A few great thoughts, minor scoops and war stories from the cluttered notebook, mailbox and mind of an ink-stained wretch:
BLOCKBUSTER DEAL:
This column has learned that six 18-hole golf courses in the Chicago
suburbs will soon be sold in a blockbuster deal, perhaps worth
somewhere near $60 million.
It would be the largest sale of golf properties in local industry history.
Sources
say the American Golf Corp. will sometime in December sell its Tamarack
GC in Naperville, Eagle Brook CC and Mill Creek GC in Geneva, Fresh
Meadow GC in Hillside, Ruffled Feathers GC in Lemont and Mission Hills
CC in Northbrook to Eagle Golf Corp. of Texas.
Four are public
courses; Mission Hills and Eagle Brook are private clubs. All courses
are part of residential developments except for Fresh Meadow.
Eagle Golf already has a presence in the area with a management contract with Bull Valley GC.
A manager for one of the courses on the block was asked if the new owner plans to retain current employees.
“At this point, that’s what they’re leading us to believe,” he said.
Stay tuned.
FEDUP CUP:
Okay, so the PGA Tour has made some “tweaks” to the FedEx Cup playoffs
– most prominent the decision to move the Tour Championship to the far
side of the Ryder Cup and giving the winner $9 million in cash right
away with $1 million deferred, instead of the entire wad not being
available until the player reaches 45.
CBS Sportsline’s Steve Elling says a more powerful entity than the tour had influence in the payout decision.
“[PGA
Tour commissioner Tim] Finchem said governmental pressures contributed
to the tour’s decision to back away from giving the FedEx winner’s
bonus out in deferred payment ... elected representatives in
Washington, D.C., are taking a long, dim look at large deferred payment
plans.”
Well, the decision to move the Tour Championship to
later dates was a no-brainer, seeing that with the original
mid-September dates you run the risk of playing on a course with
heat-damaged turf – which is exactly what happened at East Lake in
Hotlanta.
But nothing has been done to “encourage” the game’s
top stars to play all three of the playoff events, perceived by many to
be a problem after Tiger Woods, Ernie Els and Phil Mickelson each took
off one week during the playoffs this year. One also wonders if Tiger
and Lefty participated just to do their share to launch the event;
right now, I’ve got even money saying one or both will blow it off next
year.
And while the Tour keeps running “computer models” to test
the points system, those same computers last fall failed to address the
possibility that a person with a huge lead like Tiger Woods could play
only two of three playoff events, win one and have enough points to win
the whole enchilada without even showing up for the Tour Championship.
That kills the concept that all of the marquee names would play all
four events – a concept that was sold to event organizers and their
title sponsors.
What didn’t change was the concept of FedEx Cup
points, a silly exercise solely to have people repeat the title
sponsor’s name as often as possible. The points standing in 2007 were
nearly identical to the money list, which doesn’t have a sponsor’s name
welded to it.
More tweaks may be announced after another meeting
in February. Personally, I’d like to see the fields reduced for each
playoff event to make it more of an honor. Having ostensibly 19 players
in the FedEx Cup playoffs who had to return to Q-School this December
doesn’t add high drama, quality or glitz. Start with the top 120, then
cut to 80, 60 for the BMW Championship and 30 for the Tour Championship.
BACK TO SCHOOL?: The final 2007 PGA Tour money list
was determined when the Tour’s seven-event Ho-Hum Swing was recently
completed. Or the desperate “chase for a card” or whatever the PVB
hyperbole factory calls it.
The events are strictly third-tier,
nearly void of marquee name players and like tour events that oppose a
major, winners do not get an invite to the Masters starting next year,
as will this year’s “authentic” champions.
Each year the top
125 players earn their tour cards, and its been a mad scramble the last
few weeks for those near the cutoff line. Ending up in the first spot
on the outside looking in (No. 126) is Ben Curtis, who backed into a
major championship when Thomas Bjorn self-destructed at Royal St.
Georges in the 2003 British. But as part of his prize package, Curtis
received a five-year exemption to the Tour. It will expire at the end
of 2008.
Notables expected to head for PGA Tour Qualifying
School Nov. 28 to Dec. 3 at Panther Lake GC and Crooked Cat GC in
Winter Garden, Fla., include Ted Purdy (127), Harrison Frazar (131),
Robert Gamez (132), Billy Andrade (150), Bob Tway (154), Dickie Pride
(159), Janzen (160), Chris Riley (161), Glen Day (163), Duffy Waldorf
(166), Kirk Triplett (173), Joey Sindelar (174), Olin Browne (175),
Paul Stankowski (178), Greg Kraft (179) and John Daly (188). They will
all be exempt to the final stage. Brett Quigley finished at No. 130,
but is expected to get a partial medical exemption.
By the way,
2007 was the last year anyone who received the old 10-year exemption
could have been eligible under that umbrella. Starting with majors won
in 1998, the automatic exemption was cut to five years. The old
standard would have helped Lee Janzen, who’s been struggling lately and
will head to Q-School after finishing well out of the running at No.
160. Janzen won the 1998 U.S. Open, the first year the exemption was
cut back to five years.
As an aside, still fully-exempt for
winning a PGA Championship or U.S. Open prior to 1970 are Al Geiberger,
Jack Nicklaus, Jack Burke, Jr., Billy Casper, Don January, Arnold
Palmer, Gene Littler, Gary Player, Dow Finsterwald, Bob Rosburg, Jack
Fleck, Raymond Floyd, Lee Trevino, Doug Ford, Orville Moody, Ken
Venturi, Bobby Nichols and Tom Watson.
Wouldn’t it be a hoot
if those guys started showing up again for an occasional event, if for
nothing other than selling a few extra tickets and providing
interesting Wednesday interviews in places like Milwaukee and the Quad
Cities?
STILL BUILDING: Marengo-based
course builder Golf Creations has broken ground in Downstate Sherrard,
Ill., on a new Jack Nicklaus Design project that, due to its proximity
to Moline, has drawn an extraordinary level of involvement from another
name brand, John Deere.
Trees are being cleared and grading is
underway at Fyre Lake National Golf Club & Marina, where Golf
Creations field operations manager Kevin Stieneke hopes to rough out
nine holes and lay irrigation before the snow flies. Chris Rule, the
Nicklaus design architect presiding at Fyre Lake, anticipates a spring
2009 opening for the 18-hole, 6,600-yard, par-70 layout. It has not
been announced if the club will be public or private.
Golf
Creations is the sister division of Marengo-based Lohmann Golf Designs
and builds the designs of other architects. However, this is the first
time Golf Creations has been tasked with building a Nicklaus Design.
FINALLY:
Usually the modus operandi of our Winter issue is to cram in as much
content as we can because the next print issue won’t be forthcoming
until sometime in March. That’s not the case during the regular season,
when we’re always inside of two weeks to the next issue.
But now
with ChicagolandGolf.com up and running, we never have to “sign off”.
We have a lot of exciting things planned for the site, soon to include
an interactive blog. Stop by and bookmark us.