All questions about the next dominating figure in world golf were answered with the torrid back nine of Rory McIllroy to win the PGA Championship, his fourth major at just 25 years and change.

Unlike the previous three which looked like a walk the park, this one required grit and resolve to overcome a lifeless front nine and three of the top players in the world playing their worldly best. In dwindling sunlight from a fairway bunker on the 17th hole to a wicked Sunday pin position chosen by the committee of fans Rory threw a lawn dart at the flag followed by a perfect roll from 10 feet for birdie to put both hands firmly on his second Wanamaker Trophy.

One for the Gipper from the sand at 17…

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It was somewhat reminiscent of Tiger’s 216-yard fairway bunker 6-iron that sealed a semi-major victory at the Canadian Open at Glen Abbey in 2000. If you saw the look in Rory’s eyes as he scampered out of the bunker to follow his shot there is little doubt about the competitive drive in this champion.

Read the vivid details of his Sunday triumph in David Kindred’s account for GolfDigest.com. This was the stuff of lore.

As Bill Macatee said, Rory had one last save for the Wanamaker trophy

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As gratifying was his golf, Rory’s statesmanship in the post round ceremonies and interviews would suggest that the game is in good hands with Rory. He took time in his acceptance speech to acknowledge the good sportsmanship of Phil and Ricky in allowing him to play up the 18th with them to insure completion of the championship in the fading sunlight. When asked about how he feels about being the figure of affection of a whole new school of young Rorys all over the world he graciously embraced this role and what comes with it.

There will be more masterpieces like this from David Cannon in year’s to come…

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This next chapter in the global golf story will be fascinating to watch unfold. Unlike in the Tiger iteration the competition is not paralyzed by Rory’s ability but seems ready to play up to the challenge on Sunday afternoons. The Realm of Rory will provide great theater for the fans and a proliferation of young kids strutting up the final holes in the fading light of dusk imagining their own glorious finishes in majors further down the road.

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David Kindred
GolfDigest.com
August, 2014

Gerry McIlroy and a few of his blokes plunked down a 200 pound wager ($340) when Rory was 15 with a British betting house that he would win the Open Championship and be designated Champion Golfer of the Year within 10 years. Rory waited until the last minute but finally delivered by winning the championship and the 500 to 1 odds payout of 100,000 pounds ($171,000) for his father and friends. Just one more reason to drink some champagne from that Claret Jug.

Jason Gay’s entertaining lampoon article on this in today’s Wall Street Journal is a real smile.

Little doubt that Gerry’s intuition about Rory’s potential was right. Once he won the U.S. Open at Congressional by 8 furlongs at age 21 he had to feel pretty good about it. The similar runaway win of the 2012 PGA at Kiawah Island seemed like the next natural step
in this prodigy’s progression.

Yes young man that is your name on the bottom of the Claret Jug

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His unwavering performance with the lead all week, winning this one wire-to-wire against a very strong field playing well, was reiterative of his past Major triumphs. He is the third youngest person to win three Majors by age 25 and that is behind the rare company of two of the greatest ever, Jack and Tiger. His 11 PGA and European Tour wins by age 25 has him light years ahead of the rest of the class of mid-twenty something stars-to-be.

In spite of the media’s temptation to categorize him as the next dominate player it seems unlikely that Rory will ever fill this mold. Jack and Tiger had as many second and thirds in the Majors as firsts.  Except for a couple of thirds Rory is either a winner or tied for 26th or worse in most of the Majors during his short career. But when he takes command of a Major he is just off the charts dominant, maybe the best front runner in the game today.

He also will never move the needle like Tiger has done throughout his career. Sure plenty of people love him and root for him but he is not that Tiger/Jordan phenomenon that draws the attention of the casual golf fan or even not golf fan every time he shows up for any event.

What he is though is a very competitive, driven natural talent with an endearing personality that makes him a pleasure to root for when he is in the hunt. If you heard his Saturday afternoon interview with Tom Rinaldi after his third round dusting of the field to lead by six shots you heard in his responses honesty we rarely get from a prodigy performer at the top of his game. Quite refreshing to know that you can be focused on winning the big one and not have to look down on the competition to succeed.

Mum this one is for you…….

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In his acceptance speech after he finished the job with a steady hand on the tiller on the way to a two shot win over Sergio Garcia and Rickie Fowler he thanked the R & A, the members of Royal Liverpool Golf Club, and the fans who supported him so graciously through the week. He dedicated the win to his mother Rosie as it was the first time she could be on hand for one of his Major Championship victories.

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Class…Rory took the time to thank the competition for the day’s good game

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He found time to acknowledge the quality of the competition of Sergio and Rickie and specifically say how much he enjoyed watching young Rickie play so competitively with the pressure of being in the final group on Sunday. A bit of the Payne Stewart sage advice to a young Phil Mickelson at the 1999 U.S. Open, saying Rickie will have many more chances in the Majors and his time to win is one of these is sooner rather than later.

Rory may never be the dominant competitor that Tiger proved to be the last decade and a half but the game of golf badly needs the combination of competitive flair and approachable personality that he will bring to the sport between now and the time he is 35. Pretty sure you can bet the house on this.

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(Click to read Jason Gay’s WSJ article “Rory McIlroy’s Father Knows Best”)

Jason Gay

Wall Street Journal

July, 2014

As you can read in Ron Sirak’s article about Mo Martin’s win in the Ricoh Women’s British Open at Royal Birkdale it was totally unexpected and it made lots of people happy.

Mo brandishes a telegenic smile…..

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The fact that she did it with a near Gene Sarazen on the final hole in a howling British Isle breeze makes it all the more intriguing. As the 99th player in the World Rankings I don’t think there were even odds for her at the British betting establishments. This outcome was the stuff of bedtime fairy tales.

Almost a shot heard round the world…at least the ladies golf world

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Like Ben Curtis winning the Open Championship at Royal St. Georges in 2003, the best player the last day won the hardware and it does not matter whether it seemed to happen under the radar or not. Mo’s even par 72 on Sunday was tie for the best round on a very difficult day when the more familiar names were hemorrhaging strokes to par from the opening hole. Major winners like Feng and Pettersen shot 75, Park shot 77, and Lewis shot 78-none of them could mount an assault on the one-under 287 score Mo posted an hour earlier.

Some kind of a pleasant surprise….

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As the article says Mo is a breath of fresh air on the ladies tour and someone the players and the fans find it easy to root for.  Based on the celebration of her co-workers and the comments of the name pursuers involved it is obvious that this was a magical Cinderella story that the golf world will embrace with open arms.

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(Click to read Ron Sirak’s joyous article about Mo Martin’s British Open Win)

(A related piece by Jamie Diaz on Mo Martin’s engaging graciousness )

Ron Sirak and Jamie Diaz

Golf World

July, 2014

My buddy Larry and I walk into a golf shop to check in for our tee time and when we announce that Larry and Moe are here for the 10:05 the response is often the standard…”So where is Curly?”. When we walked into the shop at Pat Ruddy’s European Club in Brittas Bay, south of Dublin, on a day in late June 2001 we got the same refrain.

Commemorative Larry-Curly-Moe photo op adorns all our walls

Imagine our surprise when returned after the round for a cold Guinness and some Paddys and Pat’s son at the counter says Curly will be out in a second. Next thing we know a gregarious man with a mop on his head burst out of the kitchen with his arms spread and says ”Larry……Moe?”

What ensued was an hour and a half of some of the most entertaining golf talk I have ever experienced. Ruddy once said in an interview for Golf Ireland, “When a person comes to Ireland, they become a member of the family. Friendships are formed that last for decades. We notice a visitor and we embrace them. They are not just fodder to a business, they are very welcome,”

Pat shows off his library of 6500+ golf books upstairs at the European Club

He was true to his word with us….Ruddy treated us like long lost friends as we talked links courses, bad design, good rounds, tricky winds, knee-deep stuff on 13, and everything in between.

Some sample Ruddyisms:

We were discussing the severity of bunkers on links courses that often force you to consider the option of playing away from the hole. Pat, the king of the big fish story, related how he was playing an alternate shot event one day partnered with one of the local parish clergy. When Pat pinned him up against the face of a green side bunker with his approach he said, “Father you might consider hitting this one backward to give me a playable shot”. At which point his partner dutifully pulled a six iron from the bag and hit it 150 yards back down the fairway.  The man knew how to follow instructions.

In response to my suggestion that he consider adding a chicken sandwich to the robust menu in the cafe at the European Club he said, “Chicken…a great idea…I’ve been in touch with a Chinese chap who is faced with a crisis concerning 60,000,000 birds with throaty coughs. Maybe we can bring those sandwiches in really cheap…. if we can solve the transportation problem….leave it to me.”

In discussing the construction of the two signature par threes that play off the tallest dune on the Ballyliffen Glashedy Links, he said the locals, dead set against him disturbing this iconic dune,  failed to understand that it was already blowing away and covering the fairways of the new holes behind it with sand.  “So one February night at 11 p.m. I organized two dozer men, two excavator men, and a truck man and worked through the night in snow and sleet having them 95% built by dawn. No one came out to protest so they were too lazy or maybe they knew how determined I was.” These holes are two truly delectable links experiences or as Ruddy says, “I was giving them two helpings of that dessert”.

Quite the backdrop…the 8th green and beyond at his European Club

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As I found out from our first conversations and a number of correspondences between us over the next few years this is a funny, charming, opinionated, and charismatic guy that the golf world needs to know better.

You can get a bit more about Pat Ruddy, his opinions on things golf architecture and more through the David Desmith article from Links Magazine linked below.

One of the many European Club features that spur contemplation

Enjoy this article as well as a couple of moegolf course reviews of The European Club and Ballyliffen Glashedy Links.   Most important, make it a point to visit The European Club next time your soft spikes make land in Ireland.  It is a unique links experience not to be missed and, maybe if you are lucky, a diametrically challenged man will appear from the kitchen and regale you with a bit of Irish hospitality that you will never forget.

(Click here to read David Desmith’s Article About Pat Ruddy from Links Magazine)

(Click here to read moegolf reviews of The European Club and Ballyliffen Glashedy Links)

David Desmith

Links Magazine

In this week’s NCAA Men’s National Golf Championships the use of push carts at the hands of members of the nationally ranked Stanford Cardinal Golf Team seems to have turned a few heads.

As you can read in this article “A Pushback Against Push Carts” by John Paul Newport of the Wall Street Journal, some talking heads felt that use of push carts by young golfers represents unmanly behavior. These are obviously the same people who think that dropping cigar ash on a putting green is no big deal.

A Good Walk Enhanced…….

Trent Dilfer, former NFL quarterback who obviously took a few too many head hits from charging lineman said “push carts are a BAD look for these kids”. PGA pro Bo Van Pelt agreed. Ex-PGA pro Steve Flesch said that using them in tournaments doesn’t look right.

As Newport says, these are prejudiced expressions of thoughtless macho men who continue to perpetuate the ludicrous notion that hand carts somehow represent a more lowly form of muni-golf. They are oblivious to the concerns of golfers of all wage categories who want to get a good walk on the golf course without the stress of lugging 20 lbs of equipment on their back.

Hand carts have been the mode of transportation for golf clubs everywhere but the United States forever. The snobbishness Americans cling to against their use is just senseless.

I dare say that Dilfer probably does not carry his bag from his trunk to the bag drop at the celebrity events he plays in and Van Pelt and Flesch pay others to carry around their coffin sized bag of golf goodies when they play in a tournament.

At our place we fought for almost 20 years for the right to stay out of motorized carts if we choose and walk the course for our physical well being. We finally prevailed and hand carts have become a seamless part of the fabric of our country club every day of the week. Many of those who fought it vociferously are now adopters.

At least guys with a college education are starting to get it. Stand up and assert your right to push anywhere you play.

(Click to read John Paul Newport’s article “A Pushback Against Push Carts”)

May, 2014

We know that golf has become a global game and so has the dissemination of information about it. For the last few years the folks at TalkinGolf Radio in Australia have built a library of podcasts, for your listening and learning enjoyment, from interviews with a variety of notables in the game of golf.

Australian Rod Morri moderates these heady conversations along with the help of Geoff Shackelford of Golf Digest/Golf Channel/Geoff Shackelford.com, Mike Clayton a former Aussie touring professional now turned golf course designer, and Scottish columnist John Huggan. They cover an array of golf stuff that matters in unvarnished conversations without editorial constraints-this means no holds barred-they tell it like it is.

These world wide conversations come out about every fortnight with distinguished guests including authors, course architects, and dignitaries of the game. Their 39 episodes, each about an hour in length, have covered slow play, how money is ruining the game, marketing and the business of golf, bifurcation of the rules, Golden Age course architecture, and lots more. Guests have included golf analyst Judy Rankin, architect Gil Hanse, authors Mark Broadie and Curt Sampson, PGA of America President Ted Bishop, and Ran Morrissett one of the protagonists of GolfClubAtlas, the premier course architecture website.

I particularly enjoyed the conversation with Gil Hanse (episode 6) from 2012 right after he was awarded the task of designing the Olympic Course in Rio.  It gives your a real sense of the design/build approach his firm employs in all their design projects.  There is a wonderful rambling conversation between Morri, Clayton, and Shackelford (episode 32) about the charm and intrigue of Royal Melbourne.  The conversation (episode 39) with Ran Morrissett, the editor of GolfClubAtlas, is a treasure trove of content.  It covers everything from sand based course architecture with the restoration of Pinehurst #2  to the solace of playing with hickory clubs.  This man knows what is good golf and is not afraid to share his opinion.

You can subscribe to these podcasts for free through Apple iTunes/State of the Game or by downloading the free Apple Podcast app.

This is heady stuff that will fascinate the golf devoted. Perfect companion for a long ride to beach or a quite hour of golf meditation in your favorite easy chair.

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State of the Game

Talkin Golf Radio
May, 2014

As a young toddler Michael Labrie was the victim of a horrid household accident that left him badly burned over 90% of his body. There was little hope he would survive but with an incredible display of personal courage and determination, and lots of family support, he has done way better than survive, he has flourished.

As you can see in this piece from Jimmy Roberts’ In Play series on Golf Channel, this young man teaches a life lesson to the rest of us. What he has overcome is mind boggling, but what he has accomplished is the stuff of true inspiration.

Whether it his him rendering a soulful piano piece, playing to a single-digit handicap, or simply displaying a grounded perspective of how to deal with the cards he was dealt, this is a person who understands life is for living. As Jimmy Roberts says, “Maybe the scars….first compel your gaze…but what he can do, not what he can’t, soon become the attraction.”

When asked, “Do you think you are extraordinary.” Michael’s reply was, “No…don’t.” When asked if he thinks he is unusual, “I think I am unusual, but we all are.”

There is something reassuring and extraordinary about that statement….this is a man who has found inner peace and accomplishment where it ought to be found….in his heart.

(Click to see this wonderful Profile in Courage of Michael Labrie)

Jimmy Roberts

In Play-Golf Channel

February, 2014

This week the PGA Tour will put on display once again the gem George Thomas created in 1926 at Riviera Country Club.  The course remains remarkably unaltered and is one of the favorite courses for guys who appreciate the genius of the classic designs from the Golden Age of Golf Course architecture.  Hale Irwin says there are no two holes that are remotely alike and loves the challenge that demands thoughtful tactical play to resolve Thomas’s strategic puzzle.

For more insight into the mind of it’s creator you can read the attached “interview” that Geoff Shackelford did with George C. Thomas (born Philadelphia October, 1873-died Beverly Hills February, 1932) for Golf Club Atlas in September, 2001.  As a course architect and author Shackelford is uniquely qualified to ask the questions and provided the authentic answers since he has written a history of Riviera (1996) and a biography on George Thomas (1997).

In the interview Shackelford reveals George Thomas’s philosophy of design, his relationship with his long time construction associate Bill Bell, his opinion on the developing “ball problem”, and even his reaction to the disastrous changes that have been made to two of his most famous designs Bel-Air and Los Angeles Country Club.

His central theme in all his designs are captured in this quote regarding what features of Riviera have helped fend off the advantages of new technology.

“The element of thought. Each hole was designed with ‘an intelligent purpose’ as my old pal Max Behr used to say. Giving the players options and tempting situations keeps them a bit off balance, even with the equipment they have today. The ability of players to understand the simple strategy of a hole is undoubted, but too often they play blindly and do not consider their best line of attack.”

Shackelford is one of the most knowledgable architectural writers of our time and this interview is an insightful look into the mind of one of the storied course architects of the Golden Age.

(Click to read Geoff Shackelford’s posthumous interview with George C. Thomas)

Geoff Shackelford
GolfClubAtlas
September, 2001