason that Tiger needs him:

'Collusion,' 'fishy' and 'shady' among PGA Tour players' descriptions of AT&T Pebble Beach's sponsor exemptions

 Ya think?

The AT&T’s sponsor invites also are a hot topic of conversation among players. Sponsor invites

were granted to four players. Three of the four exemptions to AT&T were handed out to members of the Tour’s independent Board of Directors – Peter Malnati, Adam Scott, Webb Simpson – as well as local product Maverick McNealy, who last week fulfilled his medical exemption.

“It seems like collusion, a political game that should never happen on Tour,” said one veteran player. “It’s very shady, if you ask me.”

Given that Malnati, Scott and Simpson are on the verge of being three of the six players to vote on the Tour’s deals with private equity groups and potentially Saudi Arabia’s PIF, it could be perceived as a kickback for their unpaid efforts on behalf of the Tour or even as a way of buying their votes.

You'd have to be really cynical to think that Peter Malnati's exemption is an attempt to buy his vote.... Isn't it far more likely that his spot in the field is a reflection of the buzz he cerates and the additional viewers he'll bring?  Let me know if you're done laughing yet.

The craziness goes even deeper, because there's this whole kerfuffle about categories of status and the relative priority, but look who is in the field:

Multiple players reached out to Golfweek to argue players were originally told during a meeting at the Players Championship last March that winners would be automatically exempt into Signature events. That is still true, but the Swing 5 category, which was designed to give hot and trending players a shot to play their way into the big-money events, falls higher on the priority list than winning.

“Now it’s like, oh, no, winners are part of the Swing 5. That is allowing fewer players to qualify for these events,” a veteran player said. “It’s really disappointing that you’re under the impression that if you play well, you’re going to have the opportunity to get into one of these events and then you don’t. If there are an extra two or three players in this field, who cares at this point? There’s $20 million in the purse.”

Indeed, for the AT&T the Tour resorted to the “fill the field” category, admitting Nos. 62-69 on the 2023 FedEx Cup Fall standings to bring the field to 80 for the pro-am.

It's that last bit that's bat-guano crazy.  They're trying to create the illusion of being able to play one's way in, but to do that they're taking guys that posted results in tourneys that shouldn't even be PGA Tour events.  Then, because of the hard cap on filed size, they can't include guys like MacIntyre.

So, not only is eighty players a ridiculously small field size, but they're not even trying to get the best eighty players.  

I'm going to leave you here.  No specific plans as to the blogging schedule, but if anything pops form that call today we'll definitely flood the zone. 

Weekend Wrap - Bonus Sunday Blogging Edition

I expect that, with Sunday dinner plans, that I'll be finishing watching  the conference championship games Monday morning.  But with Torrey finishing on Saturday, it's win-win, baby!

Vive Le France - So, in the last two weeks we've had an amateur and a Frog win...... which do you think is the rarer occurrence?

Matthieu Pavon took one step closer to qualifying for the Olympics in his home country and made a little history at the same time.

The 31-year-old from Toulouse who now resides in the wine region north of Bordeaux became the first Frenchman to win on the PGA Tour with his victory at the 2024 Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines on Saturday. Pavon shot a 3-under 69 in the final round to finish at 13 under, one shot clear of Nicolai Hojgaard (70). Nate Lashley (67), Jake Knapp (69) and 54-hole leader Stephan Jaeger (72) all finished T-3 at 11 under.

“Yeah, I still can’t believe it. As I said, it feels like there is another round to play tomorrow because we’re only Saturday,” joked Pavon. “That is special. I can’t thank the PGA tour enough to give us the opportunity to come from Europe and compete here in America against the best players in the world. That’s always been the dream for me. I got finally a shot and I took it. I mean, it’s a dream come true and it’s a little bit hard to believe.”

Ranked No. 78 in the world, the victory will move Pavon inside the top 60 in the Official World Golf Ranking and put him in prime position to represent France at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.

The Olympics?  Seriously?  

So, every Monday the obvious question is, did the Tour put on a good show?  I've used some of my best ammo below (yeah, one of those time-bending posts), but to this observer it was one of the most embarrassing final rounds I can remember.  Guys like Stephen Jaeger and Tony Finau melting down, and I don't think I have ever seen more short putts missed (yes, I know about poa, but still...). I remain in awe at how many combined short puts were missed by Auberg and Hojgaard, yet they simply couldn't play themselves out of contention.....

Pavon was well on the way to adding his name to the honor roll of French meltdowns, missing that kick-in on No. 17, and missing it quite badly, followed by two horrible swings on the finishing hole.  That said, he certainly showed us something with the wedge from the deep rough and his center-cut birdie putt, but what a dreary, dismal day of golf.

AK, The Reconquista - Why so soon?  I could easily go another decade without him.....but maybe that's just me.

For more than a decade he’s been golf’s Yeti, golf’s most famous recluse, golf’s man of mystery, golf’s greatest “what-if”. As the years have ticked by, stories from his abridged career have been

told and retold with increasing levels of admiration and exaggeration. His cult hero status has continued to grow, even as hopes of his competitive future have dwindled.

But now Anthony Kim is planning his return to professional golf.

Kim has spent the last few months in discussions with the PGA Tour, LIV and potential sponsors as he plots a way back, multiple sources familiar with those discussions told GOLF. He’s been playing more golf. He’s been ramping up workouts. He’s confident in his game. That part, people say, definitely hasn’t changed. Now, it’s just a matter of where he makes his return.

I'll agree that he looked for a moment like a transcendent talent, but the hold he seems to have on folks' imagination seems way out of proportion to the length of time at which he played at a high level.  I also find it strange in light of this decision:

A central issue in negotiations has been an insurance policy from Kim’s playing days, now worth an estimated $10 million, that would be voided if he returned to competition.

Now, I would have thought enough time has passed that he would have collected that insurance payment and it would be at risk if he returned, though this seems to confirm that it's still an issue:

Sources familiar with the LIV negotiations said that the league had not initially expressed much interest nor willingness to pay for Kim to join the league. But as word of Kim’s potential return spread, key figures including Dustin Johnson spoke out about Kim’s potential value. A call from LIV CEO Greg Norman directly to Kim followed and then negotiations began in earnest, including a one-year offer that would cover Kim’s insurance policy — again, in the area of $10 million — while allowing him to earn prize money and sponsor deals on top of that. A LIV spokesperson declined to comment.

His moment in the sun was an eternity ago:

He hasn’t played professional golf in 12 years. The last of his three Tour wins came 13 years ago. He beat Sergio Garcia in singles in the Ryder Cup 15 years ago. People forget Kim was so intensely focused during that match that after he had closed Garcia out, Kim started to walk to the next hole to keep playing. Garcia had to call him back.

They were the first match on the golf course and it was an all-time beatdown....that said, after the passage of so many years, we can only be skeptical of his retention of those skills.  In a rational world we could all sit back and watch him prove his talent the good old-fashioned way, but we all know how this will go.  And if he suddenly finds himself with tee times on LIV, it feels more like a circus sideshow.  Then again, it's a perfect fit, because LIV itself is a circus sideshow...

For those interested in his act, Alan Shipnuck has posted a link to his 2014 Sports Illustrated article on Kim's disappearance.

But I caught this tweet from one of the young golf writers, and I haven't stopped laughing yet:

Anthony Kim kept it so real. Connected with a younger audience in a way golfers just didn't back then. But he couldn't monetize it the same before the social media/PIP age. LIV would be a perfect way for him to cash in on his celebrity a decade letter.pic.twitter.com/EzZx0pnwuj

— Dan Rapaport (@Daniel_Rapaport) January 26, 2024

I'm sorry Danny Boy, but in what actual sense did Anthony Kim "keep it real", a tired, over-used term if ever there were one?  I mean he disappeared without a trace and tried to keep that bit about the insurance payment from coming out.  And apparently he couldn't monetize before social media because people wouldn't pay him for his shirt and hat logos and for using their equipment?  Danny, guys have been making serious bank in golf for decades.... and you're throwing a pity party for a guy that cashed an insurance check for $10 million large.  Maybe the injuries were a shame, but the man made bank.

And LIV is only perfect if, yanno, he can't play....  But don't get me wrong, AK and Yasir are for sure a match made in heaven.

But Max, on the other hand, seems to understand how these discussions will go:

Here’s a behind the scenes scoop of the PGA Tour and LIV negotiating with Anthony Kim to make a comeback:

PGA Tour: Plz come play on our Tour

LIV: Plz come play on our Tour and also here is 500 million dollars

— max homa (@Maxhoma) January 27, 2024

Having already decided to cash a large check instead of playing our game, I just can't imagine which way he might go.  And I only have one small ask of Greg and Yasir.  Please, pretty please, put him on Brooks' team.

In case you've not yet discerned it, this is one of those posts that covers a couple of news cycles.  The above AK stuff was drafted Saturday afternoon, but Sunday morning presents with Eamon Lynch making Dan Rappaport look like a snotty-nosed kid:

Lynch: A second coming of Anthony Kim would mesmerize his cult, but it wouldn’t save LIV Golf or the PGA Tour

Both of them?

As the cockiest among the PGA Tour’s young flat-brimmers back in the noughties, Anthony Kim

has long been venerated by aging millennial bros as the apostolic leader of golf cool, but as with most cults, the enthusiasm for a second coming says less about the promise of the savior than the desperation of those wishing to be saved.

In lieu of results, the cult of Anthony Kim took over. A dozen years of applying Vaseline to the critical lens has obscured the reality that his prime was as brief as it is distant: three wins, three top 10 finishes in 15 major starts, one standout Ryder Cup. Revisiting performance statistics from his injury-free period suggests that Kim’s greatest weapon was his confidence, and how much of that can we reasonably expect now? Discount the messianic cult and you’ve got a 38-year-old with three wins and a bit of moxie.

Is moxie even desirable in a 38-year old?  Certainly not in a 38-year old that's lost his game...

We don't need to know which two guys this is, because they're all Spartacus:

Two things have sustained the Kim cult for a dozen years: an unshakeable belief among a subset of fans that he would have accomplished much more in his career, and the convenient fact that he hasn’t returned to test that belief. Among his peers, mild interest remains. “I’d be interested in watching Anthony Kim play golf for about five minutes,” one Tour veteran wrote in a group text Thursday evening.

“Four more than me,” another player responded.

I'll let Eamon take us out because, while I say things like this all the time, it takes me about three paragraphs, and I greatly respect how he got it into one short sentence:

Signing Jon Rahm signals what LIV Golf aspires to be. Signing Anthony Kim would illustrate what it is.

LIV Stuff - You can blame Luke for us losing the best Polish golfer of all time:

Eight days before LIV Golf’s 2024 season opener and about eight hours after he withdrew from the PGA Tour’s Farmers Insurance Open, Adrian Meronk is leaving the PGA Tour for the rival circuit.

According to a report by The Times of London, Meronk, considered the biggest snub from the 2023 European Ryder Cup team, will join LIV Golf in time for the first event of the year in Mexico on Feb. 2-4. He finished second at the Hero Desert Dubai Classic last week. Meronk will reportedly join the Cleeks, captained by Martin Kaymer.

The Times report also states that LIV Golf is continuing its pursuit of England’s Tyrrell Hatton, who earlier Wednesday was announced among the latest commitments to the 2024 WM Phoenix Open. That tournament is set for Super Bowl weekend, as is LIV Golf’s second event of 2024 in Las Vegas from Feb. 7-11.

Not sure if Hatton is going or not, but Golfweek posted a photo gallery as a parting gift, and I certainly wouldn't have recognized him:

 But what really made me laugh was this from one of the No Laying Up guys:

Sittin here down under thinking about Nick Dunlap having as many PGA Tour wins as Tommy Fleetwood and Tyrell Hatton, combined pic.twitter.com/3T15e4rTsX

— Big Randy (@BigRandyNLU) January 22, 2024

Heh!

This logically should have been paired with Eamon Lynch's item above:

Golf has become a sport without needle-movers

For my money, Shane Ryan is about the most thoughtful guy peddling golf journalism, though admittedly quite the low bar.  But this will have heads exploding in PVB:

Nick Dunlap's historic win at the AmEx on Sunday drew 534K viewers on Golf Channel, up 37% from Jon Rahm's win last year (391K).

That's the best for the event's final round since 2019 (574K for Adam Long-Phil Mickelson) pic.twitter.com/OyiKScZX9H

— Josh Carpenter (@JoshACarpenter) January 23, 2024

Can you see where he's headed (the header was kind of a spoiler)?

1. Beyond Tiger Woods, the perpetual and eternal needle-mover, golf audiences broadly don't care about any specific player. (If your initial reaction here is, "but Rahm isn't like Rory or Spieth," just hang tight a moment.)

2. A good story, rather than any single personality, is what resonates with golf audiences. That story can range from something as complex as "an amateur is about to win a PGA Tour event" to something as simple as "we're playing at a major championship with all its attendant historical import."

From there, you can make a convincing leap to a third conclusion:

3. The LIV defections, like Rahm's, look increasingly absurd if you only tie the dollar sign ($300 million) to the player's actual market value (nowhere even close to $300 million), and only make sense as a ploy to crack golf's foundations as a means of getting in on the organizational level; i.e., you're paying guys like Rahm or Cam Smith to disappear from public view until the PGA Tour capitulates. BUT, despite an appearance of diluting the product, the individual players might matter so little that it's not actually doing any real damage beyond perception, since more people tuned in to watch some kid named Nick Dunlap on a given week than Jon Rahm, even before he left for a league that nobody is watching in the first place.

I've been saying much the same thing, though I've been making the point that the game itself is the needle-mover, but importantly it's only interesting when combined with legitimacy and importance.  Because of its history and venues, the PGA Tour has some of those, though of course not nearly as much as it pretends to.

I think Shane gets way too bogged down in numbers, for instance wonderingly unproductively whether those 2023 AMEX ratings might have been higher had Rahm already won that Masters.  He does understand the importance of stories, as you'll see here:

Speaking of the Canadian Open, you may remember that Nick Taylor, a Canadian, won it with one of the more memorable shots of the entire 2023 season. As it turned out, that final round drew higher ratings than any Canadian Open since 2000, which was won by—you guessed it—Tiger Woods. (It was the only time he won that event.) The important note here, though, is that it did better than Rory McIlroy's win a year earlier. I say it's "important" because another clear line of argument against the conclusions drawn about Rahm above is that Rahm himself may not have moved the needle in 2023, but Rory McIlroy or Jordan Spieth definitely do. Well, not Rory necessarily, at least not in comparison to another low-profile player named Nick who happened to deliver a great story at the perfect time.

Of course, he's ignoring the fact that this story would have been nothing without another Canadian being tackled by security guard (I kid).  He doesn't seem to connect the dots, though, does he?  This was a story because it was the Canadian Open being won by a Canadian (and not only ids that unprecedented, but it was an unlikely Canadian winning in an incredibly unlikely scenario).

But the dot he fails to connect is the extent to which the Tour, pushed by Tiger, Rory and Cantlay, has made it its business to OUTLAW STORIES.  That's right, we're trying to exclude unlikely winners from the fields of the most important events.  Rory says it's because we need to know when guys are playing, though we kind of knew that already.

How's that working out, kids?

Well, here are the the winners of the first four Tour events of the year:

Sentry: Chris Kirk

Sony: Grayson Murray

AMEX: Nick Dunlap (a)

Farmers: Matthieu Pavon

Can you feel the cream rising?  Just to pile on, here's your final Farmers leaderboard:

I don't think any of those guys are formally in the FBI's witness protection program, but they might as well be....

Perhaps the jury is still out on the Signature Events, but the extent to which the Tour his helping the non-signature events commit assisted suicide seems quit obvious.  And, given Chris Kirk's win in an actual Signature Event, I suspect they won't even generate the marquee match-ups they've promised.  Why?  Because golf remains maddingly. well, golf.

UPDATE: So, as if I'm not angry enough with the powers that be, were you aware that there are still sponsors' exemptions into those Signature Events.  And do you still cling to any naive thoughts that this anything more than a reboot of Mean Girls?  Well, get a load of this:

Three of whom are representatives on the PGA Tour policy board in 'unpaid' roles https://t.co/X6Kro3qkC9

— James Corrigan (never had a blue tick) (@jcorrigangolf) January 27, 2024

The most important name on that list is probably Peter Malnati, because he's the only one of the five that could remotely be considered a Tour rabbit and therefore likely to represent the interests of the lunch pail set.  He is now thoroughly bought and paid for... Well played, Patrick! 

Appointment Television - You'll want to mark this date in your diary for sure:

Rory McIlroy, Max Homa, Rose Zhang and Lexi Thompson to play in first mixed edition of 'The Match'

It's a quick buck, so we know why they guys might peg it.  It's just hard for me to understand why they think anyone would watch this....

But I can't laughing over the one girl, because this her third event teeing it up against the men, after a year in which she would have, absent some kind of lifetime exemption, lost her LPGA card.  We now live in a Bizarro World where not being good enough for the women's tour is a qualification to play against the best men....

But we're not quite done making fun of Lexi, because while the organizers of The Match don't seem to understand the current state of her game, the equipment industry does:

Lexi Thompson signs with Maxfli for 2024 season

Maxfli?  Seriously?  Was Pinnacle not interested?

Olympic Dreams -  One last laugh for you, but please ensure you have no liquids nearby.  We mentioned the Olympics above, and I can at least understand a guy like Pavon caring given that it's a home game.  But, do the American golfers really acre?  I know Justin Rose and the X-Man want us to treat it as important, but it obviously fills resume holes for them.

I guess whoever qualifies will go, but I do question whether you can get them to wear tis crap:

J.Lindeberg has revealed what Team USA golfers will be wearing during the Olympics this summer in Paris: pic.twitter.com/92RQE5rBXc

— Josh Carpenter (@JoshACarpenter) January 24, 2024

Have you stopped laughing yet?

I have a small ask....Please let Cantlay qualify and make him wear that shirt pictured....  I am taking way too much joy in that thought, so much so that can even go hatless.

Kids, that's it for now....  You will not see me tomorrow, and perhaps not until Wednesday, depending upon a decision to be made later this morning.  Enjoy the football.

Midweek Musings - Torrey In Remission Edition

Remember when Torrey Pines was the unofficial kick-off to the PGA Tour's West Coast swing?  It wasn't very long ago but, like the Honda, quite the swing in fortunes..... Everyone keeps telling us how important it is to know when the top players will peg it, seemingly unaware of the fact that that also tells us when they won't be playing.  

Arrivederci Farmers - I felt a little bad for Josh Allen last weekend, but it could have been far worse.  After all, he could have been a PGA Tour sponsor....  Shockingly, the rats are heading for the exits:

Another longtime PGA Tour tournament sponsor seems to be on its way out.

Farmers Insurance, which has been the title sponsor of the San Diego event at Torrey Pines since 2010, will not renew its agreement with the PGA Tour after its current contract expires in 2026, Sports Business Journal reported Thursday.

Farmers is sending fewer executives to the Farmers Insurance Open later this month and returned a number of hotel rooms to the tour, along with plans for less activation, SBJ reported. Farmers Insurance also sponsors the APGA Tour event at Torrey Pines.

Tiger ain't ever coming back and the move to a Saturday conclusion, clever as it might be, leaves them with only the one weekend day to make hay.

But the problems lie in that 904 area code:

It’s also the second notable company to not renew its contract with the PGA Tour. Wells Fargo will not renew its agreement after it expires this year to host the championship at Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, North Carolina. SBJ reported the company wanted to remain a sponsor but didn’t want to pay the higher asking price.

Full-field events on the PGA Tour have been commanding between $13 million to $15 million per year from title sponsors.

Is it me, or did Honda get swept down the memory hole awfully quickly?

Interesting how they deal with those economics because, while a full-field event sounds like it would be significant, it's actually loserville.  The cost to be a Signature/Designated event is far higher (might have been an interesting figure to cite), but without that status you're fighting over the dregs....

And this is maybe even more ominous:

RBC, which is the title sponsor for the Canadian Open and the Heritage at Hilton Head, a signature event, signed a one-year deal for 2024 instead of a long-term extension to get a feel of the changing golf landscape. Could this be the way many major companies are thinking with the tumultuousness in golf?

Yowzer!  How many of those stopgaps has the Tour accepted?

Reality intrudes.  When you make some of your events "special", it leaves the other events looking, well, not so special....  Really, who coulda seen that coming?

With everything going so swimmingly for Farmers, the last thing they needed were hits like these.  This first one is completely understandable:

Nick Dunlap’s encore will have to wait at least another week.

Less than 24 hours after his breakthrough win at The American Express, the 20-year-old amateur pulled out of this week’s Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines.

“After a life changing last 24 hours, I’ve decided to withdraw from the Farmers Insurance Open,” Dunlap wrote in a statement released by the PGA Tour. “I plan to return home to Alabama to be with my family, friends and teammates. Thank you to Farmers Insurance and American Express for giving me these opportunities.”

The term "life-changing" can be hyperbolic, but in this case it's pretty much true.

But this is the one that Jay might want to think through the ramifications thereof:

After securing T3 at the American Express, Justin Thomas has withdrawn from the next event of the PGA Tour. The American Express was the first event for Thomas in the 2024 season and he is reported to miss the next big event. As per what ‘Justin Thomas Tracker’ shared on X, the golfer has withdrawn from the Farmers Insurance Open, starting next week. This would have been the fifth time the 2x major winner had played the Open, but he will continue his 2024 season with AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am after that.

The tweet read, “NEW: JT withdraws from Torrey. Not too surprised, playing 5 times in a row isn’t something he does and with the AMEX result his status in the elevated events is now secure. I’d assume this was always the plan.”

I don't know where that five times comes from, given that Torrey is the fourth event on the Tour calendar.  But, given that he's committed to the next three (Pebble, Riv and Phoenix), we can agree that it's an insane amount of golf.  Why is he doing that?  Because his spots in those Signature events was at risk.  Does this make any sense in a rational world?  How about we just make them full-field?  JT, you know who have to blame for this insanity?  yeah, your good buddy.

But spare a moment and think through how this must feel to the folks at Farmers.  Their only chance to get a name-brand golfer like JT was because of his fading fortunes, but once he's solved his access problems he's outta there in a heartbeat.  So, Jay is asking Farmers for $13-15 million for the privilege of being a feeder event for Pebble.  How can they turn down such a screaming hot deal?

Obviously a few guys show up pretty much anywhere, but this is the best they could rustle up for featured groups (amusingly, there's apparently a higher status called a marquee group):

Marquee group

1:40 p.m.: Tony Finau, Max Homa, Xander Schauffele (South Course, first tee)

Featured groups

12:12 p.m.: Collin Morikawa, Sahith Theegala, Patrick Cantlay (North Course, 10th tee)

12:23 p.m.: Ludvig Åberg, Justin Rose, Hideki Matsuyama (North Course, 10th tee)

Your best grouping includes Tony Finau?  Yeah, he's a nice guy and at least hasn't gone to LIV, but that sound you here is the scraping at the bottom of the barrel....

She Walked Up To Me And She Asked Me To Dance -  I left this one on the cutting room floor on Monday, but this issue was bound to present in our little golf fishbowl.  And it covers the full gamut of human emotion, and I will approach with all the delicacy and sensitivity you've come to expect.  But they say that denial isn't just a river in Egypt, and you'll see how that plays here as well.

Let's start at the start:

Trans golfer Hailey Davidson pushes back on ‘misinformed hatred’ after backlash over win on women’s tour

Pot, kettle!  The people putting tampon machines in men's rooms are outraged about misinformation?  Noted.

Transgender golfer Hailey Davidson reacted to the backlash over her victory earlier in the week at a tournament on the NXXT Women’s Pro Golf Tour.

Davidson won the NXXT Women’s Classic in a playoff.

Davidson wrote on Instagram the win put her in first place in the race to earn an Epson Tour exemption. The Epson Tour is the developmental tour of the LPGA Tour.

The top 10 players of the Epson Tour graduate to the LPGA Tour.

A few thing worth noting include that she's still far removed from qualifying for the LPGA Tour, as she's not even yet qualified for the Epson Tour.  

So, what is this shocking misinformation?

“It’s crazy the amount of misinformed hatred I have received so far today,” Davidson wrote. “All of these people (think) I hit it 300 yards or even 280 yards. How about 250 on a good day.”

C'mon, that's the best you got?  Somewhere else there's a reference to death threats, and you'll shocked to know that I am solidly anti-death threat.   There's a lot of idiots on social media and a lot of angry people, so maybe, but color me skeptical that an NXXT event generated that level of response.  Because Hailey seems a little thin-skinned....

let's cover a few more aspects of this about which you're excuse for being uninformed.  First, this might surprise:

The LPGA Tour removed its “female at birth” requirement in 2010. Davidson began hormone therapy treatments in 2015 and underwent gender reassignment surgery in 2021, Golfweek reported in May 2021.

Jeez, where does that end?  Here's more on those LPGA guidelines:

LPGA's gender policy, applicable to applicants for membership in LPGA Tour, Epson Tour, LET, LETAS and LPGA Professional states the following on it's website:

• Tournaments and membership are open to "transitioned female athletes," though they must identify themselves upon application. LPGA retains the the right to require the athlete to substantiate her status if questions on eligibility arise, the site states.
• The athlete must provide a written declaration that her gender identity is female, and can not be changed in the context of the sport for a minimum of four years.
• She must have undergone gender affirming surgery.
• She must have received hormone therapy for one year and "maintained testosterone levels in a verifiable manner sufficient to minimize or negate gender-related advantages in sport competitions."

The testosterone testing seems especially creepy, and I'll add this from the protagonist herself, what a lawyer would call an admission against interest:

Hailey Davidson, a transgender golfer who has been in the spotlight after winning the NXXT Women’s Classic last week, said that she “definitely had an advantage” — but not anymore.

Davidson, appearing on Good Morning Britain, detailed the contrast between herself and other competitors who have just begun their transitioning process.

Davidson was asked by host Noel Phillips about studies that it is an “undisputed fact men are physically stronger than women” and that the golfer had an unfair advantage against her fellow competitors.

Davidson, who reportedly underwent gender reassignment surgery in 2021 after beginning hormone therapy treatments in 2015, said she would agree if that was in the past, acknowledging that it would’ve been “clearly unfair.”

“My whole philosophy behind all of this is I don’t believe trans people should be banned from sports, but I do believe there needs to be guidelines in effect,” Davidson said. “Going back even four years ago or even before I had surgery, I definitely had an advantage. I would 100% agree with that.

Apparently, we're just supposed to take her word for it and ignore that we see that she clearly has the body of a man.....  Did Orwell nail it, or what?

“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

― George Orwell, 1984

Additionally, Hailey is saying all sorts of ridiculous things.  That yardage bit above is part of it, insisting we ignore that voice in the back of our heads telling us that, were she not a man at birth, she'd probably be hitting it 220.

But here's another good one:

“It’s always interesting how no one gets angry until there is any form of success,” Davidson wrote in an Instagram post.

Duh!  This article is behind a paywall, but the headers tell us all we need to know:

It is time golf crushed noisy trans ideology with some common sense

Hailey Davidson admits to an inherent physical advantage and then absurdly insists the sport should just turn a blind eye

 Yes, its....what's the word, Orwellian.

I do actually feel tremendous sympathy for Hailey and those similarly situated.  The problem with transgenderism to me is that it's merely an Orwellian language change to divert our attention from the fact that such folks such folks suffer from what we used to call gender dysphoria, a truly debilitating psychological condition. 

The other point I'd like to make is that I'd prefer to ignore her comments, because she's overly invested in the outcome.  This is why lawyers with conflicts recuse themselves and why we reject the opinions of those with vested interest.  One of the problems with our therapeutic culture is that it wants us to make decisions with our hears, not our heads.

One important aspect that I suspect Hailey doesn't get is that a statement like this provides zero comfort to those concerned about biological men in women's sports:

“While this win was amazing, unlike every article is saying, I am so incredibly far from the LPGA Tour with a lot of work to be done to possibly earn my way there one day.

It's probably true that Hailey herself isn't sufficiently talented to make to the top of women's golf.  But what she can't understand is that the pushback is about who comes next.... there's no limiting factor as to what will be allowed.

But two points and then I'll move on.  The first, a point every time this comes up, is that I understand the instinct to want to create opportunities for people, especially those who have suffered (and, if you're lopping off a piece of your anatomy, we can stipulate that you've suffered).  But this leads to one blindingly obvious conclusion, whatever the merits, that it will kill women's sports.  I don't expect that Hailey Davidson to understand that, but shouldn't those running the major women's sports organization have a clue?

I have one last piece of speculation that occurred to me in connection with this story.  While the libertarian in me has no issue with an adult making their own decisions, we have developed a gender reassignment industrial complex that is quite freakish.  Because of the compromised media, these stories don't get any oxygen:

Doctors say there is a “perverse” monetary incentive structure built around pushing “transgender” drugs and surgeries on children.

Breitbart News sat down with two Richmond-area physicians — a neurologist and a pediatrician — to discuss left-wing movements in the practice of medicine. Both spoke on the condition of anonymity so as to not face professional backlash.

As Breitbart News has reported, there is a significant difference between how western Europe and the United States treats children with gender dysphoria.

While the American medical establishment is pushing heavily for the “affirmation” model — which includes prescribing puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and mutilation surgeries to children — European countries have sounded the alarm on how harmful such a model is for children.

Got that?  This is so out there that the Europeans think we are crazy....

The point I'm trying to make is, has anyone thought through the perverse incentive we're creating?  You'll be justifiably skeptical that a man would transition to the distaff side solely to play women's sports, but is it so crazy?  We're talking about confused people with limited hope, who are presumably desperate to create a place for themselves in this world.   Could they find a purpose in being able to compete at a higher level on the other team?

Yowzer, this really freaks me out, that we are offering incentives for people to mutilate their bodies.

A Palate Cleanser - Trust me, I need it more than you do....  Dylan Derthier is one of golf journalism's (oxymoron alert) young turks, and I found some interesting bits in this week's version of his Monday Finish feature.  First, on Nick Dunlap, I very much felt the same as Dylan here:

I felt delighted for Dunlap as I watched him revel in the victory on Sunday afternoon. This is his dream, after all, realized faster than he ever imagined. But then I felt something else, too: a bit of sadness for him. The promises of status and money and Signature Events — it’s all likely too tantalizing to turn down. His life has changed overnight. There’s no going backwards from here. This is likely dumb and overly sentimental but I wonder if there’s part of him that isn’t yet ready to say goodbye to bus rides with his teammates, no matter how hard they’re pulling for the guy on their screen.

It was a great story, but like Dylan I worry that it's too much, too soon.  The talent is evident, but he's all of 20 years old and it's a lonely, isolated existence out there.

But here's where it gets really interesting, as he exposes the rot at the core of the new golf world:

2. The PGA Tour can still produce moments — and create stars

The LIV vs. PGA Tour era has empowered individual players and emphasized their value, and I’m all good with that. But somewhere in this new world of pros negotiating their specific values and signing guaranteed contracts we’ve probably overcorrected; I’d argue we’re overrating individuals and underrating the game’s biggest institutions, namely the majors and the PGA Tour.

I’m not here to beat my chest about how great a tournament the American Express is. If anything, I’d argue the opposite; I’m not a huge fan of the three-course setup nor the pro-am format, and it lacks the gravity of the West Coast events that follow. But despite all of that, and despite the fact that it was running up against the end of one massive NFL game and the start of another, it still felt like Nick Dunlap produced a significant moment. A star moment. The world was aware of what he was doing because of decades and decades of building the context around what it means to win a PGA Tour event.

There are holes in this argument. Not all PGA Tour events are created equal, particularly in the age of opposite-field events (much weaker fields) and, now, Signature Events (much stronger fields) and at some point we’ll need to make better sense of how to measure one type of Tour win against another. Dunlap’s win was a reminder of the virtues of full-field events, too, where Cinderellas can become champions. But after a relatively quiet fall — and despite the Tour’s imperfections — Sunday was a reminder that it’s still the place for golf fans to turn in the waning hours of their weekend, looking for something that matters.

What I think Dylan is trying to get to is that we've been sold quite the bill of goods.  The product is GOLF, not Patrick Cantlay.  The PGA Tour works  (not every week, for sure) because it provides a context and significance to these guys trying to get a ball into hole.  

Rory and Tiger are trying to convince us that THEY are the product, yet all you have to do is tune into any installment of The Match to see how that falls flat.  And that's why the WGCs and LIV are so lame, so naturally we're taking the best Tour events and chasing a failed business model.

Rendering this from Rory quite lame:

It’s been nice, having actual golf tournaments to talk about rather than theoretical future tours. But this week included some chatter about a hypothetical vision for the future of the game, a topic advanced by McIlroy’s musings.

“The way I view it is a bit like Champions League in football,” McIlroy said, describing a hypothetical top tour. “It’s like the best of the best in Europe, and then all of the other leagues feed up into it.

“There’s lots of different tours getting interest and a lot of great players. But if you want to create something that is real value for the game of golf, I think it’s this top-level tour, and then all the other tours feed into it. And there’s promotion and relegation and you have to earn your way in, and you have to earn your spot to stay in, as well. I think that’s really important, too.

“I think it has to be global in nature, and to me, you need to figure out a structure where all these other tours feed into that so it gives people a chance to come up.”

What he’s describing sounds like the PGA Tour, particularly its Signature Events model, but with a more global presence. What he’s describing sounds like LIV but with more cache and a greater emphasis on meritocracy. But it’s not clear to me how what he’s describing works with ongoing negotiations between the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour and the PIF — particularly given that in his vision, LIV gets relegated to a team series in the game’s shoulder season.

We had that Rory.  It was called the PGA Tour, so naturally you're tearing it down.

Yeah, it was more U.S. based, but overseas events have been pretty big failures, as they pretty much can only get the guys there with huge appearance fees.

That's it for today kids.  Catch you down the road...

Weekend Wrap - Long, Strange Trip Edition

Well, this has certainly been fun....  Employee No. 2 and I were both whacked pretty hard by the Covid thing (she uses a scatological reference to describe her reaction), but I'm hoping that we're at long last coming out of it.

But I'm unclear as to its effect on my blogging.... For instance, did I hear that a college sophomore won a PGA Tour event, or is that just some bizarre Wuhan Flu fever dream?

The Kids Are All Right - Amusingly, this had folks curious and/or upset earlier in the week:

The American Express golf tournament rarely gives one of its coveted sponsor exemptions to an amateur, but Nick Dunlap is a rare amateur.

Dunlap, a 20-year-old sophomore at the University of Alabama, won the U.S. Amateur last year in Denver and two years after he won the U.S. Junior Amateur at Pinehurst in 2021. Only one other golfer has pulled off the U.S. Junior Amateur-U.S. Amateur double: A guy named Tiger Woods.

This week’s PGA event, which begins Thursday in La Quinta, California, will be the fourth professional event Dunlap has played in. He’s played in the last two U.S. Opens and the 2023 Butterfield Bermuda Championship. So even though he’s performed on the sport’s biggest stage, he’s still thrilled to get the invite to The American Express.

I'm easy, as I can live with just about any sponsor's exemptions not named John Daly..... 

But how had those prior experiences gone?

Tournament executive director Pat McCabe said giving Dunlap one of the event’s eight sponsor’s exemptions was a pretty easy call.

“I just think it’s important to give these decorated young players opportunities like this,” McCabe said. “It will be fun to see him out there playing with the pros at a PGA event. We’re excited to have him here.”

Dunlap did not make the cut in his other three pro tournaments, so that’s a streak he’d like to see end this week. He feels like his game suits the three courses used in the event, and his secret weapon on the bag is former assistant coach Hunter Hamrick.

As long as the kid knows his place and is gone by Sunday.....What?  The ingrate!

Having seen a bit of his U.S. Amateur win, I pretty much knew the kid was gonnna be a stud.  What I didn't fully understand is that, at age 20, he already is.... Now I didn't see all that much of his day, though the break between those NFL games (gee, kids, are we over the Bills?) allowed me to see him finish.  Unfortunately, it also allowed me to see Sam Burns finish, who might actually be the Josh Allen of professional golf.  

I didn't see his double-bogey on No. 7, but I did catch the bounce-back birdie on No. 8, which told me he wasn't going away.  For most of the remainder of the round it felt like he would come up just short, and maybe that helped him manage his way around PGA West?  

Shall we dive into the Tour Confidential panel?

1. Nick Dunlap, a 20-year-old amateur making his fourth career PGA Tour start, made history at the American Express. He shot 60 on Saturday (tying the lowest round by an amateur in PGA Tour history) and then closed with a 70 on Sunday to win by one and become the first amateur to win on Tour since Phil Mickelson in 1991. How in the world did he do it?

By posting the low number?  Just spitballin' here.... 

James Colgan: He did it by being — by a relatively wide margin — the best player in the field this week. All weekend long he displayed the mix of shotmaking skill and ice-cold putting that have turned golfers into very wealthy golfers for as long as time. And, considering his name now sits alongside those like Mickelson and Woods, I think it’s fair to suggest Dunlap could be a very wealthy golfer very soon.

The Tiger shout-out is odd, given that that connection relates to them being the only men to win both a Junior and an Amateur, which is both a mere oddity and also has nothing to do with the events of this week.  As one commentator noted, the odd thing about Tiger's unprecedented amateur career is how poorly he played when teeing it up in professional events.  Odd, given that once he started cashing checks, it took an hour-and-a-half for him to own them. 

Josh Sens: So much comes down to the mental game. Dunlap said he thought of the pressure as a

privilege. That’s easy to say. But he played like he believed it.

Alan Bastable: It was another reminder that today’s top college players are unafraid to embrace big moments at the pro level. I was so impressed not only by Dunlap’s game but also by his maturity. In his post-round pressers, he sounded like he’d been there before. And as Josh said, he oozed self-belief. As Dunlap himself said Sunday evening, “I felt the script today was already written.” Pretty cool. One thing that really surprised me, though: Dunlap’s admission that he thought he had a two-shot lead as he played the 72nd hole. How he could have been misinformed on such critical information felt like a strategic gaffe that could have come back to bite him.

Misinformed?  Does Alan not understand how golf tournaments are conducted?  He's hitting on an interesting moment,  but he can't be bothered listening to the broadcast?  His colleague James Colgan provides the explanation:

As Golf Channel broadcaster Steve Burkowski and analyst Brandel Chamblee watched the 20-year-old think through his crucial 72nd hole, they seemed terrified to address the truth: Dunlap was about to hit the biggest shot of his entire life with less knowledge about the current

competitive situation than any fan with a stable internet connection standing within 10 feet of him.

“He doesn’t know the score,” Chamblee said. “He can’t.”

Eventually, he settled on a club and smoked an iron well right, striking a fan and miraculously dribbling past the greenside bunker. The strategy, he said later, was simple: “just don’t hit it in the water.”

It wasn’t until after he cleared the fairway that word finally reached Dunlap himself: his lead was only one. Those of us watching at home let out audible yelps of relief when Dunlap’s approach came to rest in a collection area just off the back side of the green. He had managed to avoid the doomsday scenario dreaded by every golfer since the beginning of time: losing a game of leaderboard bingo.

Your humble blogger has two reactions, the first is to note how recent this concept of always knowing where you stand is in the history of our game.   If you read accounts of Bobby Jones or Ben Hogan you will quickly realize that the players had little understanding of what other players had done.

Perhaps the most famous example of this is Sam Snead coming to his final hole in the 1939 U.S. Open believing he needed a birdie to win.  He played the hole aggressively, found two bunkers, and made a triple-bogey.  Not only would a bogey have won it, but Snead never won an Open. But this was professional golf for its first 100 years until the age of television.

But the second point to make is that sometimes it doesn't matter.  In this case, he really only could play the shot the way he did (he got a bit lucky in how it bounced), both because of the water and to ensure that a playoff would be his worst possible outcome.

Gee, here's a tough question:

2. Dunlap had an impressive resume prior to this week, as just last summer he became the second golfer ever (joining Tiger Woods) to win both the U.S. Amateur and U.S. Junior Am. Now, with this win under his belt, is he the frontrunner to be the game’s next star?

Colgan: Yep. There’s been an awesome youth movement in the pro game over the last several years, but no one has entered the sport with more momentum than Dunlap. Hovland, Wolff, Morikawa, and Scheffler all entered with huge hype, but nobody’s quite done anything like this. We’re witnessing something seriously rare.

Sens: Agreed. It’s a fickle game and nothing is guaranteed. But as spectacular as this was, there was also nothing fluky about it. No reason to think there won’t be more if the same to come.

Bastable: Lol, he’s already a PGA Tour winner — who you gonna put ahead of him?! Speaking of Tiger, I loved what Dunlap said about how chasing Tiger’s records will motivate him: “I know that’s an extremely high bar, and I don’t know if that comes off really cocky or not, but for me that’s something.” Nobody’s expecting Dunlap to put up Woodsian numbers but you have to appreciate him setting the bar high for himself. Going to be very fun to track his development.

Any dolt answering in the negative would lose his journalism license, though the guy that should is the one that wrote the question.  First, we'll stipulate that the kid is a stud, but our TC panel can't bothered with the most pressing issue.... Anyone remember the final scene of the movie, The Candidate?

The American Express champion Nick Dunlap has a big decision to make – to turn pro or not to turn pro.

The first amateur to win on the PGA Tour since Phil Mickelson in 1991 is exempt on the PGA Tour through the 2026 season, so technically there’s no rush. But if he turns pro, he’s also exempt into the remaining seven signature events this season, several of which are limited field, no-cut events with purses of at least $20 million (as well as The Sentry in 2025). It’s a no-brainer for the Alabama sophomore, right?

And you probably thought you didn't need another reason to hate Tiger and Rory's money grab?  But you were misinformed...

But nothing is simple in this golf world right now..... who was the last amateur to win on Tour?  Anyone know where that guy is playing these days?

There is, of course, a wild card to be considered in all of this. There’s no doubt that LIV Golf will circle with a lucrative offer that will make him think twice about whether he wants to try to win a ring or have a bank account with Saudi-funded generational wealth.

During a virtual press conference I asked Dunlap if he or his representatives have been contacted by LIV, and if so, does he have any interest in competing in the league?

“As of right now I have no idea, I really don’t,” he said.

He shared that he is represented by GSE and agent Kevin Canning, who Dunlap said worked a deal for Jason Kokrak to go to LIV. GSE also represents Bryson DeChambeau and numerous of their clientele jumped to LIV for big bucks.

Another fine mess you've gotten us into, Jay!

Two last bits before we move on from Coachella.  First, the TC panel had this on the latest audition:

4. NBC’s lead analyst “tryout” continued at the American Express, this time with Brandel Chamblee getting his spot in the chair. What did you think of Brandel in that role? And was he different — for better or for worse — than the studio-analyst version golf fans are used to?

Colgan: I expanded on this further in the Hot Mic newsletter, but I was seriously impressed with

Brandel’s work. Made me feel smarter for watching, and rose to the moment following Dunlap’s win. I think he should be a serious consideration for the lead analyst chair.

Sens: Chamblee is better known for deep-dive pre and post-round analyses. But he was especially good at being Johnny-on-the-spot this week. His commentary was clear, concise and insightful throughout. You could say he benefited from being handed a great story. But, as they say of clutch golfers, he also met the moment. I say hire the man for the hot-seat role.

Bastable: Full disclosure: I was able to watch only on Sunday afternoon, but during that stretch Chamblee sounded prepared and at ease. I didn’t hear any vintage Chamblee analysis or candor that might make for Monday-morning blog-post fodder, but no doubt those nuggets would come if he gets tapped for the job.

I'm more than a little surprised that Brandel wants the gig.... Were I him, I think I'd would bitterly cling to the cushy studio and Live From gig.   Not sure I watched enough to trust my opinion, but he was fine.  He's a little prone to hyperbola, not least when he declared that a massive drive by DJ at Kapalua to be the best drive ever in a significant professional event.  Did I mention that it was at Kapalua?  One of these days I'll stop laughing....

A million dollar putt is almost a cliché for these entitle brats, but in this case it comes with a heck of a twist:

Christiaan Bezuidenout drains million-dollar putt on 72nd hole, claims first-place money for second-place finish

Are we at the point where we have to collectively agree on how to pronounce the guy's name?

Other Results -  The TC panel came up with quite the way of dissing the rest of the golf world, combining these two events into one meager question:

3. Who had the other most impressive, or important, finish on Sunday: Rory McIlroy, who won the Dubai Desert Classic after letting a different tournament title slip through the cracks a week earlier? Lydia Ko, who was winless on the LPGA Tour last year but won the season-opener on Sunday? Or Justin Thomas, who finished T3 at the AmEx, after he had just two top 5s all of last season?

Have our expectations for JT been so reduced that we're celebrating him coming within two strokes of a 20-year old kid that hasn't started shaving yet?  If I'm JT, I am royally pissed at that question...

Colgan: Rory! Who quickly flipped the narrative after last week’s struggles in Dubai into a conversation about how he’s had two top-2 finishes in two starts this year. But to your point, seeing both JT and Rory card some strong early-season finishes fuels some major optimism for the year ahead. I’m giddy.

Rory winning a meaningless event on a soft desert course flips your script?  Are you sure you're in the right line of work?  After the back-door top ten at the masters, this is Rory's signature move.

Sens: Call me biased, as Ko is my favorite golfer on any tour. But she had such a perplexingly poor 2023, coupled with caddie and swing coach changes. I’d argue that her return to the

winner’s circle is more striking than either Rory or JT’s play — Rory has long been hot and cold from one event to the next. And Thomas was showing signs of revival before this week.

Bastable: Yeah, a January win in the Middle East for Rory doesn’t exactly get my motor running. I’m with Sens. Ko is a huge asset for the women’s game, both on and off the course (she’s always elite in the press room), so her return to form is a big deal for the women’s game. Here’s hoping this week portends more success to come in ‘24.     

Of course it has to be Lydia, because of her potentially outsized importance to the LPGA (and the LPGA's greater need for visibility).  Plus, I still kinda have that thing for her, though I remain convinced that losing the glasses is when it all went bad for her.

The Road Ahead - Anyone have a clue as to what comes next?  Because we are in quite the weird interregnum, no?

Not gonna push myself too hard here, but the big news is the allegations that surfaced last week against the man of the hour, Yasir al-Rumayyan.  Eamon Lynch does with it what Eamon Lynch does:

During whatever passes for his quiet moments these days, Jay Monahan must yearn for the time when his news consumption was principally focused on the sports and business pages, those

being the areas most consequential to his remit as commissioner of the PGA Tour. Nowadays, he must also turn to international affairs, one assumes with a knot in his gut at what might await.

This week, one dispatch was downright ulcerative.

A lawsuit accused the Tour’s soon-to-be partner, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, of taking part in a malicious campaign to punish a dissident defector whose children have been imprisoned for four years without due process. Allegations leveled in lawsuits are often hyperbolic, of course. Many colorful claims evaporate when oaths are administered or are dismissed with something approximating derision by a court, at least in the case of one chap who seems to think that both jurisprudence and the rules of golf are matters of personal interpretation.

Why, is this a problem?  certainly I see a fit with Patrick Reed and Pat Perez..... as for Phil, by now they're soul mates.

Eamon actually provide more background on the participants:

On paper, Al-Rumayyan’s latest entanglement could be viewed as a squabble between stooges for a despotic government. His accuser is Dr Saad Aljabri, the former chief of Saudi intelligence. Aljabri claims that companies under Al-Rumayyan’s control have been used to apply pressure on his family, and it’s not the first time an asset in the PIF portfolio has been implicated in nefarious activity. A charter jet company seized by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and transferred to Al-Rumayyan’s fund was later alleged to have been used in the murder of Washington Post writer Jamal Khashoggi. There has been no suggestion that Al-Rumayyan was involved in that gruesome act, but there’s still reason for his business associates to be apprehensive.

Al-Rumayyan enjoys a reputation as a sophisticated, savvy dealmaker (his bankrolling of Greg Norman’s ego notwithstanding) but he’s like everyone else in Saudi Arabia’s state apparatus: a factotum for MBS. These are not people likely to demur if called upon to act on a matter close to the Crown Prince’s heart. There’s evidence of what MBS has been known to ask of loyalists — particularly those who have demonstrated proficiency with a bonesaw — so anyone who is in business with the Saudi fund can’t delay scanning the international news section until after they’re done with the funnies.

How lucky for them that no one is too despicable for the Patrick Cantlays of the world to cash their checks....

 I'm just going to keep copying-and-pasting Eamon's rant:

Whatever troublesome relationships the Tour has encountered in the past — say, a sponsoring bank that defrauds customers (Wells Fargo) or an occasional Ponzi schemer (Allen Stanford) — the wrongdoing wasn’t known in advance of contracts being signed. No blissful ignorance defense exists when it comes to the sovereign wealth fund of a government with a lousy human rights record. Nor does this situation mirror Saudi involvement in other sports, like F1 or cricket. There’s an enormous difference between sponsorship and ownership, and if agreement is reached with PIF, the U.S. and European tours — and the private investors of Strategic Sports Group — risk having to ‘own’ more than mere equity. Harvard Business School can’t teach one how to predict the perils of a direct relationship with an autocratic regime headed by a capricious prince who doesn’t take well to criticism. But then, it shouldn’t have to.

A blueprint exists in how to handle proximity to abuses, though. It has been furnished by the LIV golfers who slavishly refer to Al-Rumayyan as His Excellency, often shortened to “H.E.” in a hollow attempt to suggest familiarity that elevates them above serf status. The strategy is to brazen it out, prevaricate if questioned, insist the association is strictly commercial, and repeatedly point to other entities that also take Saudi investment. It works. The past few years have proven that revenue is exculpatory in the minds of many, based on the wretched assumption that everyone would overlook cruelties for cash if presented the option.

If a day arrives when Monahan is forced to explain his organization’s adjacency to another Saudi outrage, it shouldn’t be overlooked that this partnership wasn’t brought about by the imperial ambitions of executives in Ponte Vedra or Wentworth. It’s happening because the best players in the world feel entitled to compensation beyond their worth in any rational market. By presenting a ransom demand that only the Saudis will pay, golfers on the PGA Tour are forcing a deal that absolves them of individual decision-making responsibility. And if there’s a reputational price to be paid for that later, well, it’s like bad yardages or swing slumps. Someone else will take the fall.

But Eamon, you're forgetting the best part.  They're jumping into bed with the bonecutters after Tiger and Rory used the threat to carve the rank and file out of the vast riches.  Between the PIP program and the limited fields in the ultra-rich Signature Events, approximately twenty players have stake a preemptive claim on the Saudi riches, to fend off a threat that allegedly doesn't exist any longer.  So, why aren't we unwinding those arrangements?

That sound you hear is Rahm Emanuel asking, "Why didn't I think of this?"

Yanno that part above where Eamon says the players feel entitled to riches above and beyond their value?  here's their value:

No golf telecasts were in the top 100 sports broadcasts in 2023.

With 12.1 million viewers (golf's most-watched event), the final round of the Masters was the 131st-most-viewed sporting event: https://t.co/akRTR7xhPR

— Josh Carpenter (@JoshACarpenter) January 5, 2024

That's the Masters, which dwarfs all other golf broadcasts.  I only wish we had been provided with the largest audience for an actual PGA Tour event, which might well not have been in the top 200.

Patrick and his wingmen simply refuse to be bound by economic reality..... and Jay isn't gonna let that get in the way of a deal.

Along these lines is this piece from Ewan Murray in the Guardian, the most interesting bits being the Saudi's investment in a Premiere League club:

In Newcastle, discourse surrounds whether Eddie Howe can retain his job or whether an injury crisis and the demands associated with Champions League football mean the manager has legitimately extenuating circumstances for a Premier League position of 10th. Just as well for Howe he isn’t dealing with ruthless overlords. Newcastle’s followers are audibly frustrated that financial fair play rules prevent the club from throwing even more money at players. Not even the Saudis can circumvent that.

The Premier League insisted it had “legally binding assurances” the kingdom of Saudi Arabia would not control Newcastle. Before peace broke out in golf, the Saudis argued Rumayyan and the fund he controls should be spared the giving of evidence during legal wrangling on the basis of sovereign immunity. Eyebrows were raised among some Premier League clubs but, in keeping to form, the matter basically disappeared. Let’s focus on VAR.

Remind you of anything?  Remember Jay's assurances that he would control everything?  The Saudis are, if he's to be believed, prepared to invest billons and not have any control..... Yanno, I was born in the morning, just not THIS morning.

That's it for today's' rant.  We'll have more as the week proceeds, though I'll make up the schedule as we go along.