"Who Is Hall Of Fame Worthy?"

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The induction of Davis Love and Ian Woosnam raised the question from some: who is World Golf Hall Of Fame worthy?

Jaime Diaz of Golf World praises the hall for its new criteria and opening the door to worthy players based on the way the game has changed.

There is no doubt the WGHOF has set minimum victory requirement that is lower than what had unofficially been imposed. But it had to. While 15 lifetime victories seemed like a pittance when the game’s giants—several with more than 60 victories and in some cases double-digit majors—were being inducted, it’s also become clear that winning 15 times in the post-1975 era is a greater achievement than it would have been before, much like a .280 lifetime batting average is now more worthy of a spot in Cooperstown.

Recognizing the greatness in players who were stalwarts but didn’t win as much as the very best helps one understand the immense challenge of the game. Lowering standards increases appreciation, and keeps up the supply of candidates. It’s all good.

The hall continues to struggle with people who made contributions to the game in areas other than competitively. Tom Weiskopf was hugely influential as a television commentator and architect. And we know architects have struggled to gain respect from the hall, with people who made great contributions having not been recognized while Robert Trent Jones, whose positive impact becomes less understandable by the year, is in.

Also disconcerting is the even more backroom, old boys vibe to the selection process that only has two media members and decides who is HOF worthy in secrecy. Other sports HOF's succeed in part because the public knows who is eligible and even debates the merits of candidates.

Trinity Forest To Host Nelson Year Earlier Than Planned

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The Coore-Crenshaw design, opening this weekend and reportedly considered a potential future major venue, will host the 2018 AT&T Byron Nelson. That is a year earlier than expected, ending the PGA Tour's run at Las Colinas (since 1983) this upcoming season.

Art Stricklin reports the announcement will be made Wednesday with Jordan Spieth, PGA Tour EVP Andy Pazder.

Salesmanship Club officials said the early move came about for two reasons: The club and the Tour came to an agreement with the Four Seasons Resorts owner, Blackstone Real Estate Advisors, to get out of the contract early and the Tour's agronomy staff has signed off on when the course could host its first professional event.

Translation: they couldn't get away from TPC Las Colinas fast enough.

You can see a few Trinity Forest images at their official site.

Golf Pros Who Read Files: Padraig Harrington Credits Book (Really!) After Portugal Masters Win

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Shockingly there is a golf pro willing to confess his love (and good use) of the written word.

Even better than the idea a future Hall of Famer is searching so hard, is that Padraig Harrington credited the mental performance book after winning the European Tour's Portugal Masters on Sunday.

From Brian Keogh's account of the tournament:

What pleased him most about his win was his mental attitude and he credited coach Dave Alred with the turnaround having read his book, The Pressure Principle: Handle Stress, Harness Energy, and Perform When It Counts, earlier in the week.

"I feel really good," Harrington said. "I was very relaxed all week. I was in a nice place mentally.

"I've been reading Dave Alred's The Pressure Principle and it gave me a few pointers that maybe I'd been missing out on and I stuck to those all week. It was a big plus for me.

"I just realised how poor my own language is about myself and my game. So I was very focused on my self-talk this week and what I was saying to myself and very focused on my posture walking around on the golf course and it was a tremendous help."

More Stroke Play! PGA Tour Adds "The CJ Cup" In South Korea

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I held out hope that the PGA Tour adding an event in Korea with "cup" in the title might give us something to get excited about. Instead it's following the same old script beyond the massively unsustainable ($9.25 million) purse: limited 78-player field, 72-holes of stroke play.

The CJ Cup "@" Nine Bridges does bring us closer to our first tournament title including an Emoji in the title, and as far away as possible from a format that will inspire interest. It also just adds more clutter to the fall wraparound that isn't working well for players or fans, as we discussed on Morning Drive.

From the PGA Tour release on what we first learned about last week from Doug Ferguson, only with not as many CAPS.

THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES will feature a field of 78 players, with 60 coming from the PGA TOUR FedExCup points list. The remaining players, with many of the best Korean players represented, will come from a number of different exemptions to be named at a later date.

“This announcement is a historic landmark for the PGA TOUR as we add another tournament in Asia. We had such a phenomenal experience in Korea last year at The Presidents Cup, and we hoped an official, permanent event in this great country would be the result of that success,” said Monahan. “Partnering with a respected business leader like the CJ Corporation means this tournament will be on the Korean sports landscape for years to come. We have a tremendous population of Korean golfers on the PGA TOUR, and we anticipate that will continue as THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES inspires a new generation of players, not only in Korea, but also around the world.”

And...

The 72-hole tournament will feature competition Thursday through Sunday, with a pro-am on the Wednesday of tournament week. The host site of the tournament will be announced at a later date.

“The addition of  THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES to our schedule gives us three strong tournaments in consecutive weeks in Asia, and they will play a significant role in shaping the early part of the FedExCup season and the FedExCup chase overall,” Monahan continued. “The CJ Group is well-trusted and highly valued in the global marketplace. We couldn’t be happier to partner with such a strong, vibrant company that taps into the lives of consumers worldwide through food and food service, bio pharmaceuticals, homeshopping and logistics, entertainment and media, and now golf.

“South Korea is a beautiful country with a rich golf tradition,” Monahan added. “Many of our players who have been to the country already know that, and those who haven’t are in for a treat. The fact that valuable FedExCup points will be offered only enhances this tournament’s position on our schedule.”

As long as the Nine Bridges folks aren't hoping for big ratings, the event should succeed though prove utterly unremarkable beyond the purse.

Last week's CIMB Classic drew dismal ratings for the first three rounds (here, here, here) with the usual competition (baseball, football) and unusual (debate coverage) drawing viewers elsewhere.

Would a different tournament format boost audience sizes into six-figures? Probably not, but we'll never know apparently, either.

Let Sleeping Dogs Lie Files: Tiger and His Stanford Regret

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During Tiger's rebranding/Foundation 20th media tour, he understandably didn't have much to talk about given the state of his game. This unfortunately led to the strange comment of only having one regret: leaving Stanford with two years of eligibility remaining.

This opened the door for this analysis of the many reasons Woods had no choice but to flee Stanford. From GolfDigest.com's John Strege, who closely covered Tiger's junior and college career and said the comments "ring hollow".

1. The NCAA’s influence. It began when he was a high school sophomore and had accepted an offer of an honorary membership at Big Canyon Country Club in Newport Beach. The NCAA was concerned that Woods might be jeopardizing his college eligibility. The NCAA eventually ruled that that there was not a rules violation.

Once Woods started at Stanford, several NCAA conflicts or potential conflicts arose, among them: Writing diaries for magazines from his first Masters appearance, warranting a one-day suspension; using, in the same Masters, balls and equipment not provided by the university in potential violation of rules. “If you look at this situation objectively,” his father Earl said, “this is the perfect opportunity for Tiger to say, ‘kiss my yin, yang’ and leave school.”

Woods also was suspended briefly for having lunch with Arnold Palmer at the Silverado Resort and allowing Palmer to pay for it. “I don’t need this. It’s annoying,” he said.

Tiger was also mugged by someone who knew his name, reason enough for most of us to get out of Palo Alto!

The SI/golf.com gang kicked the topic around in this week's Tour Confidential and if you can handle the constantly wiggling web page, the discussion is interesting. From Gary Van Sickle:

VAN SICKLE: Tiger isn't delusional, he's utterly competitive. What's delusional is that he regrets leaving Stanford, where he was mugged at knifepoint on campus by someone who knew his name, and that he could've possibly remained eligible for NCAA or amateur golf after his first two years and all that went on. Other than that, it was close to the vest and, to be honest, kind of a snooze despite Rose's best efforts.

Lions Muny Gets Endangered Places Landmark, Still Needs Help

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Jenni Lee of KVUE reports on the dedication ceremony bequeathing official national endangered status on Lions Municipal. The course land is owned by the University of Texas, the former football power mired in another rough season, which wants to turn the historic course into a mixed-use development.

Among those turning out where golfers who enjoyed the links thanks to integration and affordability.

Such rich history is the reason Muny was added to the National Register of Historic Places in July.

But it was also added to the list of Most Endangered Historic Places earlier this month. The University of Texas Board of Regents wants to shut down Muny when its lease expires in 2019 and replace it with a mixed-use development.

"Here we go again," said Mary Arnold, a member of the group Save Muny.

This is the third time 81-year-old Mary Arnold is fighting UT. The university’s Board of Regents has already sold off acres of the donated Brackenridge tract of land for development twice before.

A stone lion has been greeting visitors at Muny since 1924. Supporters hope it sticks around.

I would argue that the fight for Lions is important in establishing the vitality of city-center golf courses as green spaces, but when they are in deteriorated shape, they become more expendable. One more reason we need a serious program restoring important public courses and WPA project links.

A video from KVUE's reporting on the ceremony:

Repot: Dick's Sporting Goods Wins Golfsmith Bankruptcy Auction, Loves Golf Again!

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By winning the Golfsmith auction, Jessica DiNapoli of Reuters says Dick's Sporting Goods will become the leading golf retailer based on number of stores (it may already be now).

Pending bankruptcy judge approval, DiNapoli says:

Dick's plans to keep open at least 30 Golfsmith stores and wind down the rest with liquidators from Hilco Global and Tiger Capital Group, the people said. It plans to keep about 500 of the company's employees.

Golfsmith had 109 stores in the United States at the time of its bankruptcy filing last month, and has been closing stores since then.

With the bid, Dick's, the largest U.S. sporting goods retailer, also won Golfsmith's intellectual property and inventory, the people added, asking not to be identified because the results of the auction are not yet public.

Mike Stachura of GolfDigest.com notes Dick's bullish attitude towards golf continues after the retailer gave indications that it saw golf as in "structural decline" and layed off its professional fitters not long after buying into Mark King and Adidas' Taylor Made vision of three new driver releases in one year.

Now, it looks like Dick's Sporting Goods, whose sporting goods store model is megasized but its Golf Galaxy brand model is a more conservative sized store, will be dictating a big part of golf's retail footprint going forward.

Flashback: When Bjorn Wasn’t Captain Woosnam’s Biggest Fan

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You know Thomas Bjorn is in full Ryder Cup captaincy campaign mode when he's congratulating old ("barmy") pal Ian Woosnam on his newfound World Golf Hall Of Fame status.

It's been a decade, but James Corrigan's story on Bjorn lashing out at then-Captain Woosnam from a decade ago makes for enjoyable reading, including the jab about not being burdened "with too many leadership qualities."

Amazingly, the issue was primarily over Lee Westwood getting a captain's pick with little-to-no consideration for Bjorn and others. How times haven't changed!

"So far his captaincy has been the most pathetic I have ever seen," said the 35-year-old, who is one of the European Tour's most respected players, and who is extremely popular throughout the Ryder Cup team room. "The man is barmy - to be captain and not communicate with a team or those in contention at all. I haven't spoken to him for six months, and then I find that I'm not in the team by watching it on television. How can that be right?"

This was nice too...

"I haven't heard a word off him for half a year, and I've spoken to several players who are on the team, and have been for a long time, and they haven't either," he said. "What sort of captaincy is that? I have lost all respect for him. My relationship with him is completely dead and will remain so. This will be the first time I don't even watch the Ryder Cup on television, and you don't know how sad that is, given how much I care for that tournament. I desperately want the 12 players to be a success, but I want them to do it in spite of the captain."

Ahhhh...but all is well now...that someone wants to be captain!