The Week: A Philadelphia Story

Dan Forsman prevails at the Pennsylvania Classic, but Philly is the big loser

By Michael Bamberger

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Last week the PGA Tour stopped in one of the golf capitals of the world, Philadelphia, but when it's coming back nobody knows. The field assembled for the SEI Pennsylvania Classic -- played at the Waynesborough Country Club in Paoli, the last of the leafy depots along suburban Philadelphia's fabled Main Line -- was filled with players known only to dedicated readers of the Tour's media guide (your Hidemichi Tanakas, Jeff Brehauts and Michael Longs). The surprise winner, Dan Forsman, earned $594,000, nice coin if you can get it, but not the kind of first-place money that draws the attention of most frontline stars (your Ernie Elses, Sergio Garc’as and Phil Mickelsons). Loyal Jim Furyk, born and raised in the Golf Association of Philadelphia, was the only Ryder Cupper on hand. The competitors dug the old-style George Fazio course, but no matter. The Philadelphia event is a goner.

Next year, and for at least three years after that, the Pennsylvania Classic is going to the boonies, to the Nemacolin Woodlands resort in Farmington, Pa., a tiny burg hidden in the western Pennsylvania mountains, not far from the West Virginia border. "The course is crappy, although they can probably improve it with a bunch of money," Scott Hoch said last week. Hoch had planned to play in Philadelphia but pulled out to rest his sore back for this week's World Golf Championship event in Ireland, where the winner earns a mil. "The guy is going to add $1 million to the purse, so he might get some names the first year. But if he doesn't fix up the course, they won't come back."

The guy Hoch is referring to is Joe Hardy, owner of the 84 Lumber chain and Nemacolin Woodlands. Hardy reportedly is increasing the purse from $3.3 million to $4 million, which means a first-place prize of $720,000, putting the event in the same financial league as the Western Open in Chicago and the Houston Open, old-line events that draw big crowds and big names. Who will make the long trek to Nemacolin Woodlands to watch the tournament is anybody's guess, but Hardy has a big, fat checkbook in a day when the Tour is turning over rocks to find sponsors.

The game is the same as it has always been: If you can pay, you can play. Evidently Philadelphia, despite its rich golfing lore, cannot pay. That's a shame. According to Jim Finegan, author of an eight-pound book about golf in Philadelphia, there is no place in the world with a greater concentration of first-tier courses than Philadelphia, with the possible exception of metropolitan New York. Enrolled in the Golf Association of Philadelphia are Pine Valley, Merion and Aronimink, site of Gary Player's victory at the 1962 PGA Championship and host to next year's Senior PGA. Within 35 miles of Philadelphia's City Hall are dozens of old-school gems, designed by Donald Ross, A.W. Tillinghast, William Flynn, George Thomas and other architectural heavyweights.

Merion's East course is where Bobby Jones completed his Grand Slam in 1930; where Ben Hogan, post-car crash, won the 1950 U.S. Open; and where the Merry Mex beat the Bear at the '71 Open. Brad Faxon, who finished 24th at Waynesborough, snuck over to Merion last week for his umpteenth round there and fell in love with the place all over again. "Maybe the best course in the world," he said. (It makes most Philadelphia golfers' local top five.) The Merion membership is aching to see the national championship return, but the USGA has its sights on greener pastures. (There's no room for the Open's small city of corporate tents at cozy Merion.) We believe it was the O'Jays that sang this famous lyric, although it might have been Scott Hoch: "Money, money, money. Money." Out with the old, in with the certified check.

O.B.