Thoughts from the Rough, Deep Rough

by Jeff Skinner

Am I the only one that had enough of the Tavistock Cup?  Yes, it is nice to see golf, good golf, but this event has run its course if you ask me.  The celebration of excess that surrounds this two day party is just a bit much for me.  When they first started televising this “club championship” it was a kick to see the pros in a more relaxed atmosphere at their own clubs, no matter how exclusive they are.  Now, it just seems tedious.  Lake Nona beat three other clubs and there is talk of adding more super exclusive clubs next year, oh brother.

The PGA Tour announced that the changes to the Tour, The Nationwide Tour and Q-School will go into effect in 2013.  Here’s the announcement from The PGA Tour.  There is still some tweaking to do but the bulk of the significant changes are: all 50 PGA TOUR membership cards will now be awarded through the Nationwide Tour, with the three final tournaments on the Nationwide Tour consisting of fields involving PGA TOUR and Nationwide Tour players to determine who earns those 50 cards. The annual Qualifying Tournament will now become a pathway exclusively to the Nationwide Tour.  The fields for the three final Nationwide Tour events will include the top 75 players on the Nationwide Tour’s money list, the players ranked 126-200 on the PGA TOUR’s FedExCup points list and non-members who meet certain eligibility standards.  So Q-School honors only gets you to the Nationwide Tour and that’s a sad end to an era of great rags to riches stories.

In case you missed it Yani Tseng has once again started her assault on the LPGA Tour.  This past weekend at the multiple weather delayed, RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup, Tseng fought off cold, rain, wind, lightning, darkness and a few players to claim her second win of the LPGA season.  In four starts she has two wins and four top tens.  Here we go again.

Hank Haney and his publisher have to be counting the days until their book The Big Miss hits the bookstores.  Haney’s insider account of his years with Tiger will no doubt fly off the shelves.  The excerpts released to Golf Digest have Tiger and his team all fired up and Hank has gone from “insider” to public enemy number one.  Here’s an interesting slideshow from Golf Digest with some provocative excerpts from the book.

Ernie Els looked like he shook off the pain of the Transitions Championship with his play at The Tavistock Cup.  He tied for the low round with a 67 in the singles and is ready to try again to qualify for The Masters by winning this week’s Arnold Palmer Invitational.  He wants to qualify on his own but he is also open to an invitation from the folks at Augusta.

Speaking of The Masters it is never too early to get a peek at Augusta National. Golf World has neat piece on Augusta National and all the changes it has seen since 1934.  It’s interesting to see how all the “improvements” have evolved over the years.  For instance the par three sixteenth started as a 145 yard hole over a small creek.  In 2011 it played at 170 yards over a lake to a green guarded by three bunkers.  I always said it would be great to see today’s players on Augusta National in a “mid 60’s” setup with the equipment that Arnie, Jack and Gary used to get around those hills.