PGA Tour: BMW & wTF: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).A short week on the PGA Tour with 69 of the 70 FedEx Play-Off survivors (all except the injured/resting Stenson) high-tailing it from TPC Boston to Crooked Stick GC in the Indianapolis area, 900+ miles to the WSW, for action starting Thursday. Not much time to acclimate to a course most of the field has only seen once before, in 2012, if at all. Rory McIlroy was the winner then, in red hot form having won the previous week at the Deutsche Bank. Sound familiar?

2).And, at the start of a four-tournament series to determine careers (in the short-term at least), the web.com Tour Finals commence at Canterbury Golf Club, home of 2 past US Opens and a PGA Championship, in the Cleveland area of Ohio.

3).What a great win for McIlroy on Monday. Welcome back Rory, Darren Clarke is pleased to see you.
And another disappointment for Paul Casey, his sixth Tour runner-up finish against one win, gift-wrapped seven years ago in Houston by JB Holmes.
Casey's career on the PGA Tour has been a mixed bag, with two terrific years  in 2009/2010, followed by four largely barren years dominated by injuries, bad form and divorce. Now last year's comeback followed by another decent, could yet be great, year.

4).We tend to think Casey's been around forever, but most of his career has been spent piling up European Tour wins and cash.
Despite playing the PGA Tour on and off for a decade, Casey "only" ranks 82nd in career earnings. He found out the hard way a few years ago that his only enduring exemption standing on Tour is his "Past Champion" status, significant but only yielding a place in about 1/3 of tournaments; and he has only chalked up 136 cuts. Without higher career earnings, or at least another win, he wouldn't have an exemption onto the Champions Tour, in 11 years' time. He may still be an angry young man at being left behind in Ryder Cup selection since 2008, but it's quite likely that a purely pragmatic streak also played a part in his decision to focus 100% on the PGA Tour this year.

5). It's difficult to imagine that LoveIII learned much from the Deutsche Bank play, at least as far as looking for Ryder Cup contenders in sparkling form is concerned. Perhaps he might have liked Chappell (8th), Ryan Moore (8th) or Kaufman (24th) to have enjoyed a strong Monday, but they faltered, as did Furyk and Stricker who thus failed to qualify for the BMW Championship. Other "prospects" include:
Watson, Thomas, Hoffman, Horschel all missed the cut.
Bill Haas: 67th
Piercy: 53rd
Fowler, Kuchar, Kisner: 46th
Berger: 41st
Dufner, Holmes: 33rd
Not a pretty sight.
I still think he'll go for the safe (i.e. uncontroversial) choice of proven RC losers Watson, Fowler and Kuchar (who comes with popular caddie John Wood), plus JB Holmes. But the Beemer could change/confuse things again.

6).16 golfers qualified for the (10-year-old) FedEx Play-Offs for the tenth time, another 10 qualified for Round 2 for the tenth time. But, of those, Donald, HowellIII, Kuchar, Moore, Rose and Snedeker had fallen short of qualifying for Round 3 at least once, and Furyk misses out this time.
QUIZ! Which three golfers qualify for the BMW Championship for the tenth time??

7).The narrative tends to be that Rory has had a rotten season but he still ranks high in owgr points for 2016. These nine have racked up 200 owgr points so far:
384: Day
356: DJohnson
292: McIlroy
285: Stenson
261: Spieth
255: Scott
241: Reed
220: Willett
200: Walker

8).The club of three-time FedEx Play-Off tournament winners grew to two with Rory joining Tiger at the top. Two-time winners include:
Vijay, Camilo, Phil, Stricker, DJ, Billy Ho, Stenson and Day.

9).Most interesting competitor to many Europeans in the first web.com Tour Final tournament will be Andrew Johnston, especially with Beef having taken a few weeks off then bellying straight back up to the bar with last week's 3rd place finish in the Swiss Alps. We'll keep an eye on this action over the next month.

10).Pete Dye is now about 145 but Crooked Stick endures as one of his landmark designs, made famous in 1991 when John Daly gripped it and ripped his way to become PGA Champion. It took the PGA Tour until 2012 to come to the course for the first time and McIlroy made off with the Championship by two strokes from Mickelson and some guy called Westwood. Other Top 25 finishers then who return for more include:
T6: Dustin and (my idea of closest pursuer to Rory this week) Adam Scott.
T10: Ryan Moore
T12: Zach, Kirk, Bubba
T16: Rose (what happened to him yesterday?   ), Oosthuizen
T24: Sergio

PS: Three more US Ryder Cuppers due to be selected following the Beemer (which should be Sunday but not a great forecast in prospect).
Also: Nice to see Darren Clarke grouped with Stewart Cink in Switzerland - good health to the Cinks.
And: Don't forget Trivia in Note 6). above.

http://www.golf.com/tour-and-news/announcer-bmw-championship-garbles-jason-days-name

And immidiately hereafter the announcer was offered a job at the USGA.

Other than Television, a Monday finish this week is less onerous than normal as there is no PGATour event.

Haven't checked to see if any player in Indy has reservations in Italy next week

There is a new contender for PGATour Rookie of the Year: Si Woo Kim

Thanks to some lobbying from John Hahn, Si Woo Kim was reclassified as a 2015-16 Rookie.

Kim joins Grillo and Kaufman as the main contenders for RotY, Grillo and Kim will make it to the Tour Championship and Kaufman might also qualify.

GPB... My point on Beef is... Sure... If he's decided to make the PGAT his primary Tour.... Then sure... The new minimum ET rule makes it easier even without all the co-sanctions. But what I'm referring to is not next season, but the season after that which is so important to Euro RC qualifying. He might need a lot more ET events to qualify for that team... And if he's not in all the co-sanctions... That's gonna make it even harder. He could very well fall victim to the Shane Lowry conundrum.

Lowry never seemed to be committed to the PGATour. As was repeatedly pointed out in these blogs, his schedule seemed strange.

At this time, Beef's first priority should not be the Ryder Cup, it should be the OWGR Top 50, because IMO, he can't be a contender for the RC unless he is playing the 2017 Majors and WGCs. Without those tournament, the other EuroT tournaments are just not lucrative or strong enough to make the team.

I'm having trouble wrapping my head around the justification of making Si Woo Kim eligible for Rookie of the year.

First... here's the FULL current policy as written in the policy manual:

PGA TOUR ROOKIE OF THE YEAR

The Player Advisory Council and the Player Directors nominate annually a list of first-season PGA TOUR members for the PGA TOUR Rookie of the Year. A player’s rookie season (“Rookie Year”) is defined as the season in which he becomes a PGA TOUR member (including Special Temporary Members) and plays in 10 or more events as a member or finishes in the Top 125 on the Official FedExCup Points List, the Top 125 on the Official PGA TOUR Money List or qualifies as a Top 125 Non-member, whichever occurs first.

Further, for purposes of this definition, a new member (including Special Temporary Members) shall not be eligible to be a rookie if he has previously played in more than seven (7) Official PGA TOUR Money events as a professional in any prior season.

PGA TOUR members who have played in at least 15 official money tournaments vote on this award. The Ryder Cup, Presidents Cup and Olympic Games count as one of the 15.

- - - - - -

Now I DON'T like the current policy... IMO it's too restrictive because it wrongly excludes what I believe is a legitimate Rookie exactly like Si Woo Kim. But the policy is the policy, and IMO policy needs to be followed to the letter when there's no grey area. From all reports, it appears The Tour decided to go with the first paragraph of the policy and ignore the second. Well in effect that completely undoes the change to the policy from a few years ago. By ignoring the "Further" paragraph for Si Woo Kim are they going to ignore it for everybody else too? If they use only the first paragraph, then Soren Kjeldsen will be eligible for Rookie of the Year next season. OK... that's fine if that's what they want to do... but the entire reason for the addition of the second paragraph a few years ago was EXACTLY to prevent a long time Touring pro from another tour (like Kjeldsen) to come in and be a rookie on the PGA Tour.

Now if they want to change the rule, I'm ALL for that. Change it and implement the policy for next year. But IMO it's just wrong to change it on the fly because someone has decided something is not "fair" about the current policy, despite it working EXACTLY as originally intended.

Whatever the ruling, I think Si Woo is a star of the future. Almost as impressive in defeat against Badds as he was a few weeks ago in victory.


Agree about the leeway that the Tour has for Monday play, DLIII's timetable notwithstanding, though perhaps Friday's forecast is not as grim as it seemed 24 hours ago. Maybe Jason Dufner will be the man to step forward for Davis - he's played well for him before, after all.

GPB wrote:Lowry never seemed to be committed to the PGATour.  As was repeatedly pointed out in these blogs, his schedule seemed strange.

At this time, Beef's first priority should not be the Ryder Cup, it should be the OWGR Top 50, because IMO, he can't be a contender for the RC unless he is playing the 2017 Majors and WGCs.  Without those tournament, the other EuroT tournaments are just not lucrative or strong enough to make the team.

IMO Lowry's schedule was dumb, but not necessarily a lack of commitment to the PGA Tour... The very nature of dual touring, and in light of the PGAT and ET minimum event rules, is it GUARANTEES a player will not have a full commitment to EITHER tour.

But I certainly agree if Beef gets a card and comes over here he needs to focus HERE as his first priority. And I think if he does that he has a reasonable chance to be successful here. But his potential conflict is really going to be the following season (Ryder Cup year) unless he's a solid top-echelon player by then.

But I disagree in that players absolutely can get on the Ryder Cup Team based on a strong ET results and weak or absent co-sanction results.... SEE: Thomas Pieters. And that's what Lowry was doing... FU'ing up his schedule and screwing up both his ET and PGAT seasons due to angling for a PICK... because he wasn't going to make it on either list.

kwinigolfer wrote:Whatever the ruling, I think Si Woo is a star of the future. Almost as impressive in defeat against Badds as he was a few weeks ago in victory.


Agree about the leeway that the Tour has for Monday play, DLIII's timetable notwithstanding, though perhaps Friday's forecast is not as grim as it seemed 24 hours ago. Maybe Jason Dufner will be the man to step forward for Davis - he's played well for him before, after all.

Agree on Si Woo's potential future... just don't like rules being arbitrarily changed or ignored at the last minute.

I don't think this week's forecast is anywhere near as grim as it was for the DB... yet they got that one in. Sure... they "might" get pushed into Monday, but I'm doubting it. If they can get two rounds in by Saturday night then they should be fine to finish on Sunday. (And getting 2 rounds over the next TWO full days seems more likely than not seeing as how they're already playing one wave in split tees for the first two rounds)

Kjeldson played 12 events this year so that disqualifies him in Provision 1.

I don't understand why Part 1 specifies 10 or more events and Part 2 specifies 7 or more events.

10 or more events if you are (Webbie) member and 7 events if you are a STM.

Personally I think SWK was a rookie in 2013.

Apparently Patrick Cantlay is a rookie in perpetuity.

One difference between Thomas Pieters of 2016 and Beef's hypothetical year of 2018.

Pieters was not a PGATour member. He was playing a full time EuroTour schedule.

The foundation of my "Beef cannot make the 2018 RC team unless he is the top 50 position" is that Beef is a PGATour member in 2018.

As I posted in the PGATour Rookie article, there should be a common sense clause in the Rookie eligibility.

Previous members of the EuroTour should not be eligible. Soren Kjeldson should not have been eligible this year. Peter Uihlein should be eligible.

And it goes the other way too!

Russell Knox should not be eligible for the EuroT RoY this season, nor should have Patrick Reed been eligible last year.

Looks like the Na for RC pick bandwagon is gaining momentum!

Can't imagine why - he's been on Tour for ever and has one small win, always seems to bottle winning chances.
He'll fit right in.

Forecast looking much better for Crooked Stick, they should get Round 2 in today.

kwinigolfer wrote:Can't imagine why - he's been on Tour for ever and has one small win, always seems to bottle winning chances.

Not been around for as long as one of the RC's wonder boys, Lee Westwood, and he only has two small wins.  As Super is always keen to point out the RC isn't about PGAT success.

And how many wins does lw1 have in Europe? Get real.

Not to mention that, even by your most blinkered criteria, Westwood has two wins in 220 PGA Tour events, Na has one in 323; even you can do the arithmetic there.

Kwini

Doesn't that just strengthen the case for Na? He is even worse at strokeplay than I thought, by super's reckoning Na would be an RC superstar.

Mac, Don't be a plank, I didn't say that having fewer wins meant you WOULD be a Ryder Cup Superstar, I simply said that having lots or having few has no bearing upon your Ryder Cup success.

Sometimes you really do give away the level of simpleton you actually think at.

Super

Come on, this is just RC banter. Don't take it so seriously.

Fine Mac, I just don't like to be misrepresented about things I haven't said.

You'd have to imagine they'd put Na out number 4 otherwise they'd never get round in time.

If the STP is to be believed other players really don't like Na, so in all seriousness he would have some needle factor. I would make sure he was in pea brains group.

Jordan Spieth?

kwinigolfer wrote:And how many wins does lw1 have in Europe?

One win in the last 7 years.

Same as Kevin Na on Tour then, plus eight worldwide wins, including the Jakarta Four-Ball sponsored by Scott Verplank.

Unfortunate for Lee Majorless that the RC is not played in SE Asia.

Looking at the course tour at the Ryder Cup website, the Nines at Hazeltine have been reversed. What was Hole #16 in the 2009 PGA Championship is #7 for the RC.

The course is "balanced" for foursomes. 2 of the Par 3's are even holes, and two of them are odd holes. Ditto Par 5's, which on the scorecard are LONG. Three of the four par 5's are listed at well over 600 yds.

After Round 1 at the Beemer, Dufner is making a case for a wildcard. I was thinking he would be a good foursome player if his putting could be minimized on a unbalanced course

http://www.rydercup.com/course-tour

Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America.

super_realist wrote:Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America.

Wow, that is really going out on a limb while a treading on a slippery slope of thin ice.

Yes, Westwood's record in America is much better than GPB and about 325 Million other Americans.

I bet Kevin Na's record in Britain is pretty much better than most Brits in Britain.

BRILLIANT!!!

GPB, I think he meant Lee has a better RC record in America compared to members of US RC teams.

Although the rest of the planet has as good a major record as Lee has.

GPB wrote:

super_realist wrote:Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America.

Wow, that is really going out on a limb while a treading on a slippery slope of thin ice.

Yes, Westwood's record in America is much better than GPB and about 325 Million other Americans.

I bet Kevin Na's record in Britain is pretty much better than most Brits in Britain.  

BRILLIANT!!!

What a plank. Even Mac knew I was referring to the American Ryder Cup players.

McLaren wrote:GPB, I think he meant Lee has a better RC record in America compared to members of US RC teams.

Although the rest of the planet has as good a major record as Lee has.

Exactly how does Westwood's record in America match up to

Dustin Johnson
Jordan Spieth
Phil Mickelson
Jimmy Walker
Zach Johnson
Patrick Reed
Brandt Snedeker
Brooks Koepka

Admittedly, Westwood's record in SE Asia is superior to anyone on the US Ryder Cup team.

super_realist wrote:

What a plank. Even Mac knew I was referring to the American Ryder Cup players.

See post above

And I guess "super_realist" is the only poster allowed to take a post of out of context. Talk about an

Super only takes posts out of context. That, or he has some comprehension issues.

American resume (did not include Open Championship or HSBC China)

Westwood (2 wins in Memphis and New Orleans)

DJ (10 wins including a major)
Spieth (8 wins including 2 majors)
Mickelson (40 wins including 4 majors)
Walker (6 wins including 1 major)
ZJohnson (11 wins including 1 major)
PReed (4 wins including a WGC)
Sneds (8 wins)
Koepka (2 wins)

Westwood's American record is only comparable to Koepka. Westwood has played about 200 events in Amerca while Koepka has played about 60 events in America.

I was talking about Westwood's RC record in America against American RC players in the RC in America.

Christ on a bike.

Main contenders for a US Wildcard spot

Bubba 8 wins, two majors (did not include HSBC)
Holmes 3 wins
Fowler 3 wins
Kuchar 7 wins

Mac, Super, which of these players does Westwood have a better record in America.

GPB, are you really that much of a quarter wit?

It was clear as day I was referring to the RYDER CUP RECORD OF WESTWOOD ON AMERICAN SOIL BEING BETTER THAN VIRTUALLY ANY AMERICAN RYDER CUP PLAYER IN THE RYDER CUP ON AMERICAN SOIL.

I know Americans have a reputation for being thick but do you really need it spelt out? Mac has explained that to you once, and that's the SECOND time I have.

super_realist wrote:I was talking about Westwood's RC record in America against American RC players in the RC in America.

Christ on a bike.

Of the 8 qualifiers Walker, Reed, Spieth, Koepka have never played a RC in America.

DJ, ZJ have only played one RC in America, in 2012.

DJ is undefeated in America in RC competition  (3-0)
Zach Johnson is 3-1 in American in RC Competition

Westwood RC record in America

2012 2-2-0
2008 0-2-2
2004 4-0-1
1999 2-3-0

Total 8-7-3

So Westwood is better than Sneds and Mickelson, worse than Dustin Johnson and Zach Johnson.

Ooops, I got Kuchar and Koepka mixed up.

Kuchar is not on the team yet, and Koepka has never played.

My last post is edited.

Finally he gets it. Well done GPB, only took about 4 attempts.

Funny thing is, DJ, Rev Zac and Kuchar still haven't won the competition before in America if I'm correct. So their wins have been futile.

Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America

Pretty much wrong then isn't it?

GPB wrote:

Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America

Pretty much wrong then isn't it?

Nope, still correct, you've only found 3 players where it isn't better, of all the players that have been in opposing teams to Westwood, I bet his record stacks up better than the majority of them.

GPB wrote:

Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America

Pretty much wrong then isn't it?

Super will never admit defeat. But nice work owning him GPB.

He hardly "owned" me Mac, it took him four attempts to understand a simple statement, and then he could only pick 3 players out of goodness knows how many who have played in recent Ryder Cups.

You're easily pleased Mac.

Westwood has played in 4 US Ryder Cups. I wonder how many of those players he has a better record than? Better than most I would imagine, certainly those who have played more than one event.

Super you got your arse spanked.

super_realist wrote:

GPB wrote:

Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America

Pretty much wrong then isn't it?

Nope, still correct, you've only found 3 players where it isn't better, of all the players that have been in opposing teams to Westwood, I bet his record stacks up better than the majority of them.

If you keep narrowing the constraints I am sure you are correct.

If I had the likely RC players of Holmes and Kuchar, who have winning records on US Soil and add Bubba who has a poor record on US Soil then the tally goes from 2-2 to 3-4 against Americans on US Soil.

Of course, after those players are added, you will probably narrow the constraint to team matches in the 3rd match of each session.

Then again I could add the likes of Nicklaus, and Trevino, and Wadkins, and Palmer and your whole theory is would be blown to bits.

GPB wrote:

super_realist wrote:

GPB wrote:

Westwoods RC record in America is pretty much better than most Americans in America

Pretty much wrong then isn't it?

Nope, still correct, you've only found 3 players where it isn't better, of all the players that have been in opposing teams to Westwood, I bet his record stacks up better than the majority of them.

If you keep narrowing the constraints I am sure you are correct.

If I had the likely RC players of  Holmes and Kuchar, who have winning records on US Soil and add Bubba who has a poor record on US Soil then the tally goes from 2-2 to 3-4 against Americans on US Soil.

Of course, after those players are added, you will probably narrow the constraint to team matches in the 3rd match of each session.

If you keep missing the very simple premise, then don't blame me for having to explain it.
 

Then again I could add the likes of Nicklaus, and Trevino, and Wadkins, and Palmer and your whole theory is would be blown to bits.

If you keep missing the entire point because you don't read properly, the don't blame me for having to explain.
The bottom line is that in general Americans have terrible records in Ryder Cup, so slag off Westwood all you like for his strokeplay mediocrity in America, but that wasn't what I was talking about. Most American players would love to have the positive record that LW has. Certainly the likes of Furyk, Fat Phil, Watson, 9C, Stricker, etc would.

Super, there is no way Tiger looses any sleep over his RC record.

Mac, will you please learn the difference between "Lose" and "Loose". this is about the 5th time you said "Looses" in the last few days.

Super: 8-7-1 record in America is not outstanding.

If you are going to bring players that are not going to play in the 2016 RC Cup like Woods, Stricker and Furyk, why can't I bring in players like Pavin, Nicklaus, Wadkins, Snead (both of them), Hagen, and Palmer.

Because those players aren't going to play the 2016 Ryder Cup either

Just keep narrowing the constraints so you get the result you want.

Got to admit, your cherry picking is SPECTACULAR!!!

I do have some grammer issues.

GPB wrote:Mac, will you please learn the difference between "Lose" and "Loose".  this is about the 5th time you said "Looses" in the last few days.  

Super:  8-7-1 record in America is not outstanding.

If you are going to bring players that are not going to play in the 2016 RC Cup like Woods, Stricker and Furyk, why can't I bring in players like Pavin, Nicklaus, Wadkins, Snead (both of them), Hagen, and Palmer.

Because those players aren't going to play the 2016 Ryder Cup either

Just keep narrowing the constraints so you get the result you want.

Got to admit, your cherry picking is SPECTACULAR!!!

It's certainly not outstanding GPB, I never said it was, I was using Westwood as an example that even with a mediocre record in the US, he's still got a better record than most of the American players of the same era.
Why can't you bring in Hagen, Palmer, Wadkins etc, I would have thought that clear, they didn't compete against Westwood. You need to compare like with like.