Woods, Hanse To Design 36 And Maybe Help Put Oahu Golf On The Map?

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For Immediate Release on Pacific Links’ big plans for Mākaha Valley Resort, with one Tiger Woods and one Gil Hanse design:

Pacific Links Press Release – Wednesday 3rd April 2019

  • Pacific Links International (PLI) announces Tiger Woods and Gil Hanse as designers of two world-class golf courses on the island of Oahu, Hawaii

  • Mākaha North Course (TGR Design) and Mākaha South Course (Hanse Golf Course Design) will become the highlight of the Mākaha Valley Resort

  • PLI is working with community leaders, landowners, native Hawaiian cultural practitioners and regulatory agencies on the project’s long-term vision

Golfing icon Tiger Woods and his TGR Design company have today been unveiled as lead architects for one of two spectacular golfing layouts to be created at Mākaha Valley Resort, Hawaii, a project commissioned by Pacific Links International, the world’s premier golfing network. Inspired by the pristine setting on Oahu’s Leeward Coast, TGR Design will lead the development of the Mākaha North Course, while Gil Hanse, creator of the Olympic Course in Rio de Janeiro, will develop the Mākaha South Course. Together, these world-class, tournament-quality layouts will become the centre pieces of the Mākaha Valley Resort, a 644-acre mixed-use property developed in conjunction with community leaders and native cultural practitioners on Hawaii’s third-largest island.

WATCH: To view a video which celebrates the announcement of Tiger Woods and Gil Hanse as designers of Mākaha North and South

As Jason Scott Deegan notes for GolfAdvisor.com based on his time in Hawaii, this may finally be the project that puts Oahu golf on the map. To this point, the golf tourism side of things there has been pretty weak.

Roundup: The Augusta National Women's Amateur Is Here As Is The First Women's Major Of 2019

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Golfweek’s Beth Ann Nichols sets up the 54-hole Augusta National Women’s Amateur and after reading the player’s excitement , with all 72 getting to play Augusta National Friday, the format is aging well (as opposed to all getting to play prior to the two rounds at Champions Retreat followed by the final round Saturday).

But before Augusta, there’s Champions Retreat, a 27-hole facility with nines designed by Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and Arnold Palmer.

Rain pushed back Tuesday’s low-key practice round at Champions Retreat, where players pulled out long irons and hybirds a bit more than expected.

The signage, food (including prices), merchandise and pairings sheet look the same as what you’d find at the Masters. The logo is different, of course, and the scoreboards are electronic, but there are enough similarities here to make it feel like we’re in a neighboring zip code.

Out in the west where the ANA Inspiration starts Thursday, three of the top five players in the Women’s World Amateur Rankings accepted invites while four of the top 11 are there instead of Augusta. But LPGA Tour Commish Mike Whan is sounding (finally) more positive about the week and attention given to women’s golf, reports Randall Mell in this look at the co-existing events.

“I think there’s the potential the media coverage will end up being dramatically greater this week,” Whan said. “Everyone has their reporters talking about women’s golf. When’s the last time we can say that? Even when we play the U.S. Women’s Open, I’m not sure that happens.”

Also worth noting will be cross promotion and the impact from NBC/Golf Channel’s coverage at Augusta and how that aids the ANA Inspiration. Which reminds me: NBC coverage is from noon ET to 3:30 ET Saturday. I

And first of many plugs: I’ve worked with Golf Channel’s Dominic Dastoli on a feature that will air during ANWA Live From coverage that looks at Bobby Jones and the role several all-time great female amateurs played in his life.

The official tournament website where you can read coverage and see scores.

Ryan Lavner profiles U. Of Arizona’s Haley Moore, one of the top players and most recognizable in the field given her NCAA and ANA Inspiration play in recent years.

Maria Fasi is filing a daily diary and offered a lot of insight into how the players are being treated. As usual, there are rules, but also spectacular attention to detail.

Tonight we’re going to the Chairman’s Dinner at the clubhouse. I’m never been to Augusta National before, so it’s going to be super exciting just to drive down Magnolia Lane and be at such a historic place.

I’m especially looking forward to the shopping experience they have planned in the pro shop. We get to pick two shirts, a pullover and a hat from our tournament. Then we can just buy whatever we want. They are bringing everything that we buy to our room and leaving it there for us. Every little detail has been taken of.

If video is your thing, here is Golf Central’s setup, followed by Matt Adams and I discussing what we’re most interested in seeing. Hint: we both picked the golf course and how these women tackle Augusta National.

A stellar group shot from the first Chairman’s dinner on what looked like a beautiful evening in Augusta.

There's Life In The Old Masters App And Social Accounts!

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Tie to download the update folks, the High Holy days are almost here. If you’re an Android user, sorry, I don’t have your link.

The Instagram account has been teasing us too, with some stellar flashback’s to great calls.

The 1960 and 1997 editions stood out.

Is it me is or Tiger less upright over the putter then?

Dell Match Play Sunday Ratings Plummet Without Tiger; How About A Monday Finish?

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Austin Karp reports on Saturday’s 2.4 rating for the 2019 Dell Match Play featuring Tiger Woods in the round of 8.

Sunday’s final day on NBC featuring the Kevin Kisner-Matt Kuchar final saw it’s lowest last day rating since 2010 Karp reports, a 1.6. However, that all time low was against the Vancouver Olympic Games. This year’s 1.6 was only slightly down from the 1.8 Sunday drew the last two years.

Still, there is a sense that Sunday is anti-climactic, whether due to player fatigue (and so-so-golf) or just the limits of only have two matches.

I proposed on Morning Drive a Thursday start, with Saturday’s broadcast bringing us elimination day while Sunday shows us the round of 16 and round of 8. This would get the final match away from the NCAA Regional Finals and let golf get some limelight with a Monday finish, perhaps late in the day on Golf Channel. The current sponsor is said to not be pleased with the small crowds and small field on Sunday’s.

My chat on this with Morning Drive’s Damon Hack:



ANWA Theme Music Debuts, The Players Can Only Ponder What Might Have Been?

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If you’re still scratching your head over that forgettable new Players Championship music replacing a very memorable theme, hearing the new Augusta National Women’s Amateur theme won’t help matters

While it’s not Dave Loggins piano ballad—what is—the ANWA theme appears to have a hook and as soon as it appears in a place of purchase, I’ll be adding it to my Masters playlist for the drive to Augusta.

Kuchar, Sergio Film PSA: Stop Obsessing About Our Match Play Dust-Up

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I’m all for any kind of match play drama and the Matt Kuchar-Sergio Garcia negotiation over a short miss by Sergio before Kuchar could concede was fun. But it was not the stuff of the attention it’s getting since Garcia acknowledged mistake, took full responsibility and Kuchar wisely held his ground.

Well the two combatants put the whole thing to rest (maybe) with this PSA filmed Monday at Austin Golf Club, with Kuchar doing all the talking.


Justine Reed Plans To Be First Wife To Attend Champions Dinner, Asks Guy Fieri To Help In The Kitchen

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Celebrity chef Guy Fieri will be helping with the Champions Dinner

Celebrity chef Guy Fieri will be helping with the Champions Dinner

After successfully convincing instructor David Leadbetter to help with her husband’s game without Patrick Reed’s knowledge, Justine Reed is pulling out all the stops as her man prepares his Augusta National return. She has enlisted celebrity chef Guy Fieri to take over Champion’s Dinner preparations just two weeks shy of the annual Tuesday gathering where her husband is this 2019’s host.

Via text, Mrs. Reed confirmed the news. 

“Guy and I chatted at length about the menu and we are pleased to welcome him to the team,” Justine Reed said. “He is going to ensure that Patrick stays on his current diet while all of the former champions get something better than what the club wanted Patrick to serve.” 

Justine also confirmed her intention to be the first spouse to attend the Champion’s Dinner. While Patrick is not yet aware of his wife’s plan just as he was not aware of the Leadbetter outreach, Justine confirmed her plan to this decision out on their shared wavelength sometime Monday night of tournament week.

“I don’t want to bother him while he’s trying to find a swing,” she texted.

The 2018 winner’s spouse has grown concerned about the Champions Dinner and decided to contact the host of Diners, Drive Ins and Dives to make last minute changes for this year’s gathering of living Masters winners and the current chairman.

A Masters spokesman would not discuss Fieri’s standard practice of including a Food Network camera crew wherever he goes, but did confirm the club has reminded the charismatic host that Augusta National forbids the wearing of sunglasses inside its clubhouse.

Source: Mueller Report’s Mid-April Release Designed To Avoid The Masters

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William Barr informed lawmakers last week of plans to release a redacted Special Counsel report on Russian interference by mid-April.

Left out of the Attorney General’s letter, according to senior-level Justice Department sources: Barr is waiting for the Masters to conclude before sharing the redacted Mueller report with the public.

“The AG knows the President doesn’t want his executive time interrupted,” said one official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “The President is planning to watch a lot of the Masters. So no report until April 15 at the earliest.”

The Attorney General wrote last week to Congress explaining why he could not meet an April 2 deadline set by the judiciary committee.

“Everyone will soon be able to read it,” Mr. Barr wrote. Yet he did not elaborate on what sources say was the primary reason for delay: the 2019 Masters.

An Augusta National spokesman declined comment when asked if the club influenced the decision. However, several longtime members are reportedly still bothered by the distraction caused when U.S. troops took Baghdad in 2003 and felled Saddam Hussein’s statue as Chairman Hootie Johnson was giving his annual State Of The Masters press conference.

“That was just not well orchestrated by the generals,” said an Augusta National source. “The last thing America needs to be doing tournament week is reading the Mueller Report when we could be watching The Masters.”

USGA Advertises For Player Relations Officer To Work Between Staff And Executive Committee

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Buoyed by goodwill over the expansion of their players relations staff to communicate between the USGA and professional golf tours, the USGA is looking for a “Jason Gore-like” person. The goal is to improve communications between the Far Hills-based staff and the organization’s 16-person Executive Committee.

Sources at ziprecruiter.com first spotted the job posting and shared with GeoffShackelford.com.

As always, I’ve copy and pasted here if or ever anyone takes the job:   

From the money-losing USGA Handicap System to the annual cash-cow that is the U.S. Open, to modernizing the game’s Rules to a totally unappreciative audience of spoiled golfers, while supporting sustainable golf course management practices 51 weeks a year, the United States Golf Association promotes the health of a game that inspires, challenges, and rewards like nothing else can. Most of the time. If you have the leisure time and disposable income.

Are you looking to join a dynamic team that meets as much as eight times in a day to promote and protect the conservative spirit of golf? 

The Executive Committee (XC) Partnership Builder is a front-line intermediary role position responsible for qualifying, cultivating, soliciting, massaging and sharing thoughts from the XC to USGA staff leadership so that the XC members are not encumbered by time-consuming small talk with staff.

Relationships will be cultivated by meeting with XC members at primarily southeastern and southwestern five-star resorts during winter before transitioning to northeastern clubs in summer. The individual will travel extensively while possibly getting to play the occasional round at a Golf Digest Top 100 course. (Caddie fees typically not expensible).

WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT:

• Manage a portfolio of 16 XC members with divergent individual needs spread throughout the country’s best neighborhoods and gated communities. 

• In conjunction with the Chief People Officer and Deputy Chief of Staff, establish annual goals for visits, solicitations and filtering all ideas proposed, no matter how asinine.

• Develop strategies and prepare proposals—including written documentation—for accurate recording and acknowledgment of mostly dull ideas hatched from Sea Island to the Monterey Peninsula.

WHAT YOU BRING TO THE USGA:

• A minimum of a BA/BS degree with 5-7 years of experience as a front-line communicator, unless you were one of four former White House Communication Directors over the last two years.

• Retain demonstrated ability to create and cultivate relationships with a variety of inflated egos and sometimes out of touch individuals who prefer to converse only with those in a similar tax bracket.

• No prior experience in the golf industry necessary but if you do play golf, do not expect to get into Somerset Hills until the next Great Recession. 

• Proven track record of recording ideas, nodding head in convincing fashion

• Strong working knowledge of America’s most storied vacation spots, with a keen ability to explain the difference between The Breakers and The Cloisters

• Positive attitude and the ability to display consistent initiative no matter how condescending the treatment is by an XC member

• The ability to travel up to 90% of the year in economy class or Main Cabin Extra/Premium Economy if status allows. Private jet travel forbidden.

• Strong working knowledge of fine wine, with an emphasis on American vintages.

• Strong working knowledge of America’s golf architects, with an ability to understand the difference between an A.W. Tillinghast Redan and a C.B. Macdonald Redan. Never say Rodan. 

Sergio Garcia To Be First Masters Champions To Receive A Dedicated Walking Official

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Beset by regular run-ins with the rules of golf and etiquette, Masters Chairman Fred Ridley has enlisted a retired USGA official to serve as Sergio Garcia’s personal walking rules official for next week’s Masters.

“We have such a strong affinity for our Champions and want to make sure that Sergio Garcia feels welcome both on the course and off,” Chairman Ridley said in a statement. “Keeping in line with the vision of our founders, it is essential we make sure that Sergio has the best possible experience at the 2019 Masters.”

The decision to enlist a personal rules valet is a big one given Augusta National’s preference for only seeing players and caddies inside the ropes. Normally rulings are administered by officials roving throughout the course after a player calls them in to assess a situation.

The call was made by Chairman Ridley soon after Garcia’s disqualification at the European Tour’s Saudi Arabia stop for damaging greens. Augusta National reportedly considered appointing a second dedicated official after Saturday’s Dell Match Play dust-up when Garcia raked a putt away before Matt Kuchar could concede the tap-in.

Several Twitter users have posted photos of former USGA director of rules and competitions Tom Meeks preparing at a local Indianapolis library, where he was seen reading Clifford Roberts’ Story Of Augusta National Golf Club, Emily Post’s Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics, and at Home, and the Richmond County civil code.

The Forecaddie reports that Meeks has told friends he will be trailing Garcia both on and off the course, also ensuring the 2017 Champion does not violate any of Augusta National’s many house rules or even the Augusta, Georgia speed limits.

Got To Gram Before Wheels Up: Rory McIlroy Apologizes For Storming Out Of Match Play

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Nice of Rory McIlroy to realize the error of his ways in blowing off the assembled scribblers after his fun—except for the 16th hole—battle with Tiger Woods in the 2019 WGC Dell Match Play.

His almost unimaginably long drive followed by six shots at the par-5 16th might have had something to do with it, as Steve DiMeglio notes for Golfweek.

Moochgate 2 Never Hits Theaters: Sergio Takes The Blame For Raking Ball Before Kuchar Can Concede

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We were so close to having a fabulous squabble on our hands, but Sergio Garcia eventually came to his senses after some mid-round tension in the WGC Dell Match Play. Our dreams of Moochgate 2 were dashed when it went straight to video (long story, under 20 year olds).

Bob Harig of ESPN.com on the negotiation between the green vandal and the mooch.

It was after that hole where Garcia suggested to Kuchar that he concede a hole to make up for what happened on the seventh.

"I thought about it and said I don't like that idea, either," Kuchar said.

"Typically there's an acknowledgement," he added of a conceded putt. "I understand how the concession needs to be vocal and I try to do a really good job. I hate it when guys sort of mumble something. I always try to be very clear, very vocal. This is one where I was on the back of the green. It happened so fast. I knew I hadn't conceded it. But it was never a tactic or anything."

Despite the apparent tension within the match, Garcia backed away from any controversy after it.

"It's quite simple: I screwed it up, it's as simple as that," he said. "Obviously I missed my putt and I kind of tapped it with the back of my putter before he said anything. It's a loss of hole. I understand that.

"There are many options that you can do if you don't want to take the hole, even though I've already lost that hole. But obviously he didn't like any of the options that were there. It's fine. At the end of the day, I'm the one who made the mistake."

Boo!

The mistake by Garcia that likely cost him his match in Saturday’s round of 8:

Lucy Li WD's From ANWA, Probably Does Everyone A Favor

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Not that many will feel good about losing the marquee player in next week’s first-ever Augusta National Women’s Amateur, especially to an unspecified injury (mild thumb sprain according to Golf Channel’s Steve Burkowski). But Lucy Li was coming to the inaugural event with tainted amateur status. The USGA ruled that she had violated amateur status rules but allowed her to retain her standing.

Li’s withdrawal, announced just days before the first round, does take away a marquee player but also allows the event to focus on the amateur standing of those in attendance.

Beth Ann Nichols reports for Golfweek on the two additions to the field in place of Li and Alex Melton.

Tiger Hits A Stellar Lefty Shot From The Bushes, Loses To Snedeker

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Tiger may have lost to Brandt Snedeker, setting up a likely elimination unless he beats Patrick Cantlay and Aaron Wise takes out Snedeker (or Snedeker ties, Tiger wins).

Anyway, he only briefly stopped to talk to a PGA Tour staff member so we didn’t get to ask him about this spectacular recovery shot: