Trump Doral: "Next week is the equivalent of a date night with someone you’ve already served divorce papers on."

Susanne Crane and David Chen of the New York Times tried to brand Donald Trump a non-player in the city that openly declares itself the greatest in the world.

Poor Donald!

It's a strange "Special Report" attempting to belittle the Republican frontrunner and Nevada caucus winner. But the piece seems to backfire by reminding us that New Yorkers have a woefully inflated sense of civic importance that doesn't register past the George Washington Bridge.

The only thing missing was a paragraph about how The Donald wasn't able to secure decent Hamilton tickets. (Lucky man!)

More enjoyable is Eamon Lynch's suggestion in Newsweek that Trump has moved on from golf as only a frontrunner for the world's most powerful job can do.

While campaigning in South Carolina last week, Trump addressed a rally in Kiawah Island, the famed golf community. Speaking with his usual combination of incoherence and immodesty, he told the crowd that the developers of Kiawah had also built Doonbeg, the resort on Ireland’s west coast that Trump purchased two years ago.

“I bought it a number of years ago, and during the downturn in Ireland I made a good investment. It is an incredible place,” Trump said. “We spent a lot of money on making it just perfect, and now it’s doing great.” (Recently filed accounts showed a loss of $2.7 million in the first year of his ownership.)

It’s what Trump said next that matters.

“But I don’t care about that stuff anymore. It is like small potatoes, right? I’ll let my kids run it, have fun with it, let my executives have a good time, but I don’t care about it. I care about making America great again. That’s what I care about.”

Small potatoes. That’s us, he’s talking about. Golf.

While executives in the sport fretted about how best to break up with Trump, he’s pulled a George Costanza and broken up with them.

Lynch goes on to prepare us for next week's fun, where the PGA Tour visits Trump Doral under strained terms.

Forward Press: Goodbye West Coast, Hello Animal-Branded Golf!

Another wonderful West Coast Swing has ended--the best ever!--and now we move to Florida.

Get ready for our Bear Trap, Blue Monster and Snake Pit drinking games! My column here on the risks and rewards of cozying up to branded knicknames as your course identity.

I didn't know about it, but Golf.com launched a new live talk show today. You can check it out here.

R&A Preparing To Punt On A Trump Turnberry Decision?

Alistair Tait says R&A head honcho Martin Slumbers is meeting with media Monday and may be prepared to announce a 2020 Open Championship venue.

The name in the envelope is unlikely to be Trump Turnberry.

This is fun from Tait's report:

As reported previously in Golfweek, Trump acquired the mobile phone number of new R&A chief executive Martin Slumbers last year. Trump has made frequent calls to Slumbers to promote Turnberry’s 2020 credentials. The property tycoon is spending approximately $250 million to upgrade the course and hotel on Scotland's southwest coast.

Slumbers will sit down with golf writers Monday for a roundtable discussion on a number of issues. Trump, and his Turnberry course, likely will dominate the discussion.

Wentworth! And You Thought Your Club Had Issues

Disfunction is often part of the club world but Audrey Gillan's Guardian piece summing up the Wentworth situation should make most club members feel better about any situation they might be questioning.

Thanks to reader Tom for sending in the piece, which recaps the £135m purchase in 2014 by a Chinese conglomerate chaired by Dr Chanchai Ruayrungruang, one of China’s wealthiest men. He promptly announced a plan to make the club a place for the super rich and now members are battling back, with a website and plans to create problems for the European Tour's flagship event in May, the BMW.

The group is even suggesting this is a national issue for Britain, which seems a bit of a stretch.

The threat to the BMW sounds real, however.

Wentworth Estate Roads Committee has the right to enforce restrictive covenants under the deed, because its prior approval “is required for any future property development, use of sponsored advertising signage, erection of tents and grandstands and organisation of rock concerts”.

This is a subtle threat to the PGA Tournament to be held in 29 May. It goes on less subtly: “The PGA Tournament is a nuisance and causes significant disruption to the day-to-day quality of life of the residents of the Wentworth Estate for many weeks before. The disruption and nuisance is amplified by additional activities such as BMW-sponsored events, including rock concerts, which are not necessary or incidental events to a golf tournament.”