Finchem: U.S. Golf Has Seen Continuous Growth Since Palmer

I'm always fascinated by PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem's theories on growing the game as the mastermind of The First Tee designed to teach life lessons and now a grow-the-game initiative.

Not sure I buy the view he expressed in China Sunday while launching the developmental tour PGA Tour China, which should be a hit with the Australians.

Fourth, we know from looking at the history of golf, that the growth of the game is driven first and foremost by the development of elite players who perform at a unique level. Having the opportunity to grow elite players; thus, accelerate the development of elite players in China, will also translate into the acceleration of the growth of the game in China, which is in all of our interests.

In addition to all of those reasons, I think in summary, it's clear that today's announcement is a milestone to benefit China golf, PGA TOUR, global golf, certainly growth in China, and as a consequence, it is an important day for all of us in the game.

We've got some pretty elite players in the Tiger Woods era, starting with Tiger Woods, and the game hasn't really grown has it? In fact, most barometers suggest it's contracting.

Yet Finchem expanded on his view a few moments later in the press conference:

Q. And for Commissioner Finchem, what do you see as the No. 1 benefit to the PGA TOUR, and what will be your investment?

COMMISSIONER FINCHEM: Well, I think the overall fundamental situation is that the faster the growth, the faster we have growth of the game, impacts every aspect of the sport; certainly the professional side.

And because participation in the game drives, it drives viewership, it drives support for events, etc., etc., and they go hand in hand. Historically, the elite player comes first; strong growth comes second, and certainly that's been the case in the United States since Arnold Palmer came along in 1960 and it's been 40, 50 years of continuous growth.

Continuous? It must be so nice to live on Planet Tim where the flowers are always in bloom and everyone doesn't smoke, shaves hourly and takes their hats off before shaking hands.

So anything we can do to assist the expedition and acceleration of growth is very much in the interest of the professional game, but also golf as a whole.

I'm thinking speeding up play, shrinking the footprint of courses and figuring out ways to create fun, affordable facilities might be more, uh, impactful than developing pro golfers. I know, how absurd.

Finchem: "I can't find too much wrong in what we're doing."

Commissioner Vader appeared on Morning Drive for da full hour and if you like an arrogant, dismissive and a steady monotone, this was television gold!

As usual, the Commish put out all of the fires of the current tour, of which there are many created by the thirst to fill every week on the calendar with PGA Tour golf. (Kudos to Williams, Hack and even Finchem fishing buddy Rolfing for picking sensitive topics).

A few quotes to remember from Finchem.

On players skipping playoff events: "I don't see it developing as some kind of trend."

He did concede that the FedExCup points have "too much volatility" but summed up the current state of the tour by saying, "I can't find too much wrong in what we're doing."

Gary Williams left the interview (AFTRA rules forbid listening to Commissionerspeak for an hour straight) and Finchem fishing buddy Mark Rolfing took his place, and the topic of rules came up. Unfortunately, the one really bizarre moment was not part of the Golf Channel uploads posted below.

In a nutshell: when the topic of Tiger's ridiculous final round drop at The Players came up, Finchem revealed his axe to grind with Johnny Miller for basing his analysis on Mark Rolfing's initial reaction and the blimp shot, whereas Finchem took the evidence in and as he said this morning, declared to himself, " no problem here."

How anyone could watch that situation play out and not even concede it looked bad, is pretty disturbing.

Anyway, Finchem's rambling answer on simplifying the rules where he essentially says the PGA Tour has no desire to get into the rules business and that the Rules of Golf, as written, are "not that far off now."

On fan rulings he tries to explain why they aren't the end of the world, but doesn't go so far to say that getting rid of phone-in help would create the perception of cheating or incompetance.

Tiger Runs "Out Of Gas" & Schedules Only Get Worse From Here!

It was a pretty shocking admission for physical specimen Tiger Woods to say his Tour Championship second round fell apart because he "just ran out of gas" and calling the ResetCup series of events (even with a week off) "a long grind." (Mark Lamport-Stokes reports.)

And guess what? The 2013-14 season starts in three weeks and next year's playoffs do not include a week off. But there is a week after the playoffs so you can rest for the Ryder Cup in Scotland.

In 2015 the Presidents Cup, presumably soon after the FedExCup, will be in Korea on the moundiest looking course you'll ever see.

And do we even want to talk about the mess that is 2016? Ewan Murray did in assessing (and agreeing) with Woods' complaint about fatigue.

Woods was right to point to a condensed schedule from the Open Championship to this, the climax of the FedEx play-off events. He also predicted that matters will become even more hectic in 2016, when golf returns to the Olympic Games in Rio.

It's going to be fascinating to watch the stars getting older while Commissioner Blankfein's vision for non-stop golf plays out.

Oh Do Tell: Woods, Finchem Meet For An Hour

GolfChannel.com Digital, whose parents, Mr. and Mrs. Digital, were visionairies in naming their first born, reports that Tiger Woods and Commissioner Tim Finchem met for over an hour Wednesday. An hour, for Tiger preparing to tee off the next day in a big event and listening to the Commish bellow on, is the equivalent of a 24 hour meeting for the rest of us.

Here's guessing they were not comparing notes on the G650 or working a Steve Sands-branded whiteboard over how to revamp the FedExCup points (again) or discussing how to televise all of Tiger's shots in SD to avoid future rules mishaps.

Digital speculates that it had to do with "call-in" violations based on Tiger's press conference remarks.

“There are certainly a lot more viewer call-ins,” Woods said. “I get it from the first time I step on the range on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, all the way through, and virtually every shot is on something, and some of the top players are getting it. Most players don't get it until they're in the leader groups on Saturday or Sunday.”

Bob Harig zones in on Tiger's assertion that there needs to be a time-limit on call-ins, though what that has to do with any of the situations he was involved in is beyond me!

"There needs to be a time limit, and I think there needs to be a discussion obviously where is that time limit? Where is that line of demarcation? You've got to start with disqualification and then work our way back from there.

Commish Talks Player Utilization Ratios Of FedEx Opportunities

Numerous stories noted the big takeaway from Commissioner Tim Finchem's state of the tour presser: the tour will be taking yet another look at caller-inspired rules violations even though (A) it's the one bit of controversy Commissioner Monk embraces, and (B) it's the one sign an audience of any size is watching the playoffs.

So nothing will change. Players will commit violations.  HD will reveal violations they didn't know happened. Players will pat themselves on the back for calling penalties on themselves. And Tiger will have more run-ins with the rules because he's on television more than anyone.

Finchem is smarter than most of us and he knows the second you put a rule that says no outside observer can point out a rules violation, the integrity of the rules will be undermined because we'll have a long list of penalties that should have been given out, but were not.

In other words, a situation much more toxic than the one we have now.

As for Tuesday at East Lake, you are more than welcome to read 4855 words of the Commish and press questions--and that's just the part before Peter Jacobsen arrived to collect his Payne Stewart Award.

Or you can take Helen Ross's summary of the state of the tour, which as you might suspect, is very upbeat, with loads of numbers from the Commissioner except those top-secret playoff ratings (they're so big they keep them secret to avoid a nationwide outbreak of aneurysms).

But since we can't get those TV ratings, we can at least get some numbers confirming that the players do indeed believe in the FedExCup and its $40 million in bonus money. Shocking stuff here.

On how the FedExCup has been accepted by the players: "99.1 percent of the (Playoffs) starts by players that were available to players have been actually utilized. Of the 975 opportunities, 966 have been filled. It's an indication of the very robust interest, support, and enthusiasm the players have for this competition. And I think, as with the fans, it continues to grow."

Not that anyone is counting or anything.

On the debut of the Web.com Tour Finals: "I must say in this first year we're off to, I think, a very, very solid start. The quality of the golf courses in the finals, the juxtaposition of the 126 to 200 from the PGA TOUR against the top 75 off the Web.com Tour money list has, I think, proven to be very interesting to fans. Our galleries have been good at those events, and we've gotten good results on television."

Uh, how many more weeks do we have of the Web.com Tour Finals?

And the Commissioner's tortured take on fans phoning in rules violations:

On whether the TOUR would ever decide to not take calls from fans about potential penalties: "Well, we've been talking about it and looking at it over the years. I think twice we've actually got pretty serious about it. It's not just one thing. It's sort of three or four different ways to look at it starting with one fundamental, which is disqualification reasonable for signing a card wrong when you didn't intentionally do anything?
 


"Going from there to what's a reasonable point to accept outside information? Is it better to have some sort of limit on it? If you don't learn about something before X time. All the other sports close their books a little quicker than we do, so to speak. But there's two sides to the story. I mean, it's not an easy argument one way or the other.  I think it's cumbersome and difficult and awkward sometimes. On the other hand, sometimes it's pretty interesting to the fans. ... But we seem to have three or four of these things this year. So we'll probably be taking another harder look at it after we get done with the season."

Eh ehmmm...Tim, the season starts again in a few weeks.

Price Tried To Get Presidents Cup Format Changed; Tim Said No!

Nick Price was probably a little more blunt about his attempts get the Presidents Cup format changed, all but saying the event will struggle if something isn't done.

An unbylined SkySports report was one of the few to report Price's comments that might have had Commissioner Finchem longing for a Greg Norman captaincy.

"When you've only got four pairings and you've got 12 guys to choose from, that's a lot easier because you take your best players.

"The Europeans put out the eight best players they can. It would be really interesting to see if the Ryder Cup was played under the Presidents Cup points system what the outcome would be."

Price and Ernie Els put the idea of a change of format to PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem, who has opted to retain the 34-match schedule for this year's contest.

"Initially Tim was receptive and then he phoned me back three weeks later and said he wasn't prepared to change," added Price. "He didn't think it needed a change. Ernie and I were really disappointed with the outcome.

"The only thing the Spaniard has achieved in the last 24 hours was to make a sympathetic character out of Woods"

Tom English with a super assessment of the Sergio Garcia mea culpa.

By the time he had finished his mea culpa you almost started to feel some pity for him. Woods is not only trouncing him on the golf course but he’s also trouncing him off it. Woods has the career that Garcia always wanted. At one time, many years ago now, these two looked like they were going to form the rivalry of 
the age but Garcia has been a profound disappointment on that score.

The only thing the Spaniard has achieved in the last 24 hours was to make a sympathetic character out of Woods – a hell of a feat beyond the ken of so many who are paid to do it, but now achieved, ironically, by the man who dislikes him more than most.

John Huggan reminds us that there are others who have made mistaken comments who still populate the airwaves.

An off-the-cuff comment regarding fried chicken -- while brainless almost beyond belief -- wasn't as damaging or hurtful as Golf Channel's Kelly Tilghman saying Woods' nearest pursuers should "lynch him in a back alley." And, last time I looked, Ms. Tilghman was still on the air.

While Garcia is clearly guilty of crass stupidity, to condemn and categorize him solely on the basis of a single phrase uttered during an adrenaline-charged interview alongside his 2012 Ryder Cup teammates would be wrong. Just as no sensible assessment of a golfer's worth can be made after only one shot or one round or one tournament, the same criteria must surely apply to any assessment of a man's character.

And the Daily Mail's Derek Lawrenson suggests that Sergio's £5 million-a-year deal with
TaylorMade may be in jeopardy.  Even better is the photo that ran with it of Tim Finchem doing his best somber executive look.