Speaker 1: I miss the green, for example, I'm already upset.
Speaker 2: When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 3: And when I find my ball in a brid egg,
Speaker 3: Friday Egg, the dreaded Friday Egg, Friday Frida Bride Egg.
Speaker 1: Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the.
Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 4: Welcome back to another episode of the Friday Egg Podcast.
Speaker 4: Today we have a guest from the PGA Tour, Sean Martin,
Speaker 4: who is a special events editor. You will see a
Speaker 4: lot of his writing on PGA tour dot com. Comes
Speaker 4: up with a lot of really interesting stories and before
Speaker 4: that worked at Golf Week, so a longtime golf scribe.
Speaker 2: Sean, thanks for coming on.
Speaker 3: Thanks for having me. I hope I can represent the
Speaker 3: Shield well and hopefully make us look good on the pod.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean compared to me, it's not very hard, so
Speaker 4: you don't have much competition. I'd love to hear a
Speaker 4: little bit about how you got into the golf business
Speaker 4: and your background.
Speaker 1: Sure, I don't want to go.
Speaker 3: Too far back, but my dad was in the publishing industry,
Speaker 3: which meant we had three books, so we read a time.
Speaker 3: My parents read a time, and actually I lived in Conneticuid,
Speaker 3: and then when we were when I was eleven and
Speaker 3: sixth grade, we moved to California in the middle of
Speaker 3: school year and I got a job Etcusney, not a
Speaker 3: goofy but just in the offices. But the kids that
Speaker 3: happened to meet were into golf. And I'm a huge
Speaker 3: advocate of like affordable golf, good junior program because that's
Speaker 3: what kind of happened with me. They did this junior program.
Speaker 3: I think it was like one hundred bucks for the summer.
Speaker 3: You got three I think for three months of group lessons. Actually,
Speaker 3: Chris Zambrie, who I think you've had on the pod
Speaker 3: at the USC coach would give some of those lessons
Speaker 3: in between weeks on the buy dot Com tour to
Speaker 3: make the ends meet and make a little extra cash.
Speaker 3: You don't make a lot of money out there, so
Speaker 3: we do group lessons. I think it was six bucks
Speaker 3: to play. It was a five thousand yard golf course,
Speaker 3: so we would just hang out there all summer and
Speaker 3: just play forever, and you know, school on the chipping green,
Speaker 3: the putting green, and I just got hooked. I had
Speaker 3: played baseball until then and eventually kind of quit it
Speaker 3: for golf, and so I think my love of rereading
Speaker 3: my love of golf. I was like, you know, I
Speaker 3: want to write when I grow up, and golf's to
Speaker 3: sport I know best. And I think even then I
Speaker 3: kind of recognized, like, you know, everyone wants to be
Speaker 3: a football writer, basketball writer, baseball writer. I was like,
Speaker 3: not many people ripe about golf, so it's find my
Speaker 3: easiest way to try to, you know, make something of it.
Speaker 3: And so yeah, kind of the love of reading, love
Speaker 3: of often tried to combine those for the last decade
Speaker 3: or so.
Speaker 2: That's cool. So did you get your start out of
Speaker 2: college at Golf Week?
Speaker 1: Sort of?
Speaker 3: I worked for like six months Apiece at two one
Speaker 3: was a twice weekly newspaper. I was the one person
Speaker 3: sports department. Started that like my last semester of college
Speaker 3: and overlapped a little bit, and then got a job
Speaker 3: at the Daily News down in Los Angeles, which is
Speaker 3: like the It's kind of second to the La Times.
Speaker 3: I worked there for like six to eight months, and
Speaker 3: the newspaper industry is just.
Speaker 1: Hard, you know.
Speaker 3: I was living at home, I had no benefits, and
Speaker 3: luckily the Golf Week opportunity came a long later on
Speaker 3: then otherwise I might have gone back to school or something,
Speaker 3: because it's just tough sledding trying to make money, you know,
Speaker 3: in journalism especially, And yeah, I've been writing letters to
Speaker 3: Golf Week since college.
Speaker 1: Is like, hey, I'd really love to intern there.
Speaker 3: You know, for years, and when they finally hired. When
Speaker 3: they finally hired me, they told me that they'd been
Speaker 3: like for years in the office like this kid won't
Speaker 3: shut up and stop sending up emails. But luckily it
Speaker 3: paid off. But they would definitely give me a hard
Speaker 3: time about that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, persistence pays off. You were there when they had
Speaker 4: the the awesome I'll never forget.
Speaker 2: I used to always be.
Speaker 4: Excited for the Golf Week when they had that really
Speaker 4: big publication, you know, when it was like I'm trying
Speaker 4: to think like maybe eighteen inches wide, and you know,
Speaker 4: they'd have pretty much every tournament score. It's it's interesting
Speaker 4: to see how the print industry, especially with Golf Weeks,
Speaker 4: changed completely. I mean that that company has taken a
Speaker 4: complete one eighty in terms of you know, their editorial,
Speaker 4: you know, views and you know what they cover.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's hard to see.
Speaker 3: I mean a lot of my friends were the ones
Speaker 3: who were laid off this fall when they got bought out,
Speaker 3: and I'm glad to see they still do, you know,
Speaker 3: some of the college covers and stuff. But that was
Speaker 3: I mean when golf World went down first, uh we
Speaker 3: kind of you know, it wasn't celebrating of like all
Speaker 3: our competitors dead. It's like, you know, it's not it's
Speaker 3: not a good sign. And so uh yeah, Golf Week
Speaker 3: has changed a lot. I mean it used to be
Speaker 3: a new literally a newspaper size, like you said. And
Speaker 3: my first four years on Monday mornings, I was putting
Speaker 3: those scores together, which was kind of awesome because you
Speaker 3: just knew all these names, Like I remember Patrick Rodgers
Speaker 3: used to kill it on the Future Collegian's World Tour
Speaker 3: and like I remember that name. Then he went to Stanford,
Speaker 3: now he's on tour obviously, or like when Page Sporadic
Speaker 3: started making it big, and I don't want to get
Speaker 3: into that whole thing. That's all that tron handle that.
Speaker 3: But when she made Thak, I was like, I remember
Speaker 3: that name from I think also like the FCWT or
Speaker 3: something like. It's just you see these weird names pop up,
Speaker 3: Like I meet people in the industry, and like I
Speaker 3: can recall like, oh, yeah, you played in you know,
Speaker 3: the Arizona Junior Golf Association or something, because we spent
Speaker 3: literally four years just I mean we used to do
Speaker 3: everything from you know, junior junior tours in the state
Speaker 3: level to obviously every state amateur tournament, and so you
Speaker 3: would see all kinds of names games.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so curious, uh, given your background and just
Speaker 2: knowing all these names, who who's the guy that you're
Speaker 2: most surprised hasn't made it yet? Or is it didn't
Speaker 2: make it?
Speaker 3: It's funny because you do, you know, it was great
Speaker 3: started off covering junior golf, so the name was back
Speaker 3: in the news a little bit after Rory's milling up hood.
Speaker 3: But like I started in six and that year, like
Speaker 3: Philip Francis killed junior golf, he won EID A coworker.
Speaker 1: Then Eric Sodas from covered junior golf for me. He
Speaker 1: works the.
Speaker 3: Titleist now, but he dubbed it like the Junior Grand Slam.
Speaker 3: He won the US Junior the role X Tournament of Champions,
Speaker 3: which is the A JGAS biggest event. I think he
Speaker 3: won one of his biggest boys events. Like he basically
Speaker 3: won the four biggest junior events that year. He won
Speaker 3: a bunch of junior world titles. He's been on like
Speaker 3: Golf Channel Jim Flake when he was like six, Like
Speaker 3: everything was pointed towards like Philip Franks.
Speaker 1: Is making it, and so it was funny when Rory
Speaker 1: mentioned him on there. I mean, he's out of golf
Speaker 1: completely now.
Speaker 3: But I think even making it is kind of a
Speaker 3: funny because what is making it. Like I've talked to
Speaker 3: Charles Howell before about and Charles is great. He's like,
Speaker 3: I'm the first person to admit to like I think
Speaker 3: I should have won more. I thought I would have won.
Speaker 1: More than I had now.
Speaker 3: But at the same time, like Charles' is thirty seven,
Speaker 3: he's gonna play a five hundreds tour events this year.
Speaker 3: He's never lost his car. But I know you mean,
Speaker 3: but I think like Patrick Cantlay, obviously a lot has
Speaker 3: happened in the last couple of years. Those stories came
Speaker 3: out when.
Speaker 1: He came back to Pebble.
Speaker 3: But Patrick Cantlay in twenty eleven, I think people forgotten,
Speaker 3: like he was on that Walking Up team with Jordan.
Speaker 1: Speak and all those guys.
Speaker 3: But Patrick Cantlay was the man on that team, and
Speaker 3: it was just kind of cool because he just.
Speaker 1: He had an old school teacher. He just I don't know.
Speaker 3: Patrick Cantlay was a different kind of prospect. Almost seemed
Speaker 3: like like we always talked about, the ball just seems
Speaker 3: really heavy on the face of his club, like with
Speaker 3: every shot from his putt to it's a full swing.
Speaker 3: I don't know if that's a good description, but it
Speaker 3: just it almost felt like the ball seat on the
Speaker 3: face a little bit longer, and everything was just so solid,
Speaker 3: and he seemed like he was going to do big
Speaker 3: things and really smart kid, kind of a cool you know,
Speaker 3: it's such a bombing Gouage era and he does hate
Speaker 3: it far, but he was such like a cerebral player
Speaker 3: in a sense and a thinker that it was kind
Speaker 3: of cool to watch him play.
Speaker 1: Peter Uline has had some injuries.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 3: He did the Noling up pod this week earlier and
Speaker 3: he's playing a little bit better again. But I think,
Speaker 3: you know, Peter was number one amateur.
Speaker 1: In the world, won the UFAM, was a great player.
Speaker 1: But I look too.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think Jamie Lovemark was so good in college. Uh,
Speaker 3: and he's on tour obviously.
Speaker 4: But has one yet another back injury though, I mean,
Speaker 4: like love Mark, another got derailed both Can'tley and love Mark.
Speaker 4: I mean, those amateur careers were unbelievable. I think people,
Speaker 4: you know, not not the common you know, the everyday
Speaker 4: golf and even doesn't pay attention much to college an
Speaker 4: amateur golf. Love Mark and Cantley were out of this world.
Speaker 4: Good you line was another you know, just great amateur player.
Speaker 4: But you know, it's I think it shows that that
Speaker 4: next level it becomes more than just talent, because at
Speaker 4: the amateur level, I think you see where the talent,
Speaker 4: you know, but is you know, the primary thing. But
Speaker 4: then once you get to that pro level, it becomes
Speaker 4: about how you can handle professional life, how you handle travel,
Speaker 4: you know, what's up in your head, and then you know,
Speaker 4: finally it's like you know, when you're really really great
Speaker 4: at golf, it's it's hard to improve. You know, it's
Speaker 4: a lot easier to go from eighty five to seventy
Speaker 4: five than it is to go from seventy five to
Speaker 4: seventy two.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think those thing too.
Speaker 3: I think some people will just extrapolate, like think, oh
Speaker 3: this kid is is good at twenty didn't even better
Speaker 3: at twenty five, And I think there's people who legitimately
Speaker 3: just play played the best scenes of their career at
Speaker 3: twenty and we're always cursed by the expectation. But I
Speaker 3: think too the biggest thing is mental. Like I've been
Speaker 3: doing this for a while now, so like you know, Sick,
Speaker 3: you know, Philip France is out there, because.
Speaker 1: Like Ricky you line, those are the big names.
Speaker 3: And so I've watched some players for the last ten
Speaker 3: years or so kind of make that just that move
Speaker 3: from junior to college to amateur to professional golf, and
Speaker 3: I just think, hey, there's a lot of luck you're
Speaker 3: not getting injured. I think injuries are huge, and especially
Speaker 3: risk injuries can be.
Speaker 1: Very tough to come back from.
Speaker 3: Back injuries are obviously very hard to come back from,
Speaker 3: so saying healthy is a big one. I think the
Speaker 3: mental thing of just you know, I mean Georgian speed
Speaker 3: obviously the amazing talent, and so much of that is mental,
Speaker 3: and it's just it's handling the pressure, handling expectations, but
Speaker 3: also just you only get so many opportunities when you
Speaker 3: turn pro and you just have to make the most
Speaker 3: of them and play well at the right time, and
Speaker 3: a lot of that's mental. And you know, if you
Speaker 3: get your seven sponsor invites, you don't play well in
Speaker 3: any of them, then you're going to huge school, You're
Speaker 3: going to the web, and you know you can be
Speaker 3: out there for a couple of year possibly and all
Speaker 3: of a sudden, that just makes things hard. So I
Speaker 3: think just so much of it is mental and just
Speaker 3: handling that because there's so many good players physically obviously.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's a great point.
Speaker 4: I mean, you've got a guy like especially now the
Speaker 4: talent pool is is greater than ever, and you've got
Speaker 4: guys like you know, Jordan Niebrugie, who you know, all American,
Speaker 4: won the US PUBLNX top ten at the top ten.
Speaker 2: In a major, and he didn't get through first stage
Speaker 2: of Q School.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's it's crazy that that guy, you know,
Speaker 4: doesn't have status anywhere after you know, he finished in
Speaker 4: the top ten and the Open Championship. And you know,
Speaker 4: you've got other guys like Charlie Danielson who didn't get
Speaker 4: his card, Robbie Shelton, who's who's not playing on the
Speaker 4: web dot com. And you've got all these all these
Speaker 4: guys and you know, Frankly, the tour is you know,
Speaker 4: one of the hardest to crack because you know, there's
Speaker 4: only fifty spots every year that are up for grabs,
Speaker 4: and half of them go back to PGA tour players.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, And there's just so many. I mean,
Speaker 3: you've always got your elite players, but there's just so
Speaker 3: many guys that there's just too many guys that are
Speaker 3: good enough to be on the tour than there are spots.
Speaker 3: You have, I mean, numbers one hundred to one thousand
Speaker 3: in the world or maybe five hundred, I don't know,
Speaker 3: are fairly comparable and especially on good weeks, can contend
Speaker 3: in events, and so you just I mean, it's not
Speaker 3: that they're interchangeable faces, but you just have so many
Speaker 3: players who are.
Speaker 1: Capable and just so few spots that some guys obviously
Speaker 1: are going to miss out.
Speaker 3: And I think too, it's hard when you're a young
Speaker 3: guy and you miss a Q school, especially if you
Speaker 3: do it a second year, third year, that pressure just
Speaker 3: starts to mount so high because all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: you're you know, you're twenty five. You look at Wes Bryant,
Speaker 3: he missed Q schools first four times, you know, good
Speaker 3: player was twenty six no status, had never played a
Speaker 3: PGA Tour or a web event in his first four
Speaker 3: years as a pro.
Speaker 1: Obviously had the ability. Hasn't taken them long to show that, but.
Speaker 3: It's just it's I think h school especially, it's just
Speaker 3: so hard when you start missing at that just because
Speaker 3: it can weigh on you, and it can it can
Speaker 3: be such so hard to deal with.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think.
Speaker 4: I mean, Wes Bryan is an interesting story. I mean,
Speaker 4: I've I've heard that he started using this putting tool,
Speaker 4: but he went from you know, being a really good.
Speaker 2: Putter to one of the best putters in the world.
Speaker 2: And it just shows you.
Speaker 4: I think, you know, you have to have something that
Speaker 4: you're really, really really good at to be out there.
Speaker 4: I think you know that there's a lot of guys
Speaker 4: that are are really good at everything, but you have
Speaker 4: to have kind of almost a defining skill or just
Speaker 4: be extremely good at everything. I think, like Kevin Kissner
Speaker 4: is a guy that pops into my head that he's
Speaker 4: a guy that's just like all around really good. I
Speaker 4: don't know what I would say, he's you know, great
Speaker 4: at but he's above average and everything versus you know,
Speaker 4: guys like you know where you've got your bombers that
Speaker 4: you know are hit it long and they overpower golf courses.
Speaker 2: And then you've got guys like Wes Bryant who putt
Speaker 2: putt great.
Speaker 4: It's it's it's really an interesting thing when you look
Speaker 4: at guys making it young versus the guy that makes
Speaker 4: it at thirty.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think it's versatility because just you're playing
Speaker 3: on different grasses and you've got to be able to
Speaker 3: hang in there on days that are windy. You've you know,
Speaker 3: you're playing different courses, different types of courses. I think
Speaker 3: the big thing too, and I think where some players
Speaker 3: maybe had better success in amateur golf than pro golf,
Speaker 3: I think it's that versatility. You know, the big amateur
Speaker 3: eventure all the summer for the most part, the weather's
Speaker 3: pretty good, you know.
Speaker 1: If you're in college. I mean some college teams.
Speaker 3: Travel nationally, but as budgets have kind of gotten smaller,
Speaker 3: they say more locally, and so if you're a California
Speaker 3: a cave, you'll compete mostly in California. But I think
Speaker 3: the biggest thing too, is just versus utility, being able
Speaker 3: to work your ball, which can kind of be kind
Speaker 3: of a lost art nowadays very much wants to kill
Speaker 3: it in it. I think that's really the big thing too,
Speaker 3: because you're traveling, you're playing at different times. You got
Speaker 3: to get up early somedays and played super early and
Speaker 3: have that four am wake up call for a six
Speaker 3: thirty t time in the summer. You've got to be
Speaker 3: able to play on Bermuda because you know, and events
Speaker 3: or so in the Southeast, and you've got to be
Speaker 3: able to just deal with different conditions, whether it's rain
Speaker 3: or wind, because you can't just especially if you're a
Speaker 3: rookie with limited stars, you can't just you know, I
Speaker 3: fucking the win is wind. You'd say this rounds a
Speaker 3: loss for me. You've got to be able to grind
Speaker 3: it out. So I definitely think also, I think just
Speaker 3: versatility is huge for playing professional golf versus playing amateur
Speaker 3: in college golf.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's especially as a rookie you get they get
Speaker 4: so few chances. You know, you look at what's happened
Speaker 4: with the Fall series, as you know a lot of
Speaker 4: veterans have seeing how how many points are.
Speaker 2: Available, and you see not a lot of stars are there.
Speaker 4: So it's a it's a great chance for them to
Speaker 4: get an early jump on the on the FedEx Cup points.
Speaker 4: And you know, some of these kids, like you know,
Speaker 4: I know, like guy like Max Homa, who you know
Speaker 4: got his card, but you know, low on priority, like
Speaker 4: you know, you might not get you might be making
Speaker 4: your like third start of the year PGA Tour career
Speaker 4: at Pebble Beach. You know, it's just there aren't a
Speaker 4: lot of starts out there for these rookies, so they
Speaker 4: got to play well when they get the chance.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: One of the biggest things that I remember Dustin Johnson's
Speaker 3: college coach ever said to me was one of the
Speaker 3: biggest things he did in his career was he finished
Speaker 3: I think like tenth at Sony and seventh somewhere else
Speaker 3: pretty quick after that. And so it was right at
Speaker 3: the top of the reshuffle. And that was back when
Speaker 3: Sony was the first fool field the end of the year.
Speaker 3: But I mean just set himself up right away and
Speaker 3: now he played the full year and that just made
Speaker 3: life so much.
Speaker 1: Easier for that rookie year.
Speaker 3: So again, playing well at the right time, I do think,
Speaker 3: you know, I think Doug Ferguson, the AP writer has
Speaker 3: been around for a really long time, is really smart,
Speaker 3: and I think he did say no one who is
Speaker 3: good enough has never actually made it.
Speaker 1: You know, there's it is hard to do.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of challenges, but I think the cream
Speaker 3: does rise eventually and for whatever reason, and sometimes it's
Speaker 3: not even visibly evident because two guys look the same,
Speaker 3: you know, with everything the same skill wise, but some
Speaker 3: guys are better and I think eventually they just they do,
Speaker 3: the cream rises and they kind of separate themselves from
Speaker 3: the others.
Speaker 4: So, you know, with with cover and golf, what you know,
Speaker 4: kind of under the radar or young guy maybe a
Speaker 4: rookie or maybe he's not even at the tour level yet,
Speaker 4: are you kind of most excited to see make it
Speaker 4: and and think could be a big time star.
Speaker 3: I'm excited to see what Aaron Wise does. The kid
Speaker 3: won NCBLA is last year at Oregon. Just kind of
Speaker 3: a kid who grew up as from all accounts, a
Speaker 3: public horse kid, you know, just kind of made it
Speaker 3: his own, didn't play a ton of a j g A.
Speaker 3: But you know, Casey Martin saw him and was big
Speaker 3: on him, and I'm excited to see what he does.
Speaker 3: He's gotten off to a pretty good start and played
Speaker 3: pretty well in his PGA Tour events.
Speaker 1: He's gonna have to go the web. We're out this year.
Speaker 3: I think played pretty well to start the year out there.
Speaker 3: But I think by all accounts he's a pretty promising player.
Speaker 3: Did really well in PJ tur Canada last years. I
Speaker 3: think the Wise is the one. I'm excited to see
Speaker 3: what Curtis luck does it. Augusta, the kid that won
Speaker 3: the US Amateur and the Age of Pacific, I played
Speaker 3: pretty well ins in pro events that he's gotten the
Speaker 3: starts from after winning the Amateur, and I think he's
Speaker 3: too one. He's gonna turn pro after the Masters, so
Speaker 3: I think he could have the chance to just be
Speaker 3: a fun one to watch.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think Wise is star in the making. You
Speaker 4: know that golf swing is beautiful. And then you look
Speaker 4: at what he did last summer and kind of in
Speaker 4: the spring from NCAA's through that, and I don't think
Speaker 4: he finished outside of the top ten in any or
Speaker 4: top fifteen and any PGA Tour Canada event, which is crazy.
Speaker 4: And uh, you know, I think he's uh. I think
Speaker 4: he's only twenty too, which is another thing.
Speaker 2: You know, he's really young.
Speaker 3: So yeah, ea, tern Perhapter his sophomore year and so,
Speaker 3: and by all accounts, I think he was doing like
Speaker 3: a pre law degree, so he's pursuing something pretty uh,
Speaker 3: academically heavy. He just kind of was like, Hey, I know,
Speaker 3: I want to do golf and this is going to
Speaker 3: take a lot of my time academically, and so I
Speaker 3: know I want to do golf. I'm commit to golf.
Speaker 1: So yeah, he should go in the watch.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it'll be interesting. I think bo Hostler as a
Speaker 4: as a chance to be really good too. He's got
Speaker 4: to he's got to get some status. But that he
Speaker 4: kind of got derailed by that shoulder injury, you know,
Speaker 4: and you know, like you said, he'll he'll make it there,
Speaker 4: but you know, he got a he had a tough
Speaker 4: start to his pro career.
Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely ill timed inspired a rule change. I think
Speaker 3: it makes me think of I was listening to it
Speaker 3: theo Epstein a podcast with him in the Cubs GM
Speaker 3: and he was talking about how they did all this
Speaker 3: behavioral analysis of prospects before they decided to sign them
Speaker 3: or draft them.
Speaker 1: And he was talking about one of the.
Speaker 3: Hardest things for guys to deal with in making that transition,
Speaker 3: is you go from being the big fish in the
Speaker 3: little pond of amateur golf. You know, everyone loves you,
Speaker 3: the media loves you and love you. Everyone's telling you
Speaker 3: to me the next best thing to becoming the small
Speaker 3: fish in the big pond and awls when you.
Speaker 1: Go to a tour event and you know, you might
Speaker 1: get the media.
Speaker 3: Coverags that you pro to you that kind of stuff,
Speaker 3: but otherwise, you know, people don't really care that you're there,
Speaker 3: and so that for a lot of guys, that's just
Speaker 3: so jarring that it's hard to overcome that because they
Speaker 3: feed off that kind of, you know, big fish stature.
Speaker 3: So I thought that was really interesting too, And I
Speaker 3: think the same thing applies to golf definitely, because guys
Speaker 3: on the PGA Tour don't care what you did in
Speaker 3: amateur golf.
Speaker 1: Because they probably did the exact same thing ten years
Speaker 1: ago or even better. So that's a hard part too
Speaker 1: of it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's uh. I think we're also entering this era
Speaker 2: of parody in golf.
Speaker 4: Everybody wants to drive home this elite storyline and who's
Speaker 4: the big four or five whatever it is. But the
Speaker 4: reality is is that like one through thirty one through
Speaker 4: forty on the PGA Tour at this point is is
Speaker 4: pretty indistinguishable. And I don't think, you know, I think
Speaker 4: that's the thing that I keep going back to when
Speaker 4: I think about the tour as how you know, if
Speaker 4: I told you, you know, if I listed off thirty
Speaker 4: names you know of you know, the top forty guys,
Speaker 4: I don't think you'd be surprised if they won a major,
Speaker 4: Like you know, I mean, what do you think about
Speaker 4: a big picture?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 4: With all this young talent, the direction of the tour
Speaker 4: is going like what's going to be a good season
Speaker 4: in fifteen years?
Speaker 2: Like two wins?
Speaker 3: I think, I mean Justin's won three times this year,
Speaker 3: and I think that you know, when Justin won the
Speaker 3: third time, it's sony.
Speaker 1: Shane Bacon tweeted out something like, you know, I think
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 3: It's going into the final round with a large lead,
Speaker 3: And Shane tweeted like, it's crazy to think PJ Tour
Speaker 3: player the leader is already even locked up almost in January,
Speaker 3: if people hopped all over him.
Speaker 1: If you don't know what's going.
Speaker 3: To happen, there's majors we've played at YadA, YadA, and
Speaker 3: it's definitely true. Justin's gonna have to do probably more
Speaker 3: to win PJ Tour Player of the Year because if
Speaker 3: a guy wins once in a major, they'll probably favor
Speaker 3: the guy with a major if Justin doesn't win one himself.
Speaker 3: But three wins is three wins is a great season.
Speaker 3: Jason Day had three wins last year, Rory won twice.
Speaker 3: You know, Jordan WANs, I think a multi win season
Speaker 3: is a great year, especially if it's you know, Dustin
Speaker 3: Johnson Player the Year last year three wins. Now, granted
Speaker 3: it was a WGC, a major, and a Beatest Cup
Speaker 3: playoffs event, but three wins is three wins, and I
Speaker 3: think three wins is a great year. Anything beyond that
Speaker 3: is really special. So I mean, and I think Jordan's
Speaker 3: Speed has said it, twenty fifteen is going to be
Speaker 3: looked back at as like a historically significant year, like
Speaker 3: that might be the best year of his career, which
Speaker 3: is crazy to think about being what I think he
Speaker 3: was twenty one at the time, and that's not a
Speaker 3: knock on game. But five wins a major, the FedEx Cup,
Speaker 3: I mean, that's.
Speaker 1: That's tough to be.
Speaker 3: That's gonna be one of the best theaters in a
Speaker 3: long time, and people wanted him to repeat all of
Speaker 3: a sudden. So I'm definitely with you. I think there
Speaker 3: are just you know, there's only so many slots. Only
Speaker 3: one guy wins every week. Only ten guys are you know,
Speaker 3: some ties finish in the top ten, and there's just
Speaker 3: so many guys capable of filling those spots. I think again,
Speaker 3: kind of like what I said, like numbers one hundred
Speaker 3: to five hundred in the world ranking are pretty interchangeable,
Speaker 3: and they're just really separated by one or two good
Speaker 3: weeks and some weeks only one or two you know,
Speaker 3: good shots. And so I think it's cool to see
Speaker 3: that we have five or six players who right now
Speaker 3: have kind of separated themselves in the world ranking, and
Speaker 3: they're playing really well because people do want that star power.
Speaker 3: But once you get beyond the top ten, I'd say,
Speaker 3: I mean, it's pretty interchangeable. Guys are are pretty similar
Speaker 3: and really just separated by a couple of good shots
Speaker 3: here and there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's I mean, I'm looking at the world rankings
Speaker 4: right now and it's like if I told you that
Speaker 4: Matt Fitzpatrick one was going to win a major this year,
Speaker 4: you wouldn't be surprised, you know. But I feel like,
Speaker 4: you know, twenty years ago, if I told you whoever
Speaker 4: the thirtieth ranc player in the world was was going
Speaker 4: to win a Major, you'd be like, Oh, that's pretty
Speaker 4: surprising as a you know, and I think that's everybody's
Speaker 4: you know, looking at Major's one. But like the depth
Speaker 4: of talent in the you know, Nicholas Palmer player era
Speaker 4: was nowhere near what it is now. And I think
Speaker 4: when you look at careers and evaluating careers post Tiger,
Speaker 4: you know, we everybody needs the lower expectations because the
Speaker 4: money influx into the game has led to a lot
Speaker 4: more talent in the game, a lot more talent and
Speaker 4: a lot.
Speaker 1: More knowledge about your games.
Speaker 3: I mean, you have kids now that a kid, a
Speaker 3: high school kid nowadays, could be on track man from
Speaker 3: you know, fourteen on, and he could, you know, depending
Speaker 3: on his parents' financial situation and level of convent, he
Speaker 3: could have a biomechanical specialist working with him. You could
Speaker 3: have you know, you'd be on a TPI. I think
Speaker 3: just with more money. And Kyle Porter wrote this really well,
Speaker 3: but anytime an industry has an influx of money. There's
Speaker 3: can be an influx of investment in that industry to
Speaker 3: try to earn more of that money. And so you
Speaker 3: have you know, tour players have such a deeper knowledge
Speaker 3: of their game from nutrition. You know, you look at
Speaker 3: course management stuff, whether it's you know, Mark Brody or
Speaker 3: Scott Fawcett. You know, guys can get even course management
Speaker 3: dialed in. Whereas before, you know, a good golfer might
Speaker 3: know some stuff innately about course management that would separate
Speaker 3: him from from separate him from a guy who maybe
Speaker 3: wasn't as smart. But now you can use analytics too.
Speaker 3: If you don't fire not a good course management guy yourself,
Speaker 3: you can hire a guy who can make you into
Speaker 3: a good course manager. There's just all that more knowledge
Speaker 3: out there, and a lot of times that knowledge is
Speaker 3: innate with the best players, but now you can kind
Speaker 3: of attribute it and give it to players who aren't
Speaker 3: as good, just through technology. And I think Jack Nicholas
Speaker 3: had a great quote. He said, like they do exit
Speaker 3: exhibitions to you know, make money on the side, because
Speaker 3: the money was not great. And he said, I would
Speaker 3: go to a course and you know, one time out
Speaker 3: of ten the.
Speaker 1: Club pro would beat me. Or I think he said
Speaker 1: he was even more than that.
Speaker 3: Even like half the time, the club ro might beat
Speaker 3: me if I had a bad day and the club
Speaker 3: row had a good day.
Speaker 1: That's not happening.
Speaker 3: Nowadays, you take Jason Day out to a club, you
Speaker 3: can take him out to the guy who want one
Speaker 3: the Club Pro National Championships this year, that guy's not
Speaker 3: touching Jason Daye. That guy's five shots at least behind him.
Speaker 2: I disagree. I think I think.
Speaker 4: If Day doesn't play his best, that guy that I mean,
Speaker 4: the guy that won the Club Pro Championship, that guy's
Speaker 4: a stick and probably was a guy that just didn't
Speaker 4: have the breaks go right when he tried to play
Speaker 4: pro golf. I mean like that guy is a is
Speaker 4: probably a web dot com level player. You know, a
Speaker 4: guy that went is the Club Pro Championship. I mean,
Speaker 4: if it's just the random local pro, I would agree,
Speaker 4: But you know that that Club Pro Championship is is No,
Speaker 4: I mean it's not. It's not a PGA Tour event,
Speaker 4: but those guys are are sticks, you know.
Speaker 3: No, that might have been overstated. Maybe five trokes, that's
Speaker 3: twenty strokes tournament.
Speaker 1: That's a lot.
Speaker 3: I did pull up the guy who went to laste
Speaker 3: with Rich Barbarian. I interviewed him at Chambers of that
Speaker 3: US Open. Actually for a story, I always like to
Speaker 3: do the story on just the random guys who qualifying,
Speaker 3: what that week is like. He's played four two events
Speaker 3: this season based on the exemption he got for winning
Speaker 3: winning the club.
Speaker 1: He's missed three cuts.
Speaker 3: Now granted, one was the US Open, one was the
Speaker 3: PGA T sixty six of pel Beach.
Speaker 1: And missed the cut of Genesis.
Speaker 3: So five shots might have been a little much. I'll
Speaker 3: accept that, but at this point being just the point
Speaker 3: of the quote is that the gap between you know,
Speaker 3: your club pro to your top level player is much
Speaker 3: larger than it was Jack's day.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I definitely agree with that.
Speaker 4: It's the best players in the world are just unbelievably talented.
Speaker 4: I mean, anybody that even as has status on web
Speaker 4: dot Com is unbelievably talented.
Speaker 2: How close do you.
Speaker 4: Think the web dot Com Tour is to the European Tour,
Speaker 4: you know, outside of their big stars. I I think
Speaker 4: about this a lot. Is like, you know, how close
Speaker 4: is the web dot Com Tour to being the second
Speaker 4: best tour on in in the world.
Speaker 3: You're gonna get me, get me in trouble here. We've
Speaker 3: already been down this road. I think what two and
Speaker 3: eight or so, I think, I don't I don't know
Speaker 3: about that one. I think that I mean the probably
Speaker 3: that when you say European Tour, there's a wide disparity
Speaker 3: in you know, you're talking Abu Dhabi, Are you talking
Speaker 3: the Madeira Islands open. I think the web is strong.
Speaker 3: It's full of guys who have played on the PGA Tour,
Speaker 3: who have won on the PGA Tour. But I think,
Speaker 3: I mean, even just a little bit out of respect
Speaker 3: to the European Tour, I think I would still give
Speaker 3: it that number two spot because there are still guys.
Speaker 3: I mean, Peral Hatton plays almost all of his golf
Speaker 3: on the European Tour. He'll come to Florida for the
Speaker 3: next couple of months and play in the US between
Speaker 3: Honda and players. But you know, Cheral Haddon, your Met
Speaker 3: fitzpatricks is, those guys, Thomas Peters, they still play mostly
Speaker 3: in Europe. They'll come to the US at the right season,
Speaker 3: at the time when there's WGCs and majors and stuff.
Speaker 3: But I do think the European Tour. I would still
Speaker 3: give it the number two slot just because it is.
Speaker 3: It's a I mean, I don't know, it's the European Tour.
Speaker 1: I think it is true. That's not a knock on
Speaker 1: the Web. I think that's just the fact of the matter.
Speaker 3: There are still some European and I think you're seeing
Speaker 3: little bit more European players staying there instead of moving
Speaker 3: to Orlando. So I think the Web is strong. It's
Speaker 3: definitely is strong. But the European Tour I think is
Speaker 3: still the European Tour.
Speaker 1: And deserves some Yeah.
Speaker 4: I didn't mean in terms of like the stars. I'm
Speaker 4: talking more of your seventy five to one twenty five guys, right,
Speaker 4: and I.
Speaker 1: Think those are I would say that's pretty comparable.
Speaker 2: Definitely, Yeah, it's I think it's close across the board too.
Speaker 4: I think, you know, is what's webs one through fifty
Speaker 4: versus the tours one twenty five through Era one. You know,
Speaker 4: let's say seventy five through one twenty five.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's one of the great debates.
Speaker 3: I think that was actually one of the things they
Speaker 3: thought would be cool about the web dot Com Tour finals,
Speaker 3: is you throw those guys in the mix against each other,
Speaker 3: and I would love I'm not torn to do it,
Speaker 3: but I would love like Mark Rody to.
Speaker 1: Take those numbers. And you know, you've got.
Speaker 3: Three years now, I think of history there four years,
Speaker 3: and so you can use that in a way, I
Speaker 3: think to kind of answer that question or at least
Speaker 3: see what's the difference is. I think now that was
Speaker 3: one of the fun parts of the Web dot Com
Speaker 3: Tour Finals because you could do that.
Speaker 2: MM.
Speaker 4: So with you getting to cover golf for a long time,
Speaker 4: and what are some of your favorite courses that the
Speaker 4: tour goes to every year? You know, for whatever reasons,
Speaker 4: if it's you know, the leader boards or you know
Speaker 4: what have you kind of noticed with courses and the
Speaker 4: U and the leader boards that come from them.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I love Riviera. I mean obviously just
Speaker 3: played there, but I think it's just so it's such
Speaker 3: a classic place and it's such an easy there's a
Speaker 3: lot of courses that are tough walks. Just there's these big, open,
Speaker 3: modern courses through housing development, Riviera is awesome and just
Speaker 3: that you can it's just all right there in that
Speaker 3: canyon and it's such a cool little walk it's a
Speaker 3: classic place and it does produce a good leaderboard. I
Speaker 3: think for that reason, it's the shop Makers course. I'm
Speaker 3: always partial to the ocean, so I haven't actually covered
Speaker 3: Pebble but I love I think Moneray is my favorite
Speaker 3: place in the world, and let on our honeymoon there,
Speaker 3: so we've got to say a pebble beach.
Speaker 1: Just because I'm not gonna.
Speaker 3: Get into the whole Saturday thing again, I think I'll
Speaker 3: leave that to tront except Trona as a follow up
Speaker 3: to kind of cleaned up my mess and tie in
Speaker 3: by loose ends. But pedal on Sunday, I think just
Speaker 3: with those views is is always awesome. I think it's
Speaker 3: just I think the nice thing that's been being able
Speaker 3: to go to courses. I think when you're actually able
Speaker 3: to walk a course and see how it flows and
Speaker 3: just kind of put everything in context of where everything is.
Speaker 1: It's so different than television.
Speaker 3: It you know, TV, it's almost like eighteen separate.
Speaker 1: Corridors that have no relation to each other.
Speaker 3: It's like almost like eighteen different studios or sound stages
Speaker 3: where action happens. It's hard to tie them all together.
Speaker 3: I was thinking about that we were at Sawgraph the
Speaker 3: other day, just playing the golf course and there's no
Speaker 3: one around, and like you just forget that it's just
Speaker 3: a golf course versus like a place we have tournaments.
Speaker 3: But I think that's always been the coolest part. I'm
Speaker 3: trying to go down the schedule and give you some
Speaker 3: good ones. I think Vaalaspar obviously is very popular for
Speaker 3: good reasons. The course where they have the match play,
Speaker 3: Austin Country Club. Those holes on the water are really fun.
Speaker 3: People are on their boats watching the action. They're cool
Speaker 3: fun holes. You gotta drive a Part four or reach
Speaker 3: told part five, and there's so much elevation chain of
Speaker 3: the front nine there. I'm not just saying it's some
Speaker 3: partial but TPD Patgrass is really cool for a lot
Speaker 3: of reasons. The more I play it and the more
Speaker 3: I know about it read about it, the more I
Speaker 3: can't respect that place. Jack's Place in Columbus is great,
Speaker 3: but I think those would really top the list fast
Speaker 3: places I've been.
Speaker 4: Definitely, Yeah, it's I think obviously riv and Pebble are
Speaker 4: in their own stratosphere and everything I've heard about Monterey Peninsula,
Speaker 4: but I feel like, you know, the.
Speaker 2: Copper Head course.
Speaker 4: I think there's it's interesting how the tour has gotten
Speaker 4: in the golf courses because you know, there's this adage
Speaker 4: that length is what they need to make things tougher.
Speaker 2: I almost disagree with it.
Speaker 4: I think with the what happened with a lot of
Speaker 4: these modern courses that were built for tour events is
Speaker 4: that they promote robot golf, where you know, it's hit
Speaker 4: it far and hit it in the fairway and hit
Speaker 4: it close, versus a place like Riviera, where it's more
Speaker 4: about you know, I don't think this year was a
Speaker 4: great representation because of how soft it was, but it's
Speaker 4: more about being hitting it on a particular side of
Speaker 4: a fairway on a given day to access a certain
Speaker 4: pin because of the way the course is built, and
Speaker 4: just a little bit more strategic then say a course
Speaker 4: like I just played Golf Club of Houston. I mean,
Speaker 4: Golf Club of Houston, hit it down this fairway, hit
Speaker 4: it close to the pin, and that's the name of
Speaker 4: the game. Versus you play Riviera. It's hit it down
Speaker 4: the right side of the fairway so I can get
Speaker 4: to this back left pin. But then the next day
Speaker 4: it's hit it down the left side of the fairway
Speaker 4: so I can get to this front right pin.
Speaker 2: And I think that's that's the kind of trend the
Speaker 2: tour needs to go to get a little bit more
Speaker 2: diversity on the leader board.
Speaker 4: And I think that's what we've seen this year, is
Speaker 4: that a lot of these places lack the strategic factor
Speaker 4: and if it's about just hitting it far and straight,
Speaker 4: these young guys are gonna are gonna win a lot
Speaker 4: because that's what they've been trained to do and since
Speaker 4: you know, with the track man era and technology, No, definitely, I.
Speaker 1: Think part of it too.
Speaker 3: I think a lot of the classic older clubs don't
Speaker 3: want to host a tour event.
Speaker 1: There's so much that it's involved with doing it.
Speaker 3: Opening a golf course for a week, you know, changing
Speaker 3: the agronomy of the golf course, getting it set up
Speaker 3: for a tour event, and then also just the room.
Speaker 3: It's not the same as a major, but you need
Speaker 3: the room for hospitality and all other stuff. You have
Speaker 3: to be okay with forty thousand people trouncing your golf
Speaker 3: course for a week and having it be closed for
Speaker 3: a week before that, And so I think that's part
Speaker 3: of the challenge. You know, you look at I mean,
Speaker 3: I've the more I've played golf courses in different places,
Speaker 3: the more you realize, like a lot of these great,
Speaker 3: great golf courses are something you've never heard of because
Speaker 3: they don't want to be heard of because they they
Speaker 3: like to lay low. Like we were on Sea Island
Speaker 3: and we're going to Frederica for a shoot, and like
Speaker 3: the opening to Frederica is like literally, if you're if
Speaker 3: you don't know where you're going, you're never gonna find it,
Speaker 3: just because it's like this little opening in the bushes.
Speaker 3: And then finally the guard tower is like one hundred
Speaker 3: yards back in the in the trees, and you know,
Speaker 3: you look at Seminole. You know, Seminol love the Pro
Speaker 3: member of the Pro snout that they love. It's an
Speaker 3: amazing golf course. But you know, Seminol would have no
Speaker 3: interest in uh in hosting a tour event. So that's
Speaker 3: part of the challenge. But I definitely agree with you
Speaker 3: that I think with the technology, especially that you know,
Speaker 3: at the same time, I think strategy, even on the
Speaker 3: best design course gets taken out a little bit when
Speaker 3: guys can hit an eight iron from the rough, you know,
Speaker 3: way up in the air, stop it and so in
Speaker 3: a sense, you have a pain tugged over a bunker
Speaker 3: and it almost doesn't matter, you know, you miss it
Speaker 3: on the wrong side of the fairway.
Speaker 1: Guys can just recover by hitting a moonshot eight on.
Speaker 3: It's gonna stop when it hits the green, and so
Speaker 3: I think that's part of it too. It's just that
Speaker 3: technology has taken the strategy out of a lot of
Speaker 3: even great golf courses, and I think too just you know,
Speaker 3: maybe getting them firmer and faster.
Speaker 1: As the answer.
Speaker 3: Obviously, whether sometimes it is different, but I definitely think
Speaker 3: firm and fast.
Speaker 1: Brings strategy into it as well.
Speaker 3: Until any time you can get that going. I don't
Speaker 3: know how much control or how much the tour has
Speaker 3: a saying that, you know, I don't know if people
Speaker 3: want fifteen under winning. I always kind of like eight
Speaker 3: to ten. But you know, maybe getting golf courses firmer
Speaker 3: and faster would do the trick a little bit.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think firm and fast golf is the ultimate defense,
Speaker 4: you know, with these guys. If it's soft, it's just
Speaker 4: going to be a birdie fest. But you know, if
Speaker 4: it rains and then it completely changes the dynamic of
Speaker 4: the golf course. You look at a lot of guys,
Speaker 4: like you know, they feast on you know, soft golf courses.
Speaker 4: You can look at their career and most of their
Speaker 4: wins come when there's a lot of rain. And then
Speaker 4: you look at, you know, when courses play firm and fast,
Speaker 4: and it's a completely different leader board. So I think,
Speaker 4: you know, that's something that obviously can help, but it's
Speaker 4: it's very hard to do because of weather. So you
Speaker 4: mentioned the sagrass, what do you think about the renovations
Speaker 4: and you know, for the upcoming tournament in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 4: there's a lot of cool minor renovations.
Speaker 3: I mean, obviously twelve it's gonna be the big story,
Speaker 3: and twelve is an interesting hole. It's im I honestly
Speaker 3: have no idea how it's going to play. Part of
Speaker 3: me could see guys kind of tearing it up and
Speaker 3: it becoming.
Speaker 1: Almost too easy.
Speaker 3: Part of me could see it being too difficult and
Speaker 3: it might need to be softened with some spots. A
Speaker 3: lot of obviously it's going to do with kind of
Speaker 3: the firmness of it. But twelves can be very interesting
Speaker 3: to watch and get a lot of focus.
Speaker 1: But even like a lot of the holes that border
Speaker 1: kind of that pine straw area.
Speaker 3: I mean they've taken almost all the rough out. There's
Speaker 3: a little maybe ten foot five foot water strip of roughs,
Speaker 3: and now key shots can bound into the pine straw,
Speaker 3: so you'll.
Speaker 1: Have more guys getting out of pine straw.
Speaker 3: On like eleven, the par five and some other places
Speaker 3: they've taken out ross and put in just shade theirries partly,
Speaker 3: Like Sover eleven, for example, there's water behind the green,
Speaker 3: and the hope is that now that rough has gone,
Speaker 3: if it's firm and a guy you know, hits towards
Speaker 3: the left side, away from the bunker, away from the water,
Speaker 3: that that ball can bound through into the back water
Speaker 3: and make you think more on the second shot at
Speaker 3: that hole. It's a lot of cool subtleties that I
Speaker 3: think hopefully are translated well on television and explained well,
Speaker 3: as well as obviously be the big one. I think
Speaker 3: six and seven are two really cool holes that they
Speaker 3: took out a huge earth kind of hill.
Speaker 1: It was like a dirt mound between them, and now
Speaker 1: they've made one large lake.
Speaker 3: And if you didn't know what to look like before,
Speaker 3: you wouldn't know how cool it looks now, it looks
Speaker 3: really cool. There are two kind of holes that don't
Speaker 3: get a lot of atension, But I think the idea
Speaker 3: was that hopefully that change would get some more attentions
Speaker 3: for them. But I mean the big hole sixteen seventeen
Speaker 3: eighteen are pretty much the same, but just a lot
Speaker 3: of cool, cool, subtle things that hopefully will add some
Speaker 3: more excitement.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's uh, you know, it might not be noticeable
Speaker 4: on TV, but if it changes the way the guys
Speaker 4: play the hole, I mean that's that's a big, big change.
Speaker 4: You know, these little changes can make big impacts on
Speaker 4: the tournament and you know who wins.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: My dream scenario is eleven is one of those places
Speaker 3: where they've got pin straw on the right and it's
Speaker 3: took a rough out and I'm curious to see.
Speaker 1: But I'm hoping that leads to.
Speaker 3: Us seeing guys going for that green which has a
Speaker 3: bunker running all down the right side of the of
Speaker 3: the green and then water before that that I'm.
Speaker 1: Hoping we're seeing guys trying to hit shot out of
Speaker 1: the pines.
Speaker 3: Going for eleven into that kind of stuff. So hopefully
Speaker 3: it produces those kinds of shots.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's uh, you know, speaking of a course that
Speaker 4: you know has kind of wall the wall fair Away
Speaker 4: and Pine Stride, and I know both of us have
Speaker 4: played blue Jack. I wanted to get your quick thoughts
Speaker 4: on what you thought of Tiger Woods as an architect.
Speaker 3: I just I mean, first and foremost, I just love
Speaker 3: the whole I hate the word vibe, but I love
Speaker 3: the whole vibe of the place. It's a very you know,
Speaker 3: it's an expensive club to join. It's a it's a
Speaker 3: very well healed membership. But you would have no idea
Speaker 3: going there. You know, we played, We played in carts,
Speaker 3: which wasn't my first preference, but you know, we played
Speaker 3: with the kid literally played barefoot because he was just
Speaker 3: he likes to play that way, just kind of hang out.
Speaker 3: He we had we had a Bluetooth speaker. He was
Speaker 3: playing music. I know people differ on that, but that
Speaker 3: was really fine. The putty green there is probably what
Speaker 3: two hundred and fifty yards long, and so me and
Speaker 3: my buddy took some time hitting you know, well maybe
Speaker 3: one hundred and fifty yards whatever, but hitting long putts
Speaker 3: across it.
Speaker 1: You know, good food.
Speaker 3: Kind of it's just so they've got the target on
Speaker 3: the drive range and can try to hit pun shot that.
Speaker 3: I mean, just it's a it's a great club with
Speaker 3: a great golf course, but they've got the little nine
Speaker 3: hole pitch and put course too, Like we.
Speaker 1: Played that after we played eighteen. Just that whole it's
Speaker 1: so relaxed. One of the guys had his shirt on toped.
Speaker 3: It wasn't a big deal, you know, it's just I mean,
Speaker 3: even public courses I think can apply that to themselves.
Speaker 3: They might not have the quality of golf course. Tigers
Speaker 3: not gonna build one for them, But that was such
Speaker 3: a it was so refreshing to just kind of come
Speaker 3: and relax and you didn't have to worry.
Speaker 1: Like, oh, I have my hat on? Should I take
Speaker 1: it off? Can I reave it on?
Speaker 3: Can we just change our shoes in the parking lot?
Speaker 3: Or is that gonna get it kicked out? What if
Speaker 3: I checked Twitter when I'm you know, in the third fairway?
Speaker 3: That kind of it's just it was so nice and
Speaker 3: relaxing that made it really fun. And then you've got
Speaker 3: a golf course that kind of like you said, wal
Speaker 3: the wall fairways, it's relaxing to play. It's you know,
Speaker 3: you're not looking for balls. I was reading Alison McKenzie's
Speaker 3: Spirit of thing they do right now. He said that
Speaker 3: to get what it was basically railing on long graphs
Speaker 3: and just how looking for lost balls just as one
Speaker 3: of the worst parts of golf. And so the whole
Speaker 3: day I wish I could play it again and really
Speaker 3: get the you know, a better field for the course.
Speaker 3: But the whole day it was just fun, which is
Speaker 3: what golf is supposed to be. And I think they
Speaker 3: did a great job in doing that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a place that you just kind of want
Speaker 4: to hang out at, which is you know what golf
Speaker 4: needs more of, you know, place that you really want
Speaker 4: to go, and whether it's just sit on the range
Speaker 4: and hit balls at that target.
Speaker 2: They have music playing at the range.
Speaker 4: But then the golf course, I thought, you know, it's great,
Speaker 4: you know you I don't think we spent any time
Speaker 4: looking for golf balls.
Speaker 2: And you know, I think he did what he did
Speaker 2: was really interesting.
Speaker 4: I think the more I thought about it, the more
Speaker 4: bullish I am as on Tiger as a designer, just
Speaker 4: be because I think about his playing career and you know,
Speaker 4: the guy was the ultimate tactician. He knew exactly where
Speaker 4: he wanted to hit the ball, and then he also
Speaker 4: knew if I'm gonna miss, I need to miss it here.
Speaker 2: And I think he can take that knowledge and apply
Speaker 2: it to golf courses so well.
Speaker 4: I felt like when I looked at the fairway, there
Speaker 4: was a bunker right where I really wanted to hit
Speaker 4: the ball every time, and you know there's only forty
Speaker 4: bunkers on the golf course, and that you know it.
Speaker 2: He did such a nice job with like the subtle.
Speaker 4: Subtleties where you have these you know, you have uneven
Speaker 4: lies in the fairway, which you know give the expert
Speaker 4: player kind of fits. It makes you uncomfortable because you're
Speaker 4: hitting you know, choked down wedges off of side hill
Speaker 4: lives into you know, little pins. But you know, for
Speaker 4: the average golfer, they're they're in the fairway, they just
Speaker 4: feel like, you know, they they're doing great because they
Speaker 4: have a shot at the green every hole. You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think uneven lies and you don't see it
Speaker 3: on TV because TV just flattens everything out. But I
Speaker 3: think uneven lies are just such an awesome challenge. I
Speaker 3: think I texted you after I played TV T but
Speaker 3: like we played sixteen, the par five and there's water
Speaker 3: on the right, you've got the spectator mountains in the left,
Speaker 3: but basically see that huge lake on the right and
Speaker 3: all you and you've got to tree on the left side.
Speaker 3: All you really want to do if you're going forward
Speaker 3: to is hit a high cut, you know, start at
Speaker 3: left and if it stays left, your state. But the
Speaker 3: ball was above my feet and I'm like, I'm not
Speaker 3: I'm not taking this three wood out to the right
Speaker 3: and trusting it to draw back.
Speaker 1: Like I just don't know the guts to do that.
Speaker 3: So I tried to hit a cut off a ball
Speaker 3: above my feet and of course the keel grabs and
Speaker 3: it goes left them kind of over in the rock
Speaker 3: with no shot because it's behind the bunker. And I mean,
Speaker 3: I just chip on and make a simple five. But
Speaker 3: like just you'll never see that on TV. But that's
Speaker 3: such a cool thing. And then like you said, like
Speaker 3: the ten handicapper, he's just pumps, he's in the fairway
Speaker 3: and not look the first golf ball. And then of
Speaker 3: course we have talk about like the fruit stands at
Speaker 3: the that place at blue.
Speaker 1: Jack is amazing. But another conversation.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the the whole conversations were quite spectacular.
Speaker 2: I mean the towels at the turn. I mean it's
Speaker 2: a cool spot.
Speaker 4: I might dive in and write about five thousand words
Speaker 4: on it this afternoon. So this could get get me
Speaker 4: warmed up for that. So if you, you know, changing
Speaker 4: kind of gears back, if you were a say a
Speaker 4: common fan, like what what are your five tour events
Speaker 4: that you would recommend or a couple of tour events.
Speaker 4: If I was going to travel to go see the
Speaker 4: tour somewhere, where would you say you should go here?
Speaker 4: I mean we're talking let's just say non major. I
Speaker 4: think that you know, the majors are so overly you know, filled,
Speaker 4: just let's say just regular tour events.
Speaker 3: Sure, I mean I definitely okay so that I say,
Speaker 3: got the one and open En Championship. But I mean
Speaker 3: I think, you know, playing to Hughes for being a shill,
Speaker 3: But I do think the players is really cool. It's
Speaker 3: just I mean the golf course was built for spectators. Uh,
Speaker 3: he's got the big mounds. It's designed in like these
Speaker 3: little kind of hubs, so you can basically see a
Speaker 3: bunch of holes that wants about walking a ton. If
Speaker 3: you're not someone who wants to walk five miles and
Speaker 3: nine need to be weather, I think that one's definitely
Speaker 3: up there. I think you definitely want to go to
Speaker 3: places that are kind of accepted locally and people turn out.
Speaker 3: You know, they've got a good large crowd. I think,
Speaker 3: you know Bay Hill. I think Orlando loves that tournament,
Speaker 3: and so it's fun that there's a lot of people
Speaker 3: out there. I think I love the match play at
Speaker 3: then often I'm just going down to schedule. I don't
Speaker 3: know my top five in front of me. But I
Speaker 3: think match play is cool in that you can actually
Speaker 3: just watch two guys go head to head and they
Speaker 3: play pretty quick because they're.
Speaker 1: In a twosome, and.
Speaker 3: So I think watching watching match play, I think is
Speaker 3: always just kind of fun. I've only been to the
Speaker 3: Nelson min A Colonial with Dallas and Fort Work turnout
Speaker 3: definitely if you want to see some great architecture, which
Speaker 3: I'm sure some people listening to do. I think Greenbrier
Speaker 3: is a great one. Tough to get to, good luck
Speaker 3: with that, but Greenbrier and also Windham Over in Greenboro,
Speaker 3: I think that's another. And you're talking about golf, courses
Speaker 3: where kind of their strategy and bull style. Greenbrier and
Speaker 3: Wyndham definitely are up there, and then I al would
Speaker 3: go to I was then going to the BMW for coverage,
Speaker 3: and I think just you know, it's not the same
Speaker 3: Western Open, but it's Chicago and the Western Golf.
Speaker 1: Association still runs it and so they just they.
Speaker 3: Love that advantage. It's really well done. But I'd say
Speaker 3: those are up there. I mean, it's hard for me.
Speaker 3: I'm more I'm just saying some people want to go
Speaker 3: to big, browdy events, so they got to take seen
Speaker 3: aches in Honda and Dallas. I'm That's not my scene
Speaker 3: per se. So I'm more of a maybe you know,
Speaker 3: like Tory Pines just to go and just hang out
Speaker 3: and watch or Riviera for that reason. I think are
Speaker 3: great ones to watch. But I mean, obviously you got
Speaker 3: to take Phoenix if you're looking for just Zanian.
Speaker 4: I think, you know, I think the New Orleans has
Speaker 4: a chance with this new format to be like an
Speaker 4: awesome because, like you talk about things to do outside
Speaker 4: of you know, watching golf, that place is you know,
Speaker 4: you've got great food, great nightlife. There's a cool little
Speaker 4: golf course that you could stay in stay down in
Speaker 4: the French Quarter and take the trolley out to It's
Speaker 4: I think, yeah.
Speaker 2: I I didn't even realize.
Speaker 4: I went there last fall with my fiance and a
Speaker 4: couple another couple, and we went just to walk an
Speaker 4: Audubon Park and somebody told me about it like a
Speaker 4: long time ago, and then all of a sudden, I
Speaker 4: just saw this golf course and I was looking at
Speaker 4: it and I was like, wow, it looks pretty decent.
Speaker 4: Then sure enough, like I'm looking in the Confidential Guy
Speaker 4: Doaks book and it's one of the gourmet choices.
Speaker 2: So it's a place if I'm.
Speaker 3: Not mistaken, isn't it kind of like Winter Bark. It's
Speaker 3: like really sure, it's like five thousand yards or something.
Speaker 3: But they just put a bunch of money in when
Speaker 3: we did it to kind of, yeah, like with Winter Park,
Speaker 3: to make it a fun little challenge.
Speaker 2: It's a par sixty two. It's got a cool story.
Speaker 2: It was actually the.
Speaker 4: It was built for the World Fair in like eighteen
Speaker 4: ninety or something back then. Yeah, and and it's been
Speaker 4: around forever, but it, you know, it looks really interesting
Speaker 4: and cool.
Speaker 2: I mean, Winter Park is so so awesome. Those these
Speaker 2: types of places.
Speaker 4: Where are so important to I mean, you said it,
Speaker 4: and I grew up playing at a munique golf course,
Speaker 4: Like I mean, like you got to have places where
Speaker 4: these kids can play if you want, you know, the
Speaker 4: future of golf to be healthy. And then and the
Speaker 4: places need to be interesting, cool little places that you
Speaker 4: want to spend all day at.
Speaker 3: Definitely, And I mean I grew up. I mean the
Speaker 3: golfers I grew up at. It was five thousand yards long,
Speaker 3: but like like attracted such an audience or such a
Speaker 3: group of people, like I mean Chris Como, who teaches
Speaker 3: Tiger worked in the pro shop when I work in
Speaker 3: the carbarn. Chris Danbreen, who was playing on the Buy
Speaker 3: dot Com Tour now coaches USC one of the best
Speaker 3: teams in the country, was getting lessons there.
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 3: I mean that was our home course from my high
Speaker 3: school team. And I think three of us played golf
Speaker 3: in Division one and another kid could have but just
Speaker 3: had no interest, but he had offers. And I mean
Speaker 3: playing a five thousand junkie I mean it's not junkie,
Speaker 3: but five thousand yards golf course did obviously not a
Speaker 3: real test. And then I mean I played Winter Park
Speaker 3: a tome in Orlando. I mean I was working and
Speaker 3: traveling a lot, but I mean that was the place
Speaker 3: I probably played the most out of all the courses
Speaker 3: in Orlando because if it was Saturday and you only
Speaker 3: had two hours to drive there, play and get back,
Speaker 3: like you go do it winter Park and kind of
Speaker 3: you know a couple players you can hit driver, but
Speaker 3: it's the most part of you don't. But it gets
Speaker 3: your taste of golf and at least you're out there
Speaker 3: hitting a ball and you know you're not going to
Speaker 3: the range and just kind of smacking balls. You're actually
Speaker 3: trying to score and stuff like that. So I'm all
Speaker 3: for little golf courses of any kind.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I spent I just got to play a nine
Speaker 4: at Winter Park, but I want to go back and
Speaker 4: like I want to play a couple of different loops
Speaker 4: of it and do like different things like where I
Speaker 4: only I only play with like a seven iron or less,
Speaker 4: just to see because then I think, all of a sudden,
Speaker 4: you have these longer shots in the and this renovation
Speaker 4: was great what they did around on and around the greens.
Speaker 4: It's like, all of a sudden, when you're having longer
Speaker 4: shots into these greens, they're going to be you know,
Speaker 4: it's not going to be you know, a pushover where
Speaker 4: you can drive half the par fours. I think that's Uh,
Speaker 4: people are always afraid to take clubs out of the bag.
Speaker 4: But you know, I think it's part of the USGA
Speaker 4: is doing where score is always the defining factor, it
Speaker 4: doesn't really matter. Like if you're looking to get better,
Speaker 4: you know, play different ways and put yourself in uncomfortable
Speaker 4: situations because usually when you're under the gun, those uncomfortable
Speaker 4: situations are what kind of do you in?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, or even just take out the even
Speaker 3: numbered irons or numbered irons in your bag so that
Speaker 3: you you know, have to create shots things like that
Speaker 3: or just those are I mean those are hard to
Speaker 3: do because I think anone's so score upset, but I
Speaker 3: think that definitely, especially trying to get better, I think
Speaker 3: those are and they're just fun. I mean I think, uh,
Speaker 3: you know, golf can get repetitive in a sense, and
Speaker 3: so if you've got to, you know, you take out
Speaker 3: the odd clause, you know, the seven irons, you gotta
Speaker 3: kind of craft a little fade six iron. That's always
Speaker 3: one more fun than just lasting stock seven irons.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I agree, it's there's uh, it's it all
Speaker 4: goes back to why every round needs to be documented
Speaker 4: for your handicap. It is there's all kinds of issues
Speaker 4: in the game, but I see a lot of them
Speaker 4: stem from one organization. So the let's get into a
Speaker 4: few kind of Twitter questions we got here, So this
Speaker 4: one sounds like kind of an inside joke here, and
Speaker 4: I'd love to hear the backstory behind it. Ask him
Speaker 4: about the state of the game since last year's Dominate
Speaker 4: at Uncle Remus.
Speaker 1: Sure.
Speaker 3: So, DJ Baiowski and myself, we've become pretty good friends
Speaker 3: with the Guthries, Zach and Luke. Luke obviously plays on
Speaker 3: web dot com, which we were playing.
Speaker 1: On the PJA Tour for a few years. Zach is
Speaker 1: his older brother.
Speaker 3: And his caddie, and it was the assistant coach at Illinois,
Speaker 3: which is where I first met him with assistant coach
Speaker 3: Illinois when Zach or when Luke was there. Uh, they've
Speaker 3: moved down to Jacksonville, both of them, and we've just
Speaker 3: become pretty good friends over the years. And so I
Speaker 3: was in DJ and I were both in Zach's wedding
Speaker 3: in November and Luke got Mary in December. If they
Speaker 3: did a joint bachelor party to up to Lake of Coney,
Speaker 3: which is where Reynold's plantation is.
Speaker 1: Served.
Speaker 3: Bably, like ten of Us and Zak and Luke grew
Speaker 3: up at public golf courses in Quincy, Illinois, so they
Speaker 3: always loved kind of We played this place, Jacksonville Beach
Speaker 3: Golf Club, which is golf course which is literally like
Speaker 3: it cost fifteen dollars on weekends, but we take we'll
Speaker 3: play with them because they just it takes them back
Speaker 3: to their roots, I think. But so we did the
Speaker 3: vast Or party there and we played one round at
Speaker 3: a nice golf course on the lake that was a
Speaker 3: little more expensive, and then we're like, we found this place.
Speaker 3: Uncle Remus like in the Sticks, Uncle.
Speaker 1: Remus was like this.
Speaker 3: It sounded like basically it was one of those old
Speaker 3: cartoon characters. It's probably wouldn't be acceptable nowadays, but you're
Speaker 3: in the Sticks of Georgia, and I think the author
Speaker 3: was from the town.
Speaker 1: And so there's like a museum for it.
Speaker 3: I don't know, but it's this nine hole golf course
Speaker 3: so you can play twice from two sets.
Speaker 1: Of tea it's like sixty three hundred yards.
Speaker 3: I think it was like ten bucks, Like we were
Speaker 3: the only people out there. We just showed up the
Speaker 3: protops in the house and like, I don't know, So
Speaker 3: we made it Ryder Cup style Zach's groomsman versus Luke's
Speaker 3: and we did matches. And I don't play a whole
Speaker 3: lot anymore. And I mean I played in college that
Speaker 3: was fourteen years ago, so I'm like a five now.
Speaker 3: I usually find it by like sifting hole. But we
Speaker 3: had a baby, so that doesn't help either. But I
Speaker 3: just I think we were having fun and fooling around.
Speaker 3: I played a guy and I think I was giving
Speaker 3: them like three shots.
Speaker 1: We were supposed to be pretty close, and so.
Speaker 3: We played it from nine kind of short that part
Speaker 3: fives are you know, reachable and stuff, And I think
Speaker 3: I shoot like two under and I'm like five up,
Speaker 3: and so we're like, well, I'm just gonna start like
Speaker 3: trying a little bit more, and I ended.
Speaker 1: Up shooting sixty eight.
Speaker 3: Uh it's that uncle Remis and beating the guy like
Speaker 3: I think it was like nine and seven Tiger Woods
Speaker 3: and Stephen named him and so it was just this
Speaker 3: like just beginning his inside joke because they go, I
Speaker 3: can't I don't even I can't do the golf course
Speaker 3: justice it was, it was amazing, but yeah, it's just
Speaker 3: a joke there. I think I think Luke shots sixty
Speaker 3: five or something. Fortunately, so I didn't beat Luke. But uh,
Speaker 3: it's just we we have a thing. We let's love
Speaker 3: just bad. I don't want to say bad. We just
Speaker 3: love lower class golf courses.
Speaker 1: I think they're fun.
Speaker 3: Because you can play in a T shirt, you know,
Speaker 3: and basketball shorts.
Speaker 1: Do you want things like that?
Speaker 3: So I think I think that's where it comes from.
Speaker 3: And it's just funny that.
Speaker 1: I think. The one thing we love about.
Speaker 3: Luc and Zach is like, I mean, they can play
Speaker 3: TPC if they want, but they love coming out to
Speaker 3: like ten dollar golf courses and playing these places with us.
Speaker 2: So yeah, that's that's awesome. You know.
Speaker 4: It's the uh some of the best golf courses is
Speaker 4: that you know, people get so obsessed with conditioning and
Speaker 4: a mac, but you can find these like gems everywhere.
Speaker 1: Where.
Speaker 4: You can tell like if it had a big budget,
Speaker 4: that it would be a really really cool place to
Speaker 4: play golf.
Speaker 2: But you know it might not be in the best shape,
Speaker 2: but the bones are all there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think right now, all I look for
Speaker 3: and I think DJ is kind of the same. If
Speaker 3: it's affordable and it's pretty quick, that's I mean. I
Speaker 3: care way more about that than the niceness of the
Speaker 3: golf course.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: Granted, some nice courses are quick because a lot of
Speaker 3: people out there because they're exclusive. But I just want
Speaker 3: to play fast and cheap right now, So that was
Speaker 3: perfect for that.
Speaker 2: Uncle Remus just us a gem.
Speaker 3: Check it out, maybe maybe linked to it in the
Speaker 3: newsletter or something. Steel can see it. It's it's pretty interesting.
Speaker 4: I'm I'm gonna google it. I'm sure we got downe
Speaker 4: with us. So Ryan Ann wants to wants to know
Speaker 4: what's the best place that you've eaten ad on your
Speaker 4: on all your travels.
Speaker 3: Best place, Uh just probably appeal to a lot of people.
Speaker 1: But last week got Hondo. We sound like a really.
Speaker 3: Good vegan place. And I'm not vegan, but I think
Speaker 3: because there's you can't just rely on neat to make
Speaker 3: it taste good. You have to use a lot of
Speaker 3: flavors and make it very flavorful. So I'm all about
Speaker 3: the vegan restaurants. So we actually this placed Christopher's Kitchen
Speaker 3: at Honda last week was amazing.
Speaker 1: Man, I don't.
Speaker 3: Remember names specifically. I love Tory Pines. Just toy Pine
Speaker 3: is up on the cliffs, obviously, and kind of you
Speaker 3: see a little bit of a town behind that third hole,
Speaker 3: the downhill part three called La Joya Cove.
Speaker 1: That was probably my favorite place to visit on tour.
Speaker 3: My wife and I stayed there for Tory Pines and
Speaker 3: it's just you can walk to a bunch of different places.
Speaker 3: They got the ocean's right there, and they've all.
Speaker 1: These sea lions, like dozens of them, just.
Speaker 3: Barking and whatnot, and a lot of cool, little, funky
Speaker 3: little California places. That place is up there, I think.
Speaker 3: I don't know about eating. My favorite place to stay
Speaker 3: during the tour year is in the La Joya Cove.
Speaker 3: It's a place called La Joya in they call it
Speaker 3: European style, which just means the rooms are really small,
Speaker 3: but it's awesome. It's very affordable for where.
Speaker 1: You are, and it's such a cool location by the ocean.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's that's as I look at my window like
Speaker 4: a gray, dreary Chicago day and think about that place.
Speaker 2: I wonder what the hell I'm doing here.
Speaker 3: I have a photo on my Instagram. The place is
Speaker 3: literally like one hundred and ten bucks a night, and
Speaker 3: I have a photo my Instagram. You can see the
Speaker 3: ocean from the balcony of the room. So it's like
Speaker 3: the room is small, it's not fancy.
Speaker 1: But you get a real key for the room too,
Speaker 1: which is awesome.
Speaker 3: It's not some like plastic card. It's like a legitimate key,
Speaker 3: which you don't get a lot of those anymore.
Speaker 4: No, No, it's uh, that's a that's a good spot
Speaker 4: to hang out though, La hoya say I'm this Uh,
Speaker 4: I'm miss California. I lived there in another life and
Speaker 4: I gotta go back there. So let's get you out
Speaker 4: on uh this on some kind of quick hitter questions. Uh,
Speaker 4: we'll start a favorite architect, I don't know, the.
Speaker 3: Beginning, kind of a beginner Parks extra guy. Uh, I'm
Speaker 3: gonna go Seth Rainer because I love the look. It's
Speaker 3: just so you can just see you can tell that's
Speaker 3: the step main of course, and just the geometry of
Speaker 3: it everything, the sharp edges and just kind of the
Speaker 3: like it just looks old school before they had the
Speaker 3: equipment to make like crazy greens, like okay, I have
Speaker 3: a pretty square green here. Those kinds of things are
Speaker 3: sharp edges. Going to bunkers. I love flat bunkers with
Speaker 3: a grass space kind of thing. So I just love
Speaker 3: the geometry of it and just kind of the sharp angles.
Speaker 3: And I mean that looks really cool.
Speaker 2: I think you're playing to your audience. I'm a huge
Speaker 2: seth right now.
Speaker 1: No, I'm hopefully zactly listening.
Speaker 3: You know, we can talk about it, but uh, And
Speaker 3: I like, I think Pete Dye gets a bad rap
Speaker 3: and I think he might have gotten maybe he got
Speaker 3: cranky in his old age.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 3: But like, to me, TPC like TVC is.
Speaker 1: Part amusement park.
Speaker 3: They give tours the clubhouse, and people just want to
Speaker 3: go out and see seventeen and go out on a
Speaker 3: cart ride and see it. But like there's a lot
Speaker 3: of subtlety to that golf course. And you know, growing
Speaker 3: up where I've grown up, like, I'm not used to
Speaker 3: playing a nice golf course where every time you play
Speaker 3: it you find out something new. I'm used to playing
Speaker 3: sixty five hundred yard public courses that there's really.
Speaker 1: No strategy to them, per se they're just kind of there.
Speaker 3: So I've loved leading a lot about Pete Dye and
Speaker 3: what he's trying to do, and then just playing stadium
Speaker 3: a fair amount, and each time you play, it's just
Speaker 3: kind of seeing little things like I talked about with
Speaker 3: the undulation in the fair way and just those little,
Speaker 3: kind of subtle things. Everyone thinks he's a guy with
Speaker 3: a bunch of water hazards and bulkheads and it's.
Speaker 1: Not really that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think he's like the most underappreciated architecture. Everybody
Speaker 4: likes to like rail on him for these penals designs,
Speaker 4: but like he was the guy that like changed the
Speaker 4: whole industry. You look at the you know, dope and
Speaker 4: studied arm Bill Kohor studied under him. But Die was
Speaker 4: the first guy that brought strategy back into architecture. And
Speaker 4: you know, like when you're when you're changing the perception
Speaker 4: of an industry, like you can't make You probably couldn't
Speaker 4: do everything that he wanted to do, and I think
Speaker 4: he got.
Speaker 2: He got.
Speaker 4: You know, he had a lot of projects where like
Speaker 4: PGA West, he was told to build the hardest golf
Speaker 4: course he possibly could, So you know that's not really.
Speaker 2: Like you, you're an architecture only.
Speaker 4: Architect only has so much rain over a project, you know,
Speaker 4: especially then Yeah.
Speaker 3: And I would love to play some more Mackenzie. If
Speaker 3: anyone listening get me on Tiper's point, I'll gladly take
Speaker 3: that plain Augusta. But just reading Spirit of Saint Andrew's
Speaker 3: like his line that the bet hazard is put exactly
Speaker 3: where a good player intends to hit it, basically kind
Speaker 3: of talking about bunkers in the middle of wide fairways.
Speaker 3: I love that move because it is such a Most
Speaker 3: people probably hate it because obviously you piped down the
Speaker 3: middle and it goes to the bunker. But I mean
Speaker 3: to have to think about, you know, going around over
Speaker 3: short of left right. I mean that's the definition of thinking.
Speaker 3: So I love what mackenzie has to say about architecture
Speaker 3: in that book.
Speaker 4: And that's what I'm saying with like Robot Golf, you know,
Speaker 4: like these type faraways, it's just it's hit the fairway
Speaker 4: if there's water on both sides. These two guys, it's
Speaker 4: just like, oh, I just have to hit it straight.
Speaker 4: But you put a fairway or a bunker in the
Speaker 4: middle of the fairway, all of a sudden they have
Speaker 4: to decide if they want to hit it left or right,
Speaker 4: and just putting something that another factor in their mind
Speaker 4: where they have to make another decision is a spectacular architecture.
Speaker 4: Because that's what you need to do with great players,
Speaker 4: is that you constantly have to make them think about
Speaker 4: you know, the golf course.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean Russia Canyon opened about fifteen minutes from
Speaker 3: where I lived when I was in pri my junior
Speaker 3: year of high school, and.
Speaker 1: We played it a couple of times.
Speaker 3: I think we were just too stupid to know what
Speaker 3: it was, and so it was like thirty five bucks
Speaker 3: and it's like wide open. You're like, oh, on this
Speaker 3: golf course. Is the fairways one hundred yards?
Speaker 1: Wives? This is so stupid.
Speaker 3: But now I look back and I'm like, the second
Speaker 3: hole was two fairways joined together, obie on the left,
Speaker 3: a little pop bunker on what.
Speaker 1: Would be the right side of the fairway.
Speaker 3: And but if you miss right now you've got a
Speaker 3: long iron over bunker and the green runs away from you.
Speaker 3: If you challenge the ob you can just you've got
Speaker 3: open grass in front of the green.
Speaker 1: You can run the.
Speaker 3: Shot up and then you're hitting obviously into the green
Speaker 3: that goes back to front, and it's like, now, looking
Speaker 3: back at it fifteen years later, I'm like, oh, you've
Speaker 3: got to challenge the left side, you know, the obi
Speaker 3: to have a good angle. Back then, we were just
Speaker 3: like this is so stupid. I could hit it anywhere
Speaker 3: and it's in play. And I think that's why what
Speaker 3: you're doing with architecture and stuff will make golf so
Speaker 3: much more interesting because people, I think they just look
Speaker 3: at rankings and like, oh, this is a good golf
Speaker 3: course because this company says it is. This company is
Speaker 3: a bad or this is a bad golf course. But
Speaker 3: people don't appreciate why it's good, why it's bad. Why
Speaker 3: a golf course that maybe they've never heard of is
Speaker 3: a good golf course.
Speaker 1: And I don't know.
Speaker 3: I think that I wish I wish I could go
Speaker 3: back to Rustic Canyon and play it now.
Speaker 1: I would probably love it.
Speaker 3: Back then I just totally was like, oh, this is
Speaker 3: just so pointless. But yeah, so I think that's why.
Speaker 3: I think that's why architecture and a knowledge of it,
Speaker 3: at least just even a basic one, makes golf so
Speaker 3: much better.
Speaker 1: And so much more fun.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it takes It's another thing that takes score out
Speaker 4: of the out of play, like you know, you don't
Speaker 4: if you're if you're out there to experience the golf course.
Speaker 4: You know, if you have a bad day or a
Speaker 4: good day, it doesn't really affect your overall experience.
Speaker 3: But that's the one thing I'm still trying to learn
Speaker 3: and how to like experience the golf course. I used
Speaker 3: to love covering amateur golf because we'd go to US
Speaker 3: Amateur on a great golf course and you can just
Speaker 3: walk down the middle of the fairway and watch people play,
Speaker 3: and so you've got a great idea of the golf course.
Speaker 3: I think when I play, I still get to my
Speaker 3: own game centric and I'm just looking at the shot
Speaker 3: that I've got instead of the whole golf course.
Speaker 2: I think you just got to look around, you know,
Speaker 2: just try and be more observant.
Speaker 4: I get. I get the boost of I take like
Speaker 4: three thousand pictures, so I walk like three golf courses
Speaker 4: when I play, and you know, go and kind of
Speaker 4: look at different angles. But that I think that's the
Speaker 4: big thing is you know, just kind of pay attention
Speaker 4: and think about what your other playing competitors have for shots,
Speaker 4: and you know, how it's different if you're on one
Speaker 4: side versus the other, and you know how different Maybe
Speaker 4: maybe the day's flag positions right in the middle of
Speaker 4: the green, But think about what it would be like
Speaker 4: if that pins back left and where you want to be,
Speaker 4: and you know how the bunker. You know, as you
Speaker 4: start to get going, I think it gets a lot easier,
Speaker 4: and you know, you start to kind of compute everything. Sure,
Speaker 4: So if if you could, having been in the golf
Speaker 4: industry for a long time now, if you could have
Speaker 4: any other.
Speaker 2: Job, what would it be in the golf industry. You
Speaker 2: could have you could be a team player, you could
Speaker 2: be an architect, you could be you could be whatever
Speaker 2: you want in the golf industry. Which which job would you.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's TV announcer, account I don't know what
Speaker 3: that media, that's you could say.
Speaker 2: I'd have my job too. You know, your your own job.
Speaker 1: I like your job. I think I like that. I
Speaker 1: mean your you're your own boss.
Speaker 3: You're probably just sitting there in your bosses right now.
Speaker 3: I don't want to picture hopefully not.
Speaker 1: But like I got thrusted today, okay, good, but I think.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't want to play too stressful too much travel.
Speaker 3: I definitely want to be an architect, so much that
Speaker 3: goes into that beyond just holes. I mean, if I
Speaker 3: had the attitude to be an architect, sure, I'd love
Speaker 3: being architect. But taking my current skill set now that
Speaker 3: will work. But I think I think what you're doing
Speaker 3: is and I'm not kissing you about here, but I
Speaker 3: think what you're doing is great. Just the being your
Speaker 3: own boss, creating something. I think I would probably if
Speaker 3: I knew it would make money. I could feed my
Speaker 3: wife and my son. Probably write books. I love just
Speaker 3: diving into stuff. I think books either you have to
Speaker 3: be they're super famous and.
Speaker 1: They're gonna pay you a big advance.
Speaker 3: You have to have a big enough ego where all
Speaker 3: the hours are worth it just have your name on
Speaker 3: a book, or you just have to be super, super
Speaker 3: super passionate about it.
Speaker 1: It's the the one priority in your life. And I'm
Speaker 1: not famous.
Speaker 3: I don't think my ego is big enough, and I
Speaker 3: don't it's not my n one priority in my life
Speaker 3: because I've got a family. So I would love to
Speaker 3: write a book. I'm not going to any times soon,
Speaker 3: but I think that would be my dream writing.
Speaker 4: A book to me is kind of crazy because like
Speaker 4: I feel like with the way my brain works, like
Speaker 4: i'd be like halfway through and have put like months
Speaker 4: of work into something and then decide in my head
Speaker 4: that it wasn't a good idea.
Speaker 3: For sure, I'm sure every author goes through that. I
Speaker 3: just think that's from a purely just straightforward standpoint, like
Speaker 3: it's a ton of work. It's devoting your life to
Speaker 3: it for a year or more, and I don't unless
Speaker 3: it hits it big, which unfortunately a ton of golf
Speaker 3: books usually don't unless they're just kind of watered, just
Speaker 3: unless there's stuff for the mass audience. But it's a
Speaker 3: ton of work for not a lot of money. So
Speaker 3: I look at the formula that.
Speaker 1: Way, and I'm like, eh, I'm good.
Speaker 2: Maybe one day, maybe we just got to build up
Speaker 2: your ego a little bit more.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there we go.
Speaker 3: Oh I don't my wife and my kid would like that.
Speaker 3: That wouldn't spend any time with them.
Speaker 2: So what's uh, what's who's the best interview you've had?
Speaker 1: An interview I've had?
Speaker 2: Huh?
Speaker 1: I wish I haven't had like a lot.
Speaker 3: Of the let's just sit down and have dinner. Two
Speaker 3: hours to cover everything.
Speaker 1: Man, I'm trying to Gosh, that's a I'll.
Speaker 3: Often tweet at you later and think about that one.
Speaker 1: I really enjoy Russell Knox. Uh.
Speaker 3: He's smart, he's very humble, he gives good answers. I
Speaker 3: appreciate you guys. If one of those guys can help
Speaker 3: tries like sometimes the questions come out perfectly and you
Speaker 3: can tell they're like, I don't know what the heck
Speaker 3: you're asking, but I'm gonna try and make it work
Speaker 3: for you. Or if they do get it, they're like,
Speaker 3: I'm still gonna try to give you the best answer possible.
Speaker 3: The smartest dans are possible.
Speaker 1: Russell Knox is one of those guys.
Speaker 3: He's always been great to me. I think Speak is
Speaker 3: a great interview. I thought Ricky this week, UH did
Speaker 3: a great job in the press room. He was making
Speaker 3: fun of himself.
Speaker 1: He made fun of his height.
Speaker 3: He said his short drive probably looks long because he's short.
Speaker 3: And then when someone asked him what would mean to
Speaker 3: take on the.
Speaker 1: Trophy, he said he would join a small collection.
Speaker 3: So I felt like Ricky was really relaxed and kind
Speaker 3: of funny and gave good answers.
Speaker 1: But I'm not to tweet a you think about that
Speaker 1: one some more.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a self Deprecation's a great, great skill, you know,
Speaker 4: you got best people can self deprecate, you know, and.
Speaker 1: Just can't take yourself too seriously for sure.
Speaker 2: And then so if.
Speaker 4: If we're going to link to one of your stories,
Speaker 4: what story is your favorite one that everyone should read
Speaker 4: that's listened this far, if anybody's still.
Speaker 3: Listening, If anyone still listening, let's put a code word
Speaker 3: at the end, and then they can win a prize
Speaker 3: if they can tweet it.
Speaker 1: Probably my Brian brother's piece.
Speaker 3: I kind of tweeted it this week. I'm like, yeah,
Speaker 3: they did the trick shots, like that's cool, but there's
Speaker 3: so much more to it. Like they grew up in
Speaker 3: rural South Carolina. Their dad with this golf nut who
Speaker 3: started golf in high school and played at South Carolina
Speaker 3: because he just basically.
Speaker 1: Was obsessed with it.
Speaker 3: And then they moved to this old little house with
Speaker 3: an acre of property and he turned it into.
Speaker 1: This like.
Speaker 3: Makeshift golf academy in the backyard. And everyone thinks, oh,
Speaker 3: they grew up in a golf cabinet's being loaded, But
Speaker 3: it wasn't like that. It was just this like homemade
Speaker 3: sort of.
Speaker 1: Golf academy, and he gives lessons. He's a PGA pro.
Speaker 1: They were both really good in college.
Speaker 3: George was actually even better than than Wesley. But like
Speaker 3: I said before, Wesley missed to school the first three
Speaker 3: or four times he was broke. There's a time in
Speaker 3: college he shot one hundred and one in a tournament
Speaker 3: because he Wesley's always kind of made more of the
Speaker 3: miss a lot of fairways, scrambled really well guy, And
Speaker 3: so I think there's just so much more to that
Speaker 3: story than yeah, they did trick shots, Like even they
Speaker 3: both did the trick shots because they were literally broke,
Speaker 3: and they were George was living at home and Wesley
Speaker 3: just moved out with his wife, but they were paying
Speaker 3: the mortgage with her student loans, which isn't a good
Speaker 3: situation to be in. So like I think that one
Speaker 3: is respond. I've known them for a long time. We
Speaker 3: did an instructional article with them and Mike Bender when
Speaker 3: I was a golf week back in like seven, So
Speaker 3: that was a fun one.
Speaker 1: That was a long one.
Speaker 3: And then I wrought about Tiger. If you want a
Speaker 3: Tiger article about in ninety two, Riviera which that was
Speaker 3: fun just to see, uh, just what things were like
Speaker 3: back then as far as I mean Tiger just switched
Speaker 3: for Simmon and uh, just the reaction to people of
Speaker 3: Tiger Woods coming out on tour. He had this thing
Speaker 3: called the Tiger Claw that he did when he made
Speaker 3: Burti Pus where he basically a clawing motion, which I
Speaker 3: would just wish that had survived past the week. I
Speaker 3: think I think it was an early attempt at branding. Yeah,
Speaker 3: but probably those two, probably the Brian brothers would be
Speaker 3: that one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's uh.
Speaker 4: I think that it's it's interesting there's Brian and the
Speaker 4: Brian brothers. They get so much hype and I think that,
Speaker 4: you know, the trick shots got on so much notoriety
Speaker 4: that there's almost like a backlash because of that, and
Speaker 4: it's not really fair. But you know, I you know,
Speaker 4: there's so many other guys on the web dot com tour,
Speaker 4: you know like that would love to have be afforded
Speaker 4: the opportunities that you know, George gets. But that's, uh,
Speaker 4: that's life. It's not all fair. You know, you gotta
Speaker 4: make make your own brand.
Speaker 3: I think that that was ricky, Like everyone acts like
Speaker 3: media attention I'm in the media is owned to blame.
Speaker 3: But media attention is like this meritocracy where now, granted,
Speaker 3: you do wish that people who have success get the
Speaker 3: attention they deserve, and that sometimes we can go too
Speaker 3: far and just pay attention to stuff that's stilly and
Speaker 3: has no has no merit to it over stuff that's
Speaker 3: really important. But like, media attention is not this meritocracy.
Speaker 3: It's you know, I always tell people, like the story
Speaker 3: man does job, goes home to his family and each
Speaker 3: standard with his wife, Like that's a really good way
Speaker 3: to live your life if you're married, Like that's how
Speaker 3: I do it. I try to you know, that's a
Speaker 3: good thing. But that's not gonna be a headline story.
Speaker 3: And so you know, when there's characters on the PGA tour,
Speaker 3: whether it's Ricky or Wesley Bryant, like they're gonna get
Speaker 3: more attention because they're unique. Zach Blair, you know, you've
Speaker 3: had him on here multiple times. Zach gets a ton
Speaker 3: of attention because he's got such a great interest in
Speaker 3: something that's really interesting, and he communicates it so well
Speaker 3: and shares it with the fans so well. And I mean,
Speaker 3: he hasn't won on tour, but he gets a lot
Speaker 3: of media attention because he's different. There's one hundred and
Speaker 3: you know, fifty six guys out there, and there's a
Speaker 3: lot of similarities. And so I think when guys are
Speaker 3: different to get media attention, and that's not hey, it's
Speaker 3: not their fault, but the like just because you get
Speaker 3: a lot of media attention and you don't win as
Speaker 3: much as people think you should, don't mean you have
Speaker 3: to rip a guy.
Speaker 1: So that's my Ricky Saler take.
Speaker 2: I guess, yeah, I think Ricky.
Speaker 4: I think what Ricky does better than anybody, you know,
Speaker 4: is he markets himself. And I think where so much
Speaker 4: of the backlash comes from is when you know, they
Speaker 4: when you look at golf's biggest earners and you see
Speaker 4: a guy, you know, especially younger in his career, he
Speaker 4: who had never won, who's raking in twenty million dollars
Speaker 4: a year in advertise and endorsement, and it's like, you know,
Speaker 4: but he earns that money by you know, doing a
Speaker 4: great job promoting his personal brand. You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Ricky, I think No laing Up tweeted it too.
Speaker 3: Ricky's twenty eight, He's got four tour wins, and two
Speaker 3: really good European Tour wins that probably about as strong.
Speaker 1: As a lot of PGA Tour events. So really he's
Speaker 1: got six wins, like it's a.
Speaker 3: Good and he won a playoff event, and he won
Speaker 3: a players Championship. Wells Fargo is a good event, Honda,
Speaker 3: I mean he's won a golf courses.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I don't know.
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, Jordan Speed has nine wins at whatever,
Speaker 3: fourteen years old. But I mean Ricky's career is off
Speaker 3: to a really good start. We like judge these guys
Speaker 3: in the middle of their career, like that's the last word.
Speaker 3: Like Ricky Fowler is going to retire fifty with four
Speaker 3: PGA Tour victories. When four PGA Tour victories are twenty
Speaker 3: eight probably is a sign that he's going to have
Speaker 3: a good, solid career.
Speaker 1: But he's in the middle of it.
Speaker 3: We don't know what the next half of this go. Like,
Speaker 3: you know, he wins two majors next year, and now
Speaker 3: all of a sudden, it's like, oh.
Speaker 1: Well, it turns out he was actually pretty good and
Speaker 1: did what we thought he should.
Speaker 3: You know, I don't know, So I think it's so
Speaker 3: hard judging guys in the middle of their career because
Speaker 3: so much can change so quickly.
Speaker 2: I think that people he does everything so well too.
Speaker 4: You know, he's long, he's got a great he's you
Speaker 4: know when it's when he's putting well, he's you know,
Speaker 4: spectacular putter, and you know everything he does looks really good.
Speaker 4: It's you know, I think the other aspect of it
Speaker 4: is like, there's only four majors every.
Speaker 3: Year, and this person gonna win a major this year,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, honestly, they're probably not.
Speaker 4: It's like what we talked about under It's like what
Speaker 4: we talked about earlier, is that there's four majors and
Speaker 4: you know there's conceivably, you know, thirty to fifty guys
Speaker 4: on on in professional golf that if you said to me, hey,
Speaker 4: this guy's gonna win a major this year, I'd be like, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 4: I could. That could happen. Like Danny Willett last year's
Speaker 4: perfect example. Nobody was picking Danny Willett, but I wasn't
Speaker 4: at all surprised that.
Speaker 2: The guy won.
Speaker 4: He's, you know, he's former number one amateur player in
Speaker 4: the world, had won a ton on the European Tour.
Speaker 2: Like that is that's not surprising. He drives it well,
Speaker 2: he putts well, like you know that.
Speaker 4: And it's like you look at you know, there's only
Speaker 4: four majors, so in when fifty guys can win, your
Speaker 4: chances are pretty small, right, So I mean what Phill.
Speaker 1: Won it first?
Speaker 3: Phill won a first major at thirty four, And I've
Speaker 3: got five majors and hen Rich just won his first major.
Speaker 1: I mean, it happens. It takes a while.
Speaker 3: And yeah, again, just because it's only four of them
Speaker 3: a year, I mean, you can pick four random events.
Speaker 3: You could say, like is Ricky gonna win Travelers Genesis,
Speaker 3: you know, pick four random events, like the odds are no,
Speaker 3: Like he's not gonna win those events, just because pick
Speaker 3: any four events and then especially take them on the
Speaker 3: hardest golf courses against the toughest field, and like the
Speaker 3: odds are against it because it's just so hard to do.
Speaker 2: It's uh.
Speaker 4: I mean, and then you know, like he won the Players,
Speaker 4: that's that's a major. That's the best field in golf.
Speaker 3: Hey man, here's saying my tune.
Speaker 1: I'll probably get a raised you saying that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel dirty. I'm gonna have to take a shower.
Speaker 4: But the but yeah, I mean the play, the fact
Speaker 4: that the players you know, compare like you know, their
Speaker 4: their fields stronger than the US Open field.
Speaker 2: But it's not major. It's like, well it's uh, but hey,
Speaker 2: it is what it is. So hey, I appreciate you
Speaker 2: coming on.
Speaker 4: I don't want to take up too much of your time.
Speaker 4: I'm sure that you guys got a lot of stuff
Speaker 4: going on over there at PGA Tour h Q, and uh,
Speaker 4: don't want to get in trouble with any of your bosses.
Speaker 1: Sure.
Speaker 3: I usually just next to DJ and we just talk
Speaker 3: about things on Twitter and then do some work.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, it's uh, it's a different, different life.
Speaker 4: I gotta, I gotta, I gotta get down for this
Speaker 4: year's players though, for sure, and uh, thank you.
Speaker 3: I mean I never went to the Players before I
Speaker 3: started working here.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 3: And it's it's an underrated event. Uh It's it's cool,
Speaker 3: so I highly recommend it.
Speaker 1: I'll be here.
Speaker 3: We're trying to I'm trying to rally some people to
Speaker 3: get here. Tron might be here, Kyle Porter might be here,
Speaker 3: so we're.
Speaker 4: You never know, Yeah, I'll get out of my my
Speaker 4: cave here. I just got to look at the dates,
Speaker 4: but I think i'll probably probably probably take the plunge
Speaker 4: and head down there. Sounds good, all right man, Well
Speaker 4: be well and thanks for all the time.
Speaker 1: I'm good, thank you all right, bye bye