Two More Takes On Schedule Proposal

Tim Cronin lays out a devastating case against moving the Western Open to September. Makes you wonder if anyone at Tour headquarters gave this much thought.

Mark Bradley in the Atlanta JC points out a key distinction between NASCAR and the Tour, and why this proves that the "FedEx Cup" probably won't work too well.  

The big golfers --- Mickelson, Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh --- pick and choose. A NASCAR driver runs every weekend. Jeff Gordon can't skip a race just because he feels a little peaked. He can't because the folks at DuPont, the company bankrolling his car, want their logo displayed before 100,000 spectators plus another hefty TV audience every time the green flag waves. Estimates put the cost for a primary sponsorship in a Nextel Cup team at upwards of $15 million. When you spend that kind of money, you expect the maximum return on your outlay.

The FedEx Cup is designed to make the Big Names play more, but will a series of end-of-season tournaments capped by a fabricated "championship" alter the schedules of guys who adjust their calendars to prepare for the four majors above all else? Consider: Ted Purdy has played in 34 Tour events this season; Woods and Mickelson have played in 21 apiece.

As has been noted, NASCAR is different from other sports. It has its Big Event --- the Daytona 500 --- at the start, and then everything else is geared toward the Chase. The Chase works because Gordon and Earnhardt wanted badly to be part of it but missed the cut, not because their attentions were elsewhere.

"Do I fully understand [the FedEx Cup]? No," Ben Crane said. "But the commissioner [Tim Finchem] has a history of doing great things for the Tour."

Still, Tim Finchem doesn't control golf. Tiger Woods does. And Woods, when asked Friday if he'd consider playing five or 10 more events a year to accommodate the FedEx Cup, looked at the questioner as if he were nuts. "I don't know if my body could hold up," Woods said. "I've never played in more than 21 events."

And there's your answer right there. Gentlemen of golf, find yourselves a different gimmick.

Fall Series Question

During Tim Finchem's ABC visit, a graphic was posted explaining the parameters of the proposed 2007 schedule. Regarding the post-Tour Championship Fall Series, it said that such a swing would determine the "remainder of the 125 players who will be eligible for next year's FedEx Cup."

So if there was at FedEx Cup in 2004, would only the top 125 from the previous year have been eligible for the 2005 season? Where would that have left a 2004 Q-School grad like Sean O'Hair, or a Nationwide "Battlefield Promotion" like Jason Gore?

Eligible or not?

PS - I just looked at the 2004 money list and these players finished outside the top 125, yet each played in this year's Tour Championship: Olin Browne, Lucas Glover, and Billy Mayfair. 

Finchem On TC Telecast

Commissioner Tim Finchem stopped by the ABC booth for his annual Tour Championship visit. He noted that the reaction from players to the proposed FedEx Cup has been "very positive" and the dreaded "impactful" was dropped again. Most importantly, the new, more impactful finish will allow the events "to raise more money for charity."

Mike Tirico asked why now, and Finchem launched into the usual lines about how the Tour has been growing and will "continue to grow," then offered this: "The competition in today's environment is strengthening. When you see what other sports are spending to create the theaters for their sport and the fan experience for their sport..." etc, etc...

So the message remains the same: continue to focus on the imagery and mythology, ignore issues with the way the sport is played and how it might be made more entertaining. It's worked so well for tennis and the NBA, why not golf?

The Huggy Awards

John Huggan presents his awards for the best and worst of the year, along with grades for European Tour players. A must read. My favorites:

BIGGEST PIECE OF SELF DELUSION

Perennial contender Colin Montgomerie is up there again with his misguided, "I'm as good as I've ever been" mantra. The same is true of Peter Dawson, secretary of the R&A, whenever he opens his mouth to talk about how the modern golf ball doesn't go too far when struck by the modern professional. But this year's Huggy goes to Seve Ballesteros, who thinks he can still win on the European Tour. Stunning.

DISGRACE OF THE YEAR

The sight of long grass growing all over the Old Course last July was enough to make any self-respecting golfer puke. Because of their ineptness in the high-powered face of modern clubs and balls over the last decade and a bit, the R&A were forced to destroy the basic point of the game's most famous and revered venue in order to keep the scores within reason.

Most vomit inducing was the sneaky rough grown up the right side of the Road Hole. Without it - as the R&A knew full well - the world's best players would likely have been flipping half-wedge shots into the most feared green in golf. All of which would have represented nothing less than final confirmation that the game's administrators have lost the technological plot. Shame on them.

MOST BLATANT BIAS

In a repeat of the discriminatory selection policy he adopted for the 2003 President's Cup (when he shamelessly picked his compatriot Tim Clark), international team captain Gary Player gets a Huggy for nominating yet another undeserving South African, Trevor Immelman, for the '05 joust with the Americans. Immelman is a fine young player, but selecting him ahead of Australia's Geoff Ogilvy, a man who has beaten Immelman like a redheaded stepchild all year, was unjustifiable. One would like to think Player's actions had nothing to do with the fact that, as well as a spot on the team, Immelman received a two-year exemption onto the dollar-laden PGA Tour. One would like to think that, but one is not so sure.

Spander Weighs In

Art Spander's Sunday Herald column has him weighing in on the Tour's television dilemma and the odd nature of sports on TV in the U.S.

Tiger On Sasquatch, Clubhead Speed

Tiger on the new Nike driver he's not using in competition yet. Underlining added:

Q. Will you try the Sasquatch again?

TIGER WOODS: I'll continue experimenting with it because I certainly hit it the physics behind it, you're going to hit it a little straighter. I'm just having a hard time finding the right launch conditions. I hit it much further than I do now, which is kind of freaky, but the thing is it's getting the right flight consistently each and every time, and that's what I want to have. It's higher and it goes forever. I just need to get that ball down a little bit.

Q. When you're on the swing speed launch monitor machine stuff, what's your off the rack swing speed at impact with the driver right now?

TIGER WOODS: Swing speed or ball speed?

Q. Swing speed.

TIGER WOODS: Probably about 27, 28 26 to 28, somewhere in there.

Q. If you jump on it?

TIGER WOODS: 35.

Speedy O'Hair

Sean O'Hair was first out as a single (thank you Phil) Saturday and toured East Lake in 2 hours, 24 minutes.

Relatable?

Email from reader Keith: 

I just finished reading The Future of Golf, and I'm thrilled that someone other than me is talking about something so obvious as that golf is NOT in good shape. The parallels to the Rise and Fall of the Tennis Empire are very real, but everytime I bring it up to someone in the golf industry they dispute it. We shall see! I also just visited your website for the first time and was glad to see you question the mighty Tim and his incredible use of the English language. It's amazing how long it takes him to say nothing of interest or value. The one factor Tim and the geniuses who run the PGA Tour seem to have forgotten is that NOBODY CARES ABOUT WHO WINS THE FEDEX CUP or any other tournament for that matter. I have yet to meet one person who gives a &%$# about who wins the Charles Schwab Cup, and at least 9 out of 10 people have no idea what I'm talking about when I ask them. Golf ratings are down because none of us can relate to anything we see on the TV. It is BORING to see nothing but drivers and wedges, and to hear about who hits the ball a mile when I (and most players) are happy to hit one 225 yards! Golf is in for a BIG fall as it moves in the current direction, and I think the new proposal is the roadmap to disaster. America cares about the NFL and NBA and MLB ONLY because of heated rivalries. When Tampa Bay plays the Saints - NOBODY outside of those areas cares. When Houston plays the WhiteSox - NOBODY cares - or tunes in. NASCAR is popular only because of rivalries and the fact that all of the top drivers and teams show up for virtually every race. Golf has part of the necessary equation right - cut back the schedule WAY back and tell every player on the tour they must show up for at least 75% of all events - or go and get another job next year.

Flashback: East Lake in '98

From Sunday's post round press conference, after Hal Sutton beat Vijay Singh in a sudden death playoff at East Lake in 1998:

Q. You talked on TV about it's a high -- it calls for a high shot. You really can't get it that high.

HAL SUTTON: Well, I was a little worried. I needed the birdie at 15 really bad. I felt like, That's not a really good shot for me either. This golf course, as a whole - I should probably reflect back on this - I went to dinner with Tim Finchem Wednesday night. He said, "What do you think of the golf course?" I said, "It's a golf course, but it really favors a high ball hitter. I'm going to have to play pretty defensive. I'm not going to be able to attack the flag a lot. I'm going to have to try to be patient, 2-putt, make a putt wherever I can." He just kept reminding me of that all week long. I didn't really have a lot of close birdie putts. Probably the happiest that I am to report is that I had a lot of long putts all week long, and I only had one 3-put all week. That was the big difference right there. But the finishing holes - getting back to your question a little bit - when I didn't birdie 15, 16 was my last opportunity that I felt like a low shot could be okay, and I drove -- hit a good drive. It just trickled into the rough there. I was fortunate to get a good second shot into the green, but I still didn't have a good birdie putt. When we got to 17 and 18, I knew Vijay had the advantage because he could drive it up on top of the hill. That shot is a much different shot from on top of that hill than it is from 30 yards back there where you can't see the green. Then 18 does require a high shot. That's why I carry a 4-wood most all the time. When I saw that hole early in the week, I knew the 4-wood was in for sure.

Q. How far was 18 playing? Is that a perfect yardage for your 4-wood?

HAL SUTTON: It was playing 240. That's exact yardage that I try to hit it most of the time. Actually, I can fly it about 230 - between 230 and 235. That was just under the hill, so it could release up top.

Cog Hill Update

Looks like Cog Hill #4 will be Ree-stored. I hope Rees sends David Fay a royalty check for these wannabe-U.S. Open redos.

Tiger On?

Not sure what to make of this from Tiger's pre-tournament press conference:

Q. You mentioned that you feel a 300 yard drive that you didn't feel in your 20s. What are the things you see later in your career that you might change in your game? We know MJ went to the fade away later in his career. What are some of the things you may incorporate into your game later on?

TIGER WOODS: I don't know. Certainly that's dependent on equipment changes, whether or not we're going to make any equipment changes, whether I can roll the ball back or not, reduce the club face or whatever we're going to do. You're going to have to adjust. I think that's the great thing about this game. You have to keep it fluid. Things always have to adjust. I have plenty on my plate to work on, all the changes I'm trying to incorporate in my game. That will keep me busy for a long time.

East Lake Scoring

Tiger wasn't happy with his 66 where he hit 6 of 14 fairways. 17 players were at par or better in round one. Remember when East Lake had teeth way back in 1998 when Hal Sutton's winning score was 274 (-6). It's 200 yards longer than it was in '98 and they torch the place. 

Time for another Rees-toration?  After all, this will be the host of the Super Bowl of golf...

Hoggard On Bubble Players

Rex Hoggard and Golfweek are filing stories on players struggling to retain their card, or on guys playing in the early stages of Tour school. If you aren't a regular at Golfweek.com, here's a link to the most recent piece on Tommy Armour III.

McCleery Weighs In

Longtime golf-on-TV critic Peter McCleery weights in at GolfObserver on the state of the Tour's TV situation. Too many good points and quotes from McCleery's inside sources to clip and paste here. Just read it.

Plays Often at MountainGate in L.A.

First there was the ranking of best golfing Washington thie...politicians, now the ranking world does Hollywood golfers. Golf Digest offers up a list with comments next to each celeb. You get an insight from the people you've heard of, or a description of the names that draw a blank (plenty of those).

My favorite: Sly Stallone, a beloved Riviera member gets, "Plays often at MountainGate in L.A."

Now that's a line Sly might want on his tombstone!

"On A Course Without Roll"

That's how Ian Baker Finch described the conditions at East Lake today near the end of the broadcast as they discussed how much the course had changed in just a few years. (He mentioned how Hal Sutton won in 1998 hitting a fairway wood into par 4s and the par 3 18th compared to today's 3, 4 and 5 irons).

Well, somehow Sergio still managed to average 339 on his two measured drives, Tiger was at 318, Adam Scott at 313, Davis Love at 312, etc, etc, etc. 

Tiger had 102 yards into the 453-yard par-4 17th. He drop kicked it 230 and it rolled 120 yards. ;) Oh and the five-iron he hit on 18 from 235 rolled at least 10 feet.

And They Wonder Why ABC Isn't Interested...

From Thomas Bonk's L.A. Times column:

Ratings update: Sunday's final round of the Chrysler Championship on ABC had a 1.1 overnight Nielsen rating and was nearly doubled by the 2.1 rating for NBC's "Pro Bull Riding" show.

Campbell On "Point System"

Steve Campbell in the Houston Chronicle:

The points system is another potential series of land mines. If the tour puts too much weight and too much money on a fall finish, it runs the risk of undermining the majors and unduly rewarding a player who gets hot at the end of the season. If the tour puts in place a points system that measures a player's entire body of work, how much would that differ from the money list?

Set up a system where too many players are in contention, and the championship cup will runneth over with hold-your-nose champions. Set up a system where only the most deserving players are in contention, and you get the Tour Championship multiplied — a series of money grabs meaningful only to the richest of the rich and their accountants.

Remember, the Tour Championship seemed like a great idea once.

Sandomir On Cup Race

Richard Sandomir in the New York Times:

How much more money the PGA Tour will reap should be a concern. It has created a new revenue stream by selling the title sponsorship to its championship race to FedEx (the champion will receiver the hitherto nonexistent FedEx Cup), but will the four-tournament Championship Series be alluring enough to networks, whether it is sold as a package or piecemeal?

"It could be on different networks," Moorhouse said.

Who will carry the playoff? CBS and Fox are out, because they televise the National Football League on Sundays; ABC will return to Nascar in 2007 (replacing NBC); and NBC will be showing Sunday night N.F.L. football.

Moorhouse sees some daylight. ABC won't have Nascar every Sunday; NBC might have Sunday afternoons open; and before Labor Day, CBS might have some time. But there might not be the consistency of a single network carrying all four events. The last eight races of the Chase for the Nextel Cup, for example, are all on NBC.

East Lake Skeptic

This Cy Connelly piece for Sports Network offers some pithy comments about East Lake and the Tour.

These days, its not enough for the Tour to put on golf tournaments; it needs to be a highly visible (and tax-deductible) force for social change. Its all quite heartwarming stuff, except that while passion is hard to quantify, the financing behind the East Lake revival is not. Simply put, while a lot of money has flowed into East Lake, its not clear that golf has played a central role, despite the Tours continued focus on the East Lake story.

Of the $100 million thats been invested in East Lake, over $70 million came from only two sources: Tom Cousins, a prominent Atlanta real-estate developer with a strong philanthropic bent; and the U.S. federal government, through its "Hope VI" program for restoring public housing.

Various corporations contributed nearly another $20 million indirectly, as part of a national drive to recruit members for the restored East Lake Golf Club, which is now strictly private. (In the old days, the course was a popular choice among promising local juniors because, as Stewart Cink pointed out, "you could always get on.")

As Cousins cheerfully concedes, however, these memberships were structured to provide a substantial tax break. In return, the corporations got near- exclusive access to a top-flight golf course. Ray Robinson, Chairman of East Lake Foundation, slipped a little off-message at last years Tour Championship, noting dryly, "The golf course has little to do with whats over [at East Lake community], because this is a private club; the neighbors dont belong." The neighborhood kids are, however, welcome as caddies, though the clubs "no tipping" policy may come as a surprise to them.

Ouch. Now, as much as I enjoyed this passage, it's not quite entirely true:

For its part, the Tours actual contribution to the East Lake Foundation was roughly $700,000 last year. To put this in context, the Tour plans to spend $24 million upgrading the TPC Avenel course next year, part of the continuing cost of its unwillingness to take on the equipment manufacturers and rein in driving distances.

Actually, it's just not a very good course. Though added length and the elimination of a birdie friendly (perish the thought) par-5 are components of the redo plan.

And how about the highly-touted East Lake charter school, whose pupils will be trotted out for todays "Drive to a Billion" photo op? Its actually run by the controversial Edison Schools outfit, a for-profit concern best known for two things: shareholder lawsuits and its proposal to require students to do unpaid administrative work, as a means of cutting operating costs. Last week, Edisons efforts in "Little Vietnam" were given a borderline-passing grade by the people who brought us "Big Vietnam" - thats right, the RAND Corporation. Tough marks given that Edison itself had commissioned the study and paid $1.6 million for it.

All of which leaves the Tour sitting squarely in the middle of a broad experiment in social engineering. To the extent the East Lake story works, credit goes to a strong-willed developer with a social conscience and a lot of federal dollars to spend. Can the experiment be replicated elsewhere? Not if the White Houses current budget passes: it eliminates the "Hope VI" program entirely. If the Tour and its corporate sponsors hope to add more federally subsidized golf communities to the PGA rotation, they should get in touch with their lobbyists immediately.