Hank Gola of the NY Daily News gave us twenty minutes from Augusta National to talk the Masters this week on One on One. Jake Kring-Schreifels and I ask Hank where the best place to watch the greatest event in golf, while Hank was more interested in what was happening in New York. Tiger Woods' penalty, Tianlang Guan making the cut, the relative unknowns at the top of the leaderboard and the "sub-par" efforts of Graeme McDowell and Phil Mickelson.
One on One hit the road on August 25th as we traveled to Bethpage Park in Farmingdale, NY for the first round of the FedEx Cup Playoffs.
Are the greens at Bethpage Black unfair? Leader Sergio Garcia at 10-under didn’t think so, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t the hardest he’s ever seen.
It’s not every day you meet someone like Bubba Watson – a great person, role model, and as he described himself, “alright at golf, sometimes.”
"I'm probably going to sleep on the floor. I do that in Europe all the time, so this is nothing new."
This was not a joke from Tiger Woods, as one reporter had thought. These were the realities the aging superstar had to face after suffering through hours of pain in his lower back. He described it as pain in "a section of movement" that would come right before impact in his swing. Through all this, you'd think the 36 year-old might consider withdrawing - something he says never crossed his mind. Instead, the two-time FedEx Cup winner posted a 2-under 69 to put him three shots back of leader Nick Watney.
You’d think a 7-under 64 would be the talk of Bethpage Black, but instead leader Padraig Harrington faced question after question about his quest for a Ryder Cup spot. “The only answer I can give at this stage is I'm pleading the Fifth Amendment.”
The PGA Tour needs to come to grips with a few realities, and its needs to do so soon.
A few years back, the Tour acknowledged that golf often slips from the mind of the casual fan following the last of the four major tournaments by establishing the FedExCup, a season long, 10 million dollar prize capped by a five week playoff tournament following the PGA Championship. Now, the Tour must admit that the FedExCup needs fixing if the PGA does not wish to see the Playoffs become an afterthought in the mind of the general public.
Just a few weeks ago at the 2011 PGA Championship, Keegan Bradley proved that he could play with the big boys...and beat them too. For special insight into the life and character of the promising young golfer, Andrew O'Connell and Kyle Kesses talked to someone who knows him pretty well - St. John's University head coach Frank Darby.
In the golfing world, late August and September used to seem rather calm, a time following the season’s four majors when fans could temporarily put the game on the back burner before either the Tour Championship or the Ryder Cup brought their minds back to golf. But since the establishment of the FedEx Cup in 2007, a formerly serene couple of weeks has been replaced by the frenzied pace of a winner-take-all tournament, and the average fan should be ever thankful for the turmoil.
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