[Brandel Chamblee not handling this well. Just delivered a Woods apologia regarding Spieth smashing the aggregate majors record score. I had to tweet a reminder to Brandell about the Rock Ishii ball. Like with Oberholser, I referred Chamblee to Nobilo, who can fill him in on the details.]
Day Wins!!!
Speaking of Class…
JORDAN, RORY, JASON — EASY AS 1, 2, 3
(IN THE WORLD)
RECORD-SETTING DAY SHOOTS 20-UNDER
JORDAN SETS AGGREGATE RECORD FOR MAJORS
JORDAN CLIMBS TO WORLD NO. 1
EURO SEVEN SHOW THEIR STUFF: GRACE 3RD, LAHIRI T5
6:50 pm Update: Thumbs Up to Jordan and Jason’s Class; “That’s our game” — D. Feherty.
3:41 pm Update: Just Sayin’
Two of the top four are Euro Seveners. Just sayin’. Four of the seven made the cut. Just sayin.’
2:00 pm Update
And now the coverage moves to CBS. Only forty-five minutes until the leaders tee off. I’ve almost been avoiding golf coverage today. I think I have done so because I know how intense it is going to be.
12:30 pm Update
- The tee times are earlier today, which is nice. One hour and twenty-one minutes earlier for the leaders. Two hours and 15 minutes from now. TNT live coverage started an hour-and-a-half ago. I’ve had it on, playing softly. I am not watching much, but it adds to the nice anticipatory vibe here in the Lanny H Golf operations center.
- If Martin Kaymer wins, it would certainly heal the wound left last January at Abu Dhabi when he lost a ten-shot lead thirteen holes from the finish line. I really like Kaymer’s mental outlook, and he’s quite funny, although his subtle humor is generally wasted on the golf media.
- CBS Radio is doing live coverage on the radio. It’s not bad. It sure beats nothing when you have to leave the house during the television coverage. I heard Spieth discussed quite a bit on a national general sports radio show this morning. I meant to catch ESPN Sports Center this morning to see if they led with golf, but I totally forgot.
- Nick Faldo’s comments about Lahiri’s Buddhism were interesting yesterday. I would have liked to see them pursued further.
- Notah Begay signed off from Live From this morning by telling viewers Jordan Spieth had a chance to “do something Tiger Woods has never done — win all three majors in America.” Spieth has already done a boatload of things Woods never did. Winning a PGA Tour event as a teenager. Winning two majors by age 21. This win would mean three majors almost two years earlier than Woods won his second. Like Nantz said yesterday, these guys really need to stop pushing the old stories of golf.
Oberholser Responds: Give Oberholser credit. Twice I’ve contacted him with questions, and twice he’s responded. And both times with grace and courtesy. Even when — this morning — my comment had more than a little snark in it. Anyway, his response was quite an encouraging surprise:
The “still have to putt” argument is obviously a specious one. Consider an opposite analysis. If you gave a pro every putt within six feet, would pointing out, “You still have to drive,” make his advantage of gimme putts any less?
Nevertheless, put aside that obligatory Tiger Woods apologia and consider that Oberholser clearly states the year is tainted: “[The Rock Ishii transformational golf ball has] always been my argument against the year.”
(Also, note that he answered in five minutes — during the show!)
Morning Line
- Golf Channel keeps championing Woods’s 2000 season because “he won by such great margins.” He had a distance and accuracy ball none of the other players had until the next year. Google Rock Ishii, you fools! When Nantz spoke yesterday evening about some not being able to let go of the old story, he meant Golf Channel. (I just tweeted Oberholser, suggesting he ask Frank Nobilo about the ball Woods used in 2000. Or to google “Rock Ishii.”)
- David Feherty seems to be getting better. Less intrusive, less annoying. He doesn’t try to force his comedy routine on us the way he once did.
- I had Morning Drive on the entire two hours, but it was muted 90 percent of the time. It’s so darn phony, I didn’t want it ruining my anticipatory good mood about today’s final round.
- They just announced the Morning Drive senior producer is leaving. No offense to that guy, but maybe the new guy will make some changes.
- I can’t pull against Jason Day. I kind of want to see Jordan Spieth win. You can drop the “kind of”; I want to see Spieth win. However, there is no way I pull against Jason Day. He’s a great guy, and I’ve been a fan for a long time. Add that to the vertigo episode at Chambers Bay, and I simply cannot root against him.
- I hope the winner comes from the final group. If not, I’d like to see Grace or Lahiri get the “W.”
- One of the GC hosts last night said something like, “The Tiger Woods Era has definitely ended.” Gee, you think. Sports Illustrated had a “Golf’s New Era” cover showing Rory McIlroy more than four years ago. This past April, their cover said, “The Spieth Era Begins Now.” We’re already two eras beyond Woods; Golf Channel has just noticed?
- Golfers’ improvement and degradation falls into channels. An up channel when young; a down channel when aging. Here’s something I wrote last winter about Woods’s downtrend channel. I mentions this because Woods has spent much of this year recovering from his back surgery a year ago. His back will continue to improve, and I expect next year he’ll have a “good year” by his current standards. I mention this because when it happens, the golf media will totally jump back onto the “Tiger is Back!” bandwagon. They won’t treat it as an against-the-trend uptick in a downtrend channel.
- Oh, I almost forgot. The first place I saw the factoid about Nicklaus being aged 52 before missing three consecutive cuts in majors was from a commenter right here. Last night, Golf Channel put up a graphic showing not only Nicklaus, but several others. I think they had Watson, Player, Palmer and a couple of others. Those guys missed three consecutive cuts for the first time in their 50’s. Woods did it at 39. They then went on to discuss how Woods was far more physically beaten up at age 39 than any of those other guys. They strongly suggested Woods’s 39 was equivalent to the other guys at 50. Due to the bulking up (they didn’t mention PEDs) and his stressful swing (which they labeled “swing changes”).
Lanny H Golf 
Rooting for Spieth, but like you I also like Day. No loser here. I’d rather this have been Spieth/McIlroy, but this is great.
Great for golf that a regular cast of stars is evolving at majors.
Spieth was obviously great at The Masters and US Open. But I think his ball striking has gotten better all year. Fewer misses. Straighter off the tee. That miss right we saw fairly often has largely gone away.
Lanny…I think it’s telling that in general golf ratings on television have been holding their own this year…CBS, NBC, ESPN even Fox Sports…the numbers have been steady. But if you look at Golf Channel by themselves, the numbers are in a three year decline. There are less folks watching Golf Channel today. Golf Channel has enjoyed the ride being part of NBC’s network synergy…but if you isolate Golf Channel numbers separately from the big networks, they are in decline. They are ditching “Big Break” for a reason…it’s stale bread. The incessant Tiger Woods coverage is stale bread. Golf Channel is grasping at straws to come up with something original and creative but they are at a loss. All they really know is Tiger, Tiger, Tiger. They are a bland, pathetic bunch.
Golf Channel is like the People Magazine of golf coverage. To some degree that has a place to promote the game. But they should spread that coverage around.
Short-term thinking. They think people want Tiger all the time, they deliver. But as Woods declines and their coverage reaches nauseating saturation, their ratings take a dive. Uf they promoted the other figures of yhe game, they’d have a steadier audience less prone to fluctuations.
“Short-term thinking”…Golf Channel knows they are on thin ice…they are trying to make some programming changes…they got on a college golf kick all of a sudden and then poof, it disappears. Now they are promoting Golf in the Olympics 2016! They are floundering.
I think the Olympics push has to be coming from the top at NBC Sports. The Olympics is their baby. I’d like to know the skinny on how golf came to be in the Olympics; I wonder if NBC or Golf Channel did any arm-twisting. You know darn well they thought Woods would be playing. Oh, man, I just thought of something. The December Hero Challenge points will go toward the Olympics!!! Holy s–t!!! That may have played a big role in the decision. Man, but the people running golf are scummy.
Before today’s round starts, we should say it shouldn’t be a surprise if Spieth wins over Day….
……Jason Day’s final round scores in Majors this year: 75, 74, 70….
……Jordan Spieth’s………………………………………………: 70, 69, 69….
……That’s an 11 stroke difference just in the Sunday rounds so far in Majors….Jason Day could be the new Rickie Fowler from last year….The quality of Day’s shots on Sunday have simply not been the same as in the first three days…..
…..Day has NINE top 10s in Majors without a win……Sergio Garcia has 20 top 10’s with no majors…..
And another point…a lot of folks pooh-pooh blogs like this one…”nobody reads this junk”, etc…but the fact is, golf media types, TV heads, players, writers…A LOT OF THEM READ THIS STUFF…more than you think…they won’t admit it, but many of them read everything about golf they can get their eyeballs on. What’s really funny is guys like Shackelford read Lanny’s and other blogs religiously, looking for scraps and tidbits for their own sites but if you post the same stuff on Shackelford’s blog it gets DELETED out of fear. Mainstream media masquerading as maverick. At least Lanny is REAL.
I don’t know how many clicks Lanny gets. But you and I are golf fans. I search for interesting viewpoints on the game, as you probably do. Those searches led me here. I’m sure that a lot of very prominent people in the golf media have done the same.
Prominent people may not be free to comment under their own names. Hey, maybe “TruthTeller” or “Tigerfan” is really Notah Begay! Or “Ken” is really Sir N… Oh no, forget you saw that.
I get clicks in numbers somewhere between Drudge Report and Facebook. Well, that’s just a guess, but I feel certain that’s the case.
Whenever Tiger Woods suffers an injury, I get a lot of traffic from search engines when people Google or Bing or Yahoo Search for “Tiger Woods steroids.” We are one of the top returns because the “real” golf media avoids that topic.
I still get a lot of search engine traffic for the Nike/Macklemore song piece I wrote about way back when. The same is true for a couple of articles about the shady Fuse Science stock shenanigans I learned about after Woods became associated with the company.
I still plan to write a piece on this topic, but if this website has any goal, it is to spread information that debunks the Tiger Woods mythos that got so out of hand. For example, I follow golf quite closely, but I had no idea about the Rock Ishii ball of 2000 when Woods was so “dominant.” I never heard that until this past winter when Nobilo — to publicize his move to CBS? — brought it up. I wrote about it and someone here pointed me toward the book “Jack vs Tiger” (I think was the name). That book wrote EXTENSIVELY about the advantage the Rock Ishii ball gave Woods in 2000, but yet until Nobilo that information had never reached me (or, I’m sure, the vast majority of golf fans). That’s not right; people should know such information; it’s important when considering Woods’s career.
If this website can bring such information to just a handful of golf fans, they will then spread it to others. And that is a good thing. One of the coolest things associated with this site is the day I was reading comments on some obscure golf website — it might have been in Europe — and some guy had quoted something I had written here in his comment. (He didn’t credit me, either! But I didn’t care. I just want people to be sure everyone knows the things in books like “Jack vs. Tiger.” Because the “real” golf media sure isn’t going to tell us.)
I think the advantage of a place like this is that there is absolutely zero financial consideration. If I want to blast Nike — and I certainly have — I don’t have to think about how much money they spend here for advertising. When I blast a player — such as Rory when he signed with Nike and when he went through his on-course cursing phase — I don’t have to worry about him denying access in the future. Because I never had it. And my career (in a completely non-related field) is behind me, so I don’t write anything with “prospective employers” in mind.
Can someone explain to me how slurper Kelly T. has a job?
History? Seniority? Political correctness? Protected by Palmer/IMG and/or Woods/Steinberg?
Tilghman can blow all the smoke she wants about her so-called qualifications for the GC job, but the truth is she wouldn’t even be there if it weren’t for her father’s relationship with AP. She has no talent and no one else would hire her.
Her father and AP were very tight…business partners, etc. She will never get fired as long as AP is alive.
Did not know that!!
Having Tiger lackeys like Tllghman and Begay around just makes the Golf Channel further and further out of touch with reality.
DJ just exploded. Went from fringe contender to no chance. Four attempts to pitch to #1 from behind the green. Looking at a likely 8.
That was ugly. I felt bad for him. He knows what people will say, somewhat unfairly. He had a fine final round at Chambers Bay. Then he three-putted the final hole. But he had a putt to win it. The first putt goes in and the narrative is completely different. In the eyes of the media, 180 degrees different.
Nantz just said, “very similar starts for these two”. Yeah no shit, they were identical pars.
Why they don’t use protracer on every tee sheet makes no sense.
I’m not an expert, but I think they have to set it up ahead of time, and they aren’t free. But I don’t know for sure, and I’ve wondered the same thing.
I feel like I’ve seen it on a lot of holes but not with every golfer.
Spieth has to be deadly from 50 yards…He wasn’t on #2….
Definitely not his best but with his putting, he’s still got a good chance. I think I actually saw something where Jordan is actually more accurate from roughly 15 feet than he is from, say 5-10 feet. Weird but pretty sure I saw/heard that.
I sure as hell am no Spieth but I kind of get it. I’m more comfortable from 5-10 feet than from 3 or 4. Don’t know why but those short ones have always goven me trouble.
Happened a while ago but that tee ball Bubba hit on 6 was crazy good.
That was huge. Long on a 409 yarder.
You can tell the announcers don’t give a crap about Brandon Grace…..
From this start, they may need to start caring.
I don’t either.
Grace might be the best story of all, if you think about it. jalnichols saying Grace didn’t even belong in the OWGR top 64, that his OWGR points were bogus due to the “weak” European Tour. I mean, if Grace wins, it would be make Rickie’s “overrated” redemption win at Sawgrass look like nothing.
Haha, you don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to pick up on that, do you. I wish I were part of the broadcast, so I could give the “Euro Seven Update”; that would get fans involved in Grace and Lahiri. Maybe jalnichols could be on, too.
2nd short chip by spieth which was very amateurish….
Well like yesterday, rather slow start for Spieth and good start for Day….Will Day blink?
It’s no two-man race, though, not by any means. Way too early for that.
You and your Euro Seventeen. Exactly how many are going to win this thing? Just askin’
jalnichols picked them, not me. It’s a matter of historical record. If Grace wins, jalnichols can expect to hear from me!
Maybe but you’re the one that went and ran with it, making it a bigger deal than it really is.
jalnichols is a nobody, so who really cares?
Anyway, being a european myself, it’s no big surprise to me, that they’re doing so well.
Branden Grace is a world-class talent.
jalnichols is not the first to write of the “weak” European Tour. Some PGA Tour players have actually griped about it. (Though moreso about the Asian and Japanese Tours.)
I feel like 19 is the number.
Looks like the record will be broken today for the PGA….19, 20 under…
If that’s the case, then I think it’s Day’s W.
Man, you wasted a great opportunity to say something clever, like “It’s looking like Jason’s Day”.
Kind of looking like a 4 horse race.
Birdies for everyone!
And you just knew ANYTHING someone does they are going to try and drape up with Eldrick propaganda……..
Yeah, it’s already gotten annoyingly obvious. They won’t talk about Jordan going for his third major WAY ahead of when Woods got his.
Well, I think this one may be over folks….anyone care to say differently?
Day looks strong but not over yet. Spieth went from 6 down to 1 in a very short time yesterday.
perhaps, but when u make putts like that, it may just be your day….see how he handles this bunker shot..
If DAY WINS, PLEASE destroy the current record….
Oh, absolutely, it’s not over. Day may well win, but they are not even on the back nine yet.
Grace is still close. He gets the right break or Jason get’s the wrong one and we could see some fireworks. Right now we’re only a birdie by Grace/Bogey by Day combo away from this being tied.
Boom! Or, Day could go and do that.
Grace is trying to become the Stewart Cink of the PGA Championship…
If Jordan isn’t within 3 by the turn, bye bye.
Spieth has his B- game right now……
Oh how I love those LAME ‘lets show Eldrick’ stats…..What they failed to mention is that Spieth got to 20 under…Instead they didn’t mention that and just focused on the 19 under mark…..good ole lame cbs….and their propaganda…
Well, he got to 20 but did he finish at 20?
that wasn’t the intention of the stat they were showing…all they said was “these players reached 19 under”….Um, so what? 20 is better than 19, as math school told me….If Day reaches 20 under they BETTER show JUST Spieth and Day, otherwise you will know how it’s still trying to propagandize a fading golfer…
Or if Day keeps hitting wedges like that.
Jordan just doesn’t have it today…….If his chipping game isn’t on…forget it….
that’s the third poor chip for Jordan, and those aren’t hard chips either…..
Spieth MUST replicate yesterdays back nine to have any chance…
Day totally duffed his approach, but got away with it (while Spieth messed up).
I really hope Day can keep it up and get his first major…
Yeah, it’s impossible for me to pull against Day.
Hopefully Spieth will go on one of his angry post-bogey birdie binges.
Well if Spieth wins this one, it will be more about Day choking it away, then bout Spieth winning it..
Falling from Grace
Hater.
9 hole victory lap for Day!!
DJ would have been in contention, had he not made a snowman on #1.
Spieth has missed at least 4 fairways already……His B- game just got downgraded to a C….Hated to do that…….
Yeah, I think the main source of his struggles has been poor driving.
Meanwhile Day bombed it 388 yards leaving him a pitching wedge to the the green…
Some poor drives have hurt. C is a bit harsh. He is one worse than Day thru 10 today.
Rose-y trying to put a fight now.
DJ -2 under for the day…..after a quad/snowman….if only…..
It’s kind of interesting. To me, it’s easy to tell when protracer is going to be used and when it’s not. Something about the camera angle/look.
3 missed putts around 10 feet missed by Jordan…..
So this really comes down to whether or not Day has a triple-bogey type hole or not….
Four.
Grace has to birdie to the house if he wants a chance. Not. Gonna. Happen.
Jason’s Day!! Finally!! Congrats!!
Jordan is probably TIRED of all these 10 footers…Mentally it gets really annoying when you miss a few in a row like he has…….
If Day is smart his driver shouldn’t be used much the rest of the way….
How bout this one: Spieth will probably get to 18 under….and lose….In other words, he will proabably TIE the PGA Championship record…and not win……
Sieth moves to 1 if he finishes solo 2nd or tied with one other.
I was just thinking about that. I knew there were something like 3 or so scenarios but didn’t recall the specifics.
Decent consolation prize I guess.
This is provided a number of guys don’t collapse. McIlroy is 17th. If Jordan finishes 2nd alone, he’s#1. If he’s tied with one other guy, Jordan goes to #1 if McIlroy finishes outside 13.
Looking like USA won’t old all 4 after all. Not that that really matters. It’s just gotten a lot of pub this week.
A calendar career American sweep.
I don’t understand why the aggregate total in the majors is getting so much attention. Whether it’s 53, 43, 63, Tiger won 3. Spieth could pass that 53 number, get to, say 55 and still “only” have 2.
Doesn’t matter. Just an interesting stat.
Spieth has done the OLE so many times today, after doing something positive…
Oh that miss hurts Jordan. He’ll be lucky to save 5.
Can’t say that Day hasn’t given him openings.
Great 4. Get that #1 ranking.
Wow -20!
Not enough but still impressive.
OK WHERE’S the “GUYS WHO MADE 20 UNDER” GRAPHIC????????? OH, they aren’t showing it? hmmmmmmmm I wonder why……Because it’s only Spieth and Day that have done that…
Ok, why is Day using his driver? That’s two in a row that he’s missed the fairway with his driver….
515 par 4. That’s kind of long.
Without that snowman, DJ is -8 today….if only
He deserves a ton of credit for this round. -8 for 15 holes.
He pars to the house and shoots a back 9 30. Quad on 1 and managed 38.
Rory only birdied one of the four par 5’s too…Had he birdied one more, he’d be tied for 11th right now, and would have held onto the #1 spot……
JD is the first person EVER to go to 20-under in a major. Someone mentioned that Spieth had done so as well; that’s incorrect…
Right spieth reached 19 under, not 20 under, but boy did they NOT make a big deal out of it when Day reached 20 under……No graphic…I want graphics darnit….
They will if he remains there. They did mention it.
yeah but if you noticed, they still showed woods name, and it didn’t say “NEW RECORD”, it was lamely done by CBS..no surprise….
With Spieth in solo 2nd, Rory would have had to finish 6th to stay at #1.
cmon day, break the record please….
He’s gonna knock that in for -21.
I feel a 3 putt coming on.
maybe you just have gas
7 iron, 7 iron, 7 iron for Day
Phil texted him and said “go for the driver”
It’d be nice if both got par or better. For reasons of “shutting GC’s mouths.”
Two putts for NEW PGA Record….
For both of them!!
Lanny are you referring to the ‘under par’ record and the PGA Championship records if they both tie?
lowest under par major for jason; lowest aggregrate majors for Spieth
Rory, really regretting playing soccer with his friends now…
yeah, you know. might add some spice to the fedex playoffs, though
No, driver please – and break that record!
Up three, go with the driver. Probably most comfortable club for him.
1-1-4-2 in the majors and now #1 ranked for Jordan.
Not too Shabby
With his consistency he may take up residence there for quite a while.
Yeah, that’s the difference between him and Rory. Rory has more fire power and a higher ceiling….but his valleys seem to be deeper than Jordan’s.
What a cry baby….good lord.
The guy’s been through a lot…
Yeah, I was constantly thinking about him falling down with dizziness on No. 18 at Chambers Bay on Saturday. Got to his feet and somehow finished the hole, then cautiously navigated the course on Sunday, playing more than respectably.
17 under and you lose….the new PGA….
That reminds me of the Waste Management a couple years ago. Sneds averaged 65 over the 4 days……and lost by 6 to Phil
Day birdied ALL four par 5’s, while Spieth only did two…..That’s two of the three strokes…..It wasn’t like Spieth played terrible at -4, but he left alot out there… Day with the lead went 5 under today which deserves the win…
Like Jordan said, Day put on a driving clinic. Jordan… did not.
Jason Day is now the greatest champion of all time!!!!
Yeah, like we really care about the EuroSeventeen not winning.
Yeah, Jordan sets aggregate scoring mark….still had “only” two wins….same as guy like O’Meara and Paddy Harrington.
Neither of those guys set any records, so I’d say that’s a rather lame statement……
They had 2 wins right? What’s with an aggregate record when the next best guy has one more win?
Ofcourse the RECORDS were only made a big deal when it was Eldrick…..Now that is someone else, it will be treated more ho-hum…..
Wake me up when Jordan makes 142 consecutive cuts. (Don’t forget to count the no-cut events.)
YEAH, BECAUSE, ALTHOUGH HE WAS A STROKE BETTER, HE DIDN’T WIN AS MANY MAJORS!
Hell, I’d give more credit to Jordan having 3 wins and only -50 under. The stupid media is the one that built up that stat but what’s 55 under compared to 53 under if you have one less one?
Don’t get your panties in a knot. No one would suggest that winning two is as good as winning three.
The aggregate thing isn’t important, just an interesting bit of history. It is a stat by itself, regardless of wins. Fowler ranks high on the list for last year. Take it for what it is, just a statistic, and stop being so defensive about your fading hero.
Yeah, the important marks are winning two majors by age 21, and winning a PGA Tour event as a teenager. Everything else is just a statistician with too much time on his hands.
In approximately 75 events on tour, Jordan has approximately 5 wins. Tiger has approximately 24.
24? I think that was Woods’s age when he won his second major. Jordan has 2 at age 21!
If the majors are the only events that count, then why do they play more than 4 events a year. Tiger, fucked up the media into thinking majors are the only thing that count.
Jordan doesn’t have 4 wins this year. He has 2.
Friend, even Kyle Porter is telling you it’s time to move on. When Kyle Porter says it’s time to let go of Tiger Woods, it’s time to let go of Tiger Woods!
And if we’re going to ignore everything but the majors then Tiger leads 14-2. In today’s world, with so many capable players, it’s tough to see Jordan make up 12 major wins even though he got started 3 years earlier.
I’m not denying it’s time to move on. I am saying, considering Jordan greater than Tiger, when he has 1/5 the number of overall wins, is idiotic.
Time to move on, friend. Jordan won as a teen, and won two majors at 21. That’s Tom Morris stuff.
So Spieth has 2 majors at 21, and you are dismissing his chances of getting 15? I agree the competition is MUCH better then it was in 1990 and first decade of 2000, so it will be more difficult than it was for Woods who played against a pretty weak PGA field to win his majors…
If we use majors as the measuring stick, then John Daly, Paddy Harrington, Mark O’Mear and probably a few others, are greater than Lee Westwood, Colin Montgomerie, DLIII, and a host of others that don’t have majors or only have 1.
What a great victory for a kid who overcame so much…and here’s the best Shackelford could come up with: “Shotlink had Jason with 122 yards for the 9th hole second shot and 52 yards for the third after a 323-yard drive”
what a pathetic POS
Since 2011—- 3 of the 4 major records have either been matched or broken
without the weather issues at the British Open this year, that record would have probably fallen too…
LOL! That’s a bit on the prosaic side, for sure! 🙂
GC is going on about great athletes. They apparently believe that’s the reason for longer drives. Chamblee is making an idiotic comparison to no one complaining about runners getting faster and people crediting the shoes rather than the runner.
They are making too much of Day’s distance. In the end, Spieth’s missed putts and poor chips were the difference, not the distance advantage.
They love that “athletes” meme. I’ve got an article laid out, but unwritten, on that topic. My infamous “Lucy Li vs Tiger Woods” article. I plan to do it (and Part 2 of my review of Shane Ryan’s book) before the FedEx Cup is over.
Well they really should have to run a 40 yard dash after each hole like Altered Course, to prove their athleticism…or whatever the heck they do on that silly show…
Chamblee is a perfect example of a zero talent doing the golf tap dance on TV…looking over his shoulder and saying to myself…”Now that Tiger Woods is irrelevant, how do I keep my job”?
Tonight he was like, “Well, now, I have to discount what Jordan did because he won by fewer strokes.”
But he says NOTHING about Woods playing a ball no one else yet had that effectively had him hitting off the women’s tees! No, nothing to see there, move along!!
yeah it really was NOT ‘tiger proofing’ it was ‘ball proofing’ the golf courses…….ofcourse the eldrick camp doesn’t care to revisit that history…They just see the heavens opening up and all that jazz, when in fact there was equipment advantages…..
Yeah, that was one of the worst things the golf media did, because “Tiger proofing” raised questions of bigotry. They could have defused such speculation with discussion of how the course (I’m speaking of Augusta here) had already been Jack-proofed! But they just wanted to stir emotions — truth be damned.
……Ofcourse looking back on it, we didn’t know the ‘ball’ thing at the time….Most bought the medias take that it was JUST ‘working out’ and swinging hard enough ect…
…..Now that we REALLY know what happened, it’s just a matter of spreading the REAL truth about 2000 to one person at a time…..Social media like this is one way….
…..It would be REALLY interesting to make an hour show about the 2000 season, BUT from OUR perspective of the ‘ball’ and equipment advantages, and the weakness of the tour, INSTEAD of how they present it in the media…..Be interesting if any network would buy and show it……
…..The 2000 season was treated SO mythical-like, even though it was only 15 years ago….Now that folks got to see a SIMILAR run by Spieth this year, it takes SOME of the luster off the 2000 season IMO……Showing not only is it possible, but got bested in some ways, and almost got bested in others…
Great post. It truly would be fascinating to see a video about the season. Loses at Augusta, making his majors record 2 of 19. Starts using Ishii ball, wins four straight majors. Media portrays it as “Butch’s swing,” or “fitness.” Or sui generis uber golfer of all time.
They get on this longer, straighter, more accurate tangent…….um, if I’m not mistaken, ZJ, one of the shorter hitters won the last major prior to this. Distance is nice, accuracy matters, but putting matters even more.
yeah for sure….Putting and SHORT chipping cost Spieth at least 5 strokes today….Zach’s short game makes up for his driver, and Spieth’s short game has been SORT OF sporadic for the last TWO Majors this year on the weekend….
“It would be REALLY interesting to make an hour show about the 2000 season, BUT from OUR perspective of the ‘ball’ and equipment advantages…”
Lanny…are you listening?
Sounds like a good idea. I’ll call Ken Burns today to see if he wants to co-produce.
I’m serious about this…it would make a fantastic story…you could write a book poking holes in the year 2000…people would be interested.