By Christopher Powers
It’s long been said that Tiger Woods is the ultimate needle-mover in golf. He proved that with his return to the PNC Championship this past weekend, though his son Charlie—the potential next needle-mover—certainly played a role, too.

According to NBC Sports, the PNC Championship drew its largest audience in over two decades. Its live two-day coverage on both NBC and Peacock delivered a total audience delivery of 2.3 million viewers, which was up a staggering 53 percent from the 2020 PNC Championship, which Woods and Charlie also played in.

Of course, the fact this was Woods’ first competitive event since his car accident last February was a key factor in drawing eyeballs. Add in the fact that John Daly and his son Little John Daly went head-to-head with Tiger and Charlie, eventually clipping them by two strokes, and you had television gold.

Per NBC, it was the most-watched PNC Championship since 2000, and Saturday’s live coverage posted an event-record of 949,000 viewers. That doubled the prior record of 430,000 viewers who tuned in for last year’s final round.

Most impressively, the audience peaked at 3.2 million viewers from 3:30 p.m. to 3:45 p.m. ET on Sunday, smack in the middle of the NFL’s “witching hour.” That’s no small feat, even if this past Sunday’s 1 p.m. NFL slate left a little something to be desired. Also of note – on NBCSports.com last week, PNC Championship content accounted for 37 of the 50 most-viewed clips. Not bad for a hit-and-giggle golf tournament in December, some would say.

The post Not surprisingly, the PNC Championship did massive television numbers appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Tod Leonard
It was a valid request for NBC. Really, for all golf fans. The U.S. Open returns to Torrey Pines next week, and inescapably there will be the chatter about the 2008 championship there and Tiger Woods’ incredible performance in beating Rocco Mediate in a Monday playoff. What’s the over-under on how many times we see the Sunday putt on 18 and the celebration?

The network wanted Woods to be a part of that reminiscing, but it sounds like that’s not going to happen. On a conference call with reporters on Wednesday, NBC golf anchor Dan Hicks said that while the network invited Woods to contribute to the broadcast, he declined. Woods is missing the U.S. Open while recovering from the leg injuries he suffered in a car accident in February.

“We were thinking how good that would be,” Hicks said. “Who better, if he couldn’t be there, to voice it and have him be a part of the show? But we were rebuffed. He didn’t want to do it.

“I understand his situation,” Hicks continued. “There is a lot going on in his world right now. There’s always a part of Tiger that he doesn’t want to become a sideshow, an event, that we should be concentrating on what’s happening. I believe that if he said ‘yes’ to something, it would be a nonstop parade of asks, and you’d have to start telling everybody ‘no.’

“Hopefully, he’ll be at home watching on TV, and he’ll be inspired by us talking about what he did.”

The images and words about Woods’ victory—his last in a major until his 2019 triumph in the Masters—will no doubt resonate throughout the week at Torrey Pines. NBC golf producer Tommy Roy said on the call that 2008 is the highlight of a career in which he’s seen a lot of drama.

“Definitely No. 1 on my hit parade,” Roy said. “Growing up, Jack winning the ’86 Masters was always the most exciting event I’d seen. But that was only on the back nine, and it was about an hour and 45 minutes. The thing that happened at the U.S. Open, we had unbelievable golf. It started at 13 on Saturday [with Woods’ eagle], and then the chip-in at 17. We got off the air and I said, ‘Can you imagine if this was Sunday?’ Then it happened—him making the putt to force the playoff, then you get to the playoff, and then it goes extra holes. It just kept getting better and better. I have unbelievable memories of that whole week.”

The post Tiger Woods turned down NBC’s invite to be part of broadcast from Torrey Pines appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By John Huggan
Just three months short of his 90th birthday—“level fives” in his language—Peter Alliss passed away overnight. Born in Berlin on Feb. 28, 1931 (he was, at the time, the biggest baby in Europe, weighing in at 14 pounds 12 ounces), the doyen of golf commentating died peacefully in his sleep at home in England.

Eight times a Ryder Cup player and the winner of more than 20 events around the world, Alliss ended his distinguished playing career in the early 1970s and quickly made himself an almost indispensable part of tournament coverage on television the world over. No one in that business knew the game better; few were as quick-witted or humorous talking about what the man himself never forgot was just a game. As well as commentating regularly for the BBC, he also worked for ESPN and ABC Sports along with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

RELATED: Golf Digest Middle East’s 2014 conversation with the ‘voice of golf’

Alliss came from a distinguished golfing family. His father, Percy, played four times for Great Britain & Ireland in the Ryder Cup and was a consistent tournament winner in the two decades preceding World War II.

“I never really saw my father play,” said the younger Alliss. “But he was a lovely golfer, the Luke Donald of his day, or a Gene Littler. He had a perfectly balanced swing and was a superb driver of the ball. His putting was a bit shaky, but if you look at the greens back then they were worse than my lawn. I got a hand-written letter from Henry Cotton when I won the Assistants Championship in 1951 or ’52. Dear Peter, many congratulations on your first victory. Your father was the sweetest swinger I’ve ever seen. What a beautiful player. Sincerely, Henry Cotton.”

First through his father and later through his own exploits, Peter spent a lifetime knowing just about everyone of consequence in the game. One of his proudest claims was that, apart from maybe 15 of them, he had met, played with or known every Open champion since 1900.

“I came home one day from school to find a few of my father’s friends sitting at the kitchen table having a cup of tea and a chat,” he said. “Round that table were Reg Whitcombe [1938 Open champion], Ernest Whitcombe [1924 Open runner-up], Alf Padgham [1936 Open champion], Alf Perry [1935 Open champion], Dick Burton [1939 Open champion] and my father. It was summer time and I remember Ernest saying he had to go. He had to get back to the club—on the bus—because he had a couple of lessons that evening. Changed days indeed.”

Photo by Mrs Dulce R Stuart
Peter Alliss (left) stands next to his father Percy, circa 1961.

The young Alliss also made the acquaintance of Bobby Jones, caddying

for the great amateur in what was surely Jones’ last round of golf in the United Kingdom. It was just after the World War II at Parkstone Golf Club outside Bournemouth on England’s south coast. Jones, wearing his colonel’s uniform and with his tie tucked into his shirt, played with Alliss senior and Reg Whitcombe.

What often gets overlooked as he became more and more famous for his work with a microphone in hand was how good a player Peter Alliss was. Renowned for the smoothness and elegance of his full swing—and, later, terrible putting (the number plate on his car read ‘PUT3’) marked by a dreadful bout of the yips that, he claimed, began on the 11th green at Augusta National during a Masters—he twice played Arnold Palmer in Ryder Cup singles and finished unbeaten.

“I have a very good Ryder Cup record, mostly because of my fear of losing,” said Alliss, who went 10-15-5 on teams that went just 1-6-1. “I always had the attitude that ‘you weren’t going to beat me.’ I believe you play the man, not the course. I played Arnold three times when he was at his peak and the only one I lost was a foursome. I beat him once and halved with him in singles. I also beat Billy Casper, Gay Brewer and Ken Venturi at various times, and halved with Tony Lema.”

There was more to Alliss than a formidable match-play record, of course. In stroke play he had his moments, although—as it was for his father—not winning an Open Championship was a lingering regret (he had five top-10 finishes in 25 appearances).

R&A Championships
Peter Alliss plays a shot during the 1967 Open Championship at Royal Liverpool.

“Looking back, I was a good player,” he said modestly. “I was the best player in Europe in the 1960s, without ever winning the Open. I won my first tournament as far back as 1954, the Daks event at Little Aston, and my 21st and last in 1969. So I averaged more than one per year. There are only a handful of British players who have ever won more than I did. I’m certainly in the top 10. And my total prize money didn’t come to £30,000.

“I was a very good ball-striker in my time. And, despite my reputation, I could putt, too. You don’t win 20-odd times if you can’t putt. I would, over the course of a round, hole four or five putts of at least 20 feet. But I’d occasionally miss from no more than 15 inches. And I never knew why. I’ve seen film of myself in the mid-60s and I had hardly any backswing at all.”

Later, with all of the above behind him, Alliss’ shrewd observations on all aspects of the game were just part of his appeal as a commentator and author (he wrote 20 books on golf, from golf history to instruction to memoir). Unashamedly “un-PC,” he was unapologetically a product of his upbringing in the post-war years.

“I hate to see things going to waste,” he said. “I still go round switching lights off. I can’t bear to throw food away. I’m a relic of what influenced me when I was young. Courtesies and manners are very important to me. These days, people think you’re a dinosaur if you stand up when a lady enters the room, or if you write thank-you notes. I know it’s all progress, but it’s a different world from the one I grew up in.”

That view of modern life did occasionally get Alliss into trouble. He was, for example, not one who viewed golf in the 21st century as being necessarily superior to what had gone before.

“I do believe that the most skillful golfers were those who played between 1900 and 1920,” he said, his tongue only slightly in his cheek. “Look at the scores they did. JH Taylor won the Open at Deal around that time with scores averaging 73.5 or whatever. Look at the clubs they used. The balls weren’t round and didn’t go anywhere. The bunkers were never raked. The course was only 300 yards shorter than it is today. And the wind blew and the rain was still wet. I reckon you could take the best 20 players of today, give them the old balls and clubs in a goodish wind and they wouldn’t do what JH and his mates did.”

And he wasn’t above speaking his mind on what he sees today. A part of his character that was known to irritate a few of today’s stars.

David Cannon/Getty Images
Alliss, seen and heard by American golf fans on ABC and ESPN, served as the “Voice of Golf” at the BBC for more than 50 years.

“I watch a lot of golf on television these days,” he said not long ago. “Mostly because I don’t want the players to think I don’t know what is going on. Which is rather conceited of me. And sometimes I don’t believe what I am seeing. In Dubai recently I saw a player hit a shot from behind a tree, from rough, over a pond from about 180 yards out. Sure enough, he didn’t even get halfway across the bloody water. That sort of situation happens time and again. No wonder guys like that are also-rans; they don’t have any golfing brains. They don’t know how to play.”

Despite his long relationship with the biennial contest, the Ryder Cup was not immune either. Nor was another of the game’s sacred cows, the Masters.

“The Ryder Cup has taken on a little bit of a false persona, a bit like Augusta and the Masters,” said. “Just as Augusta National is supposed to be the greatest place in the world—it isn’t—the Ryder Cup is supposed to be the greatest golf event in the world—it isn’t either. But, because of the excitement each has generated over the years—the “War on the Shore” and all that other bollocks—it has become something it was never meant to be. Take the whole team-qualifying thing. I think the captains should just pick 12 men each and forget the rankings. It is too hurtful for someone to play quite well, finish 11th and not get picked.”

That ability to verbalize what many others think but never say was perhaps Alliss’ biggest skill during his career as a commentator. Of course, he learned at the feet of the master, former Sunday Times columnist, Henry Longhurst, who was the first journalist to transition successfully into broadcasting.

“I refused to do anything different when commentating in America,” Alliss said. “I certainly refused to say, ‘back side.’ I remember one commentator saying, ‘And here is Faldo at 14, with wind gusting from his rear.’ I thought no, I’m not saying that. For me, it was always a bunker rather than a sand trap. I always tried to do what Longhurst told me: ‘Imagine you are sitting talking to a friend with one program between you.’ If there is nothing to say, it is better to do just that. The one thing I rarely do is take my eyes off the screen. Many people do, which I liken to someone turning to look at you as he drives the car.”

In addition to his TV commentary, Alliss authored 20 books on golf.

He could do it live, too. Towards the end of his life, Alliss toured Great Britain doing a one-man show that involved nothing more than him talking to the audience and answering questions. It was a rousing success, playing to packed houses all over the country.

All of which was good for the Alliss ego, to the point where he turned down an honor from Queen Elizabeth. An OBE (Order of the British Empire) was, he felt, beneath a man of his stature and achievement.

“Yes, I turned down an OBE,” he said. “‘Other Buggers Efforts’ I called it. I was asked if I would accept it for ‘services to golf.’ Which I thought was odd. Why should I get an OBE for doing my job? Now, if it were for all the work I have done with the wheelchair charity I have been involved with, we have raised about £7 million over the years, I could have seen the point. Even then, I just contribute my name and some time. Other people do all the real work. But not for bloody golf! So I said, ‘No.’

“If I was offered a knighthood, I think I would accept. I’d have more fun with it than ‘Sir Nick Faldo’ seems to do. He has that on his golf bag for goodness sake. It would sound better if it was ‘Sir Nicholas Faldo’ but once a Nick, always a Nick.”

David Cannon/Getty Images
Peter Alliss at home with his wife Jackie and their 12 Weimaraner puppies in 2016.

Still, within it all there was a healthy dose of perspective. Life wasn’t always kind to Alliss and his wife, Jackie.

“Our daughter, Victoria, died when she was 10 years old,” he said. “She was very severely handicapped, having no central nervous system. She looked like a doll and hardly made a sound. That changed me. I used to get upset by little things and wonder why someone didn’t say hello for example. But, having had Victoria, I realised that the person who walks past without speaking might have problems I don’t know about. So all those things I used to worry about were eliminated from my life.”

And through his nearly four score years and 10, through the good, the bad and everything else in-between, Alliss was never above a bit of self-deprecation.

“I have no other talents really,” he once said. “I’ve only read about 10 books in my life. My father used to play the guitar and I played the drums until I was about 17. I dreamed of having a little band.”

Maybe in the next life. RIP.

The post Peter Alliss, renowned player and acclaimed commentator, will forever be one of golf’s distinctive characters appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Dave Shedloski
Football. Baseball. The R&A. Riviera Country Club. Torrey Pines. The PNC Challenge. The Jack Nicklaus Medal. The Olympics. COVID-19.

You have to cast a wide net over this potpourri of subject matter to fully relay the story of how the television rights to the U.S. Open changed hands from FOX Sports to NBC in a gesture of cooperation between competing networks. The deal, a child of necessity for FOX and a product of desire for NBC—which had seen FOX get in the Peacock Network henhouse in 2013 and steal away the rights to USGA championships—happened neatly and quickly and ended up being the kind of win-win-win that left all parties satisfied.

Of course, it all started with the metastasizing coronavirus pandemic that by mid-March forced golf, as well as the world of sports at large, to come to a standstill. As March turned to April, a shake-up of the major championship schedule was starting to come together, which got the wheels turning inside the head of Jon Miller, president of programming for NBC Sports.

“We kept hearing that the Open Championship was going to go from July to September, that Augusta was going to reposition to November and that the U.S. Open was possibly going to go to Riviera and be the third week of December,” Miller recalled. “And we knew that we couldn’t handle [the U.S. Open] if it was in December, because we have Sunday Night Football, and it would have also been the same weekend as our Father/Son event. So we didn’t really pay too much attention to the U.S. Open. We were just more concerned with the Open Championship.”

By the first weekend in April, the R&A informed NBC brass that the Open Championship, scheduled for July 16-19 at Royal St. George’s in Sandwich, England, was being cancelled. USGA CEO Mike Davis moved quickly, taking the September dates (this week) and thereby obviating the need to move the 120th championship from Winged Foot.

That put FOX in a fix. The network, which began hosting USGA events in 2015 in a deal over 12 years and worth an estimated $1 billion, has an extensive college football package on Saturday and the NFL on Sunday. What’s more, it also has the rights to Major League Baseball. In the midst of trying to find coverage windows on FOX but knowing that much of its U.S. Open coverage would be pushed to FS1, Larry Jones, executive vice president, business, accepted an offer from Miller to have a conversation about options for the 2020 championship.

“The original conversation was only going to be for 2020,” Miller said.

An email request to speak to Jones or Eric Shanks at FOX for this story went unanswered.

But internal conversations at NBC that involved Pete Bevacqua, Christine Dorfler and Molly Solomon at Golf Channel, among others, eventually steered Miller toward seeking the remaining seven years of the FOX deal.

“The feeling was that we just didn’t want to go for 2020. If we’re going to do this we should see if we could get the whole thing back,” Miller said. “Look, they were very open about it. Golf was not the right fit for them. None of the people who were there now at FOX were involved in the deal when it was done in August of 2013. Interestingly, there are still a lot of people at NBC who were involved with the USGA because we had it for 20 years and it was a very important property and just important to our golf business of which we think we were really strong.”

Initially, NBC golf producer Tommy Roy thought the chances were “pretty slim” that the network would regain the rights to the U.S. Open. Chris Condon

The only hurdle was the 2021 championship at Torrey Pines. NBC is committed to coverage of the U.S. Olympic Trials after the Summer Games were yet another casualty of the pandemic and postponed until next year. Eventually, they were able to work around it.

While talks were ongoing, Tommy Roy, golf producer for NBC, received a call from Mike McCarley, president, golf at NBC Sports Group, asking for a proposed budget to broadcast the U.S. Open this year. This was no problem, since Roy had produced the 2006 coverage at Winged Foot, and, in fact, had been the producer since NBC first began televising the U.S. Open in 1995.

“That’s when I knew something was going on,” Roy said. “But it was like, put this together, but chances are probably pretty slim that we’re going to get to do it.”

That’s when Roy employed his lucky medal. At a farewell dinner at the 2014 U.S. Amateur in Atlanta, NBC’s final event for the USGA, Davis presented Roy with a special rendition of the Jack Nicklaus Medal that the U.S. Open winner receives along with the trophy. “Mike said, ‘Tom, you’re the only non-winner of the U.S. Open to be ever given this medal.’ It said on it, ‘Champion Storyteller.’ It’s very cool.”

Roy kept the medal on display in his office, but he decided to put it in his pocket once he was told of the small chance to again produce his favourite event.

FOX began broadcasting the U.S. Open in 2015 at Chambers Bay with Joe Buck, Brad Faxon and Greg Norman in the booth. David Cannon

“Every four or five days one of our executives would text us going, ‘Is he carrying that medal around? Things are starting to happen here.’ And the next one, ‘Keep that medal in your pocket because things are really starting to look pretty good.’ So then when it happened it was, like, all right, the medal brought us good luck.”

It took more than luck. FOX and NBC had to hammer out a deal in which the two sides split nearly equally the cost of the remainder of the FOX contract. Talks wrapped up in early June. But that was hardly the end of it. FOX did not have the right to simply assign the TV rights to NBC. The USGA had to sign off on it, essentially negotiating an exit deal with FOX and closing on a new deal with NBC.

FOX representatives broke the news of their agreement with NBC to Davis at a June 17 meeting at Baltusrol Golf Club in Springfield, N.J. The next day NBC officials visited USGA headquarters at Golf House in Liberty Corner, N.J., to start the process of negotiations.

“I don’t think I slept for, like, almost two weeks,” said Navin Singh, chief commercial officer for the USGA, who with Chris Fraser, chief legal officer, were the primary representatives for the USGA in the talks with the two networks. “It was, basically, sunup to sundown working on this deal. Usually when you work on a rights deal, it can go over the span of a year sometimes. Or more. We did the whole thing in a matter of days.

“There were challenges for FOX and opportunities for NBC and they were able to work through all of it collectively, which was pretty impressive, and then they were able to come to us with their needs to close those deals,” Singh added. “They made it a lot easier than it could have ended up being. In the end, it was the best thing for golf and the best thing for the USGA.”

The eventual deal that NBC signed with the USGA wasn’t exactly what FOX had negotiated, though as Singh pointed out, from a fan standpoint it looks like a simple transfer from FOX to NBC because coverage hours remain the same.

With NBC getting back the U.S. Open, viewers will hear the familiar voices of David Feherty and Roger Maltbie. Scott Halleran

“The FOX contract, quite honestly, had a lot of stuff in it that we would never have agreed to,” Miller said. “In order for us to bring the USGA into the fold, we had to acquire not only the broadcast rights, the cable rights and the digital rights, but we had to get it as one complete package. The FOX contract only included broadcast rights; it did not include digital rights or streaming rights. So it was very important to us that we had all those rights.”

There were other tweaks that benefitted each side. Just to name one example, the USGA gained additional coverage in the form of “Live From” pregame programming on Golf Channel for the U.S. Women’s Open, which this year is slated for December at Champions Golf Club in Houston.

The whirlwind of activity that took place to bring the U.S. Open back to NBC took less than three months, with the official announcement from the USGA coming June 29.

“Last year’s U.S. Open was a fantastic production, and we leave FOX with nothing but positive relationships,” Singh said. “In some ways this was tough for us because we built something from scratch with them. But at the same time, we’re excited to be reunited with NBC and Golf Channel. Having already worked with them on our amateur events this year, you can sense the energy and excitement from Tommy Roy and everyone about being back. We couldn’t be more pleased how it all turned out.”

For NBC, it’s about more than just being back.

“We were very happy to get it,” Miller said, “not only for NBC Sports, but also we were happy to get it for our golf team, for our golf business. We were thrilled to get it for our affiliates. We were able to incorporate a Peacock element [NBC’s over-the-top streaming television service] into it, which is so important at NBC right now.

“We’re all just so excited to be back with this group because we just feel that the USGA and NBC are a great marriage – much like the Olympics and NBC, much like Notre Dame football and NBC, much like Sunday Night Football and NBC, or the Ryder Cup on NBC. We think the U.S. Open is home on NBC. It’s back where it belongs.”

The post Behind the scenes of one of the most complicated TV deals in golf history appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Tod Leonard
It might be light and airy. It might be awkward. It might be strictly business. We know this: When Phil Mickelson and his former caddie of 25 years, Jim (Bones) Mackay, come face to face on the first tee on Sunday at TPC Southwind in Memphis, it will be fascinating theatre.

Mickelson and Mackay, who parted ways three years ago after this tournament, the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational, will be reunited on the golf course in a group for the first time since their breakup.

Mackay, of course, took an on-course commentating job with NBC and Golf Channel, though he has made cameo appearances of late on the bag of Matthew Fitzpatrick and now Justin Thomas, whose regular caddie,Jimmy Johnson, has been undergoing tests since becoming ill at the Memorial Tournament.

On Phil’s bag is his brother, Tim, who gave up being Jon Rahm’s agent to loop after Mackay’s departure.

At least on television, Mackay and Mickelson have crossed paths only by happenstance. Much of that might be due to Mackay working among the lead groups, of which Mickelson has not often been a part of in the last few years. The Hall of Famer has won twice since Mackay left the bag—they won 42 times and five majors together— but Mickelson has only one top-10 finish in 13 starts this season.

On the strength of a four-under-par 66 on Saturday, Mickelson moved into a tie for sixth place at seven under, five off the lead of Brandon Todd. After his second 66 of the week, Thomas is one shot ahead of Mickelson, alone in fifth.

With Mackay on his bag for two events at Muirfield Village, Fitzpatrick followed a tie for 27th in the Workday Charity Open with a solo third in the Memorial. Thomas is trying for his third win of the season.

The post It’s a must-watch reunion between Phil Mickelson and his former caddie at the WGC-FedEx St. Jude appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Alex Myers
Welcome to another edition of The Grind where we have never been so thrilled to get a haircut. My appointment felt like what I can only imagine having a tee time at Augusta National feels like. I was so excited I could barely fall asleep the night before. And when I finally got into that chair, I didn’t care about the result, just that I was there after four long months in which a mop had grown on top of my head. Was it the best haircut I’ve ever gotten? No, that’s still the time I got styled for a GQ shoot. But for 17 bucks, I’m not complaining. Anyway, let’s talk some golf.

WE’RE BUYING

Dustin Johnson: Apparently this guy didn’t like falling out of the top five in the Official World Golf Ranking for the first time in four years. Johnson’s response was to win his next start at the Travelers Championship to move back to No. 3. More impressively, that’s now 21 career PGA Tour titles and a 13-season winning streak that’s only behind Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Billy Casper, Lee Trevino and Tiger Woods. Decent company.

Also decent? The payout I received from betting on DJ to win, making it two weeks in a row for yours truly after wagering on Webb Simpson at the RBC Heritage. I didn’t make nearly as much as the guy who won 20 GRAND betting on Mackenzie Hughes as a first-round leader, but at least my barber trips should be covered for the next couple years, or decades depending on the quarantine situation. Thanks, DJ!

Jayson Tatum’s swing speed: Speaking of quarantine, the Boston Celtics star caught the golf bug during his and began taking lessons. According to Tatum’s instructor, he already has elite PGA Tour swing speed that reaches 125 miles per hour despite his silky-smooth action:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CBozQzOlLwl/?utm_source=ig_embed

How about that “bunt driver” that goes 315 yards? Must be nice to be 6-foot-8 and freakishly athletic. OK, so I’d settle for just being somewhat athletic.

NBC’s USGA deal: The Peacock is getting golf’s national championship back beginning this year at a sweet discount since Fox will reportedly pay more than half of what’s remaining on the seven-year deal. Ouch. While we admire some of the innovations Fox added to its coverage these past few years, it still felt weird when the network parachuted in to broadcast only USGA events. There will be more continuity to NBC’s coverage. And more importantly, Yanni’s IN CELEBRATION OF MAN is BACK!

Between my haircut, the DJ bet, and that, it’s been quite a week.

The Summerhays family: First, 15-year-old Grace shot 76 from 7,000 yards at a Monday qualifier for the Korn Ferry Tour’s Utah Championship. Then her 17-year-old brother, Preston, shot a pair of 70s in the actual tournament to narrowly miss the cut. But Uncle Daniel saved the best for last. The PGA Tour veteran, who previously announced his hometown event would be his last start before walking away from competitive golf to become a teacher and coach at his former high school, nearly pulled off a walk-off win. Summerhays shot a final-round 62 but lost in a three-man playoff eventually won by Kyle Jones.

Matthew Stockman

What a way to go out. Except …

WE’RE SELLING

Daniel Summerhays’ retirement: The guy is playing in this week’s TPC Colorado Championship on the Korn Ferry Tour.

An emotional runner-up for Daniel Summerhays at his hometown @UTChampionship.

He had planned for it to be his final start as a pro.

But after receiving overwhelming support across the golf community, he’s onward to @TPC_ColoradoHL. pic.twitter.com/RdKHO8kUZn

— Korn Ferry Tour (@KornFerryTour) June 30, 2020

He’s back! There are retirement speeches that lasted longer than that retirement. No, all kidding aside, Daniel still plans to walk away from competitive golf full time. You just can’t walk away while you’re on a heater. We get it.

More COVID WDs: Sadly, the list of these on the PGA Tour is starting to grow rather quickly. On the bright side, though, positive tests seem to be relatively contained and players seem to be taking things very seriously. Brooks Koepka and Webb Simpson were among those pulling out despite not testing positive for the virus themselves. And players like Jason Day have quickly gotten tested when feeling symptoms. Let’s hope this remains the case—even with guys who find themselves in contention.

Being paired with Ian Poulter: Greg Chalmers’ Sunday 73 seems a lot more impressive when you consider the tough scoring conditions he faced. Just watch and listen to this epic fart by playing partner Ian Poulter:

Grip it and rip it, @IanJamesPoulter.
(Sound way up) pic.twitter.com/LyFHSIH8uz

— Skratch (@Skratch) June 28, 2020

How can anyone concentrate with that sort of flatulence around? No wonder Poulter is such a dominant force at the Ryder Cup.

ON TAP

The PGA Tour heads to Detroit for the Rocket Mortgage Classic, AKA that new event last year that Nate Lashley went wire-to-wire and won by six shots as an alternate who got into the field on the eve of the tournament.

Random tournament fact: Again, a guy who got into a PGA Tour event on the eve of the tournament as an alternate went wire-to-wire and won by six shots. It doesn’t get much more random than that.

PHOTO OF THE WEEK

Absolutely majestic. And yes, that little white spot is where DJ’s drive ended up on the final hole. My word.

VIRAL VIDEO OF THE WEEK

Check out Martin Kaymer telling a funny story about being single at the 2016 Ryder Cup and being able to hear what was going on in a teammate’s neighbouring hotel room:

Nothing worse than noisy neighbours ??#RCConfidential pic.twitter.com/iKYxcrVUZ4

— Martin Kaymer (@MKaymer59) June 25, 2020

“Others had more fun than me.” Classic. It looks like we won’t have a Ryder Cup this year, but in the meantime, we’ll take more Ryder Cup stories from Martin Kaymer, please.

TWEETS OF THE WEEK

If you’re not following Ben An on Twitter, you’re doing Twitter wrong. Here he is playfully taking a jab at Rory McIlroy:

You can…because I holed out ??? https://t.co/FIZ7XJMCBe

— Byeong Hun An (@ByeongHunAn) June 25, 2020

And here he is acknowledging why he was selected as a feature group:

Thanks to @JordanSpieth for this opportunity ? https://t.co/DVVR5HZlgi

— Byeong Hun An (@ByeongHunAn) June 28, 2020

THIS WEEK IN PHIL BEING PHIL

What a week! In his first PGA Tour start as a 50(!)-year-old, Mickelson took the 36-hole lead. Then news came out that he has trademarked the phrase “Hit Bombs” for a clothing line. Let’s just hope these joggers don’t make the cut …

Elsa

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“But what I have to do is imagine I’m the casino and just keep playing.” —Bryson DeChambeau, who after finishing T-6 at the Travelers hasn’t finished worse than T-8 in his past eight starts. I believe Bryson was referencing that he’s close to winning again because over time, “The house always wins.” But in the meantime, he’s still making money like a casino. And now he’s earned a new nickname: Bryson DeCasino. Congrats, Bryson.

THIS AND THAT

In other failed nicknames, I started calling Brendon Todd “Bren Hogan” after he missed just one fairway through three rounds at the Travelers. That didn’t age well with his tough Sunday, but I’m still going to try to get this one to stick. … Collin Morikawa had his streak of made cuts since turning pro snapped at 22, just three shy of tying Tiger Woods’ record. Now he can get to work on breaking Tiger’s overall consecutive cut record of 142. Good luck, Collin! … Toptracer announced the introduction of a new game, GO FISH, at 250 range locations worldwide. We in golf always talk about finding ways to grow the game and this could be a good one. Once my daughter realizes the difference between a golf club and a broom, I’m in. … And finally, congratulations to our John Strege for retiring after 51(!) years in the business. I’m guessing this retirement will last longer than that of Daniel Summerhays. All kidding aside, it was an honour and a pleasure working with you, John. Here’s the send-off video we made for him:

OK, enough of the sappy reminiscing, John. Go get that handicap down!

RANDOM QUESTIONS TO PONDER

Who was Martin Kaymer talking about in that Ryder Cup video?
What will Phil sell next?
Is Johnny Miller free the week of Sept. 14?

The post Dustin Johnson extends an impressive streak, Ian Poulter passes some impressive gas and a funny WAG story you have to hear appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By John Strege
NBC’s telecast of the Waste Management Phoenix Open on Saturday was less about the golf and the well-oiled chorus at the boisterous 16th hole. It was more about saying goodbye.

Johnny Miller was working his final broadcast as an analyst for NBC Sports, ending a 29-year run, and it was an emotional sendoff that hit all the right notes, including those from Jake Trout and the Ballwashers. NBC’s Peter Jacobsen, aka Jake Trout, introduced a song, “I’m Gonna Miss Johnny Miller.” It included Miller uttering the forbidden word, choke, on which his broadcast career turned, in his very first broadcast. It came on the 72nd hole of the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic in 1990, when the same Peter Jacobsen faced a long-iron second shot, all carry over water while attempting to win the tournament.

“This is absolutely the easiest shot to choke on,” Miller said, seconds before Jacobsen pulled it off en route to a victory.

Miller worked without an internal editor, a refreshing change in television golf. He did not mince words, a reminder of which he offered early in the telecast, when Scotland’s Russell Knox fanned a birdie putt well left of the hole on the 16th green.

“That was about as good as the food in Scotland,” Miller said.

“There we go,” NBC’s David Feherty said in response. “Atta boy, Johnny. Keep it coming.”

Miller’s partner in the booth, Dan Hicks, called it “springing his A-game.”

RELATED: 7 questions with Dan Hicks on Johnny Miller: The quirks you don’t see, Johnny’s “legendary lexicon,” and what he’ll miss most about Miller

His honesty was alluded to among the tributes pre-recorded. Rickie Fowler noted that Miller, “kicked me in the butt a few times. In a good way.” Patrick Reed cited Miller’s insisting he supplement his patented draw with a fade. “I’ve got to thank you for being at Doral and busting my chops for always hitting a draw,” he said. “Now I’m a little bit more rounded player. I can hit both shots. Thanks for that.”

“Sometimes a father to his son says some things that sound a little tough, but it’s for the right reasons,” Miller replied. “I feel like I almost look over these young guys and want them to step it up and move up a notch. Sometimes it takes some commentary to get them to check things out.”

CBS’ Jim Nantz, among others from broadcasting, expressed his “undying respect for you, what you’ve done for the game. A true guardian of our sport. On behalf of all my colleagues who also admire you so deeply, congratulations on such a fantastic career, and thank you for what you’ve done for our sport.”

NBC’s NFL analyst Cris Collingsworth called his approach “gut-level honesty.”

President Donald Trump complimented Miller on his analysis. “I’ve tried to copy it, but it hasn’t worked out the same way,” he said. “Congratulations on two incredible careers and maybe most importantly on an incredible family.”

Nearing the end of the broadcast, each member of the NBC crew bid him adieu, none more emotionally than Roger Maltbie, who like Miller grew up in California’s Bay area.

“Johnny, a chance to speak from the heart,” Maltbie said, wrestling with his emotions. “You’ve been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. When I was 12, 13, you were 16, 17, you were winning all the junior tournaments and I wanted to be like you. In ’66, at age 19, you played so great at the Olympic Club [in the U.S. Open] and all the junior golfers in Northern California wanted to be like you.

“We got a chance to share golf’s greatest mulligan. Got to do this for 27 years with you. It’s bittersweet. I’m going to miss you. I hope you catch the biggest fish you ever caught in your life. And I hope you’re the grandpa you want to be.”

Through it all, Miller fought back tears. He thanked the viewers for accepting “my form of commentating, which was not normal,” he said. He likely leaves with no regrets, nor should he, even for those comments that rankled players. Jimmy Roberts summed it up neatly in a piece on Miller during GolfChannel’s part of the Phoenix Open telecast on Saturday.

“He worked in service to the people on their couches,” Roberts said, “not to the people on the range.”

The post Johnny Miller’s farewell: An NBC sendoff that had him, well, choking up appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Alex Myers
For nearly three decades, Johnny Miller has been a staple of golf and sports television. But riding shotgun for a record-breaking 19 of those years has been NBC play-by-play man Dan Hicks. Just hours before the two began—and ended—a 20th consecutive year of sitting side-by-side in the 18th-hole tower with the retiring Miller’s final broadcast from the Waste Management Phoenix Open, we talked to Hicks about his longtime booth partner.

RELATED: Johnny Miller’s farewell: An NBC sendoff that had him, well, choking up

1. What do you remember about the first time you met him or worked with him? Was he an intimidating presence?
Actually, he doesn’t remember, but I was at Tucson Open as just a middle-school kid down the road. My mom would get me out of school because she was a big fan of the golf tournament, and Johnny Miller would come in and win every year by multiple shots. I think I might have asked him for an autograph. So then after I got a job in Tucson at the local NBC affiliate, I interviewed. So that was the first time I actually met him and he gave me a fantastic interview about TPC courses. Time goes on and the next time I saw him was when I first got to NBC Sports in 1992. He was at the Players Championship, and he didn’t know me. I was the new kid. I’ll never forget he was on a golf cart near the television compound and I walked by and he slaps the open seat next to him and goes, “Get in, champ, I’ll show you the course.” And I was like, you’ve got to be kidding me. I cannot believe this is happening. He couldn’t have been nicer. He showed me around TPC Sawgrass, and I’ll never forget that. To go on from there and not only work with him, but share the tower with him has been a dream come true.

2. Once you guys were in the booth together, did the chemistry come right away? And did you think you guys would spend a record amount of time together?
You never know how the chemistry is going to go. And I would say it wasn’t one of those “Oh, this is the greatest thing ever” instantly. I think Johnny was keeping a close eye on me. He’d obviously heard me being on another tower for years, but sitting up next to Johnny is an entirely different story. I kind of had to earn his respect. That takes time, that takes shows. But I think he quickly saw how passionate I was about it and how dedicated I was to it and how I could help him even become better than he was. And it just evolved into great chemistry where we knew what to expect of each other through an unspoken language. So it didn’t take long, but I had to earn his trust.

3. Is there a tournament that you guys worked together that stands out? That you guys seem to reminisce about most?
There have been so many incredible moments through the years, but it always seems to go back to Tiger’s win at the 2008 U.S. Open. It was magical in so many ways. … I thought as we walked out of booth on Saturday after Tiger made those two eagles—one of which Johnny predicted that changed the entire complexion of the championship—I told Johnny, “Remember this day. I don’t know how many years we’ll get to do this, but it won’t get any better than that.” So the next day, he sinks the putt to tie Rocco and I said, “Forget about what I said last night. This is the best.”

We were counting up tournaments, and Tiger, obviously, has won more times with Johnny in the booth than any other player. And it’s been amazing to share the spotlight with Johnny with Tiger right there with us. When I first got in the booth, one of my first events was Tiger’s second U.S. Amateur win at Newport Country Club. I’ll never forget, Tiger was playing Buddy Marucci and Johnny said, “I wouldn’t be surprised if he stuffs this in there and just ended it,” and that’s exactly what he did. So we’ve done 24 times, including those two U.S. Amateurs, Tiger won. So we’ve come full circle here. We go back to 1995 when he won for the first time with Johnny in the booth and then you go back to East Lake last year. So it’s fitting Johnny’s first and last shows with me and Tiger coincided with Tiger victories. So it’s pretty poetic how that finished.

4. What’s something fans at home don’t know about Johnny? I always wonder how he spends commercials. Are snacks ever involved?
There’s a lot of great camaraderie in the booth by everybody. Some of the best stuff comes during commercial breaks. We needle Johnny. Johnny’s got a reputation of giving it to the players, but he gets needled a lot. Roger gives him the needle. We all have fun with him. I remember one time at the Bob Hope, Eddie Van Halen was there and we got into this debate at the commercial over who is the best guitar player ever. And we’re going maybe it’s Eddie, maybe it’s Eric Clapton, maybe it’s Stevie Ray Vaughn, and Johnny goes, “Well, I think Glen Campbell is a pretty good player.” We’re like “Glen Campbell!” We gave him an endless hard time for that. But that was Johnny. He was his own guy.

Cy Cyr

I’ve done 232 events with him. And I would say 100 of those he’s done in bare feet, which people don’t know. I’ve told the story this week about how he had his own Cheez Whiz can and that was a part of his menu by our longtime 18th-tower stage manager Kathy Noce, who also put his name on tuna fish can, which she just did for the very last time. He likes a can of tuna with a little tabasco sauce. It’s not always the most nutritious, but he’ll munch on things, he’s always grazing. So yeah, there are all sorts of little quirks and we actually gave him a bag with all the little things he likes at his going away party with the crew on Thursday night. So if he misses us, he can look at that bag and remember all the cool things that happened in the tower through the years.

5. Have you played golf with him? What’s he like on the course?
I have. Not as much as I would have liked to, but it never was one of his favourite things to do on the road. He plays most of his golf with his sons and his family. But I was fortunate enough to get him out on the golf course. We’d always play during Players Championship at a really cool course called Pablo Creek. We would usually only go about 9 holes, but it was so fun. Inevitably, I get asked if we’ve played and what it’s like, and first of all, he’s a much better player than he leads on. But more importantly, to watch him in his 60s and now 70s, he still has that great action that is so him. So to just be standing next to him all these years later and watch it is pretty cool.

6. Do you recall a moment where he said something that shocked you? And what’s your favourite Johnny Millerism?
Wow. A moment when he shocked me? There were a lot of them. I’d probably say at the 2000 U.S. Open. It was my very first U.S. Open and Tiger was on 15th tee and Johnny started saying, “I’ve got this hunch Tiger is going to do something historic this week, he’s going to set all sorts of records, and he’s going to blow away the field and say ‘see you later, guys.’” This was 14 holes into the first round. And I looked over at him as if to say, “Are you really going with this, right now?” It kind of left me speechless. And I just said something like, “Well, we’ve got a lot of golf left, we’ll see.” And lo and behold, he wins by 15. That’s probably the boldest thing I’ve ever heard him say that came true, but there are just too many to document.

As for the Johnny Miller lexicon, it’s legendary. My favourite may be one that got left behind with all the chunk-and-runs and green light specials. We’re doing our first U.S. Open at Shinnecock in 1995, and Johnny looks out at the native rough, the fescue, and goes, “Well, one of the keys this week will be to keep it out of the Dingle Dangles.” And I’m thinking to myself, did that just come to him? And it did. So we’ve had a running joke through the years, especially when we’ve gone back to Shinnecock, we say, “You’ve got to keep it out of the dingle dangles.”

7. What will you miss most about sitting next to Johnny?
I’ll miss most, in addition to the broadcasting brilliance, and just never a dull moment and every single show he makes so interesting, I’ll miss just as much just being with him. Some of the things we talk about in the tower before we go on the air. It’s not all golf, it’s not all research. We talk about life, we talk about family. He has given me more nuggets of wisdom about being a good father, being a good husband, and being a good friend than anyone I’ve ever known in my life. So that is what I’m going to miss the most.

The post 7 questions with Dan Hicks on Johnny Miller: The quirks you don’t see, Johnny’s “legendary lexicon,” and what he’ll miss most about Miller appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

The word “choke” itself, as a description for the act of failing to perform under pressure, is nearly perfect. As far as I can tell from cursory research, it’s an American invention that came to prominence in the post-war period in baseball, and seems to derive more or less directly from the common, gasping-for-air definition. It’s an incredibly personal term—while a “clutch” performance conveys abstract concepts like triumph and glory, “choke” returns the focus to the gagging individual. And the more personal the sport, the more intense the insult. For example: When you think of the Houston Oilers choking against the Buffalo Bills in the 1993 playoffs, who do you think about? For me, the answer is Frank Reich. He was on the winning side, which proves that when a team chokes, there is at least some protection in the collective—you can hide behind your teammates. But when you think about Greg Norman choking at the Masters, who do you think about? The answer, of course, is Greg Norman.

It makes sense, then, that professional golfers tend to be a little sensitive about the word. Along with the natural entitlement native to the sport, and the unique belief in certain quarters that the media and fans exist to burnish the players’ images, there’s a legitimate complaint. To call someone a choker in golf is to heap scorn on a human who can’t hide, and who is already suffering from an overload of pressure in a game that’s particularly vulnerable to minor tensions—a game where the slightest mechanical deviation can result in an errant shot, and where that errant shot can be ruinous even in an otherwise perfect round. Where perfection is required, and where it is unbelievably hard to achieve, the word “choker” feels a little cruel.

RELATED: In Paul Azinger, NBC gets Johnny Miller’s candor, but delivered in his own way

But it’s also honest, and it’s also necessary. Johnny Miller would occasionally use the word “choke” as the lead analyst on NBC Sports, and as Alex Myers wrote in 2014, he knew from experience exactly what that meant. Paul Azinger, who will soon step into the retiring Miller’s role and has his own history of success and failure under pressure, has said he won’t use the word. Here was his explanation during a conference call to announce his hiring at NBC:

“I’m not afraid to use that word, but I’m not going to stick it on somebody because I don’t think that’s fair. It’s irresponsible as a broadcaster to do that. I want to help build their brand, not tear them down, and I want to do it in the way that I do it.”

This brings up a few thoughts.

1. Saying you’re “not afraid to use that word” but that you’re “not going to stick it on somebody” is a little contradictory. It’s like the student who says, “I could get good grades, but I just don’t feel like trying.” Hearing it, you can’t help think, well, maybe that’s true, but we can’t quite prove it.

2. Anyone who follows televised golf knows that the players are a little coddled by announcers not named Johnny Miller—especially in comparison to other sports—and the fact that NBC Sports is a “partner” with the PGA Tour is an economic reality. Still, it’s a little strange to hear a media member, especially a kinda-sorta-journalist, say of the players that he wants to help “build their brand.” In golf’s realpolitik, it’s no conflict of interest at all, but it does feel like Azinger is grinding the last flickering embers of perceived media independence into ashes under his heel. It certainly makes him sound more like an aspiring Nantz than an aspiring Miller.

Azinger has never shied from being candid with his opinions. Here’s hoping that doesn’t change at NBC.

All of which brings us to the concept of “fair.” Azinger says “I don’t think that’s fair” when referring to the word choke as a descriptor, but he certainly can’t mean that’s it not true. Everyone who has ever played or watched a professional sport knows that choking is real, it happens all the time, and it’s usually pretty obvious. I’ve choked, and you probably have too. And if you accept that choking is sometimes true, and that’s it an important part of a tournament narrative—again, if it’s honest and necessary—what Azinger is really saying is that telling the truth isn’t fair.

You might agree with him. Sometimes telling the truth is mean, and if we lived a life without the convenience of timely white lies, our interpersonal relationships would get ugly fast.

RELATED: There was no choke in Johnny Miller as a broadcaster

Yet we’re not talking about your aunt’s boring vacation photos. We’re talking about professional golfers who make lots of money and accept a life as a public figure as part of the bargain. Competition is the essence of what they do, and a large part of their income derives from the fact that a chunk of the American public finds that competition compelling enough to watch. One price of being a public figure and reaping those benefits is that you subject yourself to the drama as it’s presented on television. To expect that the men and women translating this drama for the public won’t honestly convey the bad with the good is unreasonable, and it’s odd to hear Azinger essentially cut off a whole avenue of commentary before he even begins.

Let’s be fair—maybe he simply means that he’ll find synonyms for the word “choke” because of the heavy connotation. But there was no evidence for that reading from his conference call. In fact, when you consider his concern for building the players’ brand, it certainly seems like he’ll shy away from negative commentary as a rule.

I like Paul Azinger. He’s a smart man, he was a great Ryder Cup captain, and he has the chance to be really good at his job. Which is why I hope he reconsiders this stance. There are a few good ways for a player to build his brand, and they include an aggressive agent, smart sponsors and, above all, success on the course. The list should not include the passive assistance of a neutered media. That’s a lesson Johnny Miller carried with him for an entire career, and it’s one Azinger would do well to heed. Free the choke.

The post Paul Azinger must free the choke appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.