PGA Tour: The Players: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).Well done to Tyrrell Hatton, great win at Bay Hill which continued the run of non-American winners - Day, Leishman, McIlroy, Molinari, Hatton.
This was also an Open Championship qualifier and Keith Mitchell (for the second year running), Danny Lee and Dahmen get to battle the traffic at Royal St.George's in July.

2).For the second week running, the course set-up seemed to make scoring unnecessarily tricky given the prevailing weather conditions. A war of attrition, but not necessarily the most attractive golf for the TV viewer to enjoy.
Hopefully the set-up at TPC Sawgrass will enable the world's best to play their shots.

3).Scott Piercy made news for all the wrong reasons last week and now Tour Commish Monahan has expressed disappointment "in the lack of judgment used" and "that it has been addressed with Scott directly". Good thing Monahan didn't say "he knows better" because Piercy clearly doesn't. But his sponsors do, thankfully, tho' any Tour punishment will be kept unpublished - unless he starts missing tournaments, from which we might draw our own conclusions.
Personally, I'd like to have seen his "invitation" to Bay Hill revoked, but no such disapproval reported from the API.

4).Interesting graph from princedrac's twitter account this week showing the top ten owgr points-getters at The Players:
Four Americans: Woods, DLIII, Furyk, Couples
Three Aussies: Elk, Scott, Shark
Nick Price
Sergio & Langer
A good week, of which there haven't been many recently, will see Garcia can jump from 2nd to 1st, ahead of Tiger.

5).That's reflective of an international honours board with eight of the last twelve winners being "overseas" players.
And first-timers at TPC have a tough time too - after Jerry Pate won on the course's debut in 1982, only Hal Sutton and Craig Perks have won trophy on their first trip. Leading "rookie" last year was Eddie Pepperell who stormed home in 3rd place - but he's busy trying to figure out how you get dq'd three times in less than 2 years.

6).This week looks like the exact halfway point of the pre-Play-Off PGA Tour season, the 23rd event out of a total of 46. About 50 pros have already won enough FedEx Points to assure them a tee-time at the Northern Trust, Round 1 of the FedEx Cup Play-Offs.
Not many are Europeans: McIlroy, Hatton, Rahm, Hovland.

7).And only Fleetwood among other Europeans is comfortably placed, for now.
Those who have struggled this season so far, but are exempt at least through next year, include McDowell (79th), Casey (93rd), Lowry (140th), Molinari (168th), Donald (assuming he takes another earnings exemption - 172nd), Garcia (179th), Willett (181st), Stenson (197th), Wallace (202nd), Rose (205th),
While this lot, all not yet exempt for 2020/21 have it all to do: Straka (82nd), Norlander (84th), Knox (90th), Fitzpatrick (100th), Noren (107th), Rafa C-B (120th), Poulter (128th), Cappelen (130th), Laird (158th), Ventura (175th), Power (201st), Bjerregard (224th), Lewis (227th), plus 3 or 4 others on more tenuous status.

8).But one or two American "faces" are also struggling, with these three less than half-way to a Play-Off goal about 400 pts:
110th: Spieth
111th: D.Johnson
213th: Koepka

9).The Florida "Swing" has a musical chairs of dates next year, starting with Bay Hill, then The Players, followed by "Honda". No word yet on how Valspar fits in, but hopefully retains its fourth slot in Florida.

10).Finally, the Top 64 in the owgr's after The Players will qualify for the WGC-MatchPlay in Austin in a fortnight's time.

Any Valspar Notes will be added here next week.

They will be fussed when they can't get into WGC's and Majors and then the PGAT becomes an even more dominant closed shop.

OWGR is gonna be massively screwed up (in some regards) due to this Covid-19 thing for probably up to 2 years. Best we just understand that and move forward.  The was NO RIGHT ANSWER for everyone in unequally time restarts.

1) The TOP of the rankings aren't gonna be much of a problem... most the top players are PGAT members anyway and even those that aren't playing immediately will be soon, and often enough. OK... maybe a Fleetwood, Molinari or Adam Scott might lose some spots, but so what?  They're not #1 contenders anyway, so it hardly matters. It's not like they're gonna miss out on any event they want to play.  

2) The issues are gonna show up more at those big event qualification benchmarks of 50, 60, 100... But it's NOT an unequally time restart that's gonna cause most the issue... it's the way the ET schedule is being totally revamped. Bottom line is once they do restart, they're gonna have even more minimum or sub minimum fields than normal for quite a while.  And that includes their bigger events later in the year, which are all but guaranteed to be generally weaker.  That's gonna have a cascading effect on ET player rankings for years.

NEAR term FIX... All the majors have members on both the OWGR technical committee and Governing Board. They are well aware of the issue of an unequal restart and are supposedly pledged to mitigate that somewhat.  If they do, that takes care of that (Masters field is already set as well). WGC qualies are yet to be discussed... but my guess is Memphis will bias more towards PGAT, but China is likely to more bias towards ET... so maybe it's a wash?  

But MID term into next year... IMO ET spots in majors and big events are gonna be affected for WGC's and majors because of the ET schedule issues.

BUT... The OWGR has for decades biased towards the ET and the smaller tours via the Home Points and Inflated event minimums causing "over allocation of points" anyway.  So in REAL terms... those biases will remain (and maybe even be stronger for the ET in the near/mid term). That will somewhat mitigate the rankings issues.

EDIT: PS... but the s**t is really gonna hit the fan in the next 3 weeks when everyone realizes all 3 of the first PGAT events in the restart are all in the 70-ish (or even 70+) range... that's gonna be a buttload of points given out..

At least a couple EuroT golfer (Matty Fitz, Mike Lorenzo-Vera) have tweeted their displeasure about the rankings

https://twitter.com/MattFitz94/status/1268212835387138050

https://twitter.com/MikeMlv/status/1268188133302075393

But as I have opined several times, the OWGR has always had an anti PGATour bias.  the short and sweet explanation is all the subsidized events on the European Tour,  The academic explanation is this paper

https://mba.tuck.dartmouth.edu/pages/faculty/richard.rendleman/docs/owgr_20130226a.pdf

Spoiler:

robopz wrote:OWGR is gonna be massively screwed up (in some regards) due to this Covid-19 thing for probably up to 2 years. Best we just understand that and move forward.  The was NO RIGHT ANSWER for everyone in unequally time restarts.

1) The TOP of the rankings aren't gonna be much of a problem... most the top players are PGAT members anyway and even those that aren't playing immediately will be soon, and often enough. OK... maybe a Fleetwood, Molinari or Adam Scott might lose some spots, but so what?  They're not #1 contenders anyway, so it hardly matters. It's not like they're gonna miss out on any event they want to play.  

2) The issues are gonna show up more at those big event qualification benchmarks of 50, 60, 100... But it's NOT an unequally time restart that's gonna cause most the issue... it's the way the ET schedule is being totally revamped. Bottom line is once they do restart, they're gonna have even more minimum or sub minimum fields than normal for quite a while.  And that includes their bigger events later in the year, which are all but guaranteed to be generally weaker.  That's gonna have a cascading effect on ET player rankings for years.

NEAR term FIX... All the majors have members on both the OWGR technical committee and Governing Board. They are well aware of the issue of an unequal restart and are supposedly pledged to mitigate that somewhat.  If they do, that takes care of that (Masters field is already set as well). WGC qualies are yet to be discussed... but my guess is Memphis will bias more towards PGAT, but China is likely to more bias towards ET... so maybe it's a wash?  

But MID term into next year... IMO ET spots in majors and big events are gonna be affected for WGC's and majors because of the ET schedule issues.

Don't agree with some of robo's preconceptions (or GPB's mantra for that matter) but overall agree with the conclusions and don't see it as necessarily being a bad thing.

Too many ET members gravitate to the PGA Tour before they're ready, often don't manage their schedules wisely, wake up at season's end without a card for the next year, slumped in the rankings and off back to Europe with tail between legs having lost a year, maybe more.

ET success is in their own hands, Admin, Sponsors, TV, Players - a setback now might be just the thing to re-set the future.

And they could certainly start, as said earlier, by reinforcing their fields "for their bigger events". Not suggesting blind altruism, but having a few of the ET's top players playing an extra event or two would help a lot.

Just wish there could be a bloodless coup with Pelley stampeding back to Calgary and someone like Bjorn taking the helm.

Robo

I agree that the ET has had a favorable situation regarding the event minimums but what was never clear to me was, were the original seeds of the OWGR fair? Was the initial assumption that a PGAT player being better than a ET player sound.

From the moment of inception it was decided the PGAT was superior which then becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.  Now of course it is stronger but only because better OWGR means more top players and more money.

If in season one of the OWGR (or the McCormack thing) they had biased towards Europe and the top 10 was de facto ET players how different would things have turned out.

I appreciate this has nothing to do with the current situation it is just something I have always wondered about.

McLaren wrote:Robo

I agree that the ET has had a favorable situation regarding the event minimums but what was never clear to me was, were the original seeds of the OWGR fair? Was the initial assumption that a PGAT player being better than a ET player sound.

From the moment of inception it was decided the PGAT was superior which then becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.  Now of course it is stronger but only because better OWGR means more top players and more money.

If in season one of the OWGR (or the McCormack thing) they had biased towards Europe and the top 10 was de facto ET players how different would things have turned out.

I appreciate this has nothing to do with the current situation it is just something I have always wondered about.

Mac... with all due respect you got the origins of the rankings wrong. From DAY 1 it had incredibly strong biases towards smaller tours, even MUCH stronger than today.

IMO the problem with the rankings today is that they EVOLVED from a simple system they could do on the back of an envelope or a simple adding machine. It was simple compilations. Plus the initial calculations were based on many false assumptions on "assumed" overall strength of various tours. Then as they became "official" world rankings, WAAAY more politics and territory protecting came into play. And as time has gone along, they added "fixes" that had the unintended consequences of convoluting them more.

IMO the REAL fix is an entirely new system based on REAL results, irrespective of any Tour on which events are played. We have the computing power on any laptop to compile and process all the data world wide we would ever need.. in which probably 99% of the politics and "turf protecting" can be removed. AND we have enough of the worlds better players getting access to the same common premium events now... we can extrapolate REAL strengths of tours in comparison to each other. There's always some subjectivity in setting any formula (like how much bonus should a major get due to it's prestige and how much should a 2nd or 3rd be worth compared to a win)... but once those formulas are set... they apply the SAME to everyone without regard to protecting some tour's "turf".

robopz wrote:

McLaren wrote:Robo

I agree that the ET has had a favorable situation regarding the event minimums but what was never clear to me was, were the original seeds of the OWGR fair? Was the initial assumption that a PGAT player being better than a ET player sound.

From the moment of inception it was decided the PGAT was superior which then becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.  Now of course it is stronger but only because better OWGR means more top players and more money.

If in season one of the OWGR (or the McCormack thing) they had biased towards Europe and the top 10 was de facto ET players how different would things have turned out.

I appreciate this has nothing to do with the current situation it is just something I have always wondered about.

Mac... with all due respect you got the origins of the rankings wrong. From DAY 1 it had incredibly strong biases towards smaller tours, even MUCH stronger than today.

IMO the problem with the rankings today is that they EVOLVED from a simple system they could do on the back of an envelope or a simple adding machine. It was simple compilations.  Plus the initial calculations were based on many false assumptions on "assumed" overall strength of various tours.  Then as they became "official" world rankings, WAAAY more politics and territory protecting came into play. And as time has gone along, they added "fixes" that had the unintended consequences of convoluting them more.

IMO the REAL fix is an entirely new system based on REAL results, irrespective of any Tour on which events are played. We have the computing power on any laptop to compile and process all the data world wide we would ever need.. in which probably 99% of the politics and "turf protecting" can be removed. AND we have enough of the worlds better players getting access to the same common premium events now... we can extrapolate REAL strengths of tours in comparison to each other. There's always some subjectivity in setting any formula (like how much bonus should a major get due to it's prestige and how much should a 2nd or 3rd be worth compared to a win)... but once those formulas are set... they apply the SAME to everyone without regard to protecting some tour's "turf".

Forgive GPB & robo for conveniently forgetting all those PGA Tour events which are subsidised by non-American golfers, especially at times European Tour members.

There are certainly some situations where an ET event has a winner's point haul that is too high, but I seriously doubt it makes a wildly significant difference these days.

I reckon if robo's suggestion had its way the PGA Tour would circle the wagons and subliminally (to give the PAC the benefit of the doubt) change the qualification system to make it even harder for overseas golfers to secure membership. MAGA

kwinigolfer wrote:Forgive GPB & robo for conveniently forgetting all those PGA Tour events which are subsidised by non-American golfers, especially at times European Tour members.

There are certainly some situations where an ET event has a winner's point haul that is too high, but I seriously doubt it makes a wildly significant difference these days.

I reckon if robo's suggestion had its way the PGA Tour would circle the wagons and subliminally (to give the PAC the benefit of the doubt) change the qualification system to make it even harder for overseas golfers to secure membership. MAGA

Kwini... that's EXACTLY where all these discussions get off track. You're trying to make it an AMERICAN thing, but it's not... it's a TOUR thing.

The strength of the PGA Tour is NOT just American's... it's because it attracts most of the best of WORLD to play on it as well. PGAT is NOT strong just because of Brooks and DJ and Tiger et al... it's strong because it's also got Rory & Rahm & Scott & Rose & Fleetwood & Molinari... etc. playing here as well (most of them more here than there). Meanwhile... you have very few of the top American's playing even the minimum on the ET or anywhere else.

IMO if all the non-American worlds best congregated on some other than the PGA Tour, then IT would be at least the equal to the PGA Tour, maybe even better But that's simply not the case. If you would get it out of your mind that this is some "American thing" (with me at least), we might be able to have some good conversation.

And I also believe you are wrong that these "subsidies" don't make much difference... It's not that the subsidy for any one event does it, it's that a bunch of them do with a little drip here... and then another drip there... and before you know it, the compounding effect of all can fill up a bathtub. I DON'T think it has much effect at the very top of the rankings. Rory and Rahm have earned their #1-2 because their rankings are NOT based on those subsides.

But where you see the effect is with the 4-8 spots being propped up into those #50-60 rankings that qualify for Majors and other top events in any given year. It's even more at the #100 level for the PGA... And it's not just ET players... it's Japan Tour players as well into the top-50...

>>>> NERD ALERT <<<<

Robo:

IMO, Home Tour subsidies benefits the PGATour more than ANY other tour and it mitigates the Minimum Tour subsidies of the other.

By my research:

In 2019, 17 EuroTour events (Not co-sanctioned with PGATour, but co-sanctioned with other tours) were bumped 63 OWGR levels by Home Tour subsidies

In 2019, 29 PGATour events (Not co-sanctioned with EuroTour) were bumped 74 OWGR levels by the Home Tour Subsidy.

On the other semi major tours (ASA, AFR, AUS, JPN, SUN, KFT, CHA), the Home Tour subsidy seldom impacts the OWGR rating)

Kwini... that's EXACTLY where all these discussions get off track. You're trying to make it an AMERICAN thing, but it's not... it's a TOUR thing.

Exactly. That is what I said in post above (in the spoiler box)

Its not America vs Europe. Its PGATour vs European Tour.

kwinigolfer wrote:
Forgive GPB & robo for conveniently forgetting all those PGA Tour events which are subsidised by non-American golfers, especially at times European Tour members.

Do you honestly think Robo and I forgot that? If so, you ought to get on twitter because you would fit in with all the bat sh!t crazy wackos who take everything out of context blame everything on whatever scapegoat of their choice.

I even said in my post above

Most of the Euro Ryder Cup team are members of the PGATour and play more uncosanctioned PGATournaments than play uncosanctioned European Tour tournaments.

Happy to agree to differ on much of the above.

And easy for PGA Tour-orientation to say "the strength of the PGA Tour is not just Americans" - you want your cake and to eat it too (a phrase I've always thought a bit nonsensical).
Following that argument, you'd re-regulate all the points those International players earned on non-PGA Tour tours and say, "Look, those are subsidised so they don't count".
"Sorry Keith Mitchell, that Honda win is only worth 32 points not the 40 or 50, whatever it was", and he'd likely be royally p1ssed off. And rightly so.

Swings and roundabouts and I doubt it'll ever be much fairer and more equitable than it is. And I completely accept the owgr had no realistic option but to restart its engines next Thursday.

And that's without hypothesising what the PGA Tour would say if the Aussies said, look I know it's winter, but our courses are in pretty good nick, we can create a bubble and some tournaments, come on down.
PGA Tour players would be frothing at the mouth if they thought others were getting off to an earlier owgr start.

And easy for PGA Tour-orientation to say "the strength of the PGA Tour is not just Americans"

Easy to say, because it is true.

We realize that the best international players play more on the PGATour than their home tour.

GPB wrote:

And easy for PGA Tour-orientation to say "the strength of the PGA Tour is not just Americans"

Easy to say, because it is true.

We realize that the best international players play more on the PGATour than their home tour.  

You have an uncanny knack of picking part of a sentence apart without bothering to try and understand the context - all I'm saying is that those very same International players bring to every Tour event their Home Tour points which are claimed to be unfairly subsidised. Perhaps they should check them at the door?

kwinigolfer wrote:

You have an uncanny knack of picking part of a sentence apart without bothering to try and understand the context -

well aint the pot calling the kettle black.

kwinigolfer wrote: all I'm saying is that those very same International players bring to every Tour event their Home Tour points which are claimed to be unfairly subsidised. Perhaps they should check them at the door?

Do you think those points only have a one way ticket to the PGATour. FWIW, a couple of hours ago, I just gave a detailed reason to Robo why I think Home Tour Points are more beneficial to the PGATour than any other tour. Did you read that?

I think you are talking about the Subsidized Minimums (which is different than HT). The 24 point minimum that all non-co-santioned EuroTour gets. Like the 2019 Magical Kenyan Open gets 24 points, when it has an OWGR rating of 17 EVR when a 24 pt event require 91 EVR. And the BMW PGA which typically gets rated in the low 50's yet gets an OWGR subsidized rating of 64.

Yes some of the PGATour gets subsidies. Puerto Rico, Reno, Punta Cana, Barbasol, and Players, but nearly as many.

It's not the pot calling the kettle black, it's just me disagreeing with you as I believe it's a two-way street.

As for "Kenya", I completely agree with you, ridiculous - but I've always advocated for those to be reduced, no argument there. Should really be a Challenge Tour event which ET Members may enter.

Good point on the Home point subsidies GPB.  If the home points aren't pushing an event above the minimum anyway, then they are not a factor. The minimum floor is.

Kwini... Totally lost me on the "have your cake and eat it too" comment.  Deane Beman figured out long ago (with a little help from a kick in the nads from Seve), PGA tour needed to attract the world's best, not just be an American tour.  And it's been growing with it's international players ever since, and it's way better & stronger because of it.  We get that over here. We embrace it. 

But that's getting far afield of the topic.  There was no "fair to everyone" restart point for the OWGR, so I think we agree now is as good a time as any. And certainly PGA Tour will have an advantage because of that for a short time.  But ET and other world tours have enjoyed biases in the OWGR for decades, so I don't care.

robo,
Don't think we disagree on that much of this.
But my point was that ET players come over to the PGA Tour with, what you'd consider to be, an inflated owgr rating, yet that same rating benefits the PGA Tour Members.

Not quite sure where you get "totally lost" on this.

kwinigolfer wrote:robo,
Don't think we disagree on that much of this.
But my point was that ET players come over to the PGA Tour with, what you'd consider to be, an inflated owgr rating, yet that same rating benefits the PGA Tour Members.

Not quite sure where you get "totally lost" on this.

In general, I DO believe a lot of ET players initially come over to the PGAT with inflated OWGR rankings. But those that are don't last long enough here to "inflate" PGAT field strengths much. And most of those that stay here play most of their events here, and when they play on the ET its in more of the premium events... so it equals out pretty quick.

You and I have discussed this before... but it's getting soooo much harder to do what Fleetwood does... play a lot both here and at home. It takes a real ironman schedule to do it, and with all the travel involved, it's just too much for most. I think that's why most who dual tour here know they're probably committing most their play here and playing nearer the minimum at home. Tough choice to make unless they relocate their family or something.

robopz wrote:

kwinigolfer wrote:robo,
Don't think we disagree on that much of this.
But my point was that ET players come over to the PGA Tour with, what you'd consider to be, an inflated owgr rating, yet that same rating benefits the PGA Tour Members.

Not quite sure where you get "totally lost" on this.

You and I have discussed this before... but it's getting soooo much harder to do what Fleetwood does... play a lot both here and at home. It takes a real ironman schedule to do it, and with all the travel involved, it's just too much for most.  I think that's why most who dual tour here know they're probably committing most their play here and playing nearer the minimum at home.  Tough choice to make unless they relocate their family or something.  

Not only is it "getting soooo much harder to do what Fleetwood does", there's no real evidence that it pays dividends for Tommy. I think perhaps a player may dedicate a year to playing heavy schedules on both Tours but they'll soon burn out, as Franny Molinari seems to have done. But I think there's still room for a Jon Rahm-type schedule and hope the top Europeans are brought to the table to discuss upcoming schedules if and when some sense of normality reappears for 2021 and 2022.

And burn-out especially likely if every week was played in mid-90 degree (or higher) sun and heat as seems to be on the menu for Colonial, Cristobal be damned (though imagine you might see a glancing blow or more)? Imagine Harbour Town will be toasty also.

Wouldn't it be nice if the Tour published next week's runners & riders early, just to whet our appetite?

Spectators at the Memorial

kwinigolfer wrote:Wouldn't it be nice if the Tour published next week's runners & riders early, just to whet our appetite?

Here you go

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EZx2Y5NXQAA3ysK?format=jpg

Prince Dracula apparently has the inside track to viewing the field. Apparently Snedeker WD sometime yesterday or this morning. One of his followers speculated that Snedeker might have CV19.

Bo Hoag looks like he is the first man out. Not sure where he stands on the reshuffle list as I can't find the link.

Featured pairings this week

Rahm-Rory-Brooks

Fowler-Thomas-Spieth

Mickelson-Na-Woodland

Reed-DJohnson-Rose

Strange they don't include the most recent Major Champion in those groupings . . . . . . . . they missed the boat there.

GPB, I'm thinking Cristobal is sliding just East of you . . . . . . ?

Path is projected just West of Chez GPB.

Lowry is not going to get into many featured groupings on PGATour.

GPB wrote:Path is projected just West of Chez GPB.

Lowry is not going to get into many featured groupings on PGATour.

Why not?
That's ridiculous. Very discriminatory.
But bl00dy typical.

kwinigolfer wrote:

GPB wrote:Path is projected just West of Chez GPB.

Lowry is not going to get into many featured groupings on PGATour.

Why not?
That's ridiculous. Very discriminatory.
But bl00dy typical.

Maybe you should start protesting, rioting and looting

No GPB,
I'll leave that to the US, you're pretty good at it.

Why ever wouldn't the Tour respect a Major winner, or are thery taking the next step in trying to diminish the status of Majors in favour of, what?, the Phoenix Open? (Sorry Rickie)

What is it about popularity that you don't understand?

Lowry is not a popular player and he has done very little to support the PGATour. He is the one that decided to not exploit his major championship win by WDing at the 11th from WGC FEDEX last summer. (Brown Bottle Flu).

IMO, he would have most certainly been in a featured pairing in Memphis.

You reap what you sow.

GPB wrote:What is it about popularity that you don't understand?

Lowry is not a popular player and he has done very little to support the PGATour.  He is the one that decided to not exploit his major championship win by WDing at the 11th from WGC FEDEX last summer.  (Brown Bottle Flu).

IMO, he would have most certainly been in a featured pairing in Memphis.

You reap what you sow.

Against which, you could say that almost none of the PGA Tour's Americans have done anything to support the ET yet they receive tee-times and media attention regardless.

If I was Shane and got dissed like this I'd be w/d'ing as well.
A Koepka / Woodland / Lowry grouping would have been far more appropriate, all things considered.

OHHHHHHHHHH!

You're making this a Europe vs America thing.

Surprise Surprise Surprise.

The object is of the featured pairings is to make money!

Shane Lowry is not going to make many rush out and subscribe to PGATour live.

GPB wrote:OHHHHHHHHHH!

You're making this a Europe vs America thing.

Surprise Surprise Surprise.

The object is of the featured pairings is to make money!

Shane Lowry is not going to make many rush out and subscribe to PGATour live.

Whereas Patrick Reed will? Just to see if he's pulling another fast one??

GPB,
The Tour disses all but the most (theoretically) mediagenic overseas golfers all the time - no-one should be surprised that the most recent Major winner is ignored just because he's from "abroad".

Mediagenic ? WTH does that mean.

FWIW, Reed has won a tournament in the last 4 events and a top 10 golfer.

Other than a very weak Hong Kong Open, Lowry has not been relevant in any event in 11 months let alone a PGATournament.

Webb Simpson is a Top 10 player, and he is not in the featured groupings either. I just don't see why you are so butthurt about this alleged snubbing. It just appears that you want to get offended by something.

Q-Score is very important, and Lowry doesn't have it here. Rory, Rahm, and to a marginal degree, Rose, have some Q-Rating. And that is why they are in the featured groupings.

. . . . . . . . . .

Shane WAS the "Champion Golfer of the Year" after all, an Englishman (or was it a Scot?) in a blue jacket said so. There you have it and that should but him in the feature groups henceforth. Harupmh, harumph.

But that was 2019 ...

Shane should get some slack. He’s both fat and Irish so he could pass for an American.

No, his ruddy complexion and ill-fitting clothes make him all English, I mean GB and I.

Sr,
Did you know that pro who was so tragically killed last week?

I do Kwin ... he worked at AGC a number of years ago. Really tragic.

I also found out that he was bringing back some carts to a cart barn when the weather turned extremely nasty. A massive tree came down onto the building as he was putting carts away. They found him 3 hours after the storm and one can hope he did not suffer long at all. He and his mate are due to have their first child this week and he also lost a brother a number of years ago in a motorcycle accident.

I didn't realize the PGA Tour Media Guide was online as a PDF file.

https://www.pgatourmediaguide.com/

There you go: Shane Lowry, Champ & Herman.
Way to go PGA Tour: Discrimination alive and well. Surprised he didn't get Keith Clearwater & JJ Henry . . . . . . .

I might of mentioned this before, but didn't I predict double dipping was going to become almost impossible quite a few years ago now?

Some people on here still feel hostile towards me for saying it.

Not that it bothered me.

McLaren wrote:I might of mentioned this before, but didn't I predict double dipping was going to become almost impossible quite a few years ago now?

Some people on here still feel hostile towards me for saying it.

Not that it bothered me.

That was before the Tour gerrymandered its schedule!
This year will be especially difficult, but it's still possible. But only for those playing well - strugglers face a long road ahead.

Who's hostile? Not towards you Mac, surely??!!

hmm, no Thanks GPB for the link to the media guide.

And FWIW, Like Lowry, Herman and Champ have won on the PGATour within the last year.

At least they didn't do the USGA thing and pair Lowry with Colt Knost and Kevin Stadler.

Got a tip for you Kwini.  Soak those Knickers in Soapy water.  They will be easier to unknot.

Kevin Na has played 408 events in his PGATour Career

He is 36 yrs old.

For some perspective, Dustin Johnson is 35 yrs old he has played 264 events.

[quote="GPB"]hmm, no Thanks GPB for the link to the media guide.

And FWIW, Like Lowry, Herman and Champ have won on the PGATour within the last year.

At least they didn't do the USGA thing and pair Lowry with Colt Knost and Kevin Stadler.

Got a tip for you Kwini.  Soak those Knickers in Soapy water.  They will be easier to unknot.[/quo


GPB,
Forwhatever it's worth, you never make a post without me concluding that you must be a total cucking funt.

Goodbye

Never? Exaggerate much?

Just trying to give you helpful hint.

You took this Shane Lowry thingy way over the top. Sorry that you cannot face the fact that Lowry is not very popular here. I like him, but I am also pragmatic about him. He is not going to bring any extra eyeballs to the the telecast.

Its absurd to think he is entitled to be in the featured groups.

Why can't you see that?

Questions for the upcoming weekend:

1 - Will the play be faster? (I'm guessing marginally so given the need to not react to or work around the crowds.)

2 - Will players mistakenly "high five"? (I would bet on it.)

3 - Will the TV ratings be strong? (Very strong I'm thinking since so many other major sports are on hold and even marginal golf fans will want some live play.)

4 - Who will surprise? (I'm hearing lots about Jordan Spieth getting out of his slump, but I would be surprised if he did. Just a hunch.)

5 - Who will win? (Rahm would be my guess.)