No one is belittling anything Jack Nicklaus ever did…that he was denied Freedom Of The City (as Bobby Jones and Ben Franklin received before him) was a bit snippy on the part of the meisters of the burgh of St. Andrews. However, the blow was cushioned with the issuance of a monetary bill with the golden bear in his glory. A story in Golf Digest struck a different tone, as it resonated with the theme that has echoed throughout golf since Tiger Woods hit the scene: african-americans and golf. I do not say “minorities,” as latinos and asians ... full post »

Never too early to fire the first salvo in the Ryder Cup wars. Taking a virtual tour of the K Club’s Palmer Course, it occurs to me that more blood might be spilled, and more shorts might be stained, by the closing triumvirate of holes than at Kiawah Island in 1991. The water courses on holes 16-18 appear left, right, and center, and should claim a number of victims, mostly from the US side. Why? Check it out. Number 16 is a wee par four of 395 yards or metres (I can’t tell from the site.) It appears that surrounding trees ... full post »

Having just crawled out from under a rock, I beg your forgiveness. The new tee time structure on the PGA tour has me in awe of someone (maybe Finchem, maybe not). I stumbled onto today’s tee times, Sunday at Booz Allen, as I was pirouetting through the PGATour.Com site. Middle-Agers like me remember the single-tee, consecutive-start-beginning-at-dawn on weekdays and weekends. This new structure has players going off one and ten, all within a two-hour (1-3) period. Brilliant! If someone lights it up on the front, the back, or both, the cameras are ready. ... full post »

If you’re not following the Booz Allen Classic this week, tune in to PGA.Com for the PGA Professional National Championship. Sure, a few of these guys get to play in the USGA Open each year, and one or two actually make the cut. For the other 99%, the CPNC is their national championship. This year it arrives in upstate New York at the Turning Stone Resort, near Utica (huh?) Turning Stone boasts courses by Rick Smith (the guy who taught Phil how to play safe), RTJ Junior, and Tom Fazio. Rumors abound that at least two more courses will be built ... full post »

The way I see it, Miles Byrne (Ian Woosnam and the 15th club) and Christopher (Jean Van de Velde and the driver on 18 at Carnoustie) have company in the caddie hall of shame. They can now hold chairs for Monty’s looper and Bones MacKay, who could have should have would have, but didn’t, say something meaningful at the proper time. There he was, ready to claim the major title that had long eluded him. Long birdie putt on 17, fairway-splitting drive on 18, and Monty had a little shot into the green. After waiting with the proper club in ... full post »

Never, under any circumstance, should you pick the following to contend in a major championship (or even make the cut): David Toms…His sun has set. He is short, like me, and not burly, like Jason Zuback. His game is quaint and less than powerful. His putter is not hot enough to ever bring him close again. Davis Love III…The southern gentleman has his hand in everything but golf preparation. He has a family, and has no desire to alienate anyone through 100% devotion to the trade that got him here. Michael Campbell…Once and done. The Paul Lawrie of ... full post »

5:59 EST, with the projected cut at +9. Here are some of the notables. Feel free to criticize everything I write, with vehemence, venom, and vinesse (all right, the last word is fake.) I’m out, I’m in, I’m out, I’m in, I’m out Award: –Allan Doyle, thanks to a bogey-birdie-bogey-birdie-bogey finish. I’m Clutch! Award: –Stephen Gangluff, thanks to a birdie on the 450 yard 18th hole to get to +9. I almost barfed it away Award: –Ryuji Imada, +4 over the final five holes to finish at +9. Ryuji Imada Award: –Tim Herron, who scored +4 ... full post »

1. Great for the game of golf. Lots of hits to lots of websites that were tracking her progess, shot by shot. Raise your hand if you didn’t check out something else on the USGA, SI, PGA Tour, or Golf Channel sites. I know that I did. 2. Wie simply cannot putt really fast greens. This is the area where I agree that her avoidance of a ladder-style tournament evolution has hurt her. Had she learned to make pressure putts on slow, junior golf greens, she would then have transitioned to faster, women’s am ... full post »

I’ll start with Duffy Waldorf. You know him, but he survived a 15-for-1 playoff in Columbus, besting the likes of John Daly, Joe Daley, Jeff Maggert, Joe Ogilvie, Justin Rose and Kirk Triplett in the playoff. Let’s move across town to Columbus #2. Madalitso Muthiya of Zambia shot 65-69. If Ghana can make the World Cup, MaMu (his new nickname) can win THE OPEN!! If a Brazilian defender can be labeled KaKa (which means caca in every language on the globe), then we can knight the marvelous Madalitso Muthiya MAMU. Amateur heaven in Cresswell, Oregon, where Jonathan Moore completed ... full post »

Some of us are linear thinkers, while others are balloon-grabbers. The linear thinkers trace every line and connect all the dots. Balloon-grabbers respond to whatever stimulus or balloon floats by, and complete that particular task. As COO of Balloon-Grabbers International, ideas tend to circle my head with alarming regularity. One of those ideas that recently occurred to me was a way to make the Old Course at St. Andrews less popular. Why do people want to play the Old Course? History, you say. Remember that the Old Course, like most of written and oral history, ... full post »

Of late, I’ve been reading an interesting book by Eyal Press called Absolute Convictions. It details the battle over abortion rights in Buffalo and the USA during the 1980s and 1990s. For those who recall, Dr. Barnett Slepian was murdered by James Kopp, an ultra-right wing zealot who believed that violence was the solution to the problem. Press’ father, Dr. Shalom Press, worked with Slepian, and was next on “the list,” according to federal marshals. One of the points that Press makes quite eloquently is that a lot of white males go around making presumptive decisions for the ... full post »

Baldwin and McDonald, tired of the relentless assault of Michelle Wie supporters, have teamed up under the pen name of “Brett Avery” on PGATour.Com to chronicle the sectional qualifying rounds. No word on the legal ramifications. Seriously, can anyone explain Avery’s negativity? I guess the PGATour.Com folks are tired of getting scooped in the blog world by the dopplegangers themselves, messrs. McDonald and Baldwin. full post »

CLICK HERE to follow the USGA Open sectional qualifying at Canoe Brook. This is no blog, just a public service announcement. Cheer for John Pharr, too, who played on my golf team (the one I coach) a few years back. He is now a golfer at NYU. –Mon of the Ron P.S. If the link doesn’t work TRY THIS ONE and click Real Time Scoring near the top. full post »

Destination: Kohler, seemed like an appropriate log entry on Friday, Mem Weekend 1 as three guys piled into a beaten but proud 1998 Caravan, 11 hours shy of Kohler, Wisconsin. The land of milk and honey (not to mention cheese and big flags) beckoned like Eden, Valhalla, or the Ganges, calling us to the shores of Lake Michigan, reworked by the architect and Herb Kohler to resemble something natural, from somewhere else. Having surveyed the two route options, we decided to avoid the Buffalo-Fort Erie and Windsor-Detroit international-incident stops and stick to a NY-PA-OH-IN-IL-WI approach. We arrived around 11:30 ... full post »