Bears Club Fine For MJ; Exclusive Video Of Meeting With Jack

Tim Rosaforte reported in his Golf World video diary that Michael Jordan texted him to clear the air regarding his plans to build what the Jupiter market so desperately needs: an ultra-exclusive golf club.

MJ confirms he's interviewing architects, with Tom Doak as the leading candidate to design the course, Rosaforte reports. The NBA legend mostly wanted to deny that pace of play at Jack Nicklaus' Bears Club is driving him away.

However, my sources suggest Jordan was called into Mr. Nicklaus' office at Bears Club and the two had a healthy discussion about the claims in golf.com's original report, even sharing a Fresca to break the ice. Here's the exclusively obtained footage:

R.I.P. Jay Morrish

Golf Course Industry's Pat Jones reports that the golf architect known for his work as a Jack Nicklaus associate and later for his highly successful partnership with Tom Weiskopf, has passed away.

Post by Pat Jones.

Update on 2015-03-03 16:25 by Geoff

**The ASGCA's remembrance of a former association president.

Update on 2015-03-04 16:35 by Geoff

**Ron Whitten remembers Morrish fondly and talks to former design partner Tom Weiskopf who said their courses had never needed changing.

I had to challenge Tom on that last statement.  After all, he'd just spent much of 2014 rebuilding every hole at TPC Scottsdale, an early Morrish and Weiskopf flagship design.

"That was a result of technology," he said. "When you have the world's best golfers playing a course every year, you'd got to keep it competitive. But its basic structure was still sound. We didn't change that."

Fox Wants AT&T U-Verse To Pay More To Show USGA Events

Variety's Brian Steinberg reports that Fox Sports 1 and AT&T U-Verse are in a battle that may cost the cable server's 6 million homes a chance to watch eight USGA events.

At issue is Fox Sports 1 adding many rights (fees) that did not exist prior to the last agreement with AT&T, so Fox is threatening not to beam, say, the USGA Four-Ball and other recently acquired packages like NASCAR to AT&T U-Verse customers. The blackout of select content provides a new twist in the various cable company spats with content providers.

In the current fight, Fox Sports 1 is trying to get paid for programming that was not in place when its carriage deal with AT&T was established. Nascar signed a new deal in 2013 that moved its events to Fox and NBC from Walt Disney’s ESPN and Time Warner’s Turner Sports for this year. Many of the other events at the center of the new dispute were also added to Fox Sports 1 after it secured carriage rights.

AT&T U-verse has approximately 6 million subscribers, according to market research firm SNL Kagan.

Fox Sports 1 said it had made “attempts to negotiate an agreement that extends to these events.” Unless each side’s stance changes, U-verse subscribers may miss out on a Nascar race tomorrow.

And the U.S. Junior Amateur!

Fox Sports signed a 12-year (12 years!) rights deal with the USGA in August, 2013, but this is the first time since handing the USGA a lavish sum that there has been any sign of squeezing cable companies for the privilege of showing USGA championships. Something tells me the AT&T folks aren't going to budge on this one for a while.

Freshen Your Remote Batteries: Rory’s Omega Ad May Run Another Six Months

Even though every golf fan has grown accustomed to leaping for their remote when Omega’s grating “Hall of Fame” ad relentlessly surfaces, it seems the Caddyshack gopher emerged from his hole to see his shadow.

You know what that means? We’ll have another six months of the Guantanamo-ready piece even though it had grown insufferable within days of its debut.

But as Golf News Net notes, if history is any gauge, we'll have another six months to detect some sort of hidden genius behind the campaign since Omega only does one golf ad a year.

Either way, please, please make sure you have fresh batteries all so you never experience the hitting the mute button only to find your remote has lost all juice from repeated MUTE use.

The problem is that the watchmaker only seems to make one ad each year, typically making a big splash associated with the PGA Championship. As a partner of the PGA of America, Omega gets a ton of commercial time, which leads to almost immediate ad fatigue. There’s only so many times someone can hear “Hall of fame!” screeched before you hit the Mute button, or, as with the Sergio Garcia ad the year prior, see a watch gear move quickly in sequence with the Spaniard’s swing before you wish for a digital watch more than anything.

Lydia Grabs 10th Win, Now Has More Than Lexi/Wie...Combined

This unbylined AP story notes that Lydia Ko took her home nation's New Zealand Women's Open by four, giving her ten professional victories.

Zak Kozuchowski notes that this puts Lydia ahead of two very young greats...combined.

It was her 10th professional win, which includes six on the LPGA Tour, three on the Ladies European Tour and one on the ALPG Tour.

To compare, Wie has four LPGA Tour wins. Thompson also has four, as well as one win on the Ladies European Tour. Keep in mind that Wie and Thompson are a combined 11 years older than Ko.