Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. This week I am joined by Kevin van Valkenberg of ESPN. Kevin and I did something a little bit different this week. We took on the make believe role of Golf Zar, where each of us were co chairs of the position and came up with five ideas to change golf. It was fun, a little bit different format, and on top of that, we discuss what's been going on the tour this season last week at RBC, and then we looked
ahead to next week's PGA Championship at Belle Reeve. I hope you guys enjoy the conversation with Kevin.
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 frid egg Frida egg, the dreaded Frida egg, Frida egg, Frida egg brid Egg, Frida egg bride egg Lie.
I'm about ready to run off of the hump course.
Did you watch last week?
I only watched the little bits of it as I was traveling for vacation stuff, so I can only comment vaguely and generally about DJ.
And Spuch yeah, I think that's all that. The takeaway from last week was is that, yeah, dj is really good at golf.
Yeah yeah, and it's hard to be really good every week, so like he does it better than most. And that's still even if you only have one major, Like that's okay, that still means you really good at golf.
Yeah. When he I mean he is. It's funny because he's what thirty four now, yeah, so thirty four he's so he's got ten more years in front of him.
M h.
I mean we're going to be talking about probably close to forty wins. Yeah, probably another major or two.
You would think, yeah, at least one major, I would think.
You know, he's probably you know, even pick to win the PGA next week.
Yeah.
That golf course is going to fit him really well. I think we're going to see see a Bomber heavy board next week. But I mean, you're starting to get into the top maybe twenty golfers of all time, top thirty.
What is the what is DJD to do to get into the top, say, top twenty golfers of all time? Because he would he need to win if he wins, no more majors, but wins like forty, has forty wins, probably got to make a pretty good case that he is regardless of the lack of majors.
Yeah, he's got all those WGCs, which I think value or are pretty good value, you know, in terms of wins. I think. I think two majors though, is kind of like an it's got you have to have two majors. I think there's I think there's sixty guys that have won two majors. That's yeah, and so like I think, I think having two majors is like really big. I mean, Zach Johnson's got too.
Yes, he does it.
He's a He's another interesting guy when it comes to career. You know, is he a hall of Famer?
I think he is.
I don't see how you can't put him in the Hall of Fame. I mean there's I mean, look, he's going to get into the Hall of Fame. I think regardless of whether he we really feel like he is a Hall of Famer. But I kind of feel like he is a Hall of famer. Like that's you know, some of it might be over achieved your talent, but I mean two majors on two iconic courses, he's got what like fourteen thirteen wins somewhere in there that might overset that.
I think that's about right. Yeah, how do you how do you count worldwide wins versus PGA tour wind?
I mean, I know Calgary player counts them pretty much. Anything with like four guys throwing money in a pot as a win. But yeah, I would say depends on the field, right, I mean you got to have like at least you know, at least some I would say, what like twenty five other like top four hundred players or something for it to really count. I mean you're
otherwise like who are you beating? And on some of these euro events where you know, the highest ranked players sixteenth in the next highest ranked players like seventy fifth, like what you know, how was that?
How was that the same quality of win as you know, Bridge Stone or Arnold Palmer or something like that.
It's almost like there needs to be like a waiting because but yeah, I mean a win is is so I mean, where would my boy Westy be if you waited? Like runner ups and majors?
Are we still in the way.
I know that you feel that ELS is better than mix and career wise, but can we make the are you going to are willing to stand up and make the case that Westy had a better career than mix Center.
No, it's too much. I think Westy was like it's going to be.
You know.
What I love about west is like he legit lost his game, Yeah, like it was gone for like three years. I always I like guys that like lose their game, Okay,
come back. I think it's just it shows a little bit more grit, you know, and like I don't know, so many of these guys end up getting onto her at age twenty three now or twenty two, and it's like, you know, seeing people go through struggles like is that's part of the journey as a golfer, I kind of think, And it's why I think sometimes like the best players are the most boring players.
That is correct, Yes, that's what I think. Tiger's more compelling now than he was at the height. Like I don't know, for me, that's just my personal feeling.
And I've always felt.
Like to me, he was much more relatable and rootable at this at this inevitable kind of comeback. And so that's the guy I've always been wanting to sort of root for, Like I don't know that I could say that I wanted Tiger to win back when he was awesome.
But now I definitely want him to win.
And yeah, obviously, like a lot of that's my personal bias, but I'm I'm totally like in on this Tiger comeback.
I feel like he's a human for like the first time in his career.
Yes, absolutely, like hugging Crime with his kids and telling him like, yeah, I just try my best, like that never would have happened to me.
The most human moment of his career is when he.
Hugged seveter the the Open Championship at Hoylake and just was you know, completely laid bare, like thinking about his dad.
Yeah, I think that's Holake, right, Yeah, I think that was Hoylake.
I didn't hook slily after he and I played Hoylake and I shot like eighty four eighty six.
Maybe I didn't know. That wasn't the crying moment for me. But the routing was different. They didn't have the eighteenth total like it was when Rory won it either, so.
The grand stands were not either.
So right, Yeah, I mean that's pretty key moment to have the grand stands.
Up the Tiger. I mean the downside of him being a human is like, you know, robot Tiger of the mid two thousand wouldn't have would have won that tournament a couple of weeks ago, car Newsty like it would have been game over he hit the back nine. Yes, like human Tiger has. He has issues that he has to get over.
That's true, but that's what makes more awesome.
Like, you know, I really feel like the most Tiger Major of all time is going to come, like in the next three or four years, when he turns like and puts up a thirty on the back nine Augusta and just snatches one from I don't know, someone who you think is just running away with it.
It's a little bit crazy that this golf season is like almost over.
Yes, it truly is.
Imagine how it'll feel when the PGA is moved up and after the British were like, oh well, what is.
There to look forward to.
I'm curious your take on PGA and may do you think it's better?
Uh?
I mean it'll bring different courses into play, right, and that's a good thing.
I don't know. I mean, I just feel like the PGA has no identity, like.
I everybody who's trudging out Saint Louis, myself included. It's like, really, like why are we going to this course? And what is what does anyone can I mean to me, like you just if you win a PGA, it's worth like, you know, zero point seventy.
Five other majors.
And so I guess maybe moving it up into the middle of the season makes it sort of a better part of the narrative as opposed to sort of.
Like oh the afterthought other major. But I don't know what's your take.
I think it's I mean, I think like j Monahan, this might go down in his career is like the greatest move the greatest like robbery of all time. Okay, because August there's like nothing going on. Yeah, Like the PGA has like I think it's almost done well for
what it is because of its date in August. And you go to May, like if it's on the West Coast, and I'm like an NBA basketball nut, like I'd much rather watch like the finals of the NBA, Like you know, you're you're budding into like conference finals, Like why would you go into contend against the NHL and the NBA. Yeah, in May versus. And you know, the other thing about May is like most of the country is just getting into golf season.
Yeah, that's true, So.
I think you're just it's just a it's a it's a bad deal for the PGA. I don't know how they got them convinced him to do it, but yeah, and then you know, the European Tours gotta be doing backflips.
Yeah.
I was trying to think, like, what's the most memorable PGA in your lifetime, Bob May, Yeah, that's it. But other than that, like, you know, does anybody really remember even like I don't know, like Michaelson att Balta Strawl or like Tiger att you know he beat Paul Casey. What was that that uta? Yeah, just boring, like nothing.
The Sergio Tiger one was pretty good.
Yeah, that was probably that probably is up there too. But other than that, like, I don't know it just hope hopefully this will make it. You know, it makes it very easily that someone could get hot and win the Masters and the PGA in that quick stretch and then all of a sudden, like it seems more fun that the Grand Slam is in play or somebody's like on a roll for having a huge season, Like I'm in on that.
It does put it in four straight months, which is kind of cool.
Yeah, but most seasons of other sports are just in a four month window.
Right You You don't remember when Rory, you know, fended off David Lynn with the title at Kiowa.
That is one of my least memorable PGAs.
I will say, yes, I mean David Lynn.
David Lynn and wasn't Uh, Carl Petterson was like third.
And that hot Carl Petterson was third. There's there was four four Englishmen in the top the top three, I guess.
I mean that's one of those Tiger Majors that no one talks about where he was sort of in it and then just completely like didn't wasn't a factor in the end because he was like midway through, right, he was only like a couple shots off the lead, like if you remember watching some of it like that, and he was sort of kind of a factor and then.
Rory just completely blew the vaporized field.
But that's like when he you know, people always talk about Tigers Majors about how like they none of them existed after two thousand and eight, But he was like in contention in a lot of like Royal Saint George's and like, you know, the Olympic Field, Olympic Fields, and there's a bunch of Tiger Majors that when we talk about Curnesy, like you probably should have won, so there at least, yeah, a couple of those other ones that he just wasn't even he kind of just completely faded out of it.
Yeah, as so Rory that year went sixty seven, seventy five, sixty seven, sixty six, Like I mean, he had he shot seventy five and still won by uh he said, seventy five and a round still one by eight.
That might be the most Rory major of all time actually, now that I think about it.
Yeah, I mean it's kind of it's kind of crazy. That's that's something that I'm kind of perplexed by. It's just is Rory.
Yeah, I you know, I spent like a year sort of trying to write a piece about him, like after it was after twenty fourteen, and it was actually like a lot more of an interesting year in terms of
I think it was. I followed him around for fifteen and then like dropped a piece like at the beginning of sixteen like in The Masters, and essentially the thesis of it was like Rory doesn't really know what he wants, and I in terms of like does he want to have Tiger's career, does he want to have Mixon's career?
Does he want to have like his normal life?
And I think, like I think for a while, he really I still don't know like if if we figured that out, Like I think he definitely wants a more normal life, and it's clear like he didn't want to basically like alienate everyone around him and have no close friends and be obsessed with pursue of greatness like Tiger. But I'm still not sure exactly if he's figured out, like you know, does he how great does he sort of want to be?
Or like does that even?
Is that even like just silly sports amateur psychoanalysis, And then he's trying really really hard to be great, and just because it's not winning, it allows people like me to be like, oh, you just don't want it enough, which is silly.
I don't know, it's a great question.
Well, he also has like the there's like a blessing and a curse of being the first superstar in the sport post Tiger yeah, and with that came like he's the first superstar that's dealt with like Tiger Riches. That's not Tiger, that's true, you know, and that I think the money thing is like a big thing because I mean, what was he nineteen when he had that Emirates deal. I mean he's been getting crazy endorsement money since, you know,
a really young age. And then you go and you factor in just like I just I mean, it's hard to be really good at golf for a really long time, yes, And it's like there's so much time you have to put in to improve and everybody's gotten better at golf, Like the level of play has certainly gotten better, and there's a lot of factors with that that that go into it. But like part of that is like it's just really hard to get better once you reach higher levels of golf.
Yeah, no, and it's like everyone has that kind of
a window where they're like truly great. And I think Rory's points out a couple of times, like most guys win all their majors in like a eight nine year period and you know, maybe you're already sort of had his Like I mean, when is Roy's career that much dramatically different than Tom Watson's other than the fact that there there wasn't as many talented people around, you know, when Watson was winning his eight majors or whatever, Like I always thought that that was Rory's kind of benchmark
because like Watson's career or you know that, you know, six seven, eight majors like that, that would be an enormous amount in today's game.
And I don't know if he's gonna get there.
It's it's quite fascinating. I uh, just looking what the thing I think that majors. It's it's crazy because I think the depth of great players is a little bit higher, Like we were just talking about with like there's more like the level of play has increased. Is that winning a major is so much harder, But like that's just the way people are evaluated, Like, yeah, would DJ go home with say he doesn't win again this year three wins?
Was this year a disappointment because he didn't get a major? Yeah, Like and then you could say this exact same thing, like rattling down the top ten, like if Spith doesn't win a major, is this year a disappointment? I like think this year obviously hasn't been great for Speed, you know, and yet he's.
In two majors.
Like I was thinking that exact same thing or this year, Like would you like overrated or underrated Speed's entire season? Like would you would he trade it for you know, previous year where he might have had three wins but didn't contend in a Major's a good question. I mean, he could have won two majors this year. Yeah, and yet he's had like a pretty bad season for his standards.
What about Ricky.
Man? Rick to me is like the biggest conundrum in the whole thing, Like I have, I've rowed for Rick for a while and then I've been like critical of him and then I sort of got back on it.
I really thought that, like Carneisty was going to be his major, and he just was never really a factor. I just thought, you know, he's creative, he can, he's a great win player. He's especially a pretty good putter on flag means that I don't know why it wasn't there for him.
It's it's ah, he's a fascinating case study. Yeah, I mean the consistency level of his play throughout like the last I don't know, five years has been out of this world good, you know, like very few players. You know, he's a he's been a top ten player despite not winning a lot, and that doesn't really happen.
You know.
You look at like the top ten in the world, they win a lot and he doesn't win a lot.
It's true.
I sort of said at the US Open last year, at some point like if you're a generally a great, generationally great player, you got to win a couple of these, like you know, one or two, Like you know, as we said, Zac Johnson's got two majors. Ricky is a way more talented player than Jack Johnson. And so you know, at some point, doesn't don't you have to kind of say, like, okay, like if if un let's if we that sports has
not played on a spreadsheet or in a computer. At some point, your inability to shoot like a good round in on a Sunday when you're in contention at a major and win it is sort of a knock on you. And you know what, He's shot a great round in the Masters this year, and Patrick Greed, you know, just
barely hung on. So like I kind of feel like often with him, I'm arguing out of both sides of my mouth, Like it's a little bit of circumstantial bias, right, Like, so I'm saying he's he should do this, and then the Masters he did kind of do it, and he still didn't win. So but at some point over over time, all those things add up, aren't you ever? Like, hey, when is this going to work out for you?
I don't know. That's a hard answer to me.
Rick's Majors, like it always comes down to one moment, Like I like, I can't get over like he made a triple last year in the first round at Coyle Hollow because he like tried to hit an absurd shot out of a fairway bunker, and like nobody wins majors with triples. But at the Masters this year, it was that second shot on thirteen, Yeah, where like you, I was looking at this, I'm like, what is he doing before he hit it? And then he hits it right in the water, and it's like, why did he do that?
Like you just lay up and make you know, like you're probably from there. Your average score if he had just laid up was like four to three, you know, and he might have made a three if he hit a miraculous shot from from where he was, but the you know, the percentages were probably just about the same.
And that's the thing about majors is it comes down to like a bounce here or a you know, a putt dropping there, And I don't know, that's what always it always sticks with Like I think you can almost go through every major Ricky's been close at and you find one hole where it's just like, what were you doing here?
I think you look.
I often think about that very thing when we're thinking of like Nicholas's career and if you you know, when they put up all those old masters online, it was sort of really fascinating to watch like how conservative Nicholas played, but that was just who he was. Like he was just gonna basically like make other guys make mistakes, just wear them down and never do a truly dumb thing
that lost him a tournament. And you could say, well, maybe if Nicholas played like Arnold Palmer his whole career, he might have won twenty majors, twenty five majors, but he also might have won thirteen or eleven, like if he had just been aggressive and dumb all the time.
And so like, over time, it's like staying on eighteen in blackjack, right, like, you never hit on that number, you're gonna win a lot of hands and you might lose them too, but you might as well just keep playing it out because and that's why Nicholas basically didn't finish out of the top ten in a major for you know what ten years almost because he was so good and he just never threw away a tournament.
That's like the thing at Augusta too, is like when you go hunting for the score is when it gets you. And if you just I feel like if you just take care of business out there almost you know, there are a lot of hard holes, harder holes now, but like at the same time, like you know, if you if you take care of business on the par fives, like you're already like three under just starting round, you know, if you say you birdy three out of the four of them, like you know, like and that's a pretty
feasible thing to do. And it's like, all right, well, like let's just take care of business the rest of the way and not do anything really dumb. But I mean it's way easier to say that than do it in a tournament, for sure, So hey, for we're gonna do a little something different. We're gonna do uh litt uh if if each of us became co golf Czar of.
The world of the world, I love it.
Yeah, And we get to just this is our initial meeting about what we're gonna do, and we each come come with five ideas. You know, what are the five? So we'll just alternate back and forth. One idea, one idea, what's the what's the first thing you do?
First thing I do?
Okay, So I've been thinking about this for a while, and I've said some of this before publicly, but I'm ready to formulate my own argument entirely. I think if I was a golf zar and I like could make any one decision that I thought was realistic, it would be that the Masters should.
Have its own ball.
And so you show up there, you can have a low spin version, you can have a high spin version, and then each one of those maybe you can have a firm or soft version.
But that's it.
Like Fred Radley has to hand you your you know, three sleeves of golf balls when you show up for bragtist round or whatever, and that's it.
That's all you're allowed to play.
With, and that like, because the Masters the Guessa is the only place in golf that could basically say.
You know what, we don't care.
We don't care if you if there's backlash, we don't care if the equipment companies pout. We don't care if you sit out of the tournament and say I can't play unless I get to have my ball. This is how it's going to be from now on, and if you pass on it, we'll bump the next guy up on the list. Guess what, we're taking another guy to
make our field of ninety. And that might be the one thing that would sort of slowly over time rein in the game without a dramatic, like huge car crash of a change, because they obviously the Master's proved like, we don't care if you protest the tournament. We don't care if you pull all the ads. We're just going to broadcast an entire thing without any ads, Like, we don't care. If you know there's tons of people who want tickets every year and can't get them.
That all sort of fits in.
With the ethos of the place, and then you could get back the course in some ways that you know, Jones and Mackenzie originally wanted to have. You could put teas in different places. You could not have to buy up millions of acres of land from the country club next door. Like you can have your tournament back the way you want it, and maybe some skill is sort of you know, returned to the tournament or at least like some realistic you know, like a guy like DJ still going to hit.
It farther than everybody, a guy like We'rey's still going to hit it farther than everybody. But you don't have to have.
Five hundred and thirty yard part fours anymore if you don't want to.
Did they still hit wedgend two?
Yes, correct, guys are going to be hitting you know, seven eight hors at least. It's because I think I think it's a little bit strange that whenever we talk about like reeling in distance, we never talk about clubs. We only talk about the ball, like we got to roll back the ball. But I also think that, you know, in part because the ball is the one thing where one sort of tournament could say, Yep, this is what you're gonna do. You're gonna take You're gonna take our ball.
And then if that's the case, then you know, Nichols might say, you know.
What, at the memorial, we're also going.
To play like the version of the ball that I want, or you know, the pomrotational or you know, some of the invite courses are like the invite tournaments say, yeah, we love that idea and we love that.
I guess it took a stand.
We can't afford to keep extending our courses so that you know, I mean, guys Aaron Wise can hit it four hundred and twenty yards and they wedgend every hole. So we're gonna basically say this is what it is, and that would maybe change the tide eventually.
In the game.
You know, I my first things as Cozar was rollback equipment.
There you go.
I did I think that. I think it's kind of almost a myth. Like I don't think equipment makes bad golfers better. Yeah, Like, I think that's like the biggest myth in the world. I think that what it does. Like I play enough with like my buddies who are beginners, like if you if if you hit it like the way the technology is, it doesn't really spin that much,
so they just hit it further offline. You know, and I just don't think it's it makes like I think playing like older equipment, one of the things that it did was like if you hit a bad shot, the ball got on the ground and rolled, you know, versus like today's just flies forever offline. And I so that would be that'd be mine. And obviously going with the ball is the popular thing. But I think that like I think it's it's the whole thing. Like I think
it like fundamentals of golf have changed. I've talked with somebodies recently, is like, so my age of golfer, I'm thirty two, and like, who's the greatest golfer that between the age of thirty and thirty five in the world.
Oh, like it's Justin Rose under thirty five.
No, he's like thirty eight. So it's like it's like Web Simpson. Yeah, okay, And like I have this whole theory is like we were the generation that grew up like I grew up playing with professionals and like small heads. Like when I was in a freshman in high school, I think I hit the ball like two hundred and twenty yards and now like an am events, I play with freshmen in high school that hit it like three hundred and like their swings have changed fundamentally, like because
of equipment. Like so my generation had to learn a new golf swing essentially like midway through our our career. And like the older guys like you know, your Roses and Sergio Stenson, they like are were established, but then this young crop, like the kids four years younger than my generation, were just better. Yeah, it's it's it's a
it's a weird it's a weird thing. But like I think that equipment is like if you took if no new equipment was made tomorrow, like we no new equipment is going to be made except for like balls, the game would be perfectly fine. Yeah, like there's there's no need. It's just like an add on to the to the game. And if you take away all the money that people spend on equipment, you know what they're going to spend their money on is like lessons and traveling to play golf.
Yeah, so to.
Think like about the margins that equipment companies or ball companies are chasing, Like if you were at this point, the rules are sort of you know set. I mean, remember like we were talking when we were sort of coming up. The idea of like a four hundred and
sixty CECED driver seemed absurd. But as soon as like drivers couldn't get any bigger, then it had to be like, oh, we're moving the weights to the back of it, or no, we're like distributing the energy with this, you know, jailbreak technology. We're doing this, and like at some point those kind of things that you're able to do within the rules and like not having a trampoline effect on the ball.
Kind of maxed out.
You're chasing like half a yard or something here and there in terms of I guess distance. And so that's why I see, you know, like, hey, it's a new set of irons that essentially a seven iron is playing at what you know four iron was playing ten years ago, and in terms of it's loft, and I don't think I don't understand how that's sustainable. Like ten years from now, what is the what are the equipment companies going to be saying to kind of like this to market to you to get make you better.
Well, it's like when one of your biggest problems as a sport is the expense of the sport, Like when you talk about it's like one of the biggest barriers to entry for golf, Like why like and then but like what the equipment industry does is it it makes people feel like they need to buy this new five hundred dollars driver, Like that is what contributes to the expense of the sport totally.
I have a gridy is that we have a golf tournament were play and like every year every year, so everybody was like, well, should we buy a new driver this year? And it's it's the point where you you know, it's silly, like how is that helping guys who are literally at best, like a sixteen handicap upgrade from one driver to the next.
It's just not Yeah, it's that's like what and think about it, if you spend that money, if that like sixteen handicap spent the money that they spend on equipment on lessons, like they would be better, you know, and like that would actually make up Like you know, I know pros always are like, well, if you take away equipment sales, like it's gonna kill my shot. But like, if you take away equipment sales, you're gonna do You're
gonna people are gonna take more lessons. Yeah, so you're gonna make it up that way.
I do think there is like a desire for the quick fix, in the sense of like, oh this this driver's gonna make me finally good. I don't have to put in the hours of like I've taken a bunch of lessons this year, and it's hard to like remake your swing, hard to really grind over. You know, so many people who are golfers like me, like I'm a nine, they're still essentially like closing the club face with their hands,
like hitting a flip. And so for me, like learning how to square my body an impact has been sort of frustrating experience. Whereas but now like I'm better than I was in January, but there was definitely weeks where I was like I'm just lost, man, I just totally lost. And I think that getting past that version of feeling lost is a hard thing for some people, and so that's why they look for other answers and just like oh this I hit this, you know this iron today that was essentially.
Like flew ten yards through. That must be the answer.
And I'm happy to pay the extra, you know, eight hundred dollars for these set of irons of one day it feels great.
Hey, you know, Bryson taught the world that everybody feels lost some days.
All right, what's your number two?
My number two would be you know, I would and I'd abolish the PGA Tour and European Tour and make a world tour.
Oh, I love it.
I just I think that it's too confusing. I think that like by central centralizing the professional golf world, like you could have more flow up and down and just make like really premier events, Like I I can't stand wgc's They're like my least favorite tour events because like, you know, there's they what they should be, and what
they are is like a disgrace, you know. It's so I would have like that, you got your majors, right, you keep the majors, put them over here, right, But then like why not have like a premier national open rotation where you play you know, the Irish Open, the Scottish Open, the Australian Open, the japan Open, South African Open, and Canadian Open, like you know, take kind of the most golf rich countries and put those countries as like your premier side events, and then you have an American
World Tour schedule and say it's the top, say the top three hundred people qualify for this tour that goes all year round, there's no off season any ways. And then from there you have a secondary US and World tour that feeds into this top tour. But like you know, like I think about like that guy who is at Dan McCarthy a couple of years ago that won like four straight events on the Canadian Tour. Yeah, yeah, and
then you know he got a thumb injury. He had to just sit down there and play these Canadian Tour events all year. He got a thumb injury right when he gets on the web the next year, and like he was out for almost the entire year. Like that guy really got screwed by the system, because you can't tell me he was winning Canadian Tour events by seven to eight shots, like he should have gotten bumped up.
Yeah. And in that respect, is the LPGA more of a true world tour? Yeah?
Yeah it is. I think in it it shows like you, I mean, I just think with the way modern travel has eased the need, like the struggle of having a world tour so much.
You know, I mean, there's so many good courses around the world that never we don't, like unless you're kind of a psycho like we are, you know, most people don't know about. It would be so much fun to see those courses featured, you know, and.
Think about how much like how good it is for the game of golf to have the best players in the world visiting these countries, you know, and like people could throw in, like all of sudden, you know, people could throw in like, hey, I'm gonna go play the New Zealand Open this year because like it's at Terry Etiers, you know, I doubt it would be there, but like, you know, somewhere really cool. Like I think like it would just and like I think it would just work
in today's day and age, like it's it's time. Like and especially I figure with all the contracts, I'm not getting this thing. This thing's not happening untill twenty thirty.
Yeah.
But that's the way I would do it, is I would I would push that, and I would you know, I would make these events really great, great courses, and then I would have like a much more fluid, you know kind of way of players coming in and out and who qualifies for really the premier events who's not and you know you got to work your way in you can fall out. I think that would be you
know much more, you know it would it would. I would come up with the system, some way of having a ranking which deems what tournaments you get into.
I like it and that way too, Like if you say you win in Australia, you get like an exemption on the tour or whatever for a year. Like it's not just like, oh, it doesn't matter, like the idea that like when Jordan's Peace won the Australian Open on a good course that it was like not even counted as like a win for him. That you're to me silly, Like that was a good field and he won a prestigious tournament and was like the beginning of Speef becoming
a truly like good player. It was posts the Masters where he didn't he didn't win it when Ian Babo sort of went toe to toe and that was like the moment that speak and that in the sort of grander scheme of things, it's almost like that win counts for nothing, but that was kind of an important thing.
I like, I like to I mean, yeah, it's like the same thing with Harold Varner. He won that Australian PGA and it was a really good field, you know, And it goes back to that problem we had with Worldwide Wind, you know, like how do you count him? Like now we know because everybody's on the same tour, you know, we know how strong that field was, because like who knows how good how good is you to
Keda in Japan? Yeah, it's probably pretty good, but he's not as good in America because he just it seems like the transition is tough for him.
Well, and there's such a huge golf market in Asia, like why not have you know, more like on of two events or something every year like the Japan National Open or the South Korea National Open, Like those should be like events where a lot of guys are are in it and sort of contending for that because that's where the game is sort of booming now, and you know, getting a huge field that has Tiger and Phil and Rory and stuff like that would be totally beneficial for
the game and then rewarding them for going that far and saying like yeah, this is this counts as official win discounts as you know, towards your lifetime exemption status, like all that would be good to the game.
Yeah, and instead of having like sixty events in the US, there's twenty, right, and then there's more across the world with better players, like all of a sudden, like the seventieth ranked player in the world is playing, you know, really an interesting schedule where like Billy Horschel isn't really a big draw in America, but he would probably be a huge draw in Japan. Yeah, so that's what's what's your number two?
Okay, So similarly, maybe this is a little bit close to my first, but the watching you and zb like play around the States with Hickory clubs made me feel like I would love it if there was like a tournament that was like a Hickory Club Challenge at like an iconic course like National Golf Links or you know, or Katie Buffs or something where, of course that we don't see every year, where we truly get to see like the skill of the players compared to you know,
how golf game was like one hundred and fifty years ago.
So you can make the.
Best hickory clubs you want whatever, and you roll them out and they're say you limit the field, you know, because you're going to play one of these courses where you can't have like huge grandstands whatever. So say, it's like it has the more feel of like an amateur term. So we'd limit the crowds to like five thousand people a day. It's like a lottery, and then you just see like how good these guys as are with clubs that you know, the old Tom Morris is the World
played with. I would be super in on that, and I think it would be if it was only one thing a year.
It would be fun, get everyone micd up, make it.
Into like a really sort of social fun thing, like encourage the guys to dress kind of old school whatever, totally like enjoyable thing, and we'd get to see courses that we just that are totally like mysteries to ninety percent.
Of the country.
It would be amazing, it would you know, like that's it. That would be a great idea. I think in general, like one of my points I didn't make with the World Tour is like more variety in the events, Like I want to see different stuff. I want to see a seven club tournament, yes, Like why don't why doesn't that exist?
There's just so many tournaments that are begging for an identity that you know, the idea that you know, Memphis changed whatever and went to the sort of team format gave them an identity that they totally didn't have. And so I would think that more tournaments that are struggling, like you know, when Houston is like begging for a spot so that we can see guys come out on a boring course and shoot sixteen under. How is that compelling?
Like long term? Like it was so much better that By and Nelson moved to a course that was just dramatically different this year, And so how do we do that with some of the other tournaments that that are struggling.
Like, I don't know, make.
It a you know, a make a full, full tournament field with you know, one hundred people were half for women and half for men. They have to you have to team up with a partner, like instead of it being like a you know, tend whatever that that tournament they play with Stableford and like you know, Lexi Thompson involved, Like make that into like a full tournament thing that's
totally fun. Like that would that would make people Some people might be like I'm not watching this, I don't care, but some people are like, oh yeah, I love this alternate shot with like Michelson and Karrie Webb like versus Tiger and like Sie Thompson, I'm in on this.
It's it the lack of variety in like the golf world, Like I use this analogy a lot for municipal golf is like you know where like if you if I looked at Chicago municipal golf, like it's essentially like everything's exactly the same. So like I come to you, Hey, I want to build this golf course and I'm gonna you know, or like hey, i want to build this donut shop and I'm gonna do it exactly like Dunkin Donuts does theirs. But it's like that's a horrible business
idea that would never get past. But like the same thing with tournaments, Like, hey, so we want to have a tournament in uh in Houston, and we're gonna do it exactly the same as every other tournament. And I think we're just gonna it's gonna do really well because you know we're Houston. Yeah, It's like that's not a that no, no, Like no entrepreneur would approach like hosting their own tournament that way. Yeah, it's so I agree
with the Hickory thing. That would be really cool. What do you guys would.
Complain the most about the Hickory Club Challenge or who would be who would excel the most about the Hickory Club Challenge. That's what I would love to see.
I think it would you would see obviously. I think I think Rory would be so good. Yeah, as a Hickory player. Yeah, I actually think the ball strikers would do really well because I think it's so much harder to hit the ball well all the time with with uh, with Hickory's.
Jason days walking off the course and the Hickery Club Challenge, isn't he at some point like it just did frustration like I can't do it, Mike, this is total.
I uh yeah, I could see, well see what would happen, and we saw it with Trinity as people just wouldn't show up, which is the sad thing because like I think I equate it to like if you told if you ran a company with a bunch of salespeople, like if you said, hey, we're changing your comp structure, you could be giving them like the best deal ever and they would still like immediately be like wait, what, what what are you doing? You know.
They do they create I mean athletes, creative normalcy, and they creve. That's I think that the I mean, I'm a certainly like pro labor sort of person, but I also think that like in golf, like because they're all independent contractors and because it's golf needs them, labor is so powerful that any kind of change makes them just recoil and horror and they're so angry about the idea
of anything that's different. And I think that's that creates a very vanilla sameness and that's why a lot of the tournaments are just like so boring, Like I just feel like, oh, all these courses are the same, and all these swings are the same, and all these personalities are kind of the same. And that I think long term like hurts golf. It's like baseball's going through that huge, huge crisis about that now where every but he either walks or hits home runs or strikes out, and so
the ball's never in play. Nothing is ever like different or creative, and I feel like golf needs to really watch out or else that is going to like potentially happen and golf people just be like ough, Like why am I turning in to see the Northern Trust, Like it's the same thing as you know, the Arnold Palmer to me, like it's one's sunny and one's kind of you know, blustery and cold.
That's the I think that's the other thing is like say what you will about like us Open and like one is compelling though, because like it's athletes overcoming adversity. Yeah, it's why Like the Open when the weather's bad is like insanely like it's like the best stuff to watch
is because that's the stuff you remember. You remember these like great performances when you know the adversity is against an athlete and and we don't have enough like I mean, frank, like the way the PGA Tour is set up is like how the players want it to be set up so there is no adversity. Yeah, And I mean, how would you remember Jordan if there wasn't like the flu game?
Yep, totally and honestly, like how would you remember Tiger
if he didn't hit it wild all the time? Like the fact that Tiger everyone sort of thinks like Tiger is like this dominant athlete, but so much of that was like his ability to kind of recover from his wildness off the tee or the fact that he was just an incredible like short game player who hit these amazing shots that were wayward, like the idea that you know often times when someone wins, now it's because they just vomb it and then they hit it close and
then they make a putt like it's not. I think what made Tiger great is his ability to kind of overcome adversity that he put himself into in those situations.
Yeah. I mean, if you look at if you think about like the most famous shots of all time, not one of them is a is a bomb drive right down the middle of the fairway, And that's like what has become of of golf highlights now absolutely so it's what's your number three?
All right?
So my number three is in I guess some of these are kind of fitting together in some ways. But I really want to see like a Women's Masters that like has the same kind of like tradition and like sort of same course every year kind of thing. And I think, let's say a course like Cyper's Point or Pine Valley could really engender like a lot of goodwill if they were like, you know what, we're going to host what we think is like a Women's Masters. It's going to be here every year, and it's gonna be
like Appointment TV. And you're gonna like this iconic course. You're gonna like remember all the holes as we sort of build up history over time, like the one that they play, you know, the only course where they're major is the same of years that Bob Hope went down.
In an a yeah, which jump in the pond, in.
The pond which God bless Pete d Ie with. That course is not that interesting at all. I just walked that course for four rounds with Lydia Coo this year and it ain't Cypres's point baby, it ain't Pie Valley. So like, how much fun would it be like if one of those clubs was like, you know what, like we really feel like it's part of our responsibility to grow the game. We don't want any part of the PGA Tour. We don't want any part of like you know, being a part of a regular stop on the schedule.
But how about a Women's Masters where we you know, award like a Awkwa blue jacket or something purple jacket. That's cool, and we have it at Cyprus Point and then everyone gets to see, like what's it like to you know, play sixteen seventeen at Cypress with like.
A you know, a huge major on the line. I think that would be so fun.
You know, the courses to do it at.
Yeah, we Shinnacock, Yeah, Chinakog would be great.
They have They've always been the most progressive club for women, like since its inception, you know, right did.
Have women member, Like, yeah, female members, like way back in the twenties, right.
No, they had founding women members. Man, that's that's good. I think they held the first US Women's Open too. Nice that that might be it. You know, just do their own tournament and uh, you know, let let their own let their own superintendent set up the course. John Jennings, I love it.
I think we're as someone with two daughters who both are like pretty into golf, I'm all in on them someday getting to play the the.
Shinnacock Masters in twenty forty.
It had to come up with a name. I don't know what it would be. We'll think on that. I bet some of our listeners will come up with good ones. My my, Number three is I would I would immediately change the Olympic format. Okay, our role as golf as are would would oversee that we would we would supersede the IOC in this room.
I love that.
But so I did like a little bit of research. This was really quick. It wasn't like I just did a scan and I found that there are at least thirty countries and for men's golf with three players in the top one thousand of the world rankings.
Nice.
Okay, So like why not have a team and individual format where you're you got three players per team and you count the top two scores each day and it's a team and individual competition, because, like I honestly think, then you could get like really cool team upset stories.
Yes, like Ireland beating the US or something some year.
Yeah. Absolutely, like Sweden could win like Henry Stenson, Alex Norrin, like even you could go to Italy could win.
That's what makes the Olympics so fun, is it? Like there's those kind of team moments like and these people who are you know?
To me?
I covered the Olympics in Beijing and the most memorable moment of that was the four by one hundred relay where Jason Lezak like ran down the remember that the French guy and they all went bonkers, and like Michael Phelps was a part of that, but it was because he was sort of a part of a team, and like how much fun would that? That's where you know, you'd get guys playing together and you get like the equivalent of essentially like the Baker's Bay Buddies trip, but
against you know, the sort of crafty year. It's like a mini Ryder Cup almost in that sense.
Well that's why Ryder Cup. The Ryder Cup is so popular because it's actually a team event where like the country unites, like I thought about we did a male I did a mailbag pod with Kyle Nathan and one of the questions was like why don't we have a team golf sport and where like where cities have players just like every other sport and it could be pretty cool, but like there's a lot of reasons that doesn't happen.
But like the Olympics, should one have a team component to it, And the fact that they don't is like it's just actually like alarming.
Yes, it's this is the best idea so far, I think, And it's the easiest one to implement, because come on, like, really, would you bring four guys and that's your team? And every everyone brings four guys and maybe like if you're you know, Malaysia or Thailand or whatever, and you and you're really struggling to put together that fourth guy, that's okay.
Maybe the fourth.
Guy is like an amateur a plus one, a handicap, or an amateur who just happens to do something super heroic that happens in every single Olympics.
You know, like here's here's a team. If it's three guys. India has has u uh what's a shub Sharma? They got Lahiri and they have the battleship, right, I mean right, they got a SSP.
I love it.
I mean that is a good team. That team could legitimately win.
Yeah, that's a kind of awesome upset. Would that be if they took out like Great Britain in the final.
Or the US like Belgium has Peters, Cole Starts and uh and d Tree. Yeah that's a good team, you know, And that's like a team you could say, over four rounds might beat you know, UH speak DJ and JT.
I think too that part of what you know makes the Presidence Cup so boring is that it's super hard to get you know, the international team with all those different cultures like to sort of rally together and feel like a team. But of course, like the guys from India or the guys from Thailand or the guys from Australia, like they're going to feel a total bond like us against ever. That's that's where you'd get that Ryder Cup feel for guys who don't normally get to be in
the Ryder Cup. And so the benefit would be huge to the international squads that don't have a right Cup that are used to just like pretending to have you know, bonds with Jason Day during the I mean like Jason Day and Adam Scott and you know.
What from you know some.
Yeah, like why that would be such a fun team, Like those guys would totally like be tearing it up and enjoying it, and that that team could absolutely beat any team like could VUK the US.
That's what I'm saying, Like England would have an awesome team, Ireland would have an awesome team. Scotland would have like if you do just three players, every team has like an actually shot, actual shot to win, you know, for the most part, or do really well, like all of a sudden, like you know, like maybe maybe India can't win,
but maybe they could get a bronze medal. Yes, like China would have a team, Yes they would Marty Doe what's his name, how Tong Lee and the other guy that's on the tour Zang I think his name is. But like they got three guys right there.
This idea might be too good.
We might have to just change it to abolish the President's cup and make this the President's cup.
There would be a way better President's cup. It's sort of like what the lpig has with that.
The crown thing whatever. They have four person teams, and you know, you know.
What the President's cup is like, it's like that that donut comparison I made where they say, hey, you know what, we're going to open a donut shop that is exactly the same as the Ryder Cup, except we have a different street address.
And it's also like it's the equivalent of like saying, let's say the Ryder Cup is like, I don't know, like really good, like New Orleans food. It's like putting really good New Orleans food in like or trying to put in like Minneapolis, instead of like trying to capture your own sort of thing. It's like, oh, let's just you know, let's take all the things that we think are good about this and put some of them in like really boring like environment.
Yeah, that's that's it. Yeah, So this this idea should just happen. Whoever, you know, hopefully somebody's list.
Is just going to implement this. Antonio sam Rock or whatever.
Those Olympic guys you know, rise him from Who's who's in charge of Olympics the States.
I don't even know, No, I don't know.
It's a collection of olig arcs who pulling the strings behind the scenes.
I'm sure golf would become like one of the coolest Olympic sports.
And how much like a guy like Rory who's like I'm out on the Olympics, would love to play with like you know, Shane Lowry and Prodrick Carrington.
I guess is true.
Irish is out of Northern Ireland, so there'd be a debate whether whether they were several countries, but like, the Irish guys would be such a fun team. I might root for the Irish over the Americans. Being Irish myself.
I know you, I would like I would root for like some obscure team, because that's what I do. You know, I would, I would, I would get behind I Actually I would love South Africa. I would love the team of Louis Hotch, Charles and I don't know who either their third would be, but I would love that team. I mean, the three guys that really don't care about golf.
Yeah, your teeth might sneak onto that team, you know, other couple of sixty eighths and qualifying and make the South African team.
I mean the combo of the Mattress, King hot Charle and the Goose. That's next level stuff.
This is your nirvana. I love it.
I mean, and then you could have captain nels.
Yes, oh my god, captains. We just unlocked a whole different thing of captains.
Co captains with Gary Player.
Oh my god, what someone needs to pay us millions of dollars with this idea, because I think we just fixed the entire Olympics.
What would happen if if Ernie and Gary wrote down with the team on Ernie's plane?
Oh like, oh, definitely a push up contest that resulted in a fist fight that resulted in hugs.
Yeah, and Louis would just be like sleeping in the back and on his on his mattress that he was bringing to whatever country the Olympics is. That's why you never.
Won more tenements. You could have won ten majors.
Like me, oh Man, then you could have like the manager b Jacko van Zil. I don't know if you remember last Olympics, he gave up playing to focus on the Olympics. He like did not play in any tournaments
all summer to focus. Yeah. But uh so my next thing, my fourth thing would be, uh so I do I'd launch a program, whether it's with like the USGA, I guess we would be the governing body here where we would take all these USGA funds and we would restore and privately manage municipal golf courses in metro areas that are like good, you know, like so like it would be like you know, you would you would go after like the historical ones, like you know, there's like Rackham
in Detroit that's pretty neat. There's like in la you have Rancho Park in Griffith Park, and you make them really good, really affordable for senior for city residents. But then, like I always I admire the best Page Tory model where you gotage out of towners, but it's a really good golf course which people want to go play, but actually do it right, you know, and manage it right, have a really good superintendent, and just get it out of like municipal government's hand.
Yes, I mean on this too, And this is a kind of goes right into my fourth My idea was essentially that it's similar but a little bit different. Every golf course in America needs to be open at least one day a month to the public, and you do like a public lottery system, but it's more like the UK model in the sense of or like if you refuse to do that, then you have to pay the
true tax burden of the land that you're on. So essentially, if you're like club, you can't sacrifice one day a month to let anybody sort of play through via a lottery system, then you're going to pay the true property
tax value of that place. You're not going to get any sort of like you know, public use exemption when you're not actually open to the public and the value of elec Hundry Cub's Land, which would be so enormous that it would be absurd for them to not say, like, all right, we'll let the riff raff in for one
day a month like that way. You know, it's the sort of the UK model, Like you can play almost any course in the UK unless it's like Swinley Forest or something, or maybe Mirfield if if you like book it out long enough ahead of time, or if you're part of a sort of two or whatever, and that would sort of at least say to golf, all right, there are no truly like snotty private places unless they're so rich that they can just sort of say, yeah, we're gonna go ahead and pay the greater tax Burgen
and that money then goes to you know, like pay for what you're talking about, like you know metro area courses that, to pay for that super, to pay for the maintenance of that.
Yeah, I love that idea. I think that there should be more lotteries like that and then take that take the money, charge a green fee for that public day and take all that money and it goes to like junior golf programs in that city or in the area who.
Does that really hurt in the sense of like the membership is was that mad and that exclusive that one day a week, Like you could limit it to say you have to be a fifteen handicap or something.
So yeah, and you can't have to you can't win it more than once, right.
And you can't grind for six hours over around or whatever. You can't be a You're still subject to the same like if you're if you're an ass, you get your you know, your throwing clubs, you're doing, you know, some of the stupid stuff you see on public courses, like you're going to get the boot and you've got to dress decent. You got to sort of be a part of the club. But you can still be a part of the club. Anyone, any kidd or whatever who can get a USG handicap under fifteen can play this course.
Yeah, I mean even make it twenty you know, like there are twenty five like handicap Like I don't think that matters as much. I think that Yeah, I mean there's just so much good and it just like you know, what it does is Andrew Green talked about this architect on My pod with him. He talked about golf IQ and having golfers the general public get to experience some of these golf courses is going to raise their golf IQ. Yes, and that is good for the overall game.
Yeah, totally agree.
What's your last one?
My last one's pretty damn dumb. But I think I think that PG guys should be able to wear shorts. I don't understand, like what the at this point in the game, Like what the hang up is over pants? And I feel like it would make the game a little more relatable to people. You know, like what kid who grows up in West Baltimore is going to be like, oh, I got to wear like pants on the golf course, Like I you know that that seems weird to me.
Like if I think that they should give players the options, and if Patrick Reid still wants to wear like big, thick old pants, great, but I think it's time to sort of loosen that sort of stuffiness and and let that dress code sort of slide.
Yeah.
If you if the pros can't play different equipment, then why why do they have to dress differently?
Exactly?
Yeah, I agree, I mean as shorts, I mean they're nice, like every.
You know, everybody wants to play in shorts unless they're kind of less cold when they're asked to play in pants.
So it's funny, how like when you see pros and shorts that you're so accustomed to seeing in pants, how weird they It's like, whoa, well, what's going on? You're wearing short?
You know you always see it like whatever, Like Tiger Rory posts like an Instagram video them practicing like they're never wearing pants, They're always wearing shorts, and so like the idea that somehow you're sort of forced to wear like a uniform.
Imagine if every softball league had to.
Wear you know, instead of like sweats or whatever, you had to wear like an official major league uniform.
That would be silly.
You get like suited up for for a for a Wednesday night co ed softball league.
Yes, like looking like Tomas sort of like absolutely.
Yeah, that's uh My last one would be uh I'd make I'd force match play on America. Yeah, I would just just shove it down their throat. It would this would no more stroke play as like no, no, just as like the the first you know, knee jerk reaction is not stroke play. It is match play, like you know, like almost give people scorecards that are like match play scorecards rather than stroke play scorecards. You know, like it's faster,
it's more fun. Like I think that golf is way better when you're is concerned with score and you're gonna shoot better scores. Like the other thing is like like in match play, like if your if your opponent hits it close on a on like a par five, you know, and you're standing over a shot, whether you're thinking about laying up or not laying up, you're going for yeah, and that's the thrill of golf. Yes, it's not like protecting a score.
No.
I had never played the single mass play match in my life until I was I think, like twenty seven or twenty eight, and now it's all I want to play, like I literally we used to go on the trip, this trip every year with seven other guys, and when we first started doing it, like it's a sort of ryder cup stuff thing like this stroke the overall like stroke title was like a big deal and it was sort of what you were sort of trying to win to be like I'm the best golfer on our trip,
and now no one cares less, could care less, like it's all about match play.
Just because match plays so much more fun.
Like we just went to Bandon this year and I posted, you know, a bunch of scores in the high eighties, and I couldn't have like been less concerned because I was just having so much fun and it was better than the guys, most of the guys I was playing with, because it was windy and it was firm and it was hard, and that it was such fun golf. And I wasn't like mad at the end of the day because it didn't shoot in the high seventies, which is
like a good round for me. I was just like thrilled to be playing golf and winning matches, even with bogies.
Yeah, I played a I played a match last night, a nine hole match against a buddy, and like this is the other benefit of match play is like I played really lousy for and I got like absolutely smoked. I was done with our match on the fifth goal, and you know what, I said, we got a new match the rest of the nine like it was over, and then you know, I ended up lifting out of plat. I lost again by one on the knife, but but you know what, it was another new match and in
like my misery ended. Yeah, it was like floor down and I almost purposely lost the last sole.
Yeah, well imagine, like you know, so imagine you're that same. You play this the equivalent of playing poorly, and it's a stroke play thing, and you make a nine on the first hole, like then you have eight holes of misery of like you just pissed because you're like, oh I just but in the end, like you make a nine in match play, you're like, well I'm one down.
Yeah, it's it's it's so much more fun. It's so much better than stroke play. I don't know, I think that would have to go into the earlier thing with more formats, more match play, because that's that's the example.
Yes, all right, golf, all of golf problems.
Yeah there's this. It's over. I'm I'm I mean, we'll see. I think this is the Olympic one is Yeah, the Hickory one's good too. I don't know, they're all they're all good. Hopefully somebody importance listening.
Well, I'm just thrilled that I finally made it onto the Friday pocket.
Oh yeah, you want to what do you got going for PGA? You're going down to Saint Louis.
Going down to Saint Louis. No idea who to pick other than probably DJ because why not that It's like I'll probably have forty chances that.
I'm right, Rory could win.
Yeah good, what if Rory has like eleven PGAs that would be great.
It's just the PGA should go back to match play.
Ooh, real killer idea, a totally identity, a different identity.
I love it, an actual identity.
Oh my goodness.
It should be They should go like Western Am style where or maybe not full but go us Am style, like do thirty six holes of qualifying, top thirty two going to match play.
Boom, wow, that would be great.
People will think of the drama.
That would be so much fun.
You know, people will rebut with like, well, Sunday will be a real dull Sunday with just two guys on the golf course. But you know most PGA Sundays are a dull.
This is true.
And also like two guys on the golf course, it would be over in five hours. You wouldn't have to watch.
Ten hours of golf to five hours.
Yeah four, well hopefully five.
I hope it would be done in five.
I mean, what if it was like speed versus day like and like it wasn't Whistling that was I was I walked that. I think that was a five and a half hour round and they basically just ran away with it.
You know that the average round at at at Whistling Straits is like six hours.
Was just insane.
I think was it you that said that the like midway through the summer that caddies there will say that they might not see a guy break ninety all year.
Yeah, oh ye, I mean it's uh, that's a that's a major problems. But uh uh, we'll got we gotta get you do some overrated underrated. I gotta come up with some off the top of my head here, all right, let's say overrated underrated. Let's do Firestone.
Firestone, I mean.
I would say that it's been overrated for most of its existence. The only thing that makes it interesting is the Tigers won there so many times. But I feel like, yeah, I'm just probably gonna stick with that. Like I would say overrated. I mean I could qualify it by saying that like most people think it's most people of our ilk. I think it's totally boring. But you know, we're not the majority. We're sort of the silent cynics out there.
Sean Martin asked me a good one. I'm going to agree with your firestone, But Sean and Martin asked me a good one. Overrated, underrated putting.
Yeah, I mean I did.
I saw this exchange and and you made a good point in that, like that's what like, ball striking is what gets you into contention, and putting is what's gonna win. I would say it's probably overrated because of the idea of like you know, drive for show, Puffer Doe. Like most people, it's like Rory's clearly, you know, a generational player, a Hall of Fame player, and he's at best like
an average putter. So the fact that if you're just an average putter and a great ball striker, you're gonna give yourself enough chances that you're gonna run in three or four twelve footers and you're gonna win.
So overrated putting's overrated. Yeah, all right, I disagree.
Disagree. Underrated.
Yeah, this comes from somebody that that's putter has cost him numerous good rounds in his life. Naturally, I'm the person that thinks it's underrated. All right, you know this is a this is a type of question that you know, I've asked a few times that has gotten always responsive. I don't know anything about that. What about Pink Floyd, Pin.
I have always felt that Pink Floyd was a little overrated. I you know, I never quite understood the people who were like super into Pink Floyd. Now, I I would admit, like, I grew up in Montana where a lot of really bad country music just sort of like permeated culture. So it took a long time for me to kind of escape the morass of bad like uh country music.
But the only other so there was basically like two.
Radio stations that worked growing up in Montana, and one was a classic rock station that played Pink Floyd all the time and like Rod Stewart, and the other was, you know, a bad country station. And so it was really like it to lose lose choice for me, but I always ended up choosing country.
Maybe I should give Pink Floyd another chance. Maybe I should queue.
Ups and put on Dark Side of the Moon, sink them up.
I'm surprised Pink Floyd wasn't touring in Montana.
I well, they should have Montana is lovely like all the all those big like musicians stars, they all like come to Montana and live and just Timberlake like thinks
of himself as like a pseudo Montana. And even though they were asking him myself in some interview, oh, what's your favorite bourbon of drinking, He's like, Oh, I really love you know, the Montana bourbons, like like Maker's Mark and you know, like this as a kid who grew up in Tennessee doesn't understand that, like they actually make, you know, bourbons in Kentucky.
Blands. That's what it was. He said, Blands, which is total like Kentucky.
U a real genuine, like well appreciated Kentucky bourbon.
He somehow was under the impression that was a Montana bourbon.
Maybe that's the only place he's had it. It's pretty, you know, it's hard. It's hard to find Blantons nowadays.
That is true. That is true. A little horse on top.
Yeah you could. When you see one, you gotta buy it.
Oh, you gotta snatch it right up. I feel like I should be just Timberlake like bourbon's are.
Yeah, it might be an open position on the website check.
I think it was going to like save golf.
It's like his him buying a like a golf course and like participating in the slb AMAS, going to like get young people involved. It seemed like a very like short sighted plan.
Steph Curry is doing that for the web dot com too.
Yeah about Steph Curry overrated, underrated?
Oh man, you know what I think it's it's overrated, overrated. Okay, Like I just don't think, like I don't know, I mean, I just whatever, He's going to shoot one nine. It's like and then the web dot Com tour social media is going to push out, like remember when tweets all year and and like for two days, golf is going to be relevant while he's doing it on like the
national stage. But I mean, I think it would be way more effective if, like you know, you've got Steph Curry and some title sponsor to do like like a golf camp for you know, inner city kids. Like that would have an impact. Him playing at a web dot com event. Yeah yeah, yeah, overrated.
Yeah yeah, people are gonna go out and like you do you see crowds come out and watch that stuff.
But like the long term impact of it is like totally non existent.
It's like this this idea of chasing impressions, you know, it's like, oh, this generated so much buzz, but it's just empty buzz.
Oh totally, And that would segue me into Mike definite overrated, which is like trying to create like memes out of like golf content of like on social Like.
I I was, I saw this.
Thing the other day wherein the PGA Tour social team like tried to make some sort of like Stranger Things meme out of like Sergio hitting out of a bunker, and so they like, I don't know if you watch.
Stranger Things on Netflix, Oh yeah.
They they did, like the weird thing when like the monster sort of you know, turns the lights out and makes it all weird. And I was like, who who like thought this was a clever idea? This is horrible, Like this is really truly Like it's like the picture of Steve Buscemi like with a skateboard over his shoulder, being.
Like, how are you doing? Fellow kids? Like even if someone like in their twenties made that content, that was truly awful, and so that there's so much of that in the golf social media world.
It's it's really hard to be funny, yes, you know, and especially it's really hard to be funny for like a long period of time, yes, which is like why you have to really respect like club pro guye no laying up like for their humor capability.
They also know how to pick their spots, like they're not like like shotgun blasting you with forty tweets a day of like, you know, here's some cheeky animal memes and one hundred percent of it is just empty, empty calories in terms of like, oh, we got a million views of you know stuff, No, like no one is interested in that low like anyone who like saw you know, Billy Horsfell's or no, who was it that smacked the gator and like put back.
Into the Cody Gribble, Cody.
Gribble, So like the gator, like snacking the gater. That must have been like the greatest day in like PGA to our social history or like the you know and everyone so everyone is chasing like some sort of animal.
Well, the thing about that is it organically happened, yes, and like that is why it was so great. It's like you know that.
They're in a meeting somewhere someone's like we should release the gator out of the course, try to recreate the mold.
I think I think this year they had like Cody Gribble like try and recreate it. It's like, no, this doesn't work. Where you're beating, you're killing it.
It's like my least favorite one, though, is that you see this every single week of like so it such and such player gets it.
We made this kid's day.
Or it's like some little kid who signing autograph or handing him a ball, and it's like this really kind of maudlin, like yeah, this guy he gets it.
He knows what's up.
And like sometimes I see players who are doing it and having dealt with them media wise, I know that they're kind of dicks and some the idea that like the tour is like yeah, this guy gets it. I'm like, no, this guy is kind of really like a pain in the butt to deal with.
It's uh yeah, I I this could be a conversation for a for another time. Yeah, you could have a whole podcast on fixing social media accounts across goff.
So virtual reality that.
Some people might say that me and you are terrible at social media too.
I had friends say that to me at some point.
But yeah, I think you know, wait till they read the they listened to this ninety minute podcast.
If they make it to the end of this, then good on you.
My favorite thing is, like, if you want to hide a secret from the world, the best place to say it is at the end of a podcast.
People might listen to it.
Yeah, it's It's kind of funny though, Like a lot of times I'll say something at the end and then I'll get like a ton of emails from people like, hey, what what can you tell me more about what you said? All right, but uh, hey, pleasure, we'll get We'll do it again. You know now that you've been you've been on you know it's you're you're a busy guy though, you know.
Well, I'm I'm always gonna make time for the Friday.
Yeah, so, uh follow you on on Twitter. I don't know what your handle is, Van Valkenberg van Valconberg. You got a nice little blue check mark.
I ready to throw some some memes out there about kids who get it, players who get it. You'll see me all PGA tweeting, tweeting out the content.
Yeah you should, you should get just looks of disgust from players, pictures of them after they hit a bad shot. This guy gets it.
I think that's the new hashtag. Would be great golf. Golf is hard, players looking pissed. This guy gets it.
Golf is hard. If Monday was a golf if if it was a golf shot. All right, well, all right, man, talk too soon. You've been listening to the Fried Egg Podcast. We do the digging for you.