Pat Perez has finished #29 and #31 in two events and made as much as Finau won this week.
On another note anyone at the Wyndham Championship this week pick up a program. Great feature on Arnold Palmer and the impact of his scholarship at Wake Forest. It was written by Irwin Smallwood who is in his 90’s now and covered AP when he won the So Con Championship
Just some random LIV musings...
Played golf this weekend with three guys I didn't know. Starting talking about LIV - the general consensus was that competition is a good thing and the moralizing over the Saudi involvement is hypocritical ("The Saudi's aren't good, but they're more of an ally to the US than China, and the PGA tour seems to have no problem with China" etc.). Obviously a sample size of three but was interesting nonetheless. After the round while grabbing beers in the clubhouse, the Rocket Mortgage was on half the TV's, and the LIV event was on the other TV's...also interesting.
I watched a few minutes of the LIV event today - while I still think a lot of it is stupid, anyone who thinks this thing is going to magically disappear or implode is being wilfully ignorant. Yes, the team names are awful, and the shotgun format just feels wrong. But there were a few thousand people there...you had drunk New Yorkers yelling "Baba Booey" and "Mashed Potato" just like you would at the Northern Trust or Barclays or whatever other Tour event is held in the tri-state area. It's definitely a "real" thing at this point.
I think the people latching onto things like the format, team names, etc. are missing the point - all of that is irrelevant right now. All that matters is that this thing exists and is moving forward. They'll run focus groups, they'll modify stuff (they already have announced some of this in recent weeks regarding team structure/format in upcoming seasons), and this thing will evolve. The longer it simply exists, the more of an existential threat to the Tour it is.
Think about it from the perspective of an average Tour player. Tony Finau had to beat 144 guys this week to take home $1.5M. Henrik Stenson beat about 15 legitimate players and 30 jerkoffs and made almost 3x what Finau did. At some point that math outweighs a lot of other things.
Anybody planning to go to the Wyndham should leave now to access that gates due to the expected throngs.
Scott Piercy and Taylor Pendrith wish PGA events were 54 holes. The fewer the holes the more random the result is likely to be. The better player is more likely to win a 72 hole event.
There's something a lot less magical about 54 holes.
Stenson had not won a PGA or DP tour event in 5 years. Stenson missed more cuts than he made on the PGA Tour this year, including his last 4 PGAT events. Stenson would not have won the Korn Ferry event this week, but he's your LIV Tour Champ.
Why not 90 holes or 108? Or better yet 720? The better player is much more likely to be identified than 72 holes...
Hey Donnie, how was attending the event at Bedminster with the massive throngs of other MAGA fuckwits. Massive, YUGE, attendance I'm sure. Rivals anything on tour.
The "that's the way its always been" crowd whined when slavery ended, when confederate statutes were ripped down, when the PGA championship became stroke play, when Bobby Jones decimated par at the old course, when hand scoreboards came down, when golfers started wearing shorts, and when Augusta National let in women members.
It's the cycle. There is nothing magical about 72 holes.
Why not 90 holes or 108? Or better yet 720? The better player is much more likely to be identified than 72 holes...
If Varner tees it up tomorrow at 11:10 then he hasn’t signed, I can assure you if he signed Mark Brazil would know and he wouldn’t be playing. Nothing to gain by signing now, after the Fed Ex another story.