The blind leading the bland.

John Bland is not only one of the best golfers that South Africa ever produced but the five time winner on the Champions Tour (formerly the Senior PGA Tour) bears a name that could be used by literally hundreds of players on the major tours on both sides of the Atlantic.

A quick question, and no looking this up on Google either, who won the PGA Tour event at the weekend? Okay, go ahead and Google it and then have a look at the Top 10 while you are there. Then after you have said "who the F*#@k are these guys" to yourself come back here and we'll move on.

Golf has a problem and its quite a big one. The standard of play on tour in the USA and Europe is staggering and the level of competition is immense. There are at least 100 players or more who enter regular tour events who believe they have a better than average chance of winning. The standard on the Nationwide Tour is at such a high level that its tour graduates tend to arrive on the main circuit ready to win.

All of them can play at a level which almost renders their exploits meaningless. How often do you watch an event and see shot after shot of staggering precision or prodigious length? It has got to the stage where a player as gifted and decorated as Nick Faldo will describe how Spike McRoy will play a shot that the five time major winner himself would never have attempted in tournament play.

Jeff Overton occasionally wears a daft hat, that seems to be about it!

The problem is one of engagement and interest. How can anyone genuinely get caught up in the excitement of a final round where identikit professional golfer A (in a Titleist hat) is battling it out with identikit golfer B (also in a Titleist hat) for the enormous novelty check? As a college golfer, Sunday's winner, Jason Bohn, won a million dollars for a hole-in-one at a charity event. He immediately turned professional, took the cash and hasn't looked back. Runner up, Jeff Overton, kept his tour card in 2008 by finishing 21st in an event less than two weeks after an appendectomy. From now on, Bohn and Overton will be 'Lucky Bastard' and 'Appendectomy Guy' but will I have any interest in watching them play golf? Would I even be able to pick them out as I surfed onto the Golf Channel on any given Thursday afternoon? If Bohn wasn't carrying a suitcase with money sticking out of it or if Overton wasn't seeping from his side or constantly showing people his scar, the answer would be 'no'!

This is the problem. If you have no Phil or Tiger, Ernie or Paddy, you have almost no way of selling your event. So this week, I have decided to provide a service to the readers and potential tour promoters by giving you reasons to watch a number of lower profile golfers over the next few weeks and months. No longer will John Bland have to lend his name to an army of hugely proficient yet completely invisible players.

Stay tuned for golfer number one later today............

Green Rice

He's a 47 year old golf professional, that is nothing remotely out of the ordinary. The fact that this golfer is making his pro debut on the Nationwide Tour three years before being eligible for the Champions Tour is most certainly outside of the ordinary.

Jerry Rice is 5 years on from his NFL retirement where he quite literally re-invented the position of wide receiver (there was no 'Yards after the catch' statistic before Rice came along). As I write this, he is on the practice range at TPC Stonebrae in preparation for round one of the Fresh Express Classic, the latest stop on the second level Nationwide Tour.

Rice would like to lead the Tour in yards after the shot

It would have been very easy for Rice to simply play in his charity pro-am on the Wednesday before the main event, but the offer of a sponsors invite to the main tournament was too tempting to turn down. So the former NFL legend begins a second professional sports career at the age that most normal human beings begin to contemplate their impending retirement options.

Rice has always pushed himself harder than any coach or trainer would, his off season conditioning program is legendary. It comes as no surprise to learn that the best receiver in the NFL today, Larry Fitzgerald, is a Rice devotee and has based his fitness program on the one that allowed Rice to play for two decades and four Superbowls. That same level of dedication will be needed if he can make the transition from a very talented amateur to touring professional.

Shooting 68 (his best ever round) in a pro-am is nothing to be sniffed at, but reproducing that type of score in consecutive rounds will be the very minimum that Rice will need to make the half way cut. One thing the future Hall of Famer is not short of is confidence and self belief, but does he have the technique, the repeatable swing and the short game to make any sort of dent in the leader board? I decided to scour YouTube to find out. While the video below, gives you some idea of his technique it does feature a midget challenging Michael Jordan to a game of one-on-one basketball and therefor it is a 'must see' clip.

Rice is approaching this endeavour with the same application that he displayed every time he put on pads and a helmet. Making the cut this weekend would be as remarkable as almost anything he ever accomplished on the football field.

Stiletto give away

Our friends over at www.golfishardtv.com decided to feature the tool on their video blog on Sunday.



If you want to enter their competition, please check out their site for all of the details.

The future of live golf doesn't include The Golf Channel

It's Masters week hooray! But wait a minute, for those of us not lucky enough to be there, what does that really mean? Well let's start with our friends over at the Golf Channel.

[Live Update: As I write this 'Live at the Masters' is broadcasting on the 'all-golf all the time' channel. Notah Begay is the current expert talking head, he is billed as a 'Two time Masters participant', yes really.]

Scratch the surface of the Golf Channel's Masters coverage and you will quickly discover that it has almost nothing to add to the build up of this wonderful event. All the evidence would suggest that their contract precludes almost any actual coverage of the live action early in the week at Augusta. Occasionally we are given furtive glimpse of the practice ground in the background at which point, all ones mental powers are then required to work out who is hitting balls in the distance and the thoughts of the on-air 'talent' are ignored. So the coverage may be live but it is so merely so GC can say it has 1000 hours [this is a made up figure] of live coverage during Masters week. But do we really want 'complete Masters coverage' with an hour of analysis from Fredrik Jacobsen or Jodie Mudd?

[Live update: Our 'live' coverage now features a pre-packaged feature on Ernie Els]

The strict control of the broadcasting rights at Augusta make all of this somewhat understandable. The fact, however, that regular tour events are restricted to 4 hours of afternoon coverage on Thursday's and Fridays, on the specialist channel solely dedicated to the sport, is beyond baffling. As a fan of the game and a relative newcomer to the USA, I simply cannot get my head around the lack of live PGA Tour action on a channel specifically created for the purpose. Is it too much to ask for coverage of an entire days play on a golf-only channel?

SPEED TV, the dedicated motorsports channel, has recently developed programming for the NASCAR demographic as opposed to the actual motor racing fan. This includes NASCAR based cooking and talent shows. Is this the future of the Golf Channel? Will we soon see shows about changing the oil on your Lear Jet or get 'specials' on how to get chateau neuf du pape stains out of your Bentley's upholstery?

The Masters Commitee has a incredibly tight grip on all broadcast coverage and commercial exploitation of its magnificent event. Augusta's own online event coverage is quickly becoming the benchmark for the future of sports broadcasting. There is no doubt that it will only grow in popularity as broadband HD delivery improves and the platforms on which we can receive it expands. We really cannot be too far away from a time when the fan can get live streaming Hi Definition coverage, of whatever pairing they chose, delivered straight to his or her Blackberry or iPhone/Pad.

This growing trend for rights holders to take control of the delivery of their events, and accompanying message, is raising some red flags within the Networks. There is a genuine concern amongst the Networks that they are paying huge sums of money for a diminishing number of actual rights. The NFL, NBA and MLB will no longer be able to justifiably charge eye popping amounts for live rights to their events when they now have their own dedicated Networks. As this trend continues, we could end up with networks having extremely limited live rights with tight restrictions on what they can show and can't show.

Despite the evidence below, Sky Soccer Saturday is a ground breaking live show that delivers a lively results and up to the second reports service on all of the professional soccer played on Saturday afternoons in the UK. In order to promote live attendance at games, the games governing body, the FA, does not allow any live coverage of games that kick off at 3pm. The best the network can offer is a tantalizing view of the crowd and occasionally a blank corner of the pitch as a background to the frantic and always upbeat live reports. Except in this case, now watch closely, this could well be the future of 'live golf' on The Golf Channel.

Don't forget that there are still 50 (that's fifty) Stiletto Green Tools to be won right now.

Ernie Els - The arrival of a rival?

The return to tournament winning form of Ernie Els may be the most welcome story of the entire golf season. Okay, there is the tiny matter of Tiger Woods return to the sport to think about. But while the majority of the chattering classes want to see Tiger hauled over the coals by a rabid press corps, I'm more concerned with who will be first in line to have a pop at him on the course.

Can Ernie and his lion take on Tiger next week?

Golf has never really found a full time rival for Tiger, a 'Larry Bird' to his, if you will, 'Magic Johnson' . Come to think of it, 'Tiger's Magic Johnson' could be the name of a tell all biography by any number of waitresses in the Clearwater area, but I digress. Over the last decade and a half, golf writing has been split evenly between coverage of Tiger and discussion as to the likely identity of any potential and permanent nemesis. Numerous players have been voted most likely to knock Woods off his perch (who knew it would actually be a Perkins waitress?) and almost to a man, they have all failed to sustain any type of challenge to his dominance. - While were on that very issue, take a look at the latest World Golf Rankings, Tiger is a country mile clear of Steve Striker despite everything that has happened to him since winning the US Open in 2008.

It is easy to forget that Ernie Els was 'Tiger' before Tiger was. His intentions were signaled with a T7 at Baltusrol in the 1993 US Open which was followed up by a quite astonishing performance at the Open Championship where he became the first golfer in Open history to have four rounds in the sixties on his way to T6. A year later, at the tender age of 24, he took his first major victory by winning the US Open at Oakmont. In 1997, following Woods win at Augusta, Els added a second US Open at Congressional and all of a sudden the golf world had two young exciting and ludicrously talented giants to admire. One could imagine the golfing version of the Treaty of Tordesillas would be needed to allow a fair distribution of global titles between Woods and Els.

But the balance of power shifted irrevocably the following year on a remarkable Sunday in Phuket, Thailand. Tiger shot a sensational 65 (31 on the inward 9) on the final day of the Johnnie Walker Classic to overhaul Els' 8 shot lead. Woods won the title, and arguably a significant presence inside Els' head, on the second play off hole. Between 1997 and 2000, Els would finish runner up to Tiger five times (twice in majors in 2000). By the end of the century the Majors count would read 'Woods 5 - Els 2.'

For the next five years Els built up a resume that almost every other professional golfer in the World would be happy with, but it only included one more Major, the 2002 Open Championship. In 2005, while taking a well earned break between the Open and the USPGA, Els ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee. Remarkably he won his second tournament back at the end of that season, but the injury was by no means fully healed. 2006 saw Els pick up the winners cheque but once, on home soil, at the South African Airways Open.

In January of 2007 Els announced, in a fashion that was somewhat out of character, that he was instigating a '3 year plan' to regain his position as World's number 1. While Els worked hard with swing coach, Butch Harmon, his putting touch eroded alarmingly. The South African's commitment was also questioned by Woods who compared his comeback from the same injury.

"I feel pretty good with what I've done and I think Ernie could have worked a little bit harder"
- Tiger Woods, September 2009

In hindsight this statement seems even more crass than it sounded at the time, particularly considering Ernie's commitment to his family and particularly as his, then six-year old son, Ben had been diagnosed with autism.

Despite the apposite timing of Els' re-emergence as a potential major winner, it may not be the culmination of his '3 year plan'. After a disappointing T67 at the Honda Classic, Els had a hard look at his game and found a flaw in his positioning at address. This, combined with a switch to a softer ball and a 35" Odyssey putter (which has altered his stance on the greens) has radically altered his results and in turn, the level of expectancy amongst the golf writers and public alike.

I simply can't imagine a more perfect way to enjoy the afternoon of Sunday, April 11th, than sitting down to watch Ernie show Woods what hard work, dedication and commitment are all about.

Don't forget that there are 50 (that's fifty) Stiletto Green Tools to be won right now.

Finchem needs to listen to more Zappa

You drank beer, you played golf, you watched football - WE EVOLVED!
- Frank Vincent Zappa

Frank Zappa believed that a "good artist is a tasteful thief". In other words if you are going to steal an idea at least have the decency to make it a good one. When George Harrison wrote 'My Sweet Lord', thank goodness it was 'He's so fine' by the Chiffons that was running amok in his subconscious and not '99 Luftbaloons' by Nena.

PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem was almost certainly not chanelling Zappa when he decided to send a memo to all PGA Tournament directors reminding them of Steve Elkington's current tour status and the fact that the 1997 USPGA Champion would need an invite to appear in their event in 2010. One has to then ask, what precisely was he thinking while composing and distributing the memo?

The motive behind this action is rather baffling seeing as it has simply served to annoy and disgruntle the scores of tour players who, for whatever reason, no longer have full playing rights. So Tim Finchem has severely dented his own credibility as the head of the most powerful professional golf tour in the World for what exactly? Making sure that Steve Elkington gets to play as often as possible!? Steve Elkington!?

Tim Finchem, descibing just how much trouble that memo got him into, yesterday

I genuinely like the personable 47 year old Australian but does anyone actually believe his presence at, for example, the John Deere Classic will put one solitary extra body through the gates? Would putting Elkington on the entry list be more beneficial than say adding John Daly, Rocco Mediate or David Duval to Thursday's pairings?

Finchem's quote, from the memo, about Elkington being "a tournament favorite for his work with the sponsors" is both a strength and, increasingly, a weakness for the tour. Golf sponsorship would never have reached the extraordinary levels it has if it were not for the fact that so many CEO's and VP's of Marketing play the game and conduct business on the course. It is not too difficult to understand why a middle aged multi-millionaire with a major under his belt would be so popular on Pro-Am days when someone is needed to play 18 holes with the head of finance from the presenting sponsor. In turn it is hardly a surprise that a Tiger-less tour doesn't attract a new generation of fans when pressure is being exerted on tournaments to add players to their events who are marking out their time waiting to cash in on the Champions Tour.

So my advice to the 'Commish' would be that if he is going to anger half his members, shoot for the stars and send out a memo reminding all of his tournaments that they could invite the cast of 'Jersey Shore' to play in their event or possibly a live, low-handicap octopus. At least that way he could guarantee some headlines in the process.

Don't forget that there are 50 (that's fifty) Stiletto Green Tools to be won right now.

The pairings at Augusta: A ratings winner!

With only a couple of weeks to go before the first major of the season, the golf world is fixing its gaze upon Augusta, Georgia. Tiger Woods' return to competitive golf has done the almost impossible and made the 74th Masters a greater 'appointment to view' event than ever before.

The question is who will the Masters committee pair him with? Who will be forced to endure the pressure of playing in front of enormous galleries of pro and anti-Tiger followers. This group of fans are as likely to cheer every shank as they are to politely applaud each birdie. It will require a strong nerve and truck loads of confidence to play the first 36 holes in that particular environment let alone make the cut. It's hard enough to qualify for the weekend at Augusta under normal circumstances without being followed by at least one representative of every media outlet on the planet.

Tiger's locker room environment at Augusta will be much differ to recent years.

I believe I may have the solution. This proposal has the potential to deliver everything that the golf fan could want; Tiger in action, great shot making, controversy, astonishingly bad trousers, belt buckles the size of Nebraska and crowd violence. All this while ensuring the safety an protection of the players and reducing the chances of the galleries or viewing television audience being offended by any audible player profanity. It's simple really, pair Tiger up with Rory Sabbatini and Ian Poulter for the first two days and while you are at it mic them up!

Precisley the sort of gallery member Augusta is looking for, yesterday

Sabbatini has a history of effectively dealing with fans who have the temerity to talk to him while on the course. In May 2007 Texas based South African declared that "[Woods is] more beatable than ever!". Inevitably this came back to bite him two months later when Woods crushed him in the final paring on the Sunday of the WGC Bridgestone Invitational. That Sunday afternoon at the Firestone Country Club, Woods equaled the low round of the week, a 65, while Sabbatini shot a miserable 74. Unfortunately, Rory's best work of the day was in making Steve Banky a household name (outside his own) for a couple of days, by having him ejected from the course. His crime? Enquiring of Rory as to whether or not he still thought Tiger was "beatable"! It would be unfair to label Sabbatini a serial ejector, if I did not have my own painful expereince of being turfed off a championship golf course at the South African's behest.

In 2001 Sabbatini was just breaking through on the US Tour and was still establishing his playing credentials in the United States. Back then he still had a South African accent, I can only assume he bought the Texan one that comes out of his mouth now. I was friends with his caddie, Kieran Docherty (now on Todd Hamilton's bag). I met up with the player and caddie at Sabbatini's rented flat on the morning of the first round of the Open Championship at Royal Lytham. He was very friendly and was probably quite happy that he had at least one supporter specifically following him that day. All was going well until about the 7th hole, Sabbatini was on the fairway conferring with Docherty, I was behind the ropes about 60 feet away from both. The belief that my mobile phone was switched off was shattered by the loud noise breaking perfect silence, it was coming from my pocket. Without even blinking, Rory ushered a USGA official over to me and he, in turn, instructed near by stewards to escort me off the course. Of the 40,000 fans there that day, I can safely say that only one was specifically there to give the South African any support and encouragement and he, in turn, had me ejected from the venue!

Ian Poulter's contribution shall be two-fold. Primarily I want him there (and here is where the mics come in handy) so that I can hear the conversation between he and Tiger regarding the Englishman's magnificently out of context "It's me and Tiger" quote from early 2008. Tiger's response to this, at the time, was cutting and to the point. After a spectacular final round of 65, at the Dubai Desert Classic, Woods was asked live on TV about the fact that the gap in the World rankings between him and second place man Phil Mickleson was larger than the gap between Phil and the golfer ranked number 1000. Wood's responded by remarking, with an impish grin, that he thought "Poulter was number two now". The secondary reason for Poulter's inclusion is much more straight forward, I honestly believe the decibel levels of his outfits will block out much of the negativity that may come from the galleries.

Don't forget that there are 50 (that's fifty) Stiletto Green Tools to be won right now.