While My Head Gently Sleeped

Yes, shocking as it may seem, I did not rise at 4 a.m. to hear more of Bobby Clampett's supreme wit and wisdom. Besides, I have TNT's PR department to capture the highlights.

Clampett: “You know what (the media is) going to do?  They are going to write about Phil Mickelson if he doesn’t do that great this week and say that he over prepared.    What a bunch of hogwash.  The poor guy just can’t win.”

"Poor" would not be a word I associate with Phil.

Clampett on the definition of a “links course:”  “I thought for years that a “links course” meant that the 9th hole didn’t return to the clubhouse, but that has nothing to do with a links course.  It’s the stretch of sandy soil land along the edge of the ocean or the sea that really describes links land, and thus a links course.”

He gets it right, but then Gannon can't resist shoveling some horse puckey on top:

Gannon:  “It links the town to the sea.  You can’t farm on that land…but it’s great for golf.”

It links the town to the sea?!?! Hopefully he was joking.

Oh, and I missed more of Clampett on bunching.

Clampett on the difficulty of the course:  “This golf course lends itself towards “bunching.”  You have to take your medicine on a certain number of holes and birdies are hard to come by.  And the combination of the two leads to bunching on the leaderboard.”

Birdies are hard to come by at Hoylake?

Clampett on Phil Mickelson’s demeanor after completing 10 holes of Round #3 with a score of 75 (+3 over par):  “(Phil Mickelson’s) just about got the demeanor of a guy playing with his buddies in a practice round.  The competitive spirit is just gone.”

Clampett on Tiger Woods’ demeanor as he steps onto the course:  “(Tiger Woods) reminds me of a boxer entering an arena.  That look, all business like, and the stare down.”

Almost poetic. Almost.

Ringo Schmingo

TNT actually send the following quotes out as part of a press release highlighting the first round Open Championship commentary, but neglected to include Bobby Clampett's declaration that John Lennon hated golf (which he corrected later). Clampett confused Ringo and Lennon. These things happen when you are making it up as you go!

Before we relive his most captivating quotes, here are my favorite Clampett redundancies from round 1:

dry hardpan fairway
big oversized driver
past history

Nice! And from TNT:

Clampett on Mike Weir: “Mike’s been licking his chops this week, because he saw the course set-up playing hard and fast, and that plays right into his game.”

Clampett on Hoylake: “I would not be surprised to see the scores this bunched throughout the whole championship. It’s a course that lends itself to bunching.”

Clampett on the wide open field this year at Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake, England: “I believe there is a better than 50-50 chance of a player out of the top 50 winning here. The reason for that is it’s a golf course that doesn’t necessarily favor the longer hitter. The guys who are the short, accurate strikers have equally as much a chance to win here as one of the bombers.”

Clampett on Faldo/Woods: “There is no bad blood here, there just isn’t, and regardless of what the media is trying to build up these guys have no problem with one another. Tiger gets that (criticism) from everybody. All of us that are in the TV business have an opinion on what he is doing. We express our opinion and he respects that we have an opinion.
 

Clampett Blues

We're not even 50 minutes into the telecast here on the west coast and already Bobby Clampett is in rare form.

In the opening he declared that there was a 50-50 chance that someone outside the top 50 in the world ranking would win. On a Mike Weir approach to 18 that was 15 yards right of the ideal line he declared that the ball finding the bunker was "unlucky."

On an Ernie Els putt he asked us to note the brown patch where the putt would roll faster (and declared that the less green the greens are, the faster they are).

And of course, the usual redundancies (a variety of different shots, etc...).

Thankfully, Mike Tirico and Ian Baker-Finch are talking a lot.  

Schneider On TGC's Next Moves

Stu Schneider offers some sound advice to The Golf Channel on who they should hire next.

Will Tiger Force Golf Telecast Delays?

Reader JPB passed along this Reuters story by Brooks Boliek on the FCC's obsenity crackdown:

In its continuing crackdown on on-air profanity, the FCC has requested numerous tapes from broadcasters that might include vulgar remarks from unruly spectators, coaches and athletes at live sporting events, industry sources said.

Tapes requested by the commission include live broadcasts of football games and NASCAR races where the participants or the crowds let loose with an expletive. While commission officials refused to talk about its requests, one broadcast company executive said the commission had asked for 30 tapes of live sports and news programs.

"It looks like they want to end live broadcast TV," said one executive, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity. "We already know that they aren't afraid to go after news."

I Guess John Hawkins Doesn't See Much Weekday Coverage...

...because his Thursday evening rant describes just about every USA Network telecast...

I wish I’d kept track of all the dim-witted, apologetic, banal and otherwise unlistenable comments uttered by Bill Patrick and Jim Gallagher during USA Network’s first-round coverage of Michelle Wie this afternoon. Such a list surely would have reached several dozen—no small chore given that Wie was midway into her back nine when the telecast began.
   
For the next hour, neither Patrick nor Gallagher managed an original thought or even a syllable of brazen analysis as Wie chopped her way to an opening 77. It was TV golf at its worst, at least five strokes higher than Wie’s own performance, full of inapt pity for the young lady and every she’s-just-a-girl excuse a couple of cliché machines could borrow from a manual.

Sorry I missed this one! 

TGC Adds Faldo, Will He Have To Fly Coach Too?

The Golf Channel makes it official, Nick Faldo is on board as the lead analyst for their PGA Tour four-round coverage events. Will he have to fly coach like the rest of the Golf Channel talent?

Jerry Foltz To Be TGC's 2007 PGA Tour Analyst?

Will this master of saying nothing be named The Golf Channel's lead analyst on early round PGA Tour coverage, or will the cable network lure Bobby Clampett away for the starring role he so richly deserves? 

We have until Tuesday to speculate: 

***CONFERENCE CALL ADVISORY***

The Golf Channel to Announce New Analyst

The Golf Channel will introduce the newest addition to its broadcast
team and main analyst for its PGA TOUR coverage, which will commence in
2007 as part of its 15-year deal as the exclusive cable home of the PGA
TOUR.

Tuesday, July 11
12:15 p.m. Eastern Time

Where Was Johnny?

Johnny Miller was noticeably absent from Monday's U.S. Women's Open playoff coverage.

Now, I know it probably has to do with some contractual nonsense about only appearing on the network. But it was much nicer with Dottie Pepper, and without his references to the "sprinkler system" or that beautiful lush green grass in the Newport fairways.

Still, I have to wonder, was Johnny...

A) At Newport begging Dick Ebersol to let him out of his contract so that he could work the playoff?

B) Doing a previously scheduled Monday outing making some extra cast to offset his low NBC wages?

B) At Prairie Dunes advance scouting Dave Axland and Stan George's recent bunker work?

C) At Golf Digest headquarters in Wilton working with Guy Yocom on his September column?

D) In a Town Car en route to Logan to catch a flight home to California?

Yep, the answer is probably (D).

U.S. Open Ratings "Tank"

The headline on this Media Life Magazine story: "Without Tiger, U.S.Open ratings tank."

Toni Fitzgerald writes:

Woods exited the tournament on Friday after shooting 12 over par for two days and missing the cut by three strokes. Thus Saturday’s Tiger-less third-round coverage of the U.S. Open on NBC averaged a 3.2 household rating, according to Nielsen overnights.

That was the lowest Saturday average since Nielsen began measuring the tournament in 1982. It was down 27 percent from the previous year, when Saturday averaged a 4.4.

Sunday’s final round averaged a 5.1, down 12 percent from a 5.8 the previous year, when Woods finished second. It was the lowest-rated final round in three years and second-lowest-rated since 1994.

NBC’s two-day average of 4.2, if it holds when final ratings are released later today, would be the worst two-day average since 1988 and tie for second-worst ever.

McCleery's TV Review

Peter McCleery's Golfobserver.com review of NBC's telecast:

What ranked as one of the more boring TV golf marathons suddenly turned riveting in the last hour or so. Before that, Johnny Miller & Co. failed to explain for the most part exactly why Winged Foot was playing as difficult as it did. Was it the narrowed fairways? The slow, bumpy greens? Did it make sense for a course to play almost as difficult 32 years later as it did in the infamous 74 Open? We never got any answers from watching NBC or ESPN during the long four days of coverage.

And...

NBC's big letdown was when Mickelson drove 70 yards left into the hospitality area on 18, NBC couldn't come up with a low-behind camera angle to reveal the exact nature of his predicament. It was a wild scene with Mickelson and his caddie warning spectators to move out of harm's way. We knew he was in trouble, but it wasn't clear what was in front of him or between him and the green. It came as a surprise, then, when Roger Maltbie told us he hit a tree with his second shot--we never saw the results (were was a blimp receive shot?), until Mickelson hit a similar, slashing third shot. With the tournament on the line, one would have hoped for a more revealing shot or multiple angles, but Mickelson was apparently so far off line that NBC couldn't scramble any better than the fast-fading runnerup.

The pictures were generally spectacular. Even the grand old Winged Foot clubhouse seemed to sparkle. None of the commentators stood out, but at times they could have said less and allowed us to eavesdrop on the players and their caddies' conversations.

1972, The Last 72?

The Golf Channel's "Live from the U.S. Open" just offered a trivia question asking when the last time was that a par of 72 was played for the U.S. Open.

The answer, they claimed, was 1972 at Pebble Beach.

But the Opens in 1990 (Medinah), 1991 (Hazeltine) and 1992 (Pebble Beach) were all played at par-72.

Good Thoughts For Judy Rankin

Ron Sirak writes about Judy Rankin's battle with breast cancer.

Note To Karl Ravech...

...that first Memorial honoree was Robert Tyre Jones, not Robert Trent Jones.

Hawkins on Ratings Decline

John Hawkins looks at the dismal PGA Tour ratings with his latest blog entry:

The first four months of 2006 did not bear good news for the PGA Tour in terms of its popularity with television viewers. Figures published in the most recent issue of Street & Smith’s SportsBusiness Journal indicate some frightening drops in TV ratings. The Shell Houston Open, for example, had a Sunday audience about one-third smaller than in 2005. There were double-digit decreases (10 percent or more) at the first three events on the Florida Swing, a whopping 56.3-percent decline at the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic and a 50-percent loss at the season-opening Mercedes Championships.

February’s AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am, a tournament once capable of attracting five million viewers, checked in at about 2.5 million on Sunday, down 37.5 percent from a year earlier. Not every tournament’s numbers were off. The Players Championship actually rose almost 32 percent, but there’s a catch—rain delays in ’05 forced NBC to televise live third-round action that Sunday.

So you're thinking, he's going to point out how the juiced up power game is not relatable to fans, course setups are not producing more consistently exciting finishes and that the Tour has left too many classic venues for contrived ones?

The PGA TOUR has not downsized enough and it is going to have to become leaner and meaner to survive.

I say bring back "blood and guts" competition to the PGA tour as played by Ben Hogan, Sam Snead, a young Arnie, Gary and Jack and other great players when men were men as well as golfers.

When men were men as well as golfers? Oh lordy. Still, he's headed to the old bring shotmaking back argument? Nope.

Cut the number of tour cards to a max of 100, cut the number of players in the field to 100 and cut the cut to the top 50 and ties.

Put some damn fire back into the competition and maybe golf will be interesting as a spectator sport once again and not seem to be just a gathering of nice fellows content to make a good check and have a good time. Screw the good time, get serious!

Shouldn't there be a rule that you only get to question the passion or manliness of players if you actually played the Tour?