Nouvelles WGT Golf

The venerable Arnold Palmer turned 80 today, and to celebrate his birthday, he and his closest friends will tee it up at Latrobe Country Club, the course his father helped build in the 1920s.

According to the club, "Arnold was born September 10, 1929 in Latrobe. His saga began when he was four-years old swinging a set of golf clubs that had been cut down by his father, Milfred (Deacon) Palmer. Before long, Arnold was playing well enough to beat the older caddies at the club. He began caddying himself when he was 11 and worked almost every job at the club over the years."

To commenorate his birthday, the Golf Channel will run more than eight hours of programming to honor Palmer, whose achievements include 62 wins on the PGA Tour. Programming will include Top 10 Arnold Palmer Moments, Golf’s Heart and Soul: Arnold Palmer, and 1964 and 1960 Masters highlights.

Happy birthday Arnie!

Photo: U.S. Coast Guard

Congratulations to the following winners of the most recent People v Pros tournaments:

August PVP Open - dmkhorns and Craiger85

PVP drawing #4 (July 15 - 31) - zacapa

PVP drawing #5 (Aug 1 - 14) - Rshing

These players will all meet up at Pinehurst Resort in October for an unforgettable golf getaway. The People v Pros tournaments run until the end of September, with two spots to compete for in the September People vs Pros Open and two sweepstakes drawings in the September People vs Pros Sweepstakes. Play now, because this is your last chance to win!

Congrats to FedExCup First Tee Scholar Brent Edelman, who was presented a new golf bag in honor of his First Tee Scholarship by Ernie Els. Edelman, from Summerland, California, is one of two 2009 FedExCup First Tee Scholars and an incoming freshman at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The First Tee is a World Golf Foundation initiative dedicated to providing young people of all backgrounds an opportunity to develop, through golf and character education, life-enhancing values such as honesty, integrity and sportsmanship.

Photo: AP Images

...First, First, Second, Second, First, First, Second and Still Not Win The Fed Ex Cup

By Peter Kessler

Photo: AP Images

Tweak Time.

Greg Norman will likely choose two of the following players next week for his two captain's picks for the President's Cup: Rory Sabatini, Jeev Milka Singh or Shingo Katayama-still awake??

I vote for Katayama because he wears a cowboy hat he got at a birthday party for 10 year olds many years ago. He just refuses to part with it. It's a stunner. Go ahead. Look it up. Check it out. Google. Katayama. Nice hat, huh?

And that my friends is the major excitement of this year's President's Cup. Hurry, get in line, tickets are almost gone. Still awake?

Mark O'Meara is on my radio show today. How come he isn't in the World Golf Hall of Fame?  Set aside the notion that I think you should be 60 years old before you get to be voted in. Active players in their 30's and 40's going into halls of fame just doesn't feel right. Their careers are in mid-stream yet there they are being toasted as though they're full of white hair dyed purple. Why is Isao Aoki in?  What did he ever win.  Nothing of consequence.  So what's the deal?  How about Deane Beman?  He won the Blinder Robinson Classic. Not exactly a major. Or a minor. If Tommy Bolt is in, so is Mark. If Bob Charles is in then O'Meara is in twice. Hubert Green? Same thing.  And what about Chi Chi? I know all about the hat over the hole trick but that is not the stuff of which hall of famers are made. And what about Lanny? Lanny is in. Well then.....   So I vote for O'Meara in and I vote for some of these guys out.

Jack and Arnie have been on course rivals for FIFTY YEARS!!!!!!! So next spring they will together be honorary starters at the Masters. One shot on the first tee on Thursday morning at 8am. One shot. One shot. One shot?  Why one shot? Why not play a few holes? Like 1,2,17 and 18. Why not play nine holes from the members tees? We want to see them. They would love to play. Let them have reasonable second shots into the par 4's, wedges into the par 5's. Why rush them off the course? Where do they have to go? To Waffle House? Oh, I forgot. They are both members at Augusta National. Think they can get a table at that busy hour? I mean after all there will be a lot of people eating breakfast waiting to get a look at Arnie and Jack teeing it up at The Masters.

By Stephanie Wei

Tiger Woods and Boston Celtics guard Ray Allen chat at the Deutsche Bank Championship Pro-Am on Thursday morning.

Aside: I love Allen’s jump shot. No doubt one of the sweetest and smoothest in the NBA, at least IMHO.

[Photo via NBA Off-Season 2009]

Across the nation this Labor Day weekend, thousands of golf courses are charging an extra $1 for tee times in support of Patriot Golf Day, the flagship fundraiser for the Folds of Honor Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that provides postsecondary educational scholarships for the children and spouses of military men and women disabled or killed while serving our great nation.

We at WGT think this is a very worthy cause, and will donate 100% of Pro Shop sales that are made on Labor Day to show our support. Please help make this a significant contribution by making a purchase in our Pro Shop this Monday, September 7th. Together we can help make a big difference for the families of our most honorable heroes. These men and women sacrifice for all of us. Let’s show our thanks.

By Peter Kessler

Photo: Dave Einsel/AP

That would be Adam Scott.

He would be the current big disappointment.

Liberty National cost $250 Million to build. $250 million. And not one player likes it. Not one.

That may be inexplicable but what may be splicable (my word) is like all courses, old and new, it will get better-it will be tweaked and and massaged and rejigged and turned into a course that the pros won't mutter about--particularly since it's not on the schedule going forward.

Heath Slocum and YE Yang. One great weekend or a sign of things to come?

Cabrera, Glover,Cink, Yang and Slocum. Not exactly golf's Mount Rushmore.

Goydos and Marino-window dressing again.

Someone actually wrote that Tiger was stuck on 14 majors after "blowing the PGA Championship." Last time I checked,he got beat by Yang.

The Fed Ex Playoffs may be a mathematical mystery but I do know that the first week identified the best players and one unknown, just like a great tournament is supposed to.

Tiger did not misread the last birdie try on the last green, he pulled it.

Tiger is still by miles and miles the best clutch putter of all time. We are just so spoiled we think he will make everything all of the time...Forever.

In 2009 Tiger has won twice as many tournaments as the next guy. Who is the next guy?

September is here, and you have until the 30th to enter the World Amateur Challenge for a chance to win a trip for two to Myrtle Beach to play in the 2010 PGATOUR Superstore World Amateur Handicap Championship. Other prizes include two playing spots in the event and a $500 gift card to the PGATOUR Superstore. Anyone can play, but only players in the US are eligible for the sweepstakes prize drawings. Please see rules for complete details.

Photo: www.worldamgolf.com

By Ryan Ballengee

After Byeoung-Han An's 7 & 5 crushing defeat of Ben Martin to become the youngest US Amateur winner ever at age 17, the USGA had some relatively easy decisions on their hands for the final two spots for the Walker Cup team.  They chose Cameron Tringale and Peter Uihlein to round out the team.

Ben Martin would have made the team had he won the title.  Instead, he's now the second alternate.  50 year old medalist Tim Jackson is the first alternate.

Buddy Marucci's squad is basically a bunch of college boys, plus a fifty year old man on guard in case one of them pulls a hammy or something.

The amateur ranks have essentially turned into a third mini-tour.  As mentioned by Tom Dunne in another post on the US Am, college kids are dominating the amateur world as a proving ground for turning pro either during college or immediately thereafter.  Though Danny Lee and An were both high school aged winners of the amateur, the trend of young men winning this championship has carried on well before them.  Think about Nick Flanagan, Ryan Moore - all the way back to Tiger Woods.  The thing is, though, that the Amateur is so much more apparently dominated by youth.  It's the money available in going pro that makes these competitions so youth-driven now.  The caliber of the field shows that a lot of these guys will be on the Nationwide, European, and PGA Tours awfully soon.

Buddy Marucci and Tim Jackson will probably be the last bastion of amateur golfer that is happy to remain with an (a) next to his name on a leaderboard.  Allen Doyle long gave up on that.

By Peter Kessler

But I bet she will before the month is over. She is too feisty, too colorful a character not to blast a sponsor's name successfully across her bag.

There were fake swans in the lakes last week at the Solheim Cup.

Five time Open champion Peter Thomson said Tiger should smile more. If he had won the PGA last week....

Tiger is playing in all four Fed Ex Cup events. Do you think he has something to prove to himself?

Tiger was asked what he thought of Liberty National, site of the first playoff round. He said it was "interesting." "In a good way," he was asked. "It's interesting." he said.

No eye contact between Tiger and Yang when they walked past each other several times this week.

Michael Bradley won the Puerto Rican Open and didn't qualify for the Fed Ex Cup Playoffs. Time to tweak the format.

Nicklaus said course design work in the U.S. is way down but that he expects it to pick up again soon. Really? Soon? Courses are closing, not opening right now.

I still don't understand golf in the Olympics. If you don't play golf, how can you fall in love with it by watching on television? It's slow, you can't follow the ball and you can't see the contours in the greens properly. Olympic stuff is usually measured in seconds, not hours.

I think Tom Watson would be a perfect pick as a member of the President's Cup team.

Two shining stars have presented themselves this year as the future of golf: Rory Mcilroy and Michelle Wie.