In golf construction art and utility meet; both are absolutely vital; one is utterly ruined without the other. GEORGE THOMAS
It’s back!
Twenty years later Tatra Press has kindly allowed me to bring back Grounds For Golf now that golf architecture is of more interest to the masses. A new Introduction looks at what’s driven the interest growth and two new chapters I had a blast adding (plus a few edits to keep things up-to-date).
I feel bad having suggested that Sergio Garcia's Tommy Bolt impersonation was unique in the anals of athlete tantrums, but after watching Marcos Baghdatis's blow up in the Australian Open, perhaps Sergio has a lot to learn.
Erik Compton got his first PGA Tour start as a card-holding member out of the way at the Sony Open and his story never gets old. Doug Ferguson catches up with the two-time heart transplant recipient about life as a full-time PGA Tour member and he's looking forward to the day he just gets asked about his favorite episode of Lost and whatever else Kelly T. comes up with!
David Peters made it 20,000 to go on the button before Sergio Garcia pulled out his driver from the big blind and mashed all of his chips into the middle. He was all in for 114,000 and Peters made the call.
The flop kept Garcia in the lead when the fell. No ace or jack came on the turn when the landed, but even that card helped Peters a little bit as it added him some outs to a gutshot. Needing an ace, jack or deuce, Peters couldn't find what he needed when the fell and Garcia was able to double up.
This should settle any questions about the health of his right wrist heading into 2012. As you may recall, Garcia recently set a record for longest one or two-handed club toss into a lake by a non-winner of a major. I think it deserves another look, don't you?
Brian Wacker explains that just a day after revealing his agent switch to Steiny, Gary Woodland is looking for a new instructor. That's because his six-year instructor Randy Smith is the proud father of Blake Smith, Woodland's former ten-percenter at Hambric Sports Management.
Abby Wambach, U.S. women's World Cup goal scorer who gives good morning talk show interview took the AP's annual Female Athlete of the Year award, making her the first individual soccer player to win one of the AP's increasingly credibility-shattered awards.
One of the charges he and his fellow multi-millionaire colleagues often face, however, does not concern the contents of his trophy cabinet, but instead his bank account. "We play for a staggering amount of money, no doubt about it and I've always stressed we are very very fortunate," he said. "I think we are paid too much money – compared to police and teachers and nurses. But then compare it to footballers. I think the only thing you can probably justify it by is that when golfers have a bad day, we don't get paid anything, but when we have a great day we get paid a lot. It's part of the pressure involved. There isn't a wage as such."
From the Evansville Courier Press, reporting on a Bloomington Herald-Times story behind a subscriber wall, on Jeff Overton's arrest after he appeared at the Indiana-Kentucky game to present a $50,000 check for the Play Golf America program:
Geoff Shackelford is a Senior Writer for Golfweek magazine, a weekly contributor to Golf Channel's Morning Drive, is co-host of The Ringer's ShackHouse is the author of eleven books.