When you come to think of it that is the secret of most of the great holes all over the world. They all have some kind of a twist. C.B. MACDONALD
Here's a clever promotion involving Golf Digest's U.S. Open cover model, Dustin Johnson.
From the folks at TaylorMade who deserve some points for an imaginative stunt that isn't totally out of the realm given Johnson's recent form: DJ wins, you either get a refund on the driver you bought in the month leading up to the U.S. Open, or you get a free one for filling out the PGA Tour Superstore form.
All the details here.
Do I notice a little more green after the recent rains? Of course, when this feature 30 days out from local TV news cuts to the shot of Rory at Quail Hollow, Chambers Bay still looks wonderfully lean, barren, crunchy and other-worldly.
Chris Francis reports for KIRO TV on the various preparations, with updates from on-site man Danny Sink and footage of the repaving effort on that one road leading in that the golf world will get to know too well!
**Twitterers, nice follow here leading up to the U.S. Open. Photographer Mike Seidl (@mikeseidlphoto) Tweeting an image a day leading into Chambers Bay's big week.
As the golf world wrestles with Mike Davis' declaration that those who do not pre-scout Chambers Bay rule themselves out of winning the world's most democratic major, a few players have either shown up at the course or talked to those who have.
The early reviews are guarded. Or worse.
Henrik Stenson ended up walking the course, reports Doug Ferguson in his AP notes column.
"I just felt like coming off six hours flying in the morning, to go straight out there and start playing when you don't know where you're going wasn't the best thing," Stenson said. "A lot of times, I feel you can get more out of walking. I'll have plenty of time to try it out in June."
Until he actually plays Chambers Bay, the Swede is reserving judgment.
"It was interesting," he said. "There is quite the elevation drops on a few of the holes. It looks like links with quite severe green areas and some big drop-offs. It could be fairly low scoring if the weather is good, and it could be brutal if the wind blows. It will be more easy to give a final say once I've played it."
Ian Poulter took to Twitter and was roasted for sharing what he'd heard from other players, which was unfortunate since Poulter made clear he had not come to a conclusion in subsequent Tweets.
**It all worked out. After all those Tweets, Poulter has accepted a tour from architect Jay Blasi, the on-site man for RTJ at Chambers Bay. Alex Myers reports.
Fox's Joe Buck talked about the first golf telecast last year from Fox Sports, which seems a bit more confident than the admirable "we're not worthy" homage paid to the other networks when kicking off last fall's Franklin Templeton Shootout.
Talking to Craig Hill of The New Tribune:
“Believe me, everybody was watching us — especially the networks that cover golf — and wondering what they were going to get from golf on Fox,” Buck said. “And I would submit to you that they came away really disappointed because it sounded like golf and it looked like golf.”
Buck said Shanks addressed the crew afterward and said, “That was the best launch of a sport we’ve had at this network.”
Fresh and innovative is the bar set for Fox by the USGA, which kicks off with the U.S. Four-Ball Championship in less than two weeks. Buck should probably leave the tech talk to Mark Loomis, the supervising producer whose team will inevitably deliver some fun stuff either this year or more likely, over the next few years.
Buck is excited to try new ways of covering golf, too. Fox Sports wants to use drones at Chambers Bay (it is awaiting Federal Aviation Administration approval), plans to have a leaderboard constantly displayed on the screen, is experimenting with cameras and angles in hopes of giving viewers a better idea of how the course plays and will use graphics to better show the contours of the greens.
Buck says Fox is also looking for ways to add more natural sound (including golfers’ conversations with caddies) to the telecast. It is sound he says he’ll be careful to not talk over.
And on some broadcast teams, that would be fresh and innovative!
When you have a Masters like 2015’s, the rest of the year is all downhill from here. Right?
After all, how do you top that leaderboard, winner, ratings, viewing experience and such overall positive impression for the professional game?
Here are three reasons I’m not giving up on the rest of the year potentially superseding what we’ve seen to date. The next few months should be fascinating.
—No gray May. With the WGC Match Play’s one-off move to May and sporting a new and improved format, we have a fun two-week run featuring future PGA Championship venue Harding Park and a Players Championship with so many top players either on their game or experiencing a renaissance. And then May gets better. The European Tour’s flagship event, the BMW Championship, always entertains in late May. But this year it’s followed by the Irish Open brought to us by Rory and Dubai Duty Free at…Royal County Down. It’s not often you get a top 10 in the world course seldom seen by most of the planet and the field could even be better than the previous week’s BMW.
—Chambers Bay Could Be Brilliant Or A Fiasco. I can’t recall a venue that so few players know—except Jordan Spieth and caddie Michael Greller—with so many questions about how the place function. Will it be a masterful, daily puzzle of course setup twists, shotmaking and stunning vistas? Or six-hour rounds, cranky players, goofy shots and a fluke winner? Will players skip the Memorial or St. Jude to get in extra practice rounds? Throw in the Fox Sports debut (though potentially not on AT&T U-Verse), and the intrigue level figures to be high on many levels.
—Gullane And The Old Course. July only gets more interesting with the one-two punch of Gullane No. 1.5 and The Old Course hosting The Open Championship. As thrilling as it is to see the game return to the course that started it all—and remain relevant with help from the neighboring courses—the debut of Gullane on the world stage will introduce many to another course instrumental in early Scottish golf. Two weeks of tournaments starting in golf-friendly towns and returning to backdrops of virtual movie sets could manage to top the Masters.
And what do you think?
Mike Reynolds reports on Fox's ambitious plans for U.S.G.A. event coverage and in particular, the U.S. Open. The news coincided with Fox's launch at the USGA annual meeting at the hotel of the people, the Waldorf Astoria. (Brad Klein with notes on the weekend.)
While the coverage time is up about only three hours for the U.S. Open over NBC/ESPN (who were on seemingly all day) with Fox Sports 1 showing golf from noon to 8 pm ET, the real eye-opener is Fox's plan to air three hours Thursday and Friday in east coast prime time (8 pm to 11 pm). NBC used to come on weekday afternoons to show a few hours of marquee players.
This means a "11.5 of the 22.5 hours scheduled for Fox will air in primetime," according to Reynolds.
Generally, the late wave of play at west coast US Opens has consisted of qualifiers and the trash crews. Galleries are thin and volunteers often outnumber fans. By 8 pm PT the A-listers are off having dinner and most of the media has moved on, while sensible spectators left hours before. And with a 17-mile spectator shuttle ride for all, the masses will be long gone even if Bobby Jones came back from the dead to qualify and is out on the course.
Yet with Fox (the big network) going live from the U.S. Open Thursday/Friday for prime time and the network paying handsomely for the privilege, this would seem to force the USGA to go with elite pairings very late in the day. It's hard to imagine Fox showing qualifiers on the big network on a Thursday night. But stranger things have happened.
The full U.S. Open broadcast schedule:
Geoff Shackelford is a Senior Writer for Golfweek magazine, a weekly contributor to Golf Channel's Morning
Copyright © 2022, Geoff Shackelford. All rights reserved.
