Over the Green

With the canceling and non-renewal of tournament sponsorships professional golf seems to be locked into a cycle which may mean fewer events and even smaller purses not to mention declining dollars for support of touring players from club makers.

Last weekend saw the final Corning Classic on the LPGA Tour after more than 30 years and almost every week another negative item makes news.

However, Dick’s Sporting Goods is standing tall. The retailer has resigned as sponsor of the Champions Tour event in Endicott, N.Y. for another three years. So not all the news is bad.

Prior to playing the new Pete Dye designed course at French Lick Resort (French Lick, Indiana) I asked the designer, Pete Dye, what I could expect. His answer proved to be on the money.

“Bring your best game and keep it in the fairway,” said Dye, who along with wife Alice are creators of some of the most highly regarded courses around the world. “This is the best inland site Alice and I have ever worked on.” More…

So how bad is the golf business?
Actually in talking with some course operators, not bad. They have had to cut their rates but there are still players around if not on some days a lot of players.

On the positive side, equipment maker Tour Edge creators of some very good clubs in recent years have added new reps in the Southeast and Plains states plus are starting a call center to supplement outside sales.

Of course as mentioned here yesterday MacGregor is gone as a standalone company, now part of the Golfsmith’s stable and word going around at recent golf media meeting was Nickent is in serious trouble.

Another positive though, one ball company (Bridgestone – they have clubs but really don’t seem interested in anything but ball sales) say sales were up 40%. But of course that’s in a market dominated by Acushnet with almost 60% and everyone else way back.

Golfsmith International Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOLF) has bought the MacGregor Golf name and so one of the game’s most venerable companies becomes just another house brand joining Walter Hagen, Maxfli and Slazenger which are owned by Dick’s Sporting Goods.

As has been reported here MacGregor has been in trouble for some time and even ownership and input from Greg Norman couldn’t resurrect the brand.

The final nail in the coffin was when TaylorMade Golf announced the Great White Shark was becoming a member of their touring staff.

Too bad but a sign of the times.

With the non-renewal of LG’s sponsorship the Skins Game is no more.

IMG, owners and managers of the event, said they couldn’t find a replacement sponsor and so were going to try for a rebirth in 2010. The Skins Game has been a staple of the so-called “Silly Season,” events played after the close of the PGA Tour season generally with hefty prize money and sometimes with unusual formats.

In other words having a high percentage chance of being ‘fun’ for the players rather than the mind-numbing concentration they must undertake week to week which also means these events generally are fun for the spectators. Golf entertainment at its best.

In the case of the Skins Game though, the event unfortunately had become irrelevant. When begun in 1983 it attracted immense attention with a dream cast of Palmer, Player, Nicklaus and Watson and even Vin Scully as the announcer. In subsequent years other golf greats played such as Trevino, Sorenstam, Norman, Stewart and Floyd. And then of course there is Fred Couples, who made the entire second season almost an annual annuity winning millions over the years in the Skins Game and other post season events.

I’m not going to miss the Skins Game even though a few times recently Mickelson and Woods have played (not won but played) since recent fields haven’t been what could be called exciting. The past three winners for example were K.J. Choi, Stephen Ames and Stephen Ames. Fine gentlemen I’m sure and fine golfers no doubt, but certainly not exciting personalities on a par with the players mentioned in the previous paragraph.

So my interest and the interest of lots of other golf fans has waned and now so too the Skins Game.

IMG says it’s only a hiatus and the Skins Game will be back next year but let’s hope the rebirth is stronger and more attractive.

GPS devices are helpful even if most of your rounds are on the same course since guesswork is removed. Knowing the distance to hazards, the pin or the front/back of the green is obviously
needed information to select both the correct club and line of play. The GPS yardage measuring devices on the market all seem to do the job, some perhaps with varying degrees of success and
there are a couple l really like.

However one GPS device in particular has earned its way to be a permanent accessory in my bag and it’s the SkyGolf SkyCaddie SG5. After rounds using just about every one of the competing devices (sometimes as many as three at a time) I found the SG5 is a clear winner. It’s certainly not the least expensive and does require an additional cost of annual membership, so this isn’t just opting for the cheap way out. More…

According to the PGA of America rounds played in 2009’s first quarter were up modestly compared to 2008. Actually the reported 1.9% increase could be viewed as at best holding even and there was an even more telling statistic in the data. Golf course revenue numbers (greens/cart fees, restaurant and merchandise) saw a 10% slump from the year earlier and you may recall a year ago things weren’t exactly great.

The golf business is suffering right along with the rest of us. The professional tours are seeing declines in tournament attendance and television viewership. It’s been well reported both the LPGA Tour and the PGA Tour are having troubles keeping and finding tournament sponsors even ones that aren’t auto companies or banks.

This all has had an effect on the golf club manufacturers and retailers as evidenced by the discounting of club prices by among others, Callaway and TaylorMade along with introduction of clubs touted for having great performance but at lower prices.

This week Acushnet Co., whose Titleist and Pinacle brands claim 60% of the ball market, laid off 169 workers due to poor sales. The company also had the about the same number of layoffs back in January.

So the immediate outlook for the industry is glum but times will improve just as they have in the past when golf went through other declines.