Departing GC Exec: Golf Needs To Spice Things Up

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No wonder Comcast had to move Page Thompson back to headquarters so that Dick Ebersol could take over Golf Channel when the Comcast/NBC merger is completed: he had some common sense ideas for livening up tournament golf. Naturally, none of these will fly with the executive ranks who experience ED drug symptoms when players take their hats off and shake hands at the end of a round.
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"Do you believe what just happened out there? I have a job again."

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Classic finish to today's Frys.com event today, classic post round remarks by champion Rocco (as always) and classic call by Oosterhuis in advance of Rocco's fourth (!?) hole-out of the week.

The video does not include epic shots by Alex Prugh, Bo Van Pelt and Rickie Fowler driving the green at the same hole.

Olympia Fields Lands 2015 U.S. Am; Confirms USGA Has A Very Short Memory

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Bradley Klein delivers the news of a USGA return to a place thought to be off the radar for a major event. I doubt this is a setup for a return U.S. Open, despite the widespread and frankly, relentless clamoring for a 2023 Open return to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Jim Furyk's unforgettable triumph over the North Course.

This is probably more of a gift to an executive committee member for time well-served, not that there's anything wrong with that:

 The 2015 Amateur will be contested on both the North Course and the South Course, with both courses sharing responsibilities for the 36-hole stroke play qualifier. It has yet to be determined which of the 18-hole layouts will be home to the match play segment of the championship.

Olympia Fields, founded in 1913, at one point included four courses, but gradually sold off some of its land. Its North Course, designed by Willie Park Jr. in 1922, has been home to the Western Open (1933, 1968, 1971), the PGA Championship (1925, 1961), the U.S. Open (1928, 2003), and the U.S. Senior Open (1997).

The South Course evolved into its current configuration from a 1916 design by Tom Bendelow and was the subject of a major overall and partial re-routing by architect Steve Smyers in 2007-08. Smyers has been a member of the USGA Executive Committee since 2006 – the only professional course architect ever to have served in that capacity.

"The end result is a 7,225-yard par-72 layout encompassing five holes from the despised Centenary course, 11 from the King's and two from the Queen's."

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Anticipating the 2014 Ryder Cup disaster that is to be held at the Centennary course at Gleneagles, John Huggan cooks up a composite course at the famed resort as an alternative idea.(Here's the Google aerial if you want to try and follow.)
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Tiger Lumped With Favre In "Doghouse"

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Okay, it's a stretch, but as reader Mark noted the golf connections are tenuous, but Tiger does make an appearance at the end of the latest Taiwanese reenactment video on Brett Favre's saga and well, they've ditched the rugby shirt and got him back in red and black cap. In a doghouse. With what looks like a slimmed down Teddy Roosevelt. Yep, you can't make it up.

“All the boomers are doing is masking what’s really leaking in golf."

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I missed Gene Yasuda's alarming Oct. 4 piece on just how far down the drain golf is headed, but it's loaded with some great stuff and one huge stink-bomb of blame directed at the wrong source of the game's troubles. First, he explains how retiring boomers are masking huge declines in play among 25-44-year-olds.
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