A legendary Solheim walk-off and Niemann pays tribute to the military
This Monday episode reacts to a wild Sunday of golf from across the globe, most notably at the Solheim Cup. Brendan and Andy review the weekend at Gleneagles, offering up a few critiques of the mowing patterns, pace of play, and some lineup choices before heaping praise on what was arguably the greatest finish to a team match event we’ve seen. Suzann Pettersen’s play on the 18th, before the clinching putt, is given due praise and they contemplate whether this finish boosts the LPGA over the rest of the season. Joaquin Niemann is then hailed as our new overlord atop the courier service rankings, which Andy equates as the best player in the world. Sergio’s win is given a modicum of praise as well as the Champions Tour player now making Ron Burgundy sweat atop the Schwab Cup. The episode finishes with a wonderful Lee Westwood locker room story heard over the weekend.
16 Syys 201951min
Solheim trash talk, POY conspiracies, and flashback to a tempestuous Ryder Cup at Greenbrier
It’s Friday! Brendan and Andy are back together holed up in an NYC hotel to reflect on opening day of the PGA Tour season. They begin by discussing all the rookies and KFT grads populating the top of the leaderboard and the return of living under par with low scores aplenty. Then they get to the back-and-forth of the Solheim Cup, where Danielle Kang and Suzann Pettersen provided sustenance for the aggregation station. Is the Solheim more heated than the Ryder Cup? A glorious Flashback Friday touches on some other match play tension and this week’s PGA Tour host venue. Included within are Seve’s debut and some stir-the-pot quotes, two Euro team members that sulked and sabotaged their own team, and a captain who tossed a note from Nick Faldo in the trash rather than read it to the team. They wrap with a breakdown of the Rory vs. Brooks Player of the Year debated that boiled over this week, highlighting some of the more amusing conspiracy theories on why we got these results.
13 Syys 201956min
Intel on driver testing, a Rickie Tour Live audit, and hacking the Fall schedule
This Wednesday episode begins with an argument and admission that it’s take two following a record button mishap. We begin with a juicy and alarming quote from the range at the Greenbrier on the new driver testing, which may not change any behaviors at all in the coming PGA Tour season. The new color-coded system for testing is given a full review. Then we get into the Slovak Open and the Shotgun Start audience taking over the comments section of the stream as the BFB won his national championship. The return of PGA Tour Live and Fan Vote Friday prompts a reveal of the Rickie Tour Live Audit, which has some damning numbers. In the last segment, we run through some lightning round answers on some the events and players we are most looking forward to and the ones we could do without over the next few months. Then we discuss a hypothetical blank canvas for Q4 of the year and how we’d approach it -- from events to markets to field sizes to formats -- if we were the PGA Tour.
11 Syys 20191h
Kuchar disgraces himself again (as do the Browns) and America’s Walker Cup rally
Victory Monday this is not, as a new week begins with the Bears and Browns both 0-1. This non-golf matter gets full attention at the top as Brendan processes all that went wrong and the emotional tumble that occurred throughout the day. Andy is also quite amused with a cheeky nickname he comes up with for the Browns coach. Rafa Nadal’s slow play penalty is applauded and put in contrast with just how far golf is from such a move. Then it’s on to the Porsche European Open, where there’s praise for Paul Casey for his win and also contemplation of whether he’s underrated or just disliked. The primary news coming out of that event, however, was Matt Kuchar yet again taking some serious liberties within the gray area of the rules. Is he obtuse, entitled, unsportsmanlike, all of the above? This progresses into a separate topic of cheating and if that’s something that occurs much, if at all, at the Tour level. The episode concludes with a discussion on the Walker Cup, which was harder to comment on because no one saw it.
9 Syys 201942min
Driver testing comes to the PGA Tour and Flashback to a media member forced to play in the Walker Cup
This delayed Shotgun Start ends with a host plagued by hiccups but comes out of the gate discussing the Bears debut on Thursday night football. Is the season over or is the door ajar for optimism? Then we get to news that the PGA Tour has will put new driver testing in place for this coming season. We discuss what we like and where the policy leaves us wanting. Also, we plea for real-time public release of the results on a giant video board with some dramatics around the new tests. Then we preview the Walker Cup and how the conditions of Hoylake will be a significant departure for so many of these highly acclaimed young American studs. We also offer to fly to Liverpool to periscope it in lieu of the lack of TV coverage. A delightful Flashback Friday goes deep on the origins of the Walker Cup, touching on a variety of amusing details like the GBI team getting worse for the wear in New York and writer Bernard Darwin having to step in and actually play matches for the team as a reserve player. Flashback also goes into a legendary stymie from the early Walker Cup days that has us yearning for the return and legalization of the practice.
6 Syys 20191h 8min
The great Labor Day card shuffle, Walker Cup sans TV, and Pat Reed’s Masters Porsche
Brendan and Andy return from the long weekend to tidy up the place, doubling back to some of the action from across multiple Tours. Andy is disgusted with the LPGA not giving exemptions the next week to high finishers at an event, as we’ll see with Yealimi Noh following her near-win in Portland. Then they react to the Korn Ferry Tour Championship and enthusiastically welcome the son of the Swing Surgeon back to the PGA Tour. They run through some of the players who got their cards, why this event worked so well, and if it can be replicated on any other Tour. Then they move to this week’s schedule, which is mostly an excuse to rant about the lack of events when there are so many bottlenecks other weeks during the summer. They also discuss the lack of TV coverage for the event of the week, the Walker Cup. In news, they get to Pat Reed’s special Masters Porsche, Bob Koepka’s tweets at Brandel and steamrolling of Little Boy Dru, and a fun Stevie Fountains story from a listener.
4 Syys 201945min
Rory critiques new major schedule, Poulter’s pool woes, and Web Tour flashbacks
A truncated Friday episode will wet your whistle heading into the holiday weekend. We begin with some scores from Europe, where Westy is lurking and Rory continued living under par. We address some comments on the “fair” test of the Swiss course from Mike Lorenzo-Vera, and start to compile a list of similar euphemisms. Then we move to Rory’s comments on the new major schedule and if his point about spreading them out over 9 months, like in tennis, works for golf. We also discuss Ian Poulter’s extreme frustration with the pool cleaning service. Then in Flashback Friday, the occasion of the KFT Championship prompts a look back at a Web Tour Finals of yore that prominently featured golf’s most famous retiree, among others.
30 Elo 201936min
The Korn Ferry shuffle and Tiger’s questionable post-surgery schedule
The PGA Tour may take a break this week but the Shotgun Start does not. This Wednesday episode runs through the schedule for the week, hitting on some premo events on the LPGA and Euro Tour before crowning the last tournament of the Korn Ferry Tour season as the event of the week. We cover which bubble boys we’re watching this week and also relay some data that shows just how extremely volatile it is this year in the positioning for the remaining PGA Tour cards. We also re-visit Stevie Fountains and discuss his prospects at Victoria National, a course which should create carnage under the most pressurized circumstances. A Champions Tour discussion leads the proposition that a PGA Tour event be held in Calgary and also confusion over who out there is actually in a Champions Tour fantasy league. The U.S. Senior Amateur events for both men and women are given their due as we run through some of the day jobs and backgrounds of the quarter finalists. A debate over how the best in the game should set their fall schedule provokes an Andy take on how we pronounce the word schedule. Then we wrap with the news of Tiger’s knee surgery and some questions about all the travel he has coming up in the final quarter of the year.
28 Elo 201948min
