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 brid egg Frida egg, the dreaded Frida egg Frida egg, Frida egg bride.
Egg, Lie, I'm about ready to run off the golf course. Welcome back to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast. I am your host, Andy Johnson, and uh oh, it's great to be back. I apologize to listeners. I had to take a little hiatus from the podcast. My October late September was just absolutely crazy. I would some might say I was a little over subscribed with the travel and different things that I needed to get done. So I needed to take a little break from the pod.
But I'm excited to be back. I'm excited to have things slow down from the travel standpoint a little bit in the coming weeks and through the end of the year so I can get back down and focused on producing episodes of this podcast. So I saw a lot of cool stuff, lots of great golf courses, lots of awesome events that I went to and really excited to, you know, share some of those experiences. But to get
things back up and running with me. Obviously, Garrett's been holding down the pod, producing some really really great episodes that I've enjoyed listening to. I had Shane Bacon and Kyle Porter come on. It's kind of like the idea of this podcast was just to have some fun talk about twenty twenty three in the Gulf. With the Ryder Cup ending, it is kind of, you know, it kind
of feels like the end of the golf year. I know, the LPGA's in European Tour and Champions Tour, I guess are still cooking, but want to kind of talk about all the stuff that's happened this year while it's fresh
in our mind. So the topic for this podcast is to rank the five people or you know, loosely people that twenty twenty three has been best to And I think we covered a lot of different ground, you know, had a lot of conversations with about things that I didn't expect to have and it was it was great fun. So thanks to Kyle Porter and Shane. I highly recommend following them and getting all their different content. We talk about it at the end of the pod as well.
But thanks for their time and for them to come on and talk with us. All right, well we are back with another show. I'm excited.
Here is that your intro? And we're back with another show with some people, with some people.
Yes, this is gonna how I'm lockcast.
Turn it off, Go do something more productive with your life.
It's gonna be it's gonna be a pod. It's gonna be a podcast. It's it's gonna be a little off the wall. We're back. I haven't been on the pod in like a month. I've been taking a little hiatus, a little recharge. I haven't been recharging. I've been depleting myself. But I'm back and I want to have a little fun. So we're We got Shane Bacon and Kyle Porter, two great golf mindes, two great golf personalities, men of many,
many talents. Right now, Kyle looks like he's the offense coordinator of the Miami Dollars.
I need like a a headset or something.
You gotta have those. You have those. McDaniel joggers on, I do, I actually do.
Okay, I didn't. I didn't plan that, but I do. We were playing fourth grade five football the other day. Okay, you guys will love this the coach of the other team. You get to you get to be on the field when you're calm plays. So you got the little I've got the playbook right here. I mean, I can send this to you guys if you need it, if you need it for future use. But the coach of the
other team has one AirPod in just one. And I looked at I looked at my buddy that I coached with, and I said, do you think he's do you think he's getting plays from the from the from the booth, like do you think he's got a green Does he have a green sticker on his hat and he can receive them play there's some guy.
There's some guy sit in the back of his truck a little higher than everybody else. Well, they played lived down on the field.
I recently had a neighbor asked me about my drone and was asking me about if if I thought it could be useful for uh like uh, young football, Like I don't know what the youth football if if I if I thought we could there's possibility to record things with a drone so they could replay it. And I was like, you know, I think that's possible, but that's not so. Maybe that was it may he was communicating with the drone pilot.
We played a team last year that how did they ran a drone over the field they were watching They were doing film of like third grade five football. It was I told you poorath about this. He said that they had like a lacrosse or something where they did the same. It's it's out of control. You think pr emails are out of control, Shane, fourth grade five football is out of control.
Well, you're in Texas. You're in the heart of it. You're in Texas.
Every email is out my school emails. Yesterday I told my wife it was Monday morning. I got a school email where they on the third paragraph to find what diarrhea was like literally hoppy pasted the terminology. I was like, oh, that's a nice way to start your Monday.
All right, I'm taking control of this.
We're moving away from this.
This is we're already off the rails. We're three minutes in.
This is the topic of today's podcast and why I brought these two a steam people on is we're talking about the five people who have had the best year. We each came up with a list of five. Mine might be four until the moment I have to hit the fourth the fourth person. But the people that have had the best year in golf in twenty twenty three, that golf spend the best too in twenty twenty three. So we each came up with a five person list and uh, and we're going to go from there.
And that's if you would, If.
You would, I would like to lead off onto my number five. If that's okay with you.
That's is since you asked for it, you can have.
The okay, go ahead, go with KP.
Well, you're asking two things. I want to know y'all's process and then two can I can I do? Honorable?
Process is still happening, so it's real time.
I was.
I looked at results for the year in terms of tournament golf, and then I was, it's funny I scrolled through podcasts. So I scrolled through like a few of the popular golf podcasts to see who'd come on on why they'd come on for the year, Like was there something I was missing? Which I actually got one of my five off the list from but I was trying. No, I didn't get Flocky didn't make my list. Andy I was, Andy asked us to try to not just focus on the golfer golfer people and try to kind of think
a little bit outside the box. So KP, I was trying my hardest to hit at least a few different genres of golf person, if you will.
Yeah, that's that was kind of mine as well. Do you have an honorable mention? Shane?
No, I I cut it all the way down to five. I listened to h to our bosses instructions.
I think you got to go with honorable mentions after after the okay, so after the five because one of your honorable mentions might be on our list of five.
Right.
Andy showed up to the pod. How many minutes in are we? We're five minutes, five minutes.
Andy's here now.
Now he's done well.
And to be clear with the way this went down is is Andy asked us to to go through this exercise, and Shane and I are just you know, we've got kids, and we've got a bunch of stuff. And when we you know, my Rangers are in the World series, and you know, we we get the work done, we go through it, and then we and then we show up and andies, I don't know, I got like three and a half.
You know, I'm four.
I have trouble making decisions.
The instructions are five. He's got four. Hey, you know what, Hey, it's close enough.
I'm gonna pick.
I'm gonna pick up a fifth while we're talking. That's the thing. I'm keeping a spot open.
You know.
It's like the like the team that's keeping a spot open and free agency.
We aren't set on our team.
We're gonna wait to see who gets bought out, and we're gonna bring them on at a at a low cost. You know.
Can I ask you guys a question when you do these podcasts? How often are you looking at the other people versus looking at yourself?
What do you guys?
What would you guys say? The process is?
I think about this all the time. I think I I think I do better when you can turn your your own view off.
Yep. I cover myself with my notes, by the way, That's what I do too, Colin, Can you.
Turn it off on? Here? There's some software where you can can you can block yourself, which I think is way better because you're not it's weird to look at yourself, right.
I hate it.
I hate it so much for how much I pay for this service, you should be able to turn it off.
But I don't know.
There you go, I don't think.
I don't think they would want me to do adrees for them.
All right, Andy, my number five, I'm gonna start us off here. Five people in golf. What did you say that had the best year in golf?
That?
Yeah, just like the best best year, you know, the just in terms of you know, twenty twenty three has treated them well.
Okay, My number five is a guy I'm a fan of and I've been a fan of for a long time. Number five on my list, Andy Johnson, been a.
Big year for the Egg. Wow for Andy.
I feel like this has kind of been the breakout year, the glow up year, if you will.
I mean, he's shooting commercials the other day.
I saw at his house he played Augusta National this year. I mean, how do you have a better twenty twenty three than that?
I love that.
I'm by the way on the call here, I'm the only person on the call that hasn't played Augusta National. But uh yeah, I just say the Egg in general, the brand, the shotgun start, the popularity of of what Andy's been able to do has I felt like taking a big leap in twenty three, so Andy Johnson my number one.
We got we gotta move on.
Well, no, no, no, I want to I want to give you an opportunity here because I know you don't want to talk about yourself, so I want to give you an opportunity to attribute that to somebody else within uh, within the egg, because I know there's a bunch of people behind the scenes. So I'm in front of the scenes. But how do you what do you because I agree with Shane, but what do you attribute that to?
I always say that you hire people that are smarter and more talented than you, so you know, just in general, it's been a long, long road. A lot of people here that are listening probably listened to early episodes of the pod when I was recording Skype calls with my cell phone and that over the speakers of my laptop, and that was that was the podcast audio, right like it. But I didn't know how to do anything, so I'm figuring it out. So at this point, I mean, like
you look at it. You know, we went from me editing video and that was like me learning how to edit video, which was like I'm bad at it.
I'm not good at it, but I was editing video.
Now we have Matt Rush's and Cameron Hurtis who who produce our videos, and it's like I don't even open video editing software anymore.
That's amazing.
Whether it's Garrett and what he's done with with this pod and you know, the written stuff, and or Brendan what he's brought. You know, there's a million things. Will runs our events right, It's it's impossib well, Meg runs everything in the pro shop. It's just you know, honestly hiring people that are better at things than you, and you know, identifying that they're better. It's the big thing I think is like I'm an idiot. I'm not very
good at a lot of stuff. But you know, so I just have to find people that are better than me at stuff and then and then have them run that part of the business and and then I, you know, I get to do what I do.
You know, can I ask the both of you guys a question? I mean, you guys are are golf people obviously, I mean you've been doing this for a long time. You get the note that you're playing Augusta because I mean, Kyle, you had it what three four years ago?
Is that right?
Kyle Kyle? Kyle, Kyle's the one that told me Kyle blew the surprise.
Well, I mean when you're coaching, sometimes you got to let people in on that.
God, I will ahead from a day out of the golf course.
He said, congratulations.
But I mean, you know, like we could be cynical about a lot of stuff.
I mean, what is that first he experience, Like, I'd like to hear from you first, But I mean, as cynical as we can be about the game and as much as we can roll our eyes about the stuff that's happened over the last year and a half, has there been a better, more like holy crap moment than first tea? There going all right, here we go.
That's up there, I think. I think walking into the Champions locker room is up there also, right because it's such a and I presume they still do that, Andy, But I don't know how much we were even allowed to talk about this.
But I forgot who. I forgot who my champions I had. I had a non descript Champions lockers That's how bad it was.
No, I was waiting for this so good, that is so good. I think. I think the I think the hard part about first t and even into the round, but also like the cool part is it feels you've seen that course, You've seen those holes so many times that it almost feels like you're it almost feels like you're watching a movie of yourself as you're at you're
acting it as you're like living it out. And that that that that was the part that was I think the most surreal for me was like having like putting myself into this almost set movie set if you will, that I've seen ten thousand times like that that made it, it almost made it difficult to play, but it made this the entire experience very surreal.
Yeah, I mean I would agree with a lot of that. Yeah, I wrote this and the thing that I wrote, but like it honestly, like I was like nervous. It was like I felt like I was teeing off in like a us AM qualifier, right, Like I was like I had this like I'm the first tea. I was like, God, you gotta heart, Like you know, it's just it's crazy, like I've honestly it felt like I played a tournament where like I'm I'm an habitual slow starter and tournament golf.
And I got off to a really bad start at Augusta, and like then I.
Started to play really well, which is like my tournament golf.
Mo.
I honestly liken it to that.
I think, like, as Kyle said, like it's a super hard experience to rate, like quantitatively, because of how many memories flood into your brain from like your childhood, your you know, coming of age moments in life watching the Masters, or you know, in your twenties. And and I think that's like the thing that's just so hard to It's just an amazing thing. And then and then like before you know, it's over right.
Yeah, Andy, Andy, how many times did you how many times were you on a hole going I know, Woozy hit it here before. I remember when Woozy was here in seventy nine.
Yeah, twelve, Yeah, I did, Ayby tell you the story about the Japanese reporter who had never played golf before played with like an played Augusta National with just the seven iron.
Yeah, I've heard. I think I think you did.
You might have you might have.
Told And she got to twelve and she asked the caddie, like, what should I do here? And he was like, well, you have to hit the seven iron, he's our only club, and she hit it right into the lotter.
I don't want to, by the way, I don't want a sidetrack on Augusta National playing Augusta National stories. But I just I just Andy, you're my number five.
That's my list?
Insane.
I just figured out my my, my four, my number four. By the way, is it woozy, No, it's not woozy. Kyle, who's your number five?
I went, I went way off the board on all of mine. I'm actually more excited about the honorable mention than the actual list. But number five for me is uh is newsletters. So this is a little bit of a testament to Andy as well. But just I've never been a big fan, I guess of newsletters. I thought I'd always connotated like it's not it's not technology forward, it's it feels like like a you know, eighty year old writing jotting down a grocery list and sending it
to somebody. But I have found, maybe this year more than ever, that my consumption of smart golf people and golf news in general has come through newsletters. Whether it's fried egg, whether it's La Manya, whether it's data Golf, whether it's the normal sporter, normal.
Sporter, Shackleford, there's Shackleford.
Yeah, and I think that I think that's a really and that's maybe a shift in media in general. But I I felt it for the first time. I mean, you've been doing the Fridagg newsletter Andy for seven years now, but I felt it for the first time broadly within the golf media landscape in twenty twenty three.
Are you saying I was just seven years early?
I think so. Here's Yeah, I've always I've always said you're ahead of the cultural curve. F you're you're way ahead of the game.
The uh.
I mean newsletters are amazing because this is uh I've obviously long believed in newsletters, but like the idea of of somebody effectively cutting through all the noise for you and giving it to you in in really easy you don't have to go anywhere, right, you're checking your email.
It's a super intimate relationship to right, especially like good newsletters do not sell you down a river, right, you're not, but you know when something comes from them that it's like something you want to open and you want to engage with and you know, it's been uh, it's been neat. I I I consume a lot of newsletters too. There's a lot of great newsletters that aren't golf specific.
But there is.
There one that stands out to the both of you that's not golf, that you guys look forward to or that you read through every time.
I've allow got named named Nathan Barry. He runs a company called convert Kit, which is kind of like a it's like it's like a niche mail chimp. It's just a it's a newsletter service. I actually don't use it, but he has built that company, and I'm interested in people who have entrepreneurial journeys like that. He's got a really cool journey, and he writes smartly about the future
of business, future of email, all those different things. And I think, to to Any's point, like the incentives and when you have a newsletter, I think are more aligned with the reader's incentives because when you have a website, you're constantly trying to pull people in, pull people in, and you're writing about John Rom's pink shirt twenty five times a year, which is just nonsense, you know, And and when you have a newsletter, you're trying to not
You're you're really attempting to not get people to unsubscribe, and you have to make it aligns your incentives with the reader's incentives, which is great, like providing value through great content. And I think that's something that I've has really hit home with me in so far this year.
Yeah, I I completely agree. Right, if you're in somebody's in box, you don't want to if you think about it from like a consumer standpoint yourself, right, you don't want to alienate that your your presence in somebody's You know, there's nothing worse than when you keep getting emails and you haven't hit unsubscribed yet, but you see no value in it, right, Like as a consumer, I think one recommendation I'd have is the the og of of the email newsletter, the og of the sub stack model before
substack existed. Ben Thompson and his protect career, He's he might he's one of the smartest guys on the Internet. I I got to talk to him like five years ago, and I was like, I think about that conversation so many times. He's smart, such a smart guy. It's it's crazy. Like when he started his business and and this is now we aren't talking about golf at all. Well, he told me, you know, he lives. I think he lives
in Thailand, Taiwan, Taiwan. He he wanted he was just hoping to get a thousand subscribers at ten bucks a month because then he knew he could he could live how he wanted to live. And I would say that he's probably got one of the most successful email newsletters in the in the world now, So he's and I think he's only got like one an assistant is the only other staff member that he has, which is insane.
Yeah, yeah, do you do.
The Ziller newsletter? And you know you're big basketball guy. That's kind of my good morning is basketball when it is kind of the one I read through all the time. But I mean there were so many good ones. I love the golf ones. I mean we listed a few that were awesome.
All Right, we're twenty minutes in and we haven't gotten through five yet.
This it's great, you're number five.
I've got a number five is golf architects not named Gil Hant, Corn Crenshaw or Tom Doak.
There's been insane. I like every day, I like find out about a new golf course, and it's crazy.
And for years there were like three or four golf courses built a year, and they all went to the same guys other than like then you had like your Discovery Fazio courses and and other you know, golf courses. But now there's so many jobs that those guys can't do all the jobs. And it's great for the up and coming golf architects who now are getting chances to build golf courses. So that's my number five. So it's technically not one name. It's a collection of names, so kind of it's.
It's your own list. It's your own list, and I'm into it.
Number four, who's.
Up, Okay, I'll get snake in here.
My yeah, Well if we're snak and then you go, Andy.
Well you get you gotta go, well all today, Okay, whatever I'm gonna go.
My number four is, uh, my number four is the Mules. The Mules with the PGA Tour had a great year. I don't know that the fans had a great year. I don't know that the partners had a great year. I don't know that a lot of other entities had a great year. But the Mules cleaned up because the PGA Tour has never been more lucrative. I want you guys to guess. So I've got I've got the list here.
I want you to guess. How much money do you think, Let's say Grayson Sigg made on the PGA Tour this year two million?
I mean yeah, I was gonna say two point.
Five one point four million. He was the one hundred and tenth ranked player in terms of money distributed. And obviously a lot of this has been caused by live and a bunch of other factors, but it has never been you know, and I think there's a The situation that we're in has come about because every vote counts the same, and that's maybe not always best for the fans, but man, it is really really good for players that
honestly don't do a lot. They create no value on the PGA Tour, but they also don't really perform that well on the PGA Tour. I mean, just everybody that was Let's see how many people made a million dollars? The top one thirty all made over a million dollars, which is just it's it's astonishing if you think about where the tour was at even ten years ago, even five years ago compared to where it is now. So that's my number four is the mules had a great, great year on the PGA.
Tour, all right, this hits perfectly and my recently selected fourth pick here, he's not a mule.
I'm gonna say he's not a mule. Eric Cole is or he had.
I mean, I think this is just one of the most amazing PGA Tour stories of the year when you look at it in totality. Is he gonna win any personality contests? No, but this is literally like the the American dream of golf, right, this is what everybody dreams about. This is what people grind for, this is what you know they do. So Eric Cole, this year he finished forty third in the FedEx Cup. Do you guys know how much money he made?
This is? I mean without the bonus.
I've oh, without the bonus four and a half million.
Really close. You were right on the money.
With the start it's four point nine million, so he made five effectively five million plus and then a bonus on there.
And he's continued.
I think he finished second last week, so you know that's in there, I think already. But so he's made five million dollars. At twenty twenty three. Two years ago, he was playing on the Minor League Golf Tour, which he had played on from two thousand and nine, so he would he had been playing on the Minor League Tour since two thousand and nine. He was on a list that nobody wants to be on, which is the
career earnings list of the Minor League Tour. He was fourth on that he had made in twelve years on the Minor League Tour, or eleven years, he had made one hundred and ninety four thousand dollars. I mean this year he played on the Minor League Tour during a break, like he had some time off. He played and he played like four events on the Minor League Tour this year, and now he's like in every elevated event. It's insane. It's an amazing story.
It is.
This is what these guys grind for, is that like, hey, you know, he he was dominant on the Minor League Tour and now all of a sudden he's on the PGA Tour and he's in every signature event.
For twenty twenty four is wild Eric Cole number four on my list.
I mean, you know, kind of piggybacking off of what KP said about this. I mean, what a time right now to find your game, ye, Derek Cole, it's just if you. I mean you think about Max, right, you think about some of these players that have taken this enormous leap over the last couple of years. That would have been great to do fifteen years ago. I mean,
you'd have been a very rich person. But now you're talking about generational wealth that you could run into by just simply being a top forty golfer in the world. And for Eric Cole, it's like, I'd love my break to happen three years ago, but god, it's nice that happened in twenty three.
Yeah, all right, Shane, who's your four?
My number four? I just mentioned Max. Mark Blackburn is my nothing. I feel like he's become to his guy in terms of golf instruction. Max took that huge leap over the last few years he's worked with him. Justin Rose flipped his game this year working with Mark. Obviously wins and makes the Ryder Cup. I've heard some rumors that a certain two time major winner that maybe just had a little bit of success across the pond. Has been working with Mark over the last few weeks and
things have changed for him. I asked Max what makes Mark so great? And as Max does, he sent me an amazing response. He said, I think he understands matchups really well, so basically cause and effect. It's not cookie cutter. I think people appreciate that you can do X if you do Y type of thing, and he doesn't. It doesn't have to be perfect with the whole golf swing,
just efficient for your body. He just feels like a new age voice and eyes and when it comes to golf swing in the professional ranks, and I feel like more of these top fifteen players are gonna go to Mark if they need any help over the next few years. So I just feel like Mark has taken a leap this year, and I feel like he deserves a place on the top five list.
That seems like such a modern philosophy right where I'm gonna try to fit my what I do to your body, your game, your mind, rather than the other way around. I feel like in twenty thirty forty years ago, it's like, oh no, I've got the answers you need to change what you do to fit, Like my philosophy a swing, you know, versus the idea of like fitting. So like David Ledbetter's like philosophy was like this is the way to swing a golf club and obviously like this is
not a shot. David Ledbetter like what the tools at Mark Blackburn's disposal now versus what you know, guys were coaching with a video camera, right, you know, if they were advanced forty years ago, right, And now you have TrackMan that tells you literally everything that's going on when a player hits the ball. Not to mention not just TrackMan, but like those things they connect to people that show exactly how your body moves everything. The information is just so much greater.
But the idea of like looking at someone and fitting a golf swing that fits them is such a just a refreshing way, like the idea of not, hey, this is how you have to swing a golf club. And I think that's the beauty of what's happened in golf instruction recently.
I mean, colle it's a little like parenting, right, I mean you know, like imagine just parenting all your kids the exact same way. I mean, I'm learning this now because you know Charlotte's now one and a half, and you know you're seeing the personality pop and I quickly understand this is a totally different human than my son, and the way I go about the parenting to her
versus him is gonna be different. But if I just went through the same process I went I go through with Henry, it wouldn't fit her, right, I mean, what she needs in wants is so different than what he needs and wants.
Yeah, I mean, and we see this in ourselves, right, Like I know that I am motivated. Like if you, if Shane, if you come to me and you say, hey, that thing you wrote on Monday that sucked, like that was not good, Like you're better than that, which you've never said that, but maybe you thought it. If you said that to me, I'd be like, damn, that did suck. Like I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna it's gonna be ten times better next Monday. If you said the same thing to my wife, if she was if she was
doing my job, she would shut down. She would not only shut down, she would never talk to you again, and she would avoid you and she would maybe quit her job. Right, And I think that some of these some of these things that we see to be true of ourselves, I think sometimes we don't presume that they're true of other people also like out like out like
broadly true. And I think some of the best coaches or teachers or or anything have kind of tapped into the fact of like these human conditions are you know, like these things that we see in our in our tiny little worlds, in our tiny little circles, those are true everywhere. And so to see that and to say, oh, I have to I have to kind of teach everybody or coach everybody differently, I think, is to kind of see what's going on in the reality of the world.
I mean, I don't think anything you right sucks, but the coaching performance Sunday night, I mean, I just felt like.
You could have gotten Tyreek more involved early.
I just can't believe the offense, you know, kind of sputter out of the gate like that. Just I mean, just you know, maybe get a little more creative as you get set for.
The rest of the season.
Okay, So my six year old is a is a Jalen Hurts fan, no idea why he just saw him play one time. He's like, I like that guy. So he has this Jalen Hurts jersey. We're in Dallas. Everybody who sees him is like, what's the deal. He doesn't understand, like why you know he doesn't understand the Eagles Cowboys thing and uh so the so the Eagles office buy on Sunday night. Monday morning, He's like, do my Eagles win? And I'm like your Eagles? Like what are you talking about?
Like you don't even He's like, I want a Davante Smith jersey for Christmas. I'm like, what do we do with here? I know it's unbelievable. Parenting your kids jerseys, by the way, is so fun, like it's the best.
Well we we I saw I saw Tron Tront's got you know, he's got two kids in jerseys now and one of them, one of them I think had et on On and the other one had Minshew And I'm like freak and he goes, he goes, and he just replied I sent up a message on Instagram.
He replied like hand me downs are a bitch or something like that.
Well, Kyle Henry now has learned because Cindy has Derrick Henry on her fantasy team and Henry's now super excited that there's a Henry in football. So I think there's gonna be a Derreck Henry jersey potentially from Santa this year.
We'll see. Yeah, we've got We've got Jamar my older son has Jamar, Lamar Jackson and Brady so we've we've kind of run the run the game and no Justin Fields yet.
I'm sorry, Andy, Yeah, we're on the Tyson Badger Baigen.
So you can find one of those jerseys. And what's number three?
I've got, uh, I've got l D. Luke Donald.
Honorable mention for me. Yep.
So I feel like the we've gotten like to the furthest extreme of Ryder Cup captaincy, where if you win your genius and if you lose, you're you're the biggest idiot in the world. And I think like everything comes out of the Ryder Cup. Luke Donald's team obviously dominates the Ryder Cup. The Europeans they come together, you know, against all odds, and they beat this American team that absolutely mopped the floor with him. Luke Donald. Now you know he goes if he wins the next Ryder Cup.
I mean like he's gonna be a legendary rider. I mean, Ari is a Ryder Cup legend from his record as an individual, and now it's like it's like we've got we're getting to the status of like a he's got a potential to be like the Phil Jackson type of of the Ryder Cup. Here if he goes and wins at beth Page, right, assuming he's he's selected.
Do you think he will be selected?
I mean it seems like it like the cupboards kind of live, kind of stole all the pipeline.
Ye, right, I think I think he'll be. I think he'll be the I think he'll be the European captain. I would if that was a bet online. I think that's the way I would late.
Who do you think who's Francesco Mulinari. He might still be playing. He hasn't been an assistant captain either.
Right, Yeah, that's true, that's true.
But big shot Bob Carlson, I mean to.
Me, to me, the loop thing makes so much sense because A you had the experience of being cat, then you understand what's going down with it when you go in. What I think is going to be the most raucous and potentially most intense Ryder Cup of all time on the European side, for those players and coaches having to go to Long Island and play at Betpage and having somebody that knows how it goes, what to experience, the good, the bad, the otherwise, what happens if your best player
wants to fight a caddy? Like all of those things going in too kind of the recipe, why not have somebody out there with a bit of experience so you can kind of avoid I think, all of the mischief that might take place, considering how weird it might be, you know, with like the American fans going nuts.
I came into the year and feeling nothing towards lou Donald. I didn't dislike him, I didn't love him. I just was. I was neutral toward him. And I came away from
Rome being like, man, that guy is. And you're right, like we overrate are we over assign value to the captain when teams win, but winning a side like just his demeanor and the way he carried himself, in the way he spoke about his team and his strategy and all those things I was and you know, those things were true of him and have been true of him for a long time, I just hadn't I just didn't see them, or I hadn't seen them, and I walked away from Rome being like, that guy is awesome as
a golf mind, as a golf personality, Like you don't get a ton of that, or you didn't get a ton of that when he was playing, and you did during the Ryder Cup, and I thought it was sweet.
Kyle.
I think this happens in sports coaching a lot.
Where the coach the law.
Yeah you know this obviously, but you know, like the locker room understands which player's voices carrion matter and fans don't really see it. I kind of lean on Vrabel a lot like this. Everybody in that Patriots locker room would always talk about how key Vrabel was to the Championships and how vocal he was and how everybody listened to him. But we didn't really know that as fans. And then you see him like in front of a microphone, or you see him coaching, go oh that makes sense.
I feel like that with Luke, Like feels like the players kind of understood the voice and the respect he carries, and then you see him on that stage and you go, oh, now we understand what you guys were all saying.
Yeah, And you saw the outpoint of that on Sunday night in Rome where totally they're pounding on the table saying we want, we want lou Donald for for twenty five and I can't Maybe they've done that for other captains. I couldn't remember. They didn't do it for Harrington, I remember, but were there other like has that happened? Does that happen?
They definitely didn't do it for Harrington, But I don't think they did it.
I think they I think they tauted McGinley a bit. I don't know if they got to the point where they were saying he needs to be in line to do it again. But it felt like people were pretty pumped about McGinley. How by the way, Andy, how it amazing it would it be if Live offered Luke like two hundred million to come play.
Just try and sabotage the Ryder Cup again?
The momentum the uh I saw he was he posted a swing on it Instagram.
It's like the first golf ball I've hit in a month.
I saw that.
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Yeah.
Yeah.
By the way, my number three, since we're talking European Ryder Cup, my number three is Jon Rahm. I just think when I'm talking about the five best years in golf, every year, I'm gonna put the Masters champion because how much weight it carries for that player, A you don't ever have to worry about winning it again because I mean, sure he'd love to win another one, but you're now in that club from this point forward. And it was on the heels of this epic run that I think
is easy to forget. I mean, he wins the Century Tournament, almost champions, he wins amex RIV and he wins the Masters. I mean this run was incredible and also again like to not have to think about winning the Masters ever again as a young great player has got to have such a weight off the shoulders because like list players that haven't justin Thomas every week's got to think about it. Rory, every time we get to August has got to think
about it until they win one. And as we've said so many times with Rory, every year goes by, it's harder for him to do it. And I think John Rahm was probably in the top three of that list that quote unquote needed to win a Masters and for him to get it as just to me, I mean, just defines a great year in an important year.
I mean also the fashion that he did it, Like he body bagged Brooks on Sunday, on a long Sunday, you know, he just everybody was like, oh, this feels like Brooks, this is Brooks Major, quintessential Brooks Major Championship. And you know we saw that one one month later at the PGA, But on that Sunday, you know, he was the guy that walked away and just you know, he just basically took the belt from Brooks right well.
And and every year, Shane I he always plays well somewhere at the beginning of the year, whether it's Hawaii or Palm Springs or maybe euro Tour. He'll have one great start and every year I'm like, oh, he's gonna win like six times this year, yep, and he doesn't. But this year this was the year where I mean he he he masters was what his fourth win of the year and did he win again?
No?
Okay, but still fou four in a year is I mean, that's like you win four, five, six in a year. That's kind of been the modern equivalent of the when VJ and Tiger were winning like seven or eight. You know, that's that's JT had the five Spieth had the five chef last year. The chuffear was what four three four last year? Yeah, And so you get one guy every year, maybe one every two years, that win four or five in a in a season, and that's yeah, that's a
different level. I love your tweet during the Ryder Cup Shane about how you said something like I don't I don't know what the clutch or I don't know what being clutch is, but whatever however you define it like that's that's John Rong and I totally agree like it. It's it's like when the intensity gets turned up, he becomes even more of what he already is, which is which is crazy.
Yeah, when you think about thirty years from now, whatever the next generation of golf journalists are and whatever Wikipedia is in thirty years from now, you know, they're gonna look at Tory Pines and go, oh, John Ram win this us open handily, right, And to think about those putts at Tory, and then to think about the way he played on Sunday, playing alongside Brooks Kopka, It's just so hard to really contextualize what happened in the moment when you're just kind of looking at recaps or looking
at finished leader boards and Rom makes these putts late. It's just unbelievable. I mean, you know, I think there's a really good chance that Rom's gonna go down as the best player of this current crop or this current generation, especially if Scotty, you know, continues to not pile up the victories even though he finishes high. And so you know, for Rom just getting a Master's win, I just feel like,
is it's the most pressure they face all year? And I think the Master Champions is always gonna be on my list.
Here can I ask a question? This is something I struggle with. How do we delineate generations?
Right? Like what's the age gap that we need?
Because it's like, you know, are Rom and Rory in different generations?
They feel like they are they are?
Yeah, like there their careers, like you know, you know, Rory's now on the backside of his career, right versus rom still on the upside? Is that the way we because then there's all these overlaps, right. I always struggle with this, right, is how do you create Are Rory and DJ in the same career window?
Right?
That seems like they were going at it? Is it when they're at their peak at the same time. Could there be a thirty year old that like the light bulb goes off and they are great from thirty to forty that match up with a twenty three year old who's great from twenty three to twenty eight, You know? Is is that how you match up generations in golf? It's hard because like the ages don't match up always they don't.
But I think generations are defined by players, and so you you almost have like whoever the player who defines that generation is you have five years in either direction and that's age range. So you went from what like Norman in the late eighties early nineties, and you had the Tiger generation, but the Tiger generation lasted a long time, and so.
Yeah, Tiger Phil Ernie VJ early two thousands. Then it's like twenty tens, was it the Martin Kaimer generation?
Luke Donald Lee West with Martin Kimer so so weird, it was a weird time in golf. It's a really weird time.
But I think I think the next generation is the Rory generation, right.
Yeah, Rory and DJ And then it feels like, now you've kind of.
Got Ricky Ricky probably in there, yeah, and then.
You went then you went speed JT to me, at least in the way I kind of look at it. Yeah, right now, it feels like it's kind of the.
I think and Jena Speith and jt Rom and Scheffler in the same ones, same one, right, because like they're what three years older than those guys. It's just Speith played the best golf of his life at twenty one, and that's something we have to come to reconcile with, right.
I think what's interesting is somebody like a Bubba Watson, like, who's whose generation is Bubba? And is he part of because he's what forty two forty three? Is he the is he the Tiger generation? He feels like.
Range Goat generation? Am I just be the Goat generation? I mean? No, I think I think he's probably I think I would probably put him in DJ Rory generation at least the way I kind of look at it because to me, to his peak years were when Rory was peaking and when DJ was peaking, you know.
Yeah, because it was like what that Oakmont US Open was where he kind of like burst down the seal, right one, Yeah, that was what eight nine.
Eight?
Yeah, because that was like that was kind of his big it just like kind of Brooks opening. Big moment was Pinehurst twenty fourteen. Right, it almost precluded. It was like a little glimpse of what was coming.
Right.
I think ironically that was probably the best US Open Bubba ever played.
Yeah, I think it was. Yep. I think sometimes you can't define the generation until well, yeah, because you don't know who the best guy is until later and it's all predicated. I think it all depends on like whoever emerges as that best guy and then guys.
Like Sale right, Like it's a floating scale there too, where some generations are fifteen years in summer four years.
I mean, I think that's fair to say totally.
I mean the yeah, the Tiger generation spanned a long way in either direction because he was the he was the the centerpiece. I mean, he was the middle of it, and so for because he was the middle for a lot. And this is kind of true of Rory, right. I think you've talked about this a lot. Andy, Like his greatest skill and DJ's greatest skill in a lot of ways is consistent, like consistent greatness over a sustained period
of time. Like that's very very difficult, and that means that the that the Ry generation will be pretty wide when we talk about players that were in it, but then there's going to be another one. I think it'll end up being I mean, probably the wrong generation. But will there be somebody behind him that's like quick, like more cowa Hoblin, somebody like that that's five years younger and just as good that it gets transferred to that to that next player.
The Rory thing's insane because he hasn't been ranked outside the top fifteen in the world since I think, oh nine mm hmm, so we're fourteen years in like, and I don't I don't foresee him being outside the top fifteen for probably at least I don't, you know, barring any injury setbacks, like five years, like we're talking about, I mean, and that's the thing with Tiger is like Tiger was like it was kind of ten years right, and then it was these like sparring moments a year here,
two years off, a year here. You know that no there, Phil would be the only you know, real comparison in terms of long deevity. And that's the weird thing. It's like, is this is Phil still part of these generations? Because he's not obviously shook up golf pretty pretty substantially in this generation, Like, is he still part of this generation?
I think? So I wrote this actually the Open this year, I think Rory is having Phil's career And that sounds weird because obviously stylistically and personality wise they're so they're so different, and I think people have always said, oh, Rory's the next Tiger, like we just got people got hooked on the like Rory's Tiger thing, which was you know just sort of I guess there was like a small window where you're like, oh, maybe, and and that's
been pretty obviously not true for a while. But to have Phil's career in this era is like you might be one of the twelve best golfers ever, you know, And and I think that people get really hung up and wound up on the I don't want a major into you know, nine years thing. And it's like Phil had long periods where he didn't win majors, you know, but but the but the.
Tiger did too, Kyle, I mean, I mean what Tiger went away to nineteen.
Yeah.
But the reason that Phil is who he is is because, like Andy said, his sustained greatness over twenty five years, that piles up and at the end, like where did everybody just get They like Lebron will have a possession tonight. It's like, oh, he might not be the best player ever. And you're like, can we maybe chill out a little bit?
It's wait till the finals. Let's just wait till Yeah.
It's the Brock party discourse right now. To be bad.
It's like every play I think it's like comical, like you know, he throws it in herself.
It's like, oh, he's not very good. You know.
It's like they're five and two, they're still gonna make the NFC Championship game. We'll see what happens then, right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's and yeah, that's the thing I wrote something years ago, like I mean probably like six years ago about like how everybody wants to call Rory the next Tiger. It's the reality is he was. He's like Dominique Wilkins, right, Like Dominique Wilkins was like all time player who played the same era of Jordan.
And it's like, what would that career look like?
What how would people talk about Dominique if if Michael Jordan wasn't around, Because he was like a spectacle of of an of an athlete, of a of a player. He could go out and drop fifty on you. He you know, he had all these dunks and then he ran into Michael Jordan a bunch of times, like he was playing in the same conference as Michael Jordan. It's
like that Clyde Drexler thing. Like with Clyde Dracon, people are like, he's the best shooting guard in the league, and then Jordan just takes him to the woodshed, you know, like it.
Was all alone Ernie L's and Dustin Johnson's Haroline.
Don't you dare insult Ernie Els Malone won amv.
I just I'm just gonna say, you know, Ernie Els, if they never went away from the wound ball, who knows what Ernie Els would have done?
Real quick? What what is? What comp what golf comp to another sport? Like player comp Are you most proud of that you've come up with. I've got one that I want to talk about. But you guys do this all the time with with NBA and and specifically with NBA, and there's got to be one that stands out to you.
Andy Scheffler is Jokic. They are super awkward while they're doing it. Their bulk big and kind of like gangly, but but you watch it and you're like, wait, what's going on? And then it goes in or it's like an unbelievable pass. Like Scheffler, he's swinging at his feed or doing all this stuff, and it's like a flushed long iron that well, there's a long iron that doesn't sound flush, but it is flushed and it ends up five feet away.
You know, that's a good I think.
I think Ludwig and Wimby is something I've been kind of sitting on for a bit, you know, just just seeing what what pops with these two guys.
Okay, honestly, I think like Ludwig, I almost put in one of my.
Five interesting I think he's listen. I think he'd been worthy of a spot honestly.
Well, like he wouldn't have a card right now. He didn't play well enough to have a car. Yeah, but it's this PGA Tour you thing just like it's like a gift from from heaven. Right, it's like, oh, here's here's your card for a year and a half and
then like these guys are so it's so hard. I think, like, you know, like what's going to get lost on history is how great players had to play to get the cards, like the things that like John Rahm did, that Morikawa did, Matthew like these, yeah, exactly, Like when you have eight starts and it's like you need to gain the FedEx Cup points that people do over an entire season in eight starts and then you get your card. Is like that is like an unbelievable like the list of people
that can do that, it's like super high pressure. Like and I think like now with this like this guarantees, I think it's a great change. I think the number one player on pg tour you should have a card, but you do lose a little bit of like that that accomplishment of the few players that could do it and get it done.
Yeah, for sure, KP.
Who's your number three? Well, my comp I'm sorry, your comp.
Sorry. I think Andy'll like this. JT and Bryce Harper.
That's good. That's good. I like it.
I mean, like you can do it all generationally good from a young age, fulfilled the expectations, a lot of drama, a lot of emotion, a lot going on.
There is there a slump in there for Bryce Harper at one point he's.
Been he's been injured. I don't know if there I know if there's a slump.
But JT a top ten player by the end and by this time next year.
No, yeah, all right, this is the decade of JT. It might be the wrong decade actually, but poor declared that Scott or Brooks Brooks, Brooks, we don't have time for Brooks. Go ahead, number three Data golf, Data Golf.
I love it.
So the reason for this is because they rank with player like my I don't disagree with what the ODEVGR has done recently in excluding live players. You're not measuring similar entities. I totally understand like why they've done what they've done, But for my purposes and our purposes, I need to be able to talk about who the best players in the world are, right like I I don't when I go to the US Open, I can't be discussing Bryson as if he's the two hundred and seventieth
best player, Like that's that's preposterous. And so of course we have to have some objective some people would say subjective, but it's math, some objective measuring stick for all the all the golfers in the world and the what has happened in the vacuum of THEWG or in the absence of the ode WGR, including live players data golf ranking them has provided I think a ton of value for people like us and for fans that are like I
don't know, I don't know what to do. I don't know, like who's good and who's not, and whether you agree with their formulas or not. I think it's I think it's provided a valuable tool for fans and media for the future.
Totally agree with you. I think it's a great call. And I mean I I lean on it during broadcast, Kyle. I mean I will, like on a Friday broadcast if I'm doing PJ Tour, a major something like that, I'll bring up the cut line number that they're providing. I just feel like, you think needs to be more involved because what they're doing is amazing and it's in depth
and obviously it's very accurate. And and I'll say this, like I had these one sheets Kyle my mom made because you know, like we're all basement bloggers at the end of the day, and like when I would do feature group stuff and it's the three players that I would do like on PJ Tour Live and stuff like that, and I've had wins last four starts and then age and owgr was one of the things and I've been
thinking about lately. It's like I can't use that anymore because no, to your point, when I'm when we're trying to quantify how good somebody is, that was what we could use. Right this guy's the eighth ranked player in the world, and now you can't really use that. And trying to define who Cam Smith as a golfer, we right now don't have a way to explain that outside of bringing up the open win.
You know, I would say one of the big losers of the year was Taylor Gooch. You know, he made twenty million dollars, but I think, like when you look at Taylor.
Gooch, I think he made thirty three Wait.
Thirty three million.
When you when you look at Taylor Gooch, he was like I I kept looking at him, I'm like, God, this guy profiles is really good player. He was good at everything. He obviously was is really good friends with Max Homa. I think he was a better player than Max when he went to Live and like, I don't think it's crazy that Taylor Gooch would be in a similar position to Max right now in the World Golf rankings.
I have that profile of Max, probably not the popularity off the course and on the course, but have that profile of like this guy could be, you know, and instead he's not even gonna be playing in the Major sext year, right.
You think he was better than Max when when he left.
I mean, if you look at it, if you look at his.
Yeah, his stats were he was He's a positive, he was good at everything, like a plus player in every facet of the game. Like he was a really like when you look at guys that are built for hard
golf in major championship golf, like his his profile. I felt like when I just looked at it and I was like, this is a guy that's gonna pop soon, and this is you know, two plus years ago and now he's popping, but him going getting like no matter what you say about live like he did some he played, had a great year, right, Yeah, and it didn't matter
because it gets him into nothing legacy wise. It does matter from like, hey, he's got generational wealth and I'm not going to discount that, like his family set up forever now, but you know he did miss out on all the other carrots of what playing great golf gets you.
Yeah, totally. And I think that the other thing that happens with Livin somebody maybe Dan Rappaport wrote about this at the US Open last year, is you don't get the like Max is a better player because he plays on the PGA Tour and has to beat guys like Rory spith Ram Scheffler, right, and Gooch obviously is a very good player. Data golf would say he's a top twenty five player, a top thirty player, whatever it is, and I would agree with that. But I don't think
he I don't think he's reached his potential. I don't think he's reached a ceiling of what he could be if he was learning how to beat guys like Rom Scheffler, more Cawa Hoblin. And that's a bummer because I think one of the reasons we watch sports is to watch guys a late like attempt to fulfill their potential. And
Goucha's doing that monetarily, which is great. Again, great for him, but I don't know that he's doing it on the golf side, which I think we would all agree leads to winning major championships.
It's like when you win a championship and the other guys are injured, right, and it's like, you still got the championship. I mean, I think about the Toronto Championship a lot.
After.
They were the best team in the NBA that year and they were unbelievable, but they played this Warriors team that's losing players by the minute, and all of a sudden, that last series wasn't the definable moment you were hoping for. It was just you were playing a team that was kind of you know, littered with injury, and all of a sudden, you kind of walk into the into the championship.
There you're gonna go out to my rockets next, aren't you winning championships?
Never? Noj was playing baseball.
It's fine, Just what's uh, what's what's your number two? Who's that for number two? I feel like it's a bacon, bacon, you go all right? My number two is Victor Hovland. He made thirty four plus million dollars playing golf this year.
He earned us as much as goo.
He earned one point series effectively one point five million for every event he teed it up in and uh and twenty thousand dollars for every hole he played, five thousand dollars per shot. Kind of crazy, insane obviously. Then you know, like on top of the FedEx Cup and he was awesome. I think there's a big question like about you know, you look at him as like can he be a major championship player? And then he plays
great in the majors. He didn't win one, but it's like, God, he's on like your short list maybe top five guys. He took chipping, he was an awful, awful chipper and he's become a good chipper of the golf ball. Like, you look at this guy and it feels like he is built to continue to get better for the next five years, and I don't think that's like every player. I think we fall into the trap with golf, and
it happens from like a junior level. Is who's the best at at fourteen doesn't mean they're gonna be the best at eighteen. Who's the best at twenty two isn't gonna be the best at twenty six. To me, Victor Holin's a guy that like he seems to progress every year and seems to continue to get better, and that's a scary thing when you're already one of the best
players in the world. Also hearing reports that, you know, the single Victor Holin, single man is is potentially dipping his toe of getting out of the still water singles market and you know and so and moving to South Florida. So that could be really good for his personal life in twenty twenty three or bad or bad?
That bubbling that bubble in Oklahoma my play.
You know, I used to comment on any of this.
I'll say this about the chipping and Kyle at the Ryder Cup. You know, you think about all this stuff we said about Victor around the greens and first hole of the first match, and he chips in and you go just a different dude. Like the confidence is just at a completely different place. It's almost like he's a different human, you know.
Yeah, and he's so I think it's a I think it's very, very difficult to rise to the level that he's risen to and maintain your likability in the way that he has. He's almost more beloved now than when you know, people knew about him as the twenty fifth best player in the world, and he's just he's he's very marketable, very likable, and I'm very interesting. He changed my mind the most about him of anybody in twenty twenty three. I always have, like one guy a year
change changes my mind the most about them. I think twenty twenty two is Matt Fitzpatrick Bryson. In twenty twenty, I don't know. You can go back year by year for me in twenty three. In twenty twenty three it was Victor Hotlin.
It's a great point.
Yeah, it's crazy too, because like you say that, it's like it's not Wyndham Clark who won a US Open over Scottie Scheffler and Rory Macklroy, like on Sunday beat Rory Macklroy Scottie Scheffler and you know Ricky, I think everybody kind of expected what he was going to do happen, but like this is a guy, you know, Wyndam Clark.
I feel like he almost made my list, but because of like you know, out of nowhere, he wasn't even like in big events at yeah, in May of twenty twenty three, and now he's in the top ten of the world, a major champion.
Right upper Yeah, Ryder Copper. But like Victor Hovelin.
To me was was just like what you said, change your perception of him as a player this year.
Andy, my number two were talking NBA earlier, my number two Steph Curry.
Oh, I almost put him in here.
I knew you were getting nervous about this when we were talking before the KP.
Before you jumped on. He was asking me Steph stuff. So on the golf course, he wins in Tahoe, he makes a hole in one that week, and he makes an eagle on the last hole, which is legitimately bananas. I went back and watched the eagle last night, so it's like forty feet he makes on the last green. It's like so.
Silly, but I mean more important. Than obviously his golf is.
You know, he wins the Charlie Sifferd Award, He's launched underrated golf. I mean, he's helped bring golf to the Howard University. He's involved in TGL. Like to me, I think you and I all, I think all three of us probably roll our eyes multiple times a day when you hear the term grow the game. But it feels like Steph Curry a few years ago was like, what can I do with my popularity in life and in the United States right now to build golf in areas that need golfer could use golf. And I feel like
he's really done that. And I think it's easy for people to do what you're comfortable doing. And when I say that, I mean Steph building basketball in areas or going out and you know, like rep saving courts that need to be repaved. But to just go out and branch yourself out into a completely different endeavor is so hard to do. And I give him a ton of credit for doing all that he's doing. So Steph's my number two.
Hey, can we talk about the U s G A scheduling for the Sifford Award. Do you know during the NBA Finals during the NBA Finals.
Is that right?
What I thought you wanted.
I thought you wanted to talk about like the mid am or like the four ball or something.
When is the When is the fore ball? Is it before or after the girls junior?
The four ball schedule makes no sense to me. Ever, you qualify the year before.
I've been saying I've been saying this either now.
Yeah, but but but anyways, they they scheduled Steph's big thing for the Sifford Award the week of the NBA Finals.
I mean, what what are we doing?
We're you can take that, you can take the ceremony, you can roll it out, you can you can talk to the NBA. I mean, I think it makes a lot of sense because all you can do is just lean on the NBA and kind of and kind of boost what you're trying to do.
Well, maybe they're expecting the Hornets to be in the other team.
I was gonna say, he could pull the reverse fill and just fly from from California to Pinehurst.
Well, I also appreciate you guys are just putting the Warriors in the NBA Finals right now.
This is amazing.
I'm not putting them I'm just saying they got a good chance. It's like, what if there's six teams that have a chance, they're one of them. Yeah, all right, who's your number two? Do you have a hard stop or we even could get through this exercise?
You're good, I got I got ten minutes Warriors, by the way, or I have at the fourth best odds to win the West right now?
Anyway, basically an injury away from being the favorites.
That's I don't think that's actually okay.
My number two is somebody that played in the Ryder Cup. But I really latched onto this idea of what Andy was talking about or has talked about with Can't and and some of these guys of man being in the Ryder Cup is such an opportunity for the rest of your career. You you were always in forever a writer Cup. And so the person that I thought parlayed that better than anybody was big shot Bobby mack Wow. Like he didn't even I mean, he's like, like, let's just be
objective here. He's not that good at golf.
He's just not yet.
Yeah, it's gonna come after you.
I thought you thought Memphis was bad, just like the people on iron.
The tweet was actually complimenting Scotland and he's going back at Scotland.
It was port Rush. It was poor Rush.
Sorry sorry, sorry port Rush.
Uh So, just just just lay of the numbers, look at the data golf, look at my number three. He's objectively like, not that great at golf, and yet he was involved in two of the best golf moments of the year. One at the scottischopin nearly beating Rory there with the shot of his and anybody else's life from the junk with the three would I mean, it was extraordinary. And then winning two and a half points at the Ryder Cup. That changes your life. I mean it changes
your year for sure. But it's like what you do in ten years is predicated on winning two and a half points at the twenty twenty three Ryder Cup. That sounds crazy, but over and over again it's proven to be true, especially for guys that are not the ROMs and Rory's and Tigers of the world. You know, like that completely changed your life. And I thought he took advantage of a very opportunistic situation this year.
I think about Jamie Donaldson a lot kp in that regard where. Yeah, when you think about Jamie Donaldson's career, you know, you kind of go to the putt to win the Ryder Cup, right, and it's like it's who you will be in golf circles for kind of the rest of your life. And I think for Bobby Mack, there's a real good chance that in twenty years from now, when we're talking about his career, twenty twenty three is
going to be the year we talk about. And to your point, the swings that you mentioned are going to be kind of the swings that stick out of everything else he's done in his career.
Totally.
All right, Number one, I got a great one.
I'll just go. I'll go. I got somebody I'm pretty sure neither of you have ever heard of before as my number one. All Right, I'm going back to the goats. I'm going to Taylor Gooch's caddie. Mal Baker is his name.
This guy, he's got three million bucks.
This guy signs up with Taylor Googe out of Oklahoma State. Taylor Gooch has a fine career at OSU. I don't know how he's been on the bag, but you know you're getting on a bag where you're like, oh, this guy would be a good PJA tour player for a while, I might make a decent living and have a have a nice you know, run with him. And now, all of a sudden, in the last two years, I'm not
totally sure how to add all this up. We've got team money, we've got individual money, you've got signing bonuses, You've got I don't I don't know what the numbers are, but from what I could put together, Taylor Goridge made over forty million dollars over the last two years. So if you're this this mal Baker fellow, who's caddying, who's
carrying the clubs, you don't. One you've made what three and a half four million dollars for over two years, so you're you're rich by most of our definition of it. And two, you can justify the whole Live Saudi thing because you just work for Taylor Gooch. You don't even I mean, you don't even work. You don't you're not part of the league. Really, you're just carrying your boss's clubs. I mean, it's a it's a it's an unbelievable situation that he finds himself in, and uh.
Yeah, cons I provide a little interlude here.
Sure, can you imagine how good Rory would be if mal Baker was carrying back?
God?
Here we go, Here we go.
Here we are.
Maybe my least favorite comment of of of Eddie and Golf is like, can you imagine how good so and so would be with so and so?
Caddy?
This is your soapbox for one of many, but it's it's one of your top showboxes, KP.
I think it's a great pick. I really do. I love where you went with it. I think it's really smart. It's maybe been kind of a weird year for caddies in general, or maybe a great year for caddies, however you want to look at it. But yeah, I think it's I think this caddies could be a winner here in the sphere. It's a really really good pick.
I mean, caddies in general are a winner.
You go to like, yes, caddies are so I mean, caddies are getting for one bag what I used to get paid for two. Like I feel like an old man now because this is what my dad used to say to me when I caddy. I got four dollars a bag, you know, but like literally, the rates for a regular caddy. I mean, and obviously I'm not trying to go after caddy fees here. It costs a lot to live in today's bottom Canada.
Who else have we gone after Scott.
Oklahoma taking a bit of females and Oklahoma taking a shot today.
So from Oklahoma, by the way, So congrats on that.
It's a tough situation after the pod, I mean, your wife, your wife being brought up twice on the pod, and I'm not sure either she's gonna love, but hey, you know what, that's the price you pay.
You're guessing she's not listening to the the Frida Egg golf.
She's not this steep into it.
She she doesn't even read. She reads like one thing a year that I write. So she's for sure not listening to the Frida Egg podcast.
My wife came to a live show years ago, probably four years ago. It was a shotgun start live show. She she had never listened to a podcast before, and afterwards, like any podcast or a Friday if any podcast I've got a part of. After she was like that was so good, and I was like, oh, thanks.
Wow, it's always great when they're like surprised by I can't believe how good that was.
Wow. Yeah, well people listen to this. That's interesting. Wow, that's really cool.
KP.
I loved your number one.
My number one to me, I think, okay, guys, we love the majors, we love the Ryder Cup, Like this is kind of what we live for in this space. Right when you cover golf, the non major championship golf is not as interested it used to be. Still can be interesting, but for the most part it gets interested on Saturday and Sundays. This has not been a great major year. It is not no on the midside of things. It was a sleepy major year, rare if at all.
Was there interesting stuff happening on the final few holes The Ryder Cup, to be fair, wasn't that close. It had its moment, as it always does. But I'm flipping to the women's side and the LPGA because when I think about twenty three, I think the big winner of the year is Lily Avo. She's now world number one, she won two majors. In twenty twenty three, she took the mantle as the best American women's golfer in the world. She won another event in twenty three. She's been a
second a couple of weeks ago. Didn't have her best solimn Cup, but she did win her singles match, which few American players were able to do. I feel like twenty three was the year of Lilya. I think she deserves the flowers for what she did in the major championships. And again going back to what I said on the men's side, nothing stands out on the men's side. I think Lilia was excellent on the women's side, and she's my number one story in person of twenty twenty three in golf.
Well, you know, I think this is a little premature because she hasn't won the race to the CME Globe yet fair enough, but yes, she was in contention for one of my spots, would have been one of my honorable mentions. Has had a fantastic year and I think it kind of came out of nowhere too, right, which is extra Like you always love those you know runs in the number one that you didn't see coming at all.
I was gonna say, what was she ranked at the beginning of the year. I mean, she was a give me a moment. I presume she was like a top what forty player, but not like a top five.
Her worst ranking this year KP this year was forty third this year. Yeah, so at some point in twenty three she was ranked forty third, which seems wild and I mean it doesn't necessarily seem like it's totally accurate, but I mean, going back to like the summer, going back to la she was ranked twelfth in the world.
So you know, guys, that would be like Sepstraca becoming the number one player in the world next year.
Yeah.
Min see who Kim.
Min wy is currently ranked forty third.
Yeah, I mean if you go to there, if you go to if you go to early twenty three, I see she was ranked thirty third, So I mean, yeah, like maybe it's accurate, maybe it's not, but I mean early year the top thirty in the world.
What if Corey Connors was the number one player in the world at this time year?
Do?
I mean, when does go to the broom?
I should have had the broom putter as one of one of the things on my five, just.
That one that everybody used to win.
Yeah, all right, my last one. I can't believe it's not on your list. Maybe you kept it off because you do be number one on my list is our our friend, Blockie boy, Michael Block, the number one winner in golf this year. I think it's gonna be extraordinary. I I think it's an amazing thing. This is an amazing thing about the PGA in general, that that you
have this wrinkle with club pros. It's amazing for a guy who's, you know, in his mid forties to go out and finish fifteenth in a major to effectively have the greatest golf week of his life and the most important golf week of his life. That intersection rarely happen. It rarely happens for anyone. But then this whole thing, this Block phenomenon, this happened afterwards. It's just it's unlike anything I've ever seen before. I mean, I think this
is not gonna end anytime soon. I think four years from now, Michael Block's still gonna be making appearances at like sporting events. So he's at the Anaheim Ducks game the other day. It's like, what's the cross section of hockey fans Michael Block fans? But like four years from now, these things are still gonna be going on and people are gonna be like, wait, what did who's Michael Block? Oh, he made a whole one and finished ten fifteenth at the PGA four years ago. But he has definitely made
the most. It is a story of having your fifteen minutes of fame, maybe more than fifteen. It was like three days of fame and just and just getting everything out of it. I mean, and I think for all intensive purposes, his personality has been terrific for it. He has the right demeanor, the right attitude to effectively ingratiate himself with all these different organizations they now works with. Like, it has been a crazy run for Michael block and twenty twenty three will always be the year.
For a Blocky.
For me, what do you think he tells people that he does, Like when he's at a party.
I used to think, is is he a pro golfer anymore?
Well, That's what I'm saying, is like when when when I'm at a party and somebody's like, what do you do? I'm like, I write about golf that in my spare time. I catch it. Yeah. Uh. But when he's at a party and somebody's like, hey, what do you do? I mean, is does he say I'm I'm a I'm an in Like, Like, what is his what's his deal, what's his role?
I mean, like it's it's it's gotta be pro golfer.
Yeah yeah, I mean it's easy to forget how awesome that Sunday was at the PGA because of all that's happened since and like the Rory comments and things like that, but like it was, it was my favorite moment of the broadcast the whole year that I was a part of.
I mean, I'm on.
The featured whole coverage for esp Plus or whatever and he flies it in the hole. It's like I went bananas. I mean, it was just so much fun to see that happen. And Andy, I mean, you and I had dreams back in the day of like maybe playing golf for living, or maybe we qualify for this or that. Michael Block's like the best case scenario. Yes, what we thought of.
It's insane. I mean, like that's the thing.
Like, I just think that because of everything that's happened, one of the things that's gonna become like under talked about and underrated is what he actually did.
At that DGA.
That's right.
He hit at two sixty on this course that rewarded distance too, and he finished ten fifteen, he hits it nowhere.
I mean, like I wonder, sometimes we live in a we live in a world now where if there's a glimmer of fame or potential, everybody's gonna come and try to grab a piece of it, right, And it's up to you and your representation or your team around you to kind of, you know, filter through what you want to do and what you don't want to do. And I think it's so easy to say yes to everything because with everything comes money and finances and stability and
whatever the case may be. I wonder if for Blockie, if just peace Sia, I'm gonna forever be this legend of golf that played so well at this golf course I shouldn't have played well at But every time he teas it up and plays in these golf tournaments and doesn't play well, it's a reminder of how incredible Andy to your point, what he was able to do at
Oakhill was actually what it actually was, right. It's like you go play in some of these other golf tournaments that maybe make more sense for your golf game, and you shoot seventy eight or eighty and you miss the cut and it almost kind of pulls away from what you're able to do. It's like John Daly at Crooked Stick in the modern world, right, or Daily pops up wins the PGA, and you're like that cannot happen. And for John Daily, he was just able to his talent was able to carry.
Him through to more success.
And for Blockie it was only gonna be a disappointment on the golf course after what he was able to do with that peach.
Yeah, I do wonder like how just objectively, how good he actually, like, like how much better at golf is he than somebody like you, Shane, you know you.
Call it that way better, like like a mile like miles better?
Yeah, Oh, I mean, like but he like like Kyle the numbers he post and like how he's able to casually go out there and shoot sixty two and sixty three and sixty four play in his club or wherever. I mean, he is an unbelievable golfer. This is like the Stu Hagastad question, Right, you get asked to lap how good is Stu Hagastad, Like Stu Hagastad is an unbelievable like like best player in certain states level of golfer.
You know what I'm saying, Yeah, yeah, but he's yeah, but he but he's like so far from the guys that he beat that.
Well, I I don't know. I I think like Michael Block, So I think this is a valuable comparison. So for years, so Michael Block's running rough shot over the Southern or Southern California PGA section great player section, like great players.
Mike Small like absolutely utterly dominated the Illinois PGA section for a while and during this time, so Mike Small is the head coach of the U I team during like a period of time, I think it was like around like four to nine, Mike Small had like the second best made cuts percentage on the PGA Tour to Tiger Woods at the same period of time. I'm not saying I think Mike Small is probably a better player
than Michael Block. Like Mike Small was out there making cuts and PGAs and doing this stuff while also like coaching a golf program where he's you know, so anyways, I think he's a very good player, Like could he be a good like a could he compete on like maybe the.
What do they call it, the Americas Tour?
Now?
Probably like I think he could go play there, and but like, I think he makes more money playing. I think he's playing where he makes the most money. He's not good enough to be a PGA Tour player, but these section events can be very very lucrative, right, Like if you if you're the best player in your section there, there's good money to be had on top of doing other things right, And he.
Like he said during the week, he doesn't even go. He doesn't teach, you know, He's like, I give lessons to like just the people I like.
Right, if I set the over under on Champs Tour starts for Michael Block at forty five and a half, or you take an over or under.
I mean, does he have to qull how does he get in?
Well, he's keep in mind his one exemption. His first exemption was the Charles Schwab and they run the Champions Tour, so will Center to be there?
Interesting? I think you guys know Spencer Hall's idea that there should be a regular human that swims in the Olympics and runs in like the four hundred and stuff. I think I think Bacon's job going forward should be to just travel around and play in tour events. And then but in your downtime you go play with I mean we I've played with you, your your well both of you guys, but Beacan's probably the best, best like
amateur I've ever played with. And to see what would happen if you went out like in the PGA Championship, I think it would blow people's minds, Like like the differentiation between you who They'd be like, oh, this guy's awesome, and even a Michael Block or and then obviously beyond that, I think it would just be like shocking to witness.
The setup at Cherry Hills for the Amateur this year and having to in a tournament environment, having to try to figure out how to just hit certain golf shots. It was like one of the weirdest moments I've ever had in my life, was standing over a golf ball, going, I don't even know how to get this ball out of this lie, you know. I mean, it was such a shock to the system of what I thought championship golf would feel like versus what it actually feels like.
I mean, everything I'd ever thought about US Opens I've covered, and US amateurs I've covered, and you see a guy make a six and match play and you'd kind of criticize him maybe a bit as he was walking to the next tee. And then you're in that moment and it's like, this isn't even the same sport, Like I'm not what I'm being asked to do on this golf course in these conditions. It's not even tournament golf. It's like a completely different you know, it's a different layer
that I've never seen. It's like how you know, you you think you've been to the VIP room, and then it's like no, no, no, no, no, there's like another room that the like real celebrities go to that they don't even open the door for somebody that's not Lebron or Shaq, you know, or Lady Gaga. It's like that's a different level of experience. I mean, that's what it kind of
felt like to me. It was just it was And then you know, you'd see these guy likes Garrett, like Gordon Sargent goes out and shoots like sixty eight and you go, wait, wait, wait, what the hell? Like when when Hagastad had to battle back after I made the ten at Colorado Golf and he shot like four or five under at Cherry, you know, and you're going, I mean, like, I'm my goal is to break eighty, you know, Like my goal starting the day is like I just want
to break eighty here, you know. And these other guys have the have the skill set to be able to go out there and still shoot four or five under well.
And this is the I think this is one of my favorite things about golf in general, is that you will never understand how good Derreck Henry is because you can't go play recreational football, right right, So there's no there's no relationship with how good he is to how good you are. But there is a relationship between how good you are and how good Nick Dunlap is, and then how good you know Ben Griffin, how much better Ben Griffin is than Nick Dunlap, and then beyond you know,
like there's that relationship I think makes golf. It's not relatable, that's not the right word, but there is a relationship there that gives you an appreciation for all of this that you I don't think you get in any other sport.
Yeah, I agree.
I don't get asked to this anymore because that's probably a good barometer of where my golf game's at these days. But people always used to ask, like, what what's the difference between you and a tour pro? And I'm like, they're literally way better at every single aspect of golf
than me. And I think that's like, you know, like Bacon hits the shit out of the ball like murders it, but you'd be a below average driver of the golf ball and the PGA Tour because of like accuracy, right, Like I mean absolutely, I mean it, and it's like crazy, you hit it three twenty easy, Like it's like this is like this is what people don't understand. It's like you could hit it really far, but like those guys hit it so straight.
Like the great drivers of the golf ball hit it so straight. I mean I've told this story before, but during the pandemic, Max and I would play this money game in Arizona every Monday because it was like one of the only things you could do right was go
play golf. And this golf course is in central Phoenix, is called Papago and it's got three part threes that are two thirty plus, you know, And I mean Andy and I are standing on the tee of a two hundred and thirty five yard part three, and it's like try to hit the green, you know, or or try to miss it in the right spot where you can
maybe make three. And my buddy Ashton would play with us, who played college golf and played many tour golf and is unbelievable, and we would literally be laughing to ourselves walking off the tee at how close Max would hit it with this four iron and five iron every single time.
This wasn't one shot around, this was all three of the par threes we'd play where Max is hitting three iron, four iron, five iron into these par threes and he's hitting at ten feet and he's hitting a whole high ten feet and it was just the the approach with his mind was just so different, like his expectation was almost a different game, you know, not just what he was able to do with the golf ball, but the expectation on what I'm going to do on this part
three was I'm going to give myself a chance at two, you know, and we're just we're trying, we're trying helplessly to not make five.
I played in a pro am with with Ricky one year at Colonial No.
Ricky Barnes.
Kfie is the one guy that hadn't worked with Barnesy on a telecast on this podcast.
We didn't get it. You never worked with a man that's called twenty minutes about college golf. Should have called him in facility.
So the Oklahoma State Ricky is the one that I played with. And the power. You know, you see these guys and you're like, oh, they're just crazy long, and that is true. They do have a lot of power. But are you gonna be okay? Andy?
I'm just remembering walking down. I think I was on the eighth fell of the Pacific Dudes when he started talking about about about college golf facilities and then I was on the ninth fairway when.
He Love Ricky Barnes.
I love Ricky Barnes. He was great. He was a great person to work with. But I'll never forget that moment.
Go ahead.
Sorry, It's not the power, it's the it's the control. Like the the amount of control those guys have over their ball is like their misses for us would be an amazing dispersion rate, right and and and it's just that that was the part that blew me away, is how much they were able to control the all in the air, even though they had already hit they'd already hit it, and it was almost like they were still
controlling it. Which is it's a It's an unbelievable trait that I think most of the top guys in the world have.
Before we go, Andy had a question for you in KP as well. We're all wearing hats here. We are all baseball cap guys. I'd say for the rest of your life, I give you either get the Ricky Barnes cap or the yakubs and hat, and you have to wear those only going forward. Which one are you picking?
Can I choose to not to not wear a hat? Go?
No hat? Did you never?
I'll never wear a hat again over those two?
Yeah? Same?
Is the upper Deck sponsorship on his flip cap the best of all time?
Yes?
For one.
Yeah, it's amazing.
Yeah, it's it's hard to beat. I I don't know.
I love the Paint Stewart NFL sponsorship so goodt that.
I love the the uh Nike logo on seven seven visor the double Nike was sweet. I would not wear a hat, but if I had to pick one of those, I would pick. I would pick the the Yes, the yes per part of it. I can't. I can't do the painter hat like I I cannot do that.
I think I take the I think I take the painters I can't. I mean, you couldn't wear.
The flip up anywhere, like, but you could go to a golf course with the flip up and people might be like, oh, that's a yes for part of it. Cat, I haven't seen that in years with the Dutch Boy, the Dutch Boy Barnes hat. Like I feel like you could go to like a hipster coffee shop and be okay, Like you could go out.
No, I don't.
It's not two thousand and two.
How many people do you think would tell you your bill was flipped up if you were that in casual situations.
But that's it was a windy I think you could get away with like, oh, that guy's just trying to be funny or ironic or whatever. The painter hat is like, you can't do anything. You can't, you can't explain it away. You're just like I have this stupid hat on.
I think Ryan Moore had a cup of coffee with the painter hat for a while too.
Yeah, yeah, remember what he was wearing. The tie.
Oh yeah, touch.
He did at the Open Championship. Speaking of the Open Championship, can I read you my honorable mention? Mega Corp, smart Uh, Andrew Waterman, Big Big Waterman, Ure, Wyndham Clark obviously, and then Ricky Ricky's water bottle? How how is it not sponsored? That's the biggest question. I don't understand how he.
Wouldn't be able to have all the stickers on it?
Then how is it not a Red Bull bottle? Like he's a red Bull guy, right.
I don't know if he's still a Red Bull guy?
Is he?
I don't imagine drinking that much red Bull in a day. It's like a thirty eight ounce bottle, my favorite, one.
Of my favorites.
Last time you had a red Bull?
Well, that's what I was gonna say. Bacon is like, I don't even know what red Bull does anymore, Like I don't even know what the what the company does.
I had a wedding. I had a wedding a couple of weeks ago.
It was with all my college friends and we had Red Bull Vodkas right before the wedding.
Did you feel awful?
It was?
It was horrible. Yeah, it tasted so bad. I was like, I can't believe I used to drink these.
Yeah, like you know, by the way speak speaking of red Bull. And again I don't. I don't. I think this is a hundred I think this is one hundred percent. But I'll say ninety nine percent just to just to cover myself. But I did a podcast on Get a Grip with Shad Toutan last week during the pot. During the pot, I think he was drinking a red Bull.
Did you did you bring up his nickname of the guy that made it?
You know what's so funny is I had like four people all in your sphere Andy that asked me if I asked that question, like on different platforms, would like d M E or text me if I asked that question.
You know it's the gas man.
Maybe we'll make next year. So list all.
Right, anything else this is? This is I don't.
I don't think we roughly covered the top subject matter and a lot of other subjects.
That's all I was expecting. To be honest.
All right, guys, thank you. Everybody can find you. Shane's got got a grip pod. You don't have to you don't have to play lots of stuff with Scratch, the Caddie Life. What was it called, that's serious called cat loop life, Loop Life, Kyle. They can find you on First Cut podcast. They can find your newsletter, the Normal Sporter they could sign up for.
You're doing Normal Sport again.
I assume the book and the ebook and everything with that. Yeah, that I thought you're excited about that.
Well, it's kind of like you with the the Year in Review. I actually cut it down this year, so we're not doing it's not going to be an all like an exhaustive list of everything that happened. It's going to be like basically my hundred or one hundred and fifty thoughts on the year. So I'm about a third of the way through.
It's man, how long is how long is every thought? I mean, it's just like pages every thought.
Or no, some of them are like some are like one sentence okay, okay, but some are paragraphs. So it's just it kind of fits. My Boreth gave me this great writing advice one time. He's like, just start writing numbers down and fill them in the just start writing thoughts down.
It's pretty good.
It is a great way. Like if you just start writing paragraphs, you know.
I think one of the best pieces of writing advice I ever got was like, you can just end a thought and start a new one. Everything doesn't have to perfectly tie together. Yeah, maybe that's why I'm a terrible writer, but.
Well this just made everything more clear for me personally. I love layup. All right, That's that's enough for me. I gotta go upstairs. Sure my kids aren't dead. I love you guys, Go dolphins.
Go doctor.
Thank you for listening to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast.
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