Clarion Content

Looking for a couple of good sports articles this Sunday morning?

We have got a pair. (NO pun intended.)


Will this man look more familiar one day?


First, how about Tiger Woods playing before the smallest galleries of his professional career? After a tremendous storm passed through Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Maryland Friday night, Saturday's round was played with only essential volunteers and family/entourage members permitted on course. Tiger played in front of less than 100 people. No camera clicking in his backswing yesterday. Third round leader Brendon de Jonge, made a gorgeous birdie on the twelfth, seen by exactly one spectator, fellow player, Hunter Mahan's wife.

Unbelievable. Read the whole story here from the Associated Press.

Our next story is a follow on to our NBA draft coverage. Great job, by the by, from our friends at The Eastside Perspective finding highlights on all the potential first round picks. Here we want to refer to an interesting link discussing the best players not drafted Thursday night.

At the top of Jeff Eisenberg of Yahoo Sports list is West Virginia's Kevin Jones, a second-team All-American last season who scored 19.9 pts per game while shooting over 50% from the field and grabbing almost 11 rebounds per game. Pretty darn good, right? NBA scouts labeled him a tweener at 6' 8". He went undrafted.

The player who tops the Clarion Content's list of "Most likely to Succeed" of the undrafted is Scott Machado of Iona. As a senior he averaged 9.9 assists per game on a lowly Iona team and shot over 40% from three-point land. The next Jeremy Lin? Read the whole article here.

Labels: college basketball, golf, interesting links, NBA, sports

Did you hear about this one? 60,000 plus angry bees unleashed on the 18th hole of Waterchase Country Club in Fort Worth, Texas?

You think Angry Birds are a problem? Try bees. Yes, they sure did cancel the final eighteen holes of tournament. The University of Texas-Arlington men's golf coach Jay Rees was stung near his eye, several other bystanders were also stung. When a beekeeper was called to the course, it was found that a beehive had fallen from a tree branch above the 18th green, and split open. According to Coach Rees, the beekeeper recommended cancellation.

They took the professional advice and shut it down.

Labels: golf, Pop Culture

For Tiger Woods, has it gotten to that point?



Word is Tiger is doing commercials in Japan. Entourage fans will know how low that likely means the cashflow is. Tiger is selling back rub, some kind of Japanese Ben Gay. He has lost endorsement deals from Gillette, Accenture, Tag Heuer, and Gatorade in the last two years.

Tiger reportedly had to dole out approximate $100 million for his divorce settlement. Who knows how liquid that left him? Yahoo estimates his endorsement deals have dropped from in the neighborhood of $75 million a year to more like $20 million. His golf earnings have also dipped from the low eight figures annually to under a million dollars year to date.

Read more here.

Labels: golf, Pop Culture, Sports Economics

It is a new season and Tiger is playing this week in the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament at Torrey Pines. Tiger is playing Thursday and Friday with Rocco Mediate, the man who famously battled the limping Woods, at this same course during 2008 U.S. Open, through regulation and then an extra 18 holes, plus a sudden-death hole before Woods won. Rising young star Anthony Kim completes the trio.

What do you think, dear readers, time for Tiger to begin the comeback?

Labels: golf, sports

Bob Hope knew people...

The prize money in golf is unbelievable. We were once again reminded of that this weekend when they played the Bob Hope Classic in the desert near Palm Springs. As the Los Angeles Times reports, "The Hope was once a tour flagship event. Movie stars and celebrities showed up in droves. TV loved the blue skies and palm trees, and so did large TV audiences, much of them watching from snow piles back East..."

Nowadays, Bob Hope, himself, has long since slipped off the national radar. The event's tradition of playing with amateurs is not highly regarded by the touring pros, who can collect fat appearances fees for showing up at events on other continents. Which brings us back to the money, the obscene gobs of money. The Bob Hope Classic pays the winner $900,000. 900 large, 900 grand, that would be nine thousand $100 bills, but in this glistening era of recovery the purse size is among the smaller on the tour. Only seven PGA events offer less prize money, four of them are in late Fall, played after the Tour Championship when the season is all but over.

Where is the resentment at the disconnect between California's economic masses and these elites? Burbling.

Labels: golf, sports, Sports Economics

The Proctor and Gamble company, makers of the Gillette razor, have elected not to renew their advertising ties with Tiger Woods going forward. Gillette said Thursday it was phasing out "Gillette Champions" marketing campaign, which featured Tiger amongst other athletes. Despite ditching Tiger and the ad campaign, Gillette did elect to retain tennis player Roger Federer, international NHL star Alex Ovechkin and the Yankee captain Derek Jeter, for new local marketing campaigns.

Labels: golf, Sports Economics

Ryder Cup Captain, Corey Pavin

This is not news to those of you who have been following his career for the long haul. Jim Gray has been a tactless, pompous ass for many years, long before he ambushed Pete Rose. His attitude and self-aggrandizing style is part of why he is working for the Golf Channel rather than holding down the NBC network gig that he used to have. Gray, known as butt smoocher, has been legendarily tight with various narcissistic sports jerks, including Barry Bonds.

Gray demonstrated his lack of personal tact and character again yesterday when Ryder Cup Captain Corey Pavin called him out for misquoting him. Gray ran with a story saying Pavin was going to add Tiger to the Ryder Cup team regardless of whether or not he was the automatic qualifier. Pavin vehemently denied it at a press conference. Gray, in his usually snaky style, waited until the rest of the media had cleared the room, and confronted Pavin. He called Pavin a liar, waived a finger in his face, and tried to slap Pavin's wife's i-Phone out of her hand when he realized she was videotaping the incident.

He finished with an impotent threat, warning Pavin, "You are going down." Really Jim Gray?

Aren't you the idiot who convinced LeBron that the hour long free agent made for TV special was going to be good for his career? (Or at least your Q rating...) Gray makes Jerry Springer look like a class act.

Labels: golf, Pop Culture, sports

The best perspective we have heard yet on the Tiger Woods saga came out this afternoon. Asked for a comment on the Tiger Woods press conference today by the Associated Press, his holiness, the Dalai Lama said, "I'm sorry, who?" And then the silly-ass A.P. reporter had to explain just who the hell Tiger Woods was to the Dalai Lama.

Now there's a perspective!

After having the situation explained, the Dalai Lama dished a little wisdom. "All religions have the same idea [about adultery] ...Self-discipline with awareness of consequences."

Labels: golf, Pop Culture

Golf Digest either timed it perfect or totally wrong depending on your perspective about publicity. If any publicity is good publicity, than they got it just right. If the content matters, they could not have been more off with their Photoshopped cover this month.

"Ten things President Obama can learn from Tiger Woods" Indeed!

Of course the issue went to press just before Tiger had his accident and the scandal broke. It was too late to change it or pull the cover.

Just a sidenote on how ridiculously out of whack modern America's sense of timing is, this is the cover of the January 2010 Golf Digest, and it was too late to do anything about it during the last week of November! This message brought to you by the society that couldn't be more out ahead of itself in a rush to nowhere: Christmas music and decorations starting just after Halloween... Black Friday store openings gradually creeping forward year by year from 6am to 5.30am to 5am... 2010 model cars on sale in September 2009

Labels: golf, Politics, Pop Culture

The Clarion Content has been generally following the story of the LPGA tours collapse. We knew that they had fired their commissioner. We knew that they had lost a significant number of tournaments from next year's schedule. (They have lost nearly 30% of the events from the 2009 schedule.) We see LPGA golf as the vanguard of wider teetering of revenue streams and value across the sports world. If we are right, athletes everywhere should beware, and put a few dollars in the bank. Much of our previous discussion of sport's economics in an era of cratering balance sheets had been about ownership's losses and vulnerabilities.

We just recently saw an article about LPGA tour pros in the New York Times that made us sit-up and take notice. The article was about Reilley Rankin, a LPGA tour pro who earned more than $400,000 a mere two years ago. Last year Rankin wasn't even breaking even on her expenses. She earned about $73k as the 100th player on the tour's money list. Of course, the competitive pressure to score well and finish high was intensified tremendously. She needed financial help from her family to finish the year. The same issue has occurred for a number of other golfers according to the New York Times, including Jamie Hullett who is working in her family's store to help make ends meet. Male golfers have to-date been insulated. The number 100 player on the men's PGA tour, Ted Purdy earned $838k. (Feminism's work is clearly not yet completed.)

The LPGA has been decimated by the loss of advertising revenue and sponsorship. Baseball, basketball, NASCAR, and cycling to name but a few have been facing smaller, but similar troubles. Just as the financial woes of the LPGA have bled through to its players, chances are these other sports will see the same thing occur.

Labels: golf, Sports Economics

The Clarion Content had not even gotten the chance to congratulate long time whipping post Michelle Wie on winning her first professional tournament before she pulled another stunt. The much hyped, minimally accomplished Wie followed her first LPGA tournament victory with a "withdraw." She ostensibly turned her ankle in an encounter with an overzealous fan. She quit after one round leaving the fans, sponsors, and the cratering L.P.G.A. at the Houstonian Golf and Country Club without her marquee name. She shot an even par 72 in windy conditions, six shots behind thirty-time LPGA tour winner Lorena Ochoa.

Labels: golf, sports

Water Hazard, indeed!

The old saw used to go, "The worst day on the golf course is better than any day in the office." There is a poor fellow who played a round of golf in Beaufort, South Carolina last week who would disagree.

At Ocean Creek Golf Course in Beaufort County, S.C., a man leaned over a water hazard to retrieve his wayward ball. Suddenly, a 10ft long alligator appeared with a mission of its own. The man lost his arm in the struggle before his golf partners were able to free him. Golf course workers killed the unsuspecting animal and retrieved the fellow's arm in hopes of reattachment. No word from the golf course or the hospital on whether or not that was successful. The man is in stable condition.

Labels: golf, sports

Tim Lincecum reminds the Clarion Content's Sports editor of Gale Sayers. There is something about the unique, the never seen it done that way before guys. We had heard once, perhaps on an old NFL Films reel, that Sayers looked like a deer running through a minefield. He was at once beautiful and desperately vulnerable. This kind of beauty is fleeting and like a rabbit being chased by wolves, it all too often ends in a violent rending.

Lincecum beat the defending World Champion Phildelphia Phillies tonight with his third shutout in the last six weeks. The other character from the sports world we might compare Lincecum to would be David Duval. He was another guy that people his field said, "Wow, never seen it done that way before..." While we see the implicit irony in comparing three figures' uniqueness, we would posit that sometimes there are reasons why it has never been done that way before that manifest themselves in the ability to sustain greatness. There is no questioning Sayers greatness. Duval was pretty damn good for a minute, too. Lincecum has pitched brillantly for a couple of years now.

Labels: baseball, golf, NFL, sports

Only one of these men has won the Open in Turnberry, Scotland.

The British Open this week will be played on the Ayrshire coast of Scotland at Turnberry. Turnberry, although not as famous as the legendary St. Andrews, was the site of the best British Open ever, and quite possibly the single best major golf tournament of the modern era. The year was 1977.

It was a duel between a twenty-seven year old Tom Watson and a thirty-seven year old Jack Nicklaus. Watson, a gap-toothed kid from Kansas City, had already won the 1975 British Open at Carnoustie and then beat the Golden Bear head-to-head in the 1977 Masters, three months before the British Open. Nicklaus was in his prime, having already won 14 of his eventual 18 major titles. Watson was hot coming in, according to Dave Anderson of the New York Times. He had just won the Western Open and a tune-up tournament in Barcelona where he shot a 61 in the final round. He would go on to win six tournaments that year and five British Open titles in his career, equaling the all-time record.

Watson and Nicklaus went mano-a-mano like great boxers for four rounds. The both opened 68-70 and pulled three strokes clear of the field. Then came the third round Saturday, booming driving, arrow like irons, long putts and when the day ended both had shot majestic 65s. They would be again alone in the final group on Sunday. The final round was the stuff legends are made of.

The winner broke the British Open scoring record by eight strokes. Watson and Nicklaus finished a full ten strokes clear of third place Hubert Green. As Sunday drew to a close, Watson was down by one stroke heading to the par three 15th hole. He answered the bell. He nailed a 60 foot birdie putt from the hardened grass a full 10 feet off of the green, dinging it off the flagstick and dropping it into the jar. They were tied with three holes to go. Both players parred the 16th hole. The 17th was a par five, Watson made the the green in two. He was facing a mere twenty foot two-putt for birdie. Nicklaus, off the green in two, finessed a tricky chip to within five feet, but he couldn't nail the birdie putt. Watson two putted for birdie and held the lead for the first time all day. But, the Golden Bear wasn't done yet.

18 was a par four and the tournament looked all but over when Nicklaus hit his drive into the deep British Open rough. Somehow he slashed through it, and put his second on to the edge of the green, forty feet from the pin. Meanwhile Watson, offering no opportunities to the consensus best player ever (pre-Tiger) hit a one-iron down the middle of the fairway, and then a seven-iron to two feet. But he knew better than most, it still was not over. According the Times veteran columnist Dave Anderson, moments before Nicklaus putted Watson whispered to his caddie that Nicklaus would make that 40-footer for birdie. And he did. Facing all the pressure in the golfing world, with greatest player in the game watching over his shoulder, Watson drilled the two footer and won the tournament. As Nicklaus told him later, "I gave you my best shot but it wasn’t enough. Congratulations."

We would be lucky to see half as much drama this week as the British Open returns to Turnberry for the first time since 1994 when Nick Price was the winner.

Labels: golf, sports

We know that the urge is to respond with, who? The answer is Lucas Glover from Greenville, South Carolina, a man with exactly one previous PGA tour victory is your 2009 U.S. Open Champion. When everyone else was fading away; Mickelson with a bogey at the 17th, the long lost David Duval, who after a birdie-birdie-birdie run to tie for the lead also bogeyed 17, and worst of all Glover's playing partner, Ricky Barnes, a former U.S. Amateur Champion who got it all the way to 11 under, before playing the final twenty-seven holes in 8 over par.

Meanwhile the small town Southerner, Glover, was as cool as the other side of the pillow. He personally witnessed Barnes meltdown, playing in the final twosome with him in the the third and fourth round, faltered with a bogey of his own on the toughest hole of the Open Championship, the 15th, then righted the ship and birdied 16. Glover closed with an every so steady Open winning par-par. Ladies and Gentlemen, Lucas Glover, who will spend the next year being announced as the U.S. Open Champion! Tiger Woods never really threatened after an opening round of four over 74, and finished in a three way tie for 6th place.

Labels: golf, sports

Whatchya gonna do when he comes for you?

The rain poured down on day one of the U.S. Open at Bethpage Black in Farmingdale, New York. It prompted officials to sternly warn that the champion would be determined with at least seventy-two holes of golf, whether that might mean Monday or even Tuesday. But stern warnings and gloomy weather were not the only story on an afternoon where the immortal Crash Davis might have said, "Some days you win, some days you lose and some days it rains."

The Boston Globe reported that the day was over when the horn sounded at 10:15 a.m., players hustled to shelter, spectators quickly sought cover. It didn’t take long for streams to form on the fairways, and greens to be completely submerged. The US Golf Association made the decision to suspend play. It was the first time since 2004 that a US Open round was not completed on the day it began.

Thomas Boswell in the Washington Post found a much more interesting story than the weather in Jeff Brehaut, forty-six years old, a journeyman who failed qualifying school 13 times and wandered the minor-league Nationwide Tour with his family in an SUV for six long seasons doing 30,000 miles a year on the open road. Though he only completed eleven holes today, Brehaut found himself "leading the U.S. Open at the end of Day 1." Even better his wife, teenage kids, seventy-six year old Dad and a total of nine family members were there to see it. It was delivered by a guy whose only two pro wins are on the Nationwide Tour and as a medalist at qualifying school.

Read Boswell's whole story here.

Labels: golf, sports

After watching the 71st and 72nd holes of the Memorial two weeks ago, the Clarion Content feels confident enough to announce Tiger is back. He is coming. He is driving the ball great and more consistently in the fairway than ever before. He is hitting his irons stiff. The competition is once again fearful. Sunday at the Memorial he made his charge from four off the lead on the final day. He capped it with a birdie, birdie finish, that included one of the most beautiful golf shots you will ever see, a seven iron from 185 yards to one foot from the pin leaving himself a tap in, tournament winning, birdie on 18th. New York welcomes Tiger to the U.S. Open today.

Labels: golf, sports

Young Baker-Finch after his 1991 British Open triumph

This story was such a surprise to encounter this morning that the Clarion Content sports editor quite literally shouted out, "What?!?" causing heads to turn across the office. Ian Baker-Finch, the excellent CBS Sports golf commentator, and perhaps the single most famous case of the shanks EVER, is playing competitive golf this weekend. He has entered the PGA tournament at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth, Texas this week.

We are rooting for Ian Baker-Finch, to at least play respectably, hopefully to even make the cut. Long before the world had heard of the rapidly disappearing David Duval, Baker-Finch had sketched the path: tremendous talent, a bevy of PGA tour and international wins, a victory in a major, the 1991 British Open at Royal Birkdale, then a complete collapse, swing and game mysteriously gone. Within in three years things had gone so far downhill that his season totals read fourteen missed cuts and four withdrawals in 18 events. Less than two years after that he was out of the game and behind the microphone at age thirty-seven. What might have been for the Aussie dubbed, "the Dark Shark," never was. He became a cautionary tale for all.

Yet he didn't run and hide. He took a very public job and succeeded tremendously. He has been by all accounts an excellent announcer. He has played competitively only once since 2001. But as the New York Times noted, he plays four times a week back home with his buddies. Sometimes he beats them. They are PGA tour professionals. So maybe, just maybe.

Let it be known the Clarion Content is rooting hard for the classy Ian Baker-Finch this week.

Labels: golf, sports

Ji Young Oh

Neither Clarion Content whipping post Michelle Wie, nor the Pink Panther, Paula Creamer made a charge finishing tied for third at 8-under at the Sybase Classic at Upper Montclair Country Club in Clifton, New Jersey. Ji Young Oh, according to the AP a 20-year-old, straight-hitting South Korean shot 2-under 70 on a raw, cold, windy day to win her second LPGA tournament.

Labels: golf, sports

Michelle Wie has another chance to win her first career LPGA tournament. Hopefully, the media hype machine hasn't deceived you, dear readers, into thinking she has already won one. Wie, to this point, is actually less athletically accomplished than the model née tennis player Anna Kournikova. Wie, however, is only nineteen, and is playing a sport with a much, much longer athletic window than tennis.

Can she pull it off tomorrow in the Sybase Classic at Upper Montclair Country Club in Clifton, New Jersey? Wie and fellow American, Paula Creamer, trail the leaders entering the final round by three strokes. Wie has consistently choked at the biggest moments of her young career. Creamer, who is affectionately known to her fans as the Pink Panther, on the other hand, has already won eight LPGA tournaments at the tender age of 23. Perhaps it is because she came through the junior ranks, playing against women her own age, learning to win tournaments. This was quite unlike Michelle Wie who was pushed by her parents and her sponsors to become a sideshow freak, attempting to compete against men twice her age.

It has cost her dearly. Tomorrow Wie has another chance to redeem her reputation as a loser. The LPGA tour desperately needs her celebrity. The LPGA has lost five tournaments this year because of hard economic times.

Read more here in the New York Times.

Labels: golf, sports