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 Sep 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 Sep 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 Aug 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 Aug 201948min
The Irish Prince of Ponte Vedra, a new Brooks-Rory rivalry, and an LPGA scandal
A full weekend of golf is reviewed on this Monday episode, starting with the low gross AND net winner at East Lake, Rory McIlroy. Andy and Brendan review Sunday’s finale to the PGA Tour season and if the new format was validated by the leaderboard and Rory winning both ways. The Tour championship is graded, the constant money chatter is critiqued, one final Dump in the Cup is awarded, and a wild proposal is made for how the winner should be given his money. The subjects of Player of the Year and a new Brooks-Rory rivalry are addressed. There’s also a discussion about which Tour player would be most likely to do an Andrew Luck style surprise retirement. They close with some news of a fascinating scandal bubbling up on the LPGA tour.
26 Aug 20191h 3min
Instant reactions to the staggered start in ATL and Sean Martin joins from East Lake
It’s Friday! Brendan and Andy offer up some quick reactions to the first ever staggered start on the PGA Tour. There is a three-way tie already atop the leaderboard -- was the format a success or was this always how it was going to go? Rory McIlroy’s comments on the “legacy” impacts of a staggered start are reviewed, and Andy offers the take that the history of the Tour Championship is being killed off in the same way as the Western Open. Matt Kuchar gets confused about Brooksy’s nudes, and it cost Tiger. Then some Champions Tour intel is also relayed via a source, who is an Uber Driver. For the second half of the pod, Sean Martin of PGATour.com joins us to provide his early impressions from on the ground as well as some lightning round takes on who we are surprised to see in Atlanta and who we are surprised did not make it. Flashback Friday gets into what Andy terms the greatest FedExCup ever and the best FedExCup performer ever, with the beautiful mind memory of Sean weaving in all the random obscure facts stuck in his brain.
23 Aug 20191h 9min
Dream and nightmare scenarios for new FEC finale format, Euro Tour takes on slow play
It’s finally here: the season-ending Tour Championship with its net and gross leaderboards at East Lake. Andy, fresh off a maddening day at Mid Am qualifying (which he describes as well), feistily lays out his issues with the staggered start. Brendan attempts to make the case for why this new change is a curiosity worth lauding and watching, at least at the start. We lay out some dream and nightmare scenarios for how this could go for Jay Monahan and the PGA Tour. Then we move to the European Tour taking on slow play, running through its four-point attack and the parts we think are best for improving the problem. The PGA Tour’s response and comments on it coming out of Atlanta are also discussed. In news, we hit on a troop deployment to the Military Tribute as well as the incredible Steph Curry announcement at Howard. We close with some picks for Atlanta for both the low gross and net portions of the proceedings.
21 Aug 201953min
JT torches Medinah, did the U.S. Am upstage the FEC, and Todd’s revenge
Andy and Brendan return from the weekend with much to discuss and begin with results -- from JT’s win on the dartboard in Chicago, to Pieters’ return to the winner’s circle, to some cards secured at the first KFT finals event, and finally to Doug Barron, the longshot monday qualifier who won on the Champions Tour. In the not-playing-for-cash department, they review the finals of the U.S. Amateur at Pinehurst, comparing the conditions and style of that championship to the FedExCup event at Medinah. Is the core golf fan tuning out the FEC in favor of something like the two amateurs the last two weeks and if so, does that even matter? The comments from Adam Scott and Tiger Woods on distance and the one club that’s become most important while also easier to hit than ever are given full review. A painful “dump in the cup” segment does not play favorites, but on the KFT, they reconnect with an old friend and prepare for a full year of #ToddWatch. They wrap by discussing the auto-qualifiers for the Presidents Cup teams and the USA Walker Cup roster.
19 Aug 201953min
