Gen Z Is Back! A Quick 2016 Drive, Chip & Putt Primer

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Year three of the Drive, Chip and Putt Championship arrives Sunday and once again the little ones will get their shot to drive down Magnolia Lane (well, they'll be shuttled), hit shots on the Masters range, putt on Augusta Natonal's 18th green and awkwardly high-five green-coated corporate moguls and former Secretaries of State. It's golf's best grow the game initiative because it's about competition and fun, with just enough Masters formality. 

In 2015, there were a couple of minor tweaks to the process in executing the championship along with Masters champions formerly agreeing to hand out trophies (they informally appeared in the inaugural year). I'll be interested to see what the atmosphere is like and how the governing bodies are getting along, but to date the USGA, PGA of America and Augusta National folks dealing with nuts and bolts stuff have done an amazing job. Mostly, it's a great day to revel in the clutch skill of the young competitors and to enjoy their once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Airtimes on Golf Channel (Eastern):
8-9 a.m.                       Pre-Game (Live From the Drive, Chip & Putt National Finals)
9 a.m.-1 p.m.               2016 Drive, Chip and Putt National Finals

One Direction's Niall Horan is going to be there and looks like he's getting in a little golf while he's in town.

 

 The kids are signing in!

Each #DriveChipandPutt golfer signs the player plaque. Follow 'drivechipputt' on Snapchat for more behind the scenes action. One more day! #ItsPlayTime

A photo posted by Drive Chip & Putt Championship (@drivechipandputt) on Apr 2, 2016 at 10:38am PDT

 The final run-through reveals there will be Snapchat coverage too...

Final preparations for #DCPFinals tomorrow! Follow 'drivechipputt' on Snapchat for a behind the scenes look at this weekends's action. #ItsPlaytime

A photo posted by Drive Chip & Putt Championship (@drivechipandputt) on Apr 2, 2016 at 6:25am PDT

 A couple of the more intriguing youngsters to watch have been profiled by Golf Channel. My favorite is that of Grant Herrenbruck, who made it to the DCP finals and this year will be rooting on his brother Tate.


Kynadia Adams is a returnee to the DCP and is profiled by Michelle Tafoya. 

About All Tiger Has Left: A Really Late Friday News Dump?

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If you were still true believing that Tiger was chipping away at his return and just felt he wasn't quite ready to tee it up in the 2016 Masters, then Friday's late news of a Masters no-start would fit a narrative that the Big Cat was oh so close to playing.

The newsroom at TigerWoods.com must have been buzzing when the call rolled in late after Woods called in to say he was just oh so close. But not really.

From their report:

"After assessing the present condition of my back, and consulting with my medical team, I've decided it's prudent to miss this year's Masters.

"I've been hitting balls and training daily, but I'm not physically ready. I've said all along that this time I need to be cautious and do what's best for my long-term health and career. Unfortunately, playing Augusta next week wouldn't be the right decision. I'm absolutely making progress, and I'm really happy with how far I've come, but I still have no timetable to return to competitive golf."

Hitting balls and training daily, but no timetable for a return? As Bob Harig notes in his take on the news, the latter line is the real takeaway here. But why wait until the Friday night before to share that?

Steve DiMeglio treated the news with the proper respect for USA Today and without information beyond what we learn on TigerWoods.com, that's the correct approach.

However, we know the circumstantial evidence suggests Tiger drew out this inevitable decision for reasons only he knows.

Perhaps resisting the urge to tell the folks at Augusta National he can't play keeps him motivated to train and hit balls, even when he has to know that showing up cold at a major after two surgeries is a terrible idea.

Perhaps he just enjoys the idea that everyone is talking about him, wondering when he'll return? But as I noted in the Forward Press this week, this news is now only of interest to casual fans. Serious golf viewers have moved on.

Perhaps he needs to project the illusion of being close to a return to keep his corporate partners happy? Though "no timetable for return" comments won't get their hopes up.

Perhaps he just watched too much of The West Wing. As Luke Kerr-Dineen noted at For The Win, this was the best one he's ever dropped.

Or maybe, he just waited until late Friday to make the golf writers and TigerWoods.com team work late into a spring Friday night in his ongoing effort to avenge the humiliating coverage that appeared on almost no golf website?

Either way, we will move along and regain our focus on what figures to be an absolutely splendid Masters.

State Of The Game Podcast 65: 2016 Masters Preview

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Rod Morri, Mike Clayton and yours truly kick around the Masters and more, from Horse Courses to Austin to the demise of the other "Masters."

As always you can listen via the embedded player below. Or get the MP3 here, check out the SOTG homepage here, or get it on iTunes here.

Meanwhile, ShackHouse Episode 2 with Joe House is alive and well and still an iTunes Top 15 show, including #1 in Sports!

iTunes users can get ShackHouse here, or specifically, Episode 2 here.

Or for Soundclouders, the show's page is here. Sticher just needs to approve and so you'll be able to get it there soon!

Preview: Bubba Watson On 60 Minutes

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Sharyn Alfonsi profiles Bubba Watson on the eve of his attempt to win a third Masters, this Sunday at 7 pm ET.

The preview:

View More: Previews News|60 Minutes News|Live News|More News Videos

Download Time! Masters, Augusta Apps Ready To Go

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The two primary apps you need for coverage and live streaming are updated and live. Just poking around the Masters app a bit, the design is beautiful as always and appears to be very user friendly (screen shots below).

The official Masters app in the iTunes store.

And in the Google Play store.

The Augusta Chronicle's app download links.


Adam Scott Not Opposed To Bifurcating Equipment Rules

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We'll put him down for reducing the driver head size. Since the scientists can only make a ball longer and not shorter, this may be an option.

From a very enjoyable Q&A with Brian Wacker at PGATour.com:

BW: If you were equipment czar of the game for a day, running the USGA and R&A, what would you change?
 
AS: I think it's possible that you could make an argument for having different equipment rules for us than the amateurs. I think that's almost logical to do that. I’d re-implement anchored putting because until I'm given facts that it actually is a game-improver, performance-enhancer, then I'm going to have to say I'd put it back in. Maybe driver head size is something I'd look at. That’s a massive difference now. When I was a kid, pulling the driver out of the bag was a concern, like you're going to have to make a great swing to hit a good drive. Now it's the go-to club. It's the most forgiving club we have. That's a huge difference in how you get off the tee to start a hole of golf.

And in the one-course-you-could-play-for-the-rest-of-your-life division, Adam picks...

 AS: I guess I'm torn. I could play Kingston Heath every day for the rest of my life in Australia, and the upside of that is in it's Australia and it's an amazing golf course. But I love Cypress Point. It's my favorite course in the world. I just love playing socially on those golf courses that are so much shorter and just less demanding length-wise for me, and then the people I play with can enjoy it. It's very hard to enjoy a round of golf when I play 90 yards from them. It's like we're on different courses. So those two, if I’m allowed to say two.

Rory Reveals Awkward Truth: Par-3 Contest A "Hassle"

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As much as we can appreciate the joy the Drive, Chip and Putt has brought to young lives, the Masters' other grow-the-game initiative took a bit of a hit with Rory McIlroy foreshadowing his plan to skip this year' Par-3 contest.

Speaking to The Guardian's Ewan Murray, the man who has famously had Caroline Wozniacki and Niall Horan as caddies and is as likely to enjoy the light pre-tournament mood as the next young star, says it's become a "hassle."


“It’s a bit of a distraction and the year I had my best chance at Augusta, 2011, I didn’t play the par-three contest,” McIlroy said. “So maybe the decision not to play it this year can work in my favour.”

Chairman Payne believes the evolution of the Par-3--which includes more cameos from kids and celebs and all televised on ESPN--can grow the game. But I have trouble imagining big Planned Parenthood donor Clifford Roberts agreeing. The Par-3 has gone from a cool chance for patrons to see old and new players in a relaxed pre-tournament setting, to a bit of a chaotic, disjointed, odd exercise interspersed with elements of the old Par-3.

To put the Par-3 in a different light: if any of the other major championships unveiled a similar pre-first round event, replete with kids running around the greens and celebrity pals chunking shots while dressed in a caddie suit, there would be calls to strip them of major championship status.

Nantz: "Bryson...has the capacity to utterly change golf"

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CBS broadcaster Jim Nantz sat down for a Golf Digest My Shot with Guy Yocom and covered many Masters-related elements, including amateur Bryson Dechambeau's upcoming start. DeChambeau stopped by Nantz's house to talk Augusta, great Masters amateurs and to borrow DVD's of recent Masters.

Nantz feels Dechambeau "has the capacity to utterly change golf" and that a win by the amateur "would be a fulfillment of Bobby Jones' dream of glory going to the amateur."

Casey Reamer, the head pro at Cypress Point and a mentor to Bryson, asked if I would speak to him about the history of the Masters. It was an amazing two hours. He asked every question imaginable about every significant player in Masters history, with an emphasis on tales of amateurs such as Billy Joe Patton, Frank Stranahan, Ken Venturi and Charlie Coe. I have DVDs of all the recent Masters, and Bryson asked to borrow them, not for entertainment so much as to study hole locations, how putts break, where players were laying up on the par 5s. This young man is obsessed with winning the Masters as an amateur. His mind works in a unique, scientific way. It all reminded me of Bert Yancey and how he constructed clay models of the greens at Augusta and studied them. It wouldn't surprise me at all to see this young man contend.

2016 Masters Odds And Why They Still Aren't Long Enough

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The "easiest" major to predict arrives in a few weeks, but a look at the various prices from GolfOdds.com or Bovada reveals very little incentive to plunk down money. A gambler can get better value on a Non-winners of Two Lifetime Starts $5000 Claimer at Turf Paradise.

Still, we know only about a dozen can win at Augusta if the course is playing long and slow as it has in recent years. As Gary Van Sickle at Golf.com found out interviewing an "anonymous gambler", the Masters is the best major to bet. But he still advises you stay on the sidelines. For reasons like this:

Anonymous Gambler: The thing that makes the Masters the best major to bet is the data. It's the only major played at the same course every year, so we've got numbers we can crunch. The Kid, as I call him, has played two Masters -- second once, ties the all-time scoring record in the other. He is the game's best putter, and there aren't three other players as good with a wedge. It's that simple. Plus, the Kid has found a system with his caddie to out-prepare the other guys, the way Jack Nicklaus used to. I love, love, love that. Except the Kid messed up this winter. He jetted all over the planet; he's pooped. He needs three weeks off, no golf, but that's not going to happen in March. O.K., he's 22; he's resilient. I'm just afraid he strained his back hauling all those dirhams, yuans and Aussie-Singapore dollars to the bank. I'm laying off him… for now.

While Spieth certainly isn't much of a value at 6/1, Rickie Fowler remains a barely interesting 12/1, while  the most attractive option is Justin Rose at 25/1. He finished second last year and has been working very hard with his team to peak in the second week of April. But until President Trump legalizes sports betting in America, I'll just have to dream of my potential winnings. Or bet that claimer at Turf Paradise.

16-Year-Old Costa Rican Headed To The Masters

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The finish to the second Latin American Amateur Championship was tense but decidedly captured by Costa Rica's Paul Chaplet.

The 16-year-old fired a final round 70 and after a few hiccups, closed out in style and becomes the first Costa Rican to appear in the Masters.

Kevin Maquire with the details and this interview with Chaplet:

"I wasn't expecting to win," Chaplet said. "I was expecting to shoot under par, which is my main goal, so that was accomplished. And with that came the win, so I can't really ask for much more."

And if you watched, I don't have to tell you that Pete Dye's Casa De Campo design looked pretty spectacular. The highlights: