SI Player Survey

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SI Golf Plus published their 5th annual players poll (subscription req. for link to work).

Some of the more interesting questions and answers:

Who is the second-best player?
Vijay Singh ...... 68%
Ernie Els ...... 12%
Phil Mickelson ...... 8%
ALSO RECEIVING VOTES: Joe Durant, Sergio García, Retief Goosen, myself, Annika Sorenstam

Annika and Joe Durant? So much for the players liking that question!

Did the U.S. make a mistake by invading Iraq?
Yes ...... 12%
No ...... 88%

That thinking may help explain the 56% on this question:

Is having early-round coverage on the Golf Channel instead of ESPN good or bad?
Good ...... 56%
Bad ...... 44%
LOOSE LIPS: "[The Golf Channel] is going to have to get better."

Do you know any pro golfers who have used steroids?
Yes ...... 1%
No ...... 99%

Should the Tour have a written policy expressly forbidding performance-enhancing drugs?
Yes ...... 73%
No ...... 27%

Overwhelming player support, so why doesn't the Commissioner agree? And finally...

Do you favor a rolled-back ball for tournament play?
Yes ...... 28%
No ...... 72%

In 2003, 60% said yes.  

Shot Hit Around the World?

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John Johnson in the LA Times:

In what will easily be the longest chip shot in golf history, a cosmonaut is scheduled to hit a gold-plated golf ball this summer from a makeshift tee outside the International Space Station.

If all goes as planned, the 17,000-mph drive will travel 2.1 billion miles before burning up in the atmosphere, giving a Canadian golf club manufacturer the kind of publicity that can't be found back on Earth.

But even before the space golfer tees off, the event has drawn hisses from galleries of critics who fear that an errant shot could punch a hole in the yet-to-be completed $53-billion, 206-ton space station.

Although the risk of serious damage is small, critics say, the stunt sends the wrong signal. Instead of a state-of-the-art scientific laboratory, the station will be seen as a haven of commercialized blarney on a cosmic scale.

And...

The out-of-this-world tee shot is the brainchild of Nataliya Hearn, an engineering professor at the University of Windsor in Canada who is also president and chief executive of Toronto-based Element 21 Golf Co.

Three-year-old Element 21 Golf is developing a line of clubs made of an alloy of scandium, the 21st element in the periodic table — hence the company's name. Element 21 Golf unveiled its clubs at a golf show in January, but they haven't yet reached retailers, a company official said.

Scandium is used in light bulb filaments and, when alloyed with aluminum, it is used to make bicycles, baseball bats and other sports gear. "It's very light and very strong," Hearn said.

The idea to use the space station as a giant floating tee box came a couple of years ago, when Hearn and her partners were trying to figure out ways to market their space-age clubs.

"Is this the right message to be sending to taxpayers in America, Russia, Europe and Japan — that it's OK to do a stunt like this?" said Keith Cowing of nasawatch.com, a feisty website that frequently challenges NASA policies.


They're Back!

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championstour.gifCart-free didn't do much for the Champions Tour, so they're coming back according to Bill Fields in Golf World.

Of course, the PGA Tour's Rick George remains sure he made the right move.

In a statement released today, George said: "The tour continues to believe the presentation of our tournaments and the on-site fan experience is enhanced when competitions don't features carts and players walk. However, due to ongoing requests made by a number of players, we have concluded that carts will be made available on a more frequent basis to those wishing to use them."

As recently as last month the seniors' player advisory council was in favor of upholding the ban. But when the policy board met Monday in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., the group's four independent directors and the four player directors on the PGA Tour were swayed by the unanimous stance to return carts by Champions Tour player directors Jim Colbert, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Purtzer and Leonard Thompson, Purtzer told Golf World.

"If the players are 4-0 for something, they traditionally haven't been overridden," said Purtzer, a cart advocate who is plagued by a painful back condition. "It came down to the directors voting because they knew a majority of the players wanted carts back. A couple of the independent directors said they weren't in total agreement but appreciated the fight we had put up. It kind of came to down to the belief that 'you guys know what's best for your tour.'"

Now, about the name of the Tour... 

Ohio Golf Assn: Trying A Competition Ball

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logo_oga_big.gifThanks to reader George for the heads on Jim Achenbach reporting in the new Golfweek that the Ohio Golf Association will provide a designated golf ball to competitors in this summer’s Ohio Champions Tournament.

A new event on the OGA schedule, "it will be an event unlike any other."

That's for sure. From the online entry form: 

The Board of Trustees of the Ohio Golf Association has decided to take a stand against the eroding playability of our old courses due to the length of the modern golf ball. The Champions Tournament will be unique in the fact that the committee will identify a golf ball for use by all contestants.

The ball to be used will be a modern ball, with specifications as similar as possible to most popular balls, the only exception will be a lower compression. The ball to be used will be on the USGA’s approved ball list.

Like a tour event, the Champions Tournament will have several stations where ball flight, distance and swing speeds will be measured and documented for the entire field. The purpose is to extrapolate information that will prove useful in the ultimate goal of identifying a tournament golf ball.

If you wish to be part of this exciting experiment, contact the OGA at: tournaments@ohiogolf.org and you may be included in what will be the most revolutionary change in tournament golf since Softspikes.

According to OGA director Jim Popa, the 36-hole event will be played August 22-23 at Windy Knoll Golf Club in Springfield, Ohio, where the Ohio State Mid-Am was played last year. The field will be comprised of Ohio club champions, city champions and local golf association champions, many of whom played the previous year's state amateur.

Alan Fadel, a one-time PGA Tour player and top amateur golfer is chairman of the OGA ball committee and says this is the culmination of several years of research and contemplation by the association.

Though no ball has been selected, both Fadel and Popa revealed that the group is close to selecting one that likely will not significantly favor clubhead speeds over 105 m.p.h. as today's balls tend to do. It will be a 3-piece ball, with a compression of around 70 with a soft cover.

Fadel says they will likely share the name of the ball maker at some point, but both confirmed that the ball to be used is on the USGA's Conforming Ball List.

In phone calls today, both Fadel and Popa emphasized that the impetus behind this project is to create a starting point for dialogue and to amass some information, but ultimately, to find a way to restore relevancy to many of Ohio's classic courses and also to deal with pace of play issues brought on by today's driving distances.

"Here in Ohio we have 800 golf courses and 25-30 just fantastic, world class older courses," said Popa. "And we can't use them anymore."

And he added, "it's time to get this game back where its supposed to be, a game of skill."

The OGA has a history of bold moves that may not exactly be popular in Far Hills (perhaps explaining why so few Ohio residents have served on the Executive Committee). 

The OGA was the first golf association in the country to endorse the use of SoftSpikes.

Could they be influencing another potentially significant trend?

Let's hope so.

Golfweek's America's Best

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A more readable version of the latest Golfweek ranking is available online. Here is Brad Klein's summary. This link will take you to the Top 100 Modern and the Top 100 Classic. And here is the State-by-State public access list.

Notable moves on the Classic list:

 3. (4) Augusta National - Wow, amazing how many panelists get there each year to see the changes!
 10. (13) Prairie Dunes Country Club - Dave Axland bunker work must be going over nicely...
 11. (14) Chicago Golf Club - Restoration work and Walker Cup pay off...
 13. (10) Pinehurst No. 2 - USGA setup taking away some of the fun and sandy charm?
 17. (19) Oakland Hills Country Club (South) - And yet it's going under the knife...
 28. (30) Plainfield Country Club - The same year Golf Digest inexplicably drops it from the list...
 33. (50) Pasatiempo Golf Club - Restoration by Team Doak is going over nicely...
 34. (58) Congressional Country Club (Blue) - Look what hosting the Booz Allen can do...
 78. (84) Bel-Air Country Club - Someone likes that blinding white sand...
 90. (NR) Atlantic City Country Club* - Ultra exclusive course finally gets enough votes 

Newcomers to the Modern list:

>> No. 17: Bandon Trails, Bandon, Ore. Coore and Crenshaw
>> No. 31: Old Sandwich Golf Club, Plymouth, Mass. Coore and Crenshaw
>> No. 39: Briggs Ranch Golf Club, San Antonio. Tom Fazio
>> No. 41: Monterey Peninsula Country Club (Shore Course), Pebble Beach, Calif. Mike Strantz
>> No. 44: Trump National Golf Cub, Bedminster, N.J. Tommy Fazio and "The Donald"
>> No. 46: Lakota Canyon, New Castle, Colo. Jim Engh
>> No. 49: Boston Golf Club, Hingham, Mass. Gil Hanse
>> No. 51: Black Rock, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. Jim Engh
>> No. 67: Whisper Rock (Lower Course), Scottsdale, Ariz. Gary Stephenson/Phil Mickelson
>> No. 68: Forest Creek Golf Club (North Course), Southern Pines, N.C. Tom Fazio
>> No. 71: Pronghorn (Nicklaus Course), Bend, Ore. Jack Nicklaus
>> No. 83: Sage Valley Golf Club, Graniteville, S.C. Tom Fazio
>> No. 99: Seven Canyons, Sedona, Ariz. Routing by Ken Kavanaugh, the rest by Tom Weiskopf
>> No. 100: May River Course at Palmetto Bluffs, Bluffton, S.C.  Jack Nicklaus

 

An Integral Part of the FedEx Cup

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In announcing the Honda's move from Mirasol to PGA National, note Commissioner Finchem's quote:

"We look forward to a bright future as the Honda Classic moves to PGA National's renowned Champion Course and becomes an integral part of the FedEx Cup for years to come."

Not an integral part of the PGA Tour for years to come, but an integral part of the FedEx Cup for years to come.

Translation: after this year, the PGA Tour name is going to become secondary to FedEx Cup.

I hope they're getting a lot of money for this. 

The Dilemma Course Officials Face Across the Country

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Bob Harig in the St. Petersburg Times writes:

For the second year in a row,  Tiger Woods  made Doral his personal playground, firing at pins and making birdies as if it were a pitch-and-putt course. His 20-under-par performance that culminated in his 48th career victory Sunday came a year after he set the tournament record at 24 under. Five times in the past 11 years, the winning score has been 18 under or lower. Three more times, it has been 17 under.

Those kind of numbers raised questions last week about Doral's viability as a World Golf Championship venue, which the tournament will become next year.

Wind has always been the course's main defense, and there has barely been a breeze, save for a day or so, during the past two tournaments. Technology, of course, has rendered many courses of long ago a far tamer test. But the lower numbers in recent years have been shocking.

Uh oh, Bob didn't get the memo! That's bias there, because after all, there is no evidence that technology has completely changed the game, just speculation. (As opposed to the overwhelming evidence that "agronomy" is responsible for 350 yard drives.)

Here, history suggests it is odd to see such low scores. But what can tournament officials do? Trick up the course to the point of absurdity?

It is a dilemma that course officials face across the country. Protect the integrity of the course against the best players in the world, or let them go at it?

Or they could be like Doral, probably pretty happy to have Tiger Woods as a back-to-back winner. 

Enlisting Bloggers For P.R.

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Michael Barbaro of the New York Times writes about Walmart's efforts to enlist the help of bloggers:

Brian Pickrell, a blogger, recently posted a note on his Web site attacking state legislation that would force Wal-Mart Stores to spend more on employee health insurance. "All across the country, newspaper editorial boards — no great friends of business — are ripping the bills," he wrote.

It was the kind of pro-Wal-Mart comment the giant retailer might write itself. And, in fact, it did.

And..

Under assault as never before, Wal-Mart is increasingly looking beyond the mainstream media and working directly with bloggers, feeding them exclusive nuggets of news, suggesting topics for postings and even inviting them to visit its corporate headquarters.

But the strategy raises questions about what bloggers, who pride themselves on independence, should disclose to readers. Wal-Mart, the nation's largest private employer, has been forthright with bloggers about the origins of its communications, and the company and its public relations firm, Edelman, say they do not compensate the bloggers.

But some bloggers have posted information from Wal-Mart, at times word for word, without revealing where it came from.

What is different about Wal-Mart's approach to blogging is that rather than promoting a product — something it does quite well, given its $300 billion in annual sales — it is trying to improve its battered image.

Gee, I wonder if this kind of blogger-corporate synergy could happen in golf. I wonder, I wonder.

Peper: I "created a monster"

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ShadowsM06_0.gifFormer Golf Magazine editor George Peper's latest mea culpa comes in the form of a cover story lead in the new Links:

Hey, it seemed like a good idea at the time. The magazine got great publicity and sold more ads and copies, and I was proud of our biennial list, the first to rank courses from one to 100. Over time, however, I came to realize I’d created a monster.
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Among golfers, we’ve seen the spawning of a new species: the conspicuous course collector, whose life mission is to play as many of the Top 100 as possible. Then there is the subspecies, the conspicuous club joiner, who collects Top 100 memberships as if they were bag tags—which essentially they are.

This wretched excess would be harmless if not for two problems. First, the lists are inherently flawed. No matter how experienced and knowledgeable, a selection panel will not—cannot—get the ratings right, simply because there is no “right.” Rankings are no more than a collective guess, an objective average of subjective opinions.
And... 
The GOLF panel also includes public relations execs, resort owners, tour operators, photographers, writers and others with close links to courses. The last I knew, all these conflict-of-interest votes counted.
Uh George, you left out the multiple USGA staffers to. Well at least you are mentioning the rest now! Continue...
I have little knowledge of the Golf Digest panel, except that it includes more than 800 low-handicap golfers, whose identities, unlike GOLF’s panelists, are kept anonymous. With a group that size, some raters inevitably will be more knowledgeable and responsible than others. I’m also not sure whether all low handicappers may be able to judge the capacity of a course to be enjoyed by all levels of player.

Amen to this...

The second weakness of the rankings is more important. The magic number—100—is simply too small. There are more than 30,000 courses in the world; to celebrate only 100 is ludicrous. Hell, there are 100 great courses within a three-hour drive of Manhattan!

Page 2 includes his list of the ten most overrated. Shockingly, none were designed by good buddy Rees Jones!

The Villages Sets New Record...

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...for the most awful ads ever to appear repeatedly on a PGA Tour broadcast?

No, but while those dreadful spots that have been airing regularly and giving the Tour's VP of 18-34 year olds a headache, they were not the source of the record.

22263452.jpgNo, Erin Cox at SouthFlorida.com has the details. Warning, we're talking Guiness stuff here...

THE VILLAGES -- Leave it to Florida's retirees to shatter world records.

Official word came Friday that The Villages set the only Guinness World Record held by a retirement community. The September charity event nearly tripled the efforts of the previous group of retirees to orchestrate The World's Largest Golf Cart parade.

The 3,321 carts winding through the paths of The Villages in the fall is a meager showing for the 57,000 retirees who travel mainly by golf cart in the sprawling community. But parade mastermind Chuck Berkey, 77, thought nearly tripling the record of 1,138 was excessive on the first try.

"Someday, if somebody challenges us, we can bring out the big guns then," said the parade's mastermind, Chuck Berkey, 77. The 12-by-16-inch certificate arrived in Berkey's mailbox Friday afternoon.

"When I got that in the mail, I almost fell over," he said.

Berkey has been checking the box for the certificate every day. Guinness officials had said it would come months ago. But even without the paperwork, Villages residents considered themselves unbeatable.

"When it comes to retirement communities, we are the undisputed champions," said Doug Tharp, president of The Villages Homeowners' Association.