Oakland Hills Country Club has hosted many a prestigeous tournament before; 6 US Opens, 3 PGA Championships and even a Ryder Cup for good measure.  Some guy by the name of Donald Ross designed this place, so that should immediately ring a bell (Pinehurst No.2) and tell you that the greens of Oakland Hills are something truly special.  You can expect monster bending breaks on virtually all of the greens on this course, with breaks and ridges and humps that make reading greens a dizzying task.  The beauty of this place is that the greens have remained entirely unchanged since the days of Ben Hogan.  A bunker or two have been moved around, and new tees have been added, and of course a tree or two have been removed, but this course is essentially the opposite of Augusta National in that it has barely changed since way back in the day.  Hard to believe, but many consider these greens the most difficult in all of golf, even surpasing those of Augusta National.  In 1951, Hogan was so skeeved out by the green of the Par 3 9th that he considered laying up and chipping to the flag.  This hole will play at 257 yards this year.  Yikes.

The PGA is has arguably the best field in golf.  The venues are always great, and the tournament isn't set up to be impossible but rather the philosophy is to "err on the side of the players," unlike the US Open which sometimes tends to be unfair in its setup.  It's a tough test of golf for sure, but it's fair.  While all four majors are fantastic tournaments, I think The PGA gets the worst rap of all.  It seems so unimportant after The Masters, US Open and Open Championships, but the truth is that it is a consistently fantastic tournament  with tons of great players on great courses.  And it also gives qualifying PGA club pros a shot at some fame as well.  Keep a close eye this year on how weather is a factor...there is some rain in the forecast for the first two rounds which will soften the place up a bit, but when it dries out I think anything can happen and the difficulty of the greens will play a huge part in how the winner is determined.      

A few things were going to make this tournament memorable.  Insane weather, a dramatic fight to the finish a la Torrey Pines or an unlikely champion.  2 out of 3 ain't bad.  While the weather was certainly bonkers, what was going through your head after DAVID DUVAL was lurking on top of the leader board after 2 rounds??  What about Greg Norman leading after 3 rounds??  The fact that either of these players had a reasonable chance to take home the Claret Jug would have been an amazing story, but equally as amazing was the fact that Padraig Harrington (affectionately known as Paddy) was perhaps the single most unlikely player to walk away with this major given the fact that he wasn't even sure if he was going to play the day before. 

Harrington injured his wrist 8 days before the tournament and gave himself only a 50% chance of even finishing, managing to hit only 3 full swings the day before the tournament started.  That's when everyone, myself included, entirely dismissed him from being a factor at this year's Open Championship.  Harrington called his injury a "great distraction," and rightly so.  So much pressure was taken off of him because there were no real expectations for him to defend his title, and no one bothered paying attention to him at all until  after the 3rd round when he had managed to finish in a tie for 2nd place with KJ Choi.  On a day when mostly everyone wore a light sweater or some kind of long-sleeved shirt, Harrington was out there with the whipping winds in just a regular short sleeve polo.  That's Irish right there.

Brilliant ball striking and smart, calm thinking allowed him to take full advantage of other people's mistakes.  Norman, an excellent driver of the ball, would have been better suited hitting a few more hybrids or irons off the tee and Choi vanished into a T16 finish with his highest round of the tournament, a 79.  You have to be extremely creative with Open Championship golf, and Harrington has proven that he knows how to make his way around these wind-swept gems of links courses that dot the UK.  He's created a bit of a dynasty now, showcasing his ability to use both power and finesse wisely.  Next to Tiger Woods, he'll easily be the '09 favorite when the tournament returns to Turnberry.

Harrington is the only player (aside from Tiger Woods) to win more than 1 Open Championship since Greg Norman did it in 1993 at Royal St. George's, and Europe's first player in more than a century to win it two years in a row. 

Yours truly, before the swing revamp: laid off at the top, and coming in too far from the inside!   Dammit!  (Picture courtesy of The Monkey Photography, LLC 2008)

The 137th Open Championship is now upon us.  Just looking at that number tells you that this major is OLD...the oldest of the 4 majors, in fact.  One of the real treats of the Open Championship venues is that they are flashbacks as to how golf was originally played.  In the US we have beautiful parkland courses and excellently fabricated links courses, but the UK offers the best in true links golf, period.  That's not to say genunie links golf does not exsist in the US...it does.  Ever hear of Shinnecock Hills?  Any one of the 9 courses currently on the Open Championship rotation are stunning examples of seaside links, the way golf was originally played hundreds of years ago.  Trees?  We don't need no stinkin' trees!  Give us July temperatures of 60 degrees, howling winds and rock hard fairways, along with the nuttiest bunkering you've ever seen and you now have true links golf.  I can taste the salty air right now.

Royal Birkdale is the site of this year's Open Championship.  The strangest thing about Birkdale is its clubhouse.  It seems entirely modern and out of place for a course that was founded in 1889.  Not quite as strange (but strange enough) is the fact that its fairways are as flat as your kitchen floor. Some speculate as to why the fairways are like that.  Frederic Hawtree, the architect in charge of the course's first reconstruction in 1932, stated that he left the course the way he saw it.  Others say that later architects, perhaps mistakenly, filled in the areas between the dunes to create perfectly graded roadbeds.  Why?  Because there really weren't many golf construction firms and the only folks who could could do the work and had the necessary tools were local road contractors.  But really, who cares, because I bet if you were to play on a perfectly flat course your mind would start playing tricks on you and you'd have no idea what to do.  Some say that Birkdale is the fairest of all the Open Championship courses, and you can probably make an argument for that.  However, when the winds blow, expect to see uncharacteristically high scores pop up.

Birkdale's greens were practically as flat as its fairways up until 1991, but the club decided to redo the drainage on the greens and subsequently the more undulating, curvy greens that we see today are the result of this reconstruction.  The last time the Open Championship was played here was i 1998, and at that time I was paying virtually no attention to golf as a young college student, so I'm greatly looking forward to analyzing this course as it is broadcast on TV.  It's a real shame that Tiger Woods is unable to participate in this year's tournament because I thought his strategy in 2006 of using no driver at Royal Liverpool was both downright silly and brilliant.  Open Championship golf requires the most imaginative shotmaking skills to win.  In 2006, Jim Furyk half putted / half chipped out of a bunker to within about 12 feet with a PUTTER.  Hard, fast conditions mean that you need to land the ball short of the intended target and let it release to the hole.  Do you think Willie Park, Jr. was spinning 9-irons off the green back in day?  No chance - these balls were running up to the hole. 

In 1998, Justin Rose made a dramatic chip from the rough on 18 for birdie to finish tied for 4th.  With Tiger Woods out for the year and Phil Mickelson playing like junk at the Open Championships, I really have no idea  who will win this tournament.  No British, European or South African player has ever won an Open Championship at Royal Birkdale - only Americans and Australians have been victorious.  I have a feeling that a European golfer will take the Claret Jug home this year.  Only time will tell.

Halfway through July, I hope you've been playing great golf, or at least having a great time attempting to do so.  :o) 

Sources tell me that this year's US Open will be different.  "OMG how can it possibly be different," you say?  Simple.  First, the fairways will be essentially the same width as they were set for the Buick Invitational.  The rough isn't going to be that much deeper than for the Buick Invitational as well.  Finally, the tees will be pushed back, but not as far back as humanly possible...because if they were, they course could be stretched back to over 7,600 yards, which is totally insane.  It will still be the longest US Open course by more than 300 yards.  Ouch.

But that doesn't mean that Torrey Pines will be a walk in the park.  The setup of Torrey Pines has been very, very carefully considered and scrutinized.  Surprisingly, Torrey Pines isn't on Golf Digest's Top 100 Greatest Golf Courses.  Crazy, right?  It's the first time that an Open course hasn't been in the Top 100 since 1976 (that distinction would belong to Atlanta Athletic Club).  Torrey Pines does belong to the Top 100 Public Golf Courses list, but even then it's ranked at a high 90th position by that golf publication.  Instead of pencil-wide fairways and 7-inch uniform rough, Torrey Pines will feature other characteristics that will make it plenty challenging.  

Mike Davis, the senior director of Rules and Competition for the USGA, can be credited with introducing the graduated rough that was mentioned above; that is, rough that becomes progressively deeper the further you hit into it.  Similarly, the rough around the greens will also be mowed in concentric steps.  The approach areas in front of the greens, which will consist of Bermuda grass instead of the Kikuyu that can be found in the fairways, have been aerified and top-dressed as if they were greens.  Top-dressing is the process of adding a fine layer of soil to the surface, a process which is done to greens to make them as firm as possible.  Why do this?  According to Davis, it's so that players can bounce shots into the green instead of flying them onto it, if they choose...and unlike Donald Ross's dome-shaped greens at Pinehurst or the steep sloping greens of A.W. Tillinghast's Winged Foot, Torrey Pines' perfect Poa greens were designed to hold long iron shots.  And here is where the brilliance of Davis' Open strategy shines - making all type of shots possible for all types of players while being as challenging, and fair, as possible.  Going back to the idea of graduated rough, Davis wants players who can bomb the ball to have that advantage of distance.  However, if you wander too far off the beaten path, long hitters will find themselves closer to the hole but in deeper rough that is a mix of gnarly Kikuyu and ryegrass.  If you're wondering what the hell Kikuyu is, Kikuyu is a coarse-textured light green grass that is actually considered a weed in coastal California.

Did I forget to mention that the fairways and greens on the coastal side of the course have been relocated closer to the ocean, bringing the cliffs into play?  Hope you don't start snap hooking into the Pacific!  Many areas around hazards, such as the small pond in front of the Par-5 18th, will be shaved so that anything landing near it will funnel into the water.  Torrey Pines' greens won't be running close to 15 on the Stimpmeter like they did early in the week at Oakmontl ast year, but should hover around no more than 13.  That's still fast as hell, as fast as either you or I have ever experienced.  But here's the real kicker, to show you how freaky Davis and his crew are:  he has kept bleachers and TV towers positioned off to the side of the greens at the 3rd, 4th, 7th, 11th, 12th, 14th and 16th holes to keep the targets fully exposed to the coastal winds.

In a way, it's totally sadistic.  It's undenialbly ingenious.  It's the US Open in all it's glory.  And if this strategy proves to be successful, I think you can count on seeing Torrey Pines a little more regularly in US Opens or PGA Championships.

The TVD 60 will be released in a limited-edition batch of 600.  Limited-release stuff is gobbled up by club junkies and if the response to the limited release is anything as good as Cameron's limited release stuff, 600 wedges will end up selling in no time flat.  But somehow I don't think that Titleist is concerned as to whether or not they can move those 600 wedges...I know they can. 

The TVD 60 has, according to the site, a high-performance sole and sole relief.  The bounce surface (which is "crescent-shaped") is cambered to keep the club from bouncing but also has enough sole width and bounce angle to prevent digging.  There is heel, toe and trailing edge relief that is designed to keep the club's leading edge close to the ground from a variety of playing positions.  The wedges also inherit the machined grooves and face of the Spin Milled models. 

The price?  $250 according to the website.  But that price also includes some personalized stamping that you can have added such as a set of initials, your choice of shaft and grip.  But why pay $250 for a "custom" wedge that is actually stock, and differs only slightly from the Spin Milled version which is over $120 cheaper?  The only real difference I see is that the TVD has a sole grind (the other Vokeys do not) and more relief.  

I guess I'm just disappointed that the website didn't really have the content I was expecting.  The Vokey.com site was lauched primarily to highlight the TVD wedge but the site didn't go into explaining the wedge as well as I had hoped.  I know that this site is a work in progress; the Cameron website started that way and has grown into its own subculture, it seems.  I hope that more loft and bounce options will be available in the future.  Perhaps the creation of the site was meant to be a way to guage the amount of interest generated by the TVD?

I'm sure the TVD is a terrific piece of equipment but $250 seems a bit steep for a wedge, a tool that is actually disposable, at least in my opinion.  If you play many rounds and hit a lot of balls your wedges will eventually lose their bite - take a brand-new wedge out to a practice bunker and hit some balls and you'll realize that you're slowly wearing down the face of the club.  Maybe it's the exclusivity of the club that will attract people, but if you're looking versatile wedges with multiple loft and bounce options, companies Cleveland and Callaway will have your head spinning with a dizzying amount of choices.  With the addition of wedge master Roger Cleveland to the company lineup, Callaway now has 2 different grinds available (PM and C-Grind) in addition to their regular sole for the same price as any other wedge, and if true customization is the name of your game then you can have a Scratch or Chikara wedge completely tailored to your preference and swing style instead of an off-the-rack single-option Vokey TVD for the same price.

Or you can take a $120 Spin Milled to your nearest bench grinder and create your own. 

But I digress.

At Carnousie last year, Garcia missed a 10-foot part put on the final hole after blowing a 3-shot lead to win the Open Championship, forcing a playoff in which he lost to Pagraig Harrington.  Winning the Open Championship would have solidified Garcia's status as one of the top young players in the game, but that loss along with the press conference the followed (he mentioned that in any tournament it was more than just him against the field, it was him against the field AND the media) showed that El Niño was still immature and had some things to learn about his game and himself.

Coupled with his brilliant ball-striking, Garcia's putter really came through this week with some huge putts.  He drained more long putts than I can ever remember, and even though he still missed some of the shorter ones Garcia managed to be much more consistant on the greens that we've known him to be.  He's been putting in some quality time with Stan Utley, a former PGA pro who is now one of the top teachers in America, focusing mostly on putting and chipping.
On Sunday Garcia drained a 14-footer for par on the 9th, and then sunk a 47-footer on the 14th for a birdie.  His final putt for par on 18th was a testy 7-footer, which he made and was good enough to get into a playoff with Paul Goydos.  On the first playoff hole at 17, Goydos ballooned his tee shot and came just a few feet short of the green, while Garcia punched a wedge to the center of the green to within 7 feet, thanks partly to a gust of wind.  Signed, sealed, delivered.

However, something very important will get overlooked by all of this putting talk, and that's how frightening Garcia was off the tee.  The weekend turned windy, and Garcia hit 10 of 14 fairways on Saturday and 14 of 18 greens, which is just absurd considering the difficulty of the course as well as the windy conditions.  He hit all 14 fairways on Friday, and ended up 1st in driving accuracy and 1st in greens in regulation for the entire tournament. There are only a couple of other players that could have been that accurate - Fred Funk and Scott Verplank - both who missed the cut.  Personally, I think that this might have to rank as one of the best weeks of driving for any player ever, factoring in course difficulty and the late round gale-force winds.  Let's not mention the pressure to perform well after a 3-year winless drought.  It was a truly remarkable display of hitting.

You have to wonder now if Sergio might be able to pull some nifty tricks from up his sleeve and maybe capture his first major this year.  He's come close before as noted above at Carnoustie.  You aren't going to win the US Open if you can't find the fairways and that might be Tiger Wood's greatest weakness at those tournaments.  Of all the majors Tiger has collected, "only two" are US Opens.  While Tiger has won at Torrey Pines more times that I've filled my car up with gas last year, his spectacular putting and recovery is what allows him to be less than accurate off the tee and still give himself a fighting chance.  Sergio is essentially the opposite - his driving as of late is spectacular, but his putter might end up being his Achilles' heel. 

If Garcia can maintain the improvements he's made with the flatstick and even improve upon THAT, we may have to start calling El Niño "El Hombre."  Certainly a win at a tournament of this caliber against the most solid field in golf will be a great confidence booster. 

Since its renovation for 2007, Sawgrass has received incredible praise from pros and amateurs alike.  Phil Mickelson recently commented that "they are the best bermuda greens I’ve ever seen."  That says a lot.  Just like Dye's Harbour Town, the greens are small, firm and fast.  Sawgrass seems to meander through forest and wasteland, requiring that the players play close attention to every shot.  Let's take a look, in no particular order, at the brilliantly designed holes that this course features...

Hole 11 - 588 Par 5

If you're standing on the tee and you don't hit your ball anywhere but straight, you're in jail (or worse!).  Water and sand all along the left edge of the tee area, with a cluster of islands in a sand bunker as well.  This hole was truly designed as a dynamic middle-length par 5, and attempting to reach the green in 2 requires a long drive down the right side of the fairway.  Oh, and don't let that huge overhanging tree on your right knock down your 2nd shot, if you even placed your drive this well.  The green is slightly elevated; come up short, and you're either in the beach or in the drink.  Go long and your approach shot might come in too shallow, bouncing and skidding off the green, possibly going into the water behind.

Hole 9 - 583 Par 5

There is simply no room for error on this hole.  As the hole progresses it becomes increasing difficult.  Players must land the ball in the fairway short of the bridge.  If they decided to go for the green in two,  there is sand all along the left, grass and bunkers to the right of the green which also slopes severely from front to back right and is very narrow.

Hole 17 - 137 Par 3

Perhaps the most famous par 3 on the planet.  At "only" 137 yards this would seem to be a mere chip shot for most of us, but when you think about the green as the target that you simply cannot miss (for obvious reasons!) and the swirling winds above, the difficulty is tremendous.  Balls have routinely bounced off the green if hit too shallow or close to the edges, and throwing a ball high in the air is a recipe for disaster as the wind can blow it completely off course.  A true classic in every sense of the word.

Hole 18 - 462 Par 4

Two things come to mind when I see this hole - 18 at Pebble Beach and 18 at Doral.  Like these holes, the finishing hole at 18 is spectacular and demanding.  Water is all the way down the left side so make sure you have your go-to fade working on this hole.  Large mounds and trees line the right side of the fairway to keep you in check.  Beware the squirrelly grass bunkers guarding the right front of the green as well. 

I believe that each hole at this course deserves an in-depth mention, but that would take forever.  I encourage you to check out the Players Championship website (http://www.pgatour.com/tournaments/r011/course/tour/course/p-index.html) and check out each hole.  Sawgrass is an amazing piece of property that tests every possible facet of the game.  The timing of the tournament would make it difficult to double as a US Open venue, but I would love to see this set up as an Open course just once.  It would be a treacherous to say the least.

• 1st in driving accuracy (48/56 fairways, 85.71%)
• 4th in driving distance (287.50)
• T2 in greens in regulation (51/72 greens, 70.83%)
• T3 in putting (1.56)

That's pretty much outstanding.  No one was as sharp as Immelman from tee to green, and he was able to maintain the laser-like focus for the entire 4 rounds.  His only mistake was a double on the 70th hole, the par 3 16th.  Whether his ball ended up in the drink because of a cross breeze or because of a mishit, he ended up with a double-bogey and still won by 3 strokes.  His drives were well-placed, his approach shots were never far from the pin, his pitching was incredible and he seemed to be making almost every putt.  He was able to put himself in perfect spots and as a result he only had 2 3-putts for the entire round.  Immelman became the first South African to win the Masters since Gary Player in 1978, exactly 30 years ago.

Immelman had a few obstacles to overcome on his way to his Masters victory.  Last year he contracted some kind of parasite and followed that up with a stomach infection which caused him to lose 22 lbs in 3 weeks.  It had taken Immelman 3 years to bulk up from 155 to 178 before contracting the parasite, essentially losing 3 years' work in 3 weeks.  In December, Immelman complained of having some chest pain and an MRI showed that he had a benign tumor.  After surgery he was out of action for approximately 6 weeks and then started practicing and preparing for the Masters.  This guy can obviously deal with adversity.  I hope he can win at least 1 other tournament this year, because that would really validate his win at Augusta.  Zach Johnson was able to do so last year and the way that Immelman was striking the ball suggests that he is in top form. 

I recently found out that DirecTV will be showing additional and extended coverage of The Masters on channel 701 (standard definition) and 706 (HD).  The DIRECTV service will be available during ESPN coverage of the first two rounds and CBS coverage of the final two rounds on Saturday and Sunday.  The highlight of the coverage will be Masters Mix Channel, offering viewers a unique window on the famous Augusta course with access to four different views on one screen - a view dedicated to covering the famed "Amen Corner," another focusing on critical finishing holes 15 and 16, a continuously updated highlight channel showcasing Tournament leaders and their scores and the CBS national broadcast.

The four views include the following:

• View One — CBS and ESPN's live coverage of the Tournament.
• View Two — "Today's Highlights" offers a continuously updating loop of the best shots from the day's play with voice-over providing context and commentary.
• View Three — "Amen Corner" provides complete coverage of the most famous stretch — holes 11, 12 and 13 — of Augusta National Golf Club. The channel will provide a continuous view of play as the field challenges this most treacherous part of the course.
• View Four — Holes 15 (the par 5 Firethorn) and 16 (the par 3 Redbud) spotlights this especially difficult part of the course, which can make or break a golfer's round.

Each of the additional three Masters channels is a fully-produced channel with its own production crew, additional cameras and announcers — provided by CBS Sports and DIRECTV. Customers with interactive receivers can highlight any of the four views on the Mix screen to hear live audio on each and expand them to full screen by pressing the select button on their remote.  If that's not insanely awesome, I don't even know what is.

For me, golf starts now.  Even though we've been treated to 3 solid months of golf coverage between CBS and NBC (including some great WCG events), The Masters tournament is the official start of golf in 2008 for yours truly.  The weather is starting to get warmer, the sun is out longer...even the air has that spring smell to it.  Something is just different. 

Are you crazy like I am about this tournament?  Have you considered calling out of work just to watch live coverage?  I have.  But then this wonderful thing called the "internet" came along and I was able to watch live broadcasts from Amen Corner on Thursdays and Fridays.  I remember last year I sat in front of my computer ALL DAY watching streaming video.  I must have been the most  unproductive employee of the week.  When I get home I'll just watch the reruns in HD.  Brilliant.

Golf nuts unite....raise your hands in the air and thank baby Jesus that Masters week is upon us.  Unfortunately for me (and probably many of you) Jesus chose to rise from the dead on Masters Sunday last year.  However, FORTUNATELY for me, I was sick last year for the entire tournament.  That meant laying around bed all day.  I must have put in a solid 24-27 hours of quality time with my TV watching live coverage and reruns.

Am I certifiably insane?  Hell yes.  But many of you are also in my boat, and I'd love nothing more than to sail the high seas with you. 

At the end of the first round, Fred Couples had fired an early 65 to take the lead at -5.  Tiger was E with a 70.  Five shots isn't a whole lot to make up over the course of four rounds, but it's a decent amount.  Many players shot good scores on Thursday.

The next day Vijay Singh went berserk and ended up being the leader after the second round at -9.  Tiger shot a -2 68, 7 shots back.

It appeared to me at this point that two things were going to happen.  First, that Tiger wasn't going to win this tournament.  Other players kept on shooting low scores and there was a large gap between -2 and -9.  He hadn't won here in 4 years and the defending champion Singh appeared to be playing VERY well.  Second, that all of the other players, somehow, in some way, would come crashing down in spectacular fashion, therefore paving the way for another Tiger victory.  I missed the entire third round but when I logged on to check the scores what I saw was both surprising and not surprising at all - Tiger Woods tied for a 1st place -6 score along with 4 other players. 

Somehow, that -9 number posted by Vijay vanished as well as any other players' hopes of winning.  When everyone else was having a hard time dealing with the swirling winds, Tiger goes on to shoot a -4 66 to place him tied for 1st place.  Ridiculous 4-iron cut shots to within 3 feet of the pin and other insane shenanigans allowed Tiger to take full advantage of his incredible talents while others folded like a house of cards on a windy day.  After 3 rounds if Tiger is leading or tied for the lead, he is 42-3 for tournament wins.  Stunning.

I feel bad for Bart Bryant.  He was the only dude to shoot 4 rounds in the 60's, the first time in 20 years that's happened at this tournament.  He stuck shot after shot after shot all day long, but to show you what kind of stuff you have to deal with when playing Tiger, consider this:  Tiger ended up 3-putting the 10th hole from about 7 feet.  That's nuts.  There's a better chance of snow in July than a 3-putt from Tiger from 7 feet.  The score was tied at -8 for about 5 minutes, when all of a sudden Bryant 3-putted the 11th for a bogey.  Bryant played his heart out and was left watching Tiger finish out the round in the scoring booth.  A 5-iron to within 24 feet is what Tiger served up.  Tiger needed to make the putt to win outright.  Afer careful analyzation, Tiger stood over the put and pulled the trigger.

How many of  you were thinking, "Yeah, this is falling in..." ?

How many of you were surprised when it happened?  EVERYONE was surprised!  It's a 24 foot downhill bender for the win!  Yet at the same time, NO ONE WAS SURPIRISED!   How is that even possible?!?

From the scoring booth, Bryant chuckled while eating his candy bar and just shook his head.  There isn't much these guys can do, they're basically at Tiger's mercy. 

Even if you don't follow golf, even if you don't know the history of the game, please understand that what we're seeing here in watching Tiger Woods is something so extraordinary and incredible that I highly doubt anyone will ever come along and repeat or surpass him.  He's taking down legend after legend, record after record, each time he steps on the course.  The PGA Tour's slogan "These guys are good" is 100% true, but when Tiger is involved he just seems to make everyone else seem totally insignificant. 

The beatdowns will continue.  These tournaments are clearly marathons and not sprints, and Tiger keeps on proving this to us time and time again. 

 

It was because I was standing outside, but this time I wasn't freezing my ass off.

For the first time in months, I didn't feel the kind of bitter cold that comes from within, the kind of cold that makes the very center of your body shiver and shake. The kind of cold that makes doing anything outside a miserable experience. As if taking out the garbage isn't a crappy enough task, the crappiness of it is compounded when it's so cold out that your eyes feel cold and it hurts to inhale the cold air. 16 degrees. Awesome. It can get so cold here sometimes that the properties of the garbage bags and the very jacket that you have on to keep you warm actually change. The plastic becomes rigid and stiff, as does the jacket, making sounds when crinkling that just don't sound normal for plastic and fabric. But the other night was different. It was soothing to be standing there, enjoying the "warmer", almost 50 degree weather. How cold would you be if in June or July the temperature suddenly dropped to 45 or 50 degrees? I've played golf on early fall mornings when the temperature was 55 to me it was almost unbearable, yet that night as I stood outside looking up I felt as if I could have easily thrown on a sweater and played in those conditions.

We are 4 days removed from what could possibly be my most favorite day of the year, running a very close 2nd behind Christmas (and only because it's tough to supplant those amazing childhood memories of Christmas that I have, and that I hope you have as well). I'm sick of early sunsets. I'm sick of cold weather. I'm sick of not hearing birds when I wake up. I'm sick of seeing either snow, sand, salt or any combination of the three that pollutes our sidewalks and roadways for weeks on end. Double-click right now if you're as big a fan of Daylight Savings Time as I am.

Daylight Savings Time allows me to get on the course at 7:30 in the evening and play 9 holes. Try thinking about that when you're driving home from work and it's dark out at 5:30. It's amazing what a little sun can do for you.

Spring is on it's way. Dust off those clubs and organize your bag…the battle with winter is almost over and the light at the end of the tunnel is shining brighter than ever.

Since the introduction of the r7 and its subsequent variants, TaylorMade has been the #1 driver on tour for what seems to be an eternity, but if you stop and think about it, it makes sense as to why.  The r7, particularly the r7 Quad, is highly adjustable with 4 different weights that can be interchanged to alter ball flight.  More weight towards the heel promotes a draw, more towards the toe promotes a fade, and equal weighting means a relatively straight ball flight.  Since there are 4 slots for weights, you can also adjust the weighting for high fades, low draws, low fades, high draws...you get the picture.  A repeatable swing will allow you to fully take advantage of these adjustments...hence the 37.65% "yes", where "yes" represents touring pros, club professionals and so on.  The rest of us hackers (62.35%) can use it to correct our consistent slices and hooks, adjusting the weights just once and leaving it that way, or losing the wrench, whichever comes first.

Callaway's first adjustable weight offering wasn't even adjustable.  In 2005 they launched their FT-3 driver which came in 3 different flavors - Draw, Neutral and Fade.  Because the head of the FT-3 was mostly carbon-composite material, a total of about 45 grams of discretionary weight was then  internally reconfigured at the factory depending on what you wanted the ball to do.  The Draw model had more weight placed towards the heel and the Fade model had more towards the toe.  That eliminated the need for a wrench and extra weights. 

In 2006 Callaway introduced the Opti-Fit system, a brilliant way to interchange almost two dozen shafts with all the various driver heads, creating a huge combination of options for golfers that wanted to be professionally fitted and matched to the clubhead and shaft that gave them the best possible combination of launch angle, distance and roll.  With the introduction of the FT-5 and FT-i drivers, the Opti-Fit system looks like a science laboratory.  Lots of options for everyone. 

The Callaway Opti-Fit system is shown above.

The USGA approved a proposal to make a rule that adjustments to clubs during rounds would now be possible.  That change was approved and was effective for Jan 1, 2008.  This meant that club heads and shafts could be interchanged between rounds.   Now, I'm not quite sure how this might benefit even professionals, because I assume that all of their clubs are tweaked out to what works best for them and what fits the course, but we'll see how much they'll use these interchangeable components as the season progresses.  These interchangeable parts are not just for the professionals, either.

Enter Callaway i-Mix, Callaway's venture into the latest in club adjustability that will be available to the public.  If you want the benefits of this kind of adjustability, you'll need at least multiple heads or multiple shafts, plus the tool necessary to lock everything into place.  While it might not make a big splash with the public due to the increase in costs, the option to make these kinds of changes now exists.  To some club tinkerers this is truly a dream.  Nickent has also introduced it's own system of interchangeable components as well and I imagine that TaylorMade and other manufacturers will be quick to follow this trend if they haven't already. 

Golf technology continues to evolve and push existing limits.  It'll be interesting to see what these companies can introduce in the future - first came adjustable weighting, and then club geometry (see Nike's SuMo or Callaway's FT-i).  Now comes club component adjustability.  I don't know what is left to do, but something tells me that even club FACES will soon be interchangeable.  Call me crazy, but it's the next logical thing.

* (a few seconds)

Callaway's i-Mix system is shown above.

Nickent's adjustable Evolver driver.

Now imagine playing a 7-hour round, and imagine you're a touring pro.  Would you want to pull your hair out, or hit the bottle at the clubhouse?  Welcome to the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am, where celebrities get to act like asses all day and the pace of play is as slow as molasses.  In the winter.  Uphill.

Sure, there are celebrities that take the game seriously and try to put on a good show, make some putts and maybe sign an autograph or two.  Kevin Costner, Don Cheadle and Andy Garcia come to mind.  But then you have clowns like Bill Murray.  Yeah we get it, you were in Caddyshack.  Yeah, you love  golf.  But is it really necessary to prance around on every green or throw chocolates into the crowd or even TALK to the crowd that much on each hole?  And then there's Danny Gans, the Vegas showman who is a permanent performer at The Mirage.  I love it when I'm watching coverage on TV and Danny Gans feels the need to always be within 3 feet of the camera.  I also love it when he feels the need to do every single one of his impersonations between each of his shots.  I don't even know how many impersonations he does, but it's more than 2 and that's enough for me.  It's completely unbearable after 5 minutes, so imagine being the pro in his group and having to deal with the constant chatter and B.S. 

7-hour rounds?  You gotta be nuts, even if it IS Pebble Beach.  Rory Sabbatini can't possibly be at this event, he might just murder someone.  If I were in this tournament because of the venue I would just come back later in the year and avoid the hooplah.   But if I were playing I might be inclined to say, "Hey...just shut the hell up and play already."

My inspiration for this post is this week's FRB Open.  I remember watching Tiger Woods get that hole-in-one in the 1997 Phoenix Open (as it was then known) and how crazy, and I mean TOTALLY CRAZY, people went.  All 10,000 or however many people on that hole went into a dizzying frenzy of screaming, shouting, whistling, clapping, cheering and yelling.  We don't need someone acing the hole to get that kind of reaction now...all it takes is a shot close to the pin, no matter who it is, to have everyone go bananas. 

It's clear that golf has become increasingly popular in the last 10 years thanks primarily to Tiger Woods.  Smaller, specialized pro shops have now made way for golf mega stores, where you can find anything from the latest equipment in all colors, styles and flavors, to apparel, gizmos, gadgets and training aids.  Before his emergence, golf was a sport mostly for adults.  If you go to any course now you will find just as many younger kids as you will older folks.  This summer I went to my local course to practice some chipping and putting and there was a group lesson being held by the club's pro.  There couldn't have been anyone older than 10 in that group, boys and girls included, with wide smiles, an eagerness to learn and enthusiasm that you just don't see often in kids anymore.  At the end of the session the instructor wanted everyone to clap and cheer for each other for a job well done.   I have no doubt that they have seen Tiger's energy and passion for the game, and it's infectious...they want to be able to do the things he does.  So does the aspiring high school player, the low handicap middle-aged father, and the early-rising senior.  People may have wanted to be like Mike, but now they want to be like Tiger.  Playing golf is now a cool thing to do.

Go to a tournament this summer if you can.  Keep silent and quiet as the players make their way through each hole, bottling up that energy you have within...and when you see that one amazing shot, throw your hands in the air and cheer loudly along with everyone else, releasing all of that pent-up energy.  Can't get to a tournament?  Wait for Phil to tee it up on 16 this week.  Take your Dolby Digital 5.1 digital surround system and crank it up, and wait...

You'll discover that the golf clap is a thing of the past.

Really mad.

On December 14th, 2007, Callaway Golf won a patent infringement suit against Acushnet, the maker of the renowned Titleist Pro V1 line of golf balls. Does this kind of stuff ever happen between two of the largest names in golf? Generally companies of this magnitude go after makers of knock-off clubs and bogus balls and settle quietly out of court. In this case, jurors found Acushnet guilty of infringement on 4 of 5 (I've also heard 8 out of 9) of Callaway's golf ball patents. I thought that was pretty interesting considering how long Titleist has been in the business of making balls. You can read a little more about that in our Golf Equipment forum. At the time I really wasn't sure what this meant for either company...until today.

While randomly surfing some days ago I came across amazing information thanks to Dave Dawsey, otherwise known as "The IP Golf Guy". Callaway golf has filed a motion for a permanent injunction. That's fancy legal-speak for seeking to totally halt the production, sale and distribution of the Pro V1. The motion itself is a challenging read, but the information contained within is incredibly intriguing, and Callaway makes a very compelling case for itself. The link to the redacted brief is here:

http://golf-patents.com/files/22847-21779/20080116_callaway_motion_for_injunction___redacted_version_of_brief_in_support.pdf

In the brief, Callaway states many interesting things. According to the brief, Callaway Golf spent hundreds of millions of dollars to develop its own golf ball business from the ground up. The result was the Callaway Rule 35 golf ball, which according to the company was a great success in the market and played by many elite professional golfers. They claim that the success of the ball was undercut by Acushnet with the release of their infringing Pro V1 line of balls. Apparently tour players gave back troubling input regarding Acushnet (Titleist) and threatened to switch from their wound balls to something else. This happened after Acushnet studied the Rule 35 and other similar balls. The response to negative feedback was the release of the Pro V1, and what this did was it enabled Acushnet to retain the huge amount of players signed under contract with Titleist and "dilute the competitive advantages of competitive balls that might have otherwise induced Titleist users to switch." Callaway recognizes that "while an injunction cannot change history…an injunction will give Callaway Golf a meaningful opportunity to secure a share of the market of the sort it would have had, and should have had, absent Acushnet's infringement."

Check out these two portions of Callaway's proposed order:

"Acushnet’s professional golfers currently under contract are permitted to play ProV1 products through the end of the 2008 calendar year. However, in addition to the notice required below in paragraph 4, Acushnet shall notify in writing all professional golfers affiliated with Acushnet that ProV1 products will no longer be available after December 31, 2008."

"Distributors and retailers of Acushnet’s products, and Acushnet customers may dispose of remaining ProV1 product inventory in their physical possession by sale or otherwise, but Acushnet shall not further supply any distributors, retailers and/or customers with ProV1 products as of the date of this Order."

Oh boy.

Callaway then systematically begins to outline and highlight how Acushnet's use of Callaway's patents-in-suit have caused the company damage by using Acushnet's own graphs, charts, and statements made in the previous patent suit that was decided on December 14th. In a press release issued shortly after the suit was filed, Callaway states that Acushnet tried to "create the impression that it had developed the Pro V1 before the filing of the patents in suit." The statement issued by Acushnet says, "Acushnet received it's first patent covering this technology on March 3, 1999. The oldest of the Callaway patents being asserted was not filed until December 12, 1999 and issued on March 15, 2001." Continuing on with the brief, Callaway states, "This statement (Acushnet's) creates the impression that the Pro V1 and the first Acushnet patent covering it came before the Sullivan (Callaway) inventions protected by the patents-in-suit - an assertion that Acushnet knows to be false. Acushnet never disputed that the patents-in-suit had effective filing dates no later than 1995 and, both in the pretrial order and during trial, conceded that the effective filing date for Callaway Golf's patent applications was 1995 - long before the 1997 filing date for the first Acushnet patent relating to the Pro V1."

The brief states that Acushnet continued to publicize this misleading statement in other public statements made after the trial. Reading the table of contents alone will give you an idea as to how solid of an argument Callaway makes:

• The infringing Pro V1 continues to Callaway Golf of marketing opportunities, intangible benefits, and sales of golf-related products
• Acushnet's other tactics irreparably harm Callaway Golf's image and reputation.
• The patented technology substantially encompasses the Pro V1, rather than being merely a minor component of the infringing product.

As if all of this weren't enough, Callaway even goes on to explain how the public interest will not be harmed by a permanent injunction by saying that the removal of the Pro V1 "will in no way deprive the public…of the convenience of a ready supply of high performance golf balls, or even three-piece urethane-over-ionomer golf balls. Once the Pro V1 is enjoined, there is nothing to suggest that the standard market forces along with the collective efforts of Callaway Golf and other manufacturers of premium polyurethane-covered multi-layered golf balls such as Bridgestone, Srixon, TaylorMade and Nike would be unable to fulfill the demand previously met by the infringing Titlist balls."

Yes, you read that correctly…Callaway just mentioned the names of competitors that could gain more market share than they currently have if the Pro V1 didn't exist. If you think Bridgestone, Srixon, TaylorMade and Nike don't or wouldn't agree, you may just be nuts.  This is just the beginning of some very interesting things in the world of golf.