Over the Green

Any journalist receives press releases. Emails, faxes, telephone calls from people with an agenda, usually to get you to write something nice about their newest, latest and greatest whatever. That’s OK though; they have a job to do but frankly most of these epistles, whatever form they take, get ignored, tossed, deleted and waste canned.

Therefore when the news of a different approach to retailing golf equipment popped up and particularly since it didn’t have anything to do with the ubiquitous Internet sales, the interest button was pushed. MORE…

Let’s see, the world’s number one female golfer is hanging up her spikes for what seem like pretty straight forward reasons-desire (i.e., lack of) and family.

Lorena Ochoa can be congratulated for making a life decision though at 28 years of age she was no doubt gong to be in the Hall of Fame except now she won’t have had the request ten years on the LPGA Tour to qualify. She leaves with the memory of the previous world number one Annika Sorenstam’s retirement still fresh.

So what does this all mean for the LPGA Tour? MORE…

By Carolyn McCool

Everyday is a winding road, as Sheryl Crow would sing. Everyday is a day of new headlines. Today would be no different for the golf world. Headlines read that Lorena Ochoa is retiring.

Surprised? Maybe. Shocked? Not in the least. Last year when I saw and interacted with Lorena at the Women’s US Open at my home course in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, I knew a lot was on her gracious soul and mind. Her petite frame made her small but her smile, golf power, and personal communication style made her very large. As I spoke to her and wished her well on her upcoming tournament, I could see her fire was burning somewhere else.

It was known and being spoken about in every place that Lorena had other things on her mind, like love. She was planning a wedding. She was in another world that asked different things of her. She was contemplating her future while she was doing what she was given to the world to do, play golf and spread goodwill to whatever she touched.
She was known to cook breakfast and mingle with Mexican grounds’ workers at tournament sites.

She spoke to anyone who spoke to her and she made you feel like what you said mattered to her. She appreciated and loved her home country and wore its flag and heritage with pride. She was a foreign player here in the US but nothing was really foreign about Lorena. She was as “native” to any place she traveled to or played golf at because she loved what she was doing and appreciated why she could do it.

She did not win the US Women’s Open last year nor was she much in the “talk” of the actual tournament happenings at Saucon Valley. It didn’t seem to matter to her, she had “fires” burning somewhere else in a place where her passions could fan.

After marrying in December and now announcing her retirement, the golf world has been tipped on its side a little. How can she walk away when she has made the points qualifications for the LPGA Hall of Fame induction requirement after eight years on tour, but not the ten year requirement some have asked? It is a question her fans and commentators will ask but she will answer.

For now, she has. Something has given Lorena more to live for, more to give for and golf’s gracious and great Mexican player has signed up for a passion and life she wants. She knows she is getting more and golf will always be something that gave that to her.

Carolyn McCool is a freelance writer and lives in Bethlehem, PA, with her husband and twin sons. Lorena Ochoa has always been one of her favorite players.

A lot of golfers felt a twinge of sadness when the venerable club manufacturer MacGregor bit the dust after spending its’ last years traveling down a tortured path of mismanagement and misfortune.

The company which started making clubs in 1897 had for several decades produced the clubs of choice for the best golfers in the world. Those who played MacGregor seemed like a Hall of Fame roster. Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson, Jimmy Demaret, Jack Nicklaus, Tom Watson and dozens of other premier players all won with MacGregors at some point in their careers.

However by the end of the twentieth century MacGregor, having been sold in the late 1960’s by the founder’s family to Brunswick Corporation was then sold and bought and sold and bought by a succession of other owners including Jack Nicklaus, finally wound up in the portfolio of a private investment company run by the flamboyant and passionate Barry Schneider. Schneider vowed a restoration of MacGregor Golf to its’ glory years but was unsuccessful due to a failure to market clubs capable of catching the public’s attention and other management missteps. MORE…

The headline could be, “Masters victor overcomes personal problems & wins.”

That winner of course was Phil Mickelson not Tiger Woods. It was Mickelson who posted a convincing triumph over the emotions from watching both his wife and mother battle cancer as well as, almost incidentally, trouncing the field by three shots. Lefty displayed both an inner strength of character plus his world class ability to play this very difficult game under stressful circumstances.

The 2010 Masters should not be looked at as a morality play with the guy in a white hat overcoming the black hats though already the post mortems being written are sounding that way. Plus it was not Woods failure to play winning golf that defined the four days at Augusta National Golf Club (in spite of the pre-tournament odds making him the favorite those who understand tournament golf did not gave him a serious chance – too much baggage).

This year’s rendition of golf’s classic symphony was defined by the incredibly steady play of Mickelson, who has been the poster child for major-losing misjudgments, with three rounds of 67 and a “bad round of 71”…amazing.

There were flashes of the less consistent Phil though. At the time some questioned his choice to hit his second shot on 13 between two trees from a lie in pine straw, over water to mounded green notoriously hard to hold. But Lefty said later the lie was good and the gap between the trees was much wider than it looked on television, in essence a shot only slightly harder than normal…amazing.

His four-foot putt for eagle missed but the birdie had the fat lady singing.

Woods on the other hand did not play up to his standard of the past, venting his anger with profanity both Saturday and Sunday making it obvious more work is required on a lot of things with the golf game not highest on that list. The world’s number one finished T-4, said he was taking time off and doesn’t know when he will play again…amazing

Billy Payne, chairman of Augusta National Golf Club, in his annual pre-Masters press conference voiced strong disapproval of Tiger Woods and his scandal-generating behavior. Though that’s the substance of the story whizzing around the Internet and permeating talk television by some who revel for another chance to rehash the details of Woods’ behavior (the nudge-nudge-giggle-smirk crowd) and some who need to rationalize it (the “boys will be boys” and “it’s all in the past” bunch), it is not the most important story.

What overshadows it is a simple obvious fact; Payne had the courage to speak out.

Payne stood up saying decent people were offended, angry at the betrayal of someone promoted as a role model for children and that he was hopeful Woods had learned his lesson with the professed reform of his behavior becoming a fact.

Good for Payne and good for Augusta National.

He could have mouthed a few platitudes and let it go at that. Confronting what has transpired was not the easy way to handle the situation.

Meanwhile, Nike released its’ latest broadcast commercial featuring Woods. In the 30-second black and white ad the world’s number one stands mute and unsmiling in front of the camera with a voiceover from his father. The key line from Earl Woods’ monologue has to be, “Did you learn anything?”

You will recall Nike was one of the few companies to not fire Woods after the news of his extramarital affairs became public. Nike stood by him, probably rationalizing this will all blow over and his value as an endorser will return. The wisdom of that decision remains to be seen.

The press conference Tiger Woods held yesterday is now being analyzed for facts, implications and nuances but the most important thing coming from the half hour he spent in front of the media was his obvious determination to move on.

It’s not appropriate to comment on what he and his family are doing or talking about but as far as the public is concerned the only thing that should matter is he confessed, showed contrition, is doing his penance and now can be forgiven. Well, maybe for some, while others will never get over the hurt he caused them, but on the other hand nobody ever said life was without pain or disappointment.

So, for those nursing negative emotions about Tiger and his duplicity now is the time as they used to say back when I was playing pickup baseball as a 12-year old, “Rub some dirt on it and get back in the game.”

Of course there appears to an unanswered or perhaps an inadequately answered question about Dr. Anthony Galea, performance enhancing drugs and why Woods thought a Canadian doctor, (unlicensed in the U.S.) was somehow the medico of choice. Sorry, “All the other guys are doing it,” didn’t work as a kid and doesn’t now.

The other two important things about Woods yesterday was what seemed to be more relaxed manner and one might even venture that he displayed a new found maturity taking on tough questions head on. Secondly was the widely reported fact he smiled, nodded and otherwise acknowledged some of the thousands of fans during his practice round with Freddie Couples. Both are welcomed; let’s hope both behaviors are here to stay.

Golf needs a healthy, engaged Tiger.

Jim Thorpe turned himself in yesterday and began his one-year prison sentence. The three time winner on the PGA Tour was convicted of not paying income tax on $5.2 million he earned in prize money and endorsements from 2002 through 2004.

Thorpe will serve the time in a minimum security prison located on Maxwell-Gunter Air Force Base near Montgomery, Ala. Upon release he must pay $1.6 million in taxes plus penalties and interest for a total of over $2 million. In addition he must do 200 hours of community service during two years of supervised release.

Those are the facts as they might appear in your local newspaper but they don’t tell anything close to the whole story.

Thorpe, one of golf’s real characters, made it as a golf hustler until his 1973 marriage and has the dubious distinction after getting his PGA Tour card of being the player Oklahoma State amateur Scott Verplank beat in a playoff for the 1985 Western Open. Thorpe did get his first tour win a month later in Milwaukee but this only served to fuel his lifelong fascination with horse racing and gambling.

He came into his own when he “graduated” to the Champions (nee Senior) Tour where the 61-year old won 13 times. The twirling finish to his swing could be spotted two fairways away and his competitive nature never got in the way of his enthusiastic, some would say profane, personality.

Though he attended Morgan State College on a football scholarship, golf was his love. Thorpe’s early years growing up were spent at Roxboro Country Club in the rolling hills of North Carolina where his father was greens superintendent. There were 12 children in the Thorpe household and Jim was number nine but not the only one to play professionally. Brother Chuck played on both the PGA Tour and the Champions Tour though not with Jim’s success.

Its sad Thorpe ended up in prison. Golf could use more “characters” like Thorpey.

As the world awaits Tiger Woods return to competitive golf at next week’s Masters the media won’t seem to let him alone, publishing and broadcasting all manner of stories.

Two examples.

Vanity Fair magazine, the pub you will remember with the cover story of an “edgier Tiger” that had some less than flattering photos appearing just after the Nov. 27 auto accident, has hit the streets with an accounting by a former member of Team Tiger of how Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley were an early part of the problem. Plus on the VF website it’s reported several of Woods staff not only knew of Woods’ extracurricular activities but helped with the arrangements and cover up.

Yesterday CNBC dug out information from Golfsmith showing Tiger Woods branded Nike items had an increase in sales of eight percent in the five months since the post-Thanksgiving accident that began the public scrutiny. Golfsmith’s CEO said though the TW items had discount pricing, it wasn’t extreme just normal end of the year price concessions.

Both stories are more of a commentary on what seems to be a never ending fascination with the details of Woods screw up. Now that he has committed to coming back into the public eye is there any doubt coverage at the Masters (and maybe even the next several tournaments) will redefine “media circus”?

No, the end is not in sight…unfortunately.