Part II
Say this for our hedonistic American lads.
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| A swing tweak left Tiger Woods' game in frighteningly good shape as the season concluded. (Getty Images) |
That said, the U.S. contingent can probably use their long winter vacation to digest the most tumultuous season in tour history, one that was rife with scheduling overhauls, a new playoff system, massive bonus payouts, plenty of terrific events and some ever-amusing griping from players who couldn't take the time to study the ramifications of the FedEx Cup changes.
On other more predictable fronts, the same guy continued to take home most of the titles and cash, between changing diapers, making TV commercials and building golf courses.
In the first of a two-part retrospective on the 2007 tour season, here's a comprehensive, and mostly comprehensible, look at what went right.
Next week, in golf terms, we'll unveil what went left.
What's fallutin' mean, anyway?
In terms of maiden voyages, the FedEx Cup hardly mirrored the Titanic, which some had feared. The previous tour model, based on earnings, had been in vogue for seven or eight decades. With the first year of the high-fallutin' fall points system in the books, it's clear that some modifications must be made, but if the central theme was to prompt the varsity players to compete head-to-head more frequently and to jointly draw the attention of the golf fans after the PGA Championship, then the tour delivered a welcome double-whammy.
People actually watched golf on television during the early stages of football season. It didn't help that Tiger Woods skipped the opener, but he nonetheless won two of the four events with some of the best golf of his career, mind you, to pocket a princely $10 million in deferred cash. He might not need the money, but the tour could use the infusion of interest.
Woods + wins = Happy networks, interested fans and a legitimized playoff premise.
"It got some criticism here and there when Phil or Tiger didn't play, but the bottom line is, it was the first year for it," Woody Austin said last week. "I don't care if it's baseball, football, basketball, NASCAR, whatever, nothing works exactly right the first year, especially when you're talking about a model that's been around for, what, almost 80 years?
"I mean, when you really look at it, it exactly did what it was supposed to do. It was supposed to get Tiger and Phil interested in those events and play head-to-head. They went head-to-head at Boston, they were head-to-head pretty much going into the final. Those two were the two top dogs, and they got them to play against each other, and that's what it was supposed to be about, and it did it.
"So from there they have to do their best to appease everybody else and try and make it a little bit better, which is what happens in any process. You always keep tweaking until you get it right. Football has been around an awful long time, and that BCS has problems every single year, and they've been tweaking a lot longer than we have in our sport."
If there's nothing to hide, prove it
In the sports spectrum today, there is an inarguable truth: If the perception of a problem exists, it doesn't matter whether the issue has real merit or not.
Despite claims from tour officials that the sport is cleaner than a new sleeve of balls, public and player outcry only increased for testing to be implemented. In 2008, the tour is expected join the major tours and governing bodies around the world to forge a unified front on testing, enforcement and penalties.
In some ways, the advent of testing marks a sad day for golf -- which prides itself on being a self-policing game -- but in this day and age, with millions on the table for athletes and extra yardage available via a pill or needle prick, testing provides an assurance that probably is overdue.
But this is golf, so don't expect much buzz in terms of busts. After all, as Brad Bryant once cracked, the traditional Champions Tour breakfast consists of "four Advil and a Diet Coke." That's likely the case on every major tour.
Masterful strokes
It didn't take long for new Augusta National boss Billy Payne to put his imprint on the Masters toonamint, as his predecessor called it. Taking over for Hootie Johnson, Payne re-instituted the old club rule in which all PGA Tour winners are assured of an invitation, except those who win an opposite event or Fall Series tournament.
In another decision that was well-received, Payne ordered the removal of trees that were planted down the right side of the 11th hole, a Johnson alteration that was roundly reviled. The trees looked like a bad hair transplant, spliced awkwardly into place anything but seamlessly.
If Payne keeps up the good work, I might actually forgive him for the two weeks of misery I spent in Atlanta in 1996, covering the Olympic Games, of which he was the head honcho. Ever spend an hour on Atlanta's cramped MARTA train while standing next to a sweaty European journalist who hasn't bathed since he set foot on U.S. soil? My contact lenses curled up.
Harried Harrington ends Euro trashing
Caroline Harrington spit forth the words that everyone was thinking but dared not say in her presence. Her husband had just make a complete mess of the 72nd hole of the British Open at Carnoustie, as had France's Jean Van de Velde in 1999 on the same course and under comparable circumstance.
"We had visions of Van de Velde there, didn't we?" she said as her disconsolate husband signed his card nearby.
A minute later, Sergio Garcia made a mess of the 18th as well, and the Irishman eventually beat the Spaniard in a playoff to become the first European to win a major in eight full years. Good thing, because Harrington doused two balls in the creek on the 18th, and had he lost, the U.K. tabs would have conjured up headlines like, "Plunk of the Irish."
Ready for prime time?
After years of waiting to televise the PGA Tour's primary product, the Golf Channel's debut this season with the big-league circuit was stronger than most had reason to expect. While industry reports indicate the season-long ratings on the cable outlet were nothing to rave about, the network's freshman effort with lead analyst Nick Faldo in the booth gave most veterans reason to be optimistic.
Since there are 14 years left in the broadcast contract, why not look at the glass as half full, right?
"I think they do a fantastic job," veteran Stephen Ames said. "I think we're seeing a different Nick Faldo in the booth than we saw on the golf course. I think he has done a wonderful job."
The network decision to selectively rebroadcast its live fare in prime time was well-received. Still, production values were often spotty, and the loss of ESPN and USA Network as platforms didn't set well with everybody.
"I think any typical sports fan would prefer it to be on ESPN," Scott Verplank said. "Because ESPN's a bigger name, a bigger network. You go into a sports bar or wherever, and ESPN's always on. It wouldn't do me any good to grade it (the Golf Channel) on one year. Ask me in 15 years."
In the grand scheme, the move to the Golf Channel was perhaps the second-biggest story of 2007 after the implementation of the FedEx Cup. There was far less complaining about the network, as it turned out.
The Seven Dwarfs
That was my sarcastic title for the seven events wedged into the Fall Series, the dead zone after the FedEx Cup finished its run in mid-September. While the fields were admittedly thin and the big stars did little to contribute to the void by making the odd cameo appearance, the tournaments seemed to get off to a solid start considering three were essentially first-year events.
Though title sponsors anteed up plenty, somewhere around $5 million, to put their names on tournaments that drew few fans and modest ratings, most were seemingly happy to have gotten (or kept) their foot in the tour door. Ginn Resorts, which sponsored a first-year event with four months' notice in South Florida, gladly paid the full rate even though the sponsor was filling a last-minute void created when another event went belly-up.
"We were just delighted and flattered to be associated with the tour's top product," said Ginn tournament director John Subers.
As long as title sponsors are lining up to pay the financial freight, veterans have a place to play and charities are being bolstered -- Disney World's new sponsor, Children's Miracle Network, signed a six-year deal -- then why not stage extra tournaments? That said, it would be nice if the Ponte Vedra could award FedEx Cup points for the following season as an inducement to get top players to enter.
"It's a slap in the face to some of those events to almost label them B-class events," said Ginn winner Daniel Chopra. "Disney's been around for years, Vegas has great history at that event.
"We were talking about it today that we need to do something, because these sponsors are putting up a lot of money, and the tournaments are not getting the respect that they deserve."
Positively presidential
The Presidents Cup is the anti-Ryder Cup. Which is to say, the Americans have fun, don't vomit on their color-coordinated attire and actually win more often than not.
The matches in Montreal were a hit across the board, thanks in part to native son Mike Weir's comeback victory over Tiger Woods in Sunday singles matches. After weeks of grinding and grousing along the FedEx trail, the matches were a welcome respite for fans and players, highlighted by Woody Austin's pratfall into a lake and his three subsequent birdies to half a match.
Now, going forward, the question becomes whether the Ryder knockoff can maintain its heady momentum when it goes abroad to Australia in four years, where it will be broadcast on a tape-delay basis. That plan hasn't worked that well for the Olympics, has it?
Tweaks, weeks and what they wreak
The Players Championship had long labored in the shadow of the Masters. Even the interviews of players in the days before the so-called Fifth Major were Masters-centric, since the season's first major was always just a dozen days down the road.
Moving the Players to May was one of the massive changes with regard to the 2007 schedule, which saw events in major towns like Chicago and Westchester, N.Y., shuffled to accommodate the FedEx freight train. But the TPC Sawgrass course never looked better, and having Phil Mickelson emerge as the winner only made the move from March to May look that much better. Now the event is evenly spaced between the Masters and U.S. Open and loses none of its perceived luster as a result.
The Harmonic convergence
It was the worst-kept secret in the game.
When Mickelson began working with swing coach Butch Harmon on the sly in the spring, word was bound to leak out. By the time Mickelson won the Players Championship, they were fully wedded to one another, and the results were fast and furious.
Mickelson shortened his loopy swing at the top, mostly kept the ball in play off the tee and was poised for a possible career year before injuring a wrist before the Memorial Tournament. Now healed, if he can keep his weight under control in 2008, he's probably the lone player in golf capable of consistently challenging Woods when the latter is at the top of his game.
Witness their duel at the Deutsche Bank Championship last fall, when a fully healed Mickelson played alongside Woods -- Harmon's former star pupil -- and took him down. It was a soap opera in spikes.
Oh, the humanity
The winning scores at the first two majors of the year were above par, and the story wasn't much different at other tour venues over the course of the year, either.
Though tour officials insist nothing sinister was afoot, there was no disputing the fact that 2007 produced some of the most punitive setups in years. Flags have increasingly been planted closer to the edges of greens. The rough keeps getting deeper as a means of fighting yardage gains. Holes get longer and longer.
As a result, in relative terms, scoring skied. For comparison, Woods led the tour in birdie average in 2000 with 4.92 per round. This year, he was first at 4.03, a drop of more than half a birdie from his 2006 season. All told, that's two fewer birdies per tournament on average for the game's top player. The number of eagles by the tour leaders fell even more notably, from 19 to 15, over the past two seasons.
Sure, tournaments like Bay Hill shaved a few shots off its posted par, and the cold weather at the Masters made scoring all but impossible, but this is a development that we are greeting with qualified applause. After all, if every tournament were conducted like the U.S. Open, where's the fun in that?
Eldrick the Unsinkable
Sometime after the British Open, all on his own, Woods made a notable change to his swing that had his peers gossiping, not to mention muttering, on the driving range. He stood more upright, moved closer to the ball and mostly ditched the ultra-flat swing plane he had used for three years. The results were jaw-dropping.
Then he became next to unbeatable, playing some of the best golf of his career to win the FedEx tournaments in Chicago and Atlanta. In Chicago, he missed a total of two fairways on the weekend, a staggering figure given his tendency to spray the ball in the past. Woods rolled to his 13th major in winning the PGA Championship and now has 61 career victories, one shy of Arnold Palmer for fourth all time.
Woods matched his career-best mark for lowest stroke average (67.79) and won seven times in 16 starts. So, what will most folks remember most about 2007?
"As a fan? It would probably be Tiger's dominance at the end of the year," Verplank said. "That or Woody falling into the water. That was a historical moment."
