18 observations, thoughts and predictions for the week in golf…
- Tom Brady’s stone-cold top of his tee shot at Pebble Beach is so comprehensive in its relatability and impact on him and everyone else. Brady grew up in Northern California and dreamed of playing Pebble Beach when golf became more than a curiosity. He started playing in the pro-am when he rose to stardom over 20 years ago. He hates being bad at anything and his competitiveness is legendary, and he can be a poor sport. The tee shot on the first at Pebble Beach will eat at him like a virus. It can happen and has happened to everyone, but not him until now. Brady loves the action, and he is a shit talker when competing at everything and now every single person he plays golf with has the “TOP” in their arsenal of abuse. Even the GOAT can be undressed by the game.
- Josh Allen has a likability that jumps through the screen wherever the venue. His love for golf was already known since he attended three of the majors last year as a fan. To see Allen with his dad caddying for him this past week was even more endearing. He proudly wore his new gear from Cypress Point during his Friday round at Pebble Beach and conducted interviews on Golf Channel with a full understanding of who Todd Lewis and Rich Lerner are. Allen loving golf is a good thing.
- LIV golf’s roster gets stronger and stronger, but I am curious to see where the traction is in local markets and across their growing reach digitally especially outside the United States. Mayakoba was always a modest crowd when it hosted a tour event but I’m hearing from a very good source in Las Vegas that the appetite for tickets for next week’s event, during Super Bowl is sparse, to put it kindly. The strategy to be in market for the first Super Bowl has some cache but watching golf off the strip while the world congregates for the first time in Sin City is not selling. If they can get some exposure for players from networks covering the game that’s a benefit but a no fans presentation contrasted against “golfapalooza” at the Waste Management is not a win.
- This past week was another example of Rory McIlroy displaying a willingness to express an opinion that is very different from a previous position. Rory was hyper critical of golf being a part of the Olympic program and used the stage of the Open Championship in 2016 to dismiss the competition in Rio. Part of that was rooted in him being used as a political football by government officials. His position changed completely and his participation in Tokyo was full circle. Similarly, Rory has expressed out and out hatred for LIV and the source of the money, but that position has evolved from resignation to acceptance. This past week he declared that LIV players should be welcomed back post haste without any penalty. A position not universally shared by his peers on the PGA Tour. His subsequent conversation with Jordan Spieth who suggested the PIF investment may or may not be needed after the SSG commitment would indicate McIlroy thinks the tour desperately needs the Saudi’s money knowing without it they will continue to strip away the tours best players.
- The USGA released their handicap rewind to all GHIN members this past week. It’s a clever review of all the scoring data for rounds in 2023. It was also a greenlight for countless people to share that information on social media. It would have been a good time for the USGA to also remind everyone that NOBODY CARES WHAT YOU SHOT, or when and how often.
- Bernard Langer was scheduled to compete in his final Masters this April and now that will have to wait a year after he tore his Achilles tendon training this past Thursday. At 66 his ability to win number 47 and beyond on PGA Tour champions was already going to be hard enough and now you must wonder if his final win to pass Hale Irwin is the end of the winningest career in tour history. I think he will get off the mat to win again.
- Every pundit, player and fan suggesting the private equity group, SSG, that just put 1.5 billion into the PGA Tour with the possibility of matching it to 3 billion is doing all of this for the good of men’s professional golf doesn’t know the first tenet of private equity. How do we make money off this investment? If a byproduct of the changes and advancements they make to the PGA Tour to make it more appealing to the consumer, and by a modest degree make the game better, great… but that is not their mission. It’s also not a criticism it’s just the plain truth.
- The Saudis are accustomed to getting what they want because they can buy anything and everything they want. In the same week of the SSG/PGA Tour deal, PIF invested in four premier rugby league teams. Their money, as I’ve said previously, is headed into other American sporting enterprises. It may be disgruntled by the tour’s new position, and they may not, but they could also turn their attention to purchasing the DP World Tour. Partnering is not their history but they may see the long-range value of a tour partnership. But one thing will not change about the Saudis, they play by their rules with the balance sheet being their continual tie breaker.
- Wyndham Clark’s round of 60 was terrific, and yes, it’s the lowest competitive round in Pebble beach history but it comes with the caveat. Lift, clean and place is a condition that alters the texture of the accomplishment. It doesn’t extinguish it, but it must be pointed out. It’s called an asterisk.
- Men’s elite professional golf is played in pants, not shorts. Jon Rahm trying to win a golf tournament in shorts makes the event feel unserious. Not diminishing anyone who wins a LIV event wearing shorts it just feels unserious.
- LIV golf had a moment with Pebble being pushed to Monday. Rahm in the mix and Sergio and Joaquin Niemann taking their playoff into the darkness. Niemann is a wonderful player but when his first reaction is that he’s not in the majors you lose the moment. The aggrieved act is not only not accurate since he is in the Open and likely in the PGA, but it rings hollow since every player who took the money knew the circumstances, and if they didn’t shame on them and or their agents for not knowing the possible major roulette they were playing.
- LIV shows golf shots and always has. It does not get bogged down in elements that are either sold or frivolous. The production is first rate, and they are required to sell the team concept because it is part of the competition but if you are not interested in the team concept the sales job gets redundant and stale, very quickly.
- Wyndham Clark joins a strong list of 54-hole winners at Pebble Beach including Johnny Miller, Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, John Cook and Payne Stewart. Weird irony that in a week where LIV got some real run with the golf gasbags that a SIGNATURE series event on the PGA tour with a short field, a 20-million-dollar purse was reduced to 54 holes.
- Justin Thomas had one bogey free round in 72 rounds played last year on tour. He has three bogey free rounds in seven rounds played in 2024. A warm putter is all that stands between him and a huge break back to where he’s always been…at the top of the food chain.
- Dylan Frittelli strongly considered doing something else when his game left him, and he found himself examining what would be next. Instead, he dug in and Sunday he won the Bahrain Championship on the DP World Tour. His first win on that tour since 2017. Just another story of someone staring into the abyss and batting it away to find success again.
- Caleb Surratt made the choice to leave the University of Tennessee and take the LIV money and join Jon Rahm’s new team. Sunday, he birdied his last five holes and cashed a check for $350,000 and also shares in the split of $3 million for the team win. Whenever the dust settles, Surratt will have to satisfy some likely qualifying process since he never had status on the PGA Tour. Talent doesn’t hide, whatever he will need to do he will do it swiftly, he’s a dude.
- Mark Hubbard finishes in a tie for 4th at Pebble beach and rakes a big check and huge points. His engagement off the 18th green in 2015 at Pebble will always be his greatest memory there but this past week was huge for his ability to land starts in the best events after ending last year 64th in the FedEx Cup fall.
- Waste Management Phoenix Open week is here. Having seen all the debauchery, imbibing and the sheer scale of the whole thing for many years I always found it thoroughly entertaining. The enormity of the build out, the grandiosity of the footprint and the singular experience make it truly different. In a current landscape of way too much sameness, WM has something most of the others just say they have, a brand.