The gods delivered the goods yesterday, as we skied through the snow falling all day (not that our days are very long). Forecast still is bountiful, although only an inch called for today. With the high projected to be a windy 16 degrees, can't imagine we'll be out there too long.
By the time we got up there we can't exactly call it a powder day, but there were powder turns to be had off the side of trails, which all concurred were our first soft turns of the season. As we ducked into one of the lodges for the boys to have a cocktail, we did notice that Lee had developed a porn 'stache stalactite:
Good Times.
European Evac - I'll allow my readers to decide what life form is deserting those ships, at least one of which is barely afloat. It's a live, it's just substantively diminished in terms of prestige. But first, this guy:
Nine years after he started, Martin Slumbers, CEO of the R&A and secretary of the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, is going to finish. In a press release the Englishman announced he will step down from both roles by the end of 2024.“It has been a privilege to serve golf at the highest level,” said the 63-year-old. “It is a role that I have been proud to carry out on behalf of the R&A's employees, the members of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club and all our global partners. In any career, there is a time to allow the next generation to have its turn. I am grateful to have had the honor, for nearly a decade, to have been the custodian of all that the R&A and the game of golf more broadly represents.“Indeed, Slumbers’ tenure has often enough been tumultuous. Quite apart from the long-running debate over distance and the announcement of a rollback on the golf ball last month, the COVID-19 pandemic led to the postponement of the 150th Open Championship at St. Andrews in 2020.More positively, though, Slumbers led a modernization of the R&A’s activities, not least through a merger with the Ladies' Golf Union that enabled the organization to represent golf for men, women, boys and girls at the elite level. Since the R&A has taken over running the AIG Women's Open, it has increased the purse from $3.25 million in 2018 to $9 million in 2023.
A long-term friend of the blog that's an R&A member sent me a heads up with a cryptic "Good riddance", though I don't know the underlying gripes. Certainly on their most important endeavor, the distance project, he gets an Incomplete, waiting decades too long to act. Though of course that involves other parties in interest, so easy enough to slough off.
Then this:
On the same day that Martin Slumbers made a surprise announcement that he is stepping down as CEO of the Royal & Ancient, Canada’s The Sports Network (TSN) reported that DP World Tour chief executive Keith Pelley has been hired as president and chief executive of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment. MLSE is the parent company of four Toronto-based sports franchises— the NHL’s Maple Leafs, NBA’s Raptors, MLS’s Toronto FC and CFL’s Argonautsason and are guaranteed stipend of $500,000.TSN noted that the job “is considered one of the most coveted positions in North American sports, overseeing a collection of prized sports and real estate assets that are worth billions of dollars.”TSN said the deal could be announced as early as Thursday, which happens to be Pelley’s 60th birthday. A Canadian, Pelley has been the chief executive of the DP World Tour (formerly the European Tour) since August 2015. He has overseen enormous changes in the golf landscape, including the strengthening of the alliance, announced in June 2022, between the DP World Tour and PGA Tour. The tours unveiled a 13-year operational joint partnership through 2035 that included the co-sanctioning of the DPWT’s Genesis Scottish Open and the PGA Tour’s Barbasol Championship and Barracuda Championship.Also among the significant changes in the new agreement was that the leading 10 players in the Race to Dubai rankings at the end of the season, who are not already exempt, earn PGA Tour cards for the following season and are guaranteed stipend of $500,000.
Damn, there go the best eyeglass frames in the business, although he's showing quite the sedate pair in the photo above.
I'm open to the concept that Pelley played a weak hand reasonably well, though I think it'll be hard for his constituents to give him much credit. The players hated when he negotiated those ten passes to the U.S. Tour, because they thought it made the Euro Tour look like a feeder tour. Of course it is a feeder tour and has been for quite a few years, so reality comes with sharp teeth.
We can't assess much about impact without knowing who fill fill the two big chairs, but at least it's not a stressful time in our game.
Common Ground - The last guy on the planet we'd expect to understand the burned bridges:
In fact, in an appearance on the Pat McAfee Show on Wednesday, Mickelson said a form of the word divisive four times in a 350-some-word answer to a question about his Ryder Cup future.He leaned heavily on the adjective as he explained why he wouldn’t be the best choice for 2025 Ryder Cup captain at Bethpage Black on Long Island.“I’ve had 12, 13 opportunities to be a part of the Ryder Cup — 12 as a player, one as a vice captain — and I’ve loved every minute of it and cherish those moments and those life experiences,” Mickelson said. “I don’t feel I’m the right guy to be involved with the team because I’m a very divisive character right now, if you will. And I understand that that the players on the PGA Tour, there’s a lot of hostilities towards me, and I don’t feel I’d be the best leader for them going forward.“I think that as a Ryder Cup captain, you have to be kind of a unifier and have these relationships solidified and somebody that you want to follow. And right now I’ve been very divisive, and I’m OK with that. I knew that was going to be the case. I knew that it was going to take a couple of years and that I was going to take a lot of hits and a lot of divisiveness.”
Obviously most of will readily agree and credit him for his honest appraisal of the environment. Except that it's Phil, so what's in it for him to make that statement now?
Is it possible he's trying to use his 3D chess kills to lock Tiger into the gig?
Wither Golf - Am I the only that has noticed that golf has attracted generation after generation, yet the powers that be feel that we're all gonna die, if we don't change everything. Sean Zak wants jazz it up by stealing from other sports, which strikes me as quite unpromising. Shall we see what he has:
What golf should steal from college basketball
Unlike college football, college basketball has figured out an important aspect of sports: stratification. With its 68-team NCAA Tournament, its 32-team NIT and even the 16-team CBI, almost every relevant team still has something to play for when the regular season comes to an end. Stratification can be good!The PGA Tour is already leaning into stratification with its top 70 advancing to the playoffs, its top 50 FedEx Cup earners entering the following season’s Signature Events, the top 125 earning full playing status for the next season. But rather than drag out the FedEx Cup Fall in seven tournaments across 10 weeks in September, October and November — where the non-elite performers play stressful golf on Sundays during the NFL season — how about a quasi-NIT golf tournament? Or quick series of events, where there are extra incentives, like, say, placement for 10 of the 55-man field in the following season’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am? Creating a consolation bracket of sorts — or rather consolation buckets — would expedite the playoff stratification of the entire Tour membership, opening up the fall season for something truly different: team golf.
Anyone have a clue as to his point? We already have that in the Korn Ferry and DP World Tours, so things are pre-stratified. But wouldn't it be better to just allow those guys into the PGA's most important events? I know what Patrick thinks, but maybe we'll find out what Tiger thinks.
What golf should steal from cricketRory McIlroy has pulled back from his outright dismissal of LIV Golf in recent months, now seeming to take up the belief that team golf of the right fashion could help buoy particular sections of the golf calendar, like the fall. If LIV Golf could be massaged in the right way, perhaps it could help bridge the gap from season to season in an intriguing way.“I would love LIV to turn into the IPL of golf,” McIlroy said recently on a podcast, leaving American golf fans scratching their heads. What’s the IPL?McIlroy was talking about the Indian Premier League, a cricket league created in the 2000s with a newer format that promised to engage fans like never before and also improve the pay structures for cricketers. It has skyrocketed in popularity.
The logical answer is to do some kind of team competition in the Fall, but good luck getting anyone to tune in. LIV's schedules have shown the same thing, they don't want to go up against the NFL any more than Jay does.
What golf should steal from…multiple sports!Part of the reason we love this sport is how gamified it can be. Putting contests, closest to the pin, up-and-down competitions. There’s a reason why the World Long Drive competition exists as a television product. It’s fun to watch! But pro golf rarely, if ever, gets to show off in these derivative settings.All we have to say is, LOOK AROUND!The NFL has sustained a Pro Bowl weekend out of goofy, athletic competitions. The NBA All-Star weekend is an annual meeting of the minds for the entire industry. The NHL wanted its own version of this action so badly that it created a speed-skating contest that gets the best in the world starving to win something different. How do we not get to see Collin Morikawa show just how skilled he is with a 7-iron, hitting 5-straight laser-beams inside 10 feet? How do we not test out Jordan Spieth’s wedge game against Xander Schauffele in wicked lies dreamed up by Justin Thomas? Videos of these competitions fare well on YouTube. So bring them to the masses, Golf Channel!This idea feels so obvious as an extra way to inject life into any of the Tour’s premier events, I’m concerned there’s something really important that I’m missing. Until someone proves me wrong, I’ll steadfastly believe that the season-ending trip to East Lake should include a Tuesday-evening all-star show under the lights. You’ve made it to the Tour Championship, now show us why you’re here.
No problem with that, though it's not clear the players really want more obligations? Don't think so, given how our pampered guys duck pro-ams.
Udder Stuff - A couple of minor bits of amusement, then I'll let you get on with your day:
Am I a loner in thinking that golf publications should know and use golf language? Not only do I see them with headers speaking of hitting a hole in one, but players hire caddies, there is no appointment power.
Full-time sounds promising, but it's Lexie, for whom the half life of a caddie is about an hour-abd-a-half.
Try not to laugh at this last bit:
Ashley Perez filed for divorce in Maricopa County (Ariz.) Superior Court in November, as first reported by the website Bro Bible.
The outlet discovered the filing after observing that the couple had removed photos of each other from their respective Instagram pages, though some older shots of the couple together do remain on Ashley’s page.
By colorful they mean this:
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