PGA Tour: South of the Border: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).The Tour travels south of the border this week, from Las Vegas to Mayakoba, the 6th of 7 autumn events before the "Holidays" break.
We also have the final action of the Champions Tour season, and the continuation of Stage 2 web.com Q-School.

2).A funny old finish to last week's Shriners Las Vegas Open; strong winds which were widely forecast for Sunday's play stayed away until the final few holes, by which time it looked as if the winning score from golf's young guns would be about 12 under par. Alex Cejka posted an early 9 under, then hung around as a breeze finally picked up and the leaders fell apart, leaking oil, hubcaps flying, wheels well and truly off; all of which may have caused the dozens of multiple winners in the field to wonder why their leaderboard-experience had been wasted.
Eventually Cantlay joined Whee Kim and Cejka in a yawn of a play-off, winning with the only par in, collectively, six holes.

3).Cantlay burst onto the scene six years ago with top 25 finishes in each of the first four Tour events he played, including a second round 60 at The Travelers. Playing sporadically he reached 176th in the 2013 owgr's but injuries dogged him thereafter until he returned with a vengeance last season.
He's up to 42 in the world rankings now and will continue a meteoric rise up the owgr charts, very likely to be a Top Ten golfer by the end of 2018 as his tournaments-played "divisor" is still only 14. (By comparison Rahm's divisor is 37.)
Perhaps by then he'll've learned to make it look as if he's enjoying himself.

4).Graeme McDowell registered his first Top Ten (just, T10) for fifteen months, hopefully the sign of better things to come as he returns to Mayakoba where he won in 2015.

5).robopz mentioned the apparent "futility" of Thomas Pieters' work in the Far East, no Top 25's in his first three tournaments as a PGA Tour member. But he DID register 3 starts . . . . . . all in limited field events!
So, how are the newly minted double dippers doing, as measured by FedEx Cup points in a season when 400 points (and probably a few less) will secure membership for another season?:
196 pts: Casey (in 3 tournaments)
175: Uihlein (3) (Assume he'll keep his ET card as long as it doesn't impair his ability to compete in the US.)
67: Hatton (1)
48: Fleetwood (1)
42: Pieters (3)
27: Noren (1)
6: Fisher (1)

6).San Diego natives, both getting on in years by Tour standards, won two of the last three "OHL Classics" at Mayakoba.
Charlie Hoffman & Pat Perez have both enjoyed a late-career resurgence since, including a further win apiece. Hoffman's earned over $9M in the last three years since his win, whilst Perez has banked more than $5M in the last 12 months.
The Greg Norman-designed course receives good reviews so perhaps it's a little surprising that more top players don't escape to Playa Del Carmen. But Rickie Fowler DID make the trip; perhaps in response to the requirement that pros compete in an event they don't usually play in?

7).Bernhard Langer is going for a hat-trick of Play-Off wins at Phoenix CC, site of the season-ending Charles Schwab Cup Championship. Amazingly, St.Bernhard has never anchored this particular tournament but is going for his fourth Cup, fifth in all, and each coming with a $1M annuity. He's a machine.

8).Finally, Tiger Woods is giving the game away a little as he advocates the Golf powers that be to rein in the distance achieved by the golf ball. Seems he's spent time next to Justin Thomas on the driving range, realised he can't compete for the distance that's becoming commonplace on today's PGA Tour. Can you imagine an in-his-prime Tiger suggesting such a thing? No, thought not!

Shotrock wrote:Super - I made the mistake ... not you.

Still "most of America isn't habitable"? I question that!

Well there is a lot of places which are either desert, mountains, forest, prairie, or are simply too far from anywhere to bother setting up any sort of civilisation there. Therefore not habitable in a practical sense.

Most countries have only a small part of the country as being inhabited. For example. Only 2% of the land in the UK is developed, and the UK is pretty densely populated. America, Australia, Canada will be even less.

I do wonder why anyone would say they had no inclination to leave their own borders. Taking the shared passion on this board as an example. Who wouldn't want to travel the world to play some of the great courses that exist in virtually every corner? Doesn't it just scream a lack of imagination to remain in one small part of the world and not bother about the rest of it? Then there's all the other things about travel which are really good like different cultures, food, languages, scenery, architecture etc.

America is a great place to live and visit, but I wouldn't ever want it to be the only place I ever went to or saw. It's not a very aspirational outlook, and is actually quite lazy and uncultured.

Super

You hate other cultures and people, why would you be so keen to travel?

Mac, I've probably been to more countries than you have, I speak more than one language, I've lived abroad and probably will do again, and I've had foreign girlfriends. You've never even been North of St.Andrews, so when I want your opinion on culture and travel, I'll ask.

Funny thing is, you probably live within 500m of me, yet you couldn't be more different.

super

Kinda weird that you know where I live.

Likewise I am well traveled and have lived in a foreign country. What does that prove?


On the millennial thing, I think you are holding back from calling me an SJW.

If you're well travelled and have lived in a foreign country it goes some way to disproving your claim I hate other countries and cultures doesn't it?

If I genuinely felt that way, I'd be a little Americaner like GPB and say that because Britain has beaches and mountains that there's no point in going abroad.

As for you being an SJW, it hardly needs mentioned does it?

America is a continent while the Britain is a small Island, therefore travelling in America would clearly provide a greater breadth of experiences. Although you would not see a great deal of cultural differences if through time or financial constraints you could only do internal US flights you would see a great variety of terrains and climates, from the arctic circle to tropical beaches.

Of course Mac, but by limiting yourself to America (or any country) you don't see all the sights and experience all the things which exist outside. If you haven't been to a lot of places, then how can you possibly say you aren't missing out? You can't possibly know, which I think is where a country like America which has a low % of people who leave the country falls down, and perhaps why many of them have this absurd notion that USA is the worlds number 1 country.

It's fine to say that America is a bigger country, and it is, but how many people actually go to the Alaskan Arctic Circle or the tropical beaches? How many Americans have never even left their own state? How many Americans ever travel further than the size of Britain in America anyway?

America is ever so slightly smaller than Europe, but you'll get a great deal more variety in what you'll see if you travel from one country In Europe than if you fly from Arkansas to North Dakota.

super_realist wrote:If you're well travelled and have lived in a foreign country it goes some way to disproving your claim I hate other countries and cultures doesn't it?

If I genuinely felt that way, I'd be a little Americaner like GPB and say that because Britain has beaches and mountains that there's no point in going abroad.

As for you being an SJW, it hardly needs mentioned does it?

Didn’t mac live in London once? That must’ve felt like a foreign country.

Nope, never lived in London.

McLaren wrote:Likewise I am well traveled and have lived in a foreign country.

Mac, am curious. What country did you live in and for how long?

raycastleunited wrote:

McLaren wrote:Likewise I am well traveled and have lived in a foreign country.

Mac, am curious. What country did you live in and for how long?

Would that be England, Mac?

I'm never wrong wrote:

raycastleunited wrote:

McLaren wrote:Likewise I am well traveled and have lived in a foreign country.

Mac, am curious. What country did you live in and for how long?

Would that be England, Mac?

Well it would have to be somewhere that you can get a bus to. So Wales or England.

Seriously though, have you ever lived abroad as an adult, or were you still hanging from your dad's coat tails?

super_realist wrote:
Most of America isn't habitable either and many Americans also live close to the coast. New York, Houston, San Fran, San Diego, Seattle, New Orleans etc are all coastal cities.

,

Have you ever heard of Chicago, St Louis, Dallas, Denver, Salt Lake City, Pittsburgh, Charlotte, Atlanta, Memphis, Tulsa, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Buffalo, Cincinnati? They are all at least 200 miles from a seaport.

shotrock wrote:Another benefit of travel is that it frequently challenges sweeping stereotypes that are all too pervasive.

Unfortunately, one blogger claims he is well traveled, but apparently he sure believes many stereo-types.

Most of America is inhabitable? Just because it is rural, doesn't mean it is inhabitable. A whole lot of farms in the breadbasket of America where I live. I suppose much of the Rocky Mountains are "technically
inhabitable, but I bet much of it could be developed if there was a need.

GPB -

GPB wrote:

super_realist wrote:
Most of America isn't habitable either and many Americans also live close to the coast. New York, Houston, San Fran, San Diego, Seattle, New Orleans etc are all coastal cities.

,

Have you ever heard of Chicago, St Louis, Dallas, Denver, Salt Lake City, Pittsburgh, Charlotte, Atlanta, Memphis, Tulsa, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Buffalo, Cincinnati?  They are all at least 200 miles from a seaport.

shotrock wrote:Another benefit of travel is that it frequently challenges sweeping stereotypes that are all too pervasive.

Unfortunately, one blogger claims he is well traveled, but apparently he sure believes many stereo-types.  

Most of America is inhabitable?  Just because it is rural, doesn't mean it is inhabitable.  A whole lot of farms in the breadbasket of America where I live.  I suppose much of the Rocky Mountains are "technically
inhabitable, but I bet much of it could be developed if there was a need.

 

In the same way you claim Australia is inhabitable, America is the same. You could also develop Australia if there was a need, just as you could America. You only need to look at places like Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Doha to show how you can develop places you'd think pretty inhabitable previously.

Your claim of America being a big country still doesn't stand as a reason for not travelling. It's a pathetic excuse, especially considering Canada, which is the second biggest country in the world, travel more frequently.

And where do those Canadians go when they travel ?  They go mostly to the USA -- an easy, inexpensive (in terms of time and money) trip.  

We've traveled extensively in europe but also have a list of places we'd like to visit over here.  It's not the size of the country that matters but the diversity of geography, history, culture etc.  A lot of people don't want to go far outside of their comfort zone when they travel. Brits who feel that way can take a cheap package trip to Spain where they'll look forward to  sunshine,  fish and chips, beer, and English spoken.  There's no real equivalent of that for Americans.

I've met about the same number of Canadians in the UK in comparison to Americans in regards to travel, no mean feat when you have just a tenth of the population, the Canadians though have been spread throughout whereas the Americans I've met have been mostly focussed in St.Andrews for golf (and very nice most of them were too)

It's not so much the lack of travel, it's more the and disinterest and apathy shown towards experiencing different countries, perhaps because many have this USA #1 attitude pervaded in the media.

Yes, of course you'll get your Blackpool Del Sol types in the UK who go to hell-holes like Benidorm, but there is so much to see in Europe particularly, and so much diversity that I'm not sure why anyone, British, American, Canadian or Australian would waste their time going somewhere which was so within their comfort zone, might as well just stay at home if all you want is your home life in a different location.

Surely Americans could just take a trip over to a dozen or so Caribbean Islands to get those same things they get at home like disgusting Budweiser and English widely spoken? In many cases it's probably easier to fly there than the other side of the country.