I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
And when I find my ball in a Frida Egg Friday Egg, the dreaded Friday Friday, Frida Egg brid Egg, Friday Bride Egg, Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the course.
Welcome back to another edition of the Friday Egg Golf Podcast. I'm your host, Andy Johnson. Happy New Year. I hope everybody had is off to great start in twenty twenty four. I hope you all had a great holiday season in twenty twenty three. I'm not gonna lie. I'm still kind of shaking off the holiday blues. Getting firing back up the pod. I was, uh, I was, you know, it was it was nice. I was excited to check golf with Shane Bacon, but I also was I was, like,
a week off was pretty nice. It had been a while since I had kind of a week off of off of work. So we're back expecting a really great twenty twenty four. Shane, who's on the podcast, he's gonna be doing more and more with us at Friday Golf,
so we're really excited about that. And caught up with him to talk about a little bit some parting thoughts on twenty twenty three and then some thoughts on twenty twenty four, which devolved, you know, into a discussion about the broadcast booth for NBC that's opened that I didn't expect, you know, brought it up in passing and it kind of ended up being a big focal topic of the pod. So thanks to Shane for coming on. And before we jump in with Shane, our sponsor today is Club TFE.
If you want to be a better golf fan, better golf you know, you want to be a bigger golf enthusiast for twenty twenty four. If that's your new year's resolution, I'm sure. I'm sure. If you've got non golfing significant other, they'd love to hear that. But if you're if you want to dive into golf, if you want to get really into it, get into architecture. We're gonna have more diverse, a lot more subject matter in Club tf this year. But if you want to get into it, sign up
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we expect a really big second year. It launched January one of twenty twenty three, so this is the second year of it. And one of the great things about it is you can go back and you get all the stuff that we wrote. A lot of it is still as good as the day we wrote it in there. Like our course profiles, there are I think forty six course profiles for you guys to peruse in there if you sign up. So jump in, join the membership, become a Club TFFE member, and now let's get to Shane. Shane,
welcome back another new year. Are you a big resolution guy? Are you in New Year's resolution guy?
No, we we've started doing like extremely attainable things, like what's something that's attainable that's not a year long process, but maybe you want to do a little thing different. We lived in this house now andy since twenty March of twenty one, so we'll be coming up on three years. We've never had like full grass before, you know, like seated and sold it and all that. And you know in this and now with the putting green I have in the backyard, there's not a ton of grass to
do that too. But I told my wife yesterday, my quote unquote New Year's resolution is to have like a grass yard this year. So that's I feel like that's extremely attainable. Like we could do that this year.
You know, maybe maybe you could get a local agronomus to stop by and uh.
You know, anybody sending my way, please thank you.
You know, if you got a lot of shade, they might have a different grass recommendation. Try and make your life easy.
Yeah, I would like multiple strains, is what I'm thinking, So as we if we could introduce multiple like exactly how do I need to like do we need to have water more in one part of the yard than the other part of the yard. And we're also andy. We're also so my kids this year are going to be five and two, and we threw around the idea of getting a trampoline as their Christmas present, but we
live in Connecticut. Connecticut, it's not extremely trampoline weather right now, but I think we're going to do trampoline like mid Mar early April, and so we have also got to factor that into the this to the grass. But what about you? Are you doing a resolution?
You know, I'm not like a resolution guy. I do do make decisions and try and stick with them. Last year, I gave up soda. I didn't have a soda all year last year.
Real quick, let me let me interject. Were you a what was your soda A choice?
I mean I didn't drink a lot of soda, but oh.
Yeah, I know. I'm the same way. Like I'll have one on an airplane.
I'll have I'll have like a I would have like a coke, okay, just a regular regular. I don't do the diet stuff. I think the diet coke might be worse for you than regular coke. I don't want to go down that that rabbit hole. But I just gave up soda. It was crazy because like I didn't even really notice, and then it was like October and I really wanted a soda one day and I was like, oh, I haven't had one of these all year.
Now, will you bring those back into your life in twenty.
Four I don't think so. I think I'm done with them, okay, but this year. So something that's stuck with me all year. Last year was in the US Open, they interviewed Novak Djokovic's wife and they asked what Novak liked to do at home, okay, and she was just like, you know, he just stretches all the time. And they're like, what stretches all the time? They like ask some questions and she's like, yeah, we'll watch TV stretches the entire time.
So my kind of this year, my thing's going to be like I'm going to really focus on trying to stretch every day, just like it's super easy to do, but it's super hard to do, right, Like something very attainable. But like if I'm just I feel like, if you're just more flexible, life is easier. It's easier to get out of bed, it's easier to pick up your kid. Like it just there's no excuse either. It's like the easiest thing to do in the world. If you're watching TV,
you could just stretch while you watch TV. It's like, legitimately the easiest thing to do. I'm gonna try and do it, but it's like one of those hard things to do well.
I mean, it pulls you off the couch, right, which is you know, the place you want to be if you're watching TV. I remember I had I had justin so we did an in person podcast last year. I get a grip and I think he said four to six hours a day he stretches, which again, that's like that's like an enormous percentage of the day you're spinning stretching. But again, I mean he's a professional athlete like Novak, so you know, you've got to be focused on your
body as much as possible. If Tom Brady taught us anything, you know, it's it's elasticity in the body is one of the more important things in terms of longevity, right. You know what's the one thing for me because I do a little bit of what you talk about with Novak, Like we're upstairs watching you know, Survivor or Amazing Race
or something like that. I'm probably on the floor half the show, rolling out on the phone roller or just stretching in general and the other But I've been trying to I know, you're a runner, so I've been trying to Somebody told me that you've got to stretch half the amount of time you exercise. So if you're gonna go a thirty minute run, you need to stretch fifteen
minutes before the thirty minute run. I've been trying to dedicate myself to that over the last four or five six months, and I do notice a completely different change to begin the run, not necessarily mid run, late in the run, but to start off the run. I do feel like I'm almost warmed up as I've gotten going.
You stretch before you run, Yeah, yeah.
Like fifteen minutes. I mean, I'll do foam roller, I'll do some stretching myself. I've got a couple of stretching things that a PT taught me. And then I'll go outside and I'll do like hamstring and stretch the legs, like just basically my front yard before I get going. But yeah, I mean, as opposed to kind of going out there cold run is what I've I've tried to do.
By the way, if anybody hope that this podcast will be normal and Andy and I are on it, you're getting like eleven minutes of stretching talk to start well.
It's funny because you know, you go out to run, and the first half mile the run is just like it feels like if you take one bad step, the run will be over. Yeah, you're gonna break.
Your grip at acl or something. Yeah yeah, yeah, I mean especially you, I know you do a lot of trail running, you know, so it's like when your trail running and obviously step per step is is you know, not as predictable as like somebody like me who's running on the pavement a lot. You know, you just gotta be you got to got to keep your eyes in
wits about you. By the way, trail running and hiking I love because I do feel like it's a little bit more of a mental workout than just like running, like street running like I do most of the time, because you're paying a lot of attention to where you're stepping. I remember when I used to hike camel back when I lived in Arizona all the time. You know, it'd be like thirty five minutes up right, and I'm busting my ass and I'm sweating, and I'm tired, and I'm
I'm winded. But I always said going down was my mental workout because a wrong step and you might twist an ankle or you know, cut an arm or fall or do something like that. So it was I felt like it was a great kind of mix of both those worlds.
Yeah, the trail I run on a lot, it's like a it's like a five six hundred foot uh incline pretty quick. And what I find is that that it's like a it's awful. I'm not gonna lie like you do it and you're just like this is this is terrible. But the only way to do it is like focus on really like breathing. Well, like you it becomes almost like meditative, right, because you're so focused on your breath in order to get up. But I think, like I
think it, I've been wondering. I you know, I haven't played competitive golf for a while long time, and I haven't really played golf for a while now now that I think about it, But I think about that breath work with golf, Like if you just focus on breathing, it helps so much in those high leverage moments in golf, right, is like really being able to lock in on how
you're breathing to keep things normal. Because that's what I think sometimes happens when you get nervous, uh or you just lose the regularity of your breath and you see how how powerful it is when you run up a hill. Is like, it's not bad if you focus on the break the breathing. It's hard if you lose track of your breathing and you lose your breath.
Then, I mean, I feel like, I mean, as we've kind of as pro sports have evolved a lot over the last let's call it seven years in terms of the mental focus as much as maybe the physical focus. And you know, I mean this is NFL players and NBA players, right, I mean you hear so much about like the work Lebron puts in and the stuff Steph does mentally to keep the focus, you know, as he gets older. I feel like golf has kind of got
there as well. I would love to hear more of this from pro golfers, by the way, about how they go about their process in a golf round. I mean, you know, like we do these do we? I know CBS did a great job last year of the like on course interviews. I love one of those interviews one day this year, it's like, what's the breathing like? Over the shot, you know, like, how are you going about the breathing technique as you prepared to hit a golf shot? Are you do you have a breath hold? Do you?
You know? Like, because I'm sure they do, I'm sure they're thinking about that.
Yeah. I feel like people probably are afraid to ask that, especially in one of those settings, because you'd be worried that the guy is then started to think about it.
Yeah, it's like the Rick Rally book where he talks about the guy looking at a shadow over the swing,
you know, and you're like, yeah, totally. But I mean again, I like that's the space for those types of questions, and I'd love to get a little bit more in depth on that because I you know, I mean, the stuff that these these top tier pros do outside of just going to the gym, I feel like hasn't totally been as explored as maybe I'd like it to be or or I haven't read the article yet, but I'm sure it's out there.
I think too. Some of them are super secretive about what that, like think about Koepka, like, wouldn't tell anybody? Still hasn't said it, right, Still hasn't Yeah said what what? It was that he.
Walks slower or something. Right, it was like, let's just slow down.
That was one of the things. One of the things was to slow down. But he said it was something else, you know that that you know, after the Masters, him and his buddy stayed up, and you know it was
his buddy was yelling at him about it. But like, I think that, like we've seen it with Tiger, Tiger is so much more open about his process and himself and the way he thinks about the game now, right than he was at age thirty three when he earthed, you know, twenty eight, when he was in his prime, just knocking down majors and trying to like inflict harm on his competitors, right, Psychological warfare, Andy.
I have a question before we kind of dive into the topic here that we're going to talk about, because I know I felt this yesterday, so we're recording this on January two. I felt this on New Year's Day as we're kind of getting into the college football playoffs, you know, I mean East Coast person, It's it's five pm when the first game starts, right, I miss golf. I miss a little bit of golf. It's so wild
how this happens. You take a few weeks off of paying attention to it and watching it all the time. And I'll be honest with you, I didn't watch any PNC. I don't think I watched a minute of the p and C.
I hear you weren't plugged into the Hero.
I don't think I watched the second of The Hero. So I don't think I watched literally a second of golf in the month of December that was That wasn't Q school that I covered. So outside of that, it's I've been four or five weeks off, which has made me kind of excited about Hawaii, you know, like that's why breaks are good.
Yeah, I mean there's a lot to be excited about with the West Coast swing in my opinion, you know, include Hawaii in that is the best, you know, like this to the Masters is the best season for golf. People are inside, people have time to watch stuff. People aren't You're not competing with people playing golf on the weekend, which I think is like an underrated thing that people don't talk about enough. It's like you capture. Yeah, like people who watch watch golf like to play golf too, Like and.
They don't work Saturdays and Sundays. Right, this is what what a what a what a weird phenomenon there, And I can't believe you cracked that code.
So so we're here, we're the like I think that's the most interesting. Golf is is really key one to the masters, right and and I you know, we have a lot of great events in the summer, but this this time of year is really great. And I agree, like I I kind of I'm itching to see golf again. I'm I'm a little bummed about the ram defection. Yeah, I feel like he always played well at Cappel And you know, you think about a couple of years ago we had that amazing Rom cam Smith duel, which was
I think one of the better terms. Both of them are gone. Now Rory's not going to be there because.
He watch that battle on the c dub. You know, you can just get just clue into that.
But we're here. So to kick things off, I figure we'll do a part reflection on twenty twenty three, just three big picture kind of takeaways from the year, and then uh and then we'll dive into some predictions thoughts on twenty twenty four. So what uh what's your what are your takeaways from twenty twenty three?
Well, I had this. It's kind of my last one, but I'll start with this just because of what we just talked about. I felt like last season golf on the men's side was extremely front loaded in terms of the storylines, and when you go back to early twenty twenty three, you know it was our introduction into the signature or elevate. I don't know what they're called. What do they call now?
Are they signature this year, signature, signature.
Elevated signature, They'll change.
It'll designated, designated or elevated be a signature I'll give you.
I'll give you over under October one, twenty four that has a sponsorship to it. Are you going to take the over or the under? So it's not gonna be it'll be like over.
I don't think. I think they're gonna try and sell I. You know, one one crazy prediction I almost put down this is jumping ahead, and I almost said that the PGA will change dates by the end of twenty twenty four.
That would be super good, going back to old may or sorry, going back to August.
Maybe, Yeah, that's I just I just like I think with the private equity money, the PIFF money, there could be just like another massive schedule shakeup.
Andy, Can I say this to that point? Yeah, the MAYPGA stinks. Get it out of my face. There's way too many good tournaments bunch together.
Well, it kills the summer. It kills That's what I'm saying. It kills every event, every event between. That's not a maze between the Masters and the Open.
Yeah. I couldn't agree with you more. Take it back to August. It was nothing wrong with that date, by the way, not that it was awesome. It was the only identity the PJA Championship had pre Blockie was the fact that it was the last major, and it was it was Glory's last shot, and that was obviously, you know,
crushed and killed like the Western. But I was writing that early in the season, we had this new thing in golf on the PGA Tour that was really cool and unique and different, and it was one of those things where you went, why isn't this Why isn't it like this all the time? Right? The fact that everybody got together and played the same golf tournaments. You know, you think about like the Tiger Ernie phil Era and they would just play random events that the other two
guys wouldn't be there, and VJ. It's like such a bummer that that was the case. But so we got Century with Rom Farmers was great, Phoenix Open, Scheffler wins, Rom wins at Riv, Scheffler wins the Players, and then ra wins the Masters, and it was literally Andy, if you remember, it was like, this is it, man, Like, these are the two best golfers in the world. We're getting them playing well week after week after week, and this is gonna be twenty twenty three and neither one again.
It's just crazy that neither of those guys won another golf tournament at all, after this incredible run early in the year where it felt like we were gonna get this juggernaut battle of these two names. So I would say, when I look back on twenty twenty three, remembering how good those two guys played early in the year and how freaking awesome it was watching them go head to head, is gonna be was one of my big takeaways, you know,
from then on. But I mean after that, so Andy, after those guys, after the Masters, right, I was looking at impactful wins on the PGA Tour were in a major championship by certified stars. Okay, these are like the guys that you turned the TV on on Saturday and Sunday if they're in the Hunt at the PGA, Hoveland at the Memorial, Ricky Fowler at the Rocket Mortgage, Rory at the Scottish and then Hoveland goes back to back
in the playoffs. So you basically had like five impactful weeks and you kind of combine the two with Hobland there after April. It wasn't a great PGA Tour season after the start of it.
You know, there were a lot of really good tournaments in there, but they weren't star driven because you think about like Nick Taylor at Canada, right, like I think about the you had Ricky at at the three MS or at the Rocket Mortgage, right, you had like great events, but not necessarily star driven stuff. I've got two things that kind of play off of that that are two of my things. So we'll do a little snake draft here.
One thing that I think, you know, I was just looking at the year is Wyndham Clark, Like is he a flash in the pan? Or are we going to look at him as a late bloomer star, right, is he going to be like someone that we look at of, Oh, I can't believe Wyndam Clark won that US Open Or is it going to be like, oh, that was Wyndham Clark's like big coming out party and he won obviously.
Wells Fargo also on the way to that, And it's like, I think, like that's a big thing that twenty twenty three, Like when we go ten years out, what Window Clark becomes is actually kind of like kind of a barometer I think of twenty twenty three because if he becomes like a really good player, like if he becomes a Tony Finale, let's just say level player in terms of or Andy.
Or Max, right, I mean, yeah, it's the trajectory is kind of on the I mean, he's younger, I think in terms of making that switch and turning it on to what we saw with Max from you know, Corn Ferry Tour to PGA Tour star. But I'd say in relative terms, is could he be that? Right to you to your point, could he be a certified top ten superstar? You know in the haunt a lot guy.
Like a guy that makes multiple team competitions like he three Ryder Cup teams or you know, four Ryder Cup teams. That's hard, Like I think that's a real barometer. Like if he becomes that, then I think twenty twenty three we look back and we'll be like, Wow, the major winners went rom Kepka, Wyndham Clark, and then you'll have Brian Harmon, which I think Brian Harmon is a nice player. That was a nice story. It was a dominant win.
But like that, this the major year is kind of like a little bit underwhelming now but could be look back, be really good. Yeah, if Wyndham Clark's this late bloomer. And then I think like the second thing that you hit on with, you know, impactful wins like Lack that are of like so going into that that rom Scotti was Rory's ridiculous run, right, and I think with Rory, you've got this now. Seven in the last eight majors he's finished in the top ten, which is crazy consistency.
Last year Scheffler wins a couple out of the gate, but then the year is just the putter is not really agreeing, but he's hitting the ball better than anybody that we've ever seen other than Tiger, right, and he's taking this ball and they're both like they're both achieving in different ways. This thing that every golfer strives for.
It's what Tiger always used to was the barama of Tiger's success was he always talked about consistency, and these players have become so consistent, yet there's so much frustration within each of their consistency, like they are putting themselves
into position. You have to be there to win, right, Like both of these guys are like, and because of that, I could see either of those guys having monster years, whether it's from a major standpoint with Rory or a major and regular event standpoint with Scotty, just because you have to be there to win. And both of those guys in different in different ways, have just been there, right, they just haven't gotten it done.
Yeah, I mean, you know you you obviously. I mean every year is the biggest year for Rory in terms of his career, in terms of major championship golf, right, I mean every time we get to the next season until he wins another one. But for Scotty, you know, it's it's kind of sneak getting to that point. I mean, you know, you put yourself in contention this often in the big events, and what we are going to be on what is that two it'll be.
Two years, he'll be eight. Yeah, he'll be eight. It'll be his eighth major.
And I mean, I mean, I'm sure you have it in front of you. How many you know of those of those seven after his win, we're top five finishes? I mean, what is it four or five of those? Not top five finishes, not.
Just top five finishes, but you think about like like literally have a chance to win. Yeah, like Brookline, he was like right there, right there, Lacc was right there the PGA at okill really kind of right there. On Saturday, his punter killed him and then he ended up tied for second. So yeah, I mean he's been there almost every single major.
We call him front door top fives. Like what's the term here, because I mean we love backdoor top tens. What is the what's Scotty's top five situation here?
I think it's got to be just like in the something in the in the mixer or something.
Gotcha, gotcha. It's like like the host table top five where you know you got in and you're waiting for your table to sit down.
You're in the blender.
I mean he was. He's been in the blender a lot. I mean, this dude is like strawberries. I mean, it is unbelievable how often we see him where you know, I mean, and he gets like sleepy stuff, or he'll be he'll be you know, fourth come like midday on Saturday in these majors, and you just go, did Scotty Scheffler come from?
But let's just say, oh yeah, he's like, oh yeah, he's leading the field and off the tee and approach surprised.
Another Scotty week. But you know, like if you go through twenty four and he doesn't win a major, then it might start to be a thing, if it's not already a thing in his brain. So I think, you know, I think it's it's not he's not on the same he's not not at the same level as Rory in terms of the importance of majors every time.
He gets there, but getting there though at.
Some point he's not getting the ball like God anymore.
Right, Yeah, I mean, I think that's the one of the things with with the game right now, and and this year I think added to that is that I think four guys have have really kind of separated themselves as of right now. And it's four guys, So who.
Is that is? That's that's Scotty, Rom, Rory and and Brooks and Brooks okay, right, And those guys are a different plane than kind of everybody else right now, especially in majors.
It feels like those four guys at any type of golf course you know, are going to be they have to be your four favorites, right.
I know, I know you're a Simmons podcast listener. He was talking about something with cousin sal this past week about the forty nine ers in the Ravens. They said that these are two teams that can win in any conditions. Right, These are why they're the two best teams in both conferences. They can win if it's cold and rainy and crappy, they can win, if it's a beautiful seventy five degree day, they can win inside, they can win outside those types
of things. It feels like these four guys are similar where you know, you look at some of the courses Rory has, I mean, Rory's maybe the outlier in the sense because a lot of his wins come on kind of the same style golf courses, but we have also seen him play well and contend outside of that style golf course everywhere. The Old Course isn't quihalo, right, yeah, And I.
Think that's like the thing is the last two years that consistency and majors at different types of setups, right lacc the old course, you know, he played horrendous and finished. You know, I think, what was it seventh at Okill? Those played awful, like you know.
What I mean, Like I mean Tory, like sneak backdoor, sneaks into that at Tory and like has a legit chance standing on eleven t to win that US Open. You know, that's andy. I haven't really thought about that. That's a really interesting point about Rory because when you when we look back on this Rory run, whatever you want to call it, his career, his thirties, whatever, it is,
like his wins were dominant victories. He was just better than everybody else, you know, Like when he won those majors, he was winning by a million golf shots, like winning by eight and a major. Could you imagine somebody doing that now? Like just see I mean.
I think like Harmon was close to that name. Everybody was sh I.
Mean, like Shane Lowry and Brian Harmon or like the two guys I think about when I think about blowout major championship victories in recent golf history, right, Rory wins two majors by eight just simply better than everybody hit it. He hit it farther, he hit it. He was a great putter, He was extremely confident, he believed in himself. All those things, you know, transfired to these victories early
in his career. You could make an argument that the last two and a half three years in major championship golfer, Rory McElroy has been better golf, and he's won the majors, but on different golf courses to your point, that ask different questions that make you style your game in times to what that golf course is asking, and to be able to go play well at LACC and play well at the Old Course and bounce back and forth at
these places. Really, the only place we haven't seen Rory play good golf at the last few years has been Augusta Nastional I mean, outside of that styled golf course, which you know, I mean he's a threat to win therevery year, just simply from the power in the driving. But it's just been these other major venues that we've seen Rory really display the beauty that we wanted to
see from Rory. Honestly, Andy, I think a two shots from Rory's year this pas last year, the shot into the into the last green at the Scottish where he scaled down and went to the two iron instead of the three iron and hit the cut. And then that pitch shot at the Ryder Cup that he hit the low fizzor that you know, went about head high open back.
To sixty degree. I've tried to hit that. I've tried to hit that so many times. I can't figure it out.
It's it's it's such a hard golf shot to pull up.
But I think what we might just get up in the air. It's like it like rolls up.
The face and it doesn't check and you're like, oh, this is supposed to rip, But you know, like these are these are artistic golf shots. And I feel like we've lost at least golf in general has lost the idea of Rory as the artist. And Rory is still a great artist on the golf course and We've seen it on different canvases over the last few years.
Yeah, it's kind of It's kind of like the maturation of like a great NBA player, where you know, they go from a great scorer to like teams start to blitz them or whatever, send doubles and they might struggle to figure it out, but then once they understand it, it's like then sending a second defenders like the worst
thing you could do. It's like Lebron, like you just you don't want to send a second defender at Lebron because and so it's like in golf, like I think, being able to play different styles and in types of golf courses, the idea of like, you know, no golf course not fitting your game, Like you know, we saw it with Brooks, even you know, as great of a major champion as Brooks is, he rolled up to l ACC and after after a round he's like, I just don't like this place. This isn't my kind of major
championship test. It's like that. That's like a guy saying, you know what, a quarterback in the NFL being like, you know what, I can't break down zone defenses, right, you don't want to hear Uh, you know, that's I think where Rory's gone is they haven't come. The wins haven't come, but the consistency, and that's what every go well for once, that's what the you know, I kind of think, so what's your second one?
So my second one is is recent and just it was on my mind when I was thinking about twenty twenty three. It's not necessarily the biggest story, but the Hayden Springer getting his PGA tour card. I just don't think we need to forget it as we get into twenty four and I like, I I love Hayden Springer. I root for this guy so much. I mean, going through that, I can't imagine what it's been like over
the last three months in his life. And for him to go and play as well as he did to get his tour card was one of the great stories in sports last year.
I thought, Yeah, so, you know, for anybody that's unaware, Hayden Springer went to Q School and Q School's back awarding cards five cards. Shane was on the call, but Hayden Springer.
So saw fun by the way that it's back by the way, and yeah, it's just so cool that Q school's back.
A month before Q School, Hayden Springer lost his daughter who had been battling a rare disease, you know, and she was what about two or three yep.
Three, Yeah, Yeah, she was one of one of two daughters and they lost her and the doctors had said they you know, gave her weeks to live. She lived you know, years, which is incredible. But you know, I mean he had to. I mean, this is the guy had to talk about it after every round, you know, the media, and he was interviewed about it and yet still goes out there and played stones golf down the stretch especially.
Yeah, so amazing story. Definitely somebody uh to favorite on that you know on Uh, it's someone that I think, like one of the hard things about pro golf is it's hard to figure out who you root for totally right, Like this is a guy that makes it easy to root for them. Like I think like that's one of the things that Max has done so well with his social media, Like with just the being himself on social media has made him such a fan favorite because it
gives somebody a reason to root for him. Oh, like, why do you root for Maxima? I love the way he he is on social media, it seems like a great guy, right, Like that's otherwise it's like why why are you in for Kega Bradley? Well, I'm a Red Sox fan. Like that's like what you get, right, I mean.
It's your point getting into golf, get into pro golf. To attach yourself to someone or multiple players is not the easiest thing to do.
Yeah, versus like a team is easy to attach yourself totally, right, Like, I'm all right, so my last one from toy Toy three, I just we're in self improvement season, so I had to call this out. I think this is like a great example of like people get super ambitious this time of year, but it's just like a small focusing on
small things. Victor Hovelin's evolution, heck, and his ability to just like hone in and recognize a weakness, recognize something holding him back and do everything he can to turn that around, right and how oh he's become just like
a complete player. A I think, like, of all the players that aren't in that top four that I said before, when it comes to majors, Victor Holn's is the one that I would expect most to jump into that and maybe make it like, you know, one of those guys that hey anywhere anytime you know someone that is kind of like a off three prediction type thing. Is what's
will z L Tours? You know, that's a question for me because like this time last year, we're probably talking about will z L Tours as one of those major championship specialists, right. But Victor Holn, I mean, he's got all the tools now, all the shots, and you have to you could see a really big year from him this year.
Yeah, I mean it was It was cool. He seems like the kind of guy that wants to be there too, you know. I mean that's what's been fun to watch. Is it seems like he wants to play Rory or he wants to play Rom in these moments, you know. And I mean I don't know if that was the case. You think about Jordan Speed winning majors early in his career, and you think about obviously twenty fifteen, that eight year he had he needed twenty fourteen at the Masters losing
to Bubba that was an important moment. I think for Jordan Speed as a young player. I think Victor is kind of counting these major moments where he's been close. Think about Saint Andrew's played terrible, you know, next to Rory McElroy on that Sunday. Then he gets to the PGA and he played really, really solid.
He was in the mix of the Masters too. He didn't play great, right, it was.
The pgaight, things changed, right, He played great for fifteen holes and then he gets that break in the bunker on sixteen. But he was right there. I mean, it was it was feeling like it might be a playoff between him and Koepka, and you know, obviously the season continued to that point. I also a lot of the time, especially with young players, I'll look at how they played after a moment like that where either you won or you lost, you know, and it was it's extremely emotional,
you know, physical toll, emotional toll, things like that. How'd you play after that? And he played excellent, you know, he was awesome. It wins the Memorial, wins a couple of playoff events, played awesome at the Ryder Cups. So yeah, I'm with you, Victor. Victor I think is the most likely candidate to kind of jump into the top five number.
You said, what's your last one all.
Right, I want to give a shout out to the LPGA Lily of Vu. I think it's easy to forget her ceasing had never won on the LPGA Tour. I looked this up. So she was forty first at the end of the year last year. Okay, she wins four times, two majors, becomes world number one. Eric Cole is currently forty first on the PGA Tour, or excuse me, on the OWGR So it would be like Eric Cole winning two majors four times and becoming world number one at the end of the year this year in men's golf.
That's how crazy and out of nowhere it came for Lily Vu player of the Year. So I just wanted to give a shout out to her season because on the men's side it might have felt a little diluted after the Masters in terms of anybody having a great season. I feel like in golf, Lily a Vu was the player that had that great season.
Yeah, like other players around Eric Cole, Cam Davis, Harris, English JT posting like all of them would be shocking.
Yeah, and if they got to be top five, you'd be like, what happened here? You know?
Yeah, exactly, it's an amazing that's an amazing story. And obviously I think Eric Cole is a great story too, totally. The guy he brought up he was playing minor league events that at the beginning of last year, he was playing on the minor league Tour. All right, let's get to Toy Toy four. We're gonna add us for a couple of predictions. So what do you got for us?
All right? I think somebody of these three is going to return to dominance. I wrote down the three players that I feel like all kind of fit the same mold, if that makes sense, Andy. So my three here are JT, Jordan, and Collin. I feel like all three of those players are you know, at one point in golf for the
best player in golf. Have struggled at times, if not for long stretches over the last years, and I feel like with Rom leaving to go to live, it was it's kind of Rory and everybody else, and I feel like Rory could really be helped at by one of these guys joining him. And that's not Scotti. Scheffler. I love Scheffler. I understand he's one of the best players
in the world. But in terms of marketing big names things like that, in golf, you need a Morikawa, a Jordan or a JT to become really really good again. And I think one of those is going to have a great season. And I think as I look at those three names, it feels like Morikawa is that guy.
Yeah, I think it's super important for I think it's super important for JT and Jordan just each other to them because those guys have that star appeal. I think Alum Markawa obviously great player two majors, has accomplished so much in such a short period of time, but they just don't have the box office appeal of a Jordan Speeth or a JT. Right now, Kyle Markawa doesn't. And that's not necessarily it's not a knock against him. I mean, these guys are have been pros for longer, and we've
seen it with golf. Like one of the things that golf really thrives with and does better than sports like the NFL, is creates these long stars, Like think about Rory. We are now almost year twenty, like getting close to year twenty of Rory, right, We're like probably seventeen years in is sixteen years into Rory. You know, Tiger, We're thirty years into Tiger, right, and you know Phil, same thing, Like thirty years of Phil, thirty plus years of Phil.
Like that is what the PGA Tour does so well, and it's been something that's kind of like with this youth invasion has eroded a little bit with the PGA Tour, is that we don't like, you know, Adam Scott's kind of an afterthought now, right versus you know, in when it was fearic can Phil and Heyday, like this was like you know, early forties was prime time, right, Like.
Like just justin Rose last year, Andy having the year he had was like this crazy outlier moment that used to be pretty normal and he was forty yeah right.
Right right, like that that used to be like okay, Like I mean Phil didn't win a major till what thirty.
Four, Yeah, thirty three, the thirty three yep.
Yeah. So it's like, you know, all these the game has changed so much, and I just I do think this is a big moment for those two because it's like are they just second page guys now or are they still you know, one of the guys in the sport? Right? And I think that's the that's a big question, and I I think for the PGA Tour sake, you know, who knows what this resolution is going to end up
being what it's going to look like. But the better they play, especially in the beginning of this year while these negotiations are going on, is extremely important for the sport as a whole. When you talk about men's professional golf, I'm not talking about you know, golf in general, recreational golf, women's golf, men's men's professional golf. Jordan Speith and JT getting off to good starts this year is very very important.
I've got I've got I think that I think Pebble Beach is going to be one of the best events of the year.
Yeah, I totally agree with you on that.
That's one of my predictions is that this event is going to be We're gonna we're gonna be get done with that event, the new format with with like seventy players, no no celebrities on the weekend, and we're gonna be like, why why was this event this way for the last thirty years?
Well, I mean, you know you I remember so when we did the twenty nineteen US Open at Pebble Beach. One of my bosses at the time at Fox was not a big golfer, and I remember Saturday night we factioned and I'd got done in our booth, and our booth was right by the Beach Club, right there, you know.
I remember stopping by, yeah, yeah, yeh yes, you know it's.
Right there by four and we walked in. There was like a little bit of a get together, and this boss came up to me and he was like, hey, man, you know, you guys did a great job whatever, and he goes, I got a question for you. Why don't think I have the US opened at Pebble Beach every year? And I was like, well, you know, it's you know, I kind of went in it. You know, I knew what he was saying, like he was he was kind of joking, right, but I think his point was valid.
West Coast Primetime Viewing, most beautiful golf course arguably in the entire world, awesome venue. I know you've got some I know you've got some issues in terms of the way it needs to be restored, which I probably agree with most of your takes there. But even in its current you know, rendering, it's still amazing. You know the course, you know the holes, you know that front nine stretch. Like golf fans, even casual golf fans, know what seven is, know what eight is, know what seventeen is.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's I mean, like how many golf courses in the world does do a lot of fans know five holes?
I would say five, three may probably. I don't know St Andrews.
I don't think people do. I think I think it's Augusta Sawgrass and Pebble Beach. Pebble Beach.
Yeah, yeah, I mean it's it's I mean, you you you might have an argument from somebody about Riviera just because there's so much unique in terms of their holes, But I don't think it probably is on the list.
Yeah, I I mean, like I it's hard for me to take a step, but I just don't think like a regular fan would. And I think, like, honestly, an event that's probably a course that's like building up towards that and it's it's like the final four holes. But is uh Scottsdale.
Yeah yeah, yeah, that's that's probably maybe the closest in terms of in the running. But you know, I mean, this guy says to me. You know, why don't you
have a US Open at Pebble every year? Well, we have an early season opportunit unity with the pro Am and it as you and I have known for years, and it's been a running joke on social media for years, the most ungolfy broadcast of the year was always that Saturday at the pro Am because they had to infuse the celebrities and in the broadcast and you kind of failed to see what was the star, which is Pebble Beach. And now the star is back right.
And it's like, think about that field, you know, the in recent years it's been going up against that Saudi International field, Okay, and it's just been like what happened to Pebble Beach is like the one of the worst fields on the PGA Tour, and it's like, oh, now we're gonna get the very best players in the world at Pebble Beach on the weekend. I mean, that event has done a complete one eighty for diehard golf fan.
I totally agree. Andy. Have a question for you. Let's say this year is a crazy success. Right to your point, do you see in the future the potential for Cypress to get back in the road.
To well, I think this the limited number of players is the biggest draw for that potentially happening.
Yeah, I think so too. I'd heard some murmurs last year, like mid summer, just you know, some light murmurs. But it would be epic, epic to have that, like with modern technology. That's the thing people don't understand, Andy, is what was the last time was like in the early nineties, was the last time Cypress was a part of this? Like drones haven't been a part of a Cypress broadcast, right, I mean the tower camera HD four K, all these
things on you know, fifteen sixteen seventeen. Would I mean, you know, you'd have that and then you could flip over to pebbles for goodness.
Say yeah, think about how excited nance would be too. Nance would be sud be thrown. You'd be thrown ninety five.
Listen, nobody could speak better or or would know more about a golf course in terms of a host than than than Jim at Cyprus. It would be I would be all in all day. Can we give a shout out to Jim Nantz by the way, I feel like he does. I feel like we underappreciate how freaking good he is at his job because we hear him so much in golf.
I agree with this awesome he's I mean so good at his job. Well, I think the thing that I think is amazing and I don't know exactly what his schedule is going to be now, but it's like the way where you can go from being the best voice on football to then like calling the NC Double a Final four and then just like effortlessly then shifting back
to golf. Right, It's the It's the variety. It's the ability to to be able to talk about sports, multiple sports, and an extraordinarily high level that I think is under the radar, you know, be on just like the name stats, knowing that like the work that he has to put in to do that. It is the ability to pay attention like he the guy has to work really hard.
Oh so that was my My big takeaway working with Joe Buck when I worked with him at the during the Fox Golf days, was how much time he'd put in to four days of a US Open broadcast. I mean, you know, like months in advanced he's reading, researching, He had multiple researchers that were sending him information. I mean this guy probably spent five months, you know, multiple days a week, reading, researching, knowing everything he could about a
the golf course and be the players involved. It was amazing how much time he would put in for four days of work. It was, it was, it made it made me understand that it was it needed I needed to elevate. I'll say that.
I I I'm definitely I'm not gonna name names, but what I will I will say that when you see the people that do the work, it makes the people in the broadcast industry that don't do the work so very very apparent, right it is. It's an interesting dynamic, but like you know, it requires you know, people like I think Trevor Moulment's done like a fantastic job. But like why you think he's why he's good is because
he's putting in the work. He knows, he's doing the research on the players, he's keeping up on like what's going on, right, And that's that's a lot of work to do, right It's not just showing up and and reacting to golf shots on TV. It is it is being so integrated and involved in the sport, right Well.
I mean, like Andy just like to let people behind. Kind of the the you know, the window for a moment is when you're doing a broadcast, you're getting research information sent to you pretty consistently, you know. I mean you're getting like news clips email to you in like a downloadable PDF or whatever you're probably gonna get, you know,
like say at the Canadian Open or something. You might get twenty articles, you know, three weeks out, twenty five articles, two weeks out, you know, twenty five thirty articles a week of. You're getting a lot of information sent It's on you to read the information, right, I mean, that's your job in a sense. But if you know the sport, you cover, the sport, you follow the sport, a lot of it is the stuff you already know, so it's very easy, I'll say, to not want to read it.
But in the information that you're getting sent, there's a quote here or a nugget there that and I will. I can, because I've done these jobs before. When I'm
watching a broadcast, I can. I could almost guarantee you that ninety five percent of the time, I could tell you if it's a nugget that's in the person's brain or if it's something handed to them you know, if it's card handed to them and you can almost tell, like, are you listening to them to the No Lane Up podcast that they're doing with x Y and Z player right,
are you paying attention? Are you listening to for play when they're interviewing or they're doing a golf segment with Sam Byrd's, you know, to get something from that that you might not get from an everyday article, Like you've got to want to do it. And I think the guys that are the best are the best because they obviously are very smart and very talented, but it's almost
like they really want to do the work. And I feel like nance has just been doing this for whatever thirty something years and still wants to wants to listen and read, you.
Know, I had I I don't. Something I thought that crossed my mind today while I was prepping for this is that I find it a bit crazy that it's January and we and we don't know who our other golf color analyst is obviously singers out. We just we got Kevin because they're stepping in for two events. From me, sim that's very interesting, but there's no what's what's going on?
I mean, I always you, and I love to compare stuff to other sports, but I just laugh at like if if the if the Money Night football analyst chair was empty, and.
It's the weekend, it's the week of it's.
The week of the season, Like, who's gonna be It's like the Mass Singer. Maybe it's Mass Singer Golf edition. You never know.
That was something that like, just while I was thinking about this next year, I kind of like irrationally got upset about was like, wait, how do how do we not? Like I think like I don't want to put you
in a spot. So this is all my thoughts. You do not have to comment, but like I think, like what's happened with NBC Golf Channel over the last like couple years has been kind of like they have really kind of given the fans the middle finger, And this is just the latest in this whole kind of oddest see of of NBC and and what the last you know, basically since Johnny Miller left has been kind of it's felt like a decline here and it's like we're now
it's January second as we're recording this, and we have no clue who our golf analyst is. For half the half the event. What they have two of the four majors and uh and we don't know who's gonna be calling calling the main main analyst in the broadcast booth, right.
Andy, It is interesting you you did speak on something earlier about about Adam Scott and Justin Rose. We were talking about that forty something golfer that had a great career for so long it could compete and win. I mean, I think about Marco Myra and ninety eight and you know, obviously was his whole his whole wife was revitalized because he, you know, lived close to this young stud that ended up being the best golfer of all time. I wonder, and I know Ogilvy's name has kind of been floated
around a bit. I wonder if that's the space that's going to take this position, because forever it was like a fifty year old, a fifty two year old, a fifty five year old that got into that world on the back end of their playing career. They tried to play Champions Tour golf and they couldn't compete or they weren't interested in doing that, and so they got into TV.
I'll be interested if that flip happens to late thirties early forty year old guys moving forward that it seems like it's happening a bit in terms of like digital broadcast and ESPN plus, PJA Tour live, those types of things. But I'm wondering if we will get the superstar level person that feels like, like, you know, Justin Rose could do that job tomorrow, right, So, like how much longer does Justin Rose want a battle Ludwig and ADDC and
you know, the and the Cootie brothers. You know, on a week to week basis on the PGA Tour, you're gonna make more money playing golf, but maybe life's a little less stressful if you get to sit in the booth and chat about it and talk about it. Obviously knowing all these guys, I mean, it's just it feels like it's a little bit of a transition period in terms of what golf and TV is going to look like kind of moving forward.
Yeah, I think there's also like this aspect of you know, the money, right, the amount of money that these guys have made is just so much different. I mean, you get somebody like Johnny Miller because they didn't make like retire like you know, totally live lavishly, like however you want to live money. When they played professional golf, they've made a lot of money. I'm not trying to discount that they you know, but there there was a certain need to work to maintain a certain level of lifestyle.
And it's like now these guys, it's like I was just looking at scrolling around here at like the most.
Just what's justin Roe's like career money. I mean it's got to be like fifty oh my god, sixty million. I mean just on the PGA tour.
That's you know, the the career moneyless is probably the place to go for this. But but yeah, the uh, you know, like that's an aspect of this and and maybe you know, it's always been this major, this all time great, like you think about fal Though, you think about Johnny Miller, you know, is the shift now, like is it going to become okay if somebody didn't win
a major, if they weren't a perennial top ten player. Now, I think, honestly, that might push the level of of broadcasting up because it's gonna be somebody that's that wants to do the work right to well.
I mean, like like Andy, who's been who's been the most popular, hottest topic person in sports broadcasting in the last five years? Like, what's the name that comes to mind, Romo Romo. I mean it's Tony Romo for sure. Right, Tony Romo is not a career NFL quarterback, Hall of Famer, super Bowl winner, any of that. Right, Tony Romo can talk ball. He knows ball. He's sat there and he's played ball. We've seen him do extraordinary things on the football field. We've also seen him do not great things
on the football field, especially in big moments. I mean, Tony Romo, in theory, should have broken this mold already. I mean should have said, well, Romo can do it in football, Like I mean, think.
About how great Greg Olsen's been. Greg Olsen is, you know.
Olsen's great. Colt Nost is great. Smiley's been extremely interesting to listen to. Like these are not guys that were winning major championships, you know. I mean Colt Nost won an ameterur, which I think is an incredible thing to have on your resume. Right, But Colt's great on course because he knows the players. He's well spoken, he's funny, he's entertaining.
He does the work.
He does the work. He does the work. Smiley's great in his position because these guys he's talking about are his buddies. If he has a question to ask Jordan Speeds, you know what he can do. He can text Jordan Speed the question and they can relay that. Now that's not the only skill set needed in that position, but it's very important to have. And I would not be surprised if you continue to see Smiley move up and the ranks because of the unique place he's in in
the game right now. He's young, he's well spoken, he's good at his job, and more importantly than all that stuff, he knows all the guys because he played against him.
All Right, I'm gonna rattle some names off just so you know. Rose made sixty two million so far. And is that just PJA Tour, just PGA tour, So.
He's probably made forty million on the on the.
Euro maybe not forty, probably twenty, probably fifteen, I would guess.
I don't even know if that's a website. By the way, is the World to officially?
I think it's still europeantour dot com. Yeah it is, it is, so here I just throw some names at you and you tell me if you're excited about any lea.
And by the way, I just want to let let everybody know this. This is not a knock on who you are.
This is just us.
We are we fired up to hear you. Are we excited? Oh by the way, Roses made thirty million on the DP World Tour.
Oh my god.
Yeah, So there you go, Zach Johnson. I know. I mean again, this is not a knock on who you are. This isn't anything like that. It's just simply this is a hard job. I mean it's one person. Two people in the world do this job.
Yeah, first, you have to occupy air for six hours. It's not an easy position. DL three we already tried. Let's see ste Sink. I love ste Sink, but I don't know if he'd he might be okay.
Actually I'm I'm like like, I'm like a maybe. I mean, I think he could be good. Just again, is he gonna? My My question to these guys I always ask is are you willing to be critical? Which it takes a little bit of time for these guys to get to that position.
Uh, David Thoms, I.
Just again, I just don't think it's a position for him.
No, brand Snetiker, don't.
Think it's a position for him.
Um Luke Donald, I think he's great. I don't thin I think it's a position for him.
Maybe I'm I'm a maybe on Luke. I'm a maybe on.
Luke all right? Or Sabatini. You think they're gonna let him in the booth?
I would say this could could potentially be awesome, could be awful, don't know. Don't think there's a I don't think he's a five out of ten. I think he's either a ten out of ten throwing heaters like Johnny, or he's got two days of the job.
I'm on the career money list. Now we've entered the Ryan Moore, Ryan Palmer, Charlie Hoffman.
Yeah, I mean that. But that's the problem and Andy, like that's what you said, is is the this is the group you're gonna probably have to pick from because Phil's not doing the job, like like like Jordan Spieth.
At home, Hunter Mayhan might be it.
Might be the guy. Maybe that's the guy.
Honestly, Hunter Mayhon might be.
Let's see, he's really good on TV. He's been really I've really enjoyed listening to him when he's done TV. He's forty one years old.
He was a top five player, top.
Five player, played on Ryder Cups, contended top ten and every major he played in at some point in his career, won some big events, was an excellent and no, and again, like knows, the problem is all the guys he knows.
And I'm not saying he's not friends with young guys, but all the guys he knows are probably in that group that he would in theory be competing against, right, Like, that's the hard part of this is you've got to be able to connect with a twenty two year old guy that's playing tour golf, which in which means you've got to care to try to connect with him, which I think, again to your point about what we started
with Trevor, Trevor is so good at that. Like, Trevor goes out of his way to approach young players and talk to young players and one time to no, I'm not trying to your best buddy.
But the President's the President's Cup Captain is a big part of that too, I have to imagine, right, because it forced him to be out there by the way.
If we somehow deviated from talking about what we're excited about in twenty twenty four to who's going to be the next great broadcaster. But I actually I'll say this, Andy, I think it's a great thing to bring up, because, like you said this week in theory, we don't necessarily know who do we know who's sitting there? Is is doing this week?
Kisner could be amazing, just amazing. I used that president president Who's cup team like three years ago?
And Andy's not gonna get the job. You have a coughing fit in the booth.
But you know the joys of having young kids.
I trust me. I know my daughter into my mouth yesterday, directly into my mouth as she sat in my laugh and then she was like, gave me the sweetest look, and you're like, I don't know what am I supposed to do here?
That's the the worst since when they cough and you literally feel the cough go into your mouth. Yeah, that's exact.
There you go, thank you so much.
Yeah.
Now it's my question, I guess would be you looked at career money. I guess another way I look at this and I might do a little dig in tonight. Is is there like a group of like Smiley where they're young and it just didn't work out, like the game maybe didn't work out. And is there is there anybody in that world that you feel like could be excellent at this position, because again, it feels like it's probably the way to go is to try to find
somebody very young and very talented. It's just way easier said than done.
I think the other crazy thing about the situation here and this is this is NBC Golf Channel Zone doing.
They had nobody in the pipeline, right, like Smiley's like the one, but it's like Smiley's been doing this for two years and I don't, like, I just don't think like that you can go from where he is now to being the lead chair right away, but like in maybe five years, ten years, five years from now he might be ready for that, right But like the fact that they didn't have anybody else that was even like, you know, we got somebody that's recalled golf going into
the booth for the first two terminus of the year, and I think Kissner's going to be really good at it, but like is he going to be so is he done playing? Like that would be my question like, but he fits the he fits the vein of what's probably realistic of career achievements at this point that would want to do the booth job that like versus, you're not getting the Nick Faldo of this year. You're not Brooks. Koepka isn't going into the booth.
Right Jordan justin Max, these guys aren't. I mean unless they really want to do it.
Max could do it.
Yeah, but again Andy, like, like you're gonna go to Max home and go, hey, you want to do this job.
You're gonna have made it like ten fifteen years.
I mean maybe, but I just like, you're gonna make a fiftieth or a twentieth of what you made as a player, and yet you're gonna have to travel the same amount. You're gonna stay in worse places. You know.
It's like, I think it's a great and it's an awesome idea that one of these guys would be excellent of the job, But in reality, once they see the week to week grind, how much work they got to put in, how it's not as easy as everybody thinks it is, how much travels involved, how they've got to get there on a Tuesday for a Thursday golf tournament, you know, in flyout Sunday night, or whatever the case
may be. I think you were right when you said it's unrealistic to assume that Nick Faldo or Johnny Miller two point zero is ever gonna exist again in golf space in terms of broadcasting, because if we've learned anything it's that we're cutting money away from this stuff versus putting more money into it. And you're gonna go to, you know, one of these twenty eight thirty thirty two year old guys that are making twenty million a year, go, we'll pay you a million a year to do this job.
I mean, they're they're gonna be like, we'll make I make a million a year, just leave my money in the bank, you know.
Yeah, all right, Wait, we've devolved here.
I actually I thought it was listening. I thought it was a great I thought it was a great conversation to have. And I think it is important because I'm sure golf fans are thinking, at least something similar to what you brought up is this is an important position, especially early in the season when you've got these monumental golf tournaments that are going to take over Sports TV when football ends and the playoffs go away, and you've kind of got RIV floating around, and you've got these
great tournaments. I know Riv's a CBS property, but you know you've got these great golf tournaments. And maybe it'll be Kissner. And if it is, I mean, I hope he's who he is, you know, away from the mic, because Kevin Kisner's extremely entertaining, he's a great listen and he's somebody I think that could crush the job if he wants to do.
It, all right. Other predictions.
I think we're gonna get some shake up in a Grand Slam world. I think the Grand Slam world has been saging it for a long long time. I'm not saying that we're going to have somebody complete the Grand Slam.
Somebody's got to do it eventually, Dude.
It's been twenty four years since somebody joined the team. How crazy is that? Two thousand when Tiger won in St. Andrews it was his last leg. Twenty four years A long time take all right, So so.
You've got it. If you had to bet on on Jordan or Rory or other.
I'm gonna take Here's Who's Here's who I'm taking right now. This is who I wrote down. I think that Morikawa is the likeliest candidate to take the step closer to the Grand Slam. You well, I mean, you know you've got so you've got, You've got three big guys that need another major to be one away, and I just feel like it's going to be a huge I think Morico is going to be Player of the Year. I
think he's gonna win a lot this year. I'm big on Colin in twenty twenty four, and I just feel like he will tick off one of the two he needs to get within one and then obviously you've got Rory and Speeth and Phil that are floating around that need one left. But I just feel like that will We'll see a little bit of shake up by years in either it's Brooks at Augusta, or it's more a Cow winning one of the two he needs, or to your point, it's rom doing much of the same either at the
PGA or the Open. So yeah, I just feel like we're gonna get some shake up there, and maybe somebody adds themselves to the list of three or four, or maybe we get somebody that finally ticks off, you know that final one they need.
This might be Phil's last US Open chance.
So he won the PGA in twenty one.
I'm saying just from like a course fit, right, I guess you get you could always count him in at Pebble, but like Pinehurst number two would be a course that's like, you're not your typical US Open course, right.
Yeah, yeah, it's a good point. Yeah. I mean like like can do all of this stuff. He does well around the greens.
Right, mm hmm. So I don't know, it'll be a course that a lot of people miss greens. It'll be a huge premium on approach play. One of the things with with Piners number two is like you could drive it a little crooked and get away with it because you get those waste areas, you get some good aches and you know.
Phil, by the way, Phil Phil camp Smith is battling it at Pineher's number two. I think anyway, go ahead.
Lots of people love camp Smith for this Pineers number two. I need to see I need to see a readddication, need read a dedication to golf for Campsmith. I saw some I saw some some of the some of the footage from the Australian Open, and that swing is like, wait, does this guy just give a not doing fitness anymore? Dude?
Andy, you know how hard it would be if somebody paid you up front one hundred million dollars and it didn't matter what you did to here, like it would take would I would.
Well, you have to be insanely competitive.
Yeah, I could easily pack on twenty LB's like right out of the gate if that was the case, you know, I mean, if you wanted to just be lazy, it would be very easy to be lazy.
I think it'd be easy to put on twenty LB's if somebody was paying you one hundred million dollars to be in shape.
Oh for sure, for sure, Zion. It's a good example. I don't think it's but let's let's focus on the fitness. I mean, I'm with you, a right, that was I think that was my second to last.
One I got. I got so Like. One of the things that I always look at is that players the fallout of the top ten. This is basically every year, every year, two to four fallout and and this year I think there's obvious contenders for falling out. So if you go to the oh wgrs jacked up to like.
It's so hard to follow.
Now, Well, I just don't think Wyndham and Brian Harmon should necessarily be in the in the top ten. I think Brooks should be in there, and and probably cam Smith maybe in tenth, I don't know, h maybe, but but anyways, you know, who are they gonna be the guys that fall out?
Right?
And I think everybody's going to point to like Brian Harmon and Wyndham Clark. I don't think Wyndham Clark's going to fall out of the town ten. I kind of think he's going to be one that sticks around. But that means like fits Matty fitz Homa, Xander can't lay one of those guys. At least one more of those guys is falling out. Yep, probably three or four guys will fall out. So it's like, who's going to fall out? Like, I just think it's always a fascinating question.
Well, I mean rom falls out right in theory, I don't.
Think he's going to he's three even he won't he's got so many he's got so many points, okay, right, he's he's over one hundred points ahead of fifth.
I just want to tell you that that you you could have set a hundred points above, mean five huts above, I wouldn't have known the difference. Yeah, Like, I don't know what. I don't know what it is?
Like a cup point?
What do you get? What do you get if you win? Like? What is what do you get if you win on the ows R? Do you know?
No? I don't know. I don't know. So I mean like it, do you think fits is gonna fall out of the top ten?
Yes?
Yeah, yeah, I think he's gonna have a good year. I don't know Markwi. So like you, you're big on markw He's coming in right top ten, so it's like he's playing his way in. I don't know.
So all right, three of my last preditions at you. Yeah, all right, you're gonna like this one. I think we've spent how long have we gone here our tour? Hour? Nine minutes? I don't think, man, we have Sorry, I take the back. We have mentioned his name one Tiger Woods. Not sure if you saw much in December on Tiger Andy. A few counts posted some stuff on social media. Not a lot. I didn't see a lot, but there was a little bit here and there, twenty twenty four President's
Cup Tiger Woods on the team. That's my prediction. Wow, on the team, twenty twenty four president Cup Tiger Woods is one of the twelve.
That's a good that's a good prediction. I got Scotty Scheffler winning a second major. I don't think we really need to talk about it.
I think the can you tell me, can you rank, give me power ranking one to four on what you think most likely the least likely of that prediction.
You're saying, like, how how good I feel about Skotty Scheffler?
No, no, no, no. Just if you said he's gonna win a major of the of the four majors, what's the most likely wins in your opinion? What's the least likely wins?
When Masters? Most likely he's already done it. And you know, I just think his short game ball striking can get him to a position where if he can totally put bad and win, right.
I think that's the I think that's the obvious number one. You got to go Masters, Yep.
I think it. I think it goes Masters, US Open, PGA, and then Open.
Okay, I would have probably flipped open in PGA, but similar, similar idea, especially with Pine Nurse. I think, Scotty, we'll have a lot of fun at Pine Nurse.
Yeah, so that's how I would I would do it. But I think the beard, the beard's here to stay. Do you see that way?
Do you think he's Jimmy Kimmel Allstars? You think he's going with it? Huh?
I think so. I think he showed up to whatever hero with the scruff. I think he got good feedback and he's gone all in.
Well, I mean he does. Let's be honest, he looks way he looks way better. I mean he looks more handsome. You know what I'm saying. It's not like better, It's just he looks a little bit older. Dude. I'll say this. In my twenties, when I realized what facial hair did for my face, it was on all the time. Now in my forties, it's gray right here. So I'm the other way. Now I'm shaving way more than not.
I uh, you know I'm not allowed to shave. My wife like doesn't let me.
Really, when's the last time you were totally clean shaven.
I had a mishap with a new trimmer. Oh, I hope it wasn't I had to go. I had to go. No, No, I had to go all the way down.
So you don't. But you don't go all the way down. Ever you leave it, you leave it up most of the time.
Interesting all the time, all the time. Like when I trim, it's like two and a half.
Okay, see, because I remember I asked my wife one time, I said beard, no beard, and she said, I do not care. And I was like, all right, well there you go. I can I'll make the decision. Does doesn't like the stash, But other than that, she's good to go.
Yeah, all right. Well, hey, Shane, good having you on.
Do you want to go back to stretching talk? Are you good?
I'm good, I'm good. Any NBA thoughts on the way out? How about the thunder.
It's it's been, without a doubt, the most fun regular season NBA that I can remember since I've been an adult. It's it's awesome, It's there's it feels like there's a new it feels like this is kind of the flippy. Remember the Lee Westwood, Martin Kaimer Luke Donald run where they were kind of battling with world number one, and it was this weird time in golf. It was like
post Tiger and Phil but before Rory and Speed. It feels like we have and not to say that the past was bad, but it feels like we're moving into like the Rory Spith world of the NBA where this kind of new crop, you know, the Timberwolves, the the Thunder like this new group are gonna be relatively dominant over the next you know, a few years, and that includes Dallas and obviously what we've seen with Denver. But it feels like it's it's a switch in terms of the old garden the new garden.
I mean, there's so much talent in the NBA so just insane.
It's so easy to turn on every night. It's just the best is a weird NFL year. So with that weird NFL, you're to have this great NBA on his bit Chef's kiss.
Yeah all right, Shane, Well, we'll talk to you soon. Thanks for coming on, and uh yeah, good luck with your start of the year. Thanks body, all right, thanks for listening to another edition the Frida Egg Golf Podcast. Big thanks to meg Atkins, she produced and edited this podcast. Jumping back in you know, it's like riding a bike. Meg. Meg. Meg's back on the Pod production while Matt is on vacation.
So thanks to Meg for seven in here and she does, you know, great work with the Frida Egg Pro Shop, so let's plug that. If you didn't get everything you wanted for the holiday season, check out the Frida Egg Pro Shop. We've got a bunch of stuff in there. Prints are always good, hats, pullovers, there's a lot of good stuff in there, so go to proshop dot Thefridagg dot com and check out what we have there. Thanks, and we'll be back next week with a new episode.
I think Garrett's cooking up another Greatest Courses episode, so that should be coming next week as well. I'll be on the pod again next week too, Thanks guys, and I hope everybody gets off to great start of the year.