Speaker 1: Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. Today,
Speaker 1: I am joined by Jeff Shackleford, Golf Channel contributor and
Speaker 1: also owner and CEO, COO, CFO of Jeffshackleford dot Com.
Speaker 1: Jeff and I talk a great deal about what's going
Speaker 1: on in the world, obviously, and how it pertains the golf.
Speaker 1: It's obviously tough times with the coronavirus and everything going
Speaker 1: on with the mass closures, you know, the increase cases.
Speaker 1: I hope everybody out there is being safe and practicing
Speaker 1: social distancing. I think that's the smartest thing to do
Speaker 1: right now. But we talk a lot about the impacts
Speaker 1: on golf and some of the positives how golf could
Speaker 1: really benefit from this kind of reset.
Speaker 2: So everybody be safe, and I.
Speaker 1: Hope you guys are all doing well, and hopefully this
Speaker 1: takes your guys mind off things for a little bit.
Speaker 1: Without further ado, here is Jeff Shackelford.
Speaker 2: I miss a green for example, I'm already upset when
Speaker 2: I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 3: And when I find my ball in a bright.
Speaker 4: Egg Frida Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, Frida Egggrid, Egg
Speaker 4: bride egg Lie.
Speaker 3: I'm about ready to run off the golf course.
Speaker 1: All right, Uh, Jeff, the crazy times here. I know
Speaker 1: you covered golf adjacently kind of during the nine to
Speaker 1: eleven stuff.
Speaker 2: How would you compare it to that?
Speaker 4: It feels very similar to me in terms of the
Speaker 4: kind of what are we going to do question and
Speaker 4: realizing that things like golf travel won't be the same
Speaker 4: for a while, probably that being the most important.
Speaker 3: Notion to the golf industry into golfers.
Speaker 4: On the other hand, you can make the case that
Speaker 4: at some point the the destination rural golf resort might
Speaker 4: look appealing where there are fewer people. So it's there's
Speaker 4: just so many questions at the moment that you you
Speaker 4: don't have an answer to, just like nine to eleven,
Speaker 4: and I hope that people just take the time to
Speaker 4: step back and.
Speaker 3: Be quiet.
Speaker 4: I'm just kind of appalled at some of the stuff
Speaker 4: I've seen, and I'm trying to I'm struggling trying as
Speaker 4: somebody has a website and want to keep it going
Speaker 4: and keep it active, but I'm also struggling with I
Speaker 4: don't want to be putting things out that you just
Speaker 4: simply do not need to know, you know, nobody needs
Speaker 4: to know that Paula Kramer's listener mansion for six.
Speaker 3: Point three million, And nobody needs to know that.
Speaker 4: Billy and Rory are in a peloton numbers battle, and
Speaker 4: and and and really nobody needs to know somebody's view
Speaker 4: on the Premier Golf League right now. It's just it's
Speaker 4: just such a it's a pandemic.
Speaker 3: I don't know else to put it.
Speaker 4: It's a very serious time and we need to focus
Speaker 4: on the people who are suffering and taking care of
Speaker 4: ourselves and protecting others.
Speaker 3: In this time when we've been told to do so.
Speaker 4: And it'll be a time, if we're quiet, to reflect
Speaker 4: on the sport and where it will go as this
Speaker 4: what's the president uses the wave passes?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've been struggling. Obviously. I think there's a role
Speaker 1: for media in times like this and providing an escape
Speaker 1: for people as they see stuff around them and such chaos.
Speaker 1: That there's definitely an aspect of being in the golf
Speaker 1: media space where you can provide somebody with entertainment when
Speaker 1: the world is semingly devoid of it. But at the
Speaker 1: same time, I've just struggled. I've got all the time
Speaker 1: in the world on my hands right now. You know,
Speaker 1: I tend to never have time, and and I just
Speaker 1: have trouble even focusing on putting something, putting five hundred
Speaker 1: words together right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, which is you know, that's that's the tricky thing.
Speaker 3: And I that it's okay though, Yeah, that's the right that's
Speaker 3: the right thing, you know.
Speaker 4: And I don't think people were just I think that's
Speaker 4: one the one positive in this is word of society
Speaker 4: where you just got to constantly be moving and producing
Speaker 4: and and this and that and and yeah, this is
Speaker 4: one of those times this week, maybe next week too,
Speaker 4: or you just don't do that and but but it's
Speaker 4: a time to reflect.
Speaker 3: So view that as to me the positive of the
Speaker 3: of this.
Speaker 2: You picked up any hobbies? This has he been?
Speaker 3: Uh No, I haven't.
Speaker 4: No, I haven't gone there, you know for a writer,
Speaker 4: as you know, uh, working from home and quarantining is
Speaker 4: really what we do normally. So this isn't really a
Speaker 4: tough one at the moment for me. The toughest question is,
Speaker 4: you know, what kind of things do you cover and
Speaker 4: not cover? And I've just really gone kind of full
Speaker 4: bore into if it's not about news related to the
Speaker 4: virus and cancelations and scheduling and the big picture stuff
Speaker 4: with the major championships. To me, everything else is tough
Speaker 4: to cover. But there is going to be a point
Speaker 4: where I think it'll be fun to to throw things
Speaker 4: out there as people start to get the itch to
Speaker 4: get back out and live to put things out. So
Speaker 4: to me, it's a time to to do some things
Speaker 4: and ponder those things and make notes and all that
Speaker 4: kind of stuff, and do some chores and clean.
Speaker 3: And avoid people.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's the biggest thing, is just distance yourself.
Speaker 1: So it's crazy, but that's it.
Speaker 4: I'm kind of one of those people. It's like, golf
Speaker 4: looks like a great thing to me.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: Andrew Cuomo gave a wonderful address today and he mentioned
Speaker 4: getting out, hike, walk, enjoy our parks. Obviously, don't get
Speaker 4: two close people. I was kind of hoping you'd mentioned golf,
Speaker 4: because I do believe that golf courses ideally should be
Speaker 4: able to stay open certain areas. Clearly the workers can't
Speaker 4: get there to maintain it, but it seems to me
Speaker 4: like the sport is a good place to be as
Speaker 4: long as you're not in a nineteenth hole and sitting
Speaker 4: sitting next to a bunch of people and or in
Speaker 4: a cart or in a.
Speaker 3: Cart, those would be the two places I'd avoid.
Speaker 4: And you know, people can change their shoes in the
Speaker 4: parking lot at most places. You know, maybe those clubs
Speaker 4: that have that rule that view that as one of
Speaker 4: the great atrocities and all of life when somebody changes
Speaker 4: their shoes in the lot, can wave that that house
Speaker 4: eteicate rule and shut the clubhouses down and have a
Speaker 4: starter somebody who can collect some revenue and money. If
Speaker 4: it's a public course and it seems to be maintenance workers,
Speaker 4: if they can get to the golf course safely, it's
Speaker 4: a great chance to keep them working. And you just
Speaker 4: can't let a golf course go without major repercussions. And
Speaker 4: in the markets where things are just okay, it seems
Speaker 4: like a good place for people to go.
Speaker 3: But we'll see. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think that that's the one thing, is the maintenance
Speaker 1: worker safety. As long as that is feasible, I think
Speaker 1: that golf is an incredible avenue. I think where I
Speaker 1: wanted to talk about this a little bit as positives
Speaker 1: coming out of it, is that you know, one of
Speaker 1: the things that this could spurn with the way the
Speaker 1: world is. If maintenance, you know, becomes a four man
Speaker 1: job or a three man job, you know, alternated, so
Speaker 1: people don't get sick coming in every day, it could
Speaker 1: become where it'd be a great thing if golf had
Speaker 1: a little bit lower maintenance expectation. We're seeing golf courses
Speaker 1: are taking rakes out of bunkers. You know, how good
Speaker 1: is that a bunker actually being a hazard?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think like nine to eleven, this is an
Speaker 4: opportunity to reset some values.
Speaker 3: Maybe they're forced on us, but.
Speaker 4: Things were getting a little bit silly of late, and
Speaker 4: also things were going in a negative direction in terms
Speaker 4: of the labor pool for golf course maintenance. So that
Speaker 4: job working in golf course maintenance, knowing the safety standards
Speaker 4: that most.
Speaker 3: Operations have now they have a lot of masks.
Speaker 4: They are places that are just so much better run
Speaker 4: now with the way the modern superintendent works and is educated,
Speaker 4: and they're great places to work. Again, assuming when we
Speaker 4: get to a certain place where people don't have their
Speaker 4: kids at home and they can commute safely on however,
Speaker 4: they get to a golf course job, it's actually going
Speaker 4: to look like an attractive place to be.
Speaker 3: But that said, one would hope.
Speaker 4: That golfers playing during this time at golf courses that
Speaker 4: are cutting back and don't mow the greens every day
Speaker 4: and don't move the fairways every day and experience some
Speaker 4: of those values see that it's still is is a
Speaker 4: wonderful game without having to have greens be thirteen and
Speaker 4: double cut and the step meter speed posted and whatever
Speaker 4: other bizarro things that go on.
Speaker 1: It's an interesting sense that I and this is just
Speaker 1: my view.
Speaker 2: I'm not an expert.
Speaker 1: You know, there's one hundred experts talking all the time,
Speaker 1: and I've been consuming it just from a personal you know,
Speaker 1: we put on a vent, so I've been paying attention
Speaker 1: to coronavirus for weeks now and just thinking, you know,
Speaker 1: worst case scenario, and here we are. But one of
Speaker 1: the things I look at is the mass gatherings could
Speaker 1: be gone for a while for us, and it could
Speaker 1: be something where golf becomes a more popular activity because
Speaker 1: because it's something you can do outside. I think people
Speaker 1: the more that we're shut in from this are the
Speaker 1: more they're going to appreciate the outdoors and being able
Speaker 1: to be out and away from people.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Absolutely, I think it's a huge opportunity. And I hate
Speaker 4: that word, but if we're looking for something to cling
Speaker 4: to and or provide people with some hope and some
Speaker 4: things to think about, that unlike maybe other things, say
Speaker 4: two thousand and eight, the market collapse, then that this
Speaker 4: is an opportunity. As you say, people are going to
Speaker 4: get cooped up, They're gonna they're gonna be driving their
Speaker 4: relatives nuts. The values of golf that have really taken
Speaker 4: a hit, I think in people's view in the last
Speaker 4: few years for whatever reason that and we we kind
Speaker 4: of can guess some of those reasons, and they're all different,
Speaker 4: and some makes more sense than others, some make no
Speaker 4: sense at all. That this opportunity, in this awful time
Speaker 4: will be something that highlights the beauty of the sport
Speaker 4: and the values of the sport and the and the
Speaker 4: things that are good about it.
Speaker 3: Exercise being outdoors.
Speaker 4: It's going to look a lot safer as a place
Speaker 4: to be than a gym for a while or sporting event.
Speaker 4: And so I think the sport hopefully will see those
Speaker 4: things and figure out ways to capitalize. And I don't
Speaker 4: know how those are yet. Again, it's just way too soon,
Speaker 4: but I hope those of the things that people are
Speaker 4: thinking about as this this unfolds.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that that's where there's you know, like
Speaker 1: you said, using opportunity is always something you don't use
Speaker 1: in this, but you look at what is going to
Speaker 1: happen in gyms are going to be less popular for
Speaker 1: the near future. It's just, you know, I think my
Speaker 1: gym still hasn't closed and it actually kind of makes
Speaker 1: me upset.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's.
Speaker 1: Just but you know, you look at look at golf,
Speaker 1: and golf could almost you know, have an opportunity to
Speaker 1: reinvent itself. Is assuming you know, the courses can withstand
Speaker 1: the financial burden that's going to be placed on them
Speaker 1: for the next two months. But the the opportunity to
Speaker 1: provide small scale golf where you can get these hours
Speaker 1: that people have devoted to the gym and get them
Speaker 1: an outdoor activity and give them a spot they can
Speaker 1: go walk and play golf for an hour would be amazing.
Speaker 3: It would.
Speaker 4: And it's so it's going to be in coming on
Speaker 4: the industry right now to think about ways and not
Speaker 4: another PSA program where we put ten million dollars into ads,
Speaker 4: but actually think about ways to help golf courses promote
Speaker 4: themselves in this time, but also not look tone deaf
Speaker 4: to what's going on. And I think that's kind of
Speaker 4: that interesting balance.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: I've been pondering on my blog and I'm just kind
Speaker 4: of doing about one thing a day. I just just
Speaker 4: don't want to I'm not looking to get hits. I
Speaker 4: really just want to try to step in and offer
Speaker 4: something and then step out. And one of those has
Speaker 4: been the question of, you know, is it is it
Speaker 4: a bad look right now for somebody to be out
Speaker 4: playing golf? Is that going to be part of what
Speaker 4: goes into the thinking in certain cities or at certain
Speaker 4: country clubs or certain resorts. And I'm not sure what
Speaker 4: the answer is, but I think perception is a tricky
Speaker 4: one and one.
Speaker 3: That they need to be able to address that the
Speaker 3: look is bad.
Speaker 4: I think in about a week and the places where
Speaker 4: the weather is good enough to be playing golf, people
Speaker 4: will look at golf as a very good thing if
Speaker 4: these courses don't shut down. Obviously, the city of San
Speaker 4: Francisco has is on a full lockdown, so they're obviously
Speaker 4: not going to send anybody out to go maintain Harding Park,
Speaker 4: which is why the PGA Championship is now officially postponed
Speaker 4: and the PGA of America can reassess whether they can
Speaker 4: play there and those kinds of things. But there are
Speaker 4: other cities like Austin where they've also kind of lumped in.
Speaker 2: Golf with its other Philadelphia.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I'm worried LA will, But it's just one
Speaker 4: of those things where I think it will be worse well,
Speaker 4: especially in our city, to be perfectly blunt, if the
Speaker 4: golf courses closed, Uh, there's gonna be a greater chance
Speaker 4: those they become encampments for our horrible homeless situation here.
Speaker 4: There there are things that you could see where it
Speaker 4: just doesn't do any good to close. You can take precautions,
Speaker 4: you can close the clubhous areas, you can do things
Speaker 4: to help the maintenance team. But at the same time,
Speaker 4: if I'm a maintenance worker, I sure love that job
Speaker 4: right now a lot more than a lot a lot
Speaker 4: of places to be having to work. And again they
Speaker 4: have they have ample safety equipment and in terms of
Speaker 4: masks and things for spraying, and they have guidelines and
Speaker 4: and so I think it's something that is again it's
Speaker 4: it's a positive, but at the right time.
Speaker 3: I you know, I don't. I don't know when that is.
Speaker 4: But I think as people sit around and and and
Speaker 4: have nothing to do at home, they are going to
Speaker 4: think through, well, wait a second, the golf course is
Speaker 4: a good place to be. I don't touch the flag stick.
Speaker 4: We've got the rule now, right, yeah, the flag stick in,
Speaker 4: don't touch the flag stick.
Speaker 3: The ranks are gone, rights.
Speaker 2: Are gone, ball washers are gone.
Speaker 1: You know, there could be the demise of the t
Speaker 1: box trinkets.
Speaker 2: You know, that's okay, those good things.
Speaker 1: And you know, I think if if carts are down,
Speaker 1: you know, people are walking more. It just becomes a
Speaker 1: healthier the whole perception of golf would would really change.
Speaker 1: I think if you looked if if all sudden bunkers
Speaker 1: were maintained, you know, at a at a reasonable level
Speaker 1: where it was you know, once every couple of days,
Speaker 1: and and you didn't have all the exorbitant spending on
Speaker 1: things that have no impact on on golf, and and
Speaker 1: and people start to understand that, hey, this is just
Speaker 1: a great outdoor activity. This is what because I mean,
Speaker 1: that's what I love about golf. You know, it's funny,
Speaker 1: I had Hey, I'm sure you feel this way sometimes
Speaker 1: is that I feel like my tank and my my
Speaker 1: golf soul kind of gets empty.
Speaker 2: Sometimes it gets down low because I get.
Speaker 1: Front, you know, working in golf it's different. And h
Speaker 1: and I had one of these experience I played. I
Speaker 1: was out at bandon dudes. I played Banded Trails by
Speaker 1: myself at five pm, the sun going down, and I
Speaker 1: played in two hours and it was like, you know,
Speaker 1: Banded Trails as a hike, you know, you're you're going
Speaker 1: up in downhills. Afterwards, I felt like I got a
Speaker 1: great workout and and I just I felt it was
Speaker 1: just one of those moments where you're like, God, this
Speaker 1: is such a great game, you know, but it was
Speaker 1: so low maintenance.
Speaker 2: At that time. My rangefinder was dead.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: All I was doing is walking up, hitting the ball,
Speaker 1: walking forward, and it was just incredible. And then sure
Speaker 1: enough two days later everything's canceled.
Speaker 4: Right, Yeah, And I think that's something that that will
Speaker 4: become apparent a piece people and the climates where they
Speaker 4: can when they can't go out and play. But yeah,
Speaker 4: I think that there's an opportunity. It was just as
Speaker 4: you were talking, was pondering what a course could do
Speaker 4: if they're limited by maintenance, and you know, maybe you
Speaker 4: kind of your daily maintenance is on just one to
Speaker 4: nine and we only have nine holes open at a time,
Speaker 4: as a way to do a little bit of a
Speaker 4: just take a little burden off the crew, but also
Speaker 4: a little bit of this mindset of maybe this is
Speaker 4: our chance to highlight loops of holes, nine holes, twelve holes,
Speaker 4: highlight more evening golf. I don't think enough courses do that.
Speaker 4: They're so worried about closing the clubhouse and the cart
Speaker 4: barn down. Well maybe there's a place now for people
Speaker 4: really playing on public courses till dark and who cares
Speaker 4: except for the one person who does have to lock.
Speaker 3: Up the parking lot. Those kinds of things so well, I.
Speaker 1: Think one of the constraints with evening golf's always been childcare,
Speaker 1: you know, and now that people have their kids at home,
Speaker 1: all are going to have their kids at home all
Speaker 1: the time for pretty much probably until at least the fall.
Speaker 1: You know, we're looking at a time where if you
Speaker 1: want to play golf, you're going to have to squeeze
Speaker 1: it in at some point, and in evenings might be
Speaker 1: the best time, because it's no longer hey this is
Speaker 1: the only time I get to side with my kids.
Speaker 3: Right right, that's a great point.
Speaker 4: And it's also a great time to possibly get kids
Speaker 4: into the sphere again, not just through the usual stuff
Speaker 4: drive chip or.
Speaker 3: Top golf or whatever, but get them out on a course.
Speaker 4: And especially as you've known, as they get really anxious
Speaker 4: being cooped up, it's it's going to come as a
Speaker 4: as a welcome relief.
Speaker 3: So again it's a it's a tricky one.
Speaker 4: I hope the game is just patient, but obviously not
Speaker 4: too patient, because if a bunch of courses are convinced
Speaker 4: they just have to close and maintenance completely slides and
Speaker 4: we have a major issue. But if there's some way
Speaker 4: to find a middle ground that that keeps places open
Speaker 4: and functional and and and maintained enough that that it
Speaker 4: just could be it could be outstanding for the game
Speaker 4: to have this moment and to show people.
Speaker 3: What it can be.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's not the only positive I can find it
Speaker 4: all this, by the way, I've fed searching too.
Speaker 2: It's it's I think that that the other thing it.
Speaker 3: Is the most well would say.
Speaker 1: It's a great one because you could see some courses
Speaker 1: where if they if they close down their clubhouse operations
Speaker 1: and they'd focus just on golf for a while. They
Speaker 1: could see that, hey, look like this clubhouse is just
Speaker 1: burying us in money, you know, and and could survive
Speaker 1: on his own.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: And there are a lot of places that have put
Speaker 4: a lot of money into clubhouses the last few years
Speaker 4: or doing it right now. And boy, I I those
Speaker 4: places there that those are bills that are going to
Speaker 4: be uh tough to swallow right now. But you're right,
Speaker 4: there are plenty of others that can can just accept that, well,
Speaker 4: we're not going to have any group business and we're
Speaker 4: gonna we're gonna have to really make the the golf
Speaker 4: work for a while. And so hopefully that can can
Speaker 4: sustain some of those places that relied too much on
Speaker 4: thinking that they had to have the clubhouse revenue to
Speaker 4: make the whole thing work.
Speaker 3: And and then.
Speaker 4: Those those reduced maintenance values will hopefully maybe reduce a
Speaker 4: few costs.
Speaker 3: So we'll see.
Speaker 4: And then then again that the I there's a major
Speaker 4: issue coming forward with with people wanting to work in
Speaker 4: the golf course maintenance industry, and this is a fantastic
Speaker 4: opportunity to suddenly say, hey, this is this is a
Speaker 4: good place to be both for your health and and
Speaker 4: and in the future if there's ever another pandemic, and
Speaker 4: in the present, and it's a it's a great career
Speaker 4: if if the industry can kind of hang in there through.
Speaker 2: This hey breaking news.
Speaker 1: While while we're talking, Yeah, Ryder Cup postponed all twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one per James Corgan.
Speaker 4: Okay, well that's one I wondered about, and I think
Speaker 4: that's probably the right thing to do.
Speaker 3: Actually, I was.
Speaker 4: I had a thought the other night that, you know,
Speaker 4: why don't we just scrap Whistling Straights all together and
Speaker 4: just turn the President's Cup into the Ryder Cup next year,
Speaker 4: even though it's quel Hollow.
Speaker 3: Just just do it.
Speaker 4: I just forget to skip the President's Cup. Nobody's excited
Speaker 4: about the President's Cup at Quell Hollow next year. The
Speaker 4: US will probably win very easily, So let's just scrap it.
Speaker 4: Let's just give it, give it the time off. But
Speaker 4: we're in the PJA of America can use their partnership
Speaker 4: to turn Quail Hollow into the Ryder Cup venue next
Speaker 4: next fall.
Speaker 1: What am I supposed to do with my twenty twenty
Speaker 1: one President's Cup gear?
Speaker 3: Though?
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, I'm sure that you stocked up on that,
Speaker 4: because I know how much that that President's Cup has
Speaker 4: been on your your radar since.
Speaker 3: It was announced.
Speaker 4: I mean, nobody, nobody is excited about that one. So yeah,
Speaker 4: that would be my proposed trade. And that's the one
Speaker 4: thing it'll be interesting in all this is how these
Speaker 4: governing bodies get together in a room and and sort
Speaker 4: out some of these things. You know, I had a
Speaker 4: post today Luke care Denen wrote a good piece on yah,
Speaker 4: are we gonna he he's.
Speaker 3: I think he's right. The majors are just going to
Speaker 3: be so tough this year.
Speaker 4: So maybe we'll have later in the year one one
Speaker 4: Hail America type tournament. And it's hard for me to
Speaker 4: picture those groups getting together and doing such a thing
Speaker 4: and making it work. But that's they're gonna need to
Speaker 4: and they're gonna need to understand that, Yeah, maybe we
Speaker 4: maybe we need to just skip a President's Cup and
Speaker 4: and and that kind of a thing. I don't know
Speaker 4: if they're capable, but I hope, I hope they are,
Speaker 4: and I hope they're open minded and also don't try
Speaker 4: to force things that that just shouldn't be forced.
Speaker 1: Right now, Yeah, you know it makes you makes you
Speaker 1: look at everything going on, and if the NBA hasn't
Speaker 1: canceled yet, it.
Speaker 3: Looks they're toasted.
Speaker 2: It looks worse and worse.
Speaker 1: But you know, a lot of these sports at least
Speaker 1: have the opportunity to do things because they have an
Speaker 1: off season. I'm I'm wondering if one of the big
Speaker 1: things that we'll see from this is that, you know,
Speaker 1: the PGA Tour eventually scales back, it's its schedule.
Speaker 3: Well, let's just.
Speaker 4: Let's just again, I'm I don't like these topics that much,
Speaker 4: but just as an example, look at look at the
Speaker 4: fall this year. You have the Greenbrier on the schedule.
Speaker 4: You have the Astros Foundation event. Now, the oil companies
Speaker 4: haven't had a real good few weeks, and they're the
Speaker 4: ones who put together the sponsorship.
Speaker 3: It's an umbrella.
Speaker 4: They're put together by Jim Crane, owner of the Houston
Speaker 4: Cheating Astros, and he I would just guess that event's
Speaker 4: got some problems in terms of the.
Speaker 3: View of it in the community right now.
Speaker 4: It's not one that does the tour really want to
Speaker 4: be associated with the Astros. This again, thinking if things
Speaker 4: get better, I'm very well aware, so please don't send
Speaker 4: the twitter hete, this is just this and yeah, speculator
Speaker 4: and the Greenbrier. Obviously tough, tough time it's going to
Speaker 4: be for that resort. I would I would assume for
Speaker 4: a while, although I believe West Virginia still hasn't had
Speaker 4: a no cases.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, there you go.
Speaker 2: But they're going that they're going to Yeah.
Speaker 4: Let's just assume that that event is one too. That
Speaker 4: is one that's a little bit shaky. I think you're
Speaker 4: going to see some some sponsorship ship issues. And that's
Speaker 4: why I was sort of flabbergasted on multiple levels by
Speaker 4: the rush to report the Premier Golf League rejections and
Speaker 4: the rush to declare the death of it. And you know,
Speaker 4: I'm just sitting there watching the futures and I don't
Speaker 4: even watch the markets that much, and thinking, do these
Speaker 4: people know that FedEx is stock price is plummeting, Their
Speaker 4: future is bleak as it would appear unless they're purchased
Speaker 4: by Walmart or somebody else.
Speaker 3: You know, A bigger issue is the fed X Cup.
Speaker 4: If you really want to get into first world issues,
Speaker 4: then the league that's not alive yet versus the ones
Speaker 4: that are alive and forget the PGA Tour for a moment.
Speaker 4: The European tours got major issues in this with sponsorship,
Speaker 4: and as you see from Mike Wan's statements, he's noting
Speaker 4: the sponsors and everything he does because he's trying to
Speaker 4: send the signal we're thinking about you, we appreciate you.
Speaker 4: Please please keep an open mind through this. This is
Speaker 4: going to be tough. And that's such a different approach
Speaker 4: to all this than what the tour PGA Tour has done,
Speaker 4: which was all about the players of the players Championship,
Speaker 4: and you know, I don't know how much they put
Speaker 4: out things like that where they're thinking about the sponsors
Speaker 4: and right now, that's going to be your most important
Speaker 4: thing as a business when all this does start up again,
Speaker 4: because some of them have taken a big, big hit
Speaker 4: and it's going to look very very bad to be
Speaker 4: putting millions of dollars into a golf tournament sponsorship when
Speaker 4: you've laid off people.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you look at like Valero Texas Open, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a big, big dollar amount.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 1: I mean, as anybody in golf look better in the
Speaker 1: last few weeks than Mike Wan.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he seems to know how to read the room.
Speaker 4: And I thought that was And obviously he knows some
Speaker 4: things we don't know, but he is clear he knows
Speaker 4: he has players who have sponsors who are not very
Speaker 4: tolerant of people not making their allotted number of starts,
Speaker 4: and so he went out of his way to note
Speaker 4: that concerned because he knows some of his players need
Speaker 4: that endorsement money. So he really came off as somebody
Speaker 4: who was in tune with what is going on in
Speaker 4: the gravity of it and the kind of the grand scheme.
Speaker 2: What what do you think will happen?
Speaker 1: Say, you know, we're now through essentially May with with cancelations.
Speaker 1: Say we get to a point where we're in August
Speaker 1: looking at and I don't want to, you know, speculate
Speaker 1: we're going to get there. I hope we're playing sooner,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe we're playing without fans at some point
Speaker 1: that seems like, but we get there. How are they
Speaker 1: going to handle the season? Do you think they'll you know,
Speaker 1: do they do they end it on the usual time
Speaker 1: or do they extend it? I mean at this point,
Speaker 1: if you I was at this today, is like if
Speaker 1: you if you go to this, how do you handle
Speaker 1: the end? Of the season, and you know where players
Speaker 1: are in the FedEx Cup, you'd have some some guys
Speaker 1: that are outside the top one twenty five that I'm
Speaker 1: sure the tour would not want there.
Speaker 4: That's a tough one. I hadn't I hadn't thought about
Speaker 4: that one yet. To be honest with you, I think
Speaker 4: we've all been kind of under the assumption that that
Speaker 4: there would be a resumption. But you're right, as today's
Speaker 4: news it's unfolding as we're talking here. It's it's becoming
Speaker 4: clear that that this season is.
Speaker 3: In trouble.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I don't I have no idea what the
Speaker 4: the answer would be. But but again I think they can.
Speaker 4: That's one they can sort through. That's an easier one
Speaker 4: to me to solve than some of the other things
Speaker 4: like losing sponsors permanently. And but they also I think
Speaker 4: before or they even get into that kind of thing
Speaker 4: that some of these organizations, and really namely all the
Speaker 4: PGA Tour, I feel like the other organizations so far
Speaker 4: have handled this very well, but they just have to
Speaker 4: first show a grasp of what is going on, and
Speaker 4: they just didn't do that going into Players Week, where
Speaker 4: other people who are paid very well to spot these things,
Speaker 4: could see where things were going and had plans ready
Speaker 4: to go for the most part, and reacted pretty nimbly.
Speaker 3: And they did not.
Speaker 4: So the first thing they really need to grasp is
Speaker 4: is kind of their sense their place in the in
Speaker 4: the world of sport and in the world and and
Speaker 4: what's important. So at least they're now kind of in
Speaker 4: line with everybody else and getting ahead and obviously canceling
Speaker 4: events through mid May when when we have certain warnings
Speaker 4: that are that are guidelines that are in place.
Speaker 1: For Yeah, I found myself now, I mean four days ago,
Speaker 1: five days ago now, but I it feels like a
Speaker 1: year ago.
Speaker 3: But I.
Speaker 1: I can't believe how disappointed I was in the way
Speaker 1: they handle the whole thing with the writing was all
Speaker 1: over the wall, and I know the world was moving
Speaker 1: so fast, and I don't think anybody envision we'd be
Speaker 1: where we are today on Thursday. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: it seemed to me that there was a decision that
Speaker 1: was the safe, smart decision and one that was very
Speaker 1: you know, kind of reckless, and the reckless one was made.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean letting people on the grounds Thursday at
Speaker 4: the Players was astonishing. I kind of could see starting
Speaker 4: the tournament and what they did there, but it was
Speaker 4: it was a week of astonishing decisions and misreading. And
Speaker 4: obviously some of the blame goes on j Monahan, but
Speaker 4: you also have to blame the people around him and
Speaker 4: the people he has surrounded himself with. That somebody wasn't
Speaker 4: in the room saying all right, let's just go worst
Speaker 4: case scenario here. You just don't somebody I would hope
Speaker 4: is but you got the sense that that somebody wasn't.
Speaker 4: Just starting with the CNBC thing on Monday, you know,
Speaker 4: where's the person saying, Okay, worst case scenario, you're going
Speaker 4: to go on, there's gonna be all these graphics and
Speaker 4: blood red of plunging markets and horrible things. And Andrew
Speaker 4: russ Orkin, who's going to have his phone just going
Speaker 4: ballistic with CEOs and people wanting to know what the
Speaker 4: heck's going on, is going to be sitting there talking
Speaker 4: to you. He might not, He might not be very happy,
Speaker 4: and he might ask you tough questions to make a
Speaker 4: fool of you. What do you think maybe we should cancel?
Speaker 4: You know, where is that person in the room doing
Speaker 4: those kinds of things? And I kind of sense that
Speaker 4: Jay really was let down by by his senior executive staff,
Speaker 4: the VP core or that there's got to be somebody
Speaker 4: that that's that that provides that point of view for him,
Speaker 4: and that's his fault for not surrounding himself with that person.
Speaker 4: It's a PGA Tour's fault for making every person who
Speaker 4: wants to be an executive there go meet with a
Speaker 4: conformity doctor and Atlanta for two days and answer questions
Speaker 4: and you know, you're just not gonna have that that
Speaker 4: kind of stuff in the room, that that will that
Speaker 4: saves you from embarrassment. So it was it was a doozy,
Speaker 4: it was. It was not it's not gonna age one.
Speaker 2: The That's that's the thing is. It's just.
Speaker 1: I I don't want to put myself in a similar situation.
Speaker 1: But you know, I was thinking about our one of
Speaker 1: our events, you know, with a with one hundred people
Speaker 1: right on Tuesday, and thinking about like, I, uh, this
Speaker 1: is I'm gonna have to cancel and you're bringing together
Speaker 1: thousands of people. And something I talk about with the
Speaker 1: with the PGA Tour on shot can start a lot
Speaker 1: is the idea of like every league has players and
Speaker 1: owners and they kind of pull against each other, and
Speaker 1: in this situation, I kind of feel I think one
Speaker 1: of the things that has in my just just this
Speaker 1: is just my opinion, is that the the fact that
Speaker 1: we have a essentially an organization that's that's got one
Speaker 1: interest in mind, the players, and that's it is kind
Speaker 1: of detrimental, especially in cases like this where you know,
Speaker 1: it wasn't it was the fact that the thing I
Speaker 1: was upset about, and people are like, oh, the players
Speaker 1: will be fine. It's like, it's not about the players,
Speaker 1: it's the it's all the elderly that are in the crowd.
Speaker 4: Or the people who have to work who don't have
Speaker 4: a choice, can't television people and volunteers, or or food
Speaker 4: and beverage workers.
Speaker 3: On and on. That was what all I was cared about.
Speaker 4: And everything you read was about the player safety, the
Speaker 4: player's safety, the player's safety. And then of course het
Speaker 4: fan goes and tells you that he's going through the
Speaker 4: clubhouse and there's there's no hand sanitizer and people are
Speaker 4: coughing at lunch. He later reveals that and but again,
Speaker 4: who yeah, who cares about the players.
Speaker 3: Let's care about the people.
Speaker 4: Who have to be there, uh or else will lose
Speaker 4: their job or will look bad to their boss who
Speaker 4: aren't making a whole lot of money. And that was
Speaker 4: what I couldn't believe and couldn't believe. There weren't statements
Speaker 4: begging seniors to stay away. See the statements about we're
Speaker 4: going to be wiping down the security apparatus when you
Speaker 4: come in and and the grand stands dealing with that,
Speaker 4: or we're going to close the grand stand. I mean,
Speaker 4: it was just as if they weren't watching what was
Speaker 4: going on in the news.
Speaker 3: It was. It was incredible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a it, it's a different you know. I
Speaker 1: think I think nobody thinks that Jay Bonahan's a bad
Speaker 1: guy like it, Oh no, no, and like but it
Speaker 1: was just an alarming lack of awareness to what what
Speaker 1: was going around outside of outside of the panaviter above
Speaker 1: bubble down there.
Speaker 4: Well and then and I think, and trying again think
Speaker 4: about where we're gonna go coming out of this whole thing.
Speaker 4: Is this question of are the players the game or
Speaker 4: is is golf the sport the most important thing? And
Speaker 4: we know this keeps coming up because of the distance
Speaker 4: topic we we we look look at look at this
Speaker 4: Premier Golf League stuff where where the top three players
Speaker 4: in the world have rejected it, therefore it is dead.
Speaker 4: And you know, it's a it's a concept of a
Speaker 4: of a tour where if it had had been hatched
Speaker 4: four years ago, people like Alex Norin and Danny Willett
Speaker 4: and and Bubba Watson, what would have been likely people
Speaker 4: invited to be part of it, And and they're not
Speaker 4: in that place now. The game changes quickly. And it's
Speaker 4: also the flaw by the way of the Premier League
Speaker 4: is that the turnover in golf is so extreme. The
Speaker 4: way you it can go bad quickly with the slightest
Speaker 4: injury is extreme.
Speaker 3: It's it's cruel.
Speaker 4: And so the sport, though, still kind of revolves around
Speaker 4: the players and they'll say something and we run around
Speaker 4: in circles, and the game's going to be here way
Speaker 4: past the time that a lot of these people are around,
Speaker 4: and a lot of them won't be relevant in.
Speaker 3: Three four years possibly.
Speaker 4: So this notion that they are the sport is to
Speaker 4: me really dangerous and bizarre and disturbing. And so when
Speaker 4: we have the distance debate, we have to get tour
Speaker 4: pros opinions. Well, they have a selfish financial stake for
Speaker 4: their views. For the most part, some of them ignore them.
Speaker 4: And it's a question we just have to consider. Is
Speaker 4: that why people are involved in golf? Are they do they?
Speaker 4: Are they attracted of the game because of the players
Speaker 4: or the actual sport.
Speaker 1: And see, this is something I think that is it's
Speaker 1: a it's a un intended consequence of this whole thing
Speaker 1: that could be a positive, you know, I think that'd
Speaker 1: be the wrong thing.
Speaker 2: A positive that comes to this.
Speaker 1: We might get to a point where more of the
Speaker 1: conversations about golf than it is about the players because
Speaker 1: the players are shut down for a while, and and
Speaker 1: that could be a very healthy thing for the game
Speaker 1: of golf. That I always fall back on this, there's
Speaker 1: there's so many people that play that don't watch, you know,
Speaker 1: and yet the vacuum of golf coverage, ninety five percent
Speaker 1: of it goes towards the players because that's what the
Speaker 1: way it is in other sports. But the golf doesn't
Speaker 1: fit the model that other sports fit. You know, I
Speaker 1: played the last the last round of golf I played with.
Speaker 1: It was actually at Harding Park, you know, and uh,
Speaker 1: I played with a buddy and I played with a
Speaker 1: complete random guy. This guy, he was the perfect guy
Speaker 1: of that would like characterize the golfer that everybody's trying
Speaker 1: to get to. He goes to Bandon Dunes twice twice
Speaker 1: a year, He plays public golf, and he doesn't watch
Speaker 1: a lick of golf, doesn't read anything about golf or anything.
Speaker 1: And it became more and more clear as we played
Speaker 1: and got to know this guy, and it was just
Speaker 1: it was amazing because you know, even club companies you
Speaker 1: could tell that couldn't get him because he had you know,
Speaker 1: mismatched clubs and everything. Like the regular the only person
Speaker 1: that could that connects and communicates with that golfer regularly.
Speaker 2: Are golf.
Speaker 1: Golf courses are the are the thing that are played on.
Speaker 1: And I think that's such an important thing because I
Speaker 1: think there's whether no governing body will admit it. That's
Speaker 1: the vast majority of golfers right there.
Speaker 4: Mm hm No, they won't admit it, and they don't
Speaker 4: like to hear it. And that's why they're always looking
Speaker 4: to create new viewers, new fans. That's why top golf's
Speaker 4: appealing to them. But that is a fascinating notion. How
Speaker 4: the core golfer like that has. It doesn't have the
Speaker 4: attachment to our interest in pro golf to me like
Speaker 4: they should. It's still there, obviously, but it is stunning,
Speaker 4: and I've seen it with being on the Golf Channel.
Speaker 4: How many people will tell me they used to watch it,
Speaker 4: they don't watch it anymore. They lost the core golfer
Speaker 4: kind of got lost in a pursuit of making the
Speaker 4: audience bigger, because that's what everybody's mentality has been in
Speaker 4: whether it's it's any kind of golf media, it's we've
Speaker 4: got to grow the audience. We've got to fund bring
Speaker 4: in those new people, bring in the person who's just
Speaker 4: casually interested, and then by doing that, you dumb things
Speaker 4: down or you don't pay attention to the things that
Speaker 4: would matter to the core audience, and then the core
Speaker 4: it's just kind of goes on their own way. There's
Speaker 4: plenty of time to be spent on the core, and
Speaker 4: they just they just disconnect.
Speaker 3: To me, that's bizarre. It's just amazing how we've lost.
Speaker 4: That that core person having the attachment to the professional game.
Speaker 1: I think there's something in this, you know, reset we're
Speaker 1: going to be in here might help this a little bit.
Speaker 1: But there's this mentality in all walks of life. If
Speaker 1: you're not growing, you're dying.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, it's it's the yeah.
Speaker 1: And I think that's the thing that golfs faced for
Speaker 1: so long and and I think the thing that they
Speaker 1: haven't realized is that their best avenue for growth is
Speaker 1: through evangelism, you know, through its core, their core audience,
Speaker 1: rather than the outward pursuit of new golfers.
Speaker 4: How many people got in the game because they tagged
Speaker 4: along or you know, to the driving range or on
Speaker 4: the course, or as a kid, they sat in the
Speaker 4: cart and it was the passion of other people that.
Speaker 3: Got them in the game. It wasn't necessarily a program.
Speaker 4: Have been a teacher that got them more attracted to
Speaker 4: it and devoted. But how many of those people do
Speaker 4: it through a program and through something seemingly not necessarily
Speaker 4: authentic or something that's forced versus something that just kind
Speaker 4: of happened and you see it, you look at it
Speaker 4: and allows you to sort of understand take in some things.
Speaker 3: And that is a great way to get into the sport.
Speaker 4: And I guarantee most people you ask that's how they
Speaker 4: got into it. The people who've really stuck with it,
Speaker 4: and that's something the sport probably needs to cherish a
Speaker 4: little bit more. And golf courses need to be welcoming,
Speaker 4: and of course you know they're not of somebody to
Speaker 4: tag along to drive the car, and all those little
Speaker 4: things need to be relaxed a little bit somehow to
Speaker 4: understand that's how you grow the game.
Speaker 3: The dreaded phrase.
Speaker 1: So I always say, if golf courses allowed dogs, my wife,
Speaker 1: who's not a golfer, would come with me, probably eight
Speaker 1: times as much. She never comes with me unless the
Speaker 1: golf course allows dogs, because then she'll just come walk
Speaker 1: with our dog and then occasionally hit shots and then
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you know, you could see how
Speaker 1: it could change where all of a sudden she hits
Speaker 1: more and more and more shots and then she starts
Speaker 1: to play. But as it is right now, you know,
Speaker 1: she has no interest in going to play golf right now.
Speaker 1: But she would if if she had an interest of
Speaker 1: she loves going for walks with our dog, you know,
Speaker 1: and if it became just that at the very lowest level.
Speaker 1: I've talked about this a million times on the pod,
Speaker 1: but yeah, it's it's it's wild. I just I think
Speaker 1: in a weird way. There's all these things all when
Speaker 1: when the world kind of melts down, there's always things
Speaker 1: that can come out of it and really thrive and
Speaker 1: reinvent itself. And I think golf has an opportunity in this,
Speaker 1: in in what's with what's going on, to come out
Speaker 1: of it in a better place than it was when
Speaker 1: it entered in a weird way. It's not going to
Speaker 1: look a lot of people won't look at it the
Speaker 1: same the same way, but I think it could become
Speaker 1: an opportunity for it and to hate that word like
Speaker 1: we talked about, where it could really you know, it
Speaker 1: could become somewhat of a national pastime again like it
Speaker 1: was becoming in the in the late Golden Age.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the key is going to be when is that
Speaker 4: time appropriate to have that push or that discussion. You know,
Speaker 4: Like right now, I'm just watching Twitter and seeing different
Speaker 4: signs of golf courses closing for various reasons, state of
Speaker 4: emergency kind of things, And I completely understand that obviously,
Speaker 4: but you also there is going to be a point
Speaker 4: where somehow it needs to be conveyed that that that's
Speaker 4: just not going to be a good thing for the
Speaker 4: community to have these places become unmaintained and possibly open
Speaker 4: to being taken over in different ways or whatever it is.
Speaker 4: And and it's it's just, but when is that? When
Speaker 4: do you have that conversation to me, I'm I'm extra
Speaker 4: sensitive right now. I just feel like those kinds of
Speaker 4: things need to be done very very carefully and and
Speaker 4: so literally. And of course then anything related to the
Speaker 4: first world of pro golfers and their their plight, especially
Speaker 4: the the upper echelon is is just a way down
Speaker 4: the list. And protecting this this pastime somehow and and
Speaker 4: and and then building on it is way more important.
Speaker 4: But it's just we have to be sensitive to to
Speaker 4: when that time is and how it will look to
Speaker 4: people to see people out playing golf while this is
Speaker 4: going on. Because right now, and my guess is the
Speaker 4: reaction is that that that will there will be a
Speaker 4: negative backlash a week from now.
Speaker 3: After people have been cooped up.
Speaker 4: It might it might be seen as a as a
Speaker 4: welcome thing.
Speaker 1: I think they should just take the pins out completely.
Speaker 3: Why is that?
Speaker 2: I think people will play better golf in general.
Speaker 3: Hmm.
Speaker 2: You know, then do you take one more risk aspect
Speaker 2: out of the game, you know, take the pin out.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: People, it's one more reason that people are probably saying
Speaker 1: don't go play golf, you know.
Speaker 4: Oh, because of what could be living and growing on
Speaker 4: the flag stick. Yeah yeah, yeah yeah if that, if
Speaker 4: that's what it takes, then great, I say.
Speaker 1: Yes, there could be a run on the end of
Speaker 1: the putter plunder too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, those are could be the new toilet paper.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Wow, there's a there's a device I never thought I'd
Speaker 4: ever want to have on my the end of my putter.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So get Obviously not the most fun topics to talk about,
Speaker 1: but the reality of golf right now. So if you
Speaker 1: if you had to guess, are we are we going
Speaker 1: to see a.
Speaker 2: Masters this year? No US Open, no p g A,
Speaker 2: no Fed X Cup.
Speaker 4: No. I think that through the summertime is is really
Speaker 4: hard to picture. I could possibly see the playoff events
Speaker 4: maybe with no crowds, but it's as of today, it
Speaker 4: just seems tough to envision yeah happening.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's uh, it's wild times.
Speaker 4: So you got and remember to remember too that that
Speaker 4: it's a very expensive thing to put on a tournament,
Speaker 4: and each tournament's different, and if they're insured, it's it's
Speaker 4: better for them to be forced to cancel, then to
Speaker 4: try to put something on that that really doesn't benefit
Speaker 4: anybody but the players. The charitable element goes, the fan
Speaker 4: element goes, the experience is just what it weird and
Speaker 4: they don't collect some insurance money to take.
Speaker 3: A take a.
Speaker 4: Less of a bite out of the big loss that
Speaker 4: they already sustain. And it it's painful as it is,
Speaker 4: it's probably the wiser thing to do, both financially and
Speaker 4: in terms of perception and and just overall kind of
Speaker 4: sense of you're thinking of bigger things than a golf tournament. Yeah, again,
Speaker 4: it's a case by case basis. Obviously some are really
Speaker 4: vital to the community and big deals and others the
Speaker 4: community will will be annoyed that you're trying to do this.
Speaker 4: It just it's as a market by market I believe
Speaker 4: was how j Monahan was was viewing the virus a
Speaker 4: week ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's, uh, it will be. I think it could.
Speaker 1: It's like the flip side of everything is if you
Speaker 1: did it with no fans, the problem is it still
Speaker 1: is going to take a thousand people to put on
Speaker 1: a right.
Speaker 4: You still have people trying to travel there, stay in hotels.
Speaker 4: You're still going. You know, again, forget the players. It's
Speaker 4: the circus around and those people do they I mean,
Speaker 4: obviously by a certain point they're.
Speaker 3: Really going to be wanting to work to be paid.
Speaker 4: But we don't know what travel will be like and
Speaker 4: how safe it'll be and different things like that, so
Speaker 4: that has to be the priority over.
Speaker 3: The needs of the players. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well you got a new podcast coming out soon.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what a time to launch? What a uh yeah,
Speaker 3: you got.
Speaker 2: You got depth and variety. You can talk about anything,
Speaker 2: you know, That's the thing.
Speaker 1: I think this is also an opportunity where uh, you know,
Speaker 1: the the kind of clickbait golf era we've been living
Speaker 1: in with media, people are going to have to get
Speaker 1: depth here.
Speaker 3: It's really going to be tested. It's already being tested.
Speaker 4: You just see some of the complete craft that's been
Speaker 4: put up in the last couple of days. And and
Speaker 4: I feel for the people doing it because you know,
Speaker 4: there's a boss somewhere saying, all right, we gotta we
Speaker 4: gotta create content, we gotta get we got to get
Speaker 4: some numbers, got to keep this going. And I, uh
Speaker 4: so I feel for the people who have to take
Speaker 4: those directives and put something up and it's it's not easy,
Speaker 4: and it's not fun and and frankly it's in some
Speaker 4: cases to me, it's just a huge credibility blow to
Speaker 4: the to those sites when you go there and you
Speaker 4: see some of the stories that are that are news,
Speaker 4: and uh, when they're they're not. So Yeah, I'm I'm
Speaker 4: battling that myself. But I'm I'm just airing on the
Speaker 4: side of caution every chance I get. I'm going to
Speaker 4: try to put up some some light stuff on my
Speaker 4: website and the occasional fun thing and try to again
Speaker 4: when the time's right, do some looking back at some
Speaker 4: history stuff or things that are of interest, and the
Speaker 4: podcast will kind of be the same thing.
Speaker 3: For now.
Speaker 4: It was gonna be a little bit more news driven,
Speaker 4: and now it's gonna be a little bit more chat
Speaker 4: driven for a while because we've got some authors who
Speaker 4: have books to promote, and I want to hear from
Speaker 4: them and talk to them about those because it's a
Speaker 4: good time to read. And that's kind of where I'm
Speaker 4: starting with it. It was going to be I had
Speaker 4: a lot of different thoughts and had narrowed it down
Speaker 4: into a concept, and I just threw that that description
Speaker 4: for the promotional pod that will go out on the
Speaker 4: little network and that's going in the trash. I'm going
Speaker 4: to rewrite it again, kind of thinking of the virus.
Speaker 4: But I'm going to try to keep it, keep it
Speaker 4: not too long and light fun, but also some serious
Speaker 4: stuff that that relates to the sport, and try to
Speaker 4: talk to some smart people and and again not not to.
Speaker 3: Throw stuff out there that's that's that's too too.
Speaker 1: Do some uh abbreviated versions of your books. I mean, God,
Speaker 1: I'd listened to hours of that. I can't I can't
Speaker 1: guess some of your books they're too expensive.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a it's a bummer, yeah that that some
Speaker 4: of them are out of print and and the algorithms
Speaker 4: have made them cost way more than they should be costing. Uh.
Speaker 3: You know, I've thought about that.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 4: I've actually got a few book ideas that I'm going
Speaker 4: to be working on, and I've actually thought about one
Speaker 4: of them, even just writing some of it, getting out
Speaker 4: in front and start posting a chapter on the site
Speaker 4: and then kind of write the rest as I'm as
Speaker 4: I'm going. But I'm not I'm not sure I want
Speaker 4: to do that yet, but I'm that's something I've I've considered.
Speaker 4: It's the kind of a fun idea to me, but
Speaker 4: it's also a little scary and it could be it
Speaker 4: could be a total disaster. But that's the beauty of
Speaker 4: having your own blow. You just just delete it. If
Speaker 4: it's really bad.
Speaker 1: You can try, you can try all the stuff you want,
Speaker 1: and if it doesn't, if it doesn't work and you
Speaker 1: suspend it, nobody usually knows.
Speaker 3: This is this is true. This is the beautiful thing.
Speaker 4: I feel like golf architecture is tough, as you know,
Speaker 4: for for podcasts and reading, things could be could be tricky.
Speaker 3: But I'll take a look at that. That's an interesting idea.
Speaker 1: I think, like I'm assuming like one of the things
Speaker 1: is like when you when you did the book deals,
Speaker 1: there's no there's no clause.
Speaker 2: Audio audio rights.
Speaker 4: A couple of them, the more recent ones, but geez,
Speaker 4: the rights have reverted to me on everything but my
Speaker 4: Cypress Point book.
Speaker 3: And I'm not going to do a live reading.
Speaker 4: Of Alistair Mackenzie's Cypress Point that that would be that
Speaker 4: would be and me trying to do a Scottish accent,
Speaker 4: even though he's he's English, she was English.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen.
Speaker 4: So I think it's better to focus on a couple
Speaker 4: of the new book ideas, but I may and you know,
Speaker 4: I'd love to go back to the future of golf
Speaker 4: and highlight some things, but again, that could be a
Speaker 4: little bit of a combo platter of obnoxious, humble bragging
Speaker 4: and also.
Speaker 3: Wow, we don't need to hear about that right now
Speaker 3: kind of thing.
Speaker 4: So it's just it's going to be a constant battle
Speaker 4: to see what is right to be talking about. But
Speaker 4: I feel I feel pretty good, especially after this chat.
Speaker 4: I think we're kind of thinking the same way, and
Speaker 4: I'm guessing other people are in the golf industry that
Speaker 4: this is an opportunity for the sport and we should
Speaker 4: keep highlighting that of the best we can and hope
Speaker 4: that the elitist perception that a lot of people have
Speaker 4: doesn't lead communities and various businesses to quickly give up
Speaker 4: on the sport or quickly move to shut down facilities,
Speaker 4: but instead see this as as a chance to make
Speaker 4: those places really valuable in this time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's uh, hopefully everybody.
Speaker 1: I think I think everybody, just the big thing has
Speaker 1: to be patient, you know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, and that's going to be lacking, and we're
Speaker 4: going to see That's why we're going to see some
Speaker 4: really awful things posted on on golf websites, where again
Speaker 4: it's just somebody trying to keep a boss from firing
Speaker 4: them by churning out clickbait and and all that stuff.
Speaker 4: So that that is going to be the test where
Speaker 4: you see people exposed for not being patient, not just
Speaker 4: saying hey, let's step back.
Speaker 3: A little bit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I mean in just society and generally
Speaker 1: in general, we've become less and less patient because of technology,
Speaker 1: you know, So it's gonna be the test for all
Speaker 1: of America, all the world.
Speaker 2: Really, Where do you.
Speaker 3: Think the distance debate is? Now?
Speaker 1: I was almostly going to ask you that I think
Speaker 1: I feel like it's gonna be shut down.
Speaker 3: Interesting, Yeah for a while. Oh yeah, yeah, I mean
Speaker 3: in terms of okay, yeah, let me rephrase that. Where
Speaker 3: is what? What? Should we continue to have the distance debate?
Speaker 2: I think it would make actually more sense than ever.
Speaker 3: I do too. Yeah. I think time maybe not this week,
Speaker 3: maybe not next week, but at some point soon.
Speaker 1: Right, it's this, We're we've got this, you know, a
Speaker 1: wonderful chance to somewhat reset some of the values of
Speaker 1: the game. And I think one of the things that
Speaker 1: the constant pursuit of of the latest and greatest equipment
Speaker 1: and the cost that comes with it is very unhealthy
Speaker 1: for the.
Speaker 2: Game of golf.
Speaker 1: Very Yeah, the idea that you know, the the technology
Speaker 1: in the in the ball and the club didn't change
Speaker 1: for some forty years, Like how refreshing would it be?
Speaker 3: That?
Speaker 1: Like you changed your irons when your grooves wore out,
Speaker 1: and you changed your your persimon driver when it cracked.
Speaker 1: You know, like that that to me is something you know,
Speaker 1: we should be looking at. I'm not saying go back
Speaker 1: to Persimmon, but you know, like my driver is no
Speaker 1: longer the best.
Speaker 2: It is a bad thing.
Speaker 1: Like I think that that the cost of golf equipment
Speaker 1: is a huge barrier. You know, people feel like that.
Speaker 1: You know, when I talk to friends, they are like,
Speaker 1: how much does a decent set of clubs cost? I'm like,
Speaker 1: you know, honestly, like probably like a couple thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: They're like oof, you know, oh yeah.
Speaker 4: It's it's woefully intimidating. And if if they go us,
Speaker 4: do they get stuff that's.
Speaker 2: It doesn't fit them? It doesn't It.
Speaker 4: Doesn't feel right either, you feel because because one of
Speaker 4: the things that is fun about a sport is if
Speaker 4: you take it up, is kind of getting the right
Speaker 4: gear and feeling good about that. And and that's so
Speaker 4: if you feel like you're just using garbage and basically
Speaker 4: glorified rental sets that that look like somebody dragged them
Speaker 4: from behind their.
Speaker 3: Car, you feel less.
Speaker 4: It's just one more thing that makes you feel uncomfortable
Speaker 4: in the sport, that makes people already so uncomfortable.
Speaker 3: And we just have to try.
Speaker 4: To get rid of some of those so not get rid,
Speaker 4: but but but downplay some of those things. And that's
Speaker 4: why to me, bifurcation is such a it's such a
Speaker 4: great thing and.
Speaker 3: And and it makes me just just have so.
Speaker 4: Little respect for the manufacturers who who who bitch and
Speaker 4: moan about all this stuff.
Speaker 3: And then when you say, well.
Speaker 4: What about bifurcation, what about allowing you to make real
Speaker 4: beginners stuff that doesn't conform but is it is just
Speaker 4: great for a beginner, really easy to hit and and
Speaker 4: cheaper to make, and and uh, it's a way to
Speaker 4: get people in in a great way or or or
Speaker 4: a you know, kids drive chip and putt set that
Speaker 4: you can sell and things like.
Speaker 3: They just have no imagination about those things. They're so
Speaker 3: locked in to the just more distance, more tech, more price,
Speaker 3: more more bottom line.
Speaker 4: That they really shouldn't. That's why it's just such a
Speaker 4: struggle to see how they should be part of the
Speaker 4: conversation when they don't see open they don't seem open
Speaker 4: minded to any kind of possible solution or different way
Speaker 4: of approaching this.
Speaker 3: That's good for them and good for the sport.
Speaker 1: The nonprofit golf needs most to be the biggest nonprofit
Speaker 1: is is a nonprofit that just provides beginner sets of golf.
Speaker 2: Clubs two people. You know, it's it doesn't need to
Speaker 2: be the professional organization.
Speaker 3: For yeah, or just not.
Speaker 4: I mean it's publicly traded companies being in the in
Speaker 4: the manufacturing businesses.
Speaker 3: Just since that's happened.
Speaker 4: And that's why we've been on this cycle which I
Speaker 4: wrote about in the Future of Golf and that's fifteen
Speaker 4: years ago now, and that that change has just been
Speaker 4: a killer.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, this could be like we've talked to,
Speaker 1: this is almost a it could be a reset for
Speaker 1: for not It's not just golf, it's across the across
Speaker 1: the world. I think that you're going to see a
Speaker 1: lot of just change, and some of it will be
Speaker 1: good change, you know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, I planned to at the right time go
Speaker 4: back more into the Distance Report on my my blog
Speaker 4: because it did get as we know, they focused a
Speaker 4: lot on these values and the things that matter to people,
Speaker 4: and that that very robust survey data. When you see
Speaker 4: how many people answered that, to me, it is just
Speaker 4: probably the least reported element of the Distance Report, and
Speaker 4: I'd love to hear more from somebody at the USGA
Speaker 4: to kind of because I know some questions got more
Speaker 4: answers than others. But when you see the volume and
Speaker 4: that that those were voluntary, to me, really makes those
Speaker 4: results very powerful. And we know some of those things
Speaker 4: like shot tracker and and the tracer technology and venues
Speaker 4: and and certain things were valued so much more than distance.
Speaker 4: I mean, there's some really important findings in those in
Speaker 4: those numbers that just punched such huge holes in those
Speaker 4: trying to either resist the change or just even resist
Speaker 4: the conversation.
Speaker 1: It's it's funny, I h you say that I posted
Speaker 1: a poll right after that that everybody took as I
Speaker 1: was like being negative, but I was meant to use
Speaker 1: it and write something, but I my fingers don't know how.
Speaker 2: To type anymore for some reason right now.
Speaker 1: And uh, it was I posted a poll, you know,
Speaker 1: what's golf's biggest problem? And I put time, cost, difficulty
Speaker 1: or other. And you know, guess how how much percentage
Speaker 1: time and cost of the one hundred percent.
Speaker 2: Of votes took up. I had to be most like
Speaker 2: ninety three percent.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and to be that's that's the the whole crux
Speaker 1: of the thing is that if you if you have
Speaker 1: limits in the technology, all of a sudden, like at
Speaker 1: real like if you if you go back a little,
Speaker 1: all of sudden, the cost of the game goes down
Speaker 1: in the time You're not going to have to walk
Speaker 1: backwards the teas all day, right, you know.
Speaker 2: That's that's the brilliance of it.
Speaker 1: And people hit it shorter, they actually will take less
Speaker 1: time to play because they'll be looking for the ball less.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I don't.
Speaker 4: Know, and they address that and and it's it's uh
Speaker 4: just it's I mean, it's we've been kicking this around
Speaker 4: so long. But again it gets back to this quite
Speaker 4: earlier of are the players the most important thing? The
Speaker 4: professional players the most important thing in the game or
Speaker 4: or not, and they're not in my view, But unfortunately
Speaker 4: we have shifted to where they are and we think
Speaker 4: that that these they play the game well for for
Speaker 4: a while and they're they're they're superhuman, they're special, and
Speaker 4: they're and then their every thought is of course, uh
Speaker 4: is profound and spot on and brilliant and just it's
Speaker 4: just exhausting. And I think we need to use this
Speaker 4: time to consider that as much as we love these
Speaker 4: great players and love watching them, that they are just
Speaker 4: one part of the sport.
Speaker 3: It's it's an amazing sport, very tiny, yes.
Speaker 2: Is there.
Speaker 1: They're they're really they're almost a minority stakeholder in the game.
Speaker 1: It's it's so much different than every other professional sport.
Speaker 4: I would yeah, all, I would say that same kind
Speaker 4: of overall worship of the player has gotten worse than
Speaker 4: other sports too. But as you noted that the give
Speaker 4: and take with owners and those other sports keeps.
Speaker 1: But think about those other sports, is they have a
Speaker 1: reverse relationship where like exponentially more people watch the sport
Speaker 1: than play well, yeah, and in golf, less people watch
Speaker 1: the sport than play it, right, right, It's unlike anything else.
Speaker 4: And the numbers have been really dismal on that front
Speaker 4: this year, I mean just just incredibly awful, which makes
Speaker 4: the worship of the players and their stance on anything
Speaker 4: even more ridiculous. As you see the numbers go down
Speaker 4: that that that it it may be having the effect
Speaker 4: that it had in tennis, where.
Speaker 3: Where you when you there's a certain.
Speaker 4: When they get to a certain point where they you
Speaker 4: sense their spoiled or they're they're out of touch, people
Speaker 4: become even less attracted to them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's I think.
Speaker 1: I think the the other aspect to you talked to,
Speaker 1: you know, the the ownership player thing is that when
Speaker 1: owners understand that any publicity is good publicity, and and
Speaker 1: the constant sweeping under the rug of of of issues
Speaker 1: and stuff limits what that the fan knows about players,
Speaker 1: and when you don't know anything about them, it's harder
Speaker 1: to be interested in them.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it is, it is, Yeah, I would agree. And
Speaker 4: it's also just harder to uh become drawn to them
Speaker 4: when they play the game kind of the way they
Speaker 4: play it, where there's not a lot of shots shaping
Speaker 4: and where it's a it's a game we can't relate
Speaker 4: to as much as as we used to and that's
Speaker 4: and and then a sport where as you say, it's
Speaker 4: the sport where more people play it than watch it.
Speaker 4: And that relatability thing has always been something that I
Speaker 4: have no idea how you measure it other than a survey,
Speaker 4: but we may be seeing that kind of hit home
Speaker 4: here now where again with these these and obviously ratings
Speaker 4: drops are also related to Tiger not playing and cord
Speaker 4: cutting and different things and long telecasts, but the numbers
Speaker 4: this year are just they're just stunning. Every week where
Speaker 4: what should be a good, good final round watched by
Speaker 4: a good sized audience and it's down twenty to thirty percent,
Speaker 4: And with with good leaderboards and compelling finishes, you just
Speaker 4: there's no there's no other way to spend the numbers.
Speaker 4: And you have to wonder, if I look with there
Speaker 4: are the options. There were the options until recently and
Speaker 4: people went to the other places.
Speaker 3: And you know that that I think, did you do?
Speaker 4: We talk about the NASCAR thing where they're they're really
Speaker 4: focused on the way the races are are are conducted
Speaker 4: again and it's not a safety thing. People got caught up, Oh,
Speaker 4: this is for safety, and it's made very clear. No,
Speaker 4: it's actually not. It's you know, they used to do safety,
Speaker 4: but this is more about seeing lead changes and strategy.
Speaker 1: The thrilling, Yeah, the thrill of the past.
Speaker 4: They want to watch them just go around in circles
Speaker 4: and see who goes the fastest and stay and whose
Speaker 4: pit crew holds a car together better. They want to
Speaker 4: see the lead changes and and drama and somebody taking
Speaker 4: a chance going for a green two.
Speaker 3: Oh there we go. Sorry, got into golf again.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well that's the thing is that when I thought about that,
Speaker 1: thrill is like, there's no thrill of going for a
Speaker 1: green in two anymore. It's just like, Okay, he hit
Speaker 1: a good drive, he's got an iron in yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: there's no oh he needs to hit this cut three
Speaker 1: wood over water. You know, I guess that did happen
Speaker 1: and in Honda with Fleetwood, but you know that's so rare.
Speaker 4: Even the short part four now has become it's data driven,
Speaker 4: so the decision to drive a short part four is
Speaker 4: made before the round instead of at the moment that.
Speaker 3: I mean.
Speaker 4: There's still some of course, but increasingly we're seeing somebody
Speaker 4: just go by what the numbers tell them and not
Speaker 4: that have faced that moment where they have to make
Speaker 4: the decision. And that's the most compelling thing I think
Speaker 4: in all of golf, is that moment when the player
Speaker 4: stands there and argues. And like you said, the Fleetwood
Speaker 4: moment at Honda was was maybe one of the best
Speaker 4: moments this year, really.
Speaker 2: And outside yelling.
Speaker 4: And thankfully he didn't hear it. Thankfully. I still don't
Speaker 4: know how. And I guess the person was right next
Speaker 4: to the mic and it is a big wide hole.
Speaker 4: I guess. I'm just glad he didn't hear it. That's
Speaker 4: all I know is that would have been so awful. Yeah,
Speaker 4: but yeah, So these are things and values that we
Speaker 4: have a chance to assess now as we're discussing this
Speaker 4: one other I now I predicted no masters, but because
Speaker 4: there are golf writers who are sitting around and looking
Speaker 4: for anything to cover. Some people have been sharing that
Speaker 4: they've had random hotel reservations in Augusta, Georgia the week
Speaker 4: of October eighth through the eleventh randomly canceled for reasons
Speaker 4: they were not expecting.
Speaker 3: So read into that what you'd like.
Speaker 4: I think that is when they if they were going
Speaker 4: to do it, they would have to do it, because
Speaker 4: I heard you and Brennan on the Shotgun talking late
Speaker 4: October early November, which I had heard too as the
Speaker 4: time they had asked volunteers. But remember the Masters field
Speaker 4: this year is huge, and I don't think they could
Speaker 4: finish those days. So, you know, again, assuming they you know,
Speaker 4: they like to sleep in there at Augusta, I.
Speaker 3: Don't like to. They don't like to start things too early.
Speaker 4: They're not mourning people, and they don't ever want somebody
Speaker 4: teen off before eight a m.
Speaker 3: If they don't have to.
Speaker 1: Marina Alex, the LPGA player, had had her room canceled.
Speaker 4: Uh yeah, Now the better question is why why was
Speaker 4: she going to be in Augusta in October. I don't know,
Speaker 4: but it's uh so anyway, that's something to ponder. I
Speaker 4: I'm going to try and see what the rates are and.
Speaker 2: Lock in something she kids, something for fun.
Speaker 4: Of course, of course, then you and I both have
Speaker 4: to ask the good Lords and Augusta to consider us
Speaker 4: for credential, which you know, we haven't been successful at
Speaker 4: as as digital bloggers.
Speaker 3: But we might. You know, maybe maybe this will convince
Speaker 3: them to change their mind.
Speaker 2: Who knows, who knows?
Speaker 1: You know, they haven't been friendly to the to the Friday.
Speaker 4: They're they're they're still kind of working on their view
Speaker 4: of of digital media in.
Speaker 3: Some parts of the of the property. Other parts there
Speaker 3: are they're all in on on digital. It's a it's
Speaker 3: a different, different place there for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so hey, thanks for coming on.