Finchem: “By every measure...strongest Presidents Cup we've had"
/No one can do anything about the Columbus weather (well, not now), but it's still fun in an agonizing kind of way to watch the gone-indoors Closing Funeral, assuming you want 10 minutes of your life to go by the wayside. (And that's without the planned entertainment.)
Robert Lusetich takes issue with Commissioner Samaranch's post Rainforest Cup assessment that this was the best one yet by "every mea$ure."
Indeed, he sounded like the old Franco blackshirt Juan Antonio Samaranch, the Spanish Don who ran the International Olympic Committee for 21 years and rolled out “the best ever” after each Olympics, even the lamentable Atlanta Games.
“By every measure, this was the strongest Presidents Cup we've had,” Finchem went on.
By any measure, it was the weakest.
If the weather was abysmal throughout, the planning was worse.
When the rain created chaos of the schedule the PGA Tour — stubbornly refusing to move up Friday’s 1:10 p.m. ET starting times — just made it up as they went along.
It was as Junior Varsity as it gets.
Not that the golf was bad, especially from golfers who had to pile into buses at 4.30 in the morning on Saturday and Sunday.
Just like the Atlanta Olympics were saved by Muhammad Ali’s poignant climb, and Michael Johnson’s fast shoes and Amy Van Dyken’s four swimming gold medals, it was the athletes who put the lipstick on this pig.
Lusetich goes on to lament the Cup's future as long as Finchem is in charge.
**Doug Ferguson takes a more diplomatic tone in making the same case: Tim Finchem is exerting too much control.
What hurts the credibility of the Presidents Cup is the lack of ownership by the International team, even when the matches leave America. Imagine a World Series between two teams with the same owner.
How can it be looked upon as a competition when the whole affair is orchestrated by one organization?
It was stunning two years ago to learn that a simple change - starting with fourballs instead of foursomes - required approval of the PGA Tour policy board.
Never mind that the International team has 12 players who are, will be or want to be PGA Tour members. This is supposed to be the United States against players from every continent except Europe. But it's governed exclusively by the American-based PGA Tour.
Finchem is and always has been chairman of the International Federation of PGA Tours. Why not let the host tour (South Africa, Canada, Australia) call the shots? Better yet, why not let the host tour reap the financial benefits to help strengthen its tour?
