This photo was taken by Certified Golf Nut Sal Panelli (#4073). He’s the shadowy character in the bottom-right of the photo. It seems that Sal was in a passionate and highly technical search for a new set of irons, so he did what any self-respecting golf nut would do. He went to his local big box store, commandeered a hitting bay sporting a launch monitor and simulator, proceeded to hit a variety of clubs for nearly two hours, and photographed the stats for each.
We wish #4073 good luck in his search and look forward to a full report on the results.
Dr. Michael Cohen, Certified Golf Nut #2780, a long-time member of the Golf Nut Society and close friend of mine, has developed a unique CBD formulation designed specifically for golfers. We are proud to assist Michael in his product launch, and you can take it from me that you can trust everything Michael says about his new products. – The Head Nut #0001
CHOOSING A CBD PRODUCT
Focusing on potency, the lowest strength CBD tincture we sell is 3000 mg. This reflects our desire to make sure our customers are taking a dose that is sufficient to expect a clinical benefit. Our muscle and joint cream has the highest mg content of CBD in the market. In the future, we will further increase the strengths available.
When choosing a CBD Product, the following inter-related factors are critical to consider, as the industry currently is essentially without regulation.
PURITY
POTENCY
QUALITY
VALUE
PIN HIGH CBD, LLC believes that the best choice for CBD is Isolate, as the CBD molecule is the most physiologically active and researched of the over 100 phytocannabinoids from the cannabis plant. Choosing an Isolate (as opposed to Full or Broad Spectrum CBD) is our preference and is the beginning criterion in the search for purity. Best manufacturing practices, including seed to bottle oversight, tracing and tracking of all ingredients, and organic farming, along with quality control lab testing and independent third party audits complete the requirements we sought, and led to our relationship with Vermont Hemp Processing (VHP).
Value for our customers is enhanced as a result of our business plan of competitive pricing and continuous discounts for members of golf associations, leagues and other organizations.
Focusing on potency, the lowest strength CBD tincture we sell is 3000 mg. This reflects our desire to make sure our customers are taking a dose that is sufficient to expect a clinical benefit. Our muscle and joint cream has the highest mg content of CBD in the market. In the future, we will further increase the strengths available.
VHP is our manufacturer and processor of premium hemp in partnership with USA farmers- processing only certified and compliant, organic industrial hemp biomass. At their pharmaceutical grade, GMP facility in Wisconsin, they take the specially grown plants through an extraction process using supercritical CO2, isolating for us pure CBD. Their use of supercritical CO2 for extraction, as opposed to ethanol, while more expensive, maintains as much of the genetic profile of the plant as possible. It also ensures that there is no contamination from chemicals or trace elements in a solvent, nor cross contamination from the reuse of chemicals. In addition, Fractional Distillation Columns are used to produce unmatched purity at 99+%.
Watching rookie Joohyung Kim shoot 61, with a 27 on the front nine, to win the Wyndham Rewards Championship got me to wondering about the lowest competitive nine holes ever shot.
Here’s the answer…
The low nine holes on the PGA Tour was a 26 shot by Corey Pavin in the first round of the Milwaukie Open…
And the lowest competitive nine holes EVER was an 11-under 25 shot by Jamie Kureluk in the first round of the Alberta Open on May 25, 2010. ELEVEN UNDER FOR NINE HOLES!!
Golf Nuts – This is a story that any golf nut would enjoy reading, especially a golf architecture nut! – The Head Nut (#0001)
By Josh Berhow, Golf.com
It’s March 2, 2018, and Mike Manthey is sitting at his desk. Manthey is the superintendent of Midland Hills Country Club in St. Paul, Minn., and his office is a part of the addition that was built on to the maintenance facility in 1991. He has posters and pictures on the walls, dozens of books behind him and a couch in front of him. In the closet to his left, which is filled with boots, tools, hats, maps and filing cabinets, one of the ceiling tiles is slightly dislodged, revealing a gap of an inch or so, enough to be noticed but never a nuisance. It’s been like this for years. For whatever reason, Manthey decides today is the day he’ll finally repair it.
He pulls up a chair, steps on to it and pushes the tile aside. Peering through the opening, he spots what appears to be a rolled-up map against the wall. He retrieves it, brings it back to his desk and knows immediately that it has been up there for many years — canvas maps of this type haven’t been made for decades. Manthey places the drawing on the floor of his office and peels open a corner.
You got to be kidding me, he thinks. Is this really what I think it is?
Midland Hills, in the early years.COURTESY PHOTO
The creation of Midland Hills
Before understanding why Manthey’s discovery was so significant, it is important to understand how Midland Hills arrived at that moment. Member John Hamburger caddied at the club in the late ’60s and was club president from 2004-06. Between Hamburger’s own experiences and extensive research — he has pored through archives of club minutes, newspapers and books — few know more about Midland Hills than its unofficial historian. But somehow, two items had always eluded him, believed to be lost over time: the founding club’s history from the 1920s, and architect Seth Raynor’s original course map.
The map, Hamburger says, was mentioned in club documents, but he never had any luck finding it, despite exhaustive searches. Chances he ever would unearth it took an ominous turn in 2003, when George Bahto visited. Bahto was an expert on the lives and design careers of giants C.B. Macdonald and Raynor; he wrote the design biography The Evangelist of Golf: The Story of Charles Blair Macdonald and, up until his 2014 death, was working on a design biography of Raynor. Interested in learning more about its past, Midland Hills hired Bahto to review the property, which led to his visit. During his tour, Bahto said Raynor never kept much from his projects, so he doubted he would have held on to the routing. It was more than likely gone.
According to Hamburger, the original site of Midland Hills — University Golf Club — officially opened in the spring of 1916 after a group of University of Minnesota staffers set out to create a club with a nine-hole golf course near campus. The initial five-year lease wasn’t extended, and the club leased two large pieces of land (about 160 acres total) just north of the club in 1919. According to club minutes, 45-year-old Tom Vardon, the head pro at White Bear Yacht Club and brother of six-time Open Championship winner Harry Vardon, was asked to survey the land. He visited in January 1920 and, despite seeing a course covered in snow, was “enthusiastic over its possibilities.”
Now all he needed was an architect.
How could this have possibly happened, and 100 years later?
Raynor was born in Manorville, N.Y., in 1874, and worked as an engineer mostly on Long Island. In 1908, Macdonald hired Raynor for a boundary survey on the property that would become iconic National Golf Links of America. Raynor and Macdonald hit it off and started working together on all of Macdonald’s designs. By 1914, Raynor had his own projects.
In 1920, about 12 miles southeast of where the Minnesota group had just leased land for its new club, on the other side of the Mississippi River, Raynor was building Somerset Country Club, in Mendota Heights, Minn. Because he was in the area — and because the club deemed Donald Ross too expensive — the group talked Raynor into touring the property, the land that would become Midland Hills. Satisfied, Raynor agreed to come aboard for $1,500. He said he’d lay out the course on a model, just as long as the club would deliver him a contour map within three weeks. It would become one of just a handful of Midwest courses Raynor designed.
A view of the original 6th hole, which was later removed.COURTESY PHOTO
“Midland really just came in as what we joke about as a two-fer,” Hamburger says. “We got very lucky.”
On July 15, 1920, construction began. Ralph Barton, a math professor, supervised a team of 33 men and three teams of horses, moving rocks, shaping tees, digging bunkers. Even club members pitched in. A farmhouse — white with green trim — became the clubhouse, and the course officially opened for play on July 23, 1921, changing its name to Midland Hills Country Club in April 1922. Initiation fees were $50 and guests could play for 50 cents on weekdays. (The nearby 9-holer where the lease was not renewed has since been renovated and is now the University of Minnesota Les Bolstad Golf Course.)
Midland Hills bought the land upon which it sits in 1947, and the course routing changed in 1960 when the new clubhouse was built. Another new clubhouse and course renovation came in 2001, and the course was lengthened in 2005. But bigger changes were coming.
The birth of a Raynor restoration
Manthey took the head superintendent job at Midland Hills in 2010, after 10 years at nearby Golden Valley Country Club. The Minnesota native, now 41, like many supers, is a golf-course architecture enthusiast. There’s pride that comes with working at one of the few Raynors in the region.
Indirectly, the club’s latest restoration stemmed from an ill-suited bunker on the par-4 1st. The bunker just never seemed to fit. The green didn’t either, actually. It spiraled from there. If we restore that bunker, Manthey and committee members thought, why not rebuild the green back to a more classic look, too? These conversations began in 2014.
“Then it turned into, If we do that to this hole alone, and really put it back to Raynor architecture, now we’re going to have one hole that’s going to look different from the other 17,” Manthey said. “So it morphed into, Maybe we need to bring in somebody that really understands Raynor architecture, and we can do this formally.”
CLICK THROUGH TO SEE BEFORE AND AFTER PHOTOS OF ALL 18 GREENS:
Jim Urbina was the co-architect at Old Macdonald at Bandon Dunes and has led many other Golden Age restorations, including one he finished on another Raynor course in Charleston, S.C. — Yeamans Hall. (Coincidentally, old Raynor maps found in the clubhouse attic in the 1980s helped guide that restoration, too.) Manthey first met Urbina by chance at Los Angeles Country Club in 2013. They kept in touch, often times discussing Midland Hills and the intricacies of Raynor designs.
Eventually, Manthey told Midland Hills general manager Tim Ivory that he’d like to bring in Urbina to check out the property. Manthey wasn’t even sure how many Raynor template holes Midland Hills had. He knew of some, but trees obscured much of the original design. Plus, Midland Hills’ earliest aerial map was from 1937, 16 years after the course debuted. No one knew how much the routing changed in those early years. Urbina was originally skeptical of Raynor’s involvement since few Raynors existed outside of the East Coast, so in 2015 he came in and toured the property with some staff and a small group of members. Manthey remembers Urbina seeing potential in the course and saying, most important, there was “a lot of Raynor here.”
Early in 2018, Urbina officially agreed to lead the restoration. The master plan was to break ground in 2020 and unveil the course in 2021, when it was celebrating its 100th year of play. Urbina and Manthey promised to restore what remained of Raynor’s routing and features from 1921. Urbina’s goal was to have members think they stepped on a Raynor course as it was in the 1920s, enjoying a game of golf, as intended, on a Golden Age course lost in a world of modern designs.
When Urbina officially joined the project, neither he nor Manthey knew of any map. That was all about to change.
‘I think I found something pretty special’
As he carefully unfurled the map on that March day in 2018, Manthey was stunned. With each inch that he revealed of the 6-foot-long canvas, he came closer to confirming his initial hunch. That’s his course. Midland Hills. As it once was.
He rolled the map out on the floor and stood back. Before him was a detailed blueprint of Raynor’s original design with the club’s first irrigation system sketched on top of it. He beckoned his assistant, Mark Ries.
“I said, ‘You gotta come in here and look at this. I think I found something. I think I found the map,’” Manthey said. “He walked in the door and was like, ‘Holy s—.’”
The 1921 Raynor map found at Midland Hills Country Club.COURTESY PHOTO
Manthey couldn’t stick around long — he had to take his kids to gymnastics practice — but he snapped some photos and sent the best ones to Ivory, the general manager; head pro Ryan Hanford; and Hamburger. “I think I found something pretty special,” he texted them. They called him immediately. He then sent a photo to Urbina, who was floored. He was already studying the document, taking zoomed-in photos of bunkers and green shapes and commenting on fairways, angles and more.
“I could hardly wait to get back to St. Paul and look at it,” Urbina said. “And when he showed it to me, and I touched it, I was like, ‘This is creepy, man.’ It’s creepy in the sense that for someone like me who relishes and cherishes Golden Age design and the history that goes with them, to actually touch a map that Raynor had worked on and been a part of — you could understand my mesmerization.”
A framed copy of the map now hangs in the entryway of the clubhouse. The original smells musty, is a touch discolored and has several stains — coffee, ink or oil, maybe mud or grease — but is in remarkable condition given its age. The detail is astonishing, handmade with a special chalk. There are diagrams of an irrigation pump and pumphouse connections and, as Manthey points out, the design is so precise that the irrigation pipes are actually two lines with just the slightest gap in between, maybe a millimeter, showing that they are hollow. One corner of the back of the map says it was made by Crane & Ordway Co., a St. Paul company. Its drawing number is 1156, dated Feb. 7, 1921. It’s almost 100 years old.
The back corner of the Midland Hills Raynor map.COURTESY PHOTO
“Finding this map did two things,” Manthey said. “We already knew we were a Raynor, but it cemented the fact that this was a Raynor. And now we have something physical that shows this was Raynor’s routing, which is really cool. A lot of clubs don’t have that.”
It’s believed the map was packed away somewhere in the clubhouse and moved to the maintenance facility when the new clubhouse was built in 1960. After the maintenance facility addition had been completed, someone stashed the map in the closet ceiling. The super there at that time told Manthey he doesn’t remember putting anything up there.
Finding Raynor’s map never meant the course would be rebuilt exactly as it was 100 years ago — not with a multimillion-dollar clubhouse in the way — but that was never the plan. Fifteen of the 18 holes at Midland Hills are originals, albeit with tweaks over the years. The routing changed after the new clubhouse was built in 1960. The 6th hole, a Short template, was moved and rebuilt where the old clubhouse and range were, and is now the 4th hole. The 7th and 16th that ran through the middle of the course were also removed (that’s where the driving range sits today), and new 1st and 18th holes were built.
The plan for this project was to restore what remained of Raynor’s routing and features. But the map did provide some extraordinary detail that was highly beneficial — not to mention fascinating — for Manthey and Urbina.
“We said, ‘Jim, take your knowledge of this golf course, of what the map has, and you come up with what you think would be the best golf course,’” Manthey said.
The found Raynor map laid over a Google Maps view of Midland Hills pre-restoration.COURTESY PHOTO/SEAN ZAK ILLUSTRATION
The map included locations of all the original cement hydrant connections that were located next to the greens and tees. The crew dug up three of them, and those, along with some of the original pipes found around the greens, helped confirm that the map and size of the property was to scale.
But there were even more hidden treasures — like bunkers. The 2nd, a par-4 Road Hole template, had a right fairway bunker in a 1937 aerial map (the earliest map the club had), but that was buried at some point, likely in the 1940s. But the 1921 map showed an original bunker, the Scholar’s bunker, on the left side of the fairway, where it should be for a Road template. The crew scouted where they thought it might be, and Urbina painted an area where sod should be removed. They dug, found the original sand and rebuilt the bunker as it was intended. This happened four different times, with the map showing bunkers unknown to them, and the crew finding and restoring them.
“The map just helped us confirm locations, fairway, widths, pipes — it was just like a gold mine of treasures that were found based off this map,” Urbina said. “How could this have possibly happened, and 100 years later?”
The project’s main shapers were Zach Varty and Joe Hancock. When they found the first trace of something that was original, the crew stopped and took pictures. A mini celebration of sorts.
“For 100 years we were walking over the top of it; you’re finding history,” Manthey said. “So stuff like this was really cool, because appreciating history, and really studying everything that we had, aerials and the map, and finding something like this in the field was really cool. Even to a guy like Jim, it was a big deal.”
A close-up look at the 7th green, which was removed when the course changed its routing in 1960.COURTESY PHOTOA look at the original 3rd green at Midland Hills.COURTESY PHOTO
Builders broke ground on the restoration on July 20, 2020, and the course was closed two weeks later. Every tee was rebuilt, repositioned and realigned, and every bunker (50 of them) was rebuilt and filled with new sand. Some bunkers discovered from the map were dug up and restored. New drainage was installed, and parts of cart paths removed. The greens were expanded by nearly one acre, and the fairways were enlarged by more than five acres. About 3,000 yards of soil was removed during the entire project, most of which taken from around the greens and to lower tees. Thirty acres of rough was converted to fescue, both for strategic and aesthetic reasons, the latter to accentuate the topography, which Manthey says is the rolling property’s biggest asset.
The scale of the property is much more visible now, too, and has been since Manthey started removing trees years ago. He’s taken out between 1,200 and 1,500 trees over the last 15 years to bring back Raynor’s intended sightlines and strategies. From the 9th tee, for example, you can now see every green on the front nine. Identifying all of Raynor’s templates years ago might have been difficult. Now, Midland Hills has 14 of them.Even the two new holes (1 and 18) built long after Raynor died incorporate his design characteristics to seamlessly integrate into the routing.
Proof that early reviews are positive: Midland Hills added 20 new members in the fall — joining a club with a course they couldn’t even play until next year.
“Younger players, they don’t care about the hot dogs and cold beer,” Manthey said. “Everybody’s got that. Architecture, if you have it properly presented, really gives you a unique asset to market. And that was a huge part of this project, and not just for current members. Our board of directors and our leadership at the club, they were smart enough to say, ‘We’re doing this for us, but we’re also doing this for future generations,’ which was really cool.”
From top, clockwise: shaper Zach Varty; superintendent Mike Manthey; architect Jim Urbina; Oli; and shaper Joe Hancock.COURTESY PHOTO
The new Midland Hills
It’s an unusually warm December Wednesday in Minnesota, perfect for a stroll. The Minneapolis skyline glimmers in the distance as Manthey twirls a water bottle and walks the 18th fairway to the new-look 18th green at Midland Hills. The bunker guarding the left side was completely overhauled and reshaped, a back bunker was added to collect any long shots and the green shape itself reverted to a more classic Raynor design with squared-off corners. Manthey’s two-and-a-half-year-old Terrier/Border Collie mix, Oli, tags along, occasionally pausing for a sniff or to grab a stick. Oli, besides being a loyal companion, helps with the geese. “She chases anything with legs,” Manthey says.
During a two-hour tour of the property, Manthey recounts the extraordinary circumstances that led to the finding of the map and, nearly three years later, is still giddy over its details and Raynor’s strategies. (His enthusiasm is also a running joke within his family: “You’re really talking about the map again,” his wife says.) But mostly, Manthey talks about the new Midland Hills, why it’s so improved, why he’s so proud of it and how excited he is for members to finally play it. He talks about the sacrifice they made to give up their golf course, especially during an unusual summer like this one when golf rounds spiked. He thinks they’ll be blown away.
Mike Manthey, and the map, at his desk at Midland Hills.JOSH BERHOW
“The thing I’m most proud of,” Urbina says, “is the involvement of the superintendent and his willingness to go the extra mile to make sure that history was, to the best of our ability, reborn. The membership, they knew what we were working on, and the GM, Tim Ivory, he was great support. But what I’m most proud of is the superintendent’s love-affair with the golf course he works on every day and realizing its place in Golden Age architecture.”
The restoration was finished in mid-November, just as winter weather started to arrive. All that’s left to do is clean up some construction scars. The new front nine will debut in the spring, with the back nine opening a week or two later.
Some members have toured the course since it closed, and a handful were there just last week, walking in groups of two, pointing to removed trees, staring down new sightlines and inspecting greens. If you looked closely, through the glare of the midday sun, and followed their eyes, you could almost see them reading putts.
Ben Hogan has closed. And this time it looks as though it’s for good.
The Fort Worth-based descendant of the original company Ben Hogan himself started in 1953 let its entire workforce go last Friday and has ceased operations.
“I don’t know if it’s permanent,” Hogan CEO Scott White tells MyGolfSpy, “but I suspect it is.”
This latest twist in the Hogan story certainly looks like the final one. And the irony is that it has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the performance of the Ben Hogan Golf Equipment Co.
BEN HOGAN IS CLOSING: WHY?
“It really boils down to the fact that our majority shareholder, ExWorks Capital of Chicago, filed for bankruptcy in March,” says White. “So we weren’t getting any funding at all.”
ExWorks specialized in high-risk-high-reward investments but its portfolio took a major hit in 2020 and 2021 due to COVID.
“They funneled a lot of money into other areas of their portfolio,” says White, “but by March, the whole thing came crashing down.”
White spent much of the past four months searching for new investors. That proved difficult because Hogan didn’t actually own the brand. Perry Ellis owns it and licensed the name to the Hogan company in order to sell equipment.
As a result, Ellis pulled the licensee agreement two weeks ago. Once that happened, Hogan’s fate was pretty much sealed.
“Without a license, you can’t sell anything branded ‘Ben Hogan’,” says White.
THE BUMPY HOGAN HISTORY
As mentioned, the Ben Hogan Co. dates back to 1953 when Hogan declared he was going to make the finest golf clubs in the world. After false starts, scrapped inventory that wasn’t up to standards and an investor buyout, Hogan sold his company to AMF in 1960.
In the mid-1980s, the Hogan company changed hands twice in less than three years and was sold again in the early ’90s before winding up as part of the Spalding Golf stable in 1998. Callaway acquired the Hogan brand, along with Top-Flite, out of bankruptcy in 2003. Callaway sold Hogan-branded equipment for five years before mothballing the brand in 2008.
In 2012, Callaway sold the Hogan brand name to Perry Ellis.
Two years later, former Hogan executive Terry Koehler announced plans to resurrect Hogan-branded equipment as a licensee. That endeavor ended in bankruptcy by early 2017. Within a few months, however, Hogan came back again, this time as a direct-to-consumer brand.
According to White, this latest Hogan iteration had been growing annually at a 50-percent clip ever since and enjoyed its best year ever in 2021. The company still relied on ExWorks for investments in R&D, marketing and inventory.
“We had seasonality to deal with,” says White. “Our wallets would be fat and happy during the summer but, in the fall and winter when we needed to buy components for the following season, we’d need funding to get us through that period.”
Because of ExWorks’s struggles, Hogan hadn’t seen any of that money since 2020.
NO WHITE KNIGHTS
ExWorks, along with White, did try to find a new owner for Hogan to no avail. Since Hogan was a licensee and didn’t own the brand name, there was little to interest a new investor. That problem only became worse over the past two weeks once Perry Ellis pulled the license.
“Yeah, it’s their (Perry Ellis’) ball and bat,” says White. “They’ve done a nice job on the apparel side but the apparel world and golf equipment world are very different. They’ll have to figure out what, if anything, they want to do with the brand on the equipment side.”
White does insist if ExWorks had remained solvent, Hogan would still be going strong.
“If they had been able to invest at the levels they had planned, we’d be two or three times the size. But we were always on a really tight budget. We weren’t able to get Tour players like we wanted. We weren’t able to invest in golf balls and in other initiatives we had in our strategic plan.”
IS HOGAN DOWN FOR THE COUNT?
Is Ben Hogan closing down for good?
It would appear so.
For a company that has gotten up off the mat more times than Rocky Balboa, this has the look and feel of a TKO. As it stands now, Perry Ellis still owns the brand name. But, as we’ve seen twice now, it’s very difficult to make a go of it in the golf equipment game as a licensee.
“It would have to be a group of investors who see the value of the Ben Hogan brand in premium golf equipment,” says White. “They’d have to be ready to invest and ready to be patient. And those are two words that don’t usually go together in the same sentence.”
For many consumers, the news of Hogan’s demise will most likely register barely above the “who cares?” level on the Big Deal Meter. It was, after all, a small direct-to-consumer brand and hadn’t been a major factor in market share for nearly 20 years.
But it’s a sad coincidence that news of the Hogan shutdown came 25 years to the day that Mr. Hogan himself passed away on July 25, 1997, at the age of 84.
And for golfers who do care about the history of the game, the existence of the Ben Hogan Company was a connection to the game’s roots and to its soul.
This golf nut, for one, is saddened by the news as the man, the company, and the clubs are yet another important part of my golfing life whichhas now faded into the background. Hogan’s early struggles as a child and then as a young pro, followed by the tragic auto accident just when he reached the pinnacle of his profession are seared into my memory. I’ve read every book written about this great man, and for me, he embodies a golfer’s never-ending search for The Secret. He even sold a story to LIFE Magazine about having discovered The Secret, making Hogan – at least for me – the ultimate golf nut.
For added perspective about the history of the Ben Hogan Golf Equipment Company, click HERE to read a story written in 2018.
And for a special treat, check out this wonderful video of the Ben Hogan Golf Equipment commercials from the early nineties.
The split is widening between golf’s preeminent tour and the Saudi-backed startup, and the game is poorer for it. Bob Harig proposes how they could live together.
Jon Rahm and Rory McIlroy have wondered recently whether it’s time for some meetings to return pro golf closer to the normalcy it had a year ago.Peter Casey/USA Today
Bob Harig, Sports Illustrated
The acrimony continues, with peace seemingly a fleeting thought. The idea of any kind of common ground when it comes to the PGA Tour and LIV Golf seems impossible to imagine. Now.
Remember the Patrick Cantlay-Bryson DeChambeau duel at last year’s BMW Championship in the FedEx Cup playoffs? The six-hole sudden-death playoff won by Cantlay that helped propel him to the FedEx Cup title? Something like that can’t happen outside of the major championships now.
DeChambeau, just two years removed from his U.S. Open win at Winged Foot, made the move to LIV Golf and is no longer allowed to play in PGA Tour events. His choice. But the fact remains the sport is headed toward a fracture that those who are taking part in the new venture are willing to endure.
For some, that’s fine. Good riddance, they say. But the overall picture does not appear bright for the game. And the idea of coming together, however abhorrent that might seem to the PGA Tour leadership, might be necessary.
With that in mind, how could some sort of meeting of the minds between the PGA Tour (and thus the DP World Tour) and LIV Golf work? There are no easy answers here. But it doesn’t take long to come up with an outline of ideas that could be the basis for something that sticks. Here goes:
1. Allow PGA Tour players (and DP World Tour) to compete in LIV events
Compromise is key and without it there is no chance for any of this to work. But for there to be a way forward between the two entities, there can’t be suspensions of PGA Tour players. They need to be able to compete on both circuits. The question: how?
Norman has said he believes that LIV Golf is “additive.’’ He continually has stated he’s not looking to replace the PGA Tour or even thwart players from players doing both. But if you are going to play 14 LIV events – the League concept going forward – it’s impossible to meet the PGA Tour’s minimum of 15 events for membership.
So here’s the compromise: LIV reduces its number of events to 10, and the PGA Tour lowers its minimum for those competing in LIV events to 10. That’s 20 events total, including the major championships, with obviously the ability to play more on the PGA Tour if desired.
2. LIV Golf would help subsidize PGA Tour purses
If you pass that first hurdle, those who compete in LIV events could still be PGA Tour members. And in exchange for the rights to get any PGA Tour member to sign on, LIV in turn could subsidize purses for the events played opposite LIV events. Let’s say $5 million per event, or a total of $50 million if there are 10 LIV events. If Saudi’s Public Investment Fund can afford huge signing bonuses to players, it can afford this rather paltry sum when the end game will help make LIV money in the long run. So this week’s Rocket Mortgage Classic, in theory, would get a $5 million boost, which would go a long way toward helping the rest of the membership not able to play in LIV events.
3. There would have to be some sort of TV agreement
This could obviously be a sticking point. And where compromise again would need to be in play. Would the 10 LIV events come under the PGA Tour’s television rights agreement? That is a complicated issue, and would likely mean the whole thing would need to be renegotiated. Not a simple task. If so, how would revenue be split? Most likely, LIV would want to make its own TV/streaming deal and cash in. But the way the Tour’s rules are written, it would require a fee for its own players to play on another circuit at the same time as its own events. The Tour owns a player’s media rights. In exchange for allowing players to compete in LIV events, the Tour would most certainly want some sort of financial return.
4. How is the PGA Tour helped by this arrangement?
It beats seeing a slow trickle of players – which is bound to happen the longer this plays out – head to LIV. And while you’d possibly be losing a majority of the top 50 players in the world to 10 LIV events, at least you’d have them for 10 of your own with the possibility of more. No matter what you think of this concept, it’s not great that Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka, among others, won’t be playing in the Players Championship in March.
5. The Schedule
The way LIV is set up now, five of its eight events this year are scheduled for after the FedEx Cup playoffs. That was not done randomly. LIV saw September and October as a good time to play a majority of its tournaments. There’s nothing to keep that from happening with a PGA Tour collaboration.
Let’s say they go with this hypothetical 10-and-10 model. LIV could potentially play once a month starting in February through July – a total of six events – and then leave four for September and October. Norman has said he is not interested in playing tournaments against legacy PGA Tour events, so a LIV player could still compete in the four majors, the Players, the Genesis, Arnold Palmer and Memorial. He’d need two more, which could consist of playoff events or others if not eligible. And if he falls behind in points, he’s got tournaments after the Open to try and earn a place in the playoffs.
6. The World Rankings
Ranking points would no longer be imperative for LIV events. With access to the PGA Tour, LIV players would benefit from earning points in those events. It would actually incentivize them to compete in more PGA Tour events if points are necessary. The LIV events, with their big purses and season-ending team championship would, in theory, be compelling enough.
7. A chance for success
If you are of the mindset that you don’t want LIV to succeed at all, that you hate the Saudi funding source, that you prefer the PGA Tour as it is now structured with no outside competition, then these ideas are not for you. And if the PGA Tour is of the same mindset, it can continue to do what it is doing by suspending all PGA Tour members and not allowing access to its tournament. And that is what could happen. But it would also face the risk of continually losing top players to the big money.
With some common ground, LIV’s 48-player fields with a good number of top players and the added team component might gain some traction among golf fans. It wouldn’t be every week, but a diversion from the regular PGA Tour grind for six months. And then something else to perhaps embrace after the FedEx playoffs. The majors would still be king, as would the Players and a majority of the favorite PGA Tour stops.
Those events that go up against LIV events would get enhanced purses and players competing in them an opportunity to gain ground on the LIV players, who would not be earning FedEx points. And perhaps those tournaments could be rotated.
It would also be helpful if the LIV events ended on Saturdays, thus giving the PGA Tour event opposite it a stage to itself on Sunday.
8. Last thing
If all of this happens, something for LIV to consider: drop the shotgun starts. Go to a two-tee start with eight groups of 3 each of the first two rounds, then go to twosomes of both tees on the final day. It’s still a condensed window of golf, which is one of the objectives. And far easier to follow.
When you earned the right to tee it up in a U.S. Open where the eventual champion was Jack Nicklaus; when you got picked up hitchhiking by none other than Byron Nelson who capped off the journey by offering a range session (true as it is, it’s a story for another day); and when you turned pro at the age of 57 not to play but to teach . . . well, you’re in possession of true golf soul and have the privilege to share perspective.
Bruce Chalas has felt the spirit of golf for more than 50 years — or at least he thought he had. Then he met Jordan Thomas and a host of other adaptive golfers.
Which is why Bruce Chalas’ text served as a reminder to the magic of golf.
“This tournament has people who will do anything to be able to play golf,” wrote the man whose passionate career in golf includes 14 appearances in U.S Golf Association tournaments and more than 20 years coaching collegians.
“It’s a fantastic sight to see. All these players love golf.”
Deep breath, wide smile, warm torrents.
The inaugural U.S. Adaptive Open in Chalas’ adopted home of Pinehurst, N.C., overwhelmed him and when he extended an invitation to speak with a participant, Jordan Thomas, the timing could not have been more perfect.
If ever we needed to hear the story of a man whose foundation boasts this simple mission – “Every kid deserves access to what they need to be a kid.” – it is at this moment in golf time.
The victim of a boating accident at age 16 in which both his legs were amputated below the knees, Jordan Thomas figures he never spent a minute feeling sorry for himself because barely out of surgery he was consumed with another train of thought.
“It never occurred to me as even a possibility that I’d never play golf again. I knew I was going to have access.”
Feeling blessed to be the son of doctors – Liz and Vic Thomas are neonatal physicians in Nashville – “I knew I had the luxury and access to (prostheses),” said Jordan. “I figured I’d go to the store and pick out a pair.”
Eventually, he did, but as he recovered in a Miami hospital back in 2005, Thomas discovered that his legs would cost about $20,000. Bit of a shock, but then came the outrage. He learned that prostheses are deemed “not medically necessary” by insurance companies in many states.
“So, many children who need the prostheses (for different functions like running or golf or swimming) cannot get them. I was furious. It was unacceptable to me. It didn’t make sense. What can be more ‘medically necessary’ than a kid being able to play games?”
The genesis of the Jordan Thomas Foundation (jordanthomasfoundation.org) was hatched while he was still in that Miami hospital. When he was missing two legs! And he was just 16!
Digest that, folks, then appreciate with total awe.
The fact that 17 years later Jordan Thomas is still an advocate for children and families living with limb losses and for insurance fairness. The Jason Thomas Foundation currently sponsors 83 children in 20 states and three countries and his goal remains unchanged from the days when he sat in that hospital room. “I want to do something long-lasting and impactful.”
A berth in the inaugural U.S. Adaptive Open was never in his crystal ball, but when the USGA unveiled plans for this unique event, Thomas was like so many others who love golf and play it despite disabilities that make it incredibly challenging.
“I’m just so thrilled and proud of what the USGA has done,” said Thomas, who is competing as one of seven men in the multiple limb amputee flight. “I never envisioned I’d ever be in a USGA championship.”
He’s in the field at Pinehurst first and foremost because of a relentless spirit. He’s there because of great parents, wonderful doctors, and a supporting cast of friends and foundation supporters. But Jordan Thomas is also there because a huge majority of people in the golf community are intensely committed to widening the playing fields, opening up avenues for diversity and inclusion, and avidly pushing agendas proclaiming that the game belongs to all.
“We get hung up watching the greatest players in the world,” said Thomas. “But it’s such a broad, vast universe and I salute the USGA for (doing this).”
In advance of his trip to Pinehurst, a mutual friend suggested Thomas look up Bruce Chalas, explaining that he’s one of those golfers who walks the walk; he loves golf and has a passion to bring more people into the game. Spot on, Thomas has learned, and they’ve hit it off beautifully.
But as much as Thomas has enjoyed the pressure of competitive golf (with rounds of 76-74 he is well in front in his flight) for the first time since junior golf, Chalas has reveled in the sights, the sounds, the emotions of these inspiring group of golfers.
“I spoke with Ken Green for a while (Monday),” said Chalas, referring to the five-time PGA Tour player from Connecticut who lost his right leg in an RV accident in 2009 that also killed his brother, his girlfriend, and his dog.
“He just wants to play golf every day.”
If Chalas sounds inspired, he is. But guess what, so is Thomas, who concedes that he looks around the range and sees the vision impaired, the intellectual impaired, the seated players “and I watch them in awe,” he said. “They have to have so much resiliency, so much perseverance.”
They also have a love of the game that is equal to, or possibly surpasses, yours and mine. That is the greatest aspect to this U.S. Adaptive Open and it is the takeaway that Thomas will embrace. “I’m not competing for money and I won’t be able to,” he said. “But I compete because of the relationships created. It’s why I love the game.”
Many thanks to fellow Golf Nut Jan Beljan for sharing this story with us. – HN
Greg Norman’s efforts are vengeful and disruptive. His attempt to start a world tour in 1993 was summarily dismissed by Tim Finchem, then Commissioner of the PGA TOUR. However, the TOUR later created the World Golf Championships. Norman saw this as kidnapping his concept. A World Tour/Championships was his idea. He was livid that Finchem was now, conceptually, doing what he had originally proposed.
In 1993 – 30 years ago, Norman was at the top of the heap. The guy was ranked number one in the world for 330 weeks in the 80’s and 90’s. In 1986 he was leading all four majors after 54 holes. He won one of them – The Open. He won the Vardon Trophy three times, was number one on the money list three times and was inducted into the WGHOF in 2001. Through the ‘80’s and early ‘90’s it was all Greg Norman. He could do no wrong. The problem is he believed it. And he continued to be worshipped in Australia with numerous awards and accolades. His ego grew as big as his shadow in the setting sun.
I believe he has been simmering for years searching for a way to get back at the TOUR. He feels wronged. And he wants to get even. He found a way to do it with the Saudi’s. This is all about evening the score and he will not stop until the professional game is completely disrupted. One former PGA TOUR player described it to me as a hijacking. In his mind he is on a roll and nothing will stop him. Public opinion and reputation be damned. I am bullet proof.
The problem is – he’s not. I do not foresee his 54-hole events earning OWGR points. His fields are too small. OWGR requires a minimum of 75 players. The Team concept might work in soccer or cricket but not in golf. Golf is a singular sport. The only team golf event of any consequence is the Ryder Cup. The Presidents Cup (created to include non-UK and Asian/Australian players, etc.) runs a distant second in public interest and ratings. Speaking of which, without a broadcast package – cable or network – LIV golf will not gain any traction. Period. I have sold broadcast and cable golf events for 30 years. It won’t happen. How many people in the 18-34 demo even know who Greg Norman is? And the internet is hardly the answer. The metrics and demos are not there. Nothing to sell.
If Greg wants LIV golf to be a viable professional golf tour with a worldwide presence, he needs to drop his sword and his shield and sit down with Monahan and Pelley and hammer out a deal. But he doesn’t think he has to. He has called and they haven’t picked up. So, his attitude is – screw ‘em. I tried. The more LIV entices players away from the PGA and DP World Tours – the deeper the wounds will grow and the harder it will be to form any alliance. So until that time in some far off world, players will continue to follow the money and leave their honor, their conscience and their reputations on the side of the road in shreds. Worldwide alliance? That’s a pipe dream. Greg Norman has never been in a business venture where he does not have control. And Monahan and Pelley will relinquish nothing.
So here we are. Standoff.
And to think there have only been two LIV tournaments thus far. Buckle up.
Thanks, #1746, for an insider’s view of the LIV Golf controversy and its long-term ramifications. – The Head Nut
Bruce Chalas has felt the spirit of golf for more than 50 years — or at least he thought he had. Then he met Jordan Thomas and a host of other adaptive golfers.
