Turkish Airports On Alert For Players Smuggling Absurd Amounts Of Appearance Cash Out Of Country

/
The players, the press, everyone who had their way paid just had a swell time at the Turkey Final taking gobs of money for a few days of inspired work. No one sounded like he was having more fun than the headbutting Turkish Golf President Ahmet Agaoglu, who played with Tiger Woods in Friday's post-tournament pro-am.
Read More

"Mini-golf may be the closest most of us get to really understanding Sisyphus."

/

Michael Tortorello files a New York Times Home and Garden section story on Bruce Stillman's 13-hole Big Stone Mini Golf Course and sculpture garden in Minnetrista, Minnesota.

The second hole, a stiff par 3, breaks a wobbly six feet from left to right. Mr. Stillman calls it “Banking on Mound.” If there’s any place in America left to pun, it’s a mini-golf course: Mound is the name of the nearby lakeside suburb, on the western edge of the Minneapolis metro, where Mr. Stillman banked his fate.

It’s a landscape of country clubs, hobby farms and marinas, with “some of the most expensive real estate in Minnesota,” said Heidi Hoy, a sculptor who has lived intermittently at Big Stone as Mr. Stillman’s companion.

When he first bought an old dairy farm here in 1991, he wanted to try his hand at landscape and environmental art: something in the spirit of the British site-sculptor Andy Goldsworthy. Another influence was a piece of popular American cinema called “Overboard,” in which reluctant lovers played by Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell create a Putt-Putt Seven Wonders of the World.

There is also a 25-image gallery accompanying the story online.

Bloomberg TV On Hanse, Rio

/

A Bloomberg TV feature on Gil Hanse following the awarding of the Olympic design contract for Rio 2016:

Meanwhile, the AP branch in Rio's Tales Azzoni continues his steadfast interest in the land dispute which will not hold up construction, says the IGF's Ty Votaw.

Votaw said the land dispute is “not a concern at this time,” and reiterated that the federation has been reassured by 2016 organizers that all issues are close to being resolved.

“There are some final discussions between the land owner and the organizing committee, and the mayor’s office that are just being finalized,” Votaw said. “We are working closely with Rio 2016 and the land owner to resolve the issues that need to be resolved so we could move forward.”

Votaw acknowledges there is a need to make planning changes for every day that goes by without construction starting, but said it doesn’t mean that current delays will affect the final project or the test events.

“There is some flexibility,” Votaw said. “We could be ready as early as March of 2015 or as late as August of 2015. You could have the test events in 2016 as well.”

The AP story ends by suggesting (yet again) that a different site may still be necessary for the 2016 course, even though a court has ruled that the construction can go ahead regardless of the ultimate decision on the land dispute that may be years away. We also know that from the AP's Azzoni.

The Real Best Field In Golf...

/

I'm always so impressed with the legends that are lured to play the PNC Father-Son Challenge, and the December 13-16 field announced Thursday remains the only event in golf that still lures The King and The Bear.

1. Steve Elkington/Sam Elkington (son)
2. Nick Faldo/Matthew Faldo (son)
3. Raymond Floyd/Robert Floyd (son)
4. Hale Irwin/Steve Irwin (son)
5. Lee Janzen/Connor Janzen (son)
6. Bernhard Langer/Christina Langer (daughter)
7. Davis Love III/Davis Love IV (Dru Love) (son)
8. Sandy Lyle/James Lyle (son)
9. Larry Nelson (Defending Champion)/John Nelson (son)
10. Jack Nicklaus/Gary Nicklaus (son)
11. Mark O'Meara/Shaun O'Meara (son)
12. Arnold Palmer/Will Wears (grandson)
13. Vijay Singh/Qass Singh (son)
14. Dave Stockton/David Stockton (son)
15. Curtis Strange/Tom Strange (son)
16. Lee Trevino/Daniel Trevino (son)
17. Lanny Wadkins/Tucker Wadkins (son)
18. Fuzzy Zoeller/Gretchen Zoeller (daughter)

PGA Tour Ratings '12: NBC Pulls Well Ahead Of CBS

/

Sports Business Daily's Austin Karp sums up the PGA Tour's numbers rising in 2012, with NBC showing a 45% increase (3.43 avg viewers) and CBS a 20% spike (2.75 million). Golf Channel was up 23% with a average of 847,000 viewers.

But check out the chart with Karp's item. It includes 2011 numbers, where NBC and CBS posted nearly identical average viewer numbers (2.3 million for NBC to 2.2 million for CBS).

I'd be curious to see if this lead in 2012 is the product of CBS having more telecasts and a few rainouts, or perhaps the NBC-Golf Channel synergy providing better promotion and telecast lead-ins?

The World Hickory Open Was This Week...

/

I'm a bit horrified to have acknowledged this cash grab in Turkey when soulful golfers were teeing it up in the World Hickory Open. The event was Monday and Tuesday at Monifeith and Carnoustie Burnside, reports the Scotsman.

The World Hickory Open Championship was established in 2004 and played at Musselburgh Golf Course, the oldest surviving playing surface in the world, according to the Guinness Book of Records.

Hickory clubs are available on the day, which is primarily to encourage parties of all abilities to participate.

According to regular hickory golfers, one of the main attractions of using hickory clubs is being able to ‘feel’ every shot - and also allowing classic golf courses to be played as intended.

A BBC preview story featured this:

This year's event has attracted about 100 players from more than 30 countries.

Competitors are limited to clubs made before, or made to replicate those manufactured before, 1935.

The World Hickory Open Championship was first held in 2005 and has become popular across Europe and the United States.

The event's chairman, Lionel Freedman, said: "It is a lot to do with the fact that the game has changed out of all recognition in the last few years and there are people who enjoy the challenge of playing with clubs that were made after the Great War.

"It brings back into play the courses that are far too short for the modern club and ball."

The official website didn't have scores but it did have this fantastic featurette with the sweet-swinging Perry Summers and Randy Jensen talking about the joys of hickory golf, a famous challenge match between Old Tom Morris and Willie Park, and showing off the magnificent Musselburgh.

"That the European Tour could come to a decision less than two weeks after the Meltdown at Medinah is truly remarkable."

/

Fantastically cranky stuff from Brian Keogh as he senses that Paul McGinley has been pushed aside for Lee Westwood's favorite public speaker Darren Clarke in the 2014 Ryder Cup captaincy stakes.

It’s a fait accompli anyway if you believe Her Majesty’s Press and one that will prove “popular with club golfers up and down the land, who identify with Clarke’s obvious struggles with his volcanic temperament on the course and his love of a pint off it.”

If that’s the case, so much for the transparency of the selection process, the opinion of the Tournament Players Committee and the general intelligence level of the sporting public, who have surely learned to see beyond the comic cut caricature of Clarke’s public persona.

Clarke, McGinley and captaincy candidates Thomas Bjorn and Miguel Angel Jimenez are also members of that august Committee alongside Colin Montgomerie, Felipe Aguilar, Paul Casey, Gonzalo Fernandez Castaño, Richard Finch, Joakim Haeggman, David Howell, Robert Karlsson, Barry Lane or Henrik Stenson.

Perhaps they’ve all agreed already that there really is just one man for the job given Clarke’s inexorable slide into irrelevance as a player since he captured the 2011 Open Championship at Royal St George’s.

And...

It’s not that Clarke would be poor but is he really a better candidate for the job that McGinley who led two understrength GB&I teams to Seve Trophy victories and played a blinder as a vice-captain in 2010 and this year. It’s certainly debatable and that the European Tour could come to a decision less than two weeks after the Meltdown at Medinah is truly remarkable.

Headbutting Turk Official Serves Up Fantastic Futbol Analogy

/

From Phil Casey's Independent story on the first tee skirmish that livened up the Turkey Final and led to Turkish Golf Federation Head and Stevie Williams wannabe Ahmet Agaoglu serving up this explanation.

But give the man credit, he's doing his part to put the incident to bed.

"I was there explaining this is not like other sports - while Messi is going to take a penalty you cannot go into the six-yard area to take a picture - and while saying this there was a reaction saying 'You cannot push us back, you cannot shout at us'.

"I was being pushed by one of them and pushed them back as well, the poor guy (local journalist Cihat Unal) was in the wrong place in the wrong time.

"While organising such tournaments I shouldn't have to be there, but I am trying to make everything so perfect. It was unlucky it happened and I will given a written apology because one way or another it was not nice.

"He stumbled back and I was almost going to fall over him."

Why Tiger Joining The European Tour Would Have An Impact

/

I saw the news out of the Turkey Final about Tiger suggesting he might take up European Tour membership if the rules are changed to include the various Cups as appearances. And I yawned, then moved right along.

But Bob Harig explains that such a membership requirement change, coupled with a few other factor$, makes the scenario increasingly likely and would certainly mean fewer appearances in the U.S. Perhaps as many as 3-4 events shaved off his PGA Tour schedule.

Because he is formalizing an endorsement deal with Turkish Airlines, it would make sense that Woods add a new Turkish European Tour event to his schedule -- which will be played in November 2013, just a week prior to the season-ending Dubai World Championship.

So four majors, four WGCs, Abu Dhabi (or something similar early in the year), Ryder Cup/Presidents Cup, Turkey and the season-ending Dubai event would bring the total to 12. He could, possibly, add the European Tour event in China prior to the WGC; or he could play another event around the time of Abu Dhabi during the tour's Gulf Coast Swing.