8:40 pm Update Jason Day sits two off the lead, very quietly positioned. Emiliano Grillo with a very solid -2. Several of the Euro Seven faltered late, but, all in all, a very good day for them.
8:20 pm Update Rory and Jordan both could have done far worse in the tough afternoon wind. They are both 3 shots out of third place, so very much in the thick of things even though they got the worst of the weather. Hopefully tomorrow will be better in the morning, so they can close the gap more easily. I think I’m going to hook up a laptop (which is newer) so I can try to watch the Rory-Jordan live stream. (WITHOUT MY MACHINE CRASHING EVERY FIVE MINUTES!)
Jordan on the putting green right now. Don’t forget you have the early tee time tomorrow, Jordan! Go eat and get some sleep!
6:40 pm Update: Yahoo Comment
I just saw this in a comment to a Yahoo article:
Golf is like gambling, in that you get intermittent reinforcement of positive outcomes that makes you think that you’ve got the answer and it brings you back for more
The comment was in response to Tiger Woods and his rationalizations about being close.
4:45 pm Update: The guessing game crap that McCord (I think) keeps doing is not appropriate for a major. It’s fine for the first two rounds at lesser events, but at a major, they should not be distracting from the actual play.
I noticed Jordan looked away as his birdie putt went past the par-5 hole. Then he missed the short comebacker for par. Had he watched the birdie miss roll out, would he have made the par putt?
Also, the anti-smoking commercials showing messed-up people are inappropriate. For people who don’t smoke — and that would be the majority — they are pointlessly showing grotesque images. They might as well let Woods cuss on air and say, “Well, some people enjoy the cussing.”
2:25 pm Update: We’re told Woods is playing “what might arguably be his last tournament of the season.” That doesn’t make no sense. It’s not an arguable premise. Either it will be or it won’t. There’s nothing to argue or debate. It might “possibly” be his last, yes, but not “arguably” his last. Damn golf media idiots.
12:00 noon: Plain and simple, the Euro Seven are kicking ass today. Leader, three in top five, four in top twelve. Two others are T-23. The seventh has yet to tee off.
10:40 am: Okay, Golf Channel… turned off!! The PGA’s leaderboard… closed!! The live stream… crashes my system!!
I’m going with the full-hole-behind PGA Tour leaderboard. It works, it has Shot Tracker, doesn’t have Tilman/Begay/Feinstein, and doesn’t crash my machine. I’ve got some reading to catch up on, so I’ll put on some music and read, checking the scoreboard once in a while.
It’s a shame to have to watch the entire morning of a major this way, but that’s my only alternative. I wonder how big golf would become if they had competent people managing it.
10:20 am: Well, my live stream lasted about ten minutes before the inevitable crash. The PGA Tour leaderboard appears to be lagging by more than a full hole, and the PGA leaderboard, while reasonably up-to-date, doesn’t have Shot Tracker. Not to mention, with all its graphics and other “movement,” it brings my machine to a crawl. I’m left with Golf Channel: Kelly and Notah and Feinstein ostensibly discussing a “rivalry” between Spieth and Rory, but really discussing “how it used to be with Tiger.”
We have all this technology, but none of the workers seem to care about it consistently working. If you think my words are sour grapes about a soon-to-be-updated PC, recall all the millions of people who paid for the Mayweather fight but never got it.
It’s too bad. It looked like a beautiful day for golf. Blue skies, scenic course.
Live Coverage (free) online: Here is a link from the PGA. (It’s free since it’s not a PGA Tour stream). My machine has been crashing left-and-right with live streams, but maybe I got a critical patch or something in the interim. We’ll see. If I last ten minutes, that’ll be a very good sign. The feature group is — surprise, surprise — Tiger Woods
6:30 am An idiotic comment by Hack led me to an idiotic question at Spieth’s presser yesterday. A media person asked Jordan, roughly, “Jordan now that you can’t win the career grand slam this year…” It wasn’t a freaking career grand slam, you fool, it was THE Grand Slam! Oh, how I hate the golf media.
6:00 am Hack and Rymer reporting live from Whistling Straits in the dark! An early start! Less than two hours until the first shot.
5:15 am Two-and-one-half hours until the first tee times. Forty-five minutes until Morning Drive. It’s strange/annoying that there will be no live coverage on television until this afternoon.
Observations about betting odds:
- Ladbrokes has Branden Grace and Brandt Snedeker as a pick’em.
- Head-to-head matchups involving Woods, once a staple of golf betting, can be hard to find these days.
- In a three-way proposition at Ladbrokes, Kaymer and Woods are equal at 13-8, with Keegan Bradley a slight dog (2-1) to those two.
- Ladbrokes has Spieth 7-1, Rory and Day at 12-1, Woods at… 66-1.
Lanny H Golf 
Is golf the only event where they don’t show the WHOLE event?
Do they start showing the NFL after the 1st quarter or MLB after the 3rd inning?
For Majors, why not just show the whole thing from start to finish….TNT is now showing ‘supernatural’ and then ‘bones’, then at 2 pm, start the coverage…..
……Even by 11 am, you would have enough players on the course to show a bunch of shots(good and bad)……I can’t believe it wouldn’t be financially beneficial to just show it all….Esp when the alternative is ALTERNATE COURSE and a bunch of bla, bla, bla for HOURS on the CULT channel, which I don’t watch…
I was think about that, too. I understand Augusta, because the guys running the tourney insist on less coverage. But these guys? If they didn’t want to spend money, they could set up a live-stream-style camera on the opening hole, and just show the intros and tee shots with crowd sounds.
But who knows the vagaries of the deals/contracts.
…..The cameras are there, the cameramen are there, everything is in place….JUST HIT THE POWER BUTTON…..
…..I find the ‘On the Range’ program extremely stupid…..If I want to watch golfers at a driving range, I’ll let you know…..It’s like watching someone else’s vacation videos….
….Obviously SOMEONE, aka NBC or the like is blocking showing all of it….Otherwise it really makes no sense….
I’m okay with the range coverage. I like to go to the range at events I attend. It kind of gives the vibe of the tourney when they show it on TV.
All more coverage would mean, is more lame interviews, player profiles, and network promo.
I said earlier this week that the PGA seemingly can do nothing right when it comes to this championship. They’ve earned their status as the 4th major.
I disagree with that, though. This is the strongest tournament of the year, by a wide margin. No crappy greens (US Open), no crappy weather decisions (Brit Open), and the coverage, while limited, is not as limited as at the Masters. I personally think it’s the best major.
………Well I do agree though that the BUNKER thing in 2010 PGA Championship was a total joke(that bunker has since been removed) and probably cost DJ a major…..That left a bad taste in your mouth about the whole championship….
Good points. You would think though that an organization whose stated goal is to “grow the game” or to get “golf ready” or to…… would see that every facet of their championship is top notch but it seemingly is not.
Never the best, but a better choice of golf courses would help their Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight image some.
Checked the 2010 PGA Championship for last time it was at this course….The cut was +1 and the first round leader was at -5(Matt Kuchar)……Kuchar was also the 2nd round leader at -8…..
Unless there’s wind this year, 1st round shootin’ thus far says under par might be the cutline.
Rapidly turning into the DJ/Matsuyama show…..
ok, maybe just the DJ show…He should have won it last time in 2010…Granted it’s real early, but he is so overdue to win one…..
Calm down. It’s round one, with half the field yet to tee off.
Hey, I put the ‘granted it’s early’, so I covered myself….I’m after all a professional media person….
But he’s close.
Just a hunch, but I’d expect both Mickelson and Woods to miss the cut…….The announcers for the featured group must already be playing the “I will remember you” song, along with pictures of his part time kids scrolling at the bottom of the screen, as a distraction…(yes it’s a reused joke, but I might as well get my money’s worth out of it)….
Soon, live coverage will begin. We’ll get all of Rory-Jordan; I was thinking the tee time I saw listed was EDT, but it was Central, so we get it all!
It’s nice that Woods did so poorly. It will cut down on the gratuitous Tiger mentions during the telecast.
3 Major cuts in a row is looking very likely now, barring a sudden WITHDRAWAL…The CUT SLAM is a possibility….
Haha, the cut slam!
Oh Lanny, perhaps someday…For now, they still LOVE to go to the CIRCUS…It’s just they get there, they realize the rides are all broken….
We wait all morning for live coverage and TNT runs their promos telling us we should watch what we are already watching.
Can someone get me out of this mess?
Martin Kaymer didn’t mind playing with the two other players who played like crap in Eldrick and Keegan…..Kaymer proving that excuse doesn’t really matter….
Did Keegan fall apart? He was -2 after two holes, I think.
apparently….Ok 14 minutes in and it’s a bunch of BLA, BLA, BLA by these idiots and only a few putts shown…..i don’t give a rats azz about what dullard Bill Mcatee or any of these other morons think….JUST SHOW THE GOLF!!!!
+5 last I checked.
I bet Kaymer was irked that he was put in the “used to be good” group with Woods and Bradley. Glad to see Kaymer didn’t get Oostied (ala Oostie in rd 1 at Chambers Bay).
You think Rory read Eldrick’s book: HOW TO WINCE ON EVERY BAD SHOT WITH A PERCEIVED INJURY……..
Woods’ last top ten at the PGA was 2009. I didn’t realize he’s sucked that badly.’
Gee, now I get why he dominates the coverage on GC. He’s so relevant.
I’ve never looked at “Tiger Tracker” until now. Now so much the tracker but the comments.
Those true believers are about the most entertaining thing I’ve read in a while. Tommy Bradley: “Putter let him down today. Otherwise he’d be up there with DJ.” There aren’t a whole lot of players who wouldn’t be in better shape with a hot putter. Delusional.
Haha, yeah, I saw that comment, too. It’s funny. They are like that every time. You’d think it was 2000, and each bad round was just an anomaly.
The cut at this pace might be around +3….
Horribly unlucky for Rory and Jordan getting stuck with the bad end of the draw today. Huge disadvantage playing in the afternoon wind.
Yeah, it has been. They are playing fairly decently.
For the record, note that the golfing Golf Industrial Complex put Woods in the best weather.
Hopefully, the wind lays down a little from here on.
The coverage is very, very “HEY WHAT HAVE YOU DONE FOR ME LATELY” coverage…..l’ve said before, I like to see the 2nd shots on par 5’s ect….Doesn’t matter who it is, just show those type of shots……Frankly Spieth and Rory aren’t doing anything exciting, they could easily show more shots….
………In other words, it already feels like a Sunday, where they are focusing on only a few golfers….
…..Also, pgatour.com is at least a hole behind the action, so when you watch it on tv, then watch the scores of other golfers, it’s rather pointless…
….In fact CBS golf scoreboard is ahead of the PGA scoreboard online by a few minutes…I don’t understand how in this digital age, it’s so hard to just keep it in REAL time…
I have found when it’s a major, the PGATour scoreboard lags. Other organizations have the “real” leaderboard. The PGA leaderboard is pretty accurate, but lacks a lot of features.
It’s frustrating.
I like the idea of more 2nd shots on par-5’s. Show more shots, and less putting.
You have golfers on the course, and instead they have Nance and Feherety waxing poetic about nothing….I just don’t see why they can’t show shots WHILE they are BLABBING about nothing……
I mean NO one care about these announcers…When did the MEDIA think they are somehow part of the story?????
I mean I would think their ratings would PLUMMET for the last half hour, since it’s showing interviews and chatting and more interviews and sunsets….I mean these producers are idiots…
Some erroneously dismiss “he hit it good, just couldn’t putt”. Personal examples. Have had scores of low 70’s even though I was all over the yard. Flip side, have scored near 80 even though I hit 10-12 fairways and 14-15 greens in regulation.
Tiger had 33 putts today which is a little over 3 strokes worse than his season average.
Sure everyone misses their share of putts in a round but when you basically miss 3 additional strokes on type of that, no bueno.
Ian Baker-Finch, after a Jordan tee shot, “Snap hook, well, that’s really not a snap hook, I’ll explain to Jordan what a snap hook really is”…Priceless!
Nice line by Ian!
You focus too much on Woods. Go look at the putting stats. In every tourney, players have good days and bad days. I think Woods lost 2.5 shots putting today. Not a difference that puts him up there with DJ.
Spieth leads Woods by 4, as I type. His putting stats are only 0.75 stroke better.
You can take any journeyman golfer and play that, “If only his chipping/putting/driving/irons had been better” game.
20 years after Tiger came on tour there are a bunch of 20 something’s leading the way. Not a coincidence. Thanks Tiger!
Uh, you obviously know NOTHING about golf….
It’s people like you who believe everything the media tells you…..sad….
Actually, I know quite a bit about golf. Along came Tiger, who raised the bar, and 20 years later, the young guys, who had the raised bar to reach for over the last 15 or so years, are getting there.
Uh, how come then none of them curse and pitch a fit when they hit bad shots?
Better parenting. Besides, they weren’t looking up to him as a person, they were looking up to him for his golf ability.
Sad. Very sad.
I believe very little the media says, and even less of what Lanny says. You all may have a gem of knowledge on occasion but more often than not I let me eyes tell me what’s going on.
So how old was Jack Nicklaus when he won? Did he have Tiger to thank too? See you don’t know what you are talking about….
No, he had Arnie and Nelson, and Hogan….and probably a few others.
My brother was 9 when he started golfing, and that was in the 70’s, LONG before we ever heard of Eldrick…..Your history is that classic ‘golf channel’ thinking that HISTORY started in 1996….It’s bogus….It’s total nonsense…..
So then why are suddenly trying to give credit for anyone who is 20 years old, that that means Eldrick was responsible, since young players have been YOUNG and winning young, aka Ben Hogan to Jack Nicklaus ect for decades, LONG before Eldrick….
So now you’re putting words in my mouth so let me lay it out for you.
Going back to the turn of the century (roughly and 1900 not 2000) you had Old and Young Tom Morris. Then in the 20’s and 30’s there was Jones and Snead. Then in the 40’s and 50’s/60’s therewas Hogan, Nelson, and Palmer. Then along came Jack and in then in the 70’s/80/90’s you had guys like Watson, Faldo, and Norman. And most recently, in the 90’s/00’s you had Tiger and to a lesser extent, Phil, Els, and Singh.
Every 15 or 20 years a unique player comes along who sets the standard and Tiger was the most recent and was someone guys like Rory, Jordan, Day, and a host of others used as the standard to beat.
Rory, as a kid, signed his name as Rory “Nick Faldo” McIlroy.
Nice try, though.
You’re allowed to have more than one role model. Besides, Rory may have looked up to Sir Nick, probably because he was European, and successful, but he wasn’t going to get to that level of accomplishment if he didn’t get to Tiger’s.
I’ll try to find the article, but there was a really good article some years back (pre-scandal, as I recall) about the golf programs at predominantly black colleges. The coaches were not pleased with Woods.
This is what happens in every sport throughout recorded history. Players age and new ones take their place. Youth is always served.
This has to be the toughest time the media has had dealing with it!
…..As Lanny has pointed out, IF you buy the ‘Eldrick brought people to the game'(even though stats show otherwise), then WHERE is all the BLACK golfers??? If you buy Eldrick GREW the game, then why are golf courses closing and FEWER golfers golfing?
Your statement gave credit for 20 some year olds winning the game, when it’s gone on decade after decade…..Ben Hogan was a hero and had parades…..Today’s media would have you believe that NO one played golf before 1996, and you seem to buy the media nonsense with your initial statement…….
Well that was just to ruffle your feathers. Saying Tiger lead the way for the current crop was sure to piss you off, which I find amusing. As you saw by my follow up, more in depth response, I realize it’s been this way forever.
As far as courses closing…..there was an over saturation of golf courses added in the late 90’s, early ’00’s. Based on the number of courses added, the golf population would have had to grow by more than 1,000,000 rounds to support those courses. There are/were also golf courses that were effectively made obsolete by technology. And, unfortunately, there were courses that were simply mismanaged and forced to close for lack of revenue.
As someone in the business, I definitely perceived an increase in the number of black golfers.. People, incorrectly, use the PGA Tour as the measuring stick of increased black play. Based on what I see in my area, generally speaking, there are more black golfers.
The sports landscape is such that black people/athletes are drawn to other sports like basketball and football. Quite frankly, those sports are comparatively easier and provide more and greater guaranteed money. They are also cheaper to get into.
Again, using the actual number of golfers in the country as the measuring stick, then yes, we are losing golfers. But it’s because of factors like age/physical limitations, financial limitations and a few other factors.
But during Tiger’s prime there were a lot of “new” people coming to the game. Unfortunately, because of the reasons mentioned above, the number leaving, was greater.
And don’t use “golfing”. You’re not golfing. You’re playing golf. And, you didn’t “golfed”. You played golf.
….Oh please, take your vocabulary lesson and stick it up your azz……
….Since you give credit to Eldrick for the beginning of mankind, it is you who needs a history lesson, more than I need to correct anything grammatically ……
Ok, so when you say “Eldrick is the reason 20 years olds play golf today”, you really shouldn’t say that…It’s historically inaccurate……So please don’t say that….Instead you should say “Eldrick had little to do with people golfing or not golfing”……End of the lesson for the day…..
Listen here Sonny. Nowhere did I give credit to Tiger for the beginning of mankind. What was implied, and also flew way over your head, is that Tiger lead the way for the current crop of 20 somethings. Just like Jack did for host of guys in the 70’s/80’s. Each generation at that one or two guys that came before them that set the standard.
And, to say Eldrick had little to do with people coming to the game of golf, is inaccurate. There are literally thousands of people that will readily admit that “Tiger is why I took up the game”, even tour pros.
Given the conditions, Rory and Jordan’s 71’s were just as good as Dustin’s 66. Flip the script tomorrow so there’s a great chance we’ll see the dynamic duo put up something like 66 and Dustin put up something like 71. I’d be surprised if Rory and Jordan aren’t in the top 5 by the end of tomorrow.
The only thing is, when I looked at the weather forecast this morning, the afternoon winds were more today than tomorrow. Although, come to think of it, there was more of a chance of rain tomorrow than any other day. Of course that may be changed by tomorrow. I sure do HOPE the wind is up tomorrow. I like when the draw doesn’t have much effect on the outcome.
Well a few golfers had GREAT rounds in the same conditions as Rory and Jordan…aka Lingmerth and Piercy…So the great round was still out there in the afternoon…..
Lingmerth is becoming a favorite of mine.
Add Danny Lee to the Lingmerth conversation. And of course Koepka is still lurking.
Yeah, Koepka had a funny round! I think he chipped in when +4 or something, the chip-in being the only reason he got on TV. Then he started birdieing left and right.
I like Danny Lee, too.
Here’s that Tiger Woods/black coaches article (I think it’s the one I had in mind) I referred to earlier. It’s a really good read: http://sports.espn.go.com/golf/news/story?id=4037243
I don’t know. It’s kind of weird. I mean, I know Tiger identifies himself as “Cablinasian” but If I’m a black person, and I see him, I feel like I would say to myself, “there’s a black golfer”.
I know this is a pretty obvious stereotype but it seems like a lot of black youth are growing up in less than ideal environments. Certainly not environments that would foster golf. Would foster more backyard type sports or driveway/street type sports like football and basketball as they don’t cost money. Now, in my experience, those black people that do gravitate to golf are often success business people who have money but also have solid careers.
I don’t know. I think Tiger has brought some to the game but I think the changed landscape of sports in general have done a good job in offsetting his potential effects.
I agree. There are a lot more factors than the media mentions, many of them muddy, which contribute to such trends. My problem is that there was this push to have all things good attributed to Woods. (Obviously attributing the rising money to Woods when it went up in EVERY sport is a really annoying meme.) It was one thing to do this prior to the scandals, but after?
Woods could have been such a great symbol. There’s a saying, something like… To whom much is given, much is expected. Woods let down an awful lot of people. He went from a tremendous source of pride for many people to a walking joke. That is almost unbearably sad. Not for him, but for them.
……..Yeah I just read it, I thought the black coach was rather UNREALISTIC about what Woods is supposed to do….He is NOT just black, so he really doesn’t have to box himself into that color-corner…..
……..The coach made mention of trying to get a cab or something to know what it’s like to be black….I kinda lost interest in what the coach had to say after that one……
……..I mean does he expect Woods to go walking down the ‘inner cities’ of America and declare to everyone that their ‘black savior’ is here for them? I mean it’s so bizarre to me how some blacks view this type of thing……
……We’ve discussed before how golf is a ‘niche’ audience…..The PGA and MLB are watched by MOSTLY white audiences…..Eldrick didn’t change those demographics….The NBA is still MOSTLY watched by blacks, while the PGA and MLB are MOSTLY watched by whites…..The more things change, the more they stay the same….
Holy Moly! You actually posted something I can actually, mostly, get on board with! Nice Job!
….who are you again…oh yeah, I’ll call you ‘2 inch’…….
Great find! You’ve got a mind like a steel trap. It’s true, a lot of black people feel alienated by Tiger because he doesn’t consider himself black unless it benefits him to do so. He called himself “brown” when he was defending himself during toothgate. He was only offended by “fried chicken” jokes for PR reasons. I’m bothered that delicious southern food like fried chicken, collard greens and watermelon ever became a racial insult in the first place, but I digress. Tiger wouldn’t have brought fried chicken to the Zoeller makeup dinner if he was actually bothered. The outrage at the Sergio comment was to deflect attention from the truly damaging things Sergio said, like how Tiger was a liar, a cheater and a jerk.
I agree that economics has more to do with it than race. It’s rare that someone from a less-than-moneyed background finds their way into golf. It’s a fact that there are fewer rich black people. Harold Varner III is the next black golfer coming up through the ranks, and he wasn’t a country club kid, but his family wasn’t struggling. It also helps that he grew up in Gastonia, NC where there are a billion cheap munis around.
My memory can be good, but it can also be selective! And balky!
A cost that doesn’t get mentioned explicitly much is a car. It’s not mandatory, but I think most high school golfers know they will get their drivers license and access to a car the day they reach the minimum age. Usually courses are not near schools.
Not sure the source of your Internet issues but after experiencing some of my own with Internet Explorer, I installed Chrome and it seems to work much better with some websites like CBS.
Thanks for the input. I, too, installed Chrome. It doesn’t help with my video lockup problem; however, it did solve the problem I had with data on certain pages displaying all in about 1/8 inch column! Right now I used Chrome for all my scoreboards, Firefox for everything else. IE is too slow, and I didn’t have a good ad blocker on it. I’m going to test the laptop this morning; my problem with it is that, well, I don’t have anything I used set up on it, but also it’s harder to type on it!
The whole debate about “20-somethings are playing well. Thanks Tiger!” is so bizarre. “Tiger dominated in his 20s and now 20-somethings are dominating today.” There’s no cause and effect there. That’s exactly the same thing that happens in every sport. Youth is always served.
Everyone who has ever played golf, even those who don’t play and are just fans (I love ice hockey; I can’t skate), probably have favorite players. That doesn’t mean that those players inspire them in some way or are the reason they took up game. I didn’t start playing until I was 20 in 1984 but I had been following golf for a number of years before that. I thought that it looked fun and that I’d like to give it a shot. No one in my family played. I had favorite players on tour, but they had nothing to do with me taking up the game. My friends and I used to go out to the local mini golf course which had a driving range and that was the first place I hit a ball.
I started playing with some friends who played golf. That’s what finally got me on course. They started playing because their fathers played. It’s probably a similar story for many pros – Rory McIlroy is an example of that.
I was much like you. It was an older brother who took me to a par-3 course a few times, then a friend and I went a couple more, then later when I started working, there was a golfing mindset, and almost everyone played to some degree or another. I became a regular. (By the way, it was a manufacturing plant, so don’t picture a bunch of lawyers wearing suits.)