Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. Today, I am joined by Jeff Shackleford, Golf Channel contributor and also owner and CEO, COO, CFO of Jeffshackleford dot Com. Jeff and I talk a great deal about what's going on in the world, obviously, and how it pertains the golf. It's obviously tough times with the coronavirus and everything going on with the mass closures, you know, the increase cases. I hope everybody out there is being safe and practicing
social distancing. I think that's the smartest thing to do right now. But we talk a lot about the impacts on golf and some of the positives how golf could really benefit from this kind of reset.
So everybody be safe, and I.
Hope you guys are all doing well, and hopefully this takes your guys mind off things for a little bit. Without further ado, here is Jeff Shackelford.
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 bright.
Egg Frida Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, Frida Egggrid, Egg bride egg Lie.
I'm about ready to run off the golf course.
All right, Uh, Jeff, the crazy times here. I know you covered golf adjacently kind of during the nine to eleven stuff.
How would you compare it to that?
It feels very similar to me in terms of the kind of what are we going to do question and realizing that things like golf travel won't be the same for a while, probably that being the most important.
Notion to the golf industry into golfers.
On the other hand, you can make the case that at some point the the destination rural golf resort might look appealing where there are fewer people. So it's there's just so many questions at the moment that you you don't have an answer to, just like nine to eleven, and I hope that people just take the time to step back and.
Be quiet.
I'm just kind of appalled at some of the stuff I've seen, and I'm trying to I'm struggling trying as somebody has a website and want to keep it going and keep it active, but I'm also struggling with I don't want to be putting things out that you just simply do not need to know, you know, nobody needs to know that Paula Kramer's listener mansion for six.
Point three million, And nobody needs to know that.
Billy and Rory are in a peloton numbers battle, and and and and really nobody needs to know somebody's view on the Premier Golf League right now. It's just it's just such a it's a pandemic.
I don't know else to put it.
It's a very serious time and we need to focus on the people who are suffering and taking care of ourselves and protecting others.
In this time when we've been told to do so.
And it'll be a time, if we're quiet, to reflect on the sport and where it will go as this what's the president uses the wave passes?
Yeah, I've been struggling. Obviously. I think there's a role for media in times like this and providing an escape for people as they see stuff around them and such chaos. That there's definitely an aspect of being in the golf media space where you can provide somebody with entertainment when the world is semingly devoid of it. But at the same time, I've just struggled. I've got all the time
in the world on my hands right now. You know, I tend to never have time, and and I just have trouble even focusing on putting something, putting five hundred words together right now.
Yeah, which is you know, that's that's the tricky thing.
And I that it's okay though, Yeah, that's the right that's the right thing, you know.
And I don't think people were just I think that's one the one positive in this is word of society where you just got to constantly be moving and producing and and this and that and and yeah, this is one of those times this week, maybe next week too, or you just don't do that and but but it's a time to reflect.
So view that as to me the positive of the of this.
You picked up any hobbies? This has he been?
Uh No, I haven't.
No, I haven't gone there, you know for a writer, as you know, uh, working from home and quarantining is really what we do normally. So this isn't really a tough one at the moment for me. The toughest question is, you know, what kind of things do you cover and not cover? And I've just really gone kind of full bore into if it's not about news related to the virus and cancelations and scheduling and the big picture stuff with the major championships. To me, everything else is tough
to cover. But there is going to be a point where I think it'll be fun to to throw things out there as people start to get the itch to get back out and live to put things out. So to me, it's a time to to do some things and ponder those things and make notes and all that kind of stuff, and do some chores and clean.
And avoid people.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think that's the biggest thing, is just distance yourself. So it's crazy, but that's it.
I'm kind of one of those people. It's like, golf looks like a great thing to me.
You know.
Andrew Cuomo gave a wonderful address today and he mentioned getting out, hike, walk, enjoy our parks. Obviously, don't get two close people. I was kind of hoping you'd mentioned golf, because I do believe that golf courses ideally should be able to stay open certain areas. Clearly the workers can't get there to maintain it, but it seems to me like the sport is a good place to be as long as you're not in a nineteenth hole and sitting sitting next to a bunch of people and or in a cart or in a.
Cart, those would be the two places I'd avoid.
And you know, people can change their shoes in the parking lot at most places. You know, maybe those clubs that have that rule that view that as one of the great atrocities and all of life when somebody changes their shoes in the lot, can wave that that house eteicate rule and shut the clubhouses down and have a starter somebody who can collect some revenue and money. If it's a public course and it seems to be maintenance workers, if they can get to the golf course safely, it's
a great chance to keep them working. And you just can't let a golf course go without major repercussions. And in the markets where things are just okay, it seems like a good place for people to go.
But we'll see. Yeah.
I think that that's the one thing, is the maintenance worker safety. As long as that is feasible, I think that golf is an incredible avenue. I think where I wanted to talk about this a little bit as positives coming out of it, is that you know, one of the things that this could spurn with the way the
world is. If maintenance, you know, becomes a four man job or a three man job, you know, alternated, so people don't get sick coming in every day, it could become where it'd be a great thing if golf had a little bit lower maintenance expectation. We're seeing golf courses are taking rakes out of bunkers. You know, how good is that a bunker actually being a hazard?
Yeah, I think like nine to eleven, this is an opportunity to reset some values.
Maybe they're forced on us, but.
Things were getting a little bit silly of late, and also things were going in a negative direction in terms of the labor pool for golf course maintenance. So that job working in golf course maintenance, knowing the safety standards that most.
Operations have now they have a lot of masks.
They are places that are just so much better run now with the way the modern superintendent works and is educated, and they're great places to work. Again, assuming when we get to a certain place where people don't have their kids at home and they can commute safely on however, they get to a golf course job, it's actually going to look like an attractive place to be.
But that said, one would hope.
That golfers playing during this time at golf courses that are cutting back and don't mow the greens every day and don't move the fairways every day and experience some of those values see that it's still is is a wonderful game without having to have greens be thirteen and double cut and the step meter speed posted and whatever other bizarro things that go on.
It's an interesting sense that I and this is just my view.
I'm not an expert.
You know, there's one hundred experts talking all the time, and I've been consuming it just from a personal you know, we put on a vent, so I've been paying attention to coronavirus for weeks now and just thinking, you know, worst case scenario, and here we are. But one of the things I look at is the mass gatherings could be gone for a while for us, and it could be something where golf becomes a more popular activity because
because it's something you can do outside. I think people the more that we're shut in from this are the more they're going to appreciate the outdoors and being able to be out and away from people.
Yeah.
Absolutely, I think it's a huge opportunity. And I hate that word, but if we're looking for something to cling to and or provide people with some hope and some things to think about, that unlike maybe other things, say two thousand and eight, the market collapse, then that this is an opportunity. As you say, people are going to get cooped up, They're gonna they're gonna be driving their
relatives nuts. The values of golf that have really taken a hit, I think in people's view in the last few years for whatever reason that and we we kind of can guess some of those reasons, and they're all different, and some makes more sense than others, some make no sense at all. That this opportunity, in this awful time will be something that highlights the beauty of the sport and the values of the sport and the and the things that are good about it.
Exercise being outdoors.
It's going to look a lot safer as a place to be than a gym for a while or sporting event. And so I think the sport hopefully will see those things and figure out ways to capitalize. And I don't know how those are yet. Again, it's just way too soon, but I hope those of the things that people are thinking about as this this unfolds.
Yeah, I think that that's where there's you know, like you said, using opportunity is always something you don't use in this, but you look at what is going to happen in gyms are going to be less popular for the near future. It's just, you know, I think my gym still hasn't closed and it actually kind of makes me upset.
Wow.
Yeah, it's it's.
Just but you know, you look at look at golf, and golf could almost you know, have an opportunity to reinvent itself. Is assuming you know, the courses can withstand the financial burden that's going to be placed on them for the next two months. But the the opportunity to provide small scale golf where you can get these hours that people have devoted to the gym and get them an outdoor activity and give them a spot they can go walk and play golf for an hour would be amazing.
It would.
And it's so it's going to be in coming on the industry right now to think about ways and not another PSA program where we put ten million dollars into ads, but actually think about ways to help golf courses promote themselves in this time, but also not look tone deaf to what's going on. And I think that's kind of that interesting balance.
You know.
I've been pondering on my blog and I'm just kind of doing about one thing a day. I just just don't want to I'm not looking to get hits. I really just want to try to step in and offer something and then step out. And one of those has been the question of, you know, is it is it a bad look right now for somebody to be out playing golf? Is that going to be part of what goes into the thinking in certain cities or at certain
country clubs or certain resorts. And I'm not sure what the answer is, but I think perception is a tricky one and one.
That they need to be able to address that the look is bad.
I think in about a week and the places where the weather is good enough to be playing golf, people will look at golf as a very good thing if these courses don't shut down. Obviously, the city of San Francisco has is on a full lockdown, so they're obviously not going to send anybody out to go maintain Harding Park, which is why the PGA Championship is now officially postponed and the PGA of America can reassess whether they can
play there and those kinds of things. But there are other cities like Austin where they've also kind of lumped in.
Golf with its other Philadelphia.
Yeah, and I'm worried LA will, But it's just one of those things where I think it will be worse well, especially in our city, to be perfectly blunt, if the golf courses closed, Uh, there's gonna be a greater chance those they become encampments for our horrible homeless situation here. There there are things that you could see where it just doesn't do any good to close. You can take precautions, you can close the clubhous areas, you can do things
to help the maintenance team. But at the same time, if I'm a maintenance worker, I sure love that job right now a lot more than a lot a lot of places to be having to work. And again they have they have ample safety equipment and in terms of masks and things for spraying, and they have guidelines and and so I think it's something that is again it's it's a positive, but at the right time.
I you know, I don't. I don't know when that is.
But I think as people sit around and and and have nothing to do at home, they are going to think through, well, wait a second, the golf course is a good place to be. I don't touch the flag stick. We've got the rule now, right, yeah, the flag stick in, don't touch the flag stick.
The ranks are gone, rights.
Are gone, ball washers are gone.
You know, there could be the demise of the t box trinkets.
You know, that's okay, those good things.
And you know, I think if if carts are down, you know, people are walking more. It just becomes a healthier the whole perception of golf would would really change. I think if you looked if if all sudden bunkers were maintained, you know, at a at a reasonable level where it was you know, once every couple of days, and and you didn't have all the exorbitant spending on things that have no impact on on golf, and and and people start to understand that, hey, this is just
a great outdoor activity. This is what because I mean, that's what I love about golf. You know, it's funny, I had Hey, I'm sure you feel this way sometimes is that I feel like my tank and my my golf soul kind of gets empty.
Sometimes it gets down low because I get.
Front, you know, working in golf it's different. And h and I had one of these experience I played. I was out at bandon dudes. I played Banded Trails by myself at five pm, the sun going down, and I played in two hours and it was like, you know, Banded Trails as a hike, you know, you're you're going
up in downhills. Afterwards, I felt like I got a great workout and and I just I felt it was just one of those moments where you're like, God, this is such a great game, you know, but it was so low maintenance.
At that time. My rangefinder was dead.
You know.
All I was doing is walking up, hitting the ball, walking forward, and it was just incredible. And then sure enough two days later everything's canceled.
Right, Yeah, And I think that's something that that will become apparent a piece people and the climates where they can when they can't go out and play. But yeah,
I think that there's an opportunity. It was just as you were talking, was pondering what a course could do if they're limited by maintenance, and you know, maybe you kind of your daily maintenance is on just one to nine and we only have nine holes open at a time, as a way to do a little bit of a just take a little burden off the crew, but also a little bit of this mindset of maybe this is our chance to highlight loops of holes, nine holes, twelve holes,
highlight more evening golf. I don't think enough courses do that. They're so worried about closing the clubhouse and the cart barn down. Well maybe there's a place now for people really playing on public courses till dark and who cares except for the one person who does have to lock.
Up the parking lot. Those kinds of things so well, I.
Think one of the constraints with evening golf's always been childcare, you know, and now that people have their kids at home, all are going to have their kids at home all the time for pretty much probably until at least the fall. You know, we're looking at a time where if you want to play golf, you're going to have to squeeze it in at some point, and in evenings might be the best time, because it's no longer hey this is the only time I get to side with my kids.
Right right, that's a great point.
And it's also a great time to possibly get kids into the sphere again, not just through the usual stuff drive chip or.
Top golf or whatever, but get them out on a course.
And especially as you've known, as they get really anxious being cooped up, it's it's going to come as a as a welcome relief.
So again it's a it's a tricky one.
I hope the game is just patient, but obviously not too patient, because if a bunch of courses are convinced they just have to close and maintenance completely slides and we have a major issue. But if there's some way to find a middle ground that that keeps places open and functional and and and maintained enough that that it just could be it could be outstanding for the game to have this moment and to show people.
What it can be.
Yeah, that's not the only positive I can find it all this, by the way, I've fed searching too.
It's it's I think that that the other thing it.
Is the most well would say.
It's a great one because you could see some courses where if they if they close down their clubhouse operations and they'd focus just on golf for a while. They could see that, hey, look like this clubhouse is just burying us in money, you know, and and could survive on his own.
Yeah.
And there are a lot of places that have put a lot of money into clubhouses the last few years or doing it right now. And boy, I I those places there that those are bills that are going to be uh tough to swallow right now. But you're right, there are plenty of others that can can just accept that, well, we're not going to have any group business and we're gonna we're gonna have to really make the the golf
work for a while. And so hopefully that can can sustain some of those places that relied too much on thinking that they had to have the clubhouse revenue to make the whole thing work.
And and then.
Those those reduced maintenance values will hopefully maybe reduce a few costs.
So we'll see.
And then then again that the I there's a major issue coming forward with with people wanting to work in the golf course maintenance industry, and this is a fantastic opportunity to suddenly say, hey, this is this is a good place to be both for your health and and and in the future if there's ever another pandemic, and in the present, and it's a it's a great career if if the industry can kind of hang in there through.
This hey breaking news.
While while we're talking, Yeah, Ryder Cup postponed all twenty twenty one per James Corgan.
Okay, well that's one I wondered about, and I think that's probably the right thing to do.
Actually, I was.
I had a thought the other night that, you know, why don't we just scrap Whistling Straights all together and just turn the President's Cup into the Ryder Cup next year, even though it's quel Hollow.
Just just do it.
I just forget to skip the President's Cup. Nobody's excited about the President's Cup at Quell Hollow next year. The US will probably win very easily, So let's just scrap it. Let's just give it, give it the time off. But we're in the PJA of America can use their partnership to turn Quail Hollow into the Ryder Cup venue next next fall.
What am I supposed to do with my twenty twenty one President's Cup gear?
Though?
Well, yeah, I'm sure that you stocked up on that, because I know how much that that President's Cup has been on your your radar since.
It was announced.
I mean, nobody, nobody is excited about that one. So yeah, that would be my proposed trade. And that's the one thing it'll be interesting in all this is how these governing bodies get together in a room and and sort out some of these things. You know, I had a post today Luke care Denen wrote a good piece on yah, are we gonna he he's.
I think he's right. The majors are just going to be so tough this year.
So maybe we'll have later in the year one one Hail America type tournament. And it's hard for me to picture those groups getting together and doing such a thing and making it work. But that's they're gonna need to and they're gonna need to understand that, Yeah, maybe we maybe we need to just skip a President's Cup and
and and that kind of a thing. I don't know if they're capable, but I hope, I hope they are, and I hope they're open minded and also don't try to force things that that just shouldn't be forced.
Right now, Yeah, you know it makes you makes you look at everything going on, and if the NBA hasn't canceled yet, it.
Looks they're toasted.
It looks worse and worse.
But you know, a lot of these sports at least have the opportunity to do things because they have an off season. I'm I'm wondering if one of the big things that we'll see from this is that, you know, the PGA Tour eventually scales back, it's its schedule.
Well, let's just.
Let's just again, I'm I don't like these topics that much, but just as an example, look at look at the fall this year. You have the Greenbrier on the schedule. You have the Astros Foundation event. Now, the oil companies haven't had a real good few weeks, and they're the ones who put together the sponsorship.
It's an umbrella.
They're put together by Jim Crane, owner of the Houston Cheating Astros, and he I would just guess that event's got some problems in terms of the.
View of it in the community right now.
It's not one that does the tour really want to be associated with the Astros. This again, thinking if things get better, I'm very well aware, so please don't send the twitter hete, this is just this and yeah, speculator and the Greenbrier. Obviously tough, tough time it's going to be for that resort. I would I would assume for a while, although I believe West Virginia still hasn't had a no cases.
Yeah, yeah, there you go.
But they're going that they're going to Yeah.
Let's just assume that that event is one too. That is one that's a little bit shaky. I think you're going to see some some sponsorship ship issues. And that's why I was sort of flabbergasted on multiple levels by the rush to report the Premier Golf League rejections and
the rush to declare the death of it. And you know, I'm just sitting there watching the futures and I don't even watch the markets that much, and thinking, do these people know that FedEx is stock price is plummeting, Their future is bleak as it would appear unless they're purchased by Walmart or somebody else.
You know, A bigger issue is the fed X Cup.
If you really want to get into first world issues, then the league that's not alive yet versus the ones that are alive and forget the PGA Tour for a moment. The European tours got major issues in this with sponsorship, and as you see from Mike Wan's statements, he's noting the sponsors and everything he does because he's trying to send the signal we're thinking about you, we appreciate you. Please please keep an open mind through this. This is
going to be tough. And that's such a different approach to all this than what the tour PGA Tour has done, which was all about the players of the players Championship, and you know, I don't know how much they put out things like that where they're thinking about the sponsors and right now, that's going to be your most important thing as a business when all this does start up again, because some of them have taken a big, big hit and it's going to look very very bad to be
putting millions of dollars into a golf tournament sponsorship when you've laid off people.
Yeah, you look at like Valero Texas Open, you know. Yeah, it's a big, big dollar amount.
I think.
I mean, as anybody in golf look better in the last few weeks than Mike Wan.
Yeah, he seems to know how to read the room.
And I thought that was And obviously he knows some things we don't know, but he is clear he knows he has players who have sponsors who are not very tolerant of people not making their allotted number of starts, and so he went out of his way to note that concerned because he knows some of his players need that endorsement money. So he really came off as somebody who was in tune with what is going on in the gravity of it and the kind of the grand scheme.
What what do you think will happen?
Say, you know, we're now through essentially May with with cancelations. Say we get to a point where we're in August looking at and I don't want to, you know, speculate we're going to get there. I hope we're playing sooner, you know, maybe we're playing without fans at some point that seems like, but we get there. How are they going to handle the season? Do you think they'll you know, do they do they end it on the usual time
or do they extend it? I mean at this point, if you I was at this today, is like if you if you go to this, how do you handle the end? Of the season, and you know where players are in the FedEx Cup, you'd have some some guys that are outside the top one twenty five that I'm sure the tour would not want there.
That's a tough one. I hadn't I hadn't thought about that one yet. To be honest with you, I think we've all been kind of under the assumption that that there would be a resumption. But you're right, as today's news it's unfolding as we're talking here. It's it's becoming clear that that this season is.
In trouble.
Yeah, so I don't I have no idea what the the answer would be. But but again I think they can. That's one they can sort through. That's an easier one to me to solve than some of the other things
like losing sponsors permanently. And but they also I think before or they even get into that kind of thing that some of these organizations, and really namely all the PGA Tour, I feel like the other organizations so far have handled this very well, but they just have to first show a grasp of what is going on, and they just didn't do that going into Players Week, where other people who are paid very well to spot these things, could see where things were going and had plans ready
to go for the most part, and reacted pretty nimbly.
And they did not.
So the first thing they really need to grasp is is kind of their sense their place in the in the world of sport and in the world and and what's important. So at least they're now kind of in line with everybody else and getting ahead and obviously canceling events through mid May when when we have certain warnings that are that are guidelines that are in place.
For Yeah, I found myself now, I mean four days ago, five days ago now, but I it feels like a year ago.
But I.
I can't believe how disappointed I was in the way they handle the whole thing with the writing was all over the wall, and I know the world was moving so fast, and I don't think anybody envision we'd be where we are today on Thursday. But at the same time, it seemed to me that there was a decision that was the safe, smart decision and one that was very you know, kind of reckless, and the reckless one was made.
Yeah, I mean letting people on the grounds Thursday at the Players was astonishing. I kind of could see starting the tournament and what they did there, but it was it was a week of astonishing decisions and misreading. And obviously some of the blame goes on j Monahan, but you also have to blame the people around him and the people he has surrounded himself with. That somebody wasn't in the room saying all right, let's just go worst
case scenario here. You just don't somebody I would hope is but you got the sense that that somebody wasn't. Just starting with the CNBC thing on Monday, you know, where's the person saying, Okay, worst case scenario, you're going to go on, there's gonna be all these graphics and
blood red of plunging markets and horrible things. And Andrew russ Orkin, who's going to have his phone just going ballistic with CEOs and people wanting to know what the heck's going on, is going to be sitting there talking to you. He might not, He might not be very happy, and he might ask you tough questions to make a fool of you. What do you think maybe we should cancel? You know, where is that person in the room doing
those kinds of things? And I kind of sense that Jay really was let down by by his senior executive staff, the VP core or that there's got to be somebody that that's that that provides that point of view for him, and that's his fault for not surrounding himself with that person.
It's a PGA Tour's fault for making every person who wants to be an executive there go meet with a conformity doctor and Atlanta for two days and answer questions and you know, you're just not gonna have that that kind of stuff in the room, that that will that saves you from embarrassment. So it was it was a doozy, it was. It was not it's not gonna age one.
The That's that's the thing is. It's just.
I I don't want to put myself in a similar situation. But you know, I was thinking about our one of our events, you know, with a with one hundred people right on Tuesday, and thinking about like, I, uh, this is I'm gonna have to cancel and you're bringing together
thousands of people. And something I talk about with the with the PGA Tour on shot can start a lot is the idea of like every league has players and owners and they kind of pull against each other, and in this situation, I kind of feel I think one of the things that has in my just just this is just my opinion, is that the the fact that we have a essentially an organization that's that's got one interest in mind, the players, and that's it is kind
of detrimental, especially in cases like this where you know, it wasn't it was the fact that the thing I was upset about, and people are like, oh, the players will be fine. It's like, it's not about the players, it's the it's all the elderly that are in the crowd.
Or the people who have to work who don't have a choice, can't television people and volunteers, or or food and beverage workers.
On and on. That was what all I was cared about.
And everything you read was about the player safety, the player's safety, the player's safety. And then of course het fan goes and tells you that he's going through the clubhouse and there's there's no hand sanitizer and people are coughing at lunch. He later reveals that and but again, who yeah, who cares about the players.
Let's care about the people.
Who have to be there, uh or else will lose their job or will look bad to their boss who aren't making a whole lot of money. And that was what I couldn't believe and couldn't believe. There weren't statements begging seniors to stay away. See the statements about we're going to be wiping down the security apparatus when you come in and and the grand stands dealing with that, or we're going to close the grand stand. I mean, it was just as if they weren't watching what was going on in the news.
It was. It was incredible.
Yeah, it's a it, it's a different you know. I think I think nobody thinks that Jay Bonahan's a bad guy like it, Oh no, no, and like but it was just an alarming lack of awareness to what what was going around outside of outside of the panaviter above bubble down there.
Well and then and I think, and trying again think about where we're gonna go coming out of this whole thing. Is this question of are the players the game or is is golf the sport the most important thing? And we know this keeps coming up because of the distance topic we we we look look at look at this Premier Golf League stuff where where the top three players in the world have rejected it, therefore it is dead.
And you know, it's a it's a concept of a of a tour where if it had had been hatched four years ago, people like Alex Norin and Danny Willett and and Bubba Watson, what would have been likely people invited to be part of it, And and they're not in that place now. The game changes quickly. And it's also the flaw by the way of the Premier League is that the turnover in golf is so extreme. The way you it can go bad quickly with the slightest injury is extreme.
It's it's cruel.
And so the sport, though, still kind of revolves around the players and they'll say something and we run around in circles, and the game's going to be here way past the time that a lot of these people are around, and a lot of them won't be relevant in.
Three four years possibly.
So this notion that they are the sport is to me really dangerous and bizarre and disturbing. And so when we have the distance debate, we have to get tour pros opinions. Well, they have a selfish financial stake for their views. For the most part, some of them ignore them. And it's a question we just have to consider. Is that why people are involved in golf? Are they do they? Are they attracted of the game because of the players or the actual sport.
And see, this is something I think that is it's a it's a un intended consequence of this whole thing that could be a positive, you know, I think that'd be the wrong thing.
A positive that comes to this.
We might get to a point where more of the conversations about golf than it is about the players because the players are shut down for a while, and and that could be a very healthy thing for the game of golf. That I always fall back on this, there's there's so many people that play that don't watch, you know, and yet the vacuum of golf coverage, ninety five percent of it goes towards the players because that's what the way it is in other sports. But the golf doesn't
fit the model that other sports fit. You know, I played the last the last round of golf I played with. It was actually at Harding Park, you know, and uh, I played with a buddy and I played with a complete random guy. This guy, he was the perfect guy of that would like characterize the golfer that everybody's trying to get to. He goes to Bandon Dunes twice twice a year, He plays public golf, and he doesn't watch a lick of golf, doesn't read anything about golf or anything.
And it became more and more clear as we played and got to know this guy, and it was just it was amazing because you know, even club companies you could tell that couldn't get him because he had you know, mismatched clubs and everything. Like the regular the only person that could that connects and communicates with that golfer regularly.
Are golf.
Golf courses are the are the thing that are played on. And I think that's such an important thing because I think there's whether no governing body will admit it. That's the vast majority of golfers right there.
Mm hm No, they won't admit it, and they don't like to hear it. And that's why they're always looking to create new viewers, new fans. That's why top golf's appealing to them. But that is a fascinating notion. How the core golfer like that has. It doesn't have the attachment to our interest in pro golf to me like they should. It's still there, obviously, but it is stunning, and I've seen it with being on the Golf Channel. How many people will tell me they used to watch it,
they don't watch it anymore. They lost the core golfer kind of got lost in a pursuit of making the audience bigger, because that's what everybody's mentality has been in whether it's it's any kind of golf media, it's we've got to grow the audience. We've got to fund bring in those new people, bring in the person who's just casually interested, and then by doing that, you dumb things down or you don't pay attention to the things that would matter to the core audience, and then the core
it's just kind of goes on their own way. There's plenty of time to be spent on the core, and they just they just disconnect.
To me, that's bizarre. It's just amazing how we've lost.
That that core person having the attachment to the professional game.
I think there's something in this, you know, reset we're going to be in here might help this a little bit. But there's this mentality in all walks of life. If you're not growing, you're dying.
Yes, yeah, it's it's the yeah.
And I think that's the thing that golfs faced for so long and and I think the thing that they haven't realized is that their best avenue for growth is through evangelism, you know, through its core, their core audience, rather than the outward pursuit of new golfers.
How many people got in the game because they tagged along or you know, to the driving range or on the course, or as a kid, they sat in the cart and it was the passion of other people that.
Got them in the game. It wasn't necessarily a program.
Have been a teacher that got them more attracted to it and devoted. But how many of those people do it through a program and through something seemingly not necessarily authentic or something that's forced versus something that just kind of happened and you see it, you look at it and allows you to sort of understand take in some things.
And that is a great way to get into the sport.
And I guarantee most people you ask that's how they got into it. The people who've really stuck with it, and that's something the sport probably needs to cherish a little bit more. And golf courses need to be welcoming, and of course you know they're not of somebody to tag along to drive the car, and all those little things need to be relaxed a little bit somehow to understand that's how you grow the game.
The dreaded phrase.
So I always say, if golf courses allowed dogs, my wife, who's not a golfer, would come with me, probably eight times as much. She never comes with me unless the golf course allows dogs, because then she'll just come walk with our dog and then occasionally hit shots and then all of a sudden, you know, you could see how it could change where all of a sudden she hits more and more and more shots and then she starts
to play. But as it is right now, you know, she has no interest in going to play golf right now. But she would if if she had an interest of she loves going for walks with our dog, you know, and if it became just that at the very lowest level. I've talked about this a million times on the pod, but yeah, it's it's it's wild. I just I think in a weird way. There's all these things all when when the world kind of melts down, there's always things that can come out of it and really thrive and
reinvent itself. And I think golf has an opportunity in this, in in what's with what's going on, to come out of it in a better place than it was when it entered in a weird way. It's not going to look a lot of people won't look at it the same the same way, but I think it could become an opportunity for it and to hate that word like we talked about, where it could really you know, it could become somewhat of a national pastime again like it was becoming in the in the late Golden Age.
Yeah, the key is going to be when is that
time appropriate to have that push or that discussion. You know, Like right now, I'm just watching Twitter and seeing different signs of golf courses closing for various reasons, state of emergency kind of things, And I completely understand that obviously, but you also there is going to be a point where somehow it needs to be conveyed that that that's just not going to be a good thing for the community to have these places become unmaintained and possibly open
to being taken over in different ways or whatever it is. And and it's it's just, but when is that? When do you have that conversation to me, I'm I'm extra sensitive right now. I just feel like those kinds of things need to be done very very carefully and and so literally. And of course then anything related to the first world of pro golfers and their their plight, especially the the upper echelon is is just a way down
the list. And protecting this this pastime somehow and and and and then building on it is way more important. But it's just we have to be sensitive to to when that time is and how it will look to people to see people out playing golf while this is going on. Because right now, and my guess is the reaction is that that that will there will be a negative backlash a week from now.
After people have been cooped up.
It might it might be seen as a as a welcome thing.
I think they should just take the pins out completely.
Why is that?
I think people will play better golf in general.
Hmm.
You know, then do you take one more risk aspect out of the game, you know, take the pin out.
Yeah.
People, it's one more reason that people are probably saying don't go play golf, you know.
Oh, because of what could be living and growing on the flag stick. Yeah yeah, yeah yeah if that, if that's what it takes, then great, I say.
Yes, there could be a run on the end of the putter plunder too.
Yeah, those are could be the new toilet paper.
Yeah.
Wow, there's a there's a device I never thought I'd ever want to have on my the end of my putter.
Yeah.
So get Obviously not the most fun topics to talk about, but the reality of golf right now. So if you if you had to guess, are we are we going to see a.
Masters this year? No US Open, no p g A, no Fed X Cup.
No. I think that through the summertime is is really hard to picture. I could possibly see the playoff events maybe with no crowds, but it's as of today, it just seems tough to envision yeah happening.
Yeah, it's uh, it's wild times.
So you got and remember to remember too that that it's a very expensive thing to put on a tournament, and each tournament's different, and if they're insured, it's it's better for them to be forced to cancel, then to try to put something on that that really doesn't benefit anybody but the players. The charitable element goes, the fan element goes, the experience is just what it weird and they don't collect some insurance money to take.
A take a.
Less of a bite out of the big loss that they already sustain. And it it's painful as it is, it's probably the wiser thing to do, both financially and in terms of perception and and just overall kind of sense of you're thinking of bigger things than a golf tournament. Yeah, again, it's a case by case basis. Obviously some are really vital to the community and big deals and others the community will will be annoyed that you're trying to do this.
It just it's as a market by market I believe was how j Monahan was was viewing the virus a week ago.
Yeah, it's, uh, it will be. I think it could.
It's like the flip side of everything is if you did it with no fans, the problem is it still is going to take a thousand people to put on a right.
You still have people trying to travel there, stay in hotels. You're still going. You know, again, forget the players. It's the circus around and those people do they I mean, obviously by a certain point they're.
Really going to be wanting to work to be paid.
But we don't know what travel will be like and how safe it'll be and different things like that, so that has to be the priority over.
The needs of the players. Yeah.
Well you got a new podcast coming out soon.
Yeah, what a time to launch? What a uh yeah, you got.
You got depth and variety. You can talk about anything, you know, That's the thing.
I think this is also an opportunity where uh, you know, the the kind of clickbait golf era we've been living in with media, people are going to have to get depth here.
It's really going to be tested. It's already being tested.
You just see some of the complete craft that's been put up in the last couple of days. And and I feel for the people doing it because you know, there's a boss somewhere saying, all right, we gotta we gotta create content, we gotta get we got to get
some numbers, got to keep this going. And I, uh so I feel for the people who have to take those directives and put something up and it's it's not easy, and it's not fun and and frankly it's in some cases to me, it's just a huge credibility blow to the to those sites when you go there and you see some of the stories that are that are news, and uh, when they're they're not. So Yeah, I'm I'm battling that myself. But I'm I'm just airing on the
side of caution every chance I get. I'm going to try to put up some some light stuff on my website and the occasional fun thing and try to again when the time's right, do some looking back at some history stuff or things that are of interest, and the podcast will kind of be the same thing.
For now.
It was gonna be a little bit more news driven, and now it's gonna be a little bit more chat driven for a while because we've got some authors who have books to promote, and I want to hear from them and talk to them about those because it's a good time to read. And that's kind of where I'm starting with it. It was going to be I had a lot of different thoughts and had narrowed it down into a concept, and I just threw that that description for the promotional pod that will go out on the
little network and that's going in the trash. I'm going to rewrite it again, kind of thinking of the virus. But I'm going to try to keep it, keep it not too long and light fun, but also some serious stuff that that relates to the sport, and try to talk to some smart people and and again not not to.
Throw stuff out there that's that's that's too too.
Do some uh abbreviated versions of your books. I mean, God, I'd listened to hours of that. I can't I can't guess some of your books they're too expensive.
Yeah, it's a it's a bummer, yeah that that some of them are out of print and and the algorithms have made them cost way more than they should be costing. Uh.
You know, I've thought about that.
Uh.
I've actually got a few book ideas that I'm going to be working on, and I've actually thought about one of them, even just writing some of it, getting out in front and start posting a chapter on the site and then kind of write the rest as I'm as I'm going. But I'm not I'm not sure I want to do that yet, but I'm that's something I've I've considered. It's the kind of a fun idea to me, but it's also a little scary and it could be it could be a total disaster. But that's the beauty of
having your own blow. You just just delete it. If it's really bad.
You can try, you can try all the stuff you want, and if it doesn't, if it doesn't work and you suspend it, nobody usually knows.
This is this is true. This is the beautiful thing.
I feel like golf architecture is tough, as you know, for for podcasts and reading, things could be could be tricky.
But I'll take a look at that. That's an interesting idea.
I think, like I'm assuming like one of the things is like when you when you did the book deals, there's no there's no clause.
Audio audio rights.
A couple of them, the more recent ones, but geez, the rights have reverted to me on everything but my Cypress Point book.
And I'm not going to do a live reading.
Of Alistair Mackenzie's Cypress Point that that would be that would be and me trying to do a Scottish accent, even though he's he's English, she was English.
Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen.
So I think it's better to focus on a couple of the new book ideas, but I may and you know, I'd love to go back to the future of golf and highlight some things, but again, that could be a little bit of a combo platter of obnoxious, humble bragging and also.
Wow, we don't need to hear about that right now kind of thing.
So it's just it's going to be a constant battle to see what is right to be talking about. But I feel I feel pretty good, especially after this chat.
I think we're kind of thinking the same way, and I'm guessing other people are in the golf industry that this is an opportunity for the sport and we should keep highlighting that of the best we can and hope that the elitist perception that a lot of people have doesn't lead communities and various businesses to quickly give up on the sport or quickly move to shut down facilities, but instead see this as as a chance to make those places really valuable in this time.
Yeah, that's uh, hopefully everybody.
I think I think everybody, just the big thing has to be patient, you know.
Yeah, yeah, and that's going to be lacking, and we're going to see That's why we're going to see some really awful things posted on on golf websites, where again it's just somebody trying to keep a boss from firing them by churning out clickbait and and all that stuff. So that that is going to be the test where you see people exposed for not being patient, not just saying hey, let's step back.
A little bit.
Yeah, I think I mean in just society and generally in general, we've become less and less patient because of technology, you know, So it's gonna be the test for all of America, all the world.
Really, Where do you.
Think the distance debate is? Now?
I was almostly going to ask you that I think I feel like it's gonna be shut down.
Interesting, Yeah for a while. Oh yeah, yeah, I mean in terms of okay, yeah, let me rephrase that. Where is what? What? Should we continue to have the distance debate?
I think it would make actually more sense than ever.
I do too. Yeah. I think time maybe not this week, maybe not next week, but at some point soon.
Right, it's this, We're we've got this, you know, a wonderful chance to somewhat reset some of the values of the game. And I think one of the things that the constant pursuit of of the latest and greatest equipment and the cost that comes with it is very unhealthy for the.
Game of golf.
Very Yeah, the idea that you know, the the technology in the in the ball and the club didn't change for some forty years, Like how refreshing would it be?
That?
Like you changed your irons when your grooves wore out, and you changed your your persimon driver when it cracked. You know, like that that to me is something you know, we should be looking at. I'm not saying go back to Persimmon, but you know, like my driver is no longer the best.
It is a bad thing.
Like I think that that the cost of golf equipment is a huge barrier. You know, people feel like that. You know, when I talk to friends, they are like, how much does a decent set of clubs cost? I'm like, you know, honestly, like probably like a couple thousand dollars.
They're like oof, you know, oh yeah.
It's it's woefully intimidating. And if if they go us, do they get stuff that's.
It doesn't fit them? It doesn't It.
Doesn't feel right either, you feel because because one of the things that is fun about a sport is if you take it up, is kind of getting the right gear and feeling good about that. And and that's so if you feel like you're just using garbage and basically glorified rental sets that that look like somebody dragged them from behind their.
Car, you feel less.
It's just one more thing that makes you feel uncomfortable in the sport, that makes people already so uncomfortable.
And we just have to try.
To get rid of some of those so not get rid, but but but downplay some of those things. And that's why to me, bifurcation is such a it's such a great thing and.
And and it makes me just just have so.
Little respect for the manufacturers who who who bitch and moan about all this stuff.
And then when you say, well.
What about bifurcation, what about allowing you to make real beginners stuff that doesn't conform but is it is just great for a beginner, really easy to hit and and cheaper to make, and and uh, it's a way to get people in in a great way or or or a you know, kids drive chip and putt set that you can sell and things like.
They just have no imagination about those things. They're so locked in to the just more distance, more tech, more price, more more bottom line.
That they really shouldn't. That's why it's just such a struggle to see how they should be part of the conversation when they don't see open they don't seem open minded to any kind of possible solution or different way of approaching this.
That's good for them and good for the sport.
The nonprofit golf needs most to be the biggest nonprofit is is a nonprofit that just provides beginner sets of golf.
Clubs two people. You know, it's it doesn't need to be the professional organization.
For yeah, or just not.
I mean it's publicly traded companies being in the in the manufacturing businesses.
Just since that's happened.
And that's why we've been on this cycle which I wrote about in the Future of Golf and that's fifteen years ago now, and that that change has just been a killer.
Yeah, I mean, this could be like we've talked to, this is almost a it could be a reset for for not It's not just golf, it's across the across the world. I think that you're going to see a lot of just change, and some of it will be good change, you know.
Yeah, well, I planned to at the right time go back more into the Distance Report on my my blog because it did get as we know, they focused a lot on these values and the things that matter to people, and that that very robust survey data. When you see how many people answered that, to me, it is just probably the least reported element of the Distance Report, and I'd love to hear more from somebody at the USGA to kind of because I know some questions got more
answers than others. But when you see the volume and that that those were voluntary, to me, really makes those results very powerful. And we know some of those things like shot tracker and and the tracer technology and venues and and certain things were valued so much more than distance. I mean, there's some really important findings in those in those numbers that just punched such huge holes in those trying to either resist the change or just even resist the conversation.
It's it's funny, I h you say that I posted a poll right after that that everybody took as I was like being negative, but I was meant to use it and write something, but I my fingers don't know how.
To type anymore for some reason right now.
And uh, it was I posted a poll, you know, what's golf's biggest problem? And I put time, cost, difficulty or other. And you know, guess how how much percentage time and cost of the one hundred percent.
Of votes took up. I had to be most like ninety three percent.
Yeah, and to be that's that's the the whole crux of the thing is that if you if you have limits in the technology, all of a sudden, like at real like if you if you go back a little, all of sudden, the cost of the game goes down in the time You're not going to have to walk backwards the teas all day, right, you know.
That's that's the brilliance of it.
And people hit it shorter, they actually will take less time to play because they'll be looking for the ball less.
Yeah, so I don't.
Know, and they address that and and it's it's uh just it's I mean, it's we've been kicking this around so long. But again it gets back to this quite
earlier of are the players the most important thing? The professional players the most important thing in the game or or not, and they're not in my view, But unfortunately we have shifted to where they are and we think that that these they play the game well for for a while and they're they're they're superhuman, they're special, and they're and then their every thought is of course, uh is profound and spot on and brilliant and just it's
just exhausting. And I think we need to use this time to consider that as much as we love these great players and love watching them, that they are just one part of the sport.
It's it's an amazing sport, very tiny, yes.
Is there.
They're they're really they're almost a minority stakeholder in the game. It's it's so much different than every other professional sport.
I would yeah, all, I would say that same kind of overall worship of the player has gotten worse than other sports too. But as you noted that the give and take with owners and those other sports keeps.
But think about those other sports, is they have a reverse relationship where like exponentially more people watch the sport than play well, yeah, and in golf, less people watch the sport than play it, right, right, It's unlike anything else.
And the numbers have been really dismal on that front this year, I mean just just incredibly awful, which makes the worship of the players and their stance on anything even more ridiculous. As you see the numbers go down that that that it it may be having the effect that it had in tennis, where.
Where you when you there's a certain.
When they get to a certain point where they you sense their spoiled or they're they're out of touch, people become even less attracted to them.
Yeah, yeah, it's I think.
I think the the other aspect to you talked to, you know, the the ownership player thing is that when owners understand that any publicity is good publicity, and and the constant sweeping under the rug of of of issues and stuff limits what that the fan knows about players, and when you don't know anything about them, it's harder to be interested in them.
Yeah, it is, it is, Yeah, I would agree. And it's also just harder to uh become drawn to them when they play the game kind of the way they play it, where there's not a lot of shots shaping and where it's a it's a game we can't relate to as much as as we used to and that's and and then a sport where as you say, it's the sport where more people play it than watch it.
And that relatability thing has always been something that I have no idea how you measure it other than a survey, but we may be seeing that kind of hit home here now where again with these these and obviously ratings drops are also related to Tiger not playing and cord cutting and different things and long telecasts, but the numbers
this year are just they're just stunning. Every week where what should be a good, good final round watched by a good sized audience and it's down twenty to thirty percent, And with with good leaderboards and compelling finishes, you just there's no there's no other way to spend the numbers. And you have to wonder, if I look with there are the options. There were the options until recently and people went to the other places.
And you know that that I think, did you do?
We talk about the NASCAR thing where they're they're really focused on the way the races are are are conducted again and it's not a safety thing. People got caught up, Oh, this is for safety, and it's made very clear. No, it's actually not. It's you know, they used to do safety, but this is more about seeing lead changes and strategy.
The thrilling, Yeah, the thrill of the past.
They want to watch them just go around in circles and see who goes the fastest and stay and whose pit crew holds a car together better. They want to see the lead changes and and drama and somebody taking a chance going for a green two.
Oh there we go. Sorry, got into golf again.
Yeah.
Well that's the thing is that when I thought about that, thrill is like, there's no thrill of going for a green in two anymore. It's just like, Okay, he hit a good drive, he's got an iron in yeah, you know, there's no oh he needs to hit this cut three wood over water. You know, I guess that did happen and in Honda with Fleetwood, but you know that's so rare.
Even the short part four now has become it's data driven, so the decision to drive a short part four is made before the round instead of at the moment that.
I mean.
There's still some of course, but increasingly we're seeing somebody just go by what the numbers tell them and not that have faced that moment where they have to make the decision. And that's the most compelling thing I think in all of golf, is that moment when the player stands there and argues. And like you said, the Fleetwood moment at Honda was was maybe one of the best moments this year, really.
And outside yelling.
And thankfully he didn't hear it. Thankfully. I still don't know how. And I guess the person was right next to the mic and it is a big wide hole. I guess. I'm just glad he didn't hear it. That's all I know is that would have been so awful. Yeah, but yeah, So these are things and values that we have a chance to assess now as we're discussing this one other I now I predicted no masters, but because there are golf writers who are sitting around and looking
for anything to cover. Some people have been sharing that they've had random hotel reservations in Augusta, Georgia the week of October eighth through the eleventh randomly canceled for reasons they were not expecting.
So read into that what you'd like.
I think that is when they if they were going to do it, they would have to do it, because I heard you and Brennan on the Shotgun talking late October early November, which I had heard too as the time they had asked volunteers. But remember the Masters field this year is huge, and I don't think they could finish those days. So, you know, again, assuming they you know, they like to sleep in there at Augusta, I.
Don't like to. They don't like to start things too early.
They're not mourning people, and they don't ever want somebody teen off before eight a m.
If they don't have to.
Marina Alex, the LPGA player, had had her room canceled.
Uh yeah, Now the better question is why why was she going to be in Augusta in October. I don't know, but it's uh so anyway, that's something to ponder. I I'm going to try and see what the rates are and.
Lock in something she kids, something for fun.
Of course, of course, then you and I both have to ask the good Lords and Augusta to consider us for credential, which you know, we haven't been successful at as as digital bloggers.
But we might. You know, maybe maybe this will convince them to change their mind.
Who knows, who knows?
You know, they haven't been friendly to the to the Friday.
They're they're they're still kind of working on their view of of digital media in.
Some parts of the of the property. Other parts there are they're all in on on digital. It's a it's a different, different place there for sure.
Yeah, so hey, thanks for coming on.