Jack Welcomes PGA Championship Move To May, Floats Muirfield Village As PGA Option

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ESPN.com's Bob Harig on Jack Nicklaus' extensive comments endorsing a Players move to March, a PGA Championship to May and the end of the golf season by Labor Day weekend.

Interestingly, in the remarks I saw, Mr. Nicklaus suggested much of the decision-making at this point is in PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan's court, not the PGA Of America's.

Harig writes:

That would make The Open the last major championship and would clear the way for the PGA Tour to conclude its season earlier by moving its FedEx Cup playoff series, with the idea of finishing by Labor Day.

"To do that, [Monahan] has many moving parts,'' Nicklaus said. "But he wanted us to know he wasn't going to slight us in any way, he wants to encourage us and promote us.''

Nicklaus noted the "dismal" Tour Championship ratings and endorsed the new order of the majors, including the tighter window for play.

"It would bring the majors a little closer together,'' he said. "April [Masters], May [PGA], June [U.S. Open] and July [The Open]. I think that's good, too.''

In a suggestion that we could end up with only May PGA Championships in Olympic years, Nicklaus said he has discussed swapping out a Memorial for a PGA with the five families.

Nick Menta writing for GolfChannel.com:

If Muirfield were to host a future PGA, that would necessitate either a temporary change of venue for the Memorial or, as Nicklaus brought up himself, “a year off.”

“If we took a year off the Memorial Tournament, I’m not sure I’d want to do that or not. I’m not sure that’s what we want for our brand, our tournament. But whatever is best for the game of golf and however it works, I’m more than happy to about it and try to do it.”

Pressed on the issue of a PGA Championship at Muirfield later on, Nicklaus clarified, “I said we would consider it.”

Nicklaus Blames WD's On Entourages, Money

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AP's Doug Ferguson reports on Jack Nicklaus's pre-Memorial remarks on player withdrawals due to injuries.

Asked about Rory McIlroy's entry into the 2017 Memorial only to WD to rest an injured rib, Nicklaus said...

“You think I had any injuries when I played? Do you think Arnold had any injuries when he played? Do you think Gary had any injuries when he played? How many tournaments do you think that we entered that we withdrew from during the course of our career?” Nicklaus said.

He put his forefinger to his thumb to signal zero.

“Never entered if I wasn’t going to play,” Nicklaus said.

After mentioning the money in the game, there was this gem about entourages.

“Would they withdraw back 30 years ago? Probably not, because that wasn’t the norm,” Nicklaus said. “We played through it. We had a ton of injuries and I played through it. But that’s sort of the norm today. And the guys … I made my own decisions. I didn’t have an entourage. I didn’t have a fitness trainer. I didn’t have a nutritionist, whatever you all have, somebody to cut my toenails in the morning.

Zing!

"I didn’t have any of that. I did that myself.

“I think that entourage helps make that decision for the player, telling them, ‘We think physically this is probably not right for you to play.’ And that’s what their job is,” Nicklaus said.

DVR Alert And Q&A: "Jack" Producer Israel DeHerrera

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Producer Israel DeHerrera, who also served as the lead producer for the critically acclaimed, three-part Arnie film in 2014, led the ambitious team behind "Jack", debuting Sunday night after Live From The Masters.

DeHerrera's Golf Films has worked on numerous projects, including ’86, a chronicle of Nicklaus’ final major championship win at the 1986 Masters.

DeHerrera helps give us some insight into the three-part film that concludes with Monday and Tuesday night airings on Golf Channel.

GS: Give us the timing of how long this documentary has taken from beginning to end?

ID: We first approached Jack at the Memorial Tournament in 2015 about a four part series. The first installment being 86, which premiered on Golf Channel in April 2016, followed by the current three part series.

Golf Films began production right away on 86, and during that process collected content for the larger Jack series. Intense pre-production for the three-part series began in  April 2016,  and post production began in December 2016.

 

GS: What are some of your favorite finds and pieces of footage we’ll see?

ID: There’s some cool footage of Jack attending Jackie and Steve’s high school football game in the early 80’s. He demanded an early tee-time at the World Series at Firestone on Friday so he could fly home for the big game. We found the footage of him at that actual game from an NBC News affiliate. Additionally, we have a lot of home movies and there is some compelling footage of him and his sister as kids with their mom and dad. Great stuff of Jack playing baseball, football and basketball, and footage of him in his dad’s old drug store on the Ohio State campus. But by far, my favorite piece of video was of Jack in Butler Cabin being interviewed during the CBS broadcast by Clifford Roberts after his win in 1972. Roberts says to Jack, “and in connection with that new wine cellar you are building, I am going to send you an entire case of Château Lafite, 1952.” And Jack’s response, (laughing),  “Hello! Look out!“

GS: You tracked down someone who attended every major won by Jack, what was that process like and what was the thinking behind that for the film?

ID: We wanted to make sure we were bringing as much authenticity to the film and taking viewers back in time to feel like they were there for all of these greats moments in Jack’s career. We tried to do that by tracking down an individual who was in attendance at each of his 18 major victories. We also tracked down memorabilia and artifacts from those major victories to help bring these stories to life.

 

GS: There have been rumblings you’ve gone to other GOAT’s to discuss Jack? Who did you get and how did that work out?

Who better to weigh in on the debate of the greatest athlete of all-time than individuals who can actually relate to that stature? From the burden of holding that title and from getting inside the mind of what makes someone stand above the rest, we were fortunate enough to have an elite collection of GOATs weigh in on Jack and his legacy in golf and sports overall, including Roger Federer, Wayne Gretzky, Jerry Rice, Pete Rose, Bill Belichick, Kelly Slater, Richard Petty, and Annika Sorenstam.

 

GS: Jack Nicklaus told the story of the gift you got him as a thank you, give us an idea how you tracked down the artifacts? 

ID: This was a big commitment of Mr. Nicklaus’ time, and I just wanted him to know how much I appreciated him letting Golf Films tell his story. What do you get the man who has everything? Jack and I got to talking about baseball one day and I asked him if he was an Indians or Reds fan. He said Indians, and in fact the first game he had ever attended was a Yankees-Indians game with his dad at Yankee Stadium in 1948.

In that game Bob Feller and Satchell Paige had pitched, and Joe DiMaggio hit a grand slam. I had actually produced a documentary before on Bob Feller and knew that 1948 team very well (World Series champs).

I started doing some research and was able to find the box-score from the game online (of course Jack remembered it all perfectly). I contacted Jimmy Roberts who has a friend, Jeff Idelson, who works for the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Jeff put me in touch with someone who collects ticket stubs from every meaningful baseball game that has ever been played. And sure enough he had a stub from that game (he refused payment and said, “Knowing this is going to Jack Nicklaus is payment enough”). I then was able to find a program from that weekend’s game online after weeks of digging. I ordered up original copies of the New York Times from the day before the game and the day after and placed everything in a shadow box with pictures of Jack and his dad plus a picture from that ball game.

 

A sampling from the film:

Jack On Lexi, Scorecard's Signed And A USGA Apology

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Pretty gripping stuff yesterday from Jack Nicklaus at a 5 pm Masters pres conference.

First on ball marking...

Q.  In a discussion earlier today with Phil Mickelson about what happened with Lexi Thompson, he suggested that on the TOUR, players are becoming very lax about marking their ball, and maybe the difference between two and three inches on the marks.  Did you ever have problems with that when you were playing?  And secondly, when you saw a rules violation when you were playing, did you bring it to the attention of the player or would you keep mum about it?

    JACK NICKLAUS:  First of all, I was very careful how I marked the ball.  I did not ‑‑ we govern ourselves.  We call rules on ourselves.  The integrity of the game is that you do things the right way.  So I don't think I ever in my career ever marked a ball incorrectly, okay.

    Second, on three occasions on the TOUR, guys were cheating.  And I looked at my playing partner, and he came to me and we talked about it and we said, if it happens again, what do you think.  So on three occasions, it happened again.  Three occasions we took it quietly to the tournament director of the tournament and got out of it.  Nothing was ever said publicly about it.

    Do I like that ‑‑ and I think it's our obligation as a player, if there is a rules violation that's blatant ‑‑ I mean, it could be accidental.  But if it's blatant, then I think it's not fair to the rest of the field not to bring it up.  But you bring it up quietly and try not to embarrass somebody and do it in a class manner that would maybe ‑‑ we had one in The Presidents Cup last time, I think it was last time.  Anyway, and we said, what do we do about it.  And I don't know why I got involved in it.  I wasn't in the tournament but I was there.

    They just got the captains together and had a little conversation with the young man and it was probably the best thing that ever happened to him.  I think you can handle it properly, to his advantage.

    What happened with Lexi, how in the world she did what she did, I don't have any idea.  She had a 12‑inch putt.  She certainly wasn't getting any advantage from it.  And I think she just made a mistake.

    I don't think she did it on purpose.  I don't think she did anything malicious about anything or trying to cheat.  It just happened.  She did it and did it wrong, and it was obvious that she marked it back probably an inch and a half away from where it was.

    So I mean, I don't know her well, but I know her.  I played with her.  Nice gal.  I don't think that's the way she was brought up or the way she would play.  And so I think it just happened to be a mistake.

And then there was this, which was the primary Big Oak topic of the day: the scar on golf caused by scorecard signing, phone-in rulings and the issues created by an outdated system.

    Now, my opinion on that kind of stuff is that once the round is over, and the scorecard is signed, the day is over.  That's my opinion.  I mean, that isn't necessarily what it is.  But that's what I think.

The Golden Bear has spoken.

Then there was this on Oakmont and Dustin Johnson's situation last year.

 I mean, I think what happened with Dustin last year at the U.S. Open, and to tell him on the 12th hole after waiting six holes to tell him; and then waiting, we're going to discuss it at the end of the round, you can't do that.

    I mean, if you're going to penalize somebody, penalize them.  At least let them know and that's when they have the ability to be able to correct it, or try to do the best they can.

    I mean, I had a big argument with Mike Davis about that at The Open.  I says, You can't do that to the guy.

    Says, Oh, we did it throughout.

    I said, Mike, I don't think so.  That was not the right way to do it.  You need to really ‑‑ you've got to tell the kid right away and he's got to know where he stands.

    Mike said, No, I think you're wrong.

    Well, okay.  Taking it back ‑‑ I went to Ireland and next day I'm coming back on an air plane from Ireland and Mike Davis found me over the Atlantic (laughter).  And he says, Jack, I want to apologize.  I think you were right.

    And I thought that was very nice that he did that.  I think the USGA, you don't often hear them say they think they were wrong (laughter).

    And that's not against the USGA or anything.  They are the ruling body in the game and try to do their best and try to do the best of their ability.  For them to make a mistake and think that they were wrong and correct it ‑‑ they had a couple last year that were not real good.

    But I think everybody in the game of golf tries to do it the right way, the best way.  I think there are very, very few people who take advantage of the rules in the game and if somebody does take advantage of the rules of the game, move on and make a lesson of it and I think that's the way we should handle it.

Even Jack Doesn't Know What To Think About Tiger At This Point

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Golfweek's Jeff Babineau quotes Jack Nicklaus discussing the state of Tiger Woods following the recent WD's and Genesis Open no-show due to back spasms.

This probably about sums up how most feel

Nicklaus doesn’t live very far from him, but he really doesn’t have much of a handle on what his happening with Woods and his health these days.

“That is the biggest puzzle to me that I know,” Nicklaus said Sunday at the Honda Classic. “I just don’t know where he is and where his mind is. I don’t know.

Jack: Tiger Struggling, But He Doesn't Know What With

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I'm not sure the bigger reveal, that Jack Nicklaus senses Tiger is struggling with is rehab/return, or that Jack knows this from an occasional text.

Joell Beall with the report on Nicklaus' latest remarks.

"He's struggling. I don't understand what he is struggling with," said the Golden Bear. "But I know he is struggling and he would be playing if he could play."

And Then Jack Said To Caitlyn...

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Opening his revamp of Sherwood Country Club, Jack Nicklaus came face to face with club member Caitlyn Jenner. Just recently Jenner posted a photo of her new Women's Locker Room locker, and Thursday she conversed with Mr. Nicklaus about the course's reopening.

Seems like a thought bubble for Mr. Nicklaus is called for, assuming you can maintain the family values theme of this website.