New Year More Golf
Hey fellow golf fans, I am happy to say that golf is back. After the short holiday break, which felt more like a month, the PGA Tour resumes play with their standard calendar year opening Sentry Tournament Of Champions. In the past this event was held for the years past winners on the PGA Tour, however this year the PGA Tour decided to do something different. Due to Covid-19 and the season being shortened, the PGA Tour expanded the field to all past winners from the previous year and all players who made it to the Tour Championship at East Lake in 2020. This is huge for this year because, in the past the field has been rather small, however now the number reaches 42 players in total. Not only is it a larger field but it's composed of literally the best golfers in the world at this moment. I like to compare this field to a major, the players this week are just that good. However some of the most notables to miss out on the action this year are Tiger woods, Brooks Koepka, and Rory McIlrory. On top of this event having a star-studded its played at one of the most unique courses in America in my opinion. The Plantation Course at Kapalua in Hawaii is just absolutely incredible. What I really like about this course is that you can get really creative with a lot of your shots. One of my favorite shots from this event and course was in 2018 when Dustin Johnson rolled his tee shot on the par 4 12th hole to two inches. There are so many different ways to score well there and it's fascinating to see which route players take. One last unique trait about this course is that it is the only par 73 course the tour plays at due to the golf courses monstrous par 5’s including the extremely long 663 yard 18th hole. Not only has PGA Tour golf resumed from it’s holiday break, there have been a lot of hot new stories around the golf world.
The most notable of those stories is World No. 2 Jon Rahm signing a long term, full equipment deal with Callaway. Now Rahm has been a part of Taylormade since he graduated from Arizona State. However in today's world it is pretty common from household names to completely switch their gear. In my opinion I think Rahm wanted to be the face of one of the brands and currently Taylormade just has too many studs right now. As good as Rahm is, he's behind the likes of Rory, Tiger and Dustin, who also just signed a contract extension with Taylormade as well. Now that Rahm is with Callaway he could make a new name and brand from himself and potentially emerge as their top dog and new face. Rahm has also signed with Travis Matthew and will be wearing their gear from here on out. Rahm has been vocal about his big change and feels more than confident that his new clubs and gear will prove to be very successful for him. Not only is Rahm gearing up for a great year so is the rest of the golf community.
This year we could be in store for some of the greatest golf we’ve ever seen. With the PGA Tour “Super Season” in full swing and the potential of fans returning to action most notably in Arizona at The Waste Management, golf itself is not only growing, and improving its evolving. I know I can speak for Tyler and myself when I say this is going to be a year for the record books. (Mike)
What is Happening At The Golf Channel?
This week there was a damming podcast released by the No Laying Up guys with Lisa Cornwell. She talks very passionately for over an hour about her experiences at The Golf Channel and it was not pretty. I recommend giving it a listen if you have not. There were some things that did not surprise me at all: such as Brandel being a douche, a bunch of old heads making bad decisions and the lack of communication from executives at the channel. The channel has gone down drastically in content lately and many people were laid off in 2020 as the channel moved from Florida to Connecticut. This is a far cry from what Arnold Palmer would have wanted for the channel. It will be interesting to see what trickles out in the coming months if anything because it surely sounds like there is a lot that the public does not know about. There are a lot of problems for golf when it comes to growing the game to different demographics and it sounds like many of those problems are all happening within The Golf Channel leadership. I am hopeful that more people will speak out so that people know there is no place for this behavior in not only the golf community, but the world as a whole. (Tyler)
Picks Of The Week:
Mike: This week considering there is no cut and you can’t really have an underdog pick because literally all 42 of these players have a chance to win, I will only be doing the winning pick and winning score. This week my winning pick goes to none other than Dustin Johnson. DJ is coming off some stellar play before the long needed holiday break, and I believe that strong play will continue into 2021. I’d expect DJ to have no less than 3 wins his years including another major. However this year DJ will take home the Sentry Tournament of Champions with the winning score of 21 under par. (Mike)
Tyler: While I also think Dustin Johnson is going to play very well this season and I fully expect him to win 4-6 tournaments and win at least one major this year I do not think he gets a win this week. My pick this week is Viktor Hovland. You have to go low here to have a chance and Hovland can go on birdie runs with the best of them. I expect to see a lot of big names start out slow and find their form into the weekend. Viktor is no stranger to winning or being in contention and I think he finds himself in the winners circle come Sunday. I think it goes even lower than what Mike thinks, I see the winning score being 23 under par. Looking forward to getting 2021 underway on the PGA tour! (Tyler)