Details Emerge From Golf's Equivalent To The Camp David Accords: Kuchar, El Tucan Clear Air Over Orange Juice

/
Screen Shot 2019-03-27 at 5.37.57 PM.png

Michael Bamberger scored the exclusive details of last month’s secret reunion between Matt Kuchar and his Mayakoba Classic-winning fill-in caddie El Tucan to settle any misunderstanding over Moochgate.

Not only has he been paid, Ortiz and Kuchar met in a clubhouse dining room in late February, when the Tour went to Mexico City for a World Golf Championship event. Over a 40-minute glass of morning orange juice on Feb. 23, the Saturday of the tournament, each apologized to the other, Ortiz said in a recent phone interview and through an interpreter.

“Matt said, ‘Hey, David, how are you?’” Ortiz said. “I apologized for the [difficulty] the situation created. I told him it was never my intention to embarrass him, but I felt eventually I had to tell the truth. Matt also offered an apology. He said it was all a misunderstanding. He asked me how my family was. He showed me a picture of his family and a video of a hole-in-one made by one of his sons.”

Ortiz said there were four people at the breakfast table, including a sports psychologist “who is very close to Matt.”

And a good time was had by all!

Kuchar Digs In: It's A Social Media Issue, Won't Lose Sleep And Even Throws Steiny Under The Bus For Trying To Mop Up His Mess!

/
Screen Shot 2019-02-14 at 7.40.42 AM.png

Matt Kuchar spoke to GolfChannel.com’s Will Gray Wednesday at the Genesis Open and FedExCup leader, all-time leading money winner without a major who won last fall’s Mayakoaba event after a four-year winless drought with his “lucky charm” local caddie, is digging in.

Mooooooooooch!

Kuchar confirmed he paid “El Tucan” $5000 and the Golf.com report that his agent has since offered an additional $15,000 refused by Ortiz. And he’s not happy about that either. But more on that momentarily.

The graciousness ended fairly quicklky in the chat with Gray.

“I kind of feel like unfortunately some other people have got it in his head that he’s deserving something different than what we agreed upon,” Kuchar said.

He’s certainly correct that he paid $1000 more than they agreed upon, but given that it was Kuchar’s first win in __ years and that a winner’s bonus usually comes with the PGA Tour territory, he’s been blasted for not paying more.

“I ended up paying him $5,000 and I thought that was more than what we agreed upon,” Kuchar said. “I kind of think, if he had the chance to do it over again, same exact deal, that he’d say yes again.”

Good to see he learns from his mistakes!. And that he has shrewd sounding boards all around!

This may be the fatal quote…

“It’s done. Listen, I feel like I was fair and good,” he said. “You can’t make everybody happy. You’re not going to buy people’s ability to be OK with you, and this seems to be a social media issue more than anything. I think it shouldn’t be, knowing that there was a complete, agreed-upon deal that not only did I meet but exceeded.

“So I certainly don’t lose sleep over this. This is something that I’m quite happy with, and I was really happy for him to have a great week and make a good sum of money. Making $5,000 is a great week."

Glad he’s not losing sleep. But in digging in, he’s certainly losing fans and at some point, endorsement income built on a “good guy” image.

Another interview with Golf.com’s Michael Bamberger comes off even worse, suggesting “someone got in his ear”, referring to El Tucan, and says the attempt to make a payment was the idea of his agent. But he didn’t exactly approve of the idea.

Kuchar seemed slightly embarrassed that the additional sum had been offered, as he felt his financial obligation to Ortiz was complete. Asked how it came to be that the additional sum was offered, Kuchar said, “That was the agency.” He was referring to Excel Sports Management, which represents him. Kuchar’s agent there is Mark Steinberg, who also represents Tiger Woods and Justin Rose.

And in case those legendary cheapskate cred wasn’t strong enough…

Kuchar smiled and said, “It’s not coming out of Steinberg’s pocket.” In other words, Kuchar would be paying. He said the additional proffered payment was Steinberg’s effort at damage control.

Given that when you start typing Matt Kuchar into the Google Machine “Matt Kuchar El Tucan” pops up, the issue will, fairly or not, define his career.

"Tiger Woods’ biggest moment didn’t last very long"

/

One highlight of Tiger’s pre-Farmers Insurance Open press conference was the revelation that he’s gone back and savored the final round NBC telecast of the Tour Championship, as well as many of the photographs from his 80th PGA Tour win.

Doug Ferguson of AP pieces together how the iconic moment in a career full of them felt to Woods and those around him.

Was there a more indelible image than Woods walking up to the 18th green, red shirt blazing, as thousands of fans rushed under the ropes and followed him down the fairway to create a stage worthy of the occasion?

“It gives me chills almost every single time I see it,” Woods said. “At the time, it didn’t seem like that because I didn’t really look back. I only looked back a couple times over my right shoulder. … I got on the green, I looked and I’m like, ‘Holy cow, there’s a lot of people out there.’

“But the rush and the commotion that happened … I’ve experienced things of that nature, but not that energy.”


The highlights:

Gillis Tracks Down Duped Looper El Tucan: Kuchar Actually Paid $5000 After Mayakoba Classic Win

/
Screen Shot 2019-01-16 at 7.11.14 PM.png

The bad news for pro golfer Tom Gillis is that he has been in contact with Matt Kuchar’s caddie El Tucan from last fall’s Mayakoba Classic and it was not $3000, as he accused while Kuchar was contending in the Sony Open.

The good news for Gillis is that the number El Tucan shared was $5000, incredibly low for a winning caddie effort in a PGA Tour event where the winner took him $1.3 million.

Good news for Kuchar! His quote after third round play is accurate: “It’s wasn’t 10 percent. It wasn’t $3,000.”

Take that Gillis!

Of course, $5000 could be viewed as a worse story because that is certainly more than the agreed-upon fee for a week involving a last-minute pickup. But it’s still painfully little as a fee plus-win-bonus amount.

Because as far as win bonuses go, it’s below the minimum, especially when you had not won in years.

Let’s just say if you’re a waiter and Matt Kuchar is in your section, don’t count a little extra something for the, you know, the effort. Or total consciousness.

ESPN's Most Dominant: Brooks Koepka Still Feeling Snubbed And He Certainly Has A Point

/
Screen Shot 2018-12-11 at 7.04.46 PM.png

There have been some odd media-related slights of 2018’s two-time major winner and Floridian Cup champ, Brooks Koepka, including at the U.S. Open, PGA Championship and Tour Championship.

The winner of two majors and three of the last seven has rightfully been a bit peeved. The latest snub came with publication of ESPN The Magazine’s list of Most Dominant Athletes of 2018 not including Koepka, he simply posted the list on Twitter:

With Ariya Jutanagarn winning one major to Koepka’s two, he’s understandably annoyed at the lack of respect given to his year.

Underrated in his season is how late he started due to a wrist injury. While “dominant” isn’t the first word that comes to mind, his play given the inactivity the first four months of the year suggests it could have been even better.

Banner Time For Fairway Mowers, Strengthened Cores! PGA Tour Distance Average Up 6.1 Yards Over Two Years

/
Screen Shot 2018-12-10 at 3.04.41 PM.png

GolfDigest.com’s Mike Johnson reports on the rather astounding jump in 2018’s PGA Tour Driving Distance average (4 yards) on top of 2017’s healthy jump (2.1) yards.

The governing bodies have relentlessly pointed to a flatlining since the old Statement of Principles days, but maybe the nation’s superintendents and physios worked behind the scenes to push distances forward the last two years. (Sarcasm emoji goes here.)

As you may recall the distance number was at an amazing 294.7 through June’s Travelers Championship, meaning the average spiked nicely in just the final two months or so of the season when things warmed up and the nation’s maintenance mechanics conspired to sharpen mower blades. Because, you know the game is played on the ground so much these days!

And as noted here on the eve of the Tour Championship, things were looking rather historic as far as increases go which Johnson affirms.

He reports last year’s 2.1 yard increase prompted the Distance Insights study and he included this curious description of the survey.

Though some who have participated feel the questions have been biased toward a negative impression of distance, there’s no denying at the elite level that the game’s best have gotten longer. Fourteen players averaged 310 yards or more this past PGA Tour season and 60 topped 300 yards compared to 7 and 40, respectively, the year before.

I haven’t heard of any negative bias from those who participated in the survey. Maybe there needed to be a few warm-up questions where people get to share their most intimate, fondest recollections of gaining distance off the tee? Or of the manufacturers? Or of their Trackman relationships?

Trophy Wrap: Rahm Wins Hero, Smith Aussie PGA, Kitayama The Mauritius And One Seriously Bizarre Trophy

/
Screen Shot 2018-12-02 at 1.57.42 PM.png

Jon Rahm ended 2018 on a strong note by winning the Hero World Challenge and with the title, one of Tony Montana’s old bookends.

Kevin Casey’s Golfweek roundup.

Cameron Smith has set the stage for a big 2019 with another great week in his native Australia, this time winning the Australian PGA after a T10 at the Australian Open and runner-up finish at the World Cup of Golf with Marc Leishman, his competition at the Aus PGA. Tony Webeck reports for Golf Australia on a showdown of Australia’s two best players.

Kurt Kitayama might have trouble getting through airport security with looted security gate remnants from a displaced dictator’s palace. But hey, he’s the 2018 Afrasia Bank Mauritius Open winner so he doesn’t care, especially since it was his first win in just his third start. Alistair Tait with the details of the ex-UNLV golfer and his breakthrough week.

View this post on Instagram

🏆😀

A post shared by European Tour (@europeantour) on

How Molinari's Big (Distance) Gain Led To His Big Season

/
Screen Shot 2018-10-23 at 10.13.33 PM.png

Francesco Molinari’s breakout 2018 will forever be remembered for his final round Open precision. Paired with Tiger Woods, Molinari never wilted on an unrelenting Carnoustie that exposed the slightest mistakes.

Yet as Sean Martin notes in this PGATour.com look at Molinari’s numbers, a sacrifice of some accuracy for distance gained through a combination of fitness and fitting allowed Francesco to pick up enough off the tee to make huge leaps.

His tee shots covered 64 percent of the yardage on par-4s and par-5s this season. That's nearly 5 percent more than three seasons ago. He ranked 27th in that statistic in 2018 after ranking 168th (out of 184 players) in 2015.

That’s pretty amazing. So was this after his fitting work with Taylor Made and fitness came together. The numbers don’t lie:

In May 2018, he was up to 114 and 169 mph. He was now carrying the ball nearly 290 yards, more than 25 yards longer than that October 2016 testing session.

Molinari’s story is even more fascinating given what an established player he was and what a bold move he made given the number of players who have tried to pick up distance and lost their games. Best of all he did it through a combination of art, science and hard work. Given the direction of the game toward a speed emphasis at younger ages, Molinari may be one of the last we’ll see to make such a big mid-career adjustment.

Mothers, Don't Let Your Sons And Daughters Grow Up To Be Average Length Straight Hitters

/
Screen Shot 2018-10-21 at 9.21.15 PM.png

If there was any doubt that learning speed and launch is vital to future PGA Tour survival coming off a season when the driving distance average jumped from 292.5 to 296.1 yards, Golfweek’s David Dusek provides all of the analysis (and charts) you’ll need to know that the money is in distance. There was a day when this kind of imbalance bothered the USGA and R&A and maybe even the PGA Tour:

As a group, the 20 longest hitters on the PGA Tour averaged more than $3.5 million in prize money last season, which was 164 percent more than the Tour average.

As massive as that percentage may seem, it falls within a range that goes several years. In 2017, the 20 longest hitters on the PGA Tour averaged 123 percent more prize money than the PGA Tour average. In the three seasons before that, they earned about 150 percent more, which tells us that as distance off the tee has increased over the last few years, the longest hitters have maintained an edge in terms of earnings.

There should be an advantage to hitting the ball a long way, but one would hope the numbers also show some kind that the game also still rewards those who show other skills besides an ability to hit the ball supreme distances. Right?

Tiger Gets His Calamity Jane, Takes To Social To Share The Spoils Of Win No. 80

/
Screen Shot 2018-10-18 at 9.20.49 PM.png

One of the coolest—dopiest to the kids reading out there—trophies in golf arrived at Tiger’s house and he promptly posted multiple shots of the 2018 Tour Championship’s Calamity Jane trophy.

Because the world revolves around FedEx and the gobs of money they are paying for the FedExCup, the Calamity Jane may be a 2019 casualty of the Tour Championship shifting to a handicap tournament resolving only the FedExCup.

So enjoy!

5.1: Tiger Delivers 206% Increase In Tour Championship Final Round Rating

/
Screen Shot 2018-09-24 at 5.46.11 PM.png

Big numbers!

For Immediate Release:

TOUR CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL ROUND BECOMES HIGHEST-RATED FEDEXCUP

PLAYOFFS TELECAST EVER AS TIGER WOODS WINS FOR FIRST TIME IN FIVE YEARS

5.21 Overnight Rating Becomes Highest-Rated PGA TOUR Telecast of 2018 

18.4 Million Minutes Streamed on Sunday (+561% YoY); Most-Streamed

NBC Sports Sunday Golf Round Ever (Excluding Majors) 

ORLANDO, Fla., (Sept. 24, 2018) – NBC Sports Group’s final round coverage of the TOUR Championship on Sunday (3:00-6:15 p.m. ET) earned a 5.21 Overnight rating, as Tiger Woods claimed his 80th career victory, and his first in five years. The telecast is up 206% vs. 2017 (1.70).  It also becomes the highest-rated telecast in the history of the FedExCup Playoffs (2007-’18) and the highest-rated PGA TOUR telecast in 2018 (excluding majors). Coverage peaked from 5:30-6p (7.19) as Woods finished his round and as Justin Rose was being crowned the FedExCup champion, only trailing the peaks for The Masters (11.03) and PGA Championship (8.28) in 2018. The extended coverage window (1:30-6:15 p.m. ET) posted at 4.35 Overnight rating, which is the highest-rated TOUR Championship telecast on record (2000-’18)

“Tiger Woods’ win at the TOUR Championship was an unforgettable event in golf,” said Mike McCarley, President, Golf, NBC Sports Group. “The massive gallery following Tiger up the 18th fairway was matched by record viewership across NBC Sports’ platforms. Golf is experiencing a surge in momentum with Tiger and the young stars of the Tiger-inspired generation atop leaderboards. We look forward to this momentum continuing this week at the Ryder Cup.”

Sunday’s Final Round saw 18.4 million minutes streamed across NBC Sports Digital platforms (+561% year-over-year), and becomes the most-streamed NBC Sports’ Sunday round (excluding majors) on record (2013-’18).

Sunday’s lead-in coverage on Golf Channel (Noon-1:30p) also earned a .74 Overnight rating to become the highest Sunday lead-in telecast of the TOUR Championship ever (2007-’18).

Tiger Wins His 80th PGA Tour Title, Completes A Comeback For The Ages

/
Screen Shot 2018-09-24 at 11.27.44 AM.png

By most measures, Tiger’s comeback is one of the finest in sports history. In golf terms, there’s always Hogan and his six majors after getting hit by a bus, but nonetheless, second best in this category is just fine.

Either way, who cares where this comeback really ranks. We as sports fans get to ride along for a few more years of history.

Bob Harig opened his ESPN.com story, as did AP’s Paul Newberry in this piece, with the coronation scene at East Lake’s 18th.

Steve DiMeglio opens his USA Today story with Tiger’s confident arrival to the course. Lebron in a Tom Ford, it wasn’t. But as he notes, the old confidence is back.

View this post on Instagram

No sleeves. Sunday drip. 🔴⚫️ #LiveUnderPar

A post shared by PGA TOUR (@pgatour) on

Tiger was the biggest story in sports Sunday, as he should be, writes ESPN.com’s Ian O’Connor.

David Dusek with the emotions and the numbers behind Tiger’s over 1800 days outside a winner’s circle.

Rex Hoggard at GolfChannel.com says that as wonderful as Tiger’s return win seems, it may now just be one of many fine days in a career that once again has room to add incredible feats.

Cameron Morfit at PGATour.com sums up a great day and also features quotes from caddie Joe LaCava.

Tiger talked with Scott Van Pelt on Sportscenter and sounded pretty spent from the energy and emotions required to win again.

The final round highlights from PGA Tour Entertainment:

Algorithm And Reset-Decided FedExCup Goes Out With A Resounding Thud

/
Screen Shot 2018-09-24 at 10.37.52 AM.png

For over a decade we were annually told that what we saw before us was not as bad as most suspected: the FedExCup was wonderful and not the most poorly constructed competition in sports. It was even exciting—Bill Haas!—and beyond the massive bonus money, was so much better than merely ending the season with a fall Tour Championship.

Which was true, if you were a PGA Tour player or executive cashing a bonus check.

Mercifully, the final version of the points-reset, algorithm-decided iteration ended with Justin Rose’s clinching 73 Sunday at East Lake. Rose made just 18 starts in 2018, killing the notion that season-long play starts were rewarded.

Questions loom about the purity of the next format with $15 million now on the line, but Tiger Woods thankfully helped everyone forget about that issue until we get to next August. But in reading David Dusek’s Golfweek account of the 2018 conclusion, it’s pretty easy to envision a scenario where anything will be better than what we’ve long been told was so exciting and fun to follow.

I explain more in this column for Golfweek on the pros and cons of the new format, one that sadly keeps clinging to attempts at rewarding season-long play in an effort to get players to tee off more often.

Also, The Forecaddie chimed in on the math behind the new Wyndham Rewards program and figures most will have to play six weeks in a row to get stars to the Wyndham Championship. Good luck with that!

Does Tiger Have To Win The Tour Championship To Make The Comeback "Complete"?

/
Screen Shot 2018-09-23 at 4.12.46 PM.png

A couple of stories on Tiger’s three-stroke lead heading into the Tour Championship final round left me uneasy. After all, should he wake up not feeling it, shoot 72 to someone else’s great round, there will be declarations that he’s never going to be the same golfer we knew.

To be clear, he’s never going to be the same golfer we knew but he’s certainly been close enough of late to give us hope for a legitimate chase of the all-time majors record over the next five years.

But as Dan Kilbridge notes in this review of the comeback, it’s incredible how far Woods has come and also how much his putter—not the often scrutinized ballstriking—has made the difference this year. Or prevented victory.

There will, however, be pressure today given his status as the greatest frontrunner the sport has ever seen, as Bob Harig notes for ESPN.com:

Woods has been money with third-round leads, especially of 3 shots or more. He has never failed to deliver, 32 times going on to victory when holding this wide of a margin.

Woods' overall record of 53-4 on the PGA Tour with at least a tie for the lead is mind-blowing itself. Imagine getting to this position 57 times. 

But Tiger has also seemingly peaked in the third rounds in 2018, opening up the possibility that he’s not as sharp today and gets passed. That would be a shame given how perfect of a final bow a win at East Lake would put on his steady 2018 comeback. But there also needs to be some perspective that he’s still coming back and has also far exceeded expectations given where his game was a few years ago.

Thankfully It's Still 2018: Tiger Opens Tour Championship With 65, Tied For Lead

/
Screen Shot 2018-09-20 at 10.30.15 PM.png

Golfweek’s David Dusek has the details of Tiger’s first round at East Lake in five years and it was a beauty.

“This was by far better than the 62 at Aronimink,” Woods said, referring to his opening round at the BMW Championship two weeks ago. “Conditions were soft there. It’s hard to get the ball close here. There’s so much chase in it. If you drive the ball in the rough, you know you can’t get the ball close.”

If this were 2019 and Tiger came into the Tour Championship/FedExCup finale 20th in the standings, things would have been different after round one given the new “strokes-based” handicap system announced this week. As Joel Beall notes for GolfDigest.com, “thank the golf gods the system doesn't come to fruition until next fall.”

Beall posts the full top 8 and Tiger would be five back of Justin Rose after one round.

Of more note for those wanting to consider how the system will work for the Cup leaders, there is Bryson DeChambeau—winner of two playoff events and the FedExCup leader—already three back following an opening 71.