My Top 100 Course Rejection and the Invention of John Daly | Weekend 9

Welcome! Where are you, you ask. I call this Weekend 9. Think of it as a place to warm up for Friday, Saturday and Sunday. We will have thoughts. We will have tips. We’ll have tweets. But only nine in all, though sometimes perhaps more and sometimes perhaps less. As for who I am? The paragraphs below tell part of the story. I can be reached at nick.piastowski@golf.com.

In the clubhouse we could buy whatever we wanted. I walked out with a bag tag and a cup.

We were even allowed to take a cart to the 1st tee. The view alone was almost worth driving west to Mullen, where the skyline never ends and cell service is lost.

As far as rejections go, the one we got a little over a decade ago at Sand Hills Golf Club went as well as we could have hoped. We were easily let down. They didn’t laugh. We didn’t cry.

But it was still a quick no.

I was reminded of all this when this site recently published its latest Top 100 courses in the world list – and Sand Hills was at number 10. Nebraska’s Bill Coore-Ben Crenshaw gem has always had a high ranking, and that has made the thought of playing it ridiculously attractive to almost anyone who lives in the Cornhusker State, which I have done for about 15 years.

It doesn’t matter that the course is ultra private.

Sand Hills, unfortunately, isn’t a place you just drive up and ask to play.

Or was it?

Maybe we can try that?

So my wife and I did that. We planned it. We went later in the year, when conditions may deter out-of-state visitors. We went on a football Saturday in Nebraska, when Big Red dominated the hearts and minds of the state – and golf courses remained empty. On Friday we stopped in Gothenburg and played Wild Horse, a must-play if you’re even remotely in the area. On Sunday we found a few paid courses – there’s no clubhouse, no supervisor, just a box – including a course called Augusta Wind, a course name that, yes, includes both Masters enthusiasts and pun enthusiasts.

Saturday afternoon we drove up Crenshaw Drive.

We parked. Three cars on the lot.

I would offer $300 to play. Our pitch would be that we would promise not to tell anyone. We would go in and out. No social media. No photos. How could they say no?

Like this:

Sorry, no.

But we could buy whatever we wanted in the clubhouse. And we were able to take a cart to the 1st tee.

We did. We watched for about 15 minutes. I saw what looked like about five people, but no one else. It ‘looked’ like one of the best courses on this site. It smelled like it too. But we never got to touch it.

Was the trip foolish? Hell no. I would do it again. And I’ll probably do it again, at another golf masterpiece. Maybe next time I’ll get a yes.

Or maybe one day I’ll meet someone with the almost unreal discipline of turning down a boy, a girl, and a few hundred dollars. That was actually impressive.

Let’s see if we can find eight more items for weekend 9.

One takeaway for the weekend

2. Was the announcement of the LPGA’s new TV deal – which will see all rounds of every tournament shown live – one of the biggest moments ever?

Yes.

But how do they retain viewers?

Is having a platform enough? Sort of. The PGA Tour in particular deals with this. You’d think golf would be enough, but the message is that people want a little more of what they see. So I’ll argue that new LPGA commissioner Craig Kessler, who says he’s aware of all variations of “a little more,” is as important to the tour as the TV deal.

On Wednesday, ahead of this week’s CME Group Tour Championship, Kessler spoke with reporters, and I found this back and forth interesting (the reporters’ questions are in italics):

What do you consider the LPGA’s competition? And I think honestly what I’m saying is, how do you get the attention that women’s soccer and the WNBA are getting, and golf honestly feels like it’s fallen behind?

“You used the most important word,” Kessler said. “We’re competing in the attention economy. It’s not just against other sports. It’s whether I should put on Netflix, whether I should go out to dinner, hang out with friends, play in the backyard, or go for a round of golf. Anything that has the potential to capture a fan’s attention, we compete against it. So our job is to stand out, be interesting and capture fans’ thoughts in every way possible.”

What message have you given to the player side that you need to get your oars in the water?

“I’ve had two player meetings,” Kessler said. “The first players meeting – and I’m so grateful they did this. The players asked, ‘What can we do to help?’ And the answer was: ‘Nothing yet. Let’s do our job, and when we have concrete answers, we will come back and ask you to do your part at the right time.”

“Last week at the Pelican… they asked again: ‘What can we do?’ And we said, ‘This is what you have to do. If we ask you to be a global superstar, join us. Introduce yourself to the culture wherever you can. If we ask you to do walk-and-talks, not just you but your caddies, try it.

“Let’s… we need you to do your part.” And at the end I asked, ‘Who’s in?’ And almost every hand in the room went up. It is now up to us to actually bring that to life.”

Another takeaway for the weekend

3. The PGA Tour, meanwhile, may be downsized. Ahead of this week’s RSM Classic, Harris English said the Tour could start its schedule after the Super Bowl and “they’ll go more where twenty events are all the same, all the points, all the money, everything the same.”

So what do the moves mean, should they happen?

I guess it depends on what you like. You get less pro golf. But maybe you’ll get more professional golf. But isn’t every week important? Or should there be a good break?

Once again, LIV Golf’s influence cannot be overstated. How many of these changes would have happened without the league?

4. Speaking of LIV, the New York Times published a story this week headlined: “Saudi Arabia’s Prince Has Big Plans, But His Giant Fund Is Low on Cash.”

You can read the full story, written by Rob Copeland and Vivian Nereim, here.

An instructional tip for your weekend

5. Lindy Duncan received the LPGA’s Heather Farr Perseverance Award this week, and the transcript of her acceptance speech is well worth reading. You can do this by scrolling below. (Click the white arrow in the center of the post to see each slide.)

A story that interests me

6. I thought the story belowfrom Skratch’s ‘Vanity Index Podcast’, was interesting. In it, co-host Chad Mumm describes a conversation with John Daly – about how the John Daly drink started.

“So John Daly, we were in the green room getting ready for this conversation,” Mumm said, “and we were just chatting in front of some restaurant people and I thought, ‘Hey, how did the John Daly cocktail come about?’ I thought, ‘How great is that?’ Have you stood up to that and given it a name? It’s clearly based on the Arnold Palmer. Have you looked into that? Did someone else come up with it and you kind of latched onto it? Because he has John Dalys – this Good Boy vodka brand, they make their own John Dalys.

“And he says, ‘No, I invented that when I was 9 years old. loved his vodka. And so my parents were nowhere to be seen. And all the kids were all partying. So I went and got her some sweet tea and I mixed it all up in a big jug and I threw the whole thing in and we had a couple of shot glasses.

“‘And I looked at my brother and said, ‘If either of us gets famous, we’re going to have to patent this drink. It’s going to be called the Jamie Daly or the John Daly.’ And so it was invented. ”

You can watch the clip featuring Mumm by scrolling directly below.

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7. Speaking of Daly, a place he visited annually during Masters week, the Hooters, about a mile from Augusta National, was demolished this week. Below is a photo of part of the work.

A question that interests me

8. I thought the video below was interesting. It asked MLB players: Is golf harder than baseball?

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