Olympic Golf Clippings - "So, what are we really exporting?"

While the Golf Channel provided virtual house organ coverage, the scribblers who weighed in offer us some more thoughtful, nuanced and constructively skeptical thoughts on the Olympic golf confirmation vote.

Lawrence Donegan reports on the overwhelmingly positive response of players who pushed for the uninspired 72-hole stroke play format and got it, starting with Tiger Woods.

Marvin Collins writes that Padraig Harrington is predicting  the Olympic gold medal will become bigger than winning a major. Of course, Padraig thought Liberty National could host a major, too.

PGATour.com shows us who the Olympic field would be comprised of if it were held today and the list suggests that they need to revisit the qualification process. And as Bob Harig writes, the format still fails to energize most, leaving out a much needed team element and ultimately "would not be much different from a World Golf Championship event."

Harig is also not sure about how quickly this will transform the "growth" that was raved about today and explains why in interesting detail. And he touches on the issue of the date, which few have noted and which the Commissioner has at least acknowledged will be messy.

With the 2016 dates set at August 5-21, the PGA Championship will have to move (most likely to late August, right before U.S. Open tennis). The PGA is locked into Baltusrol that year to celebrate the PGA of America's centennial, which is a shame because it might have made for a fun, one-off spring return to a southeastern or southwestern venue that wouldn't normally be able to host a major. But we'll never know unless the PGA does something drastic.

Alistair Tait files this excellent wishful-thinking projection for the possible venues, one that will probably be laughed at in Ponte Vedra and St. Andrews:

Let’s hope the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro produces golf courses accessible to all.

I have two suggestions for Rio’s organizing committee and the IGF:
    •    If possible, give the work to a South American architect
    •    Make sure the course(s) leave a lasting legacy that many Brazilians can share in.

Imagine how U.S. architects would have felt if the Games had been staged in Chicago and the job of designing an Olympic golf venue had been handed to Johnny foreigner.

And finally, Steve Elling nails how many of us feel about the announcement in light of the state of golf in America and elsewhere. He wonders why we're entrusting some of the same folks and their ignorant concept for what draws people to golf, and allowing them to export the tired ideals that have undermined the sport's health here in America.

It won't mean diddly unless the multifaceted folks in golf, the economic Lords of the Wrings as it relates to squeezing every dollar out of as many pockets as possible no matter the long-term ramifications, take a long hard look at why they needed to look abroad for growth in the first place. This isn't intended to be a rant about greed and the greens. Consider it a reminder, a cautionary note, a how-not-to look at what needs to happen next.

There's nothing at all wrong with the idea of growing the game, or even the notion of making a profit, if it's handled properly. Unfortunately, those have often been mutually exclusive ideas in the States, where the game's fighting to keep its foothold as a recreational activity and, to a lesser degree, a big-league sports entity.

The game's American business model has been held together with airplane glue. You know, the stuff that makes you high if you huff it out of a paper bag, but eventually kills half your brain cells.

The sentiment among the game's power structure is that various governments around the world will channel developmental money into golf as they have other medal sports, establishing academies, building courses and buying golf balls by the boatload. All the things that haven't been happening much in the States these days.

For the past three years, more golf courses have closed in the U.S. than have opened. Participation and television viewership have flattened or fallen. Private clubs, caught short by a bad economy and increasing demands on the time of their members, are increasingly battling to retain them. The game takes too long to play, is hard to learn and costs a small fortune to play.

So let's take this show on the global road, shall we?

And the key question:

So, what are we really exporting? Bulldozing another 150 acres of Brazilian rainforest to build another golf course, erected primarily as a means of selling expensive view lots, doesn't sound like such a great idea, to be honest. This needs to be a reasonable, rational expansion of the game, for reasons well beyond the heightened TV rights fees the PGA and European tours hope to soon command in India, China or, hell, Antarctica.

Economically, pricy daily-fee courses and $500 drivers have contributed to the slaughter of the game's fatted calf here in the States. We're moving backward on the growth meter, and while securing a spot in the Games didn't need to be for altruistic reasons, the need for greed should best be tempered.

A lot of the same folks who overbuilt, overexposed and overpriced the game in the first place are exporting their wares abroad, where it would be a nice surprise if they operated going forward with some sort of principles.

Hey, allow a guy to dream, will you?