• Hate to be Rude: Davis Love III
Jeff Rude’s “I Hate To Be Rude” column appears on Golfweek.com on Friday, the same day as his video show of the same name.ATLANTA – What a difference a week makes. Particularly if your name is Kenny Perry. The Kentucky gentleman might be one of 30 lucky golfers playing for $7 million at the Tour Championship ($1.25 million first prize), but it’s clear to say he’d rather be working on his cars back home in Franklin.
Perry shot 76-75 the first two days and wasn’t happy he had to submit to a random drug test for the second time since the program’s inception in July.
“This has ruined the greatest week of my life coming here,” said Perry, adding he’d rather be home celebrating his Ryder success. “It really has.”
It’s refreshing that a professional athlete in effect is saying big money isn’t everything.
• Before this gets washed away and even more lost in the shuffle, let’s just say J.B. Holmes’ finishing kick at the Ryder Cup didn’t get enough credit. In his near-clinching, 2-and-1 singles victory over Soren Hansen, Holmes hit approach shots to within 5 feet of the flagstick on each of his final four holes, Nos. 14-17, making three birdies for a closeout.
That’s about as good of golf as you’ll see under high pressure, non-Tiger Woods division.
• If the PGA of America’s objective truly is to win the Ryder Cup, then it should bring back winning captain Paul Azinger for the 2010 matches in Wales. Why get rid of a coach who finally finds a winning formula? Not naming Azinger again makes as much sense as Cowboys owner Jerry Jones firing Jimmy Johnson after two consecutive Super Bowl victories.
But don’t expect Zinger to return. Word is the PGA already has its next guy. I’d be shocked if Corey Pavin doesn’t get the nod, or already hasn’t been told. Three hints: He was an assistant captain in 2006, he got a special exemption into this year’s PGA Championship and he was spotted at this year’s Ryder Cup.
Besides, if Azinger isn’t retained and Larry Nelson isn’t rewarded as he should have been in the 1990s, who else is there if the PGA continues to choose from former major champions and Ryder Cup stars in their late 40s?
• Speaking of Ryder captains, Nick Faldo might not have been the model leader, but he didn’t deserve to be impaled by the British press. Let’s review his three most controversial moves: Picking Ian Poulter over Darren Clarke. Poulter was Europe’s best player at Valhalla.
Resting Sergio Garcia and Lee Westwood for the Saturday morning session. That was the only four-match session Europe won.
Slotting strong players Poulter, Lee Westwood and Padraig Harrington at the bottom of the Sunday singles lineup when entering the day down 9-7.
If any, the latter deserves some second guessing. As it turned out, the Americans clinched the Cup before those three matches ended. But had Hunter Mahan not made a 45-footer at 17 and Holmes not turned into Ben Hogan after struggling with short irons for a couple of days, those matches would’ve mattered and the Europeans might have won.
What’s more, had Steve Stricker not got up and down from hay on 18 Saturday and Robert Karlsson not missed a 6-foot eagle putt there, the matches would’ve been tied entering Sunday.
In other words, the competition was closer than the 16 1/2-11 1/2 final score might indicate, and Faldo wasn’t as bad as the British tabloids screamed.
• Vijay Singh in effect clinched the FedEx Cup on Sept. 7 by tapping in in front of just a few people on the ninth green at the BMW Championship. Then Singh exited without talking with NBC and the assembled news media interested in how he might spend his $10 million windfall. This dud wasn’t what the organizers had in mind in the board room.
So, yes, the points will be tweaked for Year 3 and look for the Tour braintrust to come up with a plan that makes the final round of the Tour Championship feel like more than an anticlimactic last day of a cash-grab exhibition. Golf fans and sponsor Coca-Cola need more bang.
Though it’s fashionable these days to pan the FedEx Cup playoffs as an unexciting finish to a long regular season, perspective says this: Tim Finchem needed to come up with a compelling model, something like the playoffs, at the last network TV negotiations to provide value and ensure rising purses after some networks lost millions the previous four years. Also, this beats the alternative of the days of yore when the likes of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson would vanish after the PGA Championship.
• Trivia question: Ryan Palmer ranks first on the PGA Tour in birdies, second in putting, T-28 in hitting approach shots close and 34th in ballstriking. Where does he rank in earnings? (Answer below.)
• Though the eight-decades-old Ryder Cup is bigger and better than the 14-year-old Presidents Cup, that doesn’t mean the old man on the block couldn’t improve by copying a few things from its younger, less-ballyhooed sidekick.
Like spreading the matches over four days and letting all players play the first two days.
• Bubba Watson and others interested in improving the FedEx Cup have done some hand wringing over the fact 2008 double-major winner Padraig Harrington didn’t advance to the Tour Championship.
Meanwhile, I’m sure a tired Harrington is doing something else with his hands over not being here the week after a Ryder loss: Clapping them.
• Visited the Bobby Jones Trophy Room at Atlanta Athletic Club this week. The display includes duplicates of Jones’ Grand Slam trophies from 1930 and many interesting pieces of memorabilia. But, according to a club official, the most valuable item is the smallest: Jones’ first trophy as a kid.
Word is he went to bed with that miniature hardware and said he received it not because he shot the lowest score but because he was “the cutest.”
• Trivia answer: Despite those great statistics, Palmer is 134th on the money list. Once again figures lie. The reason it doesn’t add up: Palmer has had short-game troubles, ranking 161st in scrambling (getting up and down 54.7 percent of the time) and T-172 in sand saves. So it’s easy to guess how he’s going to spend his offseason.
• Not that we don’t want to improve readership, but Jack Nicklaus, please don’t read this because you’ll get another migraine: The 2011 PGA Championship at Atlanta Athletic Club will have two par 4s over 500 yards.
Come to think of it, golf purist Hal Sutton or anyone else repulsed by bomber ball shouldn’t read that, either.
How far is too far? The question never seems to go away.
• John Daly’s fourth wife, Sherrie, surrendered to police and was released on bond Friday after being accused of theft. To avoid redundancy, no further comment necessary.
Posted: 9/26/2008
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