Your Friday Frisson

With the Irish Open as my background music, here's what's new in our little fishbowl.

Bones' Jones for.....Microphones - It's just a gift folks, don't be bitter.....Here's the gist of it:

Jim “Bones” Mackay will start carrying a microphone. 

The longtime wingman for Phil Mickelson will join NBC and Golf Channel as an on-course reporter, the network announced Thursday. He’ll cover the British Open at Royal Birkdale in Southport, England, later this month, the FedExCup playoffs at the end of the season and the Presidents Cup. 

“This is a great day for me,” Mackay said in a conference call. “I’m absolutely overjoyed to join the NBC golf team. I have so much to learn. I can’t wait to get the whole process going.”

This is a mild surprise, though not even close to a shock....  Here's the man with his C.V.:

TV feels like a natural move for Mackay, who said he loves the game and was a golf rat as a kid.“I would watch everything from start to finish. I would read golf magazines from beginning to end,” Mackay said. “I’ve always been fascinated by the game at this level. 

Certainly when I was lucky enough to get to caddie on the PGA Tour you take in everything around you. 

“I loved watching what the TV guys do. It’s intriguing. I think it’s yet another fascinating aspect of the golf world.”

Golf rat?  I've heard of range rats and golf nerds, mostly because I qualify as both.....

Those of you that, like your humble correspondent, need to get out more, might remember Bones' audition:

This won’t be Mackay’s first announcing gig. He and fellow caddie John Wood worked

alongside each other during Golf Channel’s coverage of the 2015 RSM Classic. NBC said Mackay, 51, is the first full-time caddie to be signed to a broadcasting role. 

Tommy Roy, lead producer for golf for NBC and a longtime friend of Mackay’s, said, “Bones thinks like a producer.” That when the two would have dinners, the conversation never centered on Mackay and Mickelson. Roy said Mackay always thought bigger picture and storylines. 

“Those things usually take time to get ingrained in you, to think like a producer, and he already has that,” Roy said. “He’s a great communicator. He’s already prepared with other ideas of what he can bring to the telecast.”

I only watched a little that week, though I thought that Wood was the more natural of the two, not that Bones was bad....  But glad to hear that he's got the important stuff down:

There was one thing he learned from his week at the RSM Classic that he can’t ever do on a broadcast going forward. 

“The only thing I had to get on Bones the entire time (during the 2015 RSM Classic) was he was chewing on gum during on-cameras,” Roy said. “So from now on, we ixnay the gum during on-cameras.” 

What are Mackay’s thoughts here? 

“Yeah, don’t ever chew gum on the air,” Mackay said.

Is he a quick learner, or what?

Though I do question whether this is actually true:

Have you seen that backpack that Feherty lugs around?  And unlike a staff bag, it can't be thrown on the ground.

Two thoughts about the news....  First, given that Golf Channel has a full crew doing the Irish this week and the Scottish next, I'm surprised that they didn't get him over there sooner.  As a wise man would put it, give him some reps so he can get his announcing feelz.....

Secondly, NBC has a bit of an on-course glut right now.  They've had some noticeable awkwardness in their use of Maltbie and Feherty, which will be interesting with Bones in the mix.  That said, I'm sure that Tommy Roy is playing the long game, Maltbie can't have too many years left and the rumors of Johnny retiring seem to have picked up pace, so perhaps the plan is to break Bones in (get it) gradually....

Scenes From Portstewart - I did very much like this item on Portstewart's day in the sun, including an "How times have changed " anecdote:

PORTSTEWART, Northern Ireland – Michael Moss was doing promotional work for the local government in the mid-1970s in an effort to bring more visitors to this part of

Northern Ireland. At one point in 1976, he was called into the mayor’s office in Coleraine and feted for his work driving tourists to Portstewart Golf Club. 

“I was congratulated for bringing 13 people from outside of Northern Ireland to this tournament,” Moss recalled one recent morning over coffee in the second-floor restaurant at Portstewart’s clubhouse. 

Moss laughed at the memory. During The Troubles, 13 visitors was a big deal. On a typical morning these days, several times that many international visitors file through the Portstewart pro shop and happily pay £150 ($194) to play the Strand, host course for this week’s Dubai Duty Free Irish Open.

Those were dark years, which thankfully seem behind us.

This guy came to play:

PORTSTEWART, Northern Ireland (AP) -- Rising Spanish star Jon Rahm upstaged

tournament host Rory McIlroy at the Irish Open by shooting a 7-under 65 to move one stroke off the first-round lead on Thursday. 

Rahm, ranked No. 11, showed impressive form on the links two weeks out from the British Open, rolling in six birdies and an eagle on a low-scoring day at Portstewart. He was tied for third place with Englishmen Matthew Southgate and Oliver Fisher. 

Daniel Im of the United States, ranked No. 542, and Benjamin Hebert of France, ranked No. 254, held the lead after shooting bogey-free 64s.

As opposed to this guy:

The three stages of Rory....Shock, Anger and...well, not Acceptance.

Rory has finished his round, and will have the weekend free to take his bride shopping in Coleraine.

Lord knows I don't want to be on the same side of any spat with Elk, but what is going on with Rory?  

Scenes From The Old White - Just good to see them back there, after last year's catastrophe.  It's no doubt the kind of course this guy can still compete on:

Don't try telling Davis Love III that the PGA Tour is a young man's game. 

Love surprised many of his peers when he won the 2015 Wyndham Championship at age 

51, and he is again near the top of the leaderboard after a bogey-free 63 to open The Greenbrier Classic. He's two strokes behind Sebastian Munoz, and Love's 63 was five shots lower than his previous best round this season. 

Love got out of the gates quickly on the newly-renovated Old White TPC, with birdies on four of his first five holes after a flurry of accurate approach shots. He grabbed a share of the lead with a 30-foot make on No. 14, then chipped in for birdie from in front of the green on the par-5 17th to become the first player to reach 7 under par.

Oh, he knows it's a young man's game, but there are courses for horses....

Oh, and I just found this Bubba tweet from last June:

Oh, stop whining!  It's just a little casual water....

Speaking of the Bubbameister, he played the 17th hole in perhaps the most Bubbaesque manner possible:

Watson hit his tee shot at the 17th way right, and he was honestly lucky to find it. The

ball ended up on some rocks, from which Watson decided to take a chance and hit from rather than take an unplayable lie and a one-shot penalty.

It worked out, as Watson knocked his ball back into the fairway. Now facing 304 yards to the hole, Watson decided to go driver off the deck with his third shot. 

That strike did not finish up quite as well.

Video at the link.

Scenes From Birkdale - The first of many on the upcoming Open Championship is this unbylined Nine Things You Need to Know about the venue, including these bones for Martha Burke:

3. Birkdale was opened in 1889 and became an early pioneer in women's golf when club members voted to allow women to play the course for three days each week. 

4. In 1890, the first women were elected as members. One of the first tournaments hosted at Birkdale was a ladies' championship.

Good for them.  It's a really good golf course, easily the best of the English venues.  Though surprisingly far from the Iris Sea....

But add this to the long list of "What's in the water at Golf.com" items we've had recently:

5. In the 1969 Ryder Cup, Birkdale was the site of the famous "Concession." Jack Nicklaus conceded the 18th hole to Tony Jacklin in what the club's history calls "a gesture of supreme sportsmanship which has never been forgotten." The match ended in a 16-16 tie. He finished T4 and two off the lead.

Say what?  They don't even proofread things anymore, do they?

The other Open story is the rather dramatic increase in the purse, and the rather humiliating change in denomination:

The total prize money for the 146th Open Championship will be $10.25 million, with the winner receiving $1.845 million to go along with the Claret Jug. 

Golf’s third major of the season is set for July 20-23 at Royal Birkdale in Southport, England. 

The prize money will be based on dollars. The value of the British pound has been negatively affected by last year’s Brexit vote. 

“We are operating in an increasingly global marketplace and have made the decision to award the prize fund in U.S. dollars in recognition of the fact that it is the most widely adopted currency for prize money in golf,” R&A chief executive Martin Slumbers said in a statement Wednesday.

That makes it comparable to The Masters and Players....  A far cry from the days when the winner could cover his travel costs.   But this may be our first trip in which we have a soft Pound to enjoy, though it's still not a cheap undertaking....

Cheap Shots -  In which your humble bloggers ceases to control the snark....

When dis she join CNN? - Brittany Lincicome hopes Trump won't attend the U.S. Women's Open

I'll Wait For The Man Chases Moose Story - This video of a moose chasing a golfer is alternately hilarious and terrifying

Only 29? - 29 reasons why you didn't play well today

Jordan, You Ignorant Slut.  If Only You'd Listened in 2015 - Jordan Spieth skipping John Deere Classic to prepare for British Open

A Very Important Comma - Caddie Kip Henley on Vijay Singh, cheating on Tour

Thursday Thoughts

It's an immutable law...early golf means late blogging.  Unless, of course, you have the power to change the time-space continuum....  

The Greenbrier - Given the magnitude of the damage last year, a mere two weeks before the scheduled event, it's amazing they're in a position to host again so soon:

The 100-year storm, the 1,000-year storm--whatever. A lethal storm. Howard's Creek rising. A burning house floating down it. 

"It was scary, it was depressing," Watson said in a phone interview. "Where the Greenbrier's at, it's just like where I grew up, Milton, Baghdad, Pensacola. Hard-working people who love their families and love their sports. That storm came in and houses were washed away, people lost their belongings, their pets. People lost their lives. Angie was delivering fresh water to people two hours away from the hotel. It was devastating." 

The flood hit a year and a fortnight ago, on June 23. The Greenbrier Classic, scheduled to begin July 7, was canceled two days later. Large parts of the course, called Old White, a picturesque C.B. Macdonald classic, were underwater. The rest of it was in shambles. Nearly two-dozen lives were lost in White Sulphur Springs, where the Greenbrier resides, and in nearby towns. Jim Justice, the owner of the Greenbrier and then a candidate for governor of West Virginia, mourned the loss. He told a reporter, "We're scarred."

This Golf Channel piece narrated by Tim Rosaforte captures the carnage.   As for the architectural challenges, they hired a very talented hand:

Keith Foster, the architect, dropped everything and came in to access the damage, a

doctor of golf-coursing responding to a 911 call. His first instinct was to say it could not be done. The golf course could not be reclaimed and restored in one year and open for play for the 2017 tournament. The hotel didn't even have hot water and locals suddenly rendered homeless were being put up in its plush rooms. The idea of a golf tournament seemed just...remote. But Jim Justice opened his checkbook and prodded Foster. "We just made one decision after another after another on the fly," Foster said in a recent telephone interview. If you know his name, it might be for the restoration work he has done at Colonial, Southern Hills and Philadelphia Cricket. "We did it the old way, hole by hole. We didn't get everything done the way we would ultimately like it, but it's most of the way there." On the resort guest-Tour player continuum, Foster said he was far, far far on the side of the everyday paying guest, while noting "we have our Bubba tees."

It all starts at the top, in this case with Jim Justice.

A Get Out of Jail Free Card -  I was reliably informed by Yoda that there was no such thing as intent, there was only doing or not doing....  Per Rick Blaine, I was misinformed:

Anchoring, as we all know (and as the USGA knows, with the exception of one word) is when the club, or the gripping hand, or a part of the forearm is held against the body,

relieving the player from making a free swing by restricting the movement of the club as if it were physically attached to the player’s body and thereby providing extra support and stability for the stroke. 

Anchoring is NOT deemed to have happened when and if a player holds the club, or the gripping hand, or a part of the forearm against the body, relieving the player from making a free swing by restricting the movement of the club as if it were physically attached to the player’s body and thereby providing extra support and stability for the stroke … if the player, regardless of having done all of the above, merely states that it was not their “intent” to have done so. That it was not their “intent” to have anchored. 

Intent is the get-out-of-jail-free card for both the player and those who are meant to police the player.

For the record, it was not my intent to double-bogey the 18th holes this morning, especially since I was one over par on the tee.  And yet, despite my clear intent, a six went on the card, so WTF?

It appears as if the USGA and the R&A, anticipating a clog of calls about the club or the gripping hand or part of the forearm accidentally or otherwise brushing against or settling upon one’s shirt, added the stipulation that there must be intent for the rule to have been violated. They thereby exempted themselves from all adjudicating, in effect saying that while we wrote the rule, we will not interpret the rule. 

It appears that the governing bodies in an attempt to soften the blow of taking the long putters away from the world of bad-back and flinch-afflicted golfers, at the very least provided a loophole and at the very worst abdicated the throne of governance.

Egads, what a governing class we're stuck with.  Add this to the botched ball-moving rule revision and the as-yet unresolved issue of outsourcing rules enforcement to guys in their pajamas, and a fellow could almost turn cynical.  Fortunately, Brandel provides an Arnie story to cheer us up:

A few years ago I was practicing in Scottsdale, Ariz., at the TPC and was talking to a couple of past-their-prime touring pros, Gibby Gilbert and Butch Baird. The conversation came around to Arnold Palmer and his legacy, which is a hard thing to quantify – kind of like the spirit of the game or sportsmanship, they are far easier understood in example than they are articulated. 

Gibby said that once he and the King were playing in a tournament and Arnold pointed to an imperfection on the green and wanted to know if Gibby thought it was a ball mark, meaning something that could be repaired, or just an imperfection, meaning something that couldn’t be repaired. Gibby said, “I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt." Arnold looked at him as if he had called his honor into question, and then sternly said, “I don’t want the damned benefit of the doubt, I want to know what you think."

Hmmm...did anyone know that Brandel lived in Scottsdale?  I'm just spitballin' here, but they should think about using him in promotional materials for the community....

Portstewart, Ready For Its Close-Up - Lots of video showing off the other-worldly outgoing nine of this Ulster gem:

And don't feel obligated to stay with these clowns for long, but it is worth watching a bit to see the splendid first tee:

Of course, once the camera scans to capture the buggies, I emotionally checked out.....

As we've discussed previously, the best viewing might proved to be Thursday and Friday, because the outgoing nine is where we find the dramatic dunescape.  The inward nine has some challenging holes, but nowhere near the eye candy that precedes it.  Though this gent makes a good point:

This week’s Irish Open – now part of the European Tour’s Rolex Series, which carries a $7 million purse – figures to be a similarly festive affair. Portstewart is best known for the Strand’s front nine, but the closing three holes are ideally suited for tournament viewing because they run parallel on open land, with the 16th and 18th greens resting at the base of the clubhouse. 

“The final day, people are going to be here in this big stand,” Moss said, pointing to the viewing area extending down the 18th fairway, “and they’re going to get the 18th green, the 17th tee and the 16th green,” Moss said. “There’s not many tournaments where people get that. . . 

“We want it to be a party. The European Tour is very keen on that. It’s changed from golf being played in cathedral hush. They want a bit of noise and a bit of fun.”

Not terribly interesting from a design perspective, but if it's close they'll be able to see much of that final three hole stretch.

They considered alternative routings, but with the exception of moving one tee left it as guests will remember it.... 

Friend of the blog and Portstewart member Lowell Courtney is marshaling on the 18th hole, though as of yesterday afternoon during the Pro-Am he seems to have already lost his will to live.

We'll Always Have Memphis - Phil is at The Greenbrier with brother Tim on the bag, but is appropriately taking the high road as relates to his recent divorce:

"I'm hesitant to talk too much about anything because I'm so appreciative of the time that 

I've had with Bones for 25 years, that anything I say positively about what I'm looking forward to with Tim and so forth I feel would be taken as a shot at Bones, and I don't want to do that," Mickelson told reporters Wednesday. "I have too much respect for him and our time together over the years. The thing I would say is that Tim is one of my favorite people. I love being around him. He's one of the people I respect the most, and throughout my career he's been so supportive of me."

I think that's really great, and I hope the two can remain good buddies for the long-term.  But a mere two 'graphs comes this, and I'm just wondering on what planet it isn't, you know, a shot at Bones:

"I would say that after having not won for four years, knowing that my game is at a level that is good enough to win but not having done it, I think the one thing is an element of maybe being comfortable with my brother," he said. "Maybe he gets me a little more relaxed and takes a little pressure off me, and maybe I'll play my best that way. But there's no replacing Bones. He's phenomenal."

That Bones guys is phenomenal, unless you feel the need to win.....

And this won't hurt me reputation as the master of the seamless segue, but Golf Digest has reposted a 2009 item on Bones' 10 Rules for Reading Greens.  It's worth a read for anyone that struggles on the greens, including this:

04. Develop an insurance read. One of the toughest reads is the six-footer that has a small but telling amount of break -- half a ball outside the edge, for example. After reading from my customary angles and making a decision, I use a final insurance read that gives me a feeling of certainty. Your insurance read can be any technique you like, but for me it consists of lining up the putt in the standard way -- squatting behind the ball -- and then imagining how the ball would behave if I started it dead center. I'll almost always see the ball peeling off a certain amount left or right, so then I know to aim that far out on the other side. Like I say, the insurance read can be anything, but you should have one.

Please tell me he's just effing with us....  I'm lucky to commit to one read, as wrong as it will inevitably be.

 A Good Call - Apparently Rory has failed to internalize the maxim that one should never punch down:

PORTSTEWART, Northern Ireland – Rory McIlroy has banned himself from twitter and social media following his online public spat with Steve Elkington and given over

control of his Twitter account to his new wife, Erica Stoll. McIlroy made the big reveal ahead of the $7 million Dubai Duty Free Irish Open which he is hosting this week at Portstewart. 

Elkington accused McIlory, No. 4 in the world, of being bored with golf and more interested in money after the four-time major winner missed the cut in the U.S. Open.

“Rory is so bored playing golf, without Tiger the threshold is prolly four majors with 100 mill in the bank,” Elkington tweeted. 

McIlroy couldn’t resist replying: “More like 200 mill, not bad for a ‘bored’ 28-year-old, plenty more where that came from,” Rory replied while adding a list of his considerable achievements in his 10 years in top flight golf.

Let Rory explain:

“It’s not what was said,” McIlory explained. “It’s who said it. Anyone that’s been in that environment should realise how hard golf is at times. That’s the thing that got to me more than anything else. 

“If it was written by a member of the media or something I could let it slide, because I can sort of says to myself ‘they don’t really know how it is and the don’t know what you have to deal with.’ But a former player that has won a major and been successful? That’s sort of why it got to me and why I sort of retaliated a little bit.”

Yeah, technically that's true, but it was in a galaxy far, far away....  

Of course Elk's not the only alter kocker he's misunderstanding:

Rory McIlory says Tiger Woods taught him to be 'ruthless'

 Is that what he called it?  'Cause, you might be in need of a refresher course....

Midweek Wrap...

...or Weekend Musings, whichever you prefer.  It's a Wednesday that feels like a Monday, so we're all a tad disoriented.

That Long-Ago Weekend - Golf Digest has us covered:

What you missed this weekend

What, besides all those 3-footers?  In their order of importance:

Stanley returns to winner's circle 

Starting Sunday four shots back, Kyle Stanley was hoping for a top-four finish at the

Quicken Loans National, one that would grant an invite to the Open Championship. He ultimately earned a spot in the Royal Birkdale field, but grabbed something sweeter: a win at TPC Potomac. 

The 29-year-old shot a final-round 66, good enough for a playoff against Charles Howell III, and on the first hole of sudden death, Stanley's 4 to Howell's 5 prevailed. It was Stanley's first victory in five years. And the things he had to endure between Ws. 

A former All-American and Ben Hogan Award winner at Clemson, Stanley was once a rising star in the sport. Yet though few on tour were better ball-strikers, Stanley found wayward driving and putting issues curbed his potential throughout his 20s, and -- failing to crack the FedEx Cup's top 100 the past three seasons, even spending some time at the Web.com Tour -- he was quickly becoming a tale of unfulfilled promise.

Stanley hit our radar screens when he bounced back from a heartbreaking loss at Torrey to win the following week in Phoenix.  Since then, crickets.

Though I'm having trouble reconciling that last 'graph....  wayward driving perhaps means you're not one of the best ball-strikers....or not.  But the irony is the similar career and games of the two guys that fought it out in the playoff....  At least one of them had to win.

Next up:

Fleetwood's 2017 tour continues 

Speaking of former prodigies, Tommy Fleetwood -- long heralded as Europe's "next big

thing" -- is quickly becoming the story of the summer overseas. The 26-year-old, who won at Abu Dhabi in January and posted top-five finishes at the WGC-Mexico and U.S. Open, turned in a closing 66 to best Peter Uihlein at the HNA Open de France at Le Golf National. 

The win vaults Fleetwood to No. 15 in the world, quite the accomplishment given he was ranked No. 188 as of last July. 

"Life has been a lot better," Fleetwood said. "When you enjoy doing your job, no matter what part of it it is. That's a massive, massive positive. Just to be enjoying golf again, it took a lot of hard work." 

Despite a touch-and-go short game, Fleetwood's power off the tee and second-shot finesse puts him on the short list of claret jug contenders. Oh, and if his renaissance wasn't a narrative in itself, Fleetwood grew up minutes away from Royal Birkdale. Going on a limb and saying he may have a few backers at his side in Southport.

Well, as long as he doesn't stop thinking about tomorrow.... Two can play at that game.

The home game at Birkdale assures he'll show up on quite a few fantasy rosters, though I personally can't get past that touch-and-go short game....

I'm skipping their synopsis of the round-bellies, to which we'll circle back below. 

Kang earns breakthrough on major stage 

Brooke Henderson was this close to defending her major title at the KPMG Women's PGA Championship, birdieing her final two holes to tie for the lead with her eagle putt

on the 18th hole just coming up short. But the fledging superstar was bested by 24-year-old Danielle Kang, whose birdie at Olympia Fields' home hole gave her a first LPGA victory in 144 career starts. 

Kang's back nine was far from a model of consistency. She bogeyed the 10th to fall a shot behind Henderson and Chella Choi, only to answer with four straight birdies to put herself back in the mix. However, she needed a 21-footer to save par on the 16th, and made a mess of things on the 17th for a bogey. Yet Kang, a former two-time U.S. Women's Amateur champions who hadn't had a top-10 in 30 previous major attempts, reached the par-5 18th in two, with the ensuing two-putt giving her the crown. 

“I think that it's been a really difficult road for me for the past four or five years,” Kang said. “It’s life, though. You have to pick yourself up, and you have to keep working hard at it, and then believe in what you're doing, and not letting yourself down.”

If any of this weekend's action has long-term consequences, it would be this young woman's breakthrough win.  It took longer than expected, but there's also been heartache involved:

Kang lost her father, K.S., to cancer in 2013, but her mother, Grace Lee, was one of the

first people to congratulate her on the victory. She also face-timed with brother Alex, an instrumental figure in her performance at Olympia Fields, after the trophy presentation.

Kang's father caddied for her when she won the U.S. Women's Amateur in 2010 and 2011. She keeps a journal where she writes messages to her father. 

"If I could wish anything, I would wish that my dad saw me won," said Kang, wiping tears from her eyes. "I think that it's been a really difficult road for me the past four or five years. It's life, though, you pick yourself up and you have to keep working hard at it, and then believe in what you're doing, and not letting yourself down. 

"I just know that he's here for it. What are the odds that my first win is a major? Pretty sure he had something to do with it. It's just incredible. But I know that he was there, because I felt - I felt him with me every day, and I still do."

We always think that when the first takes so long that the floodgates will open.....  She's an awfully good player and an engaging young lady, so let's hope so.

The Alter Kocker Open -  Not exactly Tom and Jack at Turnberry, but two guys pretty much lapped the field:

PEABODY, Mass. (AP) -- Kenny Perry claimed his second U.S. Senior Open on Sunday, pulling away from Kirk Triplett at Salem Country Club to finish at 16 under and win by

two strokes. 

The 56-year-old Perry closed with a 2-under 68 for a record score of 264. Perry also won the event in 2013 in Omaha, Nebraska. It is his fourth major victory on the senior tour. 

Perry started the day a stroke behind Triplett but five ahead of the next-closest contender, Brandt Jobe. Triplett, who tied the tournament record with a 62 in the opening round, had five bogeys Sunday and shot 71.

 I just thought we should salute the winner before we get down and dirty with Brandel:

Brandel Chamblee is not happy about the way the anchoring ban is being upheld on the PGA Tour. 

In a series of tweets on Saturday night, the Golf Channel analyst criticized the enforcement of the rule, calling it “appalling” and stating that it exhibits “gross disregard for the spirit of the game.”

While Twitter commenters speculated that Chamblee was referring to Bernhard Langer, Chamblee did not specifically mention any player by name.

He might not have specified them by name this time, but this isn't the first time the subject has arisen.  Oh, and do you notice a word missing above?  Let me help you by providing Brandel's tweet:

That missing "Champions" makes it pretty damn clear about whom we're speaking.... Interestingly, this rule and the enforcement thereof was the first question posed to the Tour Confidential panel:

John Wood: In a word, yes. I’ve spoken with more than a couple friends, players and caddies alike, who now work on the Champions Tour, and they are not happy. While no one has stepped up to name anyone, they tell me that in the locker rooms, many players are vocal and angry, but still trying to work the problem inside the tour with rules officials, rather than making things very public. I’ve been told that the mantra on the PGA Tour amongst rules officials is, “We need to see daylight,” so no one is pushing it out here.

Michael Bamberger: It seemed like a neat solution at the time, to alter the method and not the putter itself, but it is almost impossible to police. Which means it’s not working. The USGA’s real goal was to prevent hot-shot kids coming up in the game going to anchoring early, as so many now go to cross-handed early. The truth is, the USGA never really spoke with candor about the organization’s objection: it doesn’t look golfy. Well, the enforcement looks less golfy. Yes, it needs a facelift. The facelift may be elimination of the change or an elimination of long-shafted putters. In other words, a pretty radical facelift. It was a shame so much energy was wasted on it in the first place. The game has other things to worry about.

As the kids like to say, stay tuned....  I don't agree with Mike, as I think the only thing wrong with the anchoring ban is that it came twenty years too late....  And while they could have banned long putters instead, if you're going to ban anchoring you have to, you know, ban it. 

Play Better, Redux - yeah, yeah, yeah, but I feel strongly on this subject, so please either bear with me as I slit some hairs or skip ahead to the next item.  Back to the TC panel:

4. Two-time NBA MVP and multi-millionaire Steph Curry received a sponsor’s exemption into the Web.com tour’s Ellie Mae Classic in August. But the question of whether Curry, a 2.2 handicap, deserved a spot over grinding pros ignited a debate on social media. Do you have a problem with Curry playing in the event? 

Wood: Not really. The Ellie Mae Classic is trying to sell tickets and get eyes onto their event. This will sell tickets and get eyes onto their event. I hate to sound cruel and it is not my intention, but since I started caddying out on Tour 21 years ago, there is a mantra that goes around no matter what problem a player has with regard to fairness: Play better. It fixes everything.

There's I think two points missing from the discussion....

First, the players complaining are not asking that the exemption be for themselves....  Spots in the field are scarce resources and they're concerned that they be available for players trying to make their way in the game.  How could this possibly be otherwise?

Secondly, this is the same event that allowed Jerry Rice to beclown himself for three friggin' years....  Can you not understand how maddening that is to a kid scrambling to find enough places to play?

And this in a world when the big tour sponsors were still giving John Daly exemptions decades after his sell-by date?

I take this all as an argument to raise the standards for sponsors exemptions....   This may well be one of those instances where Steph Curry can really generate enough buzz to raise all boats (I know, a mixed analogy at best), but let's at least pretend to maintain some standards.  If nothing else, do it for the children....

Five Families Fail - Shack reprises his "Five Families" recurring bit to argue about the over-crowded TV schedule:

While the 2017 editions of the KPMG Women’s PGA, U.S. Senior Open and Quicken

Loans National probably won’t be talked about a century from now, each featured enough intrigue for a sports fan to savor. Yet each started and finished at almost the same time on a summer Sunday in the United States.

Put me down for seriously flawed programming. 

Even with the July 4th holiday falling on a Tuesday, therefore opening up Monday July 3rd as a de facto holiday, three golf tournaments went head to head for no good reason. With each played at compelling venues that alone would attract viewers (Salem CC, Olympia Fields, TPC Potomac), they competed for viewers on a Sunday that not only failed fans, but will fuel the ratings decline narrative. 

Next time the five families meet, perhaps they can bring calendars along to their meetings and kick around a way to spread the viewing love. A Monday finish most likely would not have hurt any one of the three, particularly the Quicken Loans, where galleries were thin.

I've certainly made this argument myself, especially for the LPGA.  They've experimented with some Saturday finishes and the like, but it's easier said than done.  It's difficult to get fans and volunteers to a golf course on non-weekend days, but how about three cheers for a our dying game?  It's imminent demise notwithstanding, we grabbed three out of four networks on a Sunday afternoon.   Not to shabby.....

The Good, The Bad and the Curious - We only have two items, and the subject is course restorations, and the first is the very essence of good:

I Heard… 

That 69 percent of the membership at Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester, N.Y., voted to restore its East Course to the vintage 1925 Donald Ross design. With the club contracted with the PGA of America to host two major championships in the the next six years,

Andrew Green will be handling the changes to holes that had previously been redesigned by Tom Fazio and Robert Trent Jones III. Green will have tour player input from Rochester native Jeff Sluman, the 1988 PGA champion. Ground breaking will take place just after the club hosts the Senior PGA Championship in 2019. “The history of the place is incredible and the documentation spectacular,” said Green, who is also handling a Ross restoration at Inverness. “We’ve got a nice set of documents to work off of.” The timetable for restoration is expected to have the course open for members by Memorial Day 2020, and completely grown in by 2023, when the club hosts its fourth PGA Championship, the last won by Jason Dufner in 2013. If there’s concern about Oak Hill’s readiness for the 2023 PGA, particularly if the PGA of America goes ahead with a proposal to move the dates of the major from August to May, it’s not over course conditions but whether the weather in upstate New York could create problems during the 100-day build out of the infrastructure required to host a major.

In his post on this subject, here's how Shack amusing describes the process:

Which is why a copule of items got my attention, starting with the exciting, long, long, long overdue news that Oak Hill's membership has voted to go back to their Ross design while joining the long list of courses to de-Fazio.

Geoff, any chance you'd share that long list with us?  

When I was at Bethpage with the Met. Golf Writers, I asked the PGA representatives whether they had concerns  about Bethpage as a venue for a May 2019 event, to which they all just shrugged their shoulders.  But they all agreed that May in Rochester was sub-optimal.....though I didn't consider the build-out of grandstands and other infrastructure.

Geoff also informs that The Olympic Club has gone a strange direction:

Meanwhile I'm utterly flummoxed by what has happened at the historic and enchanting Olympic Club, where the already-deep, ancient bunkers have gotten deeper and decidedly less attractive. (Unless you're into 1970s architecture with little of the historic vibe that always has been the Olympic Club look.)

For those unaware of the background, here's how the famed I-O-U bunkers have always looked:

We're living in the Heinlen crazy years.....

Are Your Ready For Some Links Golf? - I always am, and what a stretch we have before us, beginning tomorrow with The Irish Open, an event that as recently as 2011 was on its death bed, with no sponsor and few prospects.  But all is good now:

But the move to Royal Portrush in 2012, effectively creating a new rota moving the 

The crowds at Portrush in 2012.  My buddy Lowell is somewhere in there.

tournament North one year and South the next, provided a new lease of life. That staging of the tournament on the Causeway Coast, again without a title sponsor but with the purse increased to €2 million, started a chain of events that would invigorate Irish golf. 

The crowds at Royal Portrush reached 112,000 over the four tournament days - the first ever event on the European Tour to completely sell out - and, as we know, that tournament was the catalyst for the R&A’s decision to return to the famed Dunluce links for the 2019 British Open championship. 

The 2013 and 2014 Irish Opens - at Carton House and Fota Island respectively - were again staged without any title sponsor. But, by 2015, when the tournament was staged at Royal County Down, all had changed and changed utterly. Two things, not unrelated, happened: Dubai Duty Free, which has a long association with the Irish Derby, had come on board as title sponsor; and Rory McIlroy had taken on the responsibility as the tournament host.

This year they're back in the North, at Portstewart Golf Club, a spectacular links with an outgoing nine through some of the most dramatic dunes you'll ever see.

I do think the author is commingling a series of causes and effects, though it's all for the greater good.  Portrush 2012 was the critical element for Portrush 2019, the return of the Open Championship to Northern Ireland.

The restoration of the Irish Open was twofold, first the correction of the same error made by The Scottish Open.  Remember when that for years was played at Loch Lomond?  Scotland and Ireland are renown for a very specific type of golf, played on their linksland, so why were their national opens played inland?  And for the Irish, a date change to the week before the Scottish Open was the coup de grace....

Beginning at zero dark thirty tomorrow, enjoy the coverage of the greatest golf known to man.... Before moving on, this is waht those early holes at Portstewart look like:

But this header blew me away:

Ballyliffin pulls out all stops in hopes of landing Irish Open at Glashedy Links

Beloved Ballyliffin?  For anyone unfamiliar with my relationship with Ballyliffin, I'll suggest you read this first post from my maiden blog, when Employee No. 2 and I spent two weeks hanging with the wonderful folks there.  So, is this remotely possible, given how remote a place it is?

BALLYLIFFIN, Ireland – The Glashedy Links at Ballyliffin Golf Club opens with three stiff par 4s before players arrive at the par-5 fourth. At 477 yards, it’s a reasonable birdie opportunity. 

Ballyliffin, however, has been adding some starch to the Glashedy Links. If you walk past the back tee on No. 4 and wander down a path for 115 yards, you’ll arrive at a new back tee that stretches the hole to 585 yards. That would challenge even the best players.

And that’s just what Ballyliffin hopes to do. The club has made some changes in a bid to land the 2018 Irish Open. A decision by the European Tour could be announced as early as this week, when the Irish Open is played at Portstewart Golf Club.

The Glashedy is a terribly challenging links, so unless the wind is down I could see it providing a stern test.  Though this is troubling:

Pat Ruddy, who designed Glashedy, has helped the club tweak the layout for tournament play. All told, some 200 yards has been added to the front nine on Glashedy. 

A new back tee was added on No. 2, offset to the right to create more of a dogleg and bring an out-of-bounds fence into play. A bunker was added on the left side of the landing area on No. 3. And 75 yards were added to No. 9 for a back tee that brings fairway bunkers into play. Farren reasons those changes strike a good balance between tournament and member play.

I've put more than a few over that fence.....  including the day I played with the then club Captain, Paddy Logue.  As for Pat Ruddy, we met him when we visited his European Club a few years back:

Hey, who doesn't like a pretty Irish girl?

This is exciting, though I just can't see how it could be possible....  According to Wikipedia, the population of the town of Ballyliffin in 2011 was 461.....  That's not a typo.  It's a spectacularly unspoiled place, a major part of its appeal to us, but where would anyone stay?

How's that for a catch-up post?

Note To Readers

It was my original intention to blog our traditional weekend wrap this afternoon, but couldn't summon the energy when I git home from the club.  I'm taking that as a sign of bloggermortis, for which the prescribed treatment regimen is time away from a monitor.

Accordingly, I'll take the rest of the extended 4th of July weekend (what some are calling Brexit 1776) off, and return with renewed vigor on Wednesday for a combined Weekend Wrap/Midweek Musings blogapalooza....

Bonus Weekend Content

We're pacing ourselves this long holiday weekend and you, Dear Reader, are the beneficiary...

Wither The Quicken - The ubiquity of their hole-in-one commercials belies the short-term nature of their commitment:

POTOMAC, Md. — Nearly 10 years ago—July 5, 2007 to be precise—that 120 players teed off in the first round of the inaugural AT&T National at Congressional Country 

The event's signature moment

Club. The buzz around the event was only slightly below what one might expect at a major championship. After all, the tournament host was Tiger Woods—the No. 1 player in the world who had already won 12 major championships at age 31. 

Congressional was a major-championship-caliber site, having held two U.S. Opens and a PGA Championship. And the Washington, D.C., market, which had been thirsting for a big-time event after years holding what locals perceived as a second tier (at best) PGA Tour stop, finally had the sort of tournament it believed it deserved. In turn, Congressional was overrun with fans, and sponsors couldn’t sign up for corporate tents fast enough. A year after abandoning Washington, and the former Booz-Allen Classic, the PGA Tour came back to town, led by Woods on his white horse.

Whatever happened to that Woods guy?  Never hear much from him any more....

Flash forward to Thursday morning, June 29, 2017, when the 11th playing of the tournament with a different corporate sponsor (Quicken Loans) began. Woods was not only unable to play, after undergoing a fourth back surgery, but not even on site, dealing with the pain-killer issues that surfaced after his arrest for DUI over Memorial Day weekend. 

The tournament site isn’t Congressional, but rather TPC Potomac at Avenel Farm (a name most people say incorrectly), a revamped course that hosted the previous tour event for most of 20 years to decidedly mixed reviews. “It isn’t as if Avenel is a bad golf course,” Davis Love III once said. “It just doesn’t look very good if you have to drive by Congressional to get to it.” 

In a twist, it was Love who was hired to renovate the golf course in 2006. Now, players like it much better. But not THAT much better.

Now Congressional is some kind of gold standard?  For what, heat stroke?  See if this bit doesn't make you laugh?

The field that teed off for round one Thursday had four major champions in it: Geoff Ogilvy, Lucas Glover, Keegan Bradley and Jimmy Walker. The highest-ranked player among the 120 is Rickie Fowler (ninth), here at least in part because he’s under contract to Quicken Loans. A week ago, the Travelers Championship outside Hartford drew 13 major winners, among them Rory McIlroy, Jason Day and the eventual winner at TPC River Highlands, Jordan Spieth.

What, Doug Ford wasn't available?  It's technically true that each of those guys won a major, but they were in galaxies far, far away... It turns out that neither Congressional nor Quicken are in for the long-haul:

While the members agreed to the deal, it was only to host in alternating years — 2016, 2018 and 2020. And once that contract is up, the tournament won’t return to Congressional. The board is now pursuing a U.S. Open, with USGA executive director Mike Davis telling it flatly that the association won’t even consider the course unless the tour event goes away.

With the contract up after this week’s event, there has been no sign from Quicken Loans officials that it plans to renew. There also has been talk that company CEO Dan Gilbert wants to take his money to Michigan, where he lives, to bring the tour back to his home state, which hasn’t had a tour event since the Buick Open outside Flint went away in 2009.

Congressional isn't a horrible golf course, it's just that the time slot isn't conducive to firm and fast conditions.  We heard a lot about Rory's -16 winning score this year, and those conditions would likely recur with a return visit in June.  Let's hope that Mike Davis was just letting them down gently...

 Ryan Balangee nominates this event as a candidate for the "C-word":

At first glance, the only events on the schedule that appear vulnerable are the Quicken

Loans National, with an expiring deal, and The Greenbrier Classic, which is locked up through 2021. 

Meanwhile, Tiger Woods' TGR Live now runs the Genesis Open at Riviera near Los Angeles, a tournament with an established, legendary pedigree of winners and located in Woods' home state. The field is also imminently better than the National each year. 

Quicken Loans, if they choose to remain a title sponsor, could latch on to the as-of-now sponsor-less Houston Open or taking over the Tournament of Champions from SBS (which sublet their deal to Hyundai before this year), both with better schedule slots and fields.

I'm saddened to see The Greenbrier on that list, as it's the only C.B. Macdonald course you'd ever see the Tour play....

But D.C. in late June/early July?  No one will miss it...  But while New Orleans may have received a stay of execution with their timely change in format, I don't think that the Nelson should consider themselves out of the (Trinity) Forest just yet...

Mommy Issues - This is pretty funny....  As an unidentified woman wades into some unappetizing water to retrieve a tossed putter to the amusement of the Euro Tours marquee pairing of Tyrell hatton, Thomas Pieters and Alex Noren.

Go ahead, give it a look see, I'll be here when you get back.

It turns out that it isn't just any random woman, per Shack:

This is all-timer! The mother of 21-year-old Haotong Li waded into a less than inviting Le Golf National lake in an attempt to retrieve the club her son had thrown into the lake.

The world No. 129's mother set her purse and phone down on a nearby railroad tie, went inside the ropes and attempted the rescue effort as the star threesome of Tyrrell Hatton, Thomas Pieters and Alex Noren were attempting to play the hole where . 

Eventually mom did reach the floating club in question, only to find that her son had broken the dastardly weapon. Her dropping of the grip end back into the lake is a particularly special touch that turned the laughter to all-out hysterics for the group.

And it's not just any venue, it's the site of the next Ryder Cup.  Noted club tossers should be sure to be on their beta blockers....  or bring their Mums.

While I'm known for my best-in-class segues, this one might strain your patience....  But were I to tab a Euro player to have Mommy issues, it would be none other than Sergio, a man whose break-up with Greg Norman's daughter caused a decade-long career tailspin.

Alan Shipnuck has a timely profile of the Spaniard that ledes with this scene from Medinah:

In the shadow of Medinah Country Club's majestic clubhouse, at a PGA Championship long ago, Ben Crenshaw waited for his audience with the boy king. Crenshaw was a

month away from serving as captain of the 1999 U.S. Ryder Cup team, so he was closely eyeing the final round of the PGA, watching to see how both teams might gel. Just moments earlier, Sergio Garcia had run out of holes in a thrilling duel with Tiger Woods, failing to claim the Wanamaker trophy but securing a spot in his very first Ryder Cup. "Boy, that kid is gonna be a handful," Crenshaw said. Finally, the young Spaniard materialized, and Crenshaw offered him a manly hug and some down-home consolation: "You didn't get this one, but you're gonna win so many of these you're gonna get tired of lifting trophies.”

Here's the gist of Alan's premise:

It was when we finally gave up on Garcia that he became the player he was meant to be, winning the 2017 Masters in one of the grittiest, most satisfying performances ever. Decades from now they'll be singing songs in Spanish taverns about Garcia's par out of the hazard on the 13th on Sunday, and his flag-hunting approach shots on 15 and 18, to say nothing of the decisive birdie in sudden death. That putt caught a piece of the hole and tumbled in. Back in the old days, when Garcia saw himself as a dogged victim of inexorable fate, his ball would have done a power lip-out and trickled off the green.

Much was made at Augusta of how Garcia has been changed by his fiancée Angela Akins, the former Golf Channel talent. Her father Marty is an underrated part of the story. Just as Dustin Johnson is benefiting from the hard-won wisdom of his future father-in-law, Wayne Gretzky, Garcia has fallen under the thrall of Marty, an All-American quarterback at the University of Texas who was such a schoolboy legend that LBJ personally recruited him on behalf of the Longhorns. On Saturday evening at this year's Masters, I found Marty on a couch in the Augusta National locker room. He had tired of battling the crowds and was plopped in front of a large TV. "I want to see his eyes," he said of Garcia. And what did his future son-in-law's visage reveal? "I see confidence," he told me. "He's not afraid of anyone or anything.”

I don't actually think that "We" giving up on the man had much to do with it......  Perhaps it was Sergio giving up on himself?

And, lest you think that the Euro Tour is all fun and games, how about this little bit of treachery:

Bernd Wiesberger shot a respectable 2-under 69 Friday in Round 2 of the HNA French Open at Le Golf National in Paris. Problem is, his equipment wasn’t where it needed to be. 

Wiesberger posted on Facebook that someone had changed the settings on his Titleist driver, something he didn’t discover until midway through the round. 

“Struggle at the end but happy to have scored in the 60s,” Wiesberger said. “Found out during the round that settings on my Titleist Driver have been changed by somebody (this also happened (sic) to other Players today apparently.) Never happened to me before.” 

It would be easy to shrug this off as an honest mistake on someone’s part, but the fact that Wiesberger says other players had their equipment altered as well is extremely strange. We do not know of any other players who have spoken publicly about equipment tampering issues, but if correct it’s an alarming issue with so much at stake.

As always, I'll go with Professor Plum in the library with the candelabra....  But that is seriously mean to do to a guy, and I'm hoping we'll get to the penalty phase.

Another Hidden Killer - I'm not sure I know what do with this provocative header:

Confidence Kills: What If Everything You've Been Told To Think Is Wrong?

 I completely get that Billy Horschel shouldn't be anyone's role model:

Even the best in the world can filter the game this way. Consider the eventful September

that Billy Horschel had in 2014, when he won the BMW Championship and the Tour Championship, which also meant the FedEx Cup and its $10-million bonus. A lucrative hot streak made all the more impressive considering what had immediately preceded: The week before the BMW, at the Deutsche Bank Championship, Horschel hit one of the worst shots imaginable under pressure when he chunked a 6-iron into a hazard on the final hole and lost by two. 

When it came time to make sense of what happened, Horschel's strategy was to dismiss it as mostly rotten luck. He knew he played well, had put himself in contention, and says the sidehill lie was tricky enough that he caught more turf than he anticipated. It happens in golf, and he didn't see the point in dwelling. That he won twice in the next two weeks suggests he was right. "Just a really bad swing at the wrong time," Horschel says.

 Except when he is:

Fast-forward to November 2016, though, and Horschel committed another tournament-ending blunder when he missed a two-foot putt to remain in a playoff in the RSM Classic. This time the redemptive follow-up didn't come until much later (coincidentally, he won the 2017 AT&T Byron Nelson when Jason Day missed his own short putt in a playoff), but here, too, Horschel says he immediately profited from the experience. Revisiting the sequence at the RSM, he recognized he had rushed through his routine, and that a weak left hand on the putter kept the clubface open at impact. It was a crucial mistake, but at least he understood why. 

"It's a tough way to learn something, but I learned it," he said days later.

So, what's a fellow to do?  Here's the nut of the argument:

"Confidence is a garbage term in that it induces illusions of competence," Pirozzolo says. "What you really need is a passion to work hard to get the best answers about why things happen the way they do." 

Even at the game's highest rung, this is a tough place to go. Of 200 players or so on tour, Horschel estimates maybe only 30 are willing to spend time truly digging into the deficiencies that cost them. "Everyone else is scared to look in the mirror," he says. "They shield themselves from it. That's what makes guys like Rory and Spieth so great. They never shy away from their mistakes."

Sorry, but I'm not buying that argument.... First of all, Rory would be the guy with the lamest caddie on Tour, because he's either to lazy or stubborn to see the weakness....

The concept of learning from our mistakes is not rocket science, especially where those mistakes can be readily identified as in the good-Billy example above.  The hard part is that we also need to accept that we're fallible, otherwise we'd never be able to take the club back....

Show Biz For Ugly People - That's how some wit described politics, which makes this person seemingly unqualified:

Rep. Natalie Gulbis? It’s a possibility in the future. 

The Nevada Independent reports that Gulbis, 34, met with Republicans in Washington

D.C. this week to discuss a potential run for the seat of Rep. Jacky Rosen (D) in Nevada’s third Congressional district. 

Yes, it appears Gulbis is considering a run for the U.S. House of Representatives. 

Gulbis lives in Las Vegas and the the spot should be open in the next election cycle (2018), as Rosen has already said she plans to run for the U.S. Senate.

 I see two pointed qualifications for such a run, neither above the neck line....

Defending McEnroe - In an ill-considered posting at The Loop, Sam Weinman takes John McEnroe to task for a lack of....well, I guess we'll let him make his case:

Multiple choice question: In a discussion with NPR about where Serena Williams ranks among the greatest tennis players of all time, John McEnroe's response should have been:

A) That Serena is absolutely the best player ever, male or female. 

B) That Serena ranks as the greatest female tennis player of all time, but if she played the men's circuit, it would be "an entirely different story" (this was McEnroe's actual answer, by the way).

or ...

C) That he didn't hear the question, something's wrong with this mic, and oh shoot, I totally forgot I'm late for a dentist appointment.

In case you were unclear, the correct answer is C. For McEnroe to broach how Williams, winner of 23 Grand Slam titles and 72 titles overall, would fare against male competition is what's known an "unwinnable argument." It diminishes Williams' standing as one of the greatest athletes of her generation (no qualifier, full stop). It repositions McEnroe, just weeks removed from a fairly enlightened stance defending LGBT players, as some tone-deaf old coot. And it reintroduces comparisons between male and female athletes, which we've seen time and again, are quantifiably impossible.

That's cleverly done and I have no objections to most of (except that very last bit about being quantifiably impossible), but it ignores the reality in which Johnny Mac found himself.  An actual interview with an NPR SJW who wouldn't let it go:

Garcia-Navarro: We're talking about male players but there is of course wonderful

female players. Let's talk about Serena Williams. You say she is the best female player in the world in the book. 

McEnroe: Best female player ever — no question. 

Garcia-Navarro: Some wouldn't qualify it, some would say she's the best player in the world. Why qualify it? 

McEnroe: Oh! Uh, she's not, you mean, the best player in the world, period? 

Garcia-Navarro: Yeah, the best tennis player in the world. You know, why say female player? 

McEnroe: Well because if she was in, if she played the men's circuit she'd be like 700 in the world. 

Garcia-Navarro: You think so? 

McEnroe: Yeah. That doesn't mean I don't think Serena is an incredible player. I do, but the reality of what would happen would be I think something that perhaps it'd be a little higher, perhaps it'd be a little lower. And on a given day, Serena could beat some players. I believe because she's so incredibly strong mentally that she could overcome some situations where players would choke 'cause she's been in it so many times, so many situations at Wimbledon, The U.S. Open, etc. But if she had to just play the circuit — the men's circuit — that would be an entirely different story.

What was the guy supposed to say?  The perfect riposte would have been to turn it on her and ask who these "Some" were, but that's from reading the transcript in my pajamas....  He was understandably shocked by the question, because nobody actually thinks that except at NPR.

Sam also submits this from Serena to support his argument:

I'm not sure of her point, perhaps that she'd be more like 500th in the world rankings?   But Sam ignored this from Serena that seems more on point:

“Actually it’s funny, because Andy Murray, he’s been joking about myself and him playing a match. I’m like, ‘Andy, seriously, are you kidding me?’ For me, mens’ tennis and womens’ tennis are completely, almost, two separate sports. If I were to play Andy Murray, I would lose 6-0, 6-0 in five to six minutes, maybe 10 minutes. No, it’s true. It’s a completely different sport. The men are a lot faster and they serve harder, they hit harder, it’s just a different game. I love to play women’s tennis. I only want to play girls, because i don’t want to be embarrassed. I would not do the tour, I would not do Billie Jean [King] any disservice. So Andy, stop it. I’m not going to let you kill me.”

Got that Ms. Garcia-Navarro?  Serena eliminates herself from those who would not use qualifiers...

But Our Sam finally gets to the golf connection, but way over-interprets this:

One of the landmark sporting events of the last two decades was Annika Sorenstam, at

the height of her LPGA dominance, competing on the PGA Tour at Colonial in 2003. I was there, and it was a riveting two days, the fairways lined with inspired little girls and throngs of media chronicling one of the greatest female players ever playing against her male contemporaries. Sorenstam was a model of grace and grit. Her ball-striking was superb. But she also shot 71-74 and missed the cut by four shots.

There was still much achieved by Sorenstam's PGA Tour experiment, if only to show the gap between men and women wasn't as wide as some might think. But it also risked contriving a complex topic about the differences between men and women, and it fueled one of McEnroe's other statements in his NPR interview. "Maybe at some point a women's tennis player can be better than anybody," he said. "I just haven't seen it in any other sport, and I haven't seen it in tennis."

A quick show of hands for anyone still thinking that Annika at Colonial was a landmark sporting event?  For those precious few, this must be awfully disillusioning....

Stacy Lewis has been whining on this subject far too much as well, and she can't even beat the girls...  I'm a pretty reliable fan of the women's game, but not because their physical skills equal that of the men.  Men are better athletes than women in all respects, deal with it.  Who knew the SJWs at NPR were such science deniers?