OK. Let me just tell you this up front. I am still spinning from my experience at the Sybase Match Play Championships. I’ve been to PGA Tour events, and even a US Open playoff. But. This was something I really didn’t expect. Granted I was willing to wager that 99% of the Pro-Am participants were guys, and most of the fans out there were men, but still… Wow. It was weird. Perhaps it was my expectations (or lack thereof), but there was some interesting stuff I observed. There are probably going to be like half a dozen posts to rid my brain of everything, but we’ll see. Ok. Here it goes…
Overall Observations:
It definitely didn’t have the “feel” of a major league event. The tickets were distributed in a small folding tent in the parking lot. School buses took you to the course where the driver of the bus gave you the “banned items” speech. Except that instead of saying that cell phones and cameras were banned, he just asked you to put your phones on vibrate. Two small concession stands. The gave you the roll for your hotdog in one line, then you had to stand in another to actually get the hot dog…. If they were actually cooked.
The course didn’t look really difficult. Ok, the greens were undulating and pretty fast… not extremely but still fast, and you had to put your approach in the right part of the green. The fairways were so huge, I could have hit them. I saw only one missed fairway in two days- Catrona Matthew on #10 on Saturday (more on that in a later post). I know the women hit it straighter than the men, but jeez.
If you like 230-240 yard drives, the LPGA is for you. Definitely no WOW factor. Makes Michelle Wie look all the more impressive.
At a PGA Tour event, there is definitely some eye candy outside the ropes. At Sybase? Non existent. Don’t get me wrong, there is plenty inside the ropes… the Ricardi/Munoz match was something to behold, but…
…. It is weird watching post-middle aged men (and some middle aged men) ogling women easily more than a half to a third of their age. I mean really weird. To the point that I was uncomfortable being there…
… not to mention that most of these dudes still looked like they still live in their parents’ basement… or my late grandfather. Wow.
I was expecting some bigger crowds, but then again I remembered… women’s sports don’t draw outside of Knoxville, TN and Storrs, CT. And only for basketball.
My friend Matt (who is living in Beijing) has a theory that Asian women are vampires due to their aversion to the sun. I guess they use umbrellas on sunny days and not on rainy ones. Based upon what I saw… that theory is still valid.
Pretty much anyone can get a “Media” credential. I doubt half of the people carrying media credentials have ever had anything written, published, or posted. Hell, with this blog, I am more “media” then they….
….speaking of the other half of the credentialed media, the “stereotypical” sports writer: doughy, aging male, not athletically inclined, wearing wrinkled, rumpled clothes, was on full display. Needless to say, they fit right in.
The trend of wearing golf shoes while watching a tournament is still mystifying. What is the point? You don’t wear spikes to a baseball game. You don’t bring your skates to a hockey game. Why the hell do you wear golf shoes to a golf tournament? What was interesting here is that 90% of the violators at the Sybase were women. Seriously. No. Joke.
I have heard that LPGA golfer were more “accessible” to the fans (are they sure they want to be?) than their PGA brethren. While this is true, I can’t help to wonder, is this by design or by simple logistics? I smell a future blog exploring this… maybe.
I watched the players warm up on Saturday before their matches. Not many putts on the putting green dropped. I mean everything from 3 footers to lag putts. I bet the success rate was maybe 60%. Perhaps I’m missing something, but it was astounding none the less.
Well, I think this is enough for now, I’ll be back… much, much more to come.
No comments:
Post a Comment