Speaker 1: I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset.
Speaker 2: When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 2: And when I find my ball.
Speaker 3: In a bright egg Frida egg, the dreaded Frida egg,
Speaker 3: Frida egg egg egg, Frida egg bride egg lie, I'm
Speaker 3: about ready to run off the golf course.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to the Friday Golf Podcast. I'm your host,
Speaker 2: Andy Johnson, and today I will be joined by Jeff Shackelford.
Speaker 2: Jeff is the founder of the Quadrilateral. Really one of
Speaker 2: the I would say, I don't know if he would
Speaker 2: like this framing, but he's one of the original gangsters
Speaker 2: of the golf Internet, the ogs of the golf Internet.
Speaker 2: You know, I grew up reading his writings, his books,
Speaker 2: his blog, Jeffshackle for dot com. Now he's got a
Speaker 2: great newsletter. It's worth reading. Obviously, a Los Angeles native,
Speaker 2: was on site all week at the US Women's Open,
Speaker 2: and it's been a while since we caught up. So
Speaker 2: I wanted to talk to Jeff about a myriad of subjects,
Speaker 2: including the Women's Open, his re release of grounds for Golf,
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Speaker 2: I welcome in the great Jeff Shackelford, the owner of
Speaker 2: the Quadrilateral, A must read newsletter on substack well worth,
Speaker 2: well worth the subscription price every year. You're missing out
Speaker 2: if you're not, if you're not getting it. To be
Speaker 2: completely honest, Jeff, you're fresh off of home game, getting
Speaker 2: ready for another one, A little home stand for you.
Speaker 2: The Lateral focuses on the majors of golf. So yeah,
Speaker 2: the US Women's Open just this past weekend at Riviera.
Speaker 2: You're gearing up for the Curtis Cup this week before
Speaker 2: hopping on a flight to Shinney. Uh. This is the
Speaker 2: busiest the quad's ever been here.
Speaker 3: Uh yeah, Uh, not ideal, but not as bad as
Speaker 3: it is for the USGA staff, a different people who
Speaker 3: are working, you know, at least two of the three
Speaker 3: weeks and trying to do all the things I do
Speaker 3: with golf's longest stay in between. So I'm not going
Speaker 3: to complain. And it's a lot of fun. When it's
Speaker 3: a home game. It just makes it a lot easier.
Speaker 1: So I'm I'm.
Speaker 3: Uh, I've been excited about this Curtis Cup for a
Speaker 3: while now, after you know, just the Walker Cups, and
Speaker 3: I do I do do the cup events that matter.
Speaker 1: In the newsletter as well, So we'll leave it at that.
Speaker 1: I'm i'm but I'm excited.
Speaker 3: It's it's going to be a good run, and I
Speaker 3: think Shinna Cock's going to be much better this time.
Speaker 2: I'm just worried about you and the media center food
Speaker 2: for three straight weeks, you know, That's That's what I'm
Speaker 2: worried about.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's a challenge, but thankfully the current us
Speaker 3: g A group values a little bit well. They value
Speaker 3: food that's edible and occasionally healthy so well, and the
Speaker 3: coffee is key. We get they they feed us great coffee,
Speaker 3: as you know, and that's really, you know, writers, really
Speaker 3: the food isn't that important to us. It's it's the
Speaker 3: Wi Fi, the parking, and the coffee situation. So when
Speaker 3: you look at it that way, the USGA usually does
Speaker 3: pretty well.
Speaker 2: I don't want to date you. Were you ever in
Speaker 2: media centers as a young, young, enterprising golf journalist where
Speaker 2: we're smoking was allowed?
Speaker 3: No, I grew up. I've been on airplanes with smoking.
Speaker 3: I am old enough for that, but no, no, I've
Speaker 3: been in a press center with what was the thing
Speaker 3: after typewriters.
Speaker 1: They're they're sort of that they're not.
Speaker 3: A teletype, but it's a it's I watched Jim Murray
Speaker 3: work on this with with water dripping from the cart
Speaker 3: barn roof there at Riviera, just unfazed.
Speaker 1: So I try to think.
Speaker 3: Of that when I'm really whining one day, Like you know,
Speaker 3: I've got literally I can I have a camera in
Speaker 3: my phone.
Speaker 1: I mean, the equipment's amazing. I can put it all
Speaker 1: on a backpack.
Speaker 3: I've got a laptop and I think, you know, Jim
Speaker 3: Murray was trying to bang out brilliant stuff, which he
Speaker 3: did in far worse working conditions. So and I can't
Speaker 3: even imagine a room full of typewriters and smoking.
Speaker 1: And I just I have asked people about the old Augusta.
Speaker 3: They said it wasn't just that then, it was the
Speaker 3: Quantt Hut and where the acoustics were just it wasn't
Speaker 3: like our little cafe there.
Speaker 1: Now with a nice wood ceiling. It was just aluminum.
Speaker 3: And I don't know everybody got anything done, much less
Speaker 3: wrote a decent article.
Speaker 2: I feel like, you know, I just think about this.
Speaker 2: This is probably true of like a lot of professions,
Speaker 2: like anybody that watched mad Men and like you know,
Speaker 2: just the day the day of a New York ad Men,
Speaker 2: like you know, with the boozy life. The thing that
Speaker 2: made golf journalism or any sports journalism go was like
Speaker 2: a concoction of cigarettes, coffee and alcohol.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that is the one area where I do
Speaker 3: gripe still.
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, the master serves up.
Speaker 3: They opened the bar right after the champions press conference.
Speaker 3: And you can tell how I feel about the winner
Speaker 3: based on if both hands are full with an azalea,
Speaker 3: with the cosamigos.
Speaker 1: Although they changed tequila this year.
Speaker 3: But yeah, I've gotten some funny looks in recent years, Sandy,
Speaker 3: when I've asked, do we have any we have any
Speaker 3: beer wine? You know, these stories don't write themselves on
Speaker 3: a Sunday night, especially when you get a Brian Harmon
Speaker 3: win or something and they, you know, new times, they
Speaker 3: look at you like huh. And Longhurst just brought the
Speaker 3: gin in. Of course, we can't even bring something in.
Speaker 3: And then he of course famously had a he was
Speaker 3: hammered on the air on CBS.
Speaker 1: He had a vase.
Speaker 3: I have no idea how he got up and down
Speaker 3: that stand on seventeen. It's it's a it's scary, but
Speaker 3: he did it.
Speaker 2: Not to not to do a hard transition. Well, I
Speaker 2: will say, you know, one of my great regrets is
Speaker 2: that every every Sunday of the Masters, it looks like
Speaker 2: just such a wonderful time. The bar opens, and I'm
Speaker 2: always scurrying out to record a podcast. Yeah, it's just like,
Speaker 2: you know, the world's smallest violin hazards of your occupation.
Speaker 2: But that's what I always have to do. I bypassed
Speaker 2: the bar, say goodbye to everybody. It is always interesting
Speaker 2: to be also who's already got their story done by
Speaker 2: the time. Yeah, it's like the story is all written.
Speaker 2: I'm just thrown in a quote here, a quote there,
Speaker 2: and I'm hitting the open bar.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the newsletter world. I can't do that. And
Speaker 1: then I I understand why people do it.
Speaker 3: But especially the last couple of years, it's it's it's
Speaker 3: actually fun to be there late, see who's grinding, and
Speaker 3: it does help to have that little bit of lubrication
Speaker 3: in case it's But I mean, the last two have
Speaker 3: been pretty special to write about, but you could probably
Speaker 3: imagine there were a couple others recently that we're a
Speaker 3: little more work.
Speaker 2: All Right. You've watched a ton of golf at Riviera
Speaker 2: through the years and professional events. You've played a ton
Speaker 2: of golf at Riviera. It's probably the golf course you've
Speaker 2: spent the most time at in your life. I'm guessing.
Speaker 2: What was it like watching the greatest women take Riviera
Speaker 2: on at this week's US Women's Open.
Speaker 3: It was incredible, Andy and unfortunately will make me more
Speaker 3: bitter and more obnoxious about the distance issue.
Speaker 1: But it was.
Speaker 3: Just stunning to see how certain holes played. What it
Speaker 3: was like to watch certain hazards and bunkers have meaning,
Speaker 3: and really the setup was was just right in terms
Speaker 3: of being generous there. Yeah, I had my quibbles with
Speaker 3: all locations, days used, and some teas were up surprisingly
Speaker 3: short that weren't needed, things like that, But overall the
Speaker 3: rough was perfect because it was it was. It was tough,
Speaker 3: but you could all kind of You could get some
Speaker 3: good lies, you could get some horrible lies, and Nelly
Speaker 3: hit some incredible recoveries from it that my Angelino fellow
Speaker 3: Angelina's didn't really quite understand how good they were, but
Speaker 3: we can.
Speaker 1: Talk about that.
Speaker 3: It was I'm very all air on the side of
Speaker 3: an ignorant cloud crowd over an obnoxious one, and this
Speaker 3: was just a wonderful crowd. The vibes out there were
Speaker 3: just amazing, and a lot of kids too. But yeah,
Speaker 3: so to see the tenth hole play the way it did, yeah,
Speaker 3: I put a stat in the newsletter today. The women
Speaker 3: largely laid up and even the ones who drove it
Speaker 3: got typically nobody really finishes on the green when they
Speaker 3: drive it, and they still hit sixty nine percent of
Speaker 3: the shots and regulation hitting into the green, and the
Speaker 3: men this year were seventy three all basically playing as
Speaker 3: a par three. Nobody laid up this year. And to me,
Speaker 3: if the data gurus who have driven this mindset of
Speaker 3: just drive the green and take your chances thing, I
Speaker 3: would hope they'd look at that number and go, huh,
Speaker 3: so we were only four percent better doing the bomb
Speaker 3: and gouge thing. And yet but bringing in all this
Speaker 3: stress with the shenanigans that can take place going back
Speaker 3: and forth, and the bunkers and the bottle brush trees
Speaker 3: and all the stuff you see there. So I doubt
Speaker 3: they will, but I think it'd be interesting to know
Speaker 3: how those conversations go before the next Genesis based on
Speaker 3: what the women did laying up.
Speaker 2: Well, what's interesting too about that is if you take
Speaker 2: a US Women's Open field, like the bottom third of
Speaker 2: that field is like I mean, you're comparing the Genesis,
Speaker 2: which is a small signature event literally the one hundred
Speaker 2: best players in the world. You know, of course, before
Speaker 2: the live people get back, roughly one hundred of the
Speaker 2: one hundred and twenty players of the world are at
Speaker 2: that event. And you know the US Women's Open you
Speaker 2: have you know, young kids qualifying, you have a wide
Speaker 2: array of players and skills just because of the open nature.
Speaker 2: It's one of the things that makes the tournament great.
Speaker 2: But it is like an aspect of it's this giant
Speaker 2: field and there's a lot of players that aren't to
Speaker 2: the up to stuff of uber Elite, and it's so
Speaker 2: those data, the data numbers, you know, and we have
Speaker 2: a lot of unfaithful data experts in the community data
Speaker 2: community of golf, but a faithful one that was you know,
Speaker 2: really using their braid by might like, you know, move
Speaker 2: that number up even more because of to you know,
Speaker 2: kind of try and equal the data out, yeah, or
Speaker 2: you or the takeaway is that women are significantly better
Speaker 2: wedge players than men.
Speaker 3: I think that's an I think that's a discussion that's
Speaker 3: legitimate to have because you know, I sit back there
Speaker 3: at that green a lot with Doug Ferguson and over
Speaker 3: the years, and and it does shock me that there's
Speaker 3: literally Alex Norin and Justin Thomas, who are some of
Speaker 3: the last guys to lay up and Tiger hit a
Speaker 3: shot similar to this that hit a high cutting, soft
Speaker 3: landing wedge. It's just unbelievable. How many of these these
Speaker 3: guys just hit this thing that's just coming in hot
Speaker 3: and you're like, well, what do you expect it to
Speaker 3: do when it lands? And Thomas always it's this high
Speaker 3: soft thing and Atlanta takes one bounce soft bounce and
Speaker 3: and that's why he lays out or used to lay up,
Speaker 3: even he drove it this year. But I think it
Speaker 3: is a legitimate thing to wonder about as to what
Speaker 3: are you doing with a wedgeineer and do you not
Speaker 3: have other shots that you can take something off it?
Speaker 3: And because you do need to hit it with a
Speaker 3: little bit of cut spin just the way the green
Speaker 3: is shaped.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what were there any other holes that kind of
Speaker 2: stood out besides ten as ones that you just you know,
Speaker 2: hadn't seen played in that manner in a long time.
Speaker 1: The part fives, all three of them, even though they
Speaker 1: played the seventeenth, which is historically a long part five
Speaker 1: that was never reachable until recent years.
Speaker 3: You know, I mean people literally knew the players who
Speaker 3: had reached it over the years, you know, Weiss Cough,
Speaker 3: John Daily, Tom Layman.
Speaker 1: It was.
Speaker 3: It was literally a one page list until the juice
Speaker 3: equipment era, and now it's now it's reachable if there's
Speaker 3: any helping win for probably at least half the field
Speaker 3: of a normal genesis. But so yeah, watching so number
Speaker 3: one had had real meaning and you had woods going
Speaker 3: into it, the wind picked up yesterday you got a
Speaker 3: couple I think one or two maybe long irons in
Speaker 3: So that was fun. That boomerang green had had real
Speaker 3: meaning in terms of I saw a lot of women
Speaker 3: I thought misplay it. By the way, surprising how many
Speaker 3: women play a draw, and because you just don't see
Speaker 3: a draw anymore with the men unless it's an intentional
Speaker 3: shot trying to get around a corner or something. And
Speaker 3: I was surprised at that because it really it's a
Speaker 3: beautiful green to hit a cut into it with a
Speaker 3: wood and feed it down to pretty much every whole location,
Speaker 3: but maybe yesterday's which is in this back wing.
Speaker 2: And then at number eleven, think about the draw.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I don't know if this was the case with you
Speaker 2: as a junior, but I feel like all the juniors
Speaker 2: of my you know, not all of them, but a
Speaker 2: lot of them when I was growing up, you hit
Speaker 2: a draw because you needed to hit the ball further.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And that's probably the case.
Speaker 2: Right, because you get that overspin and you get you
Speaker 2: can get five ten extra yards and the way the
Speaker 2: equipment change was that, you know, the knuckle cut came
Speaker 2: to be with the pro v one x, and as
Speaker 2: soon as the knuckle cut became a formidable opponent to
Speaker 2: the distance you could get out of a draw, nobody
Speaker 2: played played the draw anymore. It was actually a huge disadvantage.
Speaker 2: But where you're trying to pick up extra yards, and
Speaker 2: I think for the women's like ten extra yards is huge.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, there's no question that's that's why some of
Speaker 3: them are doing it. But I again, I was still
Speaker 3: shocked how many that was their predominant shot shape. Uh say,
Speaker 3: Young Kim used it a lot and uh and it's
Speaker 3: not typically a good golf course for a draw a
Speaker 3: right hander straw. But you know, she obviously didn't phaze
Speaker 3: her because she was right there to the end. So yeah,
Speaker 3: So so that was one thing on one that was
Speaker 3: interesting to see because now it's just a three wood
Speaker 3: and uh and six iron, seven iron and uh. They
Speaker 3: a lot of guys also hit it into the where
Speaker 3: the merchandise tent was and the media tent in the
Speaker 3: practice the old practice fairway and the fan village early
Speaker 3: in the week, all all of the sort of Riviera
Speaker 3: locals that I know, we were all looking at it, like,
Speaker 3: what is the USGA doing. They're gonna get bombarded over there.
Speaker 3: That's where the the you know, the third of the
Speaker 3: shots seems like the men are over there, partly because
Speaker 3: you know, you're nervous on the first tee. Sometimes people
Speaker 3: just floil one out second hal for whatever reason, they
Speaker 3: always go right. Everybody's you have all the world to
Speaker 3: the left. But anyway, the women hit it much straighter
Speaker 3: and there were very few balls over there. I I
Speaker 3: uh so that U that was the USGA's view is
Speaker 3: that they just hit a straighter But the part five
Speaker 3: eleventh they played from the same tea as the men
Speaker 3: and knowing that there was going to be a good
Speaker 3: helping sea breeze. No sant Ana wins during this time
Speaker 3: of year, and it was just fantastic because you really
Speaker 3: they also pushed the rough line or the rope line
Speaker 3: back on the right so that the rough had meaning
Speaker 3: on the trees, which I'm not a huge advocate of
Speaker 3: that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: But it really is great because.
Speaker 3: It brought the baranca that intersects the whole, you know,
Speaker 3: halfway bisex the whole, and it's at a beautiful little
Speaker 3: angle the way it sits so you can get over
Speaker 3: on the right, and many many times back in the
Speaker 3: old days of different equipment, that was you know, what
Speaker 3: do you do do you get over the baranca on tour?
Speaker 3: Do you lay up and then have a wood endo
Speaker 3: the green? And we saw that restored. It really meant
Speaker 3: you had to get the t shot in the fairway
Speaker 3: and it was a blast to watch. And but then
Speaker 3: the wind got to the point where they hit basically
Speaker 3: where the guys hit it yesterday.
Speaker 1: They had some huge.
Speaker 3: Drives because it was really howling at that point, but
Speaker 3: it was still a true three shotter. And then seventeen
Speaker 3: was really fun as a reachable part five and it
Speaker 3: was just the right thing kind of in the mix
Speaker 3: of holes it would have been pretty boring.
Speaker 1: Is just from the back tee as just a old
Speaker 1: school three shotters.
Speaker 3: So those were the holes that really stood out to
Speaker 3: me in just terms of because as you know the
Speaker 3: field first few days, there's some really short hitting, there's
Speaker 3: some very young players, and Shannon's set up airing on
Speaker 3: the side of making sure they tried to get them
Speaker 3: around with the tees. She also though used some all
Speaker 3: locations that are some of the hardest on the course,
Speaker 3: so I didn't quite understand that, but there were some
Speaker 3: te's that were way up and so it distorted a
Speaker 3: little bit how those holes played. But all in all,
Speaker 3: it was a really great setup and just so fun
Speaker 3: to see some more dynamics brought back to the golf
Speaker 3: course that are just just completely gone when the Genesis comes.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I that was kind of one of my big takeaways,
Speaker 2: like seeing a lower trajectory shot in you know, effectively
Speaker 2: you know, made made angles more important. And then also
Speaker 2: the hazards just in general were so much greater of penalty,
Speaker 2: but also so many more in play. And you know,
Speaker 2: you mentioned the Baranca on eleven. I mean, think about
Speaker 2: the Genesis. Sometimes you got guys taking three wood just
Speaker 2: keep it short of it, and like you're seeing some
Speaker 2: of the best women in the world heavy to lay
Speaker 2: up in front of it and hit hit you know,
Speaker 2: lumber in.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and uh yeah, it really has has Uh it
Speaker 3: was really eye opening to to and and I just
Speaker 3: started looking at some of the comparisons on the shot
Speaker 3: link numbers and uh it, you know, the one thing
Speaker 3: with the women hitting it shorter the eighth hole, which
Speaker 3: is all screwed up anyway, but it almost nobody went
Speaker 3: left I think fifteen times on the alternate fairway because
Speaker 3: the tea is in the wrong spot anyway. But then
Speaker 3: it's also was a little far back, so that was
Speaker 3: one hole where the lack of distance didn't make things pop.
Speaker 3: But overall it just it really I'm really at the
Speaker 3: point now I'm going to reflect on a little bit more.
Speaker 3: But I and you know, I use the reference juice
Speaker 3: equipment era, but more and more, you just after seeing
Speaker 3: something like that, you just you start to say, well,
Speaker 3: I mean, are we are in our equivalent of the
Speaker 3: steroid era?
Speaker 1: The records?
Speaker 3: Really we should start questioning whether some of these things
Speaker 3: should count because the advantage of men get from from
Speaker 3: the modern equipment and what they're doing and what it means.
Speaker 1: Just it really is.
Speaker 3: It's pitiful at this point, and it's so less interesting
Speaker 3: to watch, and the fact that we're still having this
Speaker 3: discussion trying to explain to people that you're losing shop
Speaker 3: making and variety of playing styles and all that stuff
Speaker 3: is it's it's incredible that we're we have this group
Speaker 3: of players who are holding onto this for one reason
Speaker 3: and coming up with this crap about tree removal, and
Speaker 3: it's pitiful.
Speaker 1: It's just pitiful.
Speaker 3: And by the way, just on that note, the women
Speaker 3: I never heard Poa mentioned once. They didn't whine about anything.
Speaker 3: Now the golf course is immaculate, and the fringes they've
Speaker 3: done beautiful work. So I mean, you saw say Young
Speaker 3: and yesterday Nelly, because they were missing a lot of
Speaker 3: greens early hit these shots at landed right on the
Speaker 3: edge of the collar that in the old days would
Speaker 3: have just stopped. And they got, you know, to three
Speaker 3: feet and got up and down. So the maintenance is
Speaker 3: amazing and better in June, no question. But it's not
Speaker 3: like it's bad in February now.
Speaker 2: And so if if Elly's putt hits that lip, which
Speaker 2: I can't believe it hit the lip even know if
Speaker 2: the lip and missus she might have played the poe.
Speaker 3: Uh yeah, I mean her explanation afterwards it was was
Speaker 3: more of a mysterad. But I when I saw the
Speaker 3: because I was over to the side when I saw
Speaker 3: the replay.
Speaker 1: No, she she pulled that a little bit that looked
Speaker 1: like a pole she had.
Speaker 3: Oh it would have been painful. I mean, it would
Speaker 3: have been a playoff. But and her attitude was so
Speaker 3: good that I actually think she would have not been
Speaker 3: devastated by it like some people were. I mean, her
Speaker 3: attitude is just incredible, how different it is from just
Speaker 3: five six years ago when I saw it well shure,
Speaker 3: and how easily she was annoyed by mostly slow play stuff.
Speaker 1: And now she's just so.
Speaker 3: Calm, graceful, just just the temperament, the vibe. She's just
Speaker 3: so relaxed and and just doesn't look nervous at all.
Speaker 3: But yeah, that was a that was a bit of
Speaker 3: a yank.
Speaker 2: Obviously, the big story, you know, outside of you know,
Speaker 2: Riviera is kind of a sidebar. The big story is
Speaker 2: the you know, most recognizable women's golfer, the number one player,
Speaker 2: without a doubt, number one player in the world now
Speaker 2: is one the first two majors of the year, you know,
Speaker 2: with Nelly and the LPGA, the greater sport of women's golf.
Speaker 2: Do you do you see this week as a potential
Speaker 2: jumping off point for the sport to reach new levels
Speaker 2: or you know what in your mind, what needs to
Speaker 2: happen for you know, you had written earlier in the
Speaker 2: week about some of the lackluster crowds at riv like,
Speaker 2: what has to happen for women's golf to capture a
Speaker 2: bigger slice of the pie.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the crowds really were more a product of the
Speaker 3: time of year and going to a market, just like
Speaker 3: they did with Houston. When you go to a golf
Speaker 3: course where the tour is in the same year, it's
Speaker 3: just never worked well historically in the game, and the
Speaker 3: USGA had vowed to stop doing that, accept at Pebble Beach,
Speaker 3: and same with the RNA essentially with the old course,
Speaker 3: which is just different. Pebble Beach is just different and
Speaker 3: nobody minds seeing those places twice a year and all that.
Speaker 3: But in LA there's a lot going on as graduation
Speaker 3: day on Thursday for a lot of local high schools,
Speaker 3: so it wasn't a shock. I don't think it was
Speaker 3: really a statement about the women's game. I thought the
Speaker 3: marketing was kind of weird too, not a lot of
Speaker 3: visibility locally, a lot of TV ads and things like that,
Speaker 3: So I don't think you can really pin that on
Speaker 3: the women. I actually think a lot of the best
Speaker 3: thing that can happen for the women's game is to
Speaker 3: not have the conversation of is this a jumping off point,
Speaker 3: what can we do now, because you get a lot
Speaker 3: of that with the coverage of the LPGA, and I
Speaker 3: think that's a turnoff to people. I think it's all
Speaker 3: also there's almost it's showing weakness in a way, like, well,
Speaker 3: shouldn't the topic just be what a what a great
Speaker 3: champion she is and what an incredible.
Speaker 1: Leader board it was?
Speaker 3: Gabby Lopez, Bertie's the eighteenth hole to tie the club Outlee,
Speaker 3: Charlie Hall goes sixty five, sixty seven. It's yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean you look at the diversity of the leaderboard just
Speaker 3: agent and uh nationality and.
Speaker 2: Character, ales of play too. Where you are Ellie super
Speaker 2: long obviously great, you know, Charlie Hull, longer player, but
Speaker 2: then you have Gabby Lopez who's a slow who's a
Speaker 2: shorter player player too slow player too.
Speaker 1: That was a nice starting slip there.
Speaker 2: Yeah she.
Speaker 3: Short, Gaby, Gabby Slopez is on the list of great
Speaker 3: great nicknames. But yeah, yeah, and how fun is that
Speaker 3: to have this? And then you know, Kiera Romero comes
Speaker 3: out and how about the amateur play was baking?
Speaker 2: There were so many your tally at Breene and Africa
Speaker 2: in the.
Speaker 3: Mix, and this Pharaoh O'Keefe from who just won the
Speaker 3: NCAA is are already in the top three best interviews
Speaker 3: in the game. You'll see a little bit of her
Speaker 3: this week at the Curtis Cup. Just a natural, smart
Speaker 3: but interesting. She's not just a good talker, she actually
Speaker 3: has great insights. So, yeah, you have I think it's
Speaker 3: just better to focus on those things than what can
Speaker 3: they do now. But there's no question that when they
Speaker 3: go to these venues, and as much as I think
Speaker 3: going to Riviera is a negative in terms of the
Speaker 3: market and getting people there, it is such a positive
Speaker 3: that they are on these places or going to a
Speaker 3: Chicago golf club in a few years, you know, tapping
Speaker 3: into these places that can no longer host the men
Speaker 3: like a wheelsher and I think they just really need
Speaker 3: to keep doing that. And yeah, and it's fine if
Speaker 3: the women want to say, that's really cool, we're getting
Speaker 3: to play where the men are, because it's not. It's
Speaker 3: it's more about the history of the game than it
Speaker 3: is some sort of equal rights push. I think that's
Speaker 3: what people don't really need to hear. I think it's
Speaker 3: more important that you just do the right things, go
Speaker 3: to the right venues, put them out there, set up
Speaker 3: the course right, don't set it up so easy and
Speaker 3: try to do this birdiefest.
Speaker 1: Thing which the LPGA has done.
Speaker 3: I think to the point it's kind of weird, but
Speaker 3: you know, they can handle a good test.
Speaker 1: They just show that.
Speaker 3: I just don't you know, people don't know how Kkuya
Speaker 3: when it's this time of year is so tough, and
Speaker 3: they have first they worked so hard early in the
Speaker 3: week to watching you know, I watched Gino just just
Speaker 3: trying all these different shots around the greens. It was
Speaker 3: so cool, but they did it. You know, I just
Speaker 3: didn't see that that look you see in past events
Speaker 3: of Revere with Kokua thriving in the summertime, the Senior
Speaker 3: Open and the PGAs where they were just befuddled, and
Speaker 3: some of that's a maintenance. Some of that was the
Speaker 3: hard work of the of the women. So I think
Speaker 3: it's just a matter of really more admiring the skill
Speaker 3: and the talent and and it always helps to have
Speaker 3: a a tiger like thing going on, which is about
Speaker 3: where we kind of were getting with Nelly. Now with
Speaker 3: two majors and we're going to have a Grand Slam.
Speaker 4: Discussions interested in the Grand Slam with two chances, where
Speaker 4: if she doesn't accomplish one, she's still.
Speaker 1: The quater covers four majors.
Speaker 3: Uh and and is not acknowledged the Avion because Mike
Speaker 3: Wan and friends when he.
Speaker 1: Was there made it a major.
Speaker 3: So no, I'm not interested in the Super Slam, the
Speaker 3: Denny's the Slam with a side and now there should
Speaker 3: be four majors, and if she wins the next two,
Speaker 3: as far as I'm concerned, she's She's just pulled off
Speaker 3: one of the greatest feats in the history of the game.
Speaker 2: I mean, you think about it. With the way she's playing. Obviously,
Speaker 2: this year has been a basic slew of runner ups,
Speaker 2: a bunch of wins. I think her worst finish is
Speaker 2: a T eight at this point. Yeah and uh and
Speaker 2: you go in. The next major in a couple of
Speaker 2: weeks is at Hazel Team, which you know, it notoriously
Speaker 2: sets up well for long hitters who hit the ball,
Speaker 2: who drive the ball well, and that's what she does exceptionally,
Speaker 2: so it opens up there. I thought, you know this
Speaker 2: this event just in terms of you know, if you
Speaker 2: go from really like late Saturday into Sunday, was an
Speaker 2: all time finish with Nelly's burning the last three on
Speaker 2: on Saturday to set up set herself up into the
Speaker 2: final group. You get obviously Charlie Hull surging, you know,
Speaker 2: another uh you know, high profile, big name surging into
Speaker 2: contention with like an electric first eleven holes, and then
Speaker 2: you already have you have other world class players with
Speaker 2: Inji Chun say Young Kim at the top of the board.
Speaker 2: You know, this this event all timer obviously at all
Speaker 2: time stage. But you know something I took away from
Speaker 2: it just as as someone who's right now on the
Speaker 2: Eastern East coast time and this you know you were
Speaker 2: on the ground all week, is just you know, it
Speaker 2: really worked for the schedule, like the golf schedule in
Speaker 2: terms of they were after the the after memorial, they
Speaker 2: were you know, on Saturday night it was on you know,
Speaker 2: they went late and you know, I finished a long
Speaker 2: day with my family and I turn on and I'm
Speaker 2: like in the middle the middle of like the coverage window,
Speaker 2: and it's like everybody on my on my you know
Speaker 2: team here in my in my in my house is
Speaker 2: happy and I could enjoy a little bit of golf,
Speaker 2: you know, and it's like the whole thing worked really well.
Speaker 2: It makes me, you know, it makes me always wonder
Speaker 2: why we fight West Coast Golf in the summer so much,
Speaker 2: because it just seems to work for everybody's schedule.
Speaker 3: It does, and it's you know, in the tour I
Speaker 3: think recognizes that just on some of the conversation I've
Speaker 3: seen and heard. Whether they have the venues is another story,
Speaker 3: which again makes their resistance on the distance issue just laughable,
Speaker 3: because there really aren't a lot of venues that you
Speaker 3: can go to. So that's why they're always knocking on
Speaker 3: the door of a riviera Tory Pines. I can't believe
Speaker 3: they haven't scooped up Chambers Bay. I mean, just such
Speaker 3: a great sports market. We saw, Yeah, the course had
Speaker 3: some flaws in the US Open and they got carried away,
Speaker 3: and we can talk about set up stuff, the idea
Speaker 3: of trying to get the course in Sunday conditions on
Speaker 3: the Sunday before things like that tainted the place. But
Speaker 3: I'm just shocked that they haven't been all over that.
Speaker 3: And you know, San Francisco's a little trickier, but Olympics
Speaker 3: got a lot coming and you're absolutely right, you know
Speaker 3: the one obviously, I hear all about how there was
Speaker 3: nobody out there. Well, it's seven o'clock on a Saturday night,
Speaker 3: and there was nobody at Ironomic at the end of
Speaker 3: the days either and these these majors. It happens at
Speaker 3: the Open, it happens at the Masters. I know people
Speaker 3: don't want to say it, but Thursday and Friday, it's
Speaker 3: kind of embarrassing when you have the best groups out
Speaker 3: there and there's empty grand stands.
Speaker 1: These these majors need.
Speaker 3: To think about an after three pm ticket and some
Speaker 3: things that maybe maybe a little mini concert, you know something,
Speaker 3: or do something to kind of you know, Todd, tap
Speaker 3: into some of these great groups that they run events
Speaker 3: for a long time and think about these things and
Speaker 3: to get some some people out there, because that is
Speaker 3: it's a bad look. There's no question the energy is
Speaker 3: not the same. Like you said, she Berdie's the last
Speaker 3: three holes we had some incredible scores. I mean the
Speaker 3: pins were really easy those last few holes. They were
Speaker 3: right in the middle of the green. But yeah, there
Speaker 3: wasn't much energy. And you're on national television and so
Speaker 3: that's a that's an important thing. They need to all
Speaker 3: the all the groups. It's not just the women's game.
Speaker 3: This happens in all the majors. But to your point, yes,
Speaker 3: and then the weather, of course was just brilliant, perfect
Speaker 3: for set up for golf, for for watching golf, and
Speaker 3: you're not dealing with the thunderstorm stuff that you get
Speaker 3: in the South and in August. So yeah, it's a
Speaker 3: it's a mystery, but uh, the USGA sees it. And
Speaker 3: that's why Rivie is gonna have a US Open somehow
Speaker 3: in twenty thirty one.
Speaker 1: I don't know where they're gonna put anything, but it's coming.
Speaker 2: It'll be, uh, it'll be just a smaller I like,
Speaker 2: I wonder about Marion. Where's everything going at Marion?
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, Marian worked fine.
Speaker 3: I thought, I know there were some issues and they're
Speaker 3: going to fix those, just like they're going to fix
Speaker 3: some things at Chinnacok. But Riviera it's just, uh, it's
Speaker 3: it's really a tough site for the things that go
Speaker 3: with the US Open and then the golf course being
Speaker 3: I mean, maybe they're thinking they're going to have you know,
Speaker 3: drone floating teas in twenty thirty one that they can
Speaker 3: play the first hole from. I mean, they're going to
Speaker 3: be trying to drive over the Branka in twenty three
Speaker 3: to have a.
Speaker 2: New ball maybe, oh please, even though even though you
Speaker 2: know Cam youngs already playing the new ball.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I tried to ask the USGA if if their
Speaker 3: testing confirm that, but they can't.
Speaker 1: The lawyers are just no, no, we can't. That's we
Speaker 1: can't address that.
Speaker 3: So I'm a little skeptical of that situation. I'll be
Speaker 3: honest with you. You know, there are a lot of
Speaker 3: people who want to kill this thing for some reason. So, uh,
Speaker 3: I'm I'm a little skeptical of the uh of how
Speaker 3: how true that is. But well, well, I mean the
Speaker 3: USGA people have been pretty confident for a while about
Speaker 3: this this new testing and how it would impact things.
Speaker 3: But either way, it's still not enough and there's too
Speaker 3: much consensus on the driver for that to have been addressed.
Speaker 3: And it's depressing to think we'd have to start a
Speaker 3: whole new comment period and the whole process over again,
Speaker 3: even though they got right to the edge with the
Speaker 3: driver before.
Speaker 2: That's the crazy thing to be about the whole discussion.
Speaker 2: It's like we've got to a place where it seems
Speaker 2: like the players are actually like kind of like, yeah,
Speaker 2: we can go to a smaller driver head. That's that's
Speaker 2: the reasonable. Like some of the loudest voices anti rollback
Speaker 2: are with the ball, are like, well, where you're looking
Speaker 2: at the wrong thing, you should be looking at the
Speaker 2: driver head. And I just don't understand if you're going
Speaker 2: to spend all the political capital that the USGA has spent.
Speaker 2: I think we both agree that something like I don't
Speaker 2: care how you do it, something has to happen, something
Speaker 2: has to happen. And you know this is you know
Speaker 2: they like to say it's only for the for the
Speaker 2: best in the world. Is a distance problem. This is
Speaker 2: problems all through the recreational game, and like nobody wants
Speaker 2: to address Like I have friends that are sixteen handicaps
Speaker 2: that can hit the ball three hundred yards and I'll
Speaker 2: tell you what, Like when they hit one, they're out
Speaker 2: by me. But when they don't get it quite right,
Speaker 2: it is all over the place, and nobody seems to
Speaker 2: want to talk about this.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, I think yeah, And that's the biggest problem
Speaker 3: is you and I will say distance problem, and somebody
Speaker 3: will listen to that and go, what a what a
Speaker 3: couple old farts who are just don't like seeing people
Speaker 3: the athleticism. It's not that we're talking about safety issues
Speaker 3: even before the architecture. Yeah, you know, it's and they
Speaker 3: will never talk about the safety issue because again the
Speaker 3: lawyers have said, well, we could get sued if we
Speaker 3: acknowledge that it's created safety issues.
Speaker 2: What's wild to be is like I hand people. You know,
Speaker 2: I play retro clubs a fair amount and inevitably, like
Speaker 2: everybody wants to hit them, and people are like terrified
Speaker 2: to hit these clubs, but then they hit them.
Speaker 3: Wow, and I don't want to put a big skeech
Speaker 3: mark on the top of your pretty percent And yeah.
Speaker 2: If they hit it wrong bad, they're always like, oh wow,
Speaker 2: that like that wasn't that bad? Like what people don't realize.
Speaker 2: And this is where I get frustrated about like not
Speaker 2: going after the driver head is like the driver head
Speaker 2: is everything. I mean, like, all of a sudden it
Speaker 2: becomes like a you know, the ball is important, but
Speaker 2: the driver head is where the idea of like the
Speaker 2: mentality in your head do I want to go at
Speaker 2: this becomes actually a question. It's not a for like
Speaker 2: four hundred.
Speaker 1: And sixty ccs.
Speaker 2: It is a foregone conclusion that I am just swinging
Speaker 2: hard at this thing. Yeah, the driver head makes it
Speaker 2: a question. And when it becomes a question that that's
Speaker 2: the game. And what's fascinating to me is that I
Speaker 2: actually believe that the recreational would get better.
Speaker 3: Mmm with with a with with a smaller head or
Speaker 3: with the change that the smaller with the driver face.
Speaker 2: With the smaller head, because the ball gets on the
Speaker 2: ground faster, the misses aren't as bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah hmm, that's interesting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, has the recreational golfer gotten better with all this equipment?
Speaker 2: I don't think it has.
Speaker 1: I think the handicapped ATA backs that up.
Speaker 2: Like, so people haven't gotten better despite all this equipment.
Speaker 2: And what it's done is create this whole chain of
Speaker 2: events like it's all the sham.
Speaker 3: Yeah you mean zero torque putters don't make you pop better?
Speaker 2: Uh well, I will say that I actually think that's.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, all right, we were watching.
Speaker 2: We were watching. We did a rewatchable on the eighty
Speaker 2: six US Open the other day.
Speaker 1: Nice.
Speaker 2: It's like you see these like horrendous potts people hit
Speaker 2: and it's like, well they're using like a little bulls.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, you had this sweet like tiny on that thing,
Speaker 3: tiny and it's.
Speaker 2: Like, oh, it's windy, like I mishit it and it
Speaker 2: comes up eight feet short, like I look like an idiot.
Speaker 3: Greens weren't as good then either, But yeah, no, okay,
Speaker 3: well yeah no, and I I don't you know. That's
Speaker 3: what that's the difficult conversation with the average player is
Speaker 3: what you've just laid out. There's definitely some truth to that.
Speaker 3: It's just but but it's a tough case to make.
Speaker 3: And that's why I think it's just more important to
Speaker 3: have bifurcation and special rules for elite competition and then
Speaker 3: if it if it tends to feed down from there,
Speaker 3: we know people there are people who still want to
Speaker 3: play with the pros play and not what although that
Speaker 3: that is also changing if you talk to people. The
Speaker 3: the influencer groups are having more influence on club sales
Speaker 3: increasingly than the pros, which makes the are argument against
Speaker 3: bifurcation even more ridiculous. That there's less money going to
Speaker 3: these guys to endorse his stuff, there's less reason for
Speaker 3: them to be defending it in the name of selling
Speaker 3: people what they play. So but it still makes the
Speaker 3: most sense because every other sport doesn't. And again, the
Speaker 3: safety thing Like I said, you know, the first first
Speaker 3: two holes a riv they get bombarded down there in
Speaker 3: the practice fair way and it just didn't happen last
Speaker 3: week because it's it's they play a different game even
Speaker 3: than the women.
Speaker 1: It is.
Speaker 2: Uh. You know, if you if you zoom out and
Speaker 2: think about the next twenty years of golf, I would
Speaker 2: I would say that this is that the light is coming.
Speaker 2: You know that, Hey, pro golf isn't everything. Isn't the
Speaker 2: torch carrier of influence that it wasn't If you look
Speaker 2: at the growth of golf. The growth of golf has
Speaker 2: been huge in recreational areas and you know basically every
Speaker 2: metric the growth is up and rounds played, you know,
Speaker 2: participation that those numbers do not bear out at the
Speaker 2: pro goff viewership level, right like that that is you
Speaker 2: know they're yeah, the PGA Tours had a nice run,
Speaker 2: but these are incremental gains. There's nothing compared to what
Speaker 2: you're seeing at the recreational level which bears out. Like
Speaker 2: there's this whole idea of like people watch pro golf
Speaker 2: and start to play golf. Is not the case. Maybe
Speaker 2: it happens, and I think it does happen. But like,
Speaker 2: the reality is people who watch pro golf are golfers already,
Speaker 2: and they're coming into the game for the other virtues
Speaker 2: of the game, and that's the important thing to think about.
Speaker 2: It's like, really, like this thing isn't about pro golfers.
Speaker 2: It shouldn't be about pro golfers. Framing is pro golf
Speaker 2: when you think about there's maybe fifty million golfers in
Speaker 2: the United States. I don't know what the exact number
Speaker 2: is if you.
Speaker 3: Include people who are you know, somehow tied to the game,
Speaker 3: you know, top golf people and simulator golfers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's the numbers really up there now if you
Speaker 1: include all that.
Speaker 2: So you have this huge number that's grown a sizable amount,
Speaker 2: and it's like, oh good, Pja tourtelcast is three billion people.
Speaker 2: That's a tiny percentage to have such an outsized influence
Speaker 2: on what's happening with the overall sport and who governs
Speaker 2: the actual sport.
Speaker 1: That's right. Yeah.
Speaker 3: The only thing I disagree on is that I do
Speaker 3: think when people I mean, I just saw it at Riviera.
Speaker 3: There were so many kids, and I do think and
Speaker 3: the way the women treat the kids, by the way,
Speaker 3: is just spectacular, you know, signing autographs, fist bumps. I mean,
Speaker 3: Nelly's just fist bumping kids on every ta and feeding
Speaker 3: off that energy. I do think pro golf has an
Speaker 3: influence on people playing and loving the game when they
Speaker 3: come to it tournament in person and see great golf,
Speaker 3: or see people like the women last week and what
Speaker 3: class acts they are, or when they come to the Genesis,
Speaker 3: they get a little extra excitement watching them play and
Speaker 3: seeing what guys do. I think that element, but I
Speaker 3: agree with you the TV part is and severely overrated.
Speaker 3: It's more of a discussion point really and something to
Speaker 3: chat about between golfers. But does it really inspire people.
Speaker 3: I think we know there are just so many other
Speaker 3: things that have been I mean obviously COVID, but top golf,
Speaker 3: simulator stuff, There's all sorts of things, influencers and YouTube golf.
Speaker 3: I think that you would put the PGA Tour it
Speaker 3: make the top ten, but it's definitely not in the
Speaker 3: top five of things that have grown the sport.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that this has been something that's been
Speaker 2: illuminated over the last you know, five to ten yearsarticularly
Speaker 2: post COVID, where the veils really kind of come off
Speaker 2: as the success of golf has you know, gone way different, way,
Speaker 2: different trajectory than the success of pro golf. Do you
Speaker 2: have any party thoughts out of the US Women's opened
Speaker 2: before we get to the next topic here at hand?
Speaker 3: No, I think that, well, it depends on what the
Speaker 3: next topic is.
Speaker 1: But now I know, I just I think that's the thought.
Speaker 3: I'd leave you with what I mentioned earlier, that it
Speaker 3: really highlighted just how absurd the equipment is in the
Speaker 3: men's game and how different it is from the rest
Speaker 3: of what everybody.
Speaker 1: Else is playing.
Speaker 3: And guys have to do what they have to do
Speaker 3: to try to make a living, but it's it's a
Speaker 3: less attractive game, it's a less interesting game. And the
Speaker 3: women because I really I wasn't sure how they'd handle
Speaker 3: the cocuya it is.
Speaker 1: It's just hard to convey.
Speaker 3: I do those little videos of my newsletter, it's hard
Speaker 3: to convey to people this time of year, when it's
Speaker 3: when it's spongier, just getting the club through it and
Speaker 3: then where to land it and all the dynamics with
Speaker 3: firm greens, and the greens were firm and thirteen and
Speaker 3: I was just blown away because the women's short game
Speaker 3: seeing seven eight years ago, ten years ago was often
Speaker 3: sometimes really hard to watch how poor they were. And
Speaker 3: I asked Roger Cleveland one time, you know, why why
Speaker 3: are the women's short games they're little touch shots so bad?
Speaker 3: He's they don't practice. I'm just always it's nothing to
Speaker 3: do with the balance. And anyway, my point is it's
Speaker 3: clear they've they've all worked really hard on that front,
Speaker 3: and and it was so much more fun watching those
Speaker 3: little shots and the creativity and you know, taking away
Speaker 3: outside and cutting across it. I saw, you know, just
Speaker 3: way less mechanical than the men. So there's a lot
Speaker 3: to learn from the women just now watching them around
Speaker 3: the greens, which is a really cool change in their
Speaker 3: in their game in the last decade.
Speaker 2: I was thinking about this watch of that eighty six
Speaker 2: US Open. Is that just in general, I think the
Speaker 2: short game craft.
Speaker 1: Is well, right, so just the best.
Speaker 2: It's so like, I don't know, it's it's it's like
Speaker 2: that there were great players then. I don't think there
Speaker 2: were as many as now in terms of like around
Speaker 2: the greens wizards.
Speaker 1: M you think there wizards now.
Speaker 2: I just think that the the the way some of
Speaker 2: these players, how routine. They make exceptionally hard shots. Look
Speaker 2: to me, is is insane?
Speaker 1: Hmm, okay, I don't know.
Speaker 3: I I could just think of a lot of people
Speaker 3: from that era that that I would much rather trust
Speaker 3: with a with an up and down, whereas I my
Speaker 3: list of players from a hundred yards in uh, that
Speaker 3: I that I would trust currently. I mean it's it's
Speaker 3: literally you know Thomas Beith, Uh, it's Rory has really
Speaker 3: uh you know, gotten so good around the greens. Uh.
Speaker 3: Scott he's obviously when he's on is just a uh
Speaker 3: to me, more of an old school chipper. And uh,
Speaker 3: the way his technique and he's not so mechanical, whereas
Speaker 3: over the punting just right now looks so uptight and mechanical.
Speaker 1: But read yeah, yeah, I mean, oh yeah, Cameron Smith's incredible.
Speaker 1: But I don't know. I mean that that kite Peven Floyd,
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 3: Those that shot that that clip this year of Floyd
Speaker 3: at Durrell, you know, the stance is open, and I
Speaker 3: mean he would take out a six seven iron, nine iron,
Speaker 3: you know, right on the call or he loved that control.
Speaker 3: So I I it's that's that's an interesting conversation.
Speaker 2: It's like I think the thing that's hurt pro golf
Speaker 2: in terms of like washability is like you're talking about
Speaker 2: Floyd hitting like a six iron bump, Like guys don't
Speaker 2: do that anymore. They just hit like the same club everywhere.
Speaker 2: It's like, oh, I'm going to just master this club.
Speaker 2: I think the visual of it has gotten worse. I
Speaker 2: think they just are better though.
Speaker 1: That's fair.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, let's take a quick break and talk
Speaker 2: about our last partner, which is us. Father's Day is
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Speaker 2: All right, you're this is big news for the for
Speaker 2: the huge news for the golf architecture community. You're re
Speaker 2: releasing Grounds for Golf.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you. I'm not sure it's huge news, but
Speaker 1: thank you.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's one less book that you have to
Speaker 2: spend an absurd amount body crappy used copy in the world.
Speaker 1: This is true.
Speaker 2: There are dozens of people that care about this.
Speaker 1: Exactly.
Speaker 3: Yes, Grounds for Golf, which was done right after we
Speaker 3: did Rust of Canyons, so it was two thousand and three,
Speaker 3: ended up on the remainder shelves. Nobody cared about architecture then,
Speaker 3: and that's a little bit of the theme of some
Speaker 3: of the stuff I changed in the book.
Speaker 1: But it's crazy to think.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's sold fine, but it didn't, it
Speaker 3: didn't get a second printing, and and so, yeah, I'm
Speaker 3: very excited to bring it back. Publisher wanted to do it.
Speaker 3: I went really and but agreed that you know, the
Speaker 3: interest in architectures there and uh so it was fun
Speaker 3: to well, I shouldn't say fun, as hard as you know,
Speaker 3: to go back and read things you you wrote. It's
Speaker 3: it's painful. Yeah, it's not fun actually at all. But
Speaker 3: I I enjoyed two parts of it. Which was one
Speaker 3: to just kind of go through the book and trim
Speaker 3: a few things or rewrite a few things that have
Speaker 3: changed not a lot. But then I tossed the last
Speaker 3: couple of chapters that were looking at the state of
Speaker 3: the game in the future of the game, and and
Speaker 3: look at now, what's why has why has there become
Speaker 3: so much more interesting golf course design? Since I did
Speaker 3: the book and we couldn't we couldn't give it away.
Speaker 3: Uh and and uh, it's fun to explore those things
Speaker 3: what's driving it? Obviously I have some mentions of the
Speaker 3: fried egg and drones and and and all the things
Speaker 3: that you know, used to mystify me as to why
Speaker 3: people weren't more people weren't interested they have opinions on courses,
Speaker 3: but they really didn't have any desire to try to
Speaker 3: back them up.
Speaker 1: It was usually whether it was hard or not. And
Speaker 1: uh and now you know, to think just in twenty years, we're.
Speaker 3: Kind of in an age of enlightenment and and and
Speaker 3: and and where it's architectures play should be in the game,
Speaker 3: which is this sort of blend of connoisseurship and uh
Speaker 3: and and really the reason a lot of people play
Speaker 3: to see different courses because no other court sport has
Speaker 3: what we have. I mean, tennis has some different surfaces,
Speaker 3: but and you can play in some interesting locations, but
Speaker 3: the court's always the same. And we know that architectures
Speaker 3: is great because there's so many different things and it's
Speaker 3: fun to debate and uh so, yeah, so it's uh,
Speaker 3: it's refreshed, it's got a beautiful cover came out. The
Speaker 3: printing is just incredible. Uh So I'm thrilled about that.
Speaker 3: And I'm thrilled that I was able to uh fix
Speaker 3: some things or or tweak some things and then bring
Speaker 3: some a little bit of new perspective without throwing out
Speaker 3: the whole book.
Speaker 2: I'm excited. I've always put this. I wrote an article
Speaker 2: years ago about like, you know, here are the books
Speaker 2: you should get if you want to get into golf architecture.
Speaker 2: And I've always felt like this book, along with Tom's
Speaker 2: Anatomy for the Golf Course are the two like you know, hey,
Speaker 2: these are the books like if you want to if
Speaker 2: you if you have decided, I played somewhere and I
Speaker 2: felt different about it, and like I want to understand
Speaker 2: what makes this place so good or this place like
Speaker 2: and you want to get that base level of understanding,
Speaker 2: these are the go to books. And I think, like
Speaker 2: the it's exciting to have this one kind of back
Speaker 2: and update it thanks to your to your point about
Speaker 2: the golf architecture. I you know, I think about this
Speaker 2: all the time, and I think, like, so, there's this
Speaker 2: great there's this great uh Burger place in Chicago. You
Speaker 2: may remember it, Stu Hagastad was you know they did
Speaker 2: the burger dog tasting? Yes, yes, yes, last year and
Speaker 2: everybody's given the burger dog like a nine. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: he goes, I think he gave it a six if
Speaker 2: I remember correcting. He's like, I mean it's no off
Speaker 2: chival Yeah, which was the Chicago Burger It got it
Speaker 2: got voted like the greatest burger in America the world.
Speaker 2: At some point they've they've started this this concept called
Speaker 2: small chival and it's like literally they are these tiny
Speaker 2: burger stands where you can go in, you can get
Speaker 2: a burger. They're getting bigger now, so they're you know,
Speaker 2: they're changing, but the original ones, you go in, you
Speaker 2: get a burger, you can get a burger, beer, milkshake
Speaker 2: and that and then and it's just like outdoor seating
Speaker 2: or a small indoor seating. And always I used to
Speaker 2: frequent one when I lived in the city, and I
Speaker 2: always I used to think every time I was there,
Speaker 2: I thought about this as like, you know, in nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty in the nineteen fifties, McDonald's erased an entire like
Speaker 2: entire industry of this concept of like the walk up
Speaker 2: neighborhood burger stand in favor of this industrial like chain.
Speaker 2: This is better than that. And there was some at
Speaker 2: some point an awakening that society went through where like
Speaker 2: it was like what we eat actually matters, who makes
Speaker 2: the food actually matters, who makes your coffee matters. And
Speaker 2: when that changed, golf was just twenty years behind it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, which it always is it's always behind whatever bad
Speaker 3: trend is. Yeah, not not all bad, but.
Speaker 1: A lot of bad.
Speaker 2: So anyway, it's just like this burger stand is coming back,
Speaker 2: like the idea of like, hey, like I'm gonna go
Speaker 2: play this golf course that was built by Donald Ross
Speaker 2: in nineteen twenty four and it's public and it's it's
Speaker 2: fifty minutes away. I'm gonna go play there rather than
Speaker 2: like the housing development golf course built in the eighties
Speaker 2: by Dick Nugent. You know, this is my Chicago bias here.
Speaker 2: That's one hundred and twenty dollars. I'll drive the extra
Speaker 2: time to go get it. Go see this other place
Speaker 2: that might not be in as good of shape. But
Speaker 2: like right some point people woke up and it's like, wait,
Speaker 2: I enjoy Like the great thing about golf is like
Speaker 2: you can enjoy it anyway, Like if you're playing with
Speaker 2: people you like, like you can put me on any
Speaker 2: golf course, I'm fine. But like when you play somewhere
Speaker 2: that's also interesting and engaging, it only enhances the experience.
Speaker 2: This is what I've never understood about people, Like the
Speaker 2: Ryder Cup venue doesn't matter. It's like, well, do you
Speaker 2: think the course would make it worse.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but you can imagine how many times I've had
Speaker 3: that argument with our friends in Europe. Yeah, but but
Speaker 3: but it supports the tour. I don't care if it
Speaker 3: supports and the tour would go out of business. I know,
Speaker 3: I know, But can't we just once in our lifetime
Speaker 3: have a European Ryder Cup at the old course.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it would be unbelievable.
Speaker 3: There's not enough room now there actually would actually if
Speaker 3: you map it out and think it through, if you
Speaker 3: take ten minutes you actually realize the quadrants of holes
Speaker 3: and the way it would work would be incredible.
Speaker 1: It'd be amazing.
Speaker 3: Uh, even dynamics like the last match finishing on the
Speaker 3: eighteenth in the morning and the first one starting on
Speaker 3: the first tea right there.
Speaker 1: I mean there.
Speaker 3: Sadly, I've gone through all that and you're just like, stop, okay,
Speaker 3: just stop, We're gonna go to your crappy courses to
Speaker 3: pay your bills. I got it. But it's it's it's
Speaker 3: uh yeah, it's it'd be interesting. I mean, I don't
Speaker 3: know what the one if there was one breakthrough golf
Speaker 3: course or venue that that helped, but I certainly know
Speaker 3: in the last few years people being able to uh, well,
Speaker 3: one obviously some restorations and and Beth Page was really
Speaker 3: important in that conversation. Even though you know it's not
Speaker 3: as brilliant as other things tilling has to it's more
Speaker 3: that it was done and it's been sustained, and it's
Speaker 3: it's bled out to the other golf courses and all
Speaker 3: that stuff. But it's yeah, simulators, people getting to play
Speaker 3: a famous place now and in realizing, oh, yeah, this
Speaker 3: is more interesting.
Speaker 1: Drones. Bandon was Mike.
Speaker 3: Kaiser's projects, obviously a huge player and all that, and
Speaker 3: it's uh, I think it really matters what what the
Speaker 3: actual thing was. It's more about making sure we sustain it.
Speaker 3: That's why things like the National Links Trust, which concept
Speaker 3: at at East Potomac, which was was done with out
Speaker 3: a golf tournament in mind, is so important. We don't
Speaker 3: want these things to have to be relying on a
Speaker 3: golf tournament a major coming because we know their compromise
Speaker 3: is made and in the name of doing that.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it doesn't really matter what it is.
Speaker 3: It's more about how do how do we now keep
Speaker 3: that momentum going and have it spread to more places
Speaker 3: because we just have so many places that were magnificent
Speaker 3: and they're a little run down and if and obviously
Speaker 3: an operator will.
Speaker 1: Say, well, we're busy, what do we need.
Speaker 3: Why do we need to refresh the bunkers and do
Speaker 3: all your you know, architectural stuff. Well, it's the right
Speaker 3: thing to do, and it just does make the golf
Speaker 3: better when we know when a place is presented in
Speaker 3: a way and I'm not just saying the conditioning but
Speaker 3: the design that it's like they're trying and they care
Speaker 3: and they want.
Speaker 1: It to be interesting for you.
Speaker 3: It doesn't have to be over the top, but people
Speaker 3: know the difference between the place that's trying and presented
Speaker 3: in a way that cares about the game and wants
Speaker 3: to make your game more interesting without beating you up. So, uh,
Speaker 3: it's it's it's a it's a great time that way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's I I'm I think like one of
Speaker 2: the things that's still lagging is obviously the public golf.
Speaker 2: It's why, you know, one of the you know, it
Speaker 2: sounds like you share my, uh my pessimism about the
Speaker 2: new East Potomac plan led by Tom Fazio and just
Speaker 2: to touch yeah, but like the idea the you know,
Speaker 2: and this is just one of the you know, financial
Speaker 2: realities of it. Is like the private clubs, you know,
Speaker 2: they still get paid dues when they renovate a golf course,
Speaker 2: a public golf course, they don't get their due, they
Speaker 2: don't get dues. You know, they rely and you're talking
Speaker 2: about a big shortfall. But like, you know, the reality
Speaker 2: and the you know, I think one of the frustrating
Speaker 2: things about America and and just in general with what's
Speaker 2: going on with the UK and you know this this
Speaker 2: is just purely supply and demand is you know, the
Speaker 2: rates the cost of the UK trips that there are
Speaker 2: still good, cheap UK trips that you can do. There
Speaker 2: aren't as many as there used to be because of
Speaker 2: rise and green fees, but that's because there's demand to
Speaker 2: go play these great golf courses. The reality of like,
Speaker 2: and everybody gets frustrated about different things. They get frustrated
Speaker 2: about the bandoned lottery, they get frustrated about it is
Speaker 2: like the reason that this is all occurring is that
Speaker 2: there is outsize demand at this point at the public
Speaker 2: level for good quality golf architecture and there's no supply.
Speaker 2: Additional supply on the Horizon.
Speaker 3: No, but we have, at least in the United States,
Speaker 3: we have so much that is brilliant that could could be.
Speaker 1: So much better.
Speaker 3: And yeah, I understand your point about not having dues
Speaker 3: and things like that, but you know, a lot of
Speaker 3: the time, and we know that in the Grand Scheme
Speaker 3: when of course is shut down for nine months to
Speaker 3: redo it ten months in certain you know, some places
Speaker 3: it takes longer because of weather, but it's just not
Speaker 3: that that long of a period in the Grand Scheme,
Speaker 3: and trying to convince, yeah, trying to convince people, that's just.
Speaker 1: It's a battle. I mean, clubs have dealt with that.
Speaker 3: Clubs go bonkers if they lose the course for nine months,
Speaker 3: even though it's going to be so much better and
Speaker 3: all that. So, yeah, there's still hurdles. And then of
Speaker 3: course the cost, the rising cost of irrigation is just brutal.
Speaker 3: And you know, it used to be the USGA green
Speaker 3: that was the thing that you're like, oh.
Speaker 1: This is just a huge expense.
Speaker 3: And of course I hate USG greens from an artistic
Speaker 3: standpoint because they're they just strip so they're they're harder
Speaker 3: to do and harder.
Speaker 1: To tie in properly.
Speaker 3: And it's why Corn Crenshaw are on another level because
Speaker 3: they don't build USGA greens or modified ones. But that
Speaker 3: cost now is really not a big deal compared to
Speaker 3: irrigation systems, and we probably have to have a serious
Speaker 3: conversation about how much needs to be irrigated and how
Speaker 3: many of these little little bells and whistles that are
Speaker 3: in these systems now, how vital those are, because I
Speaker 3: think that's the next real hurdle. Even though we've gotten
Speaker 3: past the we've gotten to the more enlightened part and
Speaker 3: people understanding a place, the difference between something that looks
Speaker 3: tired and one that looks rejuvenated and plays better and
Speaker 3: functions better. But yeah, the irrigation cost thing is it's
Speaker 3: just crazy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think there's a lot of aspects
Speaker 2: of society right now with costs that is crazy. You know,
Speaker 2: you just go to the grocery store.
Speaker 1: Sure, sure, you know.
Speaker 2: It's like golf is experiencing similar things like irrigation, like
Speaker 2: you know, they're you know, labor, like these are all
Speaker 2: aspects of public golf that are coming to a head.
Speaker 2: I didn't expect to ask this, but I just, you know,
Speaker 2: was I was thinking of you. You're obviously a key
Speaker 2: figure in the l A golf space. What what are
Speaker 2: your thoughts on this, uh, this very controversial uh proposed tax. M.
Speaker 2: I feel like it's been floating around LA for years
Speaker 2: and it's picked up more steam than usual. Proposed tax
Speaker 2: of four dollars per square foot I believe of golf course.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Well, I was a very outspoken critic of Malcolm Gladwell
Speaker 3: when he got all upset because he couldn't run through
Speaker 3: Brentwood country Club instead of around it, even though Brentwood
Speaker 3: Country Club provides a beautiful, decomposed granite. I mean, I
Speaker 3: know some runners don't want to get their shoes dusty.
Speaker 3: I understand it, but it's better than running on concrete
Speaker 3: all the way around the golf course. Anybody can run
Speaker 3: around it, nice trees and all that. I could get
Speaker 3: a hit by too many golf balls. And so I
Speaker 3: was I, you know, because he went essentially the genesis
Speaker 3: of this current situation was a city councilman listened to
Speaker 3: the podcast where he outlined that, and he had gone
Speaker 3: back and looked and said, well, LA doesn't have enough parks. Well, yeah,
Speaker 3: LA doesn't have enough parks because somebody killed off an
Speaker 3: Olmsted Brothers plan that was this brilliant concept for the city.
Speaker 3: And it's a huge city to have more parks, and
Speaker 3: just like we killed off our red line that was
Speaker 3: a subway. Now we're spending unbelievable amounts of money to
Speaker 3: have a subway. So there are layers to this that
Speaker 3: he brought in that that were unfair to the golf
Speaker 3: clubs or in the country clubs. And then of course
Speaker 3: totally ignored the green space component. And I get that
Speaker 3: golf has always had this perception of being a big
Speaker 3: toxic waste stump, and they still use chemicals. There's still
Speaker 3: things that aren't great, but my god, it's the change
Speaker 3: is incredible and the importance of having those green spaces
Speaker 3: is vital if you you know, like anything, birds or
Speaker 3: just just oxygen. And so there's that. But then of
Speaker 3: course there is the component where they you know, the
Speaker 3: nonprofit clubs in the city of La pay it combined
Speaker 3: eight hundred and eighty thousand dollars or so in taxes,
Speaker 3: and that's not enough given that they are, you know,
Speaker 3: they rely on a lot of resources as well. So
Speaker 3: it's a mess. It's a big mess, and he's proposed
Speaker 3: this out of nowhere, listening to Malcolm Gladwell, and my
Speaker 3: understanding is, I think June twentieth it has to be
Speaker 3: approved by the city Council and before the City Attorney
Speaker 3: or maybe even proved by the City Attorney, and then
Speaker 3: it would go to the ballot. It would require two
Speaker 3: thirds already in the fall, so it's a long way
Speaker 3: to go in terms of it actually happening, but it's
Speaker 3: been something that that I mean, it has the potential
Speaker 3: to be a massive national story because there are nonprofit
Speaker 3: clubs throughout the country that other cities might see this
Speaker 3: as an opportunity to add attacks.
Speaker 1: And you know, I don't.
Speaker 3: I this is a very big place and there are
Speaker 3: a lot of golfers, so we can't really have the
Speaker 3: Scottish model that would help the perception of these clubs.
Speaker 3: But part of their problem is that they are not
Speaker 3: seen as very community oriented. So that's going to add
Speaker 3: layers to this that I don't know what the answer
Speaker 3: is because again, you know, we just have too many people.
Speaker 3: There's nothing they could do to fill the demand if
Speaker 3: they had a few random tee times and tried to
Speaker 3: reach out and and there are certain clubs that have
Speaker 3: been really great try to be unity stewards, you know,
Speaker 3: Willshire and bell Air. They have a lot of charity
Speaker 3: events and the fun friends at golf raises a ton
Speaker 3: of money for high school and college golf programs here.
Speaker 3: They welcome all the teams at bel Air, Wilshire, Rick
Speaker 3: Riley great pro got the teams out there, and you
Speaker 3: can imagine there's other clubs that aren't quite as welcoming.
Speaker 3: I noted it in my newsletter, so it's not as secret.
Speaker 3: Riviera is a for profit, but they don't have women's
Speaker 3: golf teams out there. They don't have Palisades High. We
Speaker 3: had to hear a lot about Amy Alcott last week
Speaker 3: local Legend. We didn't hear the part where Amy Amy
Speaker 3: had to play on the boys team at Pally High.
Speaker 3: Pally High now has a girls team, which is amazing.
Speaker 3: Pally High's gone through a lot the rams, The Dodgers,
Speaker 3: Steve Kerr and alum there reached out to their their
Speaker 3: the teams and their sports. Dave Roberts and the Dodgers.
Speaker 3: They did community stuff that was cool. Riviera is not
Speaker 3: a not a community place, so golf has a perception
Speaker 3: problem here that you see it in the comments, and
Speaker 3: it's going to make this issue very layered. It is
Speaker 3: my most diplomatic way of putting it. And our La
Speaker 3: City courses are just horribly run. To your point though
Speaker 3: about food, they have amazing Rancho is not quite there
Speaker 3: because they found as best of us.
Speaker 1: But we have.
Speaker 3: Amazing food and beverage operations and it happened because somebody
Speaker 3: on the golf committee decided they needed better food and
Speaker 3: they've found all these hipster food.
Speaker 1: Things and it's great. But the golf itself is just
Speaker 1: I mean, the courses are.
Speaker 3: So tired and desperately needing upgrades and modern and they
Speaker 3: have great bones architecturally, and so that's another layer in
Speaker 3: this situation where the ones we do have are really
Speaker 3: not treated very well because it's just too big of
Speaker 3: a city. I mean, it just it should be divided.
Speaker 3: It's too big.
Speaker 2: I haven't been to Rancho in since like probably about
Speaker 2: twenty thirty teen. I would I I know, nothing's happened.
Speaker 2: Some range work, but that's awful.
Speaker 1: That is disaster.
Speaker 3: And by the way, and there's still lines for a
Speaker 3: half hour to get a stall, to not be able
Speaker 3: to even hit a driver anyway.
Speaker 2: But you know, I had I had a close friend
Speaker 2: that went to Scotland for the first time, you know,
Speaker 2: just last week, and he was texted me like, man,
Speaker 2: this place is incredible. And I said something about like
Speaker 2: isn't it amazing how we took their idea and just
Speaker 2: completely aft it up? Yep, And and like if you
Speaker 2: think about, like if la like this is your point,
Speaker 2: if Malcolm Gladwell never did this, this would never be
Speaker 2: on the.
Speaker 1: Ballot, right correct.
Speaker 2: And the thing about Scotland is they have this wonderful
Speaker 2: right to rome. So you're playing off. It's just like
Speaker 2: some hikers just suck her next to y'all and and
Speaker 2: they're like, oh, you.
Speaker 3: Bring your own doc to play golf, but somebody can
Speaker 3: walk their dog through the course.
Speaker 2: So it's like if you think about, like, okay, like
Speaker 2: how golf, you know, like Scotland's to be like the
Speaker 2: bottle of like you know, how golf and society should interplay, right,
Speaker 2: And like we've gotten to like private clubs being gated
Speaker 2: enclaves and I'm you know this is they just are
Speaker 2: If this thing passes or it gets close to passing,
Speaker 2: it's just the tip of the iceberg. Like and I
Speaker 2: don't want to be like a you know, like you know,
Speaker 2: propaganda is here of like what could happen. But like
Speaker 2: the whole premise of this closed off place that you
Speaker 2: know that nobody can see is going to lead to
Speaker 2: the masses like it's closed off. Only a few hundred
Speaker 2: people get to be here, right, the masses are always
Speaker 2: going to be like, well, pissed off about whatever's happening
Speaker 2: over the fence that they can't see. Yeah, and where
Speaker 2: this where you know Scotland has it so right, is
Speaker 2: it's just open anybody can go. Yeah, and you're gonna
Speaker 2: walk around and guess what. That's a great way to
Speaker 2: get people, welcome people into the sport. As I walk
Speaker 2: around the golf course and I've always just been thinking
Speaker 2: about it looks like I'd enjoy hitting the ball, and
Speaker 2: that's how people get into the golf the game well.
Speaker 3: And you know that when golf wasn't doing as well
Speaker 3: not that long ago, that was one of the things
Speaker 3: constantly mentioned that there. Uh, and there are a few
Speaker 3: places that do this. They'll shut down the course for
Speaker 3: a day and it's a it becomes a park or
Speaker 3: they have frisbee golf or some great stuff. Going on
Speaker 3: up in San Luis Obispo. There's a really creative guy
Speaker 3: up there doing things like that that has change the
Speaker 3: perception of the game. What's happened with the food and
Speaker 3: beverage at these courses here has has had an incredible
Speaker 3: impact on people's perception of golf or the course itself
Speaker 3: in the in the area, and that it's now important
Speaker 3: to have it instead of say penmar just being the
Speaker 3: place where planes crash.
Speaker 1: Uh, and they were our capments and now.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they have this amazing food and beverage thing, or
Speaker 3: they have concerts. I mean, it's it's just unbelievable how
Speaker 3: many people show up. And then when you talk to
Speaker 3: randomly to people, they.
Speaker 1: You know, may know nothing about golf, but they'll go, oh, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I went to the Penmart for to watch the game seven.
Speaker 1: They spilled it out on the lawn. Lawn. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's not a it's not.
Speaker 3: An extravagant place, but they a very creative entrepreneur has
Speaker 3: done this, and you're just like, Okay, yeah, it'd be
Speaker 3: nice to have that. This to translate to the golf course.
Speaker 3: But to your point, it even the public courses have
Speaker 3: fences around them and there you know, people always say, oh,
Speaker 3: I didn't know I could go have lunch there. We
Speaker 3: had only one place like that in southern California, Brookside,
Speaker 3: which had a very has a very robust food and
Speaker 3: beverage operation, a lot of meetings and and it doesn't
Speaker 3: have that closed off thing and and it's part of
Speaker 3: the community. People walk around the course.
Speaker 1: All that stuff.
Speaker 3: So yeah, it's uh and there's nothing you can do
Speaker 3: in the short term to to flip that. And then obviously,
Speaker 3: you know, the fan experience at the US opened UH
Speaker 3: in twenty twenty three was was terrible, and people that
Speaker 3: that also was held a little bit against the UH
Speaker 3: the Riviera, the U s GA thing. I think the
Speaker 3: U s g A didn't really do a whole lot
Speaker 3: to make people believe that it would be a better
Speaker 3: experience at Riviera. So there's all sorts of layers on
Speaker 3: that front too, just the perception from these tournaments. And
Speaker 3: so yeah, it's it's a huge story to watch though,
Speaker 3: because I think a lot of other markets this this
Speaker 3: could happen. And it all is all because Malcolm. Malcolm
Speaker 3: wanted to run through the on that nice grass. Uh So.
Speaker 3: And by the way, I've seen him running here near
Speaker 3: me in Palisades Park, one of the great parks in
Speaker 3: the world, overlooks the ocean. But he still wants to
Speaker 3: get through Bretwood Country clubs. So that's what that's the
Speaker 3: kind of thing you're dealing with.
Speaker 2: Just like, yeah, that San Vicente stretch didn't cut it
Speaker 2: for him.
Speaker 3: No, well, Samva cid, we don't irrigate that anymore. So
Speaker 3: it's rather unattractive, even though the homes on the left
Speaker 3: side are all, you know, twenty million and up, and
Speaker 3: a bunch of them are actually overlooked Riviera. Yeah, that
Speaker 3: one's not so great. But Palisates Park's beautiful run.
Speaker 1: Running area could do the stairs.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, so yeah, but but yeah, I don't think
Speaker 3: he was ever a Samva Cini guy. Too much exhaust
Speaker 3: you know, he's got to clear his mind. So yeah,
Speaker 3: so it's one to keep an eye on. It's definitely
Speaker 3: in the next few weeks to see if it even
Speaker 3: even progresses to the point of being a situation. But
Speaker 3: it's definitely a gonna be uh A big topic at
Speaker 3: the at the UH in the grill rooms of these clubs.
Speaker 2: Last thing before we let you out of here, we
Speaker 2: got Shittakoka two weeks. What are you most you know,
Speaker 2: what's a storyline you're most excited to see play out?
Speaker 2: And what are you most excited about going back to Chittacock.
Speaker 3: Well, we have the I mean it's inevitable that the
Speaker 3: entire focus is going to be on the setup since
Speaker 3: they've lost control of the last two And you know,
Speaker 3: I was out there on Saturday watching the whole placements
Speaker 3: and they were terrible. And I think the difference will
Speaker 3: be that we have different people. I had a great
Speaker 3: session with John Bodenhammer hearing what they're planning to do,
Speaker 3: and yeah, I think a very inside baseball kind of topic.
Speaker 3: But they're really going to try to have the setup
Speaker 3: started a place and then just gradually go, which is
Speaker 3: the way it used to be with golf tournaments and
Speaker 3: they would peak on Sunday, and I mean even yeah, we.
Speaker 1: Have these theme days.
Speaker 3: Even Carrie Haig, who used to kind of hate that
Speaker 3: kind of thing, now kind of has Saturday's the Birdie
Speaker 3: Day and we're doing you know, we had that just
Speaker 3: now Riviera and the tours doing that and then Sunday
Speaker 3: we're hard and I'm I'm tired of it. Frankly, I
Speaker 3: just think a good setup every day. I love the
Speaker 3: old model of six hard six medium six, you know,
Speaker 3: easy pins and letting the course and that daily maintenance
Speaker 3: just kind of quietly ramp up that to me, even
Speaker 3: though it's not natural because it's maintenance, it is natural
Speaker 3: in a way, and just trying to control things has
Speaker 3: gotten people in trouble. So but I think John Jennings
Speaker 3: will be way more involved than me. I can remember
Speaker 3: two different times standing back with him while Mike Davis
Speaker 3: and the team were doing their thing, and he had
Speaker 3: his front nine assistant and then his back nine and
Speaker 3: I just remember going, is this opinion you use a lot?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: No, I ouh buy.
Speaker 3: So I think, as you know, your video with John
Speaker 3: is fantastic. I mean, he has seven assistants. He probably
Speaker 3: could run a corporation if he really had wanted to.
Speaker 3: He's a very bright guy. And but you as your
Speaker 3: video detailed, I mean that place the longest days of
Speaker 3: the year, the sun up, it just you it's very
Speaker 3: hard with the wind to manage the moisture. So I
Speaker 3: think they've got John's got some great ideas. They're gonna
Speaker 3: tough luck, guys. They're going to go out and do
Speaker 3: a little watering in those tea time gaps, and uh,
Speaker 3: it's better than losing control of the golf course, you know.
Speaker 3: They just worry too much about the player whining. So yeah,
Speaker 3: so it's all about the setup and what it'll be.
Speaker 3: And the rough of the fairways will be wider, which
Speaker 3: is great. They can really dry that part out if
Speaker 3: they want, if they can, And it's a as you know,
Speaker 3: it's a phenomenal golf course. It's it's just it's it's
Speaker 3: but it's extremely hard to set up up over.
Speaker 1: The course of that long day with the weather there
Speaker 1: whereas here, you know, we have it's a little more predictable.
Speaker 3: So I'm excited about that and hopefully they don't screw
Speaker 3: it up. I think the pins will be in good spots.
Speaker 3: They won't be on seams of new old green to
Speaker 3: new green and things like that, and they won't be
Speaker 3: trying to protect par so it should be it should
Speaker 3: be very exciting.
Speaker 2: Well if they if they inevitably, you know, allow for
Speaker 2: a scoreable Thursday, everybody will have the knives out.
Speaker 3: Well, we experienced that here in La you know, and
Speaker 3: and it's I feel for them because, uh, you know,
Speaker 3: it drizzled that morning and the marine layer and didn't
Speaker 3: burn off as quickly, So we had a couple of
Speaker 3: sixty two's and that was the end of the world. Well,
Speaker 3: by the way, neither one of those guys won the tournament,
Speaker 3: and the sun.
Speaker 1: Still rises the rest of the tournament.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I get that people sees on that those
Speaker 3: low numbers, but again over the court.
Speaker 1: I mean I was telling somebody the other day.
Speaker 3: About the fifteenth hole, you know, Saturday at LA and
Speaker 3: at US Open, they really wanted to recreate what happened
Speaker 3: in the Walker Cup. But again the Walker Cup has
Speaker 3: only a small number of matches and the pin was
Speaker 3: in the perfect spot. Well this time around, John Bodamer
Speaker 3: just wasn't comfortable putting it on that exact spot because
Speaker 3: over the length of the day, the sun, the foot traffic,
Speaker 3: you could lose control. And both Scott Langley and I went,
Speaker 3: I just don't think it's far enough down and you
Speaker 3: know it is my opinion. And sure enough, as the
Speaker 3: day went early on it was clear it wasn't in
Speaker 3: that great juicy spot. But by the end of the
Speaker 3: day Ricky Fowler had about a three foot or downhill
Speaker 3: to that cup and I went out right after he
Speaker 3: teed off on sixteen and I looked at it and went, oh,
Speaker 3: my gosh, this thing was like marble. If he if
Speaker 3: he had if he didn't catch the hole with it,
Speaker 3: he would have had a ten twelve foot coming back
Speaker 3: at least. So it just shows, you know, over the
Speaker 3: course of the day, with a full field modern preparation
Speaker 3: sun at the highest point it is all year. It's
Speaker 3: just really difficult to do, and especially when they do
Speaker 3: it so early in the morning, especially if a lot
Speaker 3: of guys make the cut on the weekend.
Speaker 1: So it's a it's a it's a tough task. Of course.
Speaker 3: All this is a product to of modern green speeds,
Speaker 3: which you know, that's a I don't think that's going backward.
Speaker 3: That said, by the way, just on Riviera, they kept
Speaker 3: the greens. They were beautifully smooth. They started at thirteen,
Speaker 3: but they were they were twelve at the end of
Speaker 3: the day probably, and Paula grows this time of year,
Speaker 3: and they were they were smooth as can be. So
Speaker 3: some of that argument's a little bit dicey at times.
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, yeah, it's there's a lot there with
Speaker 2: the setup and and greens.
Speaker 1: And well you you were there recently, right, Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2: It was amazing, you know. I I was. I got
Speaker 2: in very late the night before. I slept in my Garrett, Cameron,
Speaker 2: and UH and Parker from our team were all out
Speaker 2: on the golf course. They were they were talking about
Speaker 2: how much water they were putting down, like They're like
Speaker 2: it was insane how much water they were putting down.
Speaker 2: And I'm thinking, I'm gonna go there and it's gonna
Speaker 2: be like, you know, soggy. It's just I wouldn't have
Speaker 2: known they put it out of water down that trains well.
Speaker 2: I was thinking about this like it's basically like the
Speaker 2: one oh one guide of like why this places stands
Speaker 2: up as well it does to technology, and it's like
Speaker 2: it's got you know, the great soils, you know, British
Speaker 2: Isles like soils in terms of golf, it's the best
Speaker 2: draining soils. It's got you know, good turf is it's
Speaker 2: susceptible the wind, which is like anti TrackMan golf, you
Speaker 2: know where the one time you start to see these
Speaker 2: guys have to move around shots and hit real golf shots,
Speaker 2: and then it's got a little bit of that Pinehurst effect,
Speaker 2: where you know that there are a lot of marvelous
Speaker 2: design aspects of it. You could talk about the way
Speaker 2: it doesn't play in, you know, the similar direction very often,
Speaker 2: how it's got the triangulation, how it moves in all
Speaker 2: these different directions, amplifying the wind, you know, the fairways
Speaker 2: on different angles. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 2: the repelling nature of it, which has like you know,
Speaker 2: it's not as I wouldn't say it's as extreme as
Speaker 2: Pineer's number two, but just the idea of when you
Speaker 2: hit an average or mediocre shot, the ball is always
Speaker 2: running away from the target and like those things combined
Speaker 2: make it I you know, I think it's like, yeah,
Speaker 2: the setups have had issues, but also the the golf course.
Speaker 2: The golf course gets under player skins also, which amplifies
Speaker 2: the setup issues.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there's there's several moments visually that are that
Speaker 3: are murky, no matter how many times you played there.
Speaker 3: You know, ten green, eleven green, and they don't love
Speaker 3: that either. Again, I didn't have to hear any of
Speaker 3: this complaining last week.
Speaker 1: It was so nice. But and I get it.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's the US Open. It's tough. There's tension.
Speaker 3: You got to find something to blame sometimes or you're
Speaker 3: just annoyed. But yeah, it asked for everything, and and
Speaker 3: I I really hope that I and I feel confident,
Speaker 3: barring something with crazy with the weather, that the plan
Speaker 3: will be much better this time. And they have learned
Speaker 3: from their mistakes, and I having worked with them on
Speaker 3: the on the setup at LA, they're also great at
Speaker 3: taking in a lot of of opinions and some people
Speaker 3: don't do that sometimes was set up and that's usually
Speaker 3: when they get in trouble, when they don't listen to
Speaker 3: the people who are there every every day, whether it's
Speaker 3: a superintendent or the assistant superintendent or the members. You
Speaker 3: can you can pick up things from everybody. So hopefully
Speaker 3: that's the case this time, because it would it would
Speaker 3: be dreadful if if if they lost control again. And
Speaker 3: of course, you know, there's a view that they didn't
Speaker 3: lose control in two thousand and four, that somebody came
Speaker 3: in the middle of the night, and well we'll just
Speaker 3: let that one be a permanent mystery in the history
Speaker 3: of the game whether that actually happened. But so yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm excited, and uh, you know, I don't know what's
Speaker 3: I think guys need to go there and and and
Speaker 3: learn it and play it.
Speaker 1: And I think it was smartest Scott he to do that.
Speaker 3: And Rory obviously he's played their bunch and a few
Speaker 3: guys did before the Ryder Cup. But I think Arono
Speaker 3: Minks showed Rory showed it Augusta even though he'd played
Speaker 3: there so much, that there is value in the practice rounds.
Speaker 3: I saw it at riv last week and and a
Speaker 3: lot of them men now they just really don't take
Speaker 3: those practice rounds as seriously, although I felt like ironom
Speaker 3: Ink they did a little bit more. So it'll be
Speaker 3: interesting to see what goes on early in the week
Speaker 3: that way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I thought that was like something that didn't really
Speaker 2: get talked about much at ironom Ink. Was like, you know,
Speaker 2: it's like, wow, this golf course seems to be surprising guys.
Speaker 2: It's like, well, they don't really practice anymore.
Speaker 3: No, No, And the wind, you know, the wind directions
Speaker 3: were different and they were weird directions. And yeah, if
Speaker 3: you if you were if you knew anything about the course,
Speaker 3: and uh, it was an advantage And and I don't
Speaker 3: know what the answer is for that, because I understand
Speaker 3: why people want to come into the tournament rested and
Speaker 3: start that first round fresh. But you got to do
Speaker 3: your homework at some point, and you can't rely on
Speaker 3: on somebody going off Google Earth or something to tell
Speaker 3: you how to play the thing. You need to be
Speaker 3: out there, especially around the greens. So yeah, I actually
Speaker 3: enjoy this now, kind of watching who's out there grinding.
Speaker 3: My one regret it that ironom Ink was two different
Speaker 3: nights leaving the Press center. Yeah, they had the beautiful
Speaker 3: short game area there right next to the to the
Speaker 3: press Scent tentor tent, and uh, two different nights, I'm
Speaker 3: leaving and you know at dusk and there's there's Aaron
Speaker 3: Rye out there just hitting lob shots and grinding in
Speaker 3: the and I normally would just take a picture of that, like, well,
Speaker 3: that's very cool.
Speaker 1: He's really working it. And yeah, then he went on
Speaker 1: and won.
Speaker 3: He wasn't on the course, but he was really trying
Speaker 3: to get those shots around the greens figured out and
Speaker 3: it paid off.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, Well look forward to seeing you and on
Speaker 2: Long Island and uh yeah, everybody by Grounds for Golf,
Speaker 2: go sign up for the Quadrilateral. Thanks as always for
Speaker 2: coming on.
Speaker 1: Jeff, my pleasure. Thank you, Andy.
Speaker 2: All Right, big thanks to PJ Clark. He's doing the
Speaker 2: hundred hole hike tomorrow'll it'll win this errors He'll be
Speaker 2: done with one hundred hole hike. I'm hoping for I'm
Speaker 2: praying for PJ. He's got a big day of editing this.
Speaker 2: The Knicks are up to Oh, he's gonna be up
Speaker 2: late watching the Knicks. He's gonna walk a hundred holes.
Speaker 2: Big thanks to Jeff for coming on, but big thanks
Speaker 2: to PJ for putting this all together. And uh, we'll
Speaker 2: be back. We got a five things about the US
Speaker 2: Open with one of our favorites him DS will be
Speaker 2: joining and that will be out on Sunday. As we
Speaker 2: head into the US Open week, I can't believe we're
Speaker 2: about to be three of four majors of the year done.
Speaker 2: So talk to you soon. Bye,