News
Morning 9: McCord speaks out (strongly) on firing | Is Tiger already the GOAT? | LPGA POY
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By Ben Alberstadt
October 29, 2019 Good Tuesday morning, golf fans. A very Happy Birthday to my dad, who took me to Gospel Hill Golf Club in Erie, PA for my first round of golf some 25 years ago.
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1. McCord: I was fired
Golf Digest’s Dave Shedloski on the sacking of Gary McCord…
“This is not how I would have preferred to see it end,” McCord said. “I’m going on 72. I’ve been doing this for 30-odd years. I knew I was coming to the end of the deal, but I was going to go out on my terms. That’s not happening now.:
Geoff Shackelford’s take is worth noting as well….”There was a great deal of sniping in recent years over McCord’s act having grown thin, but never felt that way. He was often the one person trying to inject some life into telecasts, but without his old foil David Feherty or many opportunities to exhibit his knowledge of the swing, McCord was often limited to the role of 16th hole traffic cop. Therefore the notion of “stale” strikes me as more a statement about the CBS production elements (Yanni?) or overall energy than the work of any one announcer.”
2. Typhoons, Joker, and shaking off the rust
Bob Harig takes a backward glance at Tiger Woods’ winning week, which included some interesting elements (in every sense of the word)…”A typhoon, of all things, interrupted Tiger Woods’ unlikely brush with history. As the rain hammered down Friday, postponing play at the Zozo Championship and causing considerable upheaval in the region, Woods and several others ventured to a Narita movie theater to catch “Joker.”
3. A Tiger in the Olympics?
Golf Channel’s Will Gray…”Woods’ record-tying 82nd career win also vaulted him back into the mix for the U.S. Olympic team, with only the top four American men qualifying for next year’s event in Tokyo. While countries are capped at two players per nation, there is a provision to allow up to four players from the same country to play if all are ranked inside the top 15 in the world.”
4. LPGA POY
Golf DIgest’s Ryan Herrington…”In contrast, who would pick up the LPGA player-of the-year award has been a foregone conclusion for a few months. Jin Young Ko’s stats speak for themselves: four victories, including two major titles (ANA Inspiration and the Evian Championship), three runner-ups, five additional top-10 finishes and no missed cuts in 20 starts.”
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5. The knee is key
Tiger Woods quoted in the Independent…”The knee wasn’t allowing me to rotate and because of that it put more stress on my lower back and hip,” he said.
“I didn’t really know I’d come back and play at this level but the fact I could get down and read putts again is something I hadn’t done in months. Something pretty subtle makes a difference. I felt more comfortable with my putter just because I was able to make a better stance.
“Ironically my back has been less sore. I’ve been able to rotate better. The way I started this week, who would have thought, bogeying the first three holes, I’d shoot the number I shot. I made a few mistakes this week but they weren’t bad.”
6. East Lake Cupdate
Golfweek’s JuliaKate E. Culpepper…”After Mark Power made a birdie putt on the 18th hole at East Lake Golf Club on Monday, he pumped his fist and smiled. The freshman from Wake Forest was leading the East Lake Cup and in a good position to win the individual honors trophy.”
7. Already the GOAT?
Golf Channel’s Randall Mell makes the case…”You don’t need to be a world class litigator to make a convincing case that Tiger Woods is already the greatest player of all time.”
8. Tiger’s Rolex
In case you were wondering…from our WOTW report…”Tiger Woods was wearing what looks to be a Rolex Sea-Dweller Deepsea D-Blue (ref: 126660-0002) on his wrist after winning his 82nd event, the ZOZO Championship! Finally, we get to feature Tiger Woods on WOTW. It feels like it took forever, but after a rain-soaked ZOZO Championship Tiger gets his legendary win, and we get to look at the Rolex he had on his wrist.”
9. Full Bubba
Did you see the line Bubba took off the tee at the Zozo?
Check out the video on Golf Channel. |
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Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from a piece our Andrew Tursky originally wrote for PGATour.com’s Equipment Report. Head over there for the full article.
The timing of Lowry’s putter changeup was curious: Was he just using a Spider putter because he was paired with McIlroy, who’s been using a Spider Tour X head throughout 2024? Was Lowry just being festive because it’s the Zurich Classic, and he wanted to match his teammate? Did McIlroy let Lowry try his putter, and he liked it so much he actually switched into it?
Well, as it turns out, McIlroy’s only influence was inspiring Lowry to make more putts.
When asked if McIlroy had an influence on the putter switch, Lowry had this to say: “No, it’s actually a different putter than what he uses. Maybe there was more pressure there because I needed to hole some more putts if we wanted to win,” he said with a laugh.
To Lowry’s point, McIlroy plays the Tour X model, whereas Lowry switched into the Tour Z model, which has a sleeker shape in comparison, and the two sole weights of the club are more towards the face.
Lowry’s Spider Tour Z has a white True Path Alignment channel on the crown of his putter, which is reminiscent of Lowry’s former 2-ball designs, thus helping to provide a comfort factor despite the departure from his norm. Instead of a double-bend hosel, which Lowry used in his 2-ball putters, his new Spider Tour Z is designed with a short slant neck.
“I’ve been struggling on the greens, and I just needed something with a fresh look,” Lowry told GolfWRX.com on Wednesday at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship. “It has a different neck on it, as well, so it moves a bit differently, but it’s similar. It has a white line on the back of it [like my 2-ball], and it’s a mallet style. So it’s not too drastic of a change.
“I just picked it up on the putting green and I liked the look of it, so I was like, ‘Let’s give it a go.’”
Read the rest of the piece over at PGATour.com.
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Tommy Fleetwood has been attached to his Odyssey White Hot Pro #3 putter for years now. However, this week at the Wells Fargo Championship, we did spot him testing a new putter that is very different, yet somewhat similar, to his current gamer.
This new putter is a TaylorMade Spider Tour X head but with a brand new neck we haven’t seen on a Spider before. A flow neck is attached to the Spider head and gives the putter about a 1/2 shaft offset. This style neck will usually increase the toe hang of the putter and we can guess it gets the putter close to his White Hot Pro #3.
Another interesting design is that lack of TaylorMade’s True Path alignment on the top of the putter. Instead of the large white center stripe, Tommy’s Spider just has a very short white site line milled into it. As with his Odyssey, Tommy seems to be a fan of soft inserts and this Spider prototype looks to have the TPU Pure Roll insert with 45° grooves for immediate topspin and less hopping and skidding.
The sole is interesting as well in that the rear weights don’t look to be interchangeable and are recessed deep into the ports. This setup could be used to push the CG forward in the putter for a more blade-like feel during the stroke, like TaylorMade did with the Spider X Proto Scottie Scheffler tested out.
Tommy’s putter is finished off with an older Super Stroke Mid Slim 2.0 grip in blue and white. The Mid Slim was designed to fit in between the Ultra Slim 1.0 and the Slim 3.0 that was a popular grip on tour.
- Check out the rest of our photos from the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship
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Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from a piece our Andrew Tursky originally wrote for PGATour.com’s Equipment Report. Head over there for the full article.
…The Jailbird craze hasn’t really slowed down in 2024, either. According to Odyssey rep Joe Toulon, there are about 18-20 Jailbird putter users on the PGA TOUR.
Most recently, Akshay Bhatia won the 2024 Valero Texas Open using a broomstick-style Odyssey Jailbird 380 putter and Webb Simpson is switching into a replica of that putter at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship.
Now, Fowler, who essentially started the whole Jailbird craze, is making a significant change to his putter setup.
Fowler, who has had a couple weeks off since the 2024 RBC Heritage, started experimenting with a new, custom-orange Jailbird 380 head that’s equipped with a standard 35-inch putter build, rather than his previous 38-inch counter-balanced setup.
According to Fowler, while he still likes the look and forgiveness of his Jailbird putter head, he’s looking to re-incorporate more feel into his hands during the putting stroke.
He told GolfWRX.com on Tuesday at the Wells Fargo Championship that the 38-inch counterbalanced setup “served its purpose” by helping him to neutralize his hands during the stroke, but now it’s time to try the standard-length putter with a standard-size SuperStroke Pistol Tour grip to help with his feel and speed control.
Although Fowler was also spotted testing standard-length mallets from L.A.B. Golf and Axis1 on Tuesday, he confirmed that the custom Odyssey Jailbird 380 is the putter he’ll use this week at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship.
Head over to PGATour.com for the full article.
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G
Oct 29, 2019 at 5:30 pm
CBS thought they were too stale? So their way of fixing that was to fire the least stale guy on their team? Huge miss, golf on TV got even worse with this change.
James
Oct 29, 2019 at 12:01 pm
Tiger is hardly a GOAT. He couldn’t even keep his harem of dogs in line.
A. Commoner
Oct 29, 2019 at 7:45 pm
Picking the greatest of all time in any sport or activity is beyond nonsensical. Such an exercise ignores innumerable variables as to make it farcical.
Ryan
Oct 29, 2019 at 11:14 am
McCord got on my nerves sometimes, he would talk over others, caddie conversations etc, but he knew his stuff and was a solid announcer. Kostis is in the same boat. He is very knowledgeable when it comes to the swing. They will both be missed. I don’t really know who they are going to pull in to replace them.