The Golfer's Wife

I Have Been Remiss

I meant to mention this when it happened, but things got away from me. But even a few weeks after the fact it is worth noting the passing of Orville Moody, who died on August 8th, at the age of 74. Orville was truly the ‘every man’ golfer, long before John Daly came on the scene. And unlike John, Orville didn’t self destruct. The short description of Orville’s claim to fame is this: he was the last player to win the US Open after going through local and sectional qualifying. But that sentence doesn’t begin to do due justice to Orville. Here is the obituary from Golf.com, and the one from the LA Times. And here are some very nice posts on Orville from The Arm Chair Golfer. Take the time to read them, and appreciate the life of a truly unique Golfer.

Golf and the Olympics

( another in the long a** series of posts )

We haven’t been watching much golf here lately. We have been watching a lot of Olympics. Which of course brings up the golf-in-the-Olympics discussion. Only it’s not much of a discussion since here in The Household we think it’s a pretty silly idea.

The stated purpose of the Olympics is to determine the best in the world. And perhaps for some sports it does. Those sports where the participants aren’t considered ‘professionals’.  But for those sports where professionals play, winning a gold medal does not make you the best in the world.

Cuba won the baseball gold, but they played against single and double AA players from the US. Do you really think they would have beaten the Bosox? Or heck, even the Seattle Mariners? And the basketball ‘redeem team’. Unlike the baseball team it consists of first stringers. But even then, they may win gold, but could they beat the Boston Celtics?  They are playing for fun, and for free. Making the mortgage payment on the million dollar mansion depends on how they play during the NBA season, not winning the gold. Even the most stand out player on the Olympic team is out of a job next June if he doesn’t perform during the regular season, gold medal winner or not. Rafael Nadal won the tennis gold. Which is fine. We all know he’s # 1. But let’s say Nadal was tired, and ate some bad Peking Duck, and some no-name Swedish player took the gold. Would the world really see him as World #1? I don’t think so.  ( and while we’re on the subject, can I just point out this particular picture of Mr. Nadal? Mmmmmmmm. Okay. Back to the point I am making.). And as for golf. If John Daly or Michelle Wie won the gold, would the golf world suddenly say ‘Oh, well then. Obviously he/she’s World #1? ‘. Uh…no.

So here’s the thing. When you can earn a living playing your sport, and I mean earn, not be supported by donations and government grants given to Olympic training centers who can then give you a stipend, and I mean playing, not coaching, best in the world is determined by the number of times you win, and the money you make. Not by winning a gold medal. 

We Don't Live In Scotland

It has been raining here in the Wild West for 3 days. It was over 90 degrees on Wednesday. And then it was 60 degrees and raining. Hard. For 3 solid days. This doesn’t happen often. There are over 300 days of sunshine here every year. But it has been a very dry summer, so no one is complaining. In fact most of us see it as a chance to kind of hibernate and catch up on inside things. See, with all that sunshine we are very fair weather people here in the Wild West. Fair weather joggers. Fair weather gardeners, Fair weather bikers. Fair weather skiers. Fair weather snow shoe-ers. You get the picture. Since the weather is mostly fair, we do a lot outside, and if the weather isn’t fair we don’t go outside because we know if we just wait a day, or two at the most, the weather will be fair again. So why go out in the bad weather if you don’t have to. I know in other climes, like say Scotland for instance, if you stay inside during bad weather, you would never go outside. I have played golf in Scotland. I have played golf in the rain in Scotland. And there were a lot of other people on the course playing in the rain in Scotland. Because if you don’t play golf in the rain you don’t play much golf in Scotland. But, and here is the important thing, we don’t live in Scotland. We live here in the, mostly sunny, Wild West. And we are, above all, fair weather golfers.

At least most of us.

The Golfer had a tournament at the cc today. It was still raining hard this morning. They canceled the tournament. But The Golfer decided to play anyway. And 8 other idio…uh, other Golfers decided to play as well. They made it as far as the 9th hole, where a small stream had appeared in the fairway overnight, and they finally decided maybe they should just go inside and have breakfast. This in itself would be bad enough. But there is more. We had a 3pm tee-time. Made early in the week, before it started raining. I was eating lunch with a friend. It was raining. I figured we would not be playing. But just in case, I sent a text to The Golfer at home ‘are we playing?’. And here is his reply, ‘the kids say they want to play’. Do you see what has happened here? Somehow, when I wasn’t paying attention, The Golfer has managed to not only turn The Offspring into Golfers, but into the same kind of crazy playing in the rain kind of Golfer he is.

So we played. In the rain. Started on the back 9. Hit over the swans swimming in the new pond that has formed on the 11th fairway. Teed off from the new marsh that used to be the 12th tee box. And finally The Offspring decided they had had enough when they lost their balls in the water on the 13th hole. The water in the fairway.

And lest you think this craziness exists only in our family, there were still two groups playing as we rowed our way back to the clubhouse. 

Tomorrow’s forecast is for 70 degrees and sunshine. 70 degrees and sunshine. Huh. What kind of golfing weather is that?

6000 Feet is not Altitude

I am a little late on this one, but late or not, it needs to be said. Or at least I need to say it. It is possible to play golf at altitudes other than sea level. This seems to be a constant source of amazement to golf commentators. First I had to listen to it every year during The International. That tournament went by the wayside, but this year they played the Senior Open here in the Wild West, and I had to listen to it again. Their constant commenting on the difficulty of playing at altitude. The breathing. The ball flight. The fitness needed. Sheeze. You would think you have to be some kind of super athlete to play golf here. Apparently these commentators go directly from their booth back to their hotel rooms, and never drive around. They never see the hundreds of golf courses here with, gasp, actual people playing on them. Kids, old people, chubby people. All kinds of people who some how manage to work their way around a golf course without passing out. And here is another thing you Flatlanders - around here ‘altitude’ doesn’t even start until 8,000 feet. The Senior Open was played on a course that is at 6,400 feet. That is town. That doesn’t even come close to altitude.

A President of these United States managed to play golf regularly at Eagle Vail. And he was no super athlete. What would those commentators say if The Senior Open was played at Cordillera on The Mountain Course, or Heaven forbid, Mt. Massive? Probably nothing, they’d be too busy hyperventilating over the ‘altitude’. The rest of us will just step over them on our way to play golf.

Weekend Update

First the Pros. If you recall I said it would be nice if John Daly made the cut, and Rocco and Woody Austin finished high enough to get enough Ryder Cup points to make the team. And how did things turn out? John Daly didn’t make the cut. Neither did Woody. And Rocco did okay Thursday and Friday, but fell apart over the weekend. Both Rocco and Woody actually dropped down in Ryder Cup standings. A TGW curse perhaps?  Naaaaw. At least not until a longer trend line emerges. For now, I am just a bad judge of golfers.

Padraig Harrington won. This is his second major this year ( he also just won The Open Championship, if you recall ). He is having a very good year. Which is well deserved. And once again let me just point out, he has the cutest kids.

The final groups on Saturday got rained out. So they had to play 36 holes on Sunday. Sergio made a run. A really good run. In fact by hole 15 he was ahead by 3 strokes and the tournament was his to lose. Which he proceeded to do. Although not as badly as he has before. His putting is still much better than it was. He just hit some bad shots. He was playing with Padraig, who also made some bad shots. The difference was Padraig recovered from his bad shots better than Cutie Pie. But, Sergio kept playing, and actually hit some great recovery shots. Just not as great as Padraig. And he didn’t give up, as he has been want to do. He kept fighting till that final putt. And it was the final putt that won it for Padraig. When it was over he didn’t whine and pout either. He basically said ‘I played good, but he played better. But my game has improved and I’m happy with what I did, plus I secured myself a spot on the Ryder Cup team and that was very important to me.’  He didn’t play with quite the maturity and brilliance he showed in TPC, but it was definitely the new Sergio, not the old whiny one. Slowly he is maturing. Next year I think he will be a force to be reckoned with. Of course next year Tiger will be back so……

Now for me. You remember I was playing in a Rally for the Cure tournament, right? The results? Out of 36 teams, we came in 5th. Not too shabby, eh? Especially since I was on the team. Our final score was 58. Now lets pretend you have actually been paying attention to what I have written on this blog, and are not just reading it to humor me. You will look at that 56 and say ‘Wow TGW. A REALLY good round for a pro on the tour is a 69. A 58 is fantastic. You must’ve played the game of your life!’
Well, no. Let me explain.

First off, it was a scramble. Modified. We had to use 2 drives from each team member each nine holes. But that still means we got to use the best shot of the 4 the rest of the time. That will lower a score. Then there were the ‘extras’. The whole point of the tournament was to raise money. To raise even more money, they sold Mulligans( basically a do-over. See the glossary.), and putting strings. Each player could buy 2 Mulligans and 5 feet of putting string. Now I understand Mulligans. If you hit a bad shot, you get a do-over. And I thought I understood the putting string. The way I thought it worked was you used the string for gimmes. A ‘gimme’ is when you make a putt, and the ball just misses the hole. Stops 6 inches short, or goes left 2 inches at the last second. And the person you are playing with says ‘I’ll give ya that one.’. Meaning they are assuming you will make that final small putt, so you don’t have to actually putt it. YOU STILL HAVE TO TAKE THE STROKE ( she says in capital letters because some people seem to think a gimme means you don’t even take the stroke. AND THEY ARE WRONG. You know who you are. ). Here is something you will learn if you play golf: there is no such thing as a sure putt. Even if it’s only a one inch putt, it can be missed. And has been, even by the pros. That is why it is nice of a playing partner to give you the gimme. Because even though chances may be 98% that you will make the putt, there is still a 2% ( or more ) chance you won’t, and will end up taking 2 strokes instead of the one they just gave you. Generally speaking gimmes are given after you make a long, or impossible looking, putt, and the ball gets thiiiiisss close, but not in. The other player is impressed that you even got that close, and as a sort of pat on the back, gives you the gimme. Also generally speaking, gimmes are putts of less than 1 foot.
And obviously no gimmes are given during tournaments.

So that is what I thought the string was for. The team could decide that certain putts were gimmes, and every time you did that, you marked off the length of the putt on the piece of string. When you ran out of string, no more gimmes. Seemed semi-legal. And it was a just-for-fun tournament. So, okay. Only that’s not how the putting string worked.

Here is how the putting string worked. You pretend the ball you just putt went in the hole. If it stopped 2 feet short, you marked 2 feet off your putting string and, and here is the ‘this is soooooo wrong part’, DON’T TAKE THE STROKE. I can not tell you how WRONG that feels. To just not count what would be a stroke. There was much grumbling, and discussion, but in the end we did use the putting string. Between the 4 of us we had 20 feet. 20 feet worth of strokes we didn’t count. Please don’t tell the golfing gods. I’m sure there is some horrible punishment awaiting us if they ever find out. Although hopefully the fact that it was for a good cause would get us some leniency.

And so between the string and 2 Mulligans each, we logged a 58. There was one 54, one 56, and two 57’s ahead of us. All in all it was considered a successful outing, even though none of got a hole-in-1 on the hole where the prize was a trip to play at Bay Hill ( Arnie’s Course. Yeah, have to be golfer to appreciate it. But you would have heard us screaming all the way to, well, wherever you are, if any of us had won. ). The prize for the team in last place was lessons at the McGetrick Golf Academy. Assuming the prize is the same next year, we are changing strategy. No string, no Mulligans. And of course me. Last place for sure.

I hear yoga is fun.....

Dear Mr. Feherty,

Perhaps you should look into a different form of exercise. Something that doesn’t require a helmet. Or put you in close proximity to cars. Have you tried Pilates?

Because I sincerely care about your well being,

The Golfers Wife

The PGA Championship

This weekend is the PGA Championship. This is the 4th, and last, major on the PGA tour. Which is not in any way responsible for the PGA Championship.

Let’s review shall we? 

1st major – The Masters. Run ( absolutely controlled ) by Augusta National.
2nd major – US Open. Run by the USGA.
3rd major – The Open Championship. Run by The R&A.
4th major – The PGA Championship. Run by the PGA.

And the PGA is NOT the same as the PGA Tour. Which is a totally different organization. Professional golfers are members of the PGA. They play on the PGA Tour. The PGA Tour runs the The Players Championship. Which they are lobbying hard to have declared the 5th major. Because they feel it’s kind of silly for the organization the professionals play for not to have it’s own major.

A slight digression. What would it take for TPC to become ‘the 5th major’? To understand that we must go back to the basics. Actually the basic. TRADITION. Remember, golf is nothing if not tradition. And tradition says there are 4 majors. There is no set of criteria a tournament must meet before being declared a major. It is just a matter of over the hundreds of years tournaments have been played, these 4 have emerged as Majors. So all that the PGA Tour needs is for the players to decide that TPC can be referred to as a major. Sounds easy enough. But there is a huge road block. Tradition. Tradition says there are only 4 majors. And, repeat after me, golf is nothing if not tradition. So, as easy as it sounds, the chances of a change in the status of TPC are slim.

Here is a scenario where I could see it happening. After being off for 5 months ( or more ) Tiger decides that it’s a lot more fun to play golf with Sam than on the tour. So he announces that he is cutting way back on his tournaments and is only going to play in the 5 major tournaments: The Masters, US Open, Open Championship, PGA Championship, and TPC.
That would do it. Tiger is perhaps the one player who has the stature to establish a new tradition. But here’s the thing. Tiger is A Golfer through and through. And Golfers don’t mess with Tradition. So I’m afraid the PGA Tour will never have it’s major.

Anyway. Back to the PGA. The winner is awarded the Wanamaker trophy. Which is a huge heavy silver thing. They actually take home a copy. The PGA is played on a different course every year.  This year it is being played at Oakland Hills Country Club, which is just outside of Detroit. Oakland Hills has a long and storied history of it’s own. It has hosted many US Opens and 2 previous PGA Championships.

In addition to the trophy, this year players are playing for Ryder
Cup points. The Ryder Cup will be the subject of it’s own post ( or two or five ) here in just a little while. For now just know that every player out there would looovvve to be on a Ryder Cup team ( of which there are 2, US, and European ). The 8 players with the most Ryder Cup points, plus 4 ‘Captains picks’ make up a team. So finishing high enough in this championship to get a large number of Ryder Cup points is almost as important as actually winning the trophy.

The field this year consists of the usual suspects. I’m not pulling for anyone in particular to win. But I would like to see John Daly make the cut. And I would really like to see Rocco and Woody Austin finish high enough that they get enough Ryder Cup points to make the team ( Rocco is currently 12th and Woody is currently 9th in points ).

But even more important than that, at least as far as I’m concerned, is the announcing team will contain David Feherty. And we all know how I feel about Mr. Feherty.

Weekend Update

There was a lot of golf this weekend.

Let’s start with the Reno-Tahoe open. Michelle Wie missed the cut. Again. And that’s all I’m gonna say about that.

Vijay Singh held on to win the Bridgestone Invitational, despite not being able to make the short putt. General consensus is he has ( said in a very soft voice, after looking around to make sure no one can hear ) the yips. I sincerely hope that’s not true. I have always liked Vijay. And having, well, those, is the absolute worst thing that can happen to a golfer. Someday I will get up the nerve to write a post about, them. Till then, just know that it involves putting, and it’s baaddd, and don’t ever, ever say the word out loud around a golfer. Very bad luck. And I really hope that Vijay was just having an off day, putter wise.

Eduardo Romero won the US Senior Open out here in the Wild West. It was a great tournament. Did you watch it? Here in The Household we watched the Women’s British Open in the morning, and the Senior Open in the afternoon. Pretty much skipped the Bridgestone ( except for me. I watched a little bit on Saturday and Sunday. Had to get my Feherty Fix.). Did you see the bear? Okay, that’s not too common here in the WW. Elk, deer, marmots, foxes, coyotes, hawks, owls, skunks, raccoons, and of course the ubiquitous rabbits and geese. But not usually bears. That was special, just ‘cuz y’all were watching.

And last, but certainly not least, Annika played in her last major. It was not her best tournament, but there were as many cheers for her as for the winner, Ji-Yai Shin, of Korea. Annika admits she just doesn’t want it as much as she used to. And as the season gets closer to its end I’m sure it’s getting harder emotionally to go out there and play. But even though she didn’t stand a chance of wining on Sunday she still went out and played great golf. Unbelievable competitor, and class act all the way around.

Coming up this weekend:  The PGA Championship – the 4th major for the men. Aaaannnnd me. Playing in a Rally for the Cure tournament. The team consists of The Mother in Law, The Golfer, Golfing Offspring #2 ( who is a 15 year old member of her high school golf team, for those who aren’t keeping track ) and Me. Guess who’s the D player?  And I’m only D because they don’t go down as low as F. However, I do look good in pink, so I got that goin' for me.

Lucky Numbers

As has been noted( I mean really, it’s kind of the point of things around here) I have spent years observing the golfing world. I would like to say I have spent years as part of the golfing world, but Golfing Offspring #3( who is an 11 year old boy, in case you haven’t been keeping track ) beat me today, playing from the forward tees, so I can hardly claim to be part of the golfing world. Although, in my defense, he had just finished a lesson, so he was primed and ready to go, whereas I haven’t picked up a club in weeks.

Anyway. Many years observing. I thought I had things pretty much pegged. I admit I do tend to nod off during some of the grass discussions, but overall I think I have picked up on the important things. But as it turns out, I missed something. But in my defense( once again ) it is not something I would have expected from golfers, so I wasn’t paying attention.

Generally speaking golfers are not a superstitious lot. You don’t hear golfers saying they aren’t shaving their beards until they make the playoffs. Or not cutting their hair. Or refusing to have their lucky jersey washed. Or always eating the same meal before the big tournament. They have their little pre-stroke routines from which they never very, but that has more to do with being in the zone, than trying to appease the golf gods. Golf is definitely 80% mental ( at least ) but the mental part generally involves visualizing the stroke, or intense concentration, tuning out the crowds. You don’t hear golfers out there chanting their lucky mantra, or putting a curse on their playing partner. 

However, it turns out they do have one weakness in this area. Which I have gone all these years without noticing. It was first brought to my attention by an old Titleist commercial. I tried to find it out on youtube, or the Titleist web site, but even Google couldn’t locate it anywhere. The commercial shows various tour pros, men and women, talking about the number they play, pretty much just like the Titleist commercials where various pros describe how they mark their ball ( now THERE is a topic for a future post. ). The tag line being ‘It’s not how you mark your ball, it’s how you mark your Titleist’. This was along the same lines, but instead of the ball mark, it was the ball number. And by number I mean the number that is stamped on the ball. Some of them play 2’s, some 3’s. Some play a high number during the Thursday and Friday rounds, and move to 1’s on the weekend. And apparently Adam Scott has the number 9 stamped especially for him.

( I put picture of a Titleist ball on top of this post. You can see where the number is, under the name. And actually most golf ball manufactures stamp numbers on their balls. )

I have explained before about how tournaments are watched here in The Household. The TV is on, but at any given time there may or may not be any one actually watching. If it’s a major, it is Tivo’d and generally watched in it’s entirety later on, skipping the commercials of course. So, who knows how many hundreds of times this commercial has aired, but the first time I saw it was about a month ago. As luck would have it ( since we are talking superstition here ), both The Golfer and I were in the room when it aired. I didn’t get it. I asked The Golfer, ‘What’s the big deal about the number?’.  I got the ‘I can’t believe I’ve been married to you for this long, and you don’t know this’ look. He patiently explained to me ( because I wouldn’t let him leave the room until he did. I mean I needed to know so I could pass it on to you, right? ) that golfers are a little superstitious about the number they play. Some of them will only play one number. Some will start with 4’s during Thursdays round, move to 3’s on Friday, 2’s on Saturday, and of course 1’s on Sunday. Some never want to play 1’s, and only play 3’s ( because that’s a birdie ). Regardless, apparently the one thing that can really discombobulate a professional golfer is to play the wrong number ball.

Well. Who knew?

Apparently everyone but me, since Titleist felt the commercial needed no explanation, just a lot of people saying what number they played.

Balls are purchased by the dozen. They come in a box with 4 ‘sleeves’ of 3. Meaning four smaller boxes with 3 balls each. Unless you request otherwise, normally each box of a dozen will have one sleeve of 1’s, one of 2’s, one of 3’s, and one of 4’s. However, if you order them online you can request the numbers you want. For the record The Golfer orders 5’s, 6’s, and 7’s.  He says it is because no one likes to play the high numbers so it helps him identify his ball. Uh huh. I’m sure there is some deeper psychological explanation for his need for the high numbers, which I will eventually wheedle out of him, now that I know there is something there to wheedle.

Meanwhile, for you. Remember back at the end of this post, where I said if you really wanted to take things up a notch you could inquire of the handsome golfer as to the stiffness of his shafts?  If that goes over well you could ask him about the number on his balls.