The post Phil Mickelson drops new Augusta National sign-stealing video ‘evidence’ to support story appeared first on Golf.

The post Phil Mickelson drops new Augusta National sign-stealing video ‘evidence’ to support story appeared first on Golf.

It’s clear the prosecution has not rested, and, to be clear, the prosecutor is Phil Mickelson himself.

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In case you missed it, the six-time major champion posted a video Thursday night in which he revealed an outrageous sign-stealing scheme he enacted at the Masters back in 2005 and 2006. The scheme involved Mickelson nicking range signs under the cover of darkness so he could practice his favorite towel drill each day of the tournament. You can read all the details and watch the original video here.

The hilarious story quickly went viral, and Mickelson couldn’t resist adding more accelerant to the content fire.

So on Friday, Phil got back on X (formerly known as Twitter) to post a video with a pelzgolf.com watermark showing Mickelson practicing the now infamous “towel drill” at Augusta National, along with a description: “Doing the towel drill (without a sign saying not too )”

In the footage, you can clearly see Lefty, club in hand, in front of a stack of practice balls, with instructor Dave Pelz standing watch in front of him and several towels spread out on the range beyond them.

Check it out here:

As for the veracity of the “evidence,” a few things stand out. First, the figures in the video are clearly Dave Pelz and Phil Mickelson as claimed, with Phil sporting one of the visors he commonly wore in the era.

Second, it appears from the impeccable state of the turf and the familiar surrounding flora that this is indeed Augusta National.

But one detail doesn’t jive with Phil’s story. At the beginning of the video, a second watermark briefly appears in the bottom center of the screen that reads “2006 Masters.” According to Mickelson’s tale, the initial, successful sign-stealing incident took place at the 2005 Masters. The second sign-stealing escapade did occur in 2006, but it was unsuccessful. Mickelson stated in the original video that after he stole the sign for a second time in ’06, he arrived at the range the next morning to find that a new sign had been put in its place, which prevented him from doing his towel drill on the East practice range.

But in the new video, Mickelson is allegedly practicing the towel drill at the 2006 Masters.

So one of three things must be true: 1) This video isn’t actually from the 2006 Masters; 2) The range pictured is not Augusta’s East practice range; or 3) Phil doesn’t quite have his facts straight.

We’ll have to wait for more evidence to make a final judgment.

The post Phil Mickelson drops new Augusta National sign-stealing video ‘evidence’ to support story appeared first on Golf.

The post Phil Mickelson admits to repeated Augusta National theft in story you won’t believe appeared first on Golf.

The post Phil Mickelson admits to repeated Augusta National theft in story you won’t believe appeared first on Golf.

The reason? A video surfaced on social media Thursday night making serious allegations against the three-time Masters champion involving repeated theft at the storied club in Georgia.

And there’s a good chance the allegations are true, because the man who made the claims is none other than Phil Mickelson himself.

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Late Thursday night, Mickelson dropped a video of himself on X (formerly known as Twitter) sitting in a golf cart and spilling the details on his crime.

Mickelson begins by explaining that back in 2004 he and Dave Pelz started working on a towel drill in which they would lay towels down on a range from specific distances up to 175 yards and hit to them.

The drill seemed to turn Phil’s game around, leading to multiple wins including his first major title at the 2004 Masters, where he practiced the drill daily.

But when Mickelson showed up in 2005, as he claims in the video, a new sign had appeared on Augusta’s East driving range, his preferred spot to practice the drill, that read: “EAST PRACTICE TEE FOR SHORT GAME PRACTICE ONLY.”

This presented a problem for Phil, who would no longer be able to perform the drill he depended on for his title defense. That is, until he came up with an innovative solution: steal the sign.

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“After the Champions Dinner, I let all the champions leave first, and I go down Magnolia Lane and I park the car, and I kind of crawl under the magnolias, and I take that sign and I wiggle and I wiggle and I lift and I yank it out and I throw it in the back of my SUV and off I go,” Phil reveals in the video. “So I show up the next morning and there’s no sign there, I start hitting my shots, I do my towel drill and I do it all week long.”

But when Mickelson returned in 2006 for another Masters start, the sign had reappeared. Not to be dissuaded, Phil reenacted his theft from the previous year, and once again stole the offending range sign. This time, though, the plan didn’t work.

“I show up the next day and I’m going to go do my towel drill and there’s another sign there,” Phil explained. “It never dawned on me there are cameras everywhere and there’s some video of me crawling under these magnolias with the guys saying, ‘Look at this idiot, what’s he doing?'”

The story sounds far-fetched, especially considering Augusta National’s reputation for being very strict about rules and regulations during Masters week, for both fans and players.

But Mickelson provided some proof. At the very end of the video, Phil pulls out the very sign he stole from Augusta and displays it for the camera along with one line: “It’s a true story.”

Check it out for yourself below.

Fortunately for Phil, he wasn’t banned from the club (at least not yet), and being denied his preferred drill didn’t seem to affect him in 2006 either, as he went on to capture his second Masters title and third career major that week.

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The post 2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic tee times: Round 3 pairings for Saturday appeared first on Golf.

The post 2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic tee times: Round 3 pairings for Saturday appeared first on Golf.

Featured pairing for Round 3

We’re at the halfway point in the Motor City, and so far, it’s anyone’s ballgame.

Taylor Moore and Taylor Pendrith share the top of the leaderboard at 13 under, but there are tons of contenders within striking distance. Fourteen players are within three shots of the lead heading into the weekend, and with 36 holes to play, it’ll take two more solid rounds to take the crown.

Moore and Pendrith will tee off in the final pairing at 2 p.m. ET, while Rickie Fowler and Ludvig Aberg, who sit one shot back, will tee off in the penultimate pairing at 1:50 p.m.

You can stream Saturday’s third round via PGA Tour Live on ESPN+ beginning at 7:30 a.m. ET or watch the action on Golf Channel from 1-3 p.m. ET followed by CBS from 3-6 p.m. ET.

Check out the complete Round 3 tee times for the 2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic below.

All of our market picks are independently selected and curated by the editorial team. If you buy a linked product, GOLF.COM may earn a fee. Pricing may vary.

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2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic Round 3 tee times (All times ET)

Tee No. 1

6:50 a.m. – Kyle Westmoreland, Sam Bennett
7 a.m. – Kelly Kraft, Nick Watney
7:10 a.m. – Davis Riley, Christian Bezuidenhout
7:20 a.m. – Vincent Norrman, Robert Streb
7:30 a.m. – Robby Shelton, Matthias Schwab
7:40 a.m. – Kevin Tway, Sam Stevens
7:50 a.m. – Chase Johnson, Ryan Gerard
8 a.m. – Brice Garnett, S.H. Kim
8:10 a.m. – Zach Johnson Greyson Sigg
8:25 a.m. – Garrick Higgo, Will Gordon
8:35 a.m. – Davis Thompson, Scott Stallings
8:45 a.m. – J.J. Spaun, Ryan Brehm
8:55 a.m. Kyle Reifers, Russell Knox
9:05 a.m. – Chez Reavie, Henrik Norlander
9:15 a.m. Harry Higgs, Matt Wallace
9:25 a.m. – Marty Dou, Trevor Cone
9:35 a.m. – Nate Lashley, S.Y. Noh
9:45 a.m. – Tyler Duncan
10 a.m. – Chesson Hadley, Paul Haley II
10:10 a.m. – Sungjae Im, Alex Smalley
10:20 a.m. – Martin Laird, Adam Svensson
10:30 a.m. – Vincent Whaley, Hank Lebioda
10:40 a.m. – Danny Willett, Luke Donald
10:50 a.m. – Chad Ramey, Stephan Jaegar
11 a.m. – Brett Stegmaier, Doug Ghim
11:10 a.m. – Ryan Palmer, Ben Griffin
11:25 a.m. – Max Homa, Ryan Moore
11:35 a.m. – Carson Young, Justin Suh
11:45 a.m. – Charley Hoffman, Carl Yuan
11:55 a.m. – Sam Ryder, Keegan Bradley
12:05 p.m. – MJ Daffue, Alex Noren
12:15 p.m. – Brian Harman, Troy Merritt
12:25 p.m. – Satoshi Kodaira, Brendon Todd
12:35 p.m. Callum Tarren, Nicola Hojgaard
12:50 p.m. – Peter Malnati, Chris Kirk
1 p.m. – Adam Hadwin, Peter Kuest
1:10 p.m. – Sepp Straka, Cam Davis
1:20 p.m. – Dylan Wu, Andrew Landry
1:30 p.m. – Aaron Rai, Collin Morikawa
1:40 p.m. – Adam Schenk, Justin Lower
1:50 p.m. – Rickie Fowler, Ludvig Aberg
2 p.m. – Taylor Moore, Taylor Pendrith

The post 2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic tee times: Round 3 pairings for Saturday appeared first on Golf.

The post Phil Mickelson, in Twitter flurry, dishes on a Masters joke, Rory — and his wealth appeared first on Golf.

The post Phil Mickelson, in Twitter flurry, dishes on a Masters joke, Rory — and his wealth appeared first on Golf.

Yes, in a span of about 15 hours over Twitter, Phil Mickelson dished on a number of eclectic topics.  

Yes, you’ve probably read that sentence immediately above before. Of late, the six-time major champion has logged on often. Still, at a minimum, this latest batch of thoughts are, we’ll call it, notable. We’ll go in order. 

The Masters trash talk? That started from an Instagram post on Thursday from the “PGA Memes” account, which wrote: “Every Masters Tuesday, Phil Mickelson delights in torturing jacket-less colleagues by asking, ‘Hey, do you have any dinner plans tonight?’ Dustin Johnson was one of his favorite targets and he fell for it more than once. Last November, after having finally won his first Masters, Johnson took time on Sunday evening to dash off a text to Mickelson: I know what I’m doing for dinner next year on Tuesday, m****rf***er.” (For background here, Mickelson has won three Masters, and Johnson won his first in 2020, when it was played in November.) 

The Instagram post was then posted to Twitter on Thursday afternoon by @flushingitgolf, who also wrote: “I hope this is real.” It apparently was. At 11:27 p.m. on Thursday, Mickelson tweeted: “It’s true,” adding a shoulder shrug emoji. 

There’s more. 

The question about Rory McIlroy and Masters trash talk? That came four minutes later. At 11:31 p.m. on Thursday, @GrowTheGolfGame asked: “When was the last time you asked Rory [wink emoji].” And the answer? That came at 10:39 a.m. on Friday. 

“I haven’t asked Rory,” Mickelson wrote. “I don’t think he’d handle it well. Probably tell me to F off.” He added two laughing emojis.

There’s more. The answers to questions about gambling? And a declaration of personal wealth? Those came Friday morning, as part of a Twitter thread in response to a column by Golfweek that was critical of Mickelson. 

Wrote @mr_skilling at 1:08 p.m. on Friday: “Speaking of professional help, how is your gambling addiction?”

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Answered Mickelson at 1:10 p.m.: “Haven’t gambled in years. Almost a billionaire now. Thanks for asking.”

Wrote @GrahamOhare at 1:18 p.m.: “All that money and you’re still a miserable angry old man.”

Answered Mickelson at 1:20 p.m.: “Trying to find the best and most effective ways to give it to those most in need. I can be grateful for all I have and still not be ok with all the monopolistic stuff that I know goes on within the golf world”

Wrote @trulymassive at 1:19 p.m.: “Dude, im a BIG phil fan but holy s**t man just admit u enjoy gambling… nobody believes u havent placed a bet in “years” and saying it makes u look silly. Just own that u like a little action once in awhile… there are plenty of us who love u more for it.”

Answered Mickelson at 1:21 p.m.: “It’s true [shrug emoji].”

There was one more. 

Wrote @MattR69391492 at 1:36 p.m.: “Gotta call bs here. This means Phil doesn’t play for money on practice rounds and casual rounds.  That is gambling.”

Answered Mickelson at 1:56 p.m.: “There is an * then. We cap it at 1k. I would argue that’s creating competition. But certainly you could argue otherwise.”

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The post Phil Mickelson, in Twitter flurry, dishes on a Masters joke, Rory — and his wealth appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘What’s the budget for this?’ Jon Rahm shares Masters Champions Dinner details he’s decided appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘What’s the budget for this?’ Jon Rahm shares Masters Champions Dinner details he’s decided appeared first on Golf.

As the newly crowned champion, Jon Rahm will have the honor of choosing the menu for the 2024 gathering. And while most players stay pretty mum about their picks until the weeks leading up to the Masters, Rahm told hosts Colt Knost and Drew Stoltz on this week’s episode of Subpar that he’s already made some crucial decisions — including seeking guidance from famed Spanish chef Jose Andres.

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“We’ve talked about it as a joke in the past,” Rahm said of ultilizing Andres. “I mentioned in the press conference [at the RBC Heritage]. He sent me a text. ‘Hey man, everybody’s texting me. What’d you say?’ ‘Well, we talked about it before, what do you mean what did I say? Like, I want you to help!’ He said, ‘Okay, okay, I’ll help you out.’ We haven’t talked about it in between.”

Rahm revealed that he’s put the most amount of thought into the wine selection, but also feels good about his choice of appetizer and dessert.

“I already have a few ideas,” he said. “For people that know Spanish cuisine, jamón will be there for sure. Spanish ham. Jamón ibérico [a type of cured leg of pork], as an appetizer. I believe I know the dessert. Possibly the wine, if I get a choice on what wine is drank.”

Knost then quipped, “You’re paying for it.”

“That’s another thing I learned,” Rahm replied. “I went to Chairman Ridley, I was like, ‘What’s the budget for this?’ Whatever you want to spend! Great!”

In choosing dishes to honor his home country of Spain, Rahm is maintaining a longtime tradition. Hideki Matsuyama’s Japanese menu was a massive hit in 2022, while Sergio Garcia was the last player to craft a menu with a Spanish theme in 2018.

For more from Rahm, including the strict rules he must abide by when wearing the green jacket, check out his entire Subpar interview below.

The post ‘What’s the budget for this?’ Jon Rahm shares Masters Champions Dinner details he’s decided appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘Don’t f— this up’: Jon Rahm details nerve-wracking green jacket ceremony prep appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘Don’t f— this up’: Jon Rahm details nerve-wracking green jacket ceremony prep appeared first on Golf.

On this week’s episode of GOLF’s Subpar, Masters winner Jon Rahm joined the podcast to discuss with hosts Drew Stoltz and Colt Knost about his first-ever green jacket experience, including the moment that might have been the most nerve-wracking of his whole Masters Sunday: the Green Jacket ceremony rehearsal.

Now, not many golf fans know that before the green jacket winner reaches the post-tournament ceremony, he meets with Augusta National membership first to rehearse what is soon to come.

“They had me rehearse [the ceremony] with the people inside,” Rahm said. “I’m like, I’ve never thought of this in my life, right?”

Rahm said that after a brief wardrobe session, a team of green jackets walk the winner through what’s soon to come.

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“They have you try a few jackets on and all that, and then it’s like this is how you do this,” Rahm said. “This is pretty funny, they said the one rule that I had to remember is not to shake Scottie’s hands first. To go to the chairman first and then to him.”

Chairman first, then Scottie. Seems simple enough, right? Not so fast.

“The whole time I’m there thinking, like, don’t f— this up,” Rahm said with a laugh. “Then [we get to the ceremony] and I stand up and the first person I see is Scottie, even though he was trying to hide behind me.”

Fortunately, with the assist from Scheffler, Rahm remembered the proper handshake cadence, reaching out to club chairman Fred Ridley before turning to Scheffler. It’s a funny memory now, given it all worked out. And even funnier considering that Rahm would’ve been one of only a few dozen people to realize a mistake had been made in the first place.

“The funny thing is, if I would’ve done the wrong thing, nobody would’ve known.”

To hear the rest of his Subpar interview, check out the link below.

The post ‘Don’t f— this up’: Jon Rahm details nerve-wracking green jacket ceremony prep appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘Look what happened’: Greg Norman credits LIV contenders for Masters ratings spike appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘Look what happened’: Greg Norman credits LIV contenders for Masters ratings spike appeared first on Golf.

While Jon Rahm won by four, Brooks Koepka and Phil Mickelson tied for second, and Patrick Reed tied for fourth with Jordan Spieth. Koepka, Mickelson and Reed all left the PGA Tour for LIV Golf — and Koepka was the tournament leader virtually all week — and their strong play did not go unnoticed by LIV executives.

Those players still, however, aren’t allowed on the PGA Tour, and earlier this month The Times of London reported that the DP World Tour won its arbitration case vs. its LIV, allowing the reinstatement of fines for and suspensions of LIV defectors.

Greg Norman, the CEO of LIV Golf, touched on that recent ruling, the future of his league and more during a press conference in Adelaide on Thursday, as LIV readies for its first fourth event of the season.

“I do hope there gets to a position where there is resolution to this, because the game of golf doesn’t need to suffer. These guys don’t need to suffer. OWGR doesn’t need to suffer,” Norman said. “Augusta National recognized that, and look what happened with their ratings when the LIV players came in. It was up 19 percent. Who was the benefactor of that? Augusta National, right?”

Norman is referring to the final round of the Masters, which saw a massive ratings increase over Scottie Scheffler’s win the year before. According to CBS, the fourth round averaged 12.058 million viewers and peaked with more than 15 million from 7 to 7:15 p.m., around the time Rahm won. It was the most-watched golf telecast on any network in five years.

This year’s Masters had much going for it: juicy PGA Tour vs. LIV storylines (the first time they played together since last year’s Open Championship, and the first time at a Masters); the return of one of the most dominant major players of the last decade (Koepka, who almost won); a late Mickelson surge; and a more tightly contested final round. Rahm’s winning margin was four, but it was only two with eight holes to play.

The PGA Tour vs. LIV Golf major tension isn’t going away anytime soon. LIV players are allowed in the three remaining majors of 2023 as well.

“LIV is the force for good, and now guys want to play,” Norman said. “They want to play in the majors. You don’t think CBS, NBC, you don’t think the corporations that sponsor those major championships don’t want Cam Smith, the Open champion, in their major tournament? Of course they do. It’s a crying shame if they take their shallow view of, caused by LIV, where because of another product they’re going to ban these guys? Well, I think Augusta National proved that case point very clearly.”

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The post Tiger Woods undergoes another surgery, casting doubt over his 2023 status appeared first on Golf.

The post Tiger Woods undergoes another surgery, casting doubt over his 2023 status appeared first on Golf.

Woods’ team announced on Twitter Wednesday that he underwent a “subtalar fusion procedure to his post-traumatic arthritis from his previous talus fracture.”

“It was performed by Dr. Martin O’Malley at HSS Sports Medicine Institute in New York City,” the statement reads. “He has determined the surgery to be successful. Tiger is currently recovering and looks forward to beginning his rehabilitation.”

According to the website FootcareMD.org, a subtalar fusion procedure takes the two bones forming the subtalar joint, the talus bone and calcaneus (heel) bone, and fuses them together. The joint allows for side-to-side movement of the foot and ankle, so fusing it means a recovering patient would require getting accustomed to walking on uneven surfaces.

After surgery, the patient’s foot must be non-weight-bearing for six weeks and in a boot or cast for 8-12 weeks.

Woods withdrew during the third round of the Masters two weeks ago. It was just his second event of the season and fifth overall since returning from a major car accident in early 2021 that nearly forced the amputation of his right leg.

At the time of the withdrawal, Woods cited a recurrence of his plantar fasciitis that forced him to miss his Hero World Challenge last December. Videos circulated on social media of Woods struggling to walk at Augusta National.

Before bowing out, Woods had made the cut, earning him a share of the record for all-time consecutive made-cuts at the Masters with Fred Couples and Gary Player at 23.

Woods also withdrew after making the cut at the 2022 PGA Championship. On Masters Sunday, Jason Day said that Woods had told him the reason Woods couldn’t continue at Southern Hills was because a screw punched through his skin.

The post Tiger Woods undergoes another surgery, casting doubt over his 2023 status appeared first on Golf.

The post Tour Confidential: RBC Heritage drama, slow play, Jon Rahm the analyst  appeared first on Golf.

The post Tour Confidential: RBC Heritage drama, slow play, Jon Rahm the analyst  appeared first on Golf.

1. Matt Fitzpatrick denied Jordan Spieth a repeat victory at the RBC Heritage on Sunday, as Fitzpatrick took down Spieth on the third playoff hole after Spieth caught a piece of the cup on both birdie tries earlier in the playoff but couldn’t get either to fall. What’s your takeaway from Sunday at Harbour Town and, despite the loss, what is it about this classic Pete Dye layout that suits Spieth’s eye so well?

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Josh Sens, senior writer (@joshsens): We’ve seen Spieth win on all kinds of courses, but Harbour Town is not a place you overpower. There are tons of tight shots, small greens, overhanging trees and crafty little chipping requirements — I’d say that’s a good fit for Spieth’s inventive game.

Dylan Dethier, senior writer (@dylan_dethier): Matthew Fitzpatrick played incredible golf down the stretch. He birdied 15 and 16 in regulation and stuffed a gutsy iron shot at 17 (even though he missed the putt) — and then hit a series of impressive shots before delivering the knockout blow on the third playoff hole. Spieth played well enough to win the event. But Fitzpatrick actually did it. Massive moment for him, and it was fun to see the thoroughbreds lining up at Harbour Town.

Zephyr Melton, assistant editor (@zephyrmelton): Harbour Town demands you be creative to access some of the tucked pins, and there’s no one with more imagination than Spieth. The more shot-making a course requires, the better-suited Spieth is to perform well.

2. One week after his Masters victory, Jon Rahm tied for 15th at the RBC Heritage and then sat for about 20 minutes with Amanda Renner and provided insight and commentary as the action unfolded on the CBS broadcast. What was your favorite learning from Rahm’s sit-down, and is this a repeatable practice for CBS? Or was Rahm’s chat, coming after a major win, a convenient outlier?

Sens: I dug the details he offered right when he came on air and was asked to describe Patrick Cantlay’s chip on 13. The Bob Rosburg caricature of the golf commentator is to make a shot sound impossible (He’s got nothing, Johnny) right before a player knocks it close. But Rahm was quick to share a bunch of observations — tight lie, heel is probably going to be exposed, gonna have to hit it soft — in a clear and concise way that seemed insider-y without being overly technical. He’d be good at the gig if he ever quit his full-time job. And sure, it’s repeatable. These guys aren’t popes or in witness protection. They should make themselves accessible. It improves the product, which is in their interest.

Dethier: Well said, Josh. The walk-and-talks have been fun, but not everybody’s going to be comfortable doing those in crunch time. Rahm putting on the headset immediately delivered as a fun, insightful alternative. He’s an obsessive golfer. Loves it. Plays it better than anybody else at the moment. Thinks about it all the time. And so the best way to get to know him better is to give him a mic a few minutes after he finished up his round and hear him nerd out about golf. He enjoyed it, the CBS team clearly enjoyed it and we enjoyed it as a result. Oh yeah, and he won the Masters last week …

Melton: My colleagues are spot on, here. It’s always great when you can get these guys talking shop, and having Rahm do so in the booth was a big plus. Here’s to hoping more players follow in his footsteps as the season goes on.

3. The final round of the Masters was the most-watched golf telecast on any network in the past five years, with an average of 12.058 million viewers and an increase of 19 percent over last year, CBS reported last week. What can we credit for the increase? The PGA Tour vs. LIV storyline in the final pairing with Rahm and Brooks Koepka? An increased appetite due to a Netflix series? Phil Mickelson surging up the leaderboard? Something else?

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Sens: Not the LIV vs. Tour storylines, but the LIV vs Tour divide in general. It was the first time in this new season we got to see everyone in one place. There’s been lots of talk about how the majors now carry more weight than ever. The Masters was proof positive of that.

Dethier: There’s no way to really know, right? And I’m always reluctant to extrapolate too much from any one TV rating number. But it seems likely to be some combination of the above. Netflix introduced this professional golf world to a whole new crew. The gang was all back together and the LIV-Tour dynamic was intriguing. The best events feel big, and the Masters feels bigger than ever. Drawing this type of audience without Tiger Woods playing Sunday (and without Rory McIlroy, too!) is a great sign for professional golf.

Melton: Impossible to say, but I think Sens is on to something in that the golf-watching public was keen to see all the old gang back together. With the stars split between two tours, it makes the majors even more worth watching. When the big names tee it up together only four times a year, it makes those weeks must-watch TV.

4. The penultimate pairing of Patrick Cantlay and Viktor Hovland was criticized for their pace of play in the final round of the Masters — by both Brooks Koepka and Twitter — and Cantlay defended himself by saying it was slow for everyone. Fast-forward to Sunday at the RBC Heritage, and CBS on-course reporter Dottie Pepper said Spieth and Fitzpatrick were visibly frustrated with how long it took Cantlay to play a tricky shot inside a penalty area on the 14th green. Is it overrated or underrated how much incidents like this actually affect your playing partners?

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Sens: I think it’s pretty well established that slow play drives a lot of people crazy. What’s interesting to me is how many people defend slow play on Tour by emphasizing how important every shot is, how much money is at stake and yada-yada. That’s tedious. And dubious. I question the assumption that grinding like that actually improves performance. I suspect almost everyone would play a little better if they played a little faster, even the pros. 

Dethier: Let’s break this down: Patrick Cantlay has a deliberate pre-shot routine and stands over the ball for a while before he hits, which annoys TV viewers when they’re shown the whole thing. I totally get that. But why would he change? To appease viewers complaining on Twitter? Cantlay doesn’t use Twitter. To speed up play? There are so many other slow players that he’s hardly a significant cause; look at the Masters, where his group was slow, but the groups in front of him were slow, too! To avoid penalty? Nobody ever gets penalized for slow play. I imagine he’ll work on getting a little faster — the more he’s in contention, the more he’ll get heat for this, and he’s a self-aware guy — but Cantlay’s not particularly focused on winning golf’s popularity contest, so there’s really very little incentive to change.

Also, I’d love to see more data on slow play and per-player numbers and see how everybody stacks up.

Melton: Look, these guys are professionals — it’s their job to block out the noise and perform in any number of circumstances. It might be frustrating, but the great ones persevere through far worse adversity. 

5. Following his missed cut at the Masters, Rory McIlroy withdrew from the RBC Heritage and will now lose $3 million in guaranteed bonus cash since it’s the second designated event he’s missed this season. Do you have any issue with McIlroy, a vocal and influential piece of the Tour’s future, skipping this? Or is this the reality golf fans should expect when it comes to the Tour’s evolving designated-events model?

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Sens: My general rule in life is that we’re all entitled to a few hypocrisies. And I’m willing to cut McIlroy some slack here. He went through an emotional wringer last week. That said, I do think we’ll see more of this as schedules evolve and it could become a problem if a bunch of players opt to start skipping all at once. It’s hard to come up with effective consequences for guys who can afford to forgo $3 million. That is what is known in everyday parlance as having f-you money, and a lot of the biggest names in the game possess that kind of dough

Melton: I don’t have any issue with him skipping — I know I wouldn’t want to play another event after the mental-drain that is the Masters — but I do find it odd. McIlroy was leading the charge on the new PGA Tour model, and to see him be the first to skip two events is strange. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt, but the optics aren’t the best.

Dethier: I’m with Zeph — It’s pretty strange. I’m eager to hear McIlroy’s explanation and will reserve judgment until then, but here’s the thing: He knows he’ll get roundly criticized for this. He knows it’s a bad look. He knows what other guys on Tour will say. He knows there could be significant financial consequences. He knows he’s been beating this drum for a year. And he skipped it anyway. That means something. We just won’t know exactly what until we hear from McIlroy himself.

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The post Tour Confidential: RBC Heritage drama, slow play, Jon Rahm the analyst  appeared first on Golf.

The post Did Jim Nantz take a LIV Golf swipe at Masters? He explains the call appeared first on Golf.

The post Did Jim Nantz take a LIV Golf swipe at Masters? He explains the call appeared first on Golf.

But no, the longtime CBS announcer said this week on the SI Media with Jimmy Traina podcast, he was not taking a shot at LIV Golf, the CW Network or Brooks Koepka at last week’s Masters. 

Nantz’s call in question came last Sunday, during the completion of the third round at Augusta National. It was just nine words. But first some quick background. The PGA Tour is in a fight with LIV. And the former is broadcast by CBS; the latter by the CW. And Koepka had played on the Tour before leaving for LIV last year. And Koepka hit his second shot on the par-5 15th at Augusta onto a patron-crossing area. 

And then Nantz said this: 

“There he is right on the C.W.” He paused. “The crosswalk.”

And folks couldn’t log on to the world wide web quick enough. But Nantz said on the podcast it was all in fun. 

Here is the complete exchange:

“Let me get this out of the way first, because I know you’re not a big social media, internet guy,” Traina began. “But you know you set Twitter ablaze with a line that you had on Brooks Koepka when he hit a shot into a crosswalk, and you said, right on the CW. And everyone said Jim Nantz is taking a shot at LIV. And I said of every broadcaster I know, Jim Nantz is probably the last one who would do that. And then I was like, I kind of hope he was doing that because it would, you know, we’d have a new thought about Jim Nantz. Give us the backstory on the right on the CW there, because everyone — the headlines are all over the place: Jim Nantz takes shot.” 

“I’m honestly shocked that there was any kind of reaction to it,” Nantz said. “First off, we were on for 29 hours, either taping or being on the air. So, for the Masters to be summed up in a throwaway line for me on a Sunday morning — I find it all pretty amazing, what people latch on to.

“It definitely was not a shot. It just was something that I could see for the first time that his second shot at 15 had ended up on the crosswalk. And that’s a rarity, you see a player on the crosswalk. It’s just the way my brain works, sometimes.

“I said that, ‘There he is on the C.W., the crosswalk.’ I was just, maybe being a little cheeky. I certainly didn’t mean it to be a shot. It was not a shot at all. Maybe it was just trying to be a little whimsical.

“But, you know, the bottom line is, I think that we showed every golfer in that field last week a tremendous amount of respect, no matter what tour where they’re playing. And there certainly wasn’t an attempt to create any sharper edge or division between the game.

“To me it was, it was a nothing. It was just — what is it that Al [Michaels] says sometimes — he has a little bit of a rascal in him. Now, if you get to know me a little bit, and I’m talking about off the air, that’s a lot more of the kind of the way I communicate with people than maybe what you might think if you watch my broadcasting. It was meant to be, a nothing, basically. It was just on the crosswalk.”

Traina then asked: “So was it a reference to the network in a cheeky way and not as a shot, or you weren’t even thinking about the CW Network?”

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“I really wasn’t even thinking about it,” Nantz said. “You know, the CW has certainly got a lot of attention because of its alliance now with taking the, what would you call it, time buy, from the other tour. You’re overthinking it right now, Jimmy, let’s just put it that way.”

Also on the podcast, Nantz denied rumors that CBS deliberately restrained its coverage of LIV players during the Masters. The thought picked up steam after some believed Phil Mickelson disappeared from final-round coverage, despite shooting a seven-under 65 and tying for second (with Koepka). 

“At the end, the leaderboard looks like, ‘Well, he should have gotten that much coverage because he finished second,’” Nantz said. “But you don’t know how it’s all going to play out in the end. There was no effort at all by anybody at CBS to treat anyone any differently.”

Editor’s note: To listen to the entire podcast with Nantz, please click here.

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The post Did Jim Nantz take a LIV Golf swipe at Masters? He explains the call appeared first on Golf.