Popstroke: Tiger Announces Partnership With The Topgolf Of Putt-Putt

Today’s announcement was the first time I’ve ever heard of Popstroke, which already has one Port St. Lucie, Florida location. But by all appearances the concept is pretty simple: a modernized version of putt-putt courses, apparently minus the bad sound systems, windmills and pirate themes.

Essentially, a Topgolf vibe, only with a fun putting course, better food and TV’s to watch sports. Pricing seems reasonable, assuming the technology works and it’s fun.

Given how much Topgolf is thriving, the concept seems pretty smart. Tiger’s backing can’t hurt.

Adam Schupak with some of the details for Golfweek, including the basic structure of the venture and this related to the experience:

The PopStroke experience is enhanced with a technology platform consisting of the soon-to-be released electronic scorekeeping golf ball, the “iPutt” ball. The ball transmits scores electronically to the custom PopStroke app, which can be downloaded in the Apple and Android App stores. Players will be able to compete against each other in a tournament environment while earning “Pop Bucks” through the PopStroke loyalty rewards app program.

Pricing seems reasonable, assuming the technology works and it’s fun.

Schupak also notes that the company board’s initial makeup includes PopStroke founder Greg Bartoli and Pete Bevacqua, former CEO of the PGA of America and president of NBC Sports.

Compared to Topgolf, the footprint needed for one of these appears quite small. From Google Earth:

Will Golf Learn? Baseball Chases Long Ball All The Way To Lowest Attendance In Sixteen Years

The parallel’s between baseball’s pursuit of speed and home runs is oddly similar to the warped notion that golf fans mostly want to see long drives (with ratings down, that case is getting tougher to make).

Baseball and golf’s launch-angle focus has introduced safety issues in baseball, longer games and a less interesting version of the sport to watch. Similar parallels can be seen in golf. And yet…

Craig Calcaterra reports that in a record year for home runs, baseball saw its lowest attendance in sixteen years. While his focus on the price of attending games is no doubt part of the problem, the thirst to see home runs has not been enough to offset the economics. Sound familiar?

Nicklaus Outlines (In Great Detail) His Final (?) Overhaul Of Muirfield Village

This is a long one but certainly no shortage of meat on this bone!

For Immediate Release…

Muirfield Village Golf Club set to undergo course renovations for 2020 and 2021 

Dublin, Ohio – Muirfield Village Golf Club, home of the Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide, officially announced today a two-phase course renovation project that will be overseen by the Club’s founder and course designer, Jack Nicklaus. The renovations will take place over the next two years and will include three new teeing grounds, rebuilt greens and bunkers, and a redesigned fifth hole.   

Phase One will begin this fall and include new back teeing grounds for the par-3 8th hole, par-5 11th and par-5 15th, as well as new rough area for the par-5 5th hole.

A new rough area?

The work will be completed by this May and used during the 2020 Memorial Tournament, June 1-7. Each new tee box will add yardage to its respective hole, with No. 8 increasing by 25 yards, No. 11 by 15 yards and No. 15 by 30 yards. The changes will increase the total course yardage from the tips to 7,462 yards. Nicklaus’ ground-breaking and innovative design—done originally with input from the late Desmond Muirhead and officially dedicated on May 27, 1974—first played at 6,978 yards.

Well, little more than input, but let’s not get lost in a credit battle when the real eye-opener is the nearly 500-yard increase. And that Nicklaus is adding more might suggest he’s either not confident in distance regulation, or feels even with some rule changes some day that the yardage is needed.

To begin Phase Two of the renovation, Muirfield Village Golf Club will close the course July 6, 2020, at which time all 18 greens will be rebuilt, including new sub-surface heating and cooling equipment. Bunkers will be re-built, tees leveled, and the irrigation system upgraded.

As fairways are regrassed, Nicklaus said he will create new fairway widths, but keep them “fairly generous off the tee,” which has been a trait at Muirfield Village.

All greens will be laser-scanned prior to the beginning of Phase Two in order to retain the general slopes of the original design, with any modifications taking place in the field by Nicklaus. “Once we decided to redo the greens, I realized I wanted to make some minor changes to the contours,” Nicklaus said.

Once a tinkerer, always a tinkerer!

Phase Two will also include a redesign of Hole No. 5. The new layout will include an expanded landing area and convert Muirfield Village’s first par 5 on the outward nine to a par 4 during Tournament play, making the layout a par 71 for the 2021 Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide. “It’s the easiest hole on the golf course,” Nicklaus said. “They play a 3-wood or iron off the tee not to reach the creek, and then play a 5- or 6-iron into the green. I just want to create more landing area on the tee shot, so that quite often they will play driver off the tee, and then play 5 or 6 iron into the green as a true par 4.”

Sad, but true.

“This will probably be my last bite at the apple,” Nicklaus said. “I’ve done little tweaks on the golf course throughout the years, and some significant changes, like the par-3 16th. This time, we are going through the golf course, A to Z, and making sure we do everything at one time.”

One thought, just, you know, off the top of my head: maybe a little work on that new 16th too? Just saying…

“My director of grounds operations, Chad Mark, is a good man, and he helped talk me into it. He said Jack, ‘Once we’re in there, let’s just do this thing right!’ Once we decided to redo the greens, improve the irrigation system, redo bunkers and regrass fairways, the collective group—one that included Chad, General Manager Nicholas LaRocca, Head Professional Larry Dornisch and Memorial Tournament Executive Director Dan Sullivan—basically said, ‘Jack, if you are going back in there and do all this work, and the course is going to be down, you don’t want to go back to the membership and redo it again five years later for irrigation or three years later for bunkers. Let’s get the whole thing done!’ So that’s what we are doing.”

Mark has already developed a detailed timeline for the project and is excited about the work ahead.

Hopefully he consulted Chief Leatherlips.

“Working closely with Mr. Nicklaus, and with support from Nicklaus Design Associate Chris Cochran and our team at Muirfield Village, we envision the fairway bunkers and irrigation getting started after the 2020 Memorial and jumping into greens as soon as we can in July,” Mark said. “Once greens are completed in late August, and fairways and approaches are re-seeded to bentgrass, we will then finish the bunkering and push juvenile turfgrass toward maturity. Work in spring 2021 will include punch-work items with irrigation, compacting bunker sand, mending sod seams, and plugging any thin turf.”

Quick turnaround to the 2021 Memorial…

“We are very excited to carry out the vision of Mr. Nicklaus, and I think the end result will only further elevate an already spectacular golf course!”

Nicklaus emphasized that while many of the enhancements will make Muirfield Village Golf Club a better tournament venue, the renovation is also being done with the membership always front of mind.

“From what I have heard thus far, the membership is really excited about bringing the golf course back to state of the art, which they felt it was a few years ago,” Nicklaus said. “I want to make sure I do the best I can for the membership and for the Memorial Tournament. I’m putting in as many forward member tees as I can at Muirfield Village and The Bear’s Club. I will put in some forward tees at Muirfield Village while I am doing this. I have to make the golf course playable for its membership.” 

But….

“But my belief is that tournament golf should be a test to find out who is the best golfer that week. Far too many tournaments have eliminated the rough and firmness of greens, and that is just not my idea of what the game of golf should be. So I am going to stick with my old-fashioned beliefs about how the game of golf should be played and the way golf courses should be set up. How the USGA’s Joe Dey used to set up courses is how I learned and how I thought golf should be played. It’s the guy who drives the ball the straightest; the guy who plays the best iron game; the guy who is best around the greens and is sometimes challenged when he doesn’t play a good shot to the green; and the guy who putts well. The whole gamut of all shots is what the game of golf is all about. The game should challenge every facet of every club in the bag.”

Read into that however you like, but it sure sounds like the Golden Bear is tired of waiting around for governing body action on distance and defending skill.

Analyzing The Distance Debate's Latest Fuel To The Distance Debate

With the latest news on failed driver tests and Rory McIlroy’s follow-up remarks shedding a bit more light on what he was really getting at, I penned a short column for Golfweek on what this means for the Distance Insights study.

Random Testing Finds Multiple Non-Conforming Drivers From Multiple Manufacturers

Andrew Both reports for Reuters on multiple drivers failing the 30-driver random testing that began with the PGA Tour’s 2019-20 season. As promised, the tour would not comment on the failed tests or makers of the clubs, but Both says at least five belonged to players using a variety of clubs.

The non-conforming drivers are from across the manufacturing spectrum, including major brands such as Titleist, TaylorMade and Cobra, two insiders with knowledge of the matter said.

It is believed that Corey Conners, Robert Streb, Jason Dufner, Michael Thompson and Mark Hubbard were among those whose drivers did not pass the test.

That nearly twenty percent of the clubs tested failed has to be a shock to the system. Then again, it’s late in the hear and the “creep” factor that likely led to Xander Schauffele’s now-infamous failed test at the 2019 Open may be heightened near year’s end. Many players are likely to be soon switching to 2020’s latest-and-greatest drivers.

Still, the sheer number speaks to how close to the line manufacturers are taking the clubs and why the testing is both necessary, and likely to generate plenty of attention in spite of efforts to keep the results private.

Rory Apologizes: “Strategy, course management and shotmaking…are being slowly taken out of the game at the top level...worldwide"”

Realizing he barked a little too loudly after his Alfred Dunhill Cup appearance about European Tour course setup, Rory McIlroy posted an Instagram apology. But it was the last paragraph that suggests he did not lose sight of the bigger picture matter as it relates to skill and whether today’s equipment is having too much influence.

The full post:

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A post shared by RORY (@rorymcilroy) on Sep 30, 2019 at 12:00am PDT

Justin Timberlake: "I hit the ball with an old ass club and it was chill."

Add Justin Timberlake to the list of hickory converts or technophobic anti-capitalists, depending on your world view.

Neat moment in the Dunhill Links practice round posted by the entertainer:

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When they ask you to hit a hickory wood club from the 1800s and you stripe it down 18 aka for my non-golfers: I hit the ball with an old ass club and it was chill.

A post shared by Justin Timberlake (@justintimberlake) on Sep 25, 2019 at 12:32pm PDT

"Somewhere in the last three years, we’ve crossed the transom from being a sports industry to being a media industry"

As part of their “Sports Visionaries” series, the New York Times’ Ken Belson talked to sports psychologist Rich Luker about the world of sports and his polling company that works with “professional sports leagues and teams.”

He’s not wild about what he’s seeing in sports as leagues, teams and individuals soak up the numbers while distancing themselves from the core tenets of their “product”.

First off, this…

I do all I can to encourage sports to continue to be sports in the same way classic rock is classic rock. It was something that was part of the definition of the times, and it stood the test of time regardless of how things have changed. Sports in America, particularly the traditional sports, should be the same. Be the classic sports and provide the social context that is being lost on the internet.

Yeah, but Jack Nicklaus didn’t live under par dude! Sorry, go on to the really good stuff that may ring a bell, or not…

The people who run the sports are business people. They love their sports. But they are looking at what’s going on and see people developing new technologies that surpassed things in their own sports, so the logical temptation is instead of trying to beat them to join them.

If they dedicated 5 percent of their time, energy, effort and resources to the heart of their games, as well as doing the technology, they’d be just fine. My fear is that somewhere in the last three years, we’ve crossed the transom from being a sports industry to being a media industry. They are focusing more on the technology and the media than the sport itself.

But chicks dig the long ball, so we’re told without any actual spike in audience numbers to prove it.

What obstacles do you face in your field?

It’s something every social scientist faces. Some people are in research in sports who are only collecting behaviors and they do that using machines — Nielsen boxes and clicks on web pages and so on. There’s no interaction with human beings, they’re only collecting outcomes without knowing why. The biggest obstacle we face is that the research I do has always been about why you do what you do, it’s never been just what you do. It’s about understanding the motivations and your fulfillment and what detracts from your fulfillment.

If only Dr. Luker could get his hands on golf executives…

Flashback: Remember When "Flogton" Was A Thing To Save The Game?

Actually, I forgot about this doozy of a grow-the-game program, too.

Al was hatched in high-profile fashion eight years ago when former CEO Scott McNealy and friends appeared at the PGA Show, followed by a media tour to promote this game savior—including a lively episode of Talkin’ Golf with Rod Morri and yours truly debating McNealy.

I’d blissfully forgotten about this grow-the-game initiative until seeing it mentioned in this Golfweek item on McNealy hosting a President Trump fundraiser.

The group behind Flogton (Notgolf backwards) wanted to sell you non-conforming equipment to make the game more accessible. They believed excessive regulation by the USGA was stifling growth.

Some of their ideas sound incredibly absurd just eight years later and in a world more open-minded to distance regulation:

Probably the best aid right now is a low-friction face, created by either lubricating the face of the club and ball or by applying a stick-on face to the driver. By simply reducing the face/ball friction, you can reduce slices and hooks by over 50 percent.

Ah, a lubricant. Why didn’t I think of that?

Flogton has test wedges that increase spin 100 percent, just by improving the grooves and adding friction-inducing surfaces. With new, soft-but-durable-skin balls, we believe we can give “the rest of us” the ability to stop a well-hit ball on the green just like the pros.

The entire push faded fast. Which should be an important reminder for the governing bodies this fall when issuing their distance report: golfers want to play a version of the game in line with the traditional golf as we know it. The majority value rules to protect a reward for skill.

Flogton failed because the founders were attempting to profit off the game and blow a hole in the rules for a buck. Golfers, or aspiring ones, were not attracted to a dumbed-down, Al Czervik-friendly version of the sport.

It’s heartening to know something so short-sighted was a failure. It’s even more heartening that just eight years later, the array of “solutions” praised at the time no longer seem welcome now that so many more realize the game’s issues have more to do with time and cost than with ease of play.

So where is McNealy’s in 2019?

When you want to read about flogton from the AltGolf.org site it has vanished. Even the domain is now available, however, given the rise of the Alt Right, here’s guessing no one is in a hurry to claim this URL:

New Driver Testing An Upgrade, Except In The Dreaded Transparency Department

We know the PGA Tour does a lot of things well, transparency when it comes to player violations isn’t one of those. While Commissioner Jay Monahan moved the organization into the 21st century with some improved clarity on who fails drug testing, the public still may be in the dark on a number of fronts about about player fines and suspensions related to things like slow play, club tosses, recreational drug use and courtesy cars abandoned in airport loading zones.

And now drivers failing improved and more regular testing.

Golfweek’s David Dusek rightly praises the tour for upping their game in conjunction with the USGA. And focusing on catching clubs and manufacturers possibly flirting with the rules is absolutely the correct priority. However, that’s where things shift to a protectionist mindset that doesn’t seem to actually discourage cheating.

In a letter sent to players and manufacturers this week that Golfweek obtained, the tour said, “While this testing program will test the clubs in use by players on the PGA TOUR out of necessity, it is important to note that the focus of the program is not on the individual player but rather on ensuring conformity level of each club model and type throughout the season.”

That’s fine for a player’s organization to protect their own, and I’d guess 99.9% of the time players are not aware they have a juiced club because of wear and tear changing the club’s dynamics.

However, without any transparency, what’s the punishment for a clubmaker to obey the rules when all of this is kept behind closed doors free of the public shaming necessary in place of any fine system? Because Dusek writes:

There have been whispers in locker rooms and parking lots that this player’s driver is too hot and this company’s drivers are dangerously close to being non-conforming. Random testing should stop the suspicion and spare players the embarrassment and humiliation that Schauffele must have felt in July.

Random driver testing is easy, quick and long overdue. Golf may be a gentlemen’s game, but even gentlemen want to know that the playing field is level.

That includes the public and other stakeholders, no?

To put it another way: the reaction to 2019’s Xander Schauffele episode seems to be a search for a way to prevent player embarrassment, not from reigning in clubs that cross the line, whether intentional or not. Isn’t the first priority to protect skill and the competition, not egos?

"A PGA Tour player's goodbye, and record-breaking round, at his childhood course"

Sadly we’ve all lost a golf course we once knew or know of a favorite that may put us in the position Jim Herman recently experienced.

It’s a lovely read from another Cincinnati man, Joel Beall at Golf World, who talks to the two-time PGA Tour winner about returning to the muni that meant so much to his game, Shawnee Lookout. The course is closing in September and will be converted to a nature preserve.

Shawnee Lookout, a golf course that resides on the outskirts of Cincinnati. A place that charged $3 to play, that was so out of the way that Herman usually had the property to himself. A course whose fairways were rough, with greens that weren't, built on an incline so severe that it was better suited for skiing.

"It wasn't much," Herman says, "but it was ours."

Herman kept afloat through the memories of his youth that cascaded back that day, until he reached the 10th. That was the hole, Herman says, where golf hooked him. Driver, 3-wood, two-putt for a 4, from just over 300 yards, when he was no older than a fourth-grader.

State Of The Game 98: Distance, Money And Brandel

We welcome Brandel Chamblee back to the bifurcation deep state and also discuss the season-ending run of professional golf.

As always, Rod Morri, Mike Clayton and yours truly give the drinking game crowd some thrills, though if you focus only on the ball you might leave thirsty.

Little League Putting An End To Launch Angle Chase With New "Deader" Bats

The Wall Street Journal’s Amanda Christovich looks at the crackdown on what had been a speed and distance chase in youth baseball. Home runs are way down in the Little League World Series two years in a row now since “deader” bats mimicking wood were introduced for a variety of reasons.

Thanks to reader LS who detected the many things golf can learn from the USA Baseball moves, which seemed determined to keep the sport sane and safe both instead of emphasis on exit velocity, particularly since most young lads may not be physically ready for the emphasis on speed.

But that kind of power surge is not likely to happen at this year’s Little League Baseball World Series, which is now underway. Regulation changes—most notably, the switch to a “deader” bat that mimics wood bats—mean home runs in Williamsport this year are on the verge of becoming extinct.

“The difference is astounding,” said Patrick Gloriod, who coached the Peachtree City Little League team in the 2018 LLBWS and witnessed the steep decline in home runs at that tournament once the new bats went into use.

None of this would be a problem, if not for the fact that the best youth players have spent the last few years developing a swing designed for one thing: to hit as many home runs as possible. 

They’ll get over it. Will TV?

“Telling everyone to swing up is the same as telling everyone to swing down,” said Bleecker. 

If last year’s trend continues, those dismayed that the major-league ball is juiced can rejoice in how the Little League bat is deadened.

“I’m not sure how much ESPN is gonna like watching small ball,” said Gloriod.

Distance Debate: Focus Is Turning Away From The Ball And Toward Drivers

The Mauling At Medinah is Mike Clayton’s label for the shock and awe at the 2019 BMW, where Justin Thomas and many others overwhelmed the rain-softened 7600 yard course.

(Random thought interruption here: I thought it was the improved agronomy that meant tons of roll, yet Medinah was a sponge…anyway, we now return to our regularly scheduled distance post).

After looking at past Medinah majors and what scores were needed to succeed, Clayton writes:

Justin Thomas was unquestionably brilliant this past week at Medinah, where he answered all the questions the course posed. His 263 represents amazing golf, but is it a full 24 shots more compelling than Graham’s 287 was 44 years ago?

The question for the game, for the professional tour and the administrators in New Jersey and St Andrews is: How will you manage the technological assault on the game’s great courses and a game so out of balance at the top level?

Or do they abdicate their responsibility to restore the balance MacKenzie and his great contemporaries understood and built?

The evidence of what we watched from Medinah is the golf isn’t so interesting when the questions are so easily answered with power and wedges.

Much was made of Adam Scott’s comments calling out designers and officials to set courses up to require shaping the ball, but that’s tough to do overnight.

But it was his comment as reported by Evin Priest about drivers that accelerated his previous public statements about driver head size.

Scott warned superstar drivers may no longer stand out, such as Australia's Greg Norman and American Davis Love III did in previous eras.

"The driver is the most forgiving club in the bag now; it's just swing as hard as you can and get it down there far," he said.

"It's not a skilful part of the game anymore and it's really unfair for some guys who are great drivers of the golf ball.

"I don't think their talents are showing up as much as they should."

And there was Tiger as well at Medinah, echoing comments he’s been making all year:

“Now you just pull out driver, bomb it down there and you’re looking for three to four good weeks a year,” Woods said. “That’s how you play. It’s not the consistency, it’s not about making a bunch of cuts. It’s about having three, four good weeks a year. That’s the difference. Guys understand that.”

These comments have all presumably been made to the USGA and R&A as part of their distance insights research. No one mentions the ball much these days—calm down Wally!—some because they are paid not to, while others genuinely believe it’s maxed out.

So are we seeing a shifting focus to reducing the driver head size for elite players and would it make a difference? There is only one way to find out, once the manufacturers stop kicking and screaming about the massive R&D expenditures needed to knock 75 cc’s off their current models.

Taylor Made has a jump start with this mini-driver released earlier this year. Anyone test it out on a launch monitor?

Shark: Take The Ball Back To 1996 Specs

Greg Norman has been a consistent advocate for a golf ball that spins more. But unlike his recent shift away from shirtless Instagram posts, he has remained consistent on the distance matter.

And now he’s responding to Instagram posts on the hot button topic that became popular again as PGA Tour pros made a mockery of 7,600 yard Medinah.

This is the Shark we know has the game’s best interests at heart:

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Do you agree with @shark_gregnorman’s suggestion to wind the ball back rather than redesign courses for Tour events?

A post shared by GOLF.com // GOLF Magazine (@golf_com) on Aug 19, 2019 at 10:26am PDT