"Why are we changing thousands of courses - or at least dozens - for the sake of the golf ball? Why not just change the ball?"

One last item from John Huggan's profile of Bill Coore. On the distance chase:

"Why are we changing thousands of courses - or at least dozens - for the sake of the golf ball? Why not just change the ball? There is no doubt it has had a negative effect on architecture generally. Guys just hit past stuff so much these days. To which people say we can move tees back - but sometimes you can't - or move bunkers - but sometimes that isn't practical or advisable. I hate to see bunkers that have been there for decades suddenly moved. For one thing, rebuilding a bunker exactly as it was isn't that easy.

"Having said that, the ball has less influence on our work than for some other designers. We don't do courses for tournament play. Mostly, our courses are for membership play. Yes, they have been used for events - the PGA Seniors was at Colorado Golf Club this year and the PGA Tour's season-opener has been at Kapalua for a while now. But we didn't do those courses with events in mind, they arrived later.

"We tend to work from the greens backward to a certain point. Beyond that, distance is not a priority. Our biggest interest is in making a hole fun to play."

"So a golf company purchase is a long shot -- at best."

Mike Stachura and E. Michael Johnson consider the possible options for an Acushnet sale or spin off and conclude that private equity or Asian sporting goods will be the likely suitors. There was this on the bottom line...

But more importantly, Titleist has real profits and real dominance in the marketplace. Its EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization) is approximately $120 million and historically sporting goods transaction multiples are between six and eight times EBITDA. Acushnet being an industry leader would seem to command the high end of that so let's start the bidding at $1 billion. Or possibly beyond.

Uh Oh! Tiger "Understands" Calls For Ball Rollback

Steve Elling reports on today's comments in Boston:

On Thursday, Woods was asked at the Deutsche Bank Championship about his view on the issue, which is being studied by the USGA. The organization has yet to release any findings from its various studies.

“It's just something, the guys are hitting it a long way,” Woods said. “For instance, last week, No. 8 is a par3 down the hill, playing 207 the last day, and I hit 7iron. I don't ever hit 7iron that far. Then I watched Dustin Johnson hit 9iron.

“It's just, I can understand them wanting to obviously pull the game back a little bit, because the guys are just becoming more athletic. Here I am 6 foot and I'm considered short. Most of the guys now are 6-3, 6-2, 6-4. Just like every other sport, it's evolved, become more athletic.

“The guys have speed, and now we're getting some great athletes playing the game.”

Tiger is in a no-win position if he takes a hard stance on the modern distance chase. Though he has made several statements about not minding a change, he has to be careful not to upset Nike and also to appear to be favoring a possible rule change that benefits his ability, which many believe a "spinnier" ball would.

Now factor in that his distance advantage has been passed by, and he has to be even more careful. Still, I like the comments today.

Arnie: "That should be one of the major things on our agenda, to slow the golf ball down so that we don't tilt the scale."

Mark Lamport-Stokes quotes Arnold Palmer talking about today's players and it seems The King slipped this in about the ball:

Palmer, who was a member of the so-called Big Three with fellow golfing greats Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player, had no doubt about the one thing he would like to change most in the modern game.

"Because of technology, the players of today hit it too far," Palmer said. "That should be one of the major things on our agenda, to slow the golf ball down so that we don't tilt the scale.

"We have so many great golf courses but, as the players start hitting it so far, they are outdating our golf courses. We need to see if we can't just keep it in the range that we have known it for so many years."

Don't be so logical Arnie! Sheesh.

Now why is this interesting since he's mentioned the ball before? Well you might recall back in April we learned that the USGA's Dick Rugge said the groove rule change was motivated by Arnold Palmer telling that the USGA had blown it on grooves.

And as reader Andrew asked back when that item was posted, "I wonder what would have happened had Palmer said the biggest mistake they made was letting the ball go so far?"

Good question.

Letter From Saugerties: USGA Ball Testing In Canada

After this site revealed a few details about the USGA's golf ball testing (noted by the Wall Street Journal with a USGA/Dick Rugge response), the former USGA Executive Director Frank Hannigan filed this letter in response to the news of rolled back ball testing.


You remember those "short" balls the USGA asked manufacturers to make in limited quantities about 4 years ago?  They just re-surfaced at, of all places, the Canadian Tour where players are being paid by the USGA to hit the balls on days following their events.  Two tests have now taken place.

The USGA, predictably, will say nothing beyond admitting tests in Canada are happening. The results will never be revealed unless there is a rules change, says USGA technical chief Dick Rugge.  He also says they need to protect the "process." A "process" is measuring how far golf balls go?  Please.

The USGA, which gets its funds from the public, and shamelessly accepts 501c3 tax status, has one hell of a nerve in trying to shut down a discussion of a distance rollback, the most critical issue in golf for many of its sophisticates.

The issue is what would golf feel like, be like, if the ball went--pick a number--10,15,20 yards shorter for tour players than today's ball. The point of these tests is not where the balls go, it's how the players feel about what they've done.   

"Would it make any difference to you if everybody had to play the ball you used today?"

As for the outcome, you can be assured these balls have already been tested to death on the USGA's super-hip indoor driving device  which, essentially, can predict the outcome of any hit.  The balls were also carefully sprinkled around in exalted golf circles. Peter Dawson gave one to a low handicap friend of mine to play on The Old Course.  My friend say he couldn't tell the difference.

So what's going on?  Rugge is a very status quo guy, especially when it comes to his salary, which is not short.  He doesn't need a fight about distance rollback while he's dealing with the consequences of his dramatic groove change this year.  It was billed as a game changer.  So far, on the Tour, it has changed nothing. Worse, there will come a time when amateur golfers will be asked to buy new clubs with new grooves that mean absolutely nothing.

Rugge says all players must play with the same grooves lest we have bifurcation. Really?  So what about the "one ball" rule, a condition I was involved in with the USGA, which permits committees to limit players to one brand of ball throughout a round.  That condition is considered essential on the PGA Tour.  It is virtually never used in amateur golf.   So is that bifurcation and, if so, what's wrong with it?

My wild guess is that there are members of the USGA Executive Committee who don't want to give up on the issue of distance and have ordered Rugge to do these tests so they can say that with X ball the average driving distance on the Tour would drop by 15 yards--something Rugge already knows.

I would also guess that the PGA Tour knows what's going on. The USGA and R&A can't touch equipment without the consent of the PGA Tour.

This is not a matter of science.  BP could surely make a proper shorter golf ball.  The matter is political with perhaps some litigation tossed in.  All throughout golf,  the people who know it best think the ball goes too far.  At the British Open annual dinner for former champions at St. Andrews the champions beat up on the R&A about distance. The R&A listens but will do nothing.

What a deal.  The people empowered to manage a game can do nothing about the game. It's as if in baseball the major leagues were forced to convert to metal bats.

"They (the USGA) want to have data to present against emotional arguments."

Ryan Ballengee adds a few important details about the USGA's ball testing event in Canada and features quotes from an equipment company goon perspective.

"[The] USGA may have progressed on collecting data with short distance balls," the source said.  "[A] few years ago, OEMs were asked to provide balls with 20% less driver distance."

So, is there a desire to roll the ball back?

The source says the data collection may be done in the event that a ball rollback is eventually needed, but that it is not imminent because of the flattening of distance increases in the last three years.

The source added, "They (the USGA) want to have data to present against emotional arguments."

Actually, the manufacturers getting emotional on this topic clouded their judgment and has them now boxed in a corner with little wiggle room for club innovation. All to protect those little white balls that we'll always have to buy to play the game, no matter how far they fly.