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Prepping for a major
Posted: Thursday June 01, 2000 05:40 PM
Sports Illustrated senior writer Gary Van Sickle will answer your questions every Thursday during the golf season. Click here to send him a question. There is no set way to prepare for a major championship. Ernie Els intends to play the Kemper Open and Buick Classic, following on the heels of the Memorial Tournament, heading into the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach. So he'll be playing his fourth week in a row at the Open. Tiger Woods said at the Memorial that he would take the next two weeks off and his next appearance would be the U.S. Open. It'll be interesting to see who plays better and whether the way they scheduled themselves has any effect on their play, for better or worse. If I was a player, I wouldn't be keen on having to fly from New York to San Francisco on Sunday night after Westchester. I think I'd skip that week and maybe go to the Monterey Peninsula early to start absorbing some local knowledge on Pebble Beach's tricky greens.
While you're pondering that, here's the mail:
When will Cypress Point become a PGA Tour venue again? It's one of the greatest courses in the world. Never, Jerry. The first year I covered the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am was the last year for Cypress Point in the rotation. I remember walking up the 14th fairway following celebrity amateurs Burt Lancaster and Robert Wagner. The ocean holes at Cypress are as dramatic and photogenic as any golf holes anywhere in the world. But it won't be back in the rotation because of the Tour's rules about minority membership. Also, the members were thrilled to get their course back. Most of them didn't want the Tour there in the first place. In addition, Cypress may look great but it's gotten way too short for today's long-hitting Tour players. Even back in the late '80s it was often yielding 62s, 63s and 64s. Players are even longer and better today. It could get embarrassing to go back to Cypress Point. But every golf fan would like to see it.
The PGA Championship is the most boring and uneventful of the major championships -- unless, of course, Tiger Woods wins it. Remember when the PGA was the last major to use the match-play format? Why not bring it back and make the PGA unique and, hopefully, as exciting as the other three majors? I used to agree with you, Ben, but I've changed my mind. Match play is no way to determine a major champion. In the World Match Play Championships, for instance, the winner of the 64-man field has defeated only six opponents. The U.S. Open champion has to beat at least 147. In match play, you need defeat Woods only once. If you do, you don't have to worry about him shooting 63 or 61 on Sunday. He's gone. In stroke play, you've got to worry about Tiger every day for four rounds. Match play is the most entertaining and exciting format for tournament golf, but for a major? Bad idea.
How would you suggest someone -- me, of course -- become a golf scribe? I have been an avid fan of professional golf for years and I think this would be the perfect outlet for my journalistic creativity. Oh, yeah, and how little do they pay golf writers anyways? You've got a ways to go, Sean. Anyways is bad grammar. It's anyway. I also cleaned up, edited and shortened two of your other awkward sentences. You need to become a writer first, then try to weasel your way onto the golf beat. Start writing. Latch on at your local newspaper, even if it's just typing in scores. Major in journalism. Work at the school paper. When you graduate, get a job at a newspaper and write. If you progress and get lucky, maybe you'll get to cover golf. At most newspapers, golf is a part-time beat in the summer, one of just several beats you'll cover. The only full-time golf writers work at magazines, and those positions are mostly filled by people with at least 10 years of experience. You'll earn as much as the average sports writer, which is squat. Which means you can look forward to driving a Neon most of your adult life. Also, if you want to be a real golf writer, drink, smoke and cuss as much as you can. And don't forget to be cynical.
Who's the best lefthanded golfer of all time? He hasn't won a major yet but I'm going to concede the title -- and a major soon, maybe Pebble -- to Phil Mickelson. Bob Charles was probably No. 1 until Phil came along. I don't know where to rank Mac O'Grady, a righthander who also plays a pretty mean lefthanded game. Canadian Mike Weir, who's got a great short game, is rapidly moving up the rankings, too.
Why not move one of the majors to January or February to add some excitement and see who is on his game early in the year? Waiting until April is torture. Spreading them out makes more sense. What do you think? I think what you mean, Blake, is that waiting until April is torture when you live in Calgary. You could move the PGA to February and play it in some warm-weather locale, such as Hawaii, Puerto Rico or even a foreign country, but it's not going to happen. We've got the World Match Play in February, which is a significant event, and the Players Championship at the end of March. You'd have to move the Players to May, which isn't a bad idea, but it would lose a lot of its pre-Masters luster -- and the PGA Tour just isn't going to let that happen.
Click here to send your golf question to Gary Van Sickle.
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