PGA Tour: "Bridgestone" / Reno-Tahoe: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).Whatever the merits of corporations appointing golfing ambassadors, and the impact they had on the quality of last week's Glen Abbey field, it is unarguable that two of those ambassadors provided a thoroughly absorbing RBC Canadian Open last week. Snedeker proved he has finally, and fully, rebounded from rib problems to his early season form, while Mahan played beautifully before returning to Dallas for the birth of his Zoe.

2).Sneds will be forgiven if he cruises through this week's Bridgestone event, and punters will be forgiven for thinking he might take it easy this week, honing his game for Oak Hill's PGA Championship. His schedule is hectic as his long-time sponsor Wyndham are hosting the Greensboro event following the PGA, and right before the Play-Offs begin.
(Hadn't realised that Snedeker's caddie, Scott Vail, is Eric Vail's son - Eric Vail was an extremely talented ice-hockey player for the Atlanta/Calgary Flames franchise during the 70's, scoring bucketloads of goals but with a work ethic that ultimately fell foul of the increasingly disciplined regimes of the time. Imagine Scotty has already passed his Dad in career earnings!)

3).Hunner is taking this week off and hopefully will get some sleep before the PGA. It'll be inneresting to see what birthday pressie Snedeker gets for Baby Zoe, as Daddy Hunner had stretched last week's field and looked completely in control - he should win much more than he does and maybe this was a tournament that got away, for all the right reasons.

4).Messrs McGirt, Bohn (seems one of the genuinely good guys on Tour so happy to see him playing well again) and Badds wrapped up their Tour cards for 2013/2014, but others slip inexorably in to the mire of uncertainty, including Gary Woodland, Charlie Wi and Ben Crane.
Appleby helped himself but is still in trouble while others such as Colsaerts and Hanson desperately need some good finishes this week and next.
And then there's Mansfield Man, Greg Owen, who played himself in to job security only to make a pig's ear of the par-5 18th in bogeying it on Saturday. But fortitude saw him retrieve that situation and came to #18 on Sunday needing a birdie to secure himself "playing privileges" for next season. So, from a perfect position, he shanked his wedge in to the drink, wrapped up a closing double, and has to play well this week and at Greensboro to survive.
His Bay Hill horlicks was no fluke - his 15th club is a blunderbuss with which to blast away at his feet at the most inopportune moments.

5).We can't stop writing about Russell Knox so here we go again, in the wake of his web.com 59 last Friday. Unfortunately he was unable to spin that in to a victory and a PGA Tour card for next year, but he's surely got the right stuff as illustrated by his post-59 comment:
"I didn't come here to shoot 59, I came here to win the tournament." Better luck this week, Russell, in Reno.

6).Finally for last week, and moving to Russia for a moment, Michael Hoey won his 5th European Tournament. I'll repeat a curiosity I spotted in his career record on the European Tour web-site:
This is Hoey's 5th win, but he has only three other Tour top ten finishes. That seems extraordinary to me and the only thing I can imagine compares, on a totally different level of course, is Tiger Woods's record in Majors pre 2008 surgery:
Won 14.
Other top tens: 13.
Closer.

7).And so to Bridgestone and Reno-Tahoe.
There are sure to be divergent views on WGC's, especially the "cookie-cutter" versions at Doral and Bridgestone, but they can't be ignored and, no doubt the select few who will still be grinding out a result on Sunday afternoon will provide excellent entertainment. But the difference for most of the field between a 20th place finish and 40th, say, or 50th, is just so much petty cash and hardly surprising if the majority will care more about getting to Rochester than ekeing out a result.

8).Who will win? No idea, but Firestone Furyk is a course specialist, should have won last year, and played well in Oh Canada. No doubt the likes of Westwood and Jason Day will "ball-strike" their way to a fat cheque and it's impossible to look past Woods's multiple victories here. More important for some Europeans will be to play well enough to extend their season in to the Play-Offs, Martin Kaymer for instance, while Play-Off participation is synonymous with a job next year for Colsaerts and Hanson - has anyone managed their season worse than Peter Hanson?

9).Ah, yes! I can see Ross Fisher putting up his hand in Reno - sorry Fish, forgot about you.
There's a very competitive field on the Nevada/California border for the Tour's annual Stableford event. Harrington will be there looking to extend his season and guys like Fisher, Karlsson, Knox, Norlander and Owen will hope for a decent result to take in to the season's final "regular" event in Greensboro.

10).Very pleased to see Paul Casey teeing it up at Bridgestone. At least as talented as any of the thirty-something British crew, this could be the second step towards rehabilitation as a top PGA Tour golfer and threat at upcoming Major Championships. Paul has got a long way to go before returning to golf's upper echelon, but a top finish this week, and/or next week at Oak Hill, could see him earning his PGA Tour card after two miserable years in the wilderness. Good luck to him.

mystiroakey wrote:
We can speak out about the wrongs our country is doing today. But lets forget about the history that we have no control of.

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.

Surprised Mac hasn't been on here crying crocodile tears about Bongo Bongo land

super_realist wrote:Surprised Mac hasn't been on here crying crocodile tears about Bongo Bongo land

Why would you waste oxygen criticising such well laid out and thoughtful comments from an indubitably superior intellect? Or feckwit as we call them round these parts.

incontinentia wrote:

mystiroakey wrote:
We can speak out about the wrongs our country is doing today. But lets forget about the history that we have no control of.

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.

We can all learn from our own mistakes. But the people that blame the Brits or English for what some people did 20 years ago let alone 400 years ago can do one IMO..

There victim complex's are not going to make me feel ashamed..!

mystiroakey wrote:

incontinentia wrote:

mystiroakey wrote:
We can speak out about the wrongs our country is doing today. But lets forget about the history that we have no control of.

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.

We can all learn from our own mistakes. But the people that blame the Brits or English for what some people did 20 years ago let alone 400 years ago can do one IMO..

There victim complex's are not going to make me feel ashamed..!

True, its not like you ever get a Brit having a go at the Germans about the war is it....
I do agree with you Mysti though, stuff that happened in the 19th Century and also after the two world wars, policy that Britain had a huge part in, is responsible for so many of the problems in the middle East and other areas today. Now I have no issue with the fact that you cant really change history that far back, what's done is done. However the problem is we are still meddling, Iraq should show that sadly lessons aren't learnt and its the continued meddling that means an awful lot of people don't forget all the prior meddling that helped cause the problems in the first place.

I blame the Jews , if not them, it's the immigrants.

Bob_the_Job wrote:

mystiroakey wrote:Thanks for youe thoughts bob. I understand how impossible it is for you northern irish..

Impossible?  It's fantastic!  Beautiful place, brilliant golf courses and up until recently a reputation that kept the pesky tourists away so we could have it all to ourselves  

I shouldn't...but .

incontinentia wrote:

mystiroakey wrote:
We can speak out about the wrongs our country is doing today. But lets forget about the history that we have no control of.

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.

Eh!? Who said anything about 'forgetting'??? Mysti wasn't forgetting. In fact, looked entirely the opposite to me. He didn't say forget but you can't dwell in that past all the time.

Diggers wrote:I do agree with you Mysti though, stuff that happened in the 19th Century and also after the two world wars, policy that Britain had a huge part in, is responsible for so many of the problems in the middle East and other areas today. Now I have no issue with the fact that you cant really change history that far back, what's done is done. However the problem is we are still meddling, Iraq should show that sadly lessons aren't learnt and its the continued meddling that means an awful lot of people don't forget all the prior meddling that helped cause the problems in the first place.

To be fair Digs, I defy anyone to have made much of a better job of partitioning all that the British Empire had to help chop up and re-define borders after WWI. They may have, they may not have. We were the main Empire power in the middle east then and certainly the only one with any clout in late 1918. You can't look at decisions made then through a prism of today's morals and 20:20 hindsight. If not us, someone else would have FUBAR'd it quite nicely. I hate to put it to people like Mac, but there really isn't a Utopian paradise somewhere who're so much better.

navyblueshorts wrote:

Diggers wrote:I do agree with you Mysti though, stuff that happened in the 19th Century and also after the two world wars, policy that Britain had a huge part in, is responsible for so many of the problems in the middle East and other areas today. Now I have no issue with the fact that you cant really change history that far back, what's done is done. However the problem is we are still meddling, Iraq should show that sadly lessons aren't learnt and its the continued meddling that means an awful lot of people don't forget all the prior meddling that helped cause the problems in the first place.

To be fair Digs, I defy anyone to have made much of a better job of partitioning all that the British Empire had to help chop up and re-define borders after WWI. They may have, they may not have. We were the main Empire power in the middle east then and certainly the only one with any clout in late 1918. You can't look at decisions made then through a prism of today's morals and 20:20 hindsight. If not us, someone else would have FUBAR'd it quite nicely. I hate to put it to people like Mac, but there really isn't a Utopian paradise somewhere who're so much better.

Well that's certainly something to aspire to...

Ah, another 'Utopian'. Little point in discussing it, it would seem.

Not really, nothing changes for the better with that attitude (young man)

Happy to discuss (mate), but let's take it to the D4S 'Anything Goes' thread, this is a bit off-topic...