The Fall Series

A lot of people aren't even bothering to watch the remaining few events on the PGA Tour. That's too bad because there are some great stories to follow. And the announcers on the Golf Channel are really focusing on the money list, throwing up projected numbers every so often. I think it's important to note that David Duval had four really solid rounds this week at the Viking Classic. Hopefully, this will propel him into a really great year next year. I think they said earlier in the week that he wasn't planning on playing any other events this year. Maybe he'll change his mind.

So, some people I'll be watching in the next few weeks are Billy Andrade and Lee Janzen. I know Andrade will be playing more, but I don't know about Janzen. And I have no idea where Brad Faxon is lately.

Presidents Cup Final Day

Again, I didn't watch much of this. I saw Mike Weir go 3 up on Tiger and Tiger hit it out of bounds and then switched over to women's tennis on the tennis channel. So, I searched the web for the results. Only took about 40 minutes to find a website that would load the information. Have I mentioned how much I hate all the video and graphics on these websites? Anyway, looking at the results I have some observations:

Mike Weir made one great Captain's Pick. He beat Tiger head to head. When are people going to start admitting the truth - Tiger isn't good at matchplay, he isn't good at team events, and his #1 status doesn't count for beans in these team events. How many people have to beat him at matchplay before people see this? O'Hern, Micheel, and now Weir. The list is growing.

Scott Verplank is continuing to make Tom Lehman's decision to set him out of much of the matches of the Ryder Cup last year look really, really stupid.

Lucas Glover began his quest for a spot on the Ryder Cup with this event - he won a point so at least he wasn't shut out.

Steve Stricker ended up winning 3 points it looks like. He's one of my picks for next year's Ryder Cup (see the sidebar). We'll see how close my line-up gets to the real thing next fall.

Angel Cabrera, a favorite of mine, won 2 points this time around. You would think he would do well in a team event like this. He's a shot maker kind of player and goes for broke.

Retief Goosen won his Sunday match despite all the announcers dogging him and claiming he was doing absolutely nothing for the International team.

It's very premature for the announcers to say that Paul Azinger needs to consider Woody Austin for the Ryder Cup team. That's a year away and who knows how Woody will be playing next fall.

Seve Trophy

The Team of Great Britain and Ireland won the Seve Trophy today over the team of Continental Europe. Once again I didn't get to see much of it. I took the puppies to my parents' house for their weekly visit. You know, they kept saying that the Seve Trophy was a warm up for the Ryder Cup. They don't say that about the Presidents Cup. Frankly, I don't see how the Seve Trophy could be a warm up for the Ryder Cup when those players aren't playing against Americans. I'd say that the Seve Trophy just keeps things even in terms of matchplay experience. The Americans play the Presidents Cup in the off year, and so the Europeans have a matchplay event of their own to play.

Ryder Cup News

The big news this week is Paul McGinley's decision to resign as assistant. People are trying to turn this into a bigger story by suggesting McGinley was ticked that there are no Irish players on the GB and I team at the Seve Trophy competition, in fact some are reporting that McGinley turned down the World Cup qualifier because he was expecting to be named a wild card pick for the GB & I team. If McGinley is upset over Ireland's lack of representation in golf events, then he's going about it the right way - deciding to improve his level of play and represent his country whenever he can as a player. Some people questioned the timing of McGinley's decision - just before the Seve Trophy was to begin. Well, the sooner the better is my way of thinking - Nick can concentrate on finding someone else and McGinley doesn't have to wrestle with the decision, having it affect his play until finally jumping off the fence.

Seve Trophy

It would be a lot better if it wasn't raining. And Justin Rose isn't putting all that great. But the score is close, just one point separating the two teams. It's too bad we don't get to see all the matches.

Presidents Cup

I haven't been watching much of this but I do have a few observations:

Mike Weir is an excellent Captain's Pick
Steve Stricker is doing great

Woody Austin is the big star of the Cup so far. He is a fiery competitor. It's too bad you don't see that kind of desire out of Woods and Furyk. This is one of the things that Paul Azinger and other Ryder Cup people have to consider - having people on the team who want to be there, instead of the people who earn the most points who see the Ryder Cup as another chore. Has anyone else noticed that it isn't the really big stars doing the best out there? I would love to comment on more of the players but it's taking forever for any of the stupid golf websites that would have the scores to load. Curse Broadband technology that's ruining the internet for us dial up people. Too much crappy video and graphics on websites causing them to load too slowly.

This Sounds Like a Really Good Book!

I received an email from Erikk at Skyhorse Publishing telling me about this book and asking that I mention it on my blog. I would be glad to mention it - I love quotes. And $24.95 isn't a bad price for an 800 page hardcover book, of course Amazon is selling it for even less! Click here to get to Amazon's listing.

Here's the blurb and the book info:

The Gigantic Book of Golf Quotations
Edited and Introduced by Jim Apfelbaum
Foreword by Arnold Palmer
$24.95 Hardcover with jacket
800 pages / 7 x 9¼ / ISBN13: 9781602390140

An inspiring collection of wise, and wisecracking, quotations from golf's greatest players—an amazing gift for any golfer.
An adage about sports writing says, "The smaller the ball, the better the writing." The 3,000+ quotations that make up The Gigantic Book of Golf Quotations prove that saying true. Quotes range from the hilarious ("It took me seventeen years to get 3,000 hits in baseball. I did it in one afternoon on the golf course"—Hank Aaron) to the thought-provoking ("The most important shot in golf is the next one"—Ben Hogan).
These are just some of the names included:
Mitch Albom / Winston Churchill / Bing Crosby / John Daly / Dwight D. Eisenhower / John Feinstein / F. Scott Fitzgerald / Raymond Floyd / Gerald Ford / Ernest Hemingway / Ben Hogan / Bob Hope / Samuel L. Jackson / Bobby Jones / Michael Jordan / Bill Murray / Byron Nelson / Jack Nicklaus / P.J. O'Rourke / Harvey Penick / George Plimpton / Rick Reilly / Frank Sinatra / Annika Sorenstam / John Updike / Kathy Whitworth / Tiger Woods…and hundreds more!

This is the ultimate gift book for every golfer—and everyone who's lucky enough to own it will browse through again and again.

Sunday Wrap-up

Lee Westwood won in Europe today at the Belfry. Ian Poulter came in second. Stephen Dodd won a Jaguar for being closest to the pin on one of the holes.

In America, Steve Flesch won today. It's his second win of the season. A lot of focus on the top 125 and people trying to get their cards. Kelly Tilghman put me to sleep with her voice. Seriously, I took a nap earlier and got up to watch the final round. About an hour later, I had to take another nap.

On the Champions Tour, Mark Wiebe won the SAS championship. He's a rookie this year and he is now exempt through next year.

Updated Link

I updated the sidebar link to the Presidents Cup - it now says 2007. And I've added a link to the Seve Trophy website (the contest of Great Britain and Ireland vs. Continental Europe).

It appears that Rory Sabbatini and Geoff Ogilvy are rookies on the International team.

On the U.S. side, the rookies are: Woody Austin, Lucas Glover, and Hunter Mahan. The website is interesting in that for Glover and Mahan, their profiles say "Country: US" instead of "Birthplace". They are on the U.S. Team - of course their country is the U.S. Could the operators of the website not find out where these two guys were born? I'm sure it's in a media guide somewhere.

I don't know how much of this I will watch. The Seven Trophy is also being contested this coming week. Some particpants in the Seve Trophy: Paul Casey, Justin Rose, Colin Montgomerie, Miguel Angel Jimenez, Gonzalo Fernandez Castano, Soren Hansen.

I think I'd rather watch the Seve Trophy.

Insulting

I just read the article on Seve Ballesteros in the October issue of Golf Magazine. Unlike the honest but respectful article written about David Feherty's troubles with depression, this article on Seve was pretty insulting, suggesting repeatedly that he is, for a lack of a better description, washed up. Even going so far as to suggest some illness he suffered in June was perhaps attempted suicide. Seve denies that and his manager reported that the visit to the hospital was related to an irregular heartbeat.

The tone of this article was depressing, snarky, and just plain rude. Rather than the Goodbye to a Legend article I was expecting, what I got was a mean-spirited look at one of Golf's greatest players.

Next time Golf Magazine wants to interview a legend, they can hire me to do it. I'd even write a respectful article about Tiger Woods.

Saturday Notes

1. It was Mike Ritz who said during one of the updates that Ian Poulter had been on last year's Ryder Cup team. Wrong.

2. Why do the PGA Tour events have to change their names? I have no idea what these tournaments were called last year. How am I supposed to have memories of last year's events which will make me want to watch this year, if I don't know what these tournaments used to be?

3. Watched the European Tour coverage today. A lot of checkered pants.

I like this Tiger-Free part of the season. Don't know if I'll watch the PGA tour today. Jeff Gove is in contention but I believe he may have been one of the belly-aching whiners complaining about Michelle Wie at the John Deere Classic. I know I commented on that incident, I'll have to search my blog to see if I can find it.

A New Website for Peter Jacobsen

Check out Peter Jacobsen's new website. He says it replaces his blogger blog. Those of us on Blogger are saddened to see that he has left us, but let's support his new website.

New Blog & Website

Check out: The Society of Secret Golfers. The blogger is prolific and has some interesting points of view and there's a forum for members to discuss a variety of topics. I will have to dig deeper into this website as there are several mentions of Sergio and I'm not altogether convinced if they are good or bad references :)

Good News

Sergio is all the way up to 8th in the world now! Yay! I don't know how he did it. It seems like he had only about three good tournaments so far this year. Instead of calling him El Nino, they need to call him El Mago (according to Babelfish that's spanish for The Magician).

It's Over

Now that the Tiger Woods Retirement Fundraiser (aka The Fed Ex Cup) is over, maybe I'll get to see Sergio play in Spain. I think there are two or three tournaments in Spain coming up, including the European Tour Championship.

LPGA Notes

I watched some of the Solheim Cup today. I got the sense that things are much more hostile for the women than they are for the men of the Ryder Cup. Dottie Pepper kept talking about agreements and rules and such as if every little thing has to be spelled out or else all heck breaks loose. Women fight over the littlest thing? Crazy, I know. Where do people get these ideas? The Americans won the Solheim Cup and I'm sure there will be many people writing about what the American men can learn from the American women. I'm not going to get into that. The biggest thing I want to talk about is Suzann Petterson and her caddie. Her caddie puts his hand on the side of her face to help her with alignment in her practice swings. I'd like to see Mark Calcavecchia's caddie try that. This is the biggest problem I have with the LPGA Tour. The caddies help the women way too much on lining up their shots and stuff.

Pointless Sounds Right

I was in the kitchen washing dishes and listening to the Champions Tour coverage. They asked some of the Champions Tour players about the Fed Ex Cup. The announcer said about the "Points List". Sounded like pointless to me. Anyway, one of the players said that they should make the playoffs a three tournament event because of these guys who don't play four in a row, you know, guys like Tiger and Phil (1 and 2 in the world). Yeah, those two are at a BIG disadvantage, they should throw them a bone. Not.

It is utterly ridiculous that all of these players are even suggesting that the PGA Tour schedule should be tailored around a player's willingness to play. First of all, if you're going to 'win' $10 million, then you should be made to work a little extra for it, put some effort into it, conquer something for Pete's sake. Tiger should be forced to play all 4 events if he wants to win. As should Phil and any other player who just can't play four weeks in a row. Secondly, if we're just going to throw $10 Million away on a 'mmm, I'll play if I feel like it" approach, then why not have appearance fees for all US PGA Tour events? It's obvious some of the players don't seem to want to work for money, so just give it to them. They can appear for one round, get their fee, withdraw, and then take their rest. I mean, we just can't expect them to work four whole rounds in a row. That's just too gruelling for these elite pro athletes.

Sure, it might bankrupt the sponsors and fans won't want to buy tickets or watch tv coverage, but as long as the players are rich-uh, I mean happy, that's all that matters.

How Wonderful

I just have to say how wonderful it is to have LPGA golf all morning and European Tour golf in the afternoon opposite the PGA Tour Tour Championship. I don't have to watch yucky Tiger at all.

New Blog

Got an email from Mike Pederson asking that I check out his blog. Looks like there's a lot of content on this blog that many people would find useful. So, here it is: Perform Better Golf.

You should check it out. He's obviously invested a lot of time and effort in it.

Open Letter to Jose Maria Olazabal

Dear Jose Maria,

You're not missing anything here in America with the Fed Ex Cup. It appears the sum and total effect of the Fed Ex Cup on the PGA Tour will be to make Tiger richer. Like he, the other golfers, or the fans, needed that. You were very smart to decide to just rest up that knee. While I miss seeing you, I'm hoping to see you soon somewhere on the European Tour.

Your honorary puppy, PJ, is doing well. Although we have had a few problems with the puppy pad training, she is quickly learning that if she uses her puppy pad, I will give her a treat. Just like a female to respond to gifts.

In closing, I would just like to say that I look forward to watching the WGC World Cup event staged on your course at Mission Hills in China later in the year. As it's a sure bet Tiger won't be there, the entertainment factor for me will very high.

Your Big Fan,
Miranda