Perhaps no other figures in professional sports are as affable and approachable as golf course architects. Only industry insiders will be likely to have access to touring professional golfers. Resort owners will likely only return your cold calls if they think a business deal will result. But call a golf course architect on the phone - even as a mere golf enthusiast - and you stand a good chance that you’ll get a real person on the end of the line who’ll at least give you a response, if not an engaging dialogue.

Photo: © Jay Flemma Fun loving Stephan Kay loves golf so much, he marks his ball with famous holes. How do you mark YOUR Titleist?

New Jersey’s Stephen Kay may not be a household name, but without question, he’s one of the finest minds in golf – he’s a professor at Rutgers University teaching an entire concentration in turf management and golf design – as well as one of the most energetic. He and his design partner, Doug Smith, have built, renovated, or redesigned over 200 courses worldwide. Their restoration work includes designs by Donald Ross, Alister Mackenzie, A.W. Tillinghast, Colt & Alison, Devereux Emmet, and Walter Travis to name a few.

Moreover, besides acclaimed original designs such as the much-heralded Links of North Dakota and Scotland Run, Kay has done two popular pastiche courses – courses that pay tribute to other great designs. First, The Architects Club has 18 holes in the style of 17 Golden Age designers: from Old Tom Morris to Robert Trent Jones. The course is a living museum of golf architecture and history you can actually play, rather than just see. Second, McCullough’s Emerald Links recreates famous holes of the U.K. on the sandy soil of Atlantic City, New Jersey, Kay’s home. Let’s meet one of golf design’s brightest minds and most colorful figures.

Photo: © Jay Flemma Stephen Kay at #3 - Links of North Dakota

JF: How did you first get interested in designing golf courses?
S. Kay: Very simple: As a teenager, I didn’t know what I was wanted to do with my life. I thought I might be a math teacher, because I was always good at math. I got 100% on my New York State geometry Regents exam, and in college, I took differential calculus as an elective to get an easy A. That’s how sick I was.
But I started playing golf in April of 9th grade, (1966), and I fell in love with it in my first round. It was on the 14th hole at Clearview G.C., a muni in Queens, where I hit what I think was a 5-iron that soared into the air, then straight at the pin. I thought, “I can do that every time! This is great!” and at that moment, I was totally hooked on golf.

JF: So then what happened next to get you further along to becoming a designer?
S. Kay: My second round was at Kissena, also in Queens, which was significantly easier, than Clearview, but I didn’t know that. It’s a par-64 and I thought, “Wow! Look how much I improved!” So I took some Easter money I got as gifts from relatives, and bought a set of seven clubs: driver, 3-wood, some irons and a putter
Kroydon brand, if you remember that model.
Now in those days you used to get green stamps at the grocery stores, and I took my stamps to a redemption center to get an ugly, old, reddish-green, plaid golf bag, and that was it. I played 15 times that year, and the last round I actually broke 80 at Kissena, (again, it’s a par-64 guys).
So one day I’m bored in school, and so I started doodling golf holes. Well that month, Golf Digest had the first of a two-part article by Herbert Warren Wind called something like “Understanding Golf Architecture.” Ron Whitten would later call it a definitive article in golf course architecture history. Well I couldn’t wait for next month’s piece, and as soon as I got done with the article, I actually got down and prayed to God that I would become a golf course architect. It became my childhood dream. I still tear up thinking about that memory to this day because I was a kid with a dream and God let me achieve it and I’m so grateful for that blessing and all the rest. I even just teared up a bit now thinking about it.
It’s like Mike Schmidt the baseball player. He teared up when he got inducted into the Baseball H.O.F. in Cooperstown. People don’t realize how much childhood dreams mean to people. My dad worked on an assembly line, and he said, “This is crazy. They’ll never let a poor kid in a rich man’s game.” We didn’t know that so much of the game is played on public courses, so we thought it was a real long shot.

Photo: © Jay Flemma Original Property at The Links of North Dakota

JF: Did that encourage you to take more jobs at public courses?
S. Kay: Well I think the munis and the daily fees just had lower budgets, and could not hire Fazio or Jack. My design fee and budgets are more in their price range. They were able to afford me as opposed to Fazio or Jack. And the reverse is that private clubs feel they might need a celebrity name to attract members. Happily Hamlet G & C.C. on Long Island had a low initiation fee, and hired me. But some places need to have $150-200,000.00 initiation fees, so they need a player’s name to attract members. At the time, I wasn’t attractive as a national name.

JF: So let’s get back to your career path

S. Kay: So I’m in 10h grade. I haven’t decided what college yet and how to accomplish my goal, but end of junior year, as I’m starting to take the SATs, I approached my H.S. guidance counselor and asked her where do I major in golf course architecture.
She said, “What?”
[laughter]

JF: Okay, then what happened?
S. Kay: She had no idea! So then one of us found out about the ASGCA, and I wrote them, (or my mom called on the phone
), and I get the list of members.
So my mom and I did a letter, (mom was the typist, on an old typewriter), and we asked “where do I major in GCA” and sent it to Geoffrey Cornish, Trent Jones, Billy Mitchell, the Gordons, and a handful of others
maybe 7-10 guys. Jones, Cornish, and Mitchell all took my letter and handwrote on it (not on their stationary), and they all wrote the same thing
”no college has a major
major in civil engineering or, preferably, landscape architecture.” They suggested Cornell, Syracuse, and maybe a couple others. So I get these letters and end up going to the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry at Syracuse University, the longest named college in the world.
So I go to the 5-year program, and while there as a freshman, I see a tryout for the golf team
no charge! So the first day 50 guys show up to play. The person running the tryout was basketball coach Jim Boeheim. So, I made the freshman team, and we got to play such powerhouses as Lemoyne and Onondaga Community College.
Then sophomore year, I find out my design studios are 1 p.m. - 4 p.m. every day! I tell Coach Boeheim that I can’t play on the team any more because of my major.
He asked, “Why don’t you change majors?”
I told him, “As much fun as that sounds, I have a better chance of becoming a golf architect, than I do playing on the PGA tour.”
So then during summers I worked at the Concord Hotel on the maintenance crew at their International course, the smaller one by Billy Mitchell, after that, I graduated and wrote 20 architects. The only one who interviewed me was Joe Finger, the guy who designed The Monster! (I think that may be one reason why I got the interview.) Now in 73-74 there was a recession, so at this point I was with a landscape architecture firm on Park Ave. as a draftsman waiting for my break. Finger interviewed me in Manhattan, but no one ended up getting the job because the jobs he’d hoped would come through didn’t come happen, so he couldn’t hire me.
I was pretty depressed and unsure of what I was going to do, so I visited a friend from S.U. named Jim Wile who knew Frank Duane (who worked with Palmer before Palmer went with Ed Seay as his design partner). Jim was at Michigan State’s turf program, so I applied to that and got in and graduated as a Spartan as well as an Orangeman.
Afterwards, I got a position as a grow-in super at a course in Michigan, and then got a break working with Bill Newcombe (the first person to work with Pete Dye), and later with Jim Lite, who became Nicklaus’s senior designer.
I left Newcombe in 1983. He was getting into managing courses in California, and he wanted to know if I wanted to give up design and go into management. I said no, so my next questions were “now what?” and “where?” That answer was easy: NYC! So I went on my own in 1983.

Photo: © Jay Flemma Bird’s Eye View of what the Links of North Dakota looks like today

JF: So then what happened? How did you first start to study the architecture of the old master designers?
S. Kay: I thought my career would be better if I learned from the masters like Ross and Tillinghast, so I got old photos and reading material like George Thomas’s book on golf course architecture. The problem is that, yes, they teach you the strategy of laying out the holes and that’s critical, but I don’t think difficult to understand, and that’s why when Golf Digest had their first Armchair Architect contest, they had 20,000 entries. Everybody thinks they can do it.
The problem in those books was there weren’t enough photos to show you what they did on the ground. I tried my best when working at old clubs to find old photos. The best I could find were those in Thomas’s book. It was slow process, but they taught me which bunkers to flash and which not, how far out to put bunkers and, more importantly, tricks like flashing sand in fairway bunkers on uphill holes so as to see them from the tree and on downhill holes leaving the sand at the bottom of the bunker
a “grass down” bunker. I learned that from Ross.
So I’d collect these photos and books, and I’d go out in the field and find those holes and see if they changed or if they are the same as in the photo. Then I’d carefully study architectural drawings, as well as what’s on the ground already on the site. I had clubs that had Tillie and Flynn and Ross’s drawings, which were particularly instructive.

JF: So tell us about your career arc.
S. Kay: My first 18 hole master plan was Glen Head Country Club on L.I. It was an old Devereux Emmet course formerly called Women’s National. My first 18-hole original design was Hiland C.C. in Glens falls NY – public daily fee, circa 1988.
Then I built a 9-hole course on an estate near Millerton, N.Y. owned by Stan Peschel, but we didn’t just do two sets of tees to make an 18-hole course for him. I did two greens on some holes or I did big double greens. So he had 18 tees and 18 pins and greens and flags, but only nine fairways. From the back tees it was about 6500 yards, par-71.
When the USGA came to do slope and rating, they thought they could only go around nine holes once, but when they saw it they said, “shoot we have to go around twice and rate and slope it as a true 18-hole golf course!”

JF: How much money do you think you saved doing it that way?
S. Kay: He got that course, irrigation included, for about $400,000

JF: Do you think that in a recession more courses could look to this solution and still provide interesting cheap public golf?
S. Kay: Absolutely! One of the problems with golf is it takes so much land! People have time constraints too, but people when they play 18, they don’t want same green complexes and same putts. That’s the difference I made for Stan. His course is right on the border of where N.Y. hits Connecticut and Massachusetts, right on the corner.
This is a great way for a municipality that needs to do a course or for developers who have issues with space; it’s a nice, inexpensive compromise, 18 greens or a combination with double greens, and then some angled tees with hazards placed so that they affect shots differently each round of nine. It also works well for developers with housing. That way, it also gets more play then your average 9-holer. It costs a little more to maintain than a traditional 9-holer because there’s more green, but more marketable despite that.

JF: A smaller course a bit like what they did at the Sheep Ranch out at Bandon?
S. Kay: I wish I’d have known about that when I was out there, but I did get to play Old Macdonald.

JF: So then what courses came next?
S. Kay: Blue Heron Pines, The Hamlet Golf and Country Club, the Links of North Dakota, Manhattan Woods (private, w/Gary Player), Links at Unionvale, Scotland Run, The Architects’ Club, and McCullough’s Emerald Links.

JF: Who are some of your favorite architects and why?
S. Kay: Well I mentioned Ross and Tillie. Ross used land well and routed his courses well. He did wonderful greens, although he didn’t do the Pinehurst greens. He didn’t do turtlebacks. His best greens that I ever saw were at Oyster Harbor on Cape Cod.
Tillinghast did great looking bunkers. He varied them from flashed sand to grass down and would do it not only on the same course, but in the same bunker! I also like how he did his bunkers at a diagonal, more than Ross who did them parallel or perpendicular to the line of flight. Go to Hempstead G.C., a hidden gem of Tillie’s. The members know they have a great course there. It’s only 6500 yards, but has great diagonal bunkers. There’s also Sunningdale in Westchester: which personally I think is both a Tille and a Raynor.
I also like Dev Emmet, who did interesting putting surfaces especially. And obviously, you have to like Macdonald/Raynor/Banks. The way they would take those same 25 holes they kept doing - the Redan, the Biarritz, etc. - it was fascinating how they translated those and fit them onto the piece of property they had to work on and make them work as a cohesive whole. They did the same 25 holes, but they were masters at making every course feel different, have great variety, and give each course a character of its own.
Jack Nicklaus got a lot better over time. In the ‘80s I didn’t like his stuff at all, although I do like Desert Highlands in Scottsdale, a Jack from the 80s. Recently, he’s learned to make his courses more playable for the guy who is trying to break 100. And of course, his magnum opus is Muirfield Village in Ohio. That golf course surprised me a lot.

JF: Why and how?
S. Kay: Well I see a lot of courses, especially a lot in the top 100, and I’m not impressed with many of them. So I go there and expect sometimes when I see it, for it to be overrated. But I got to Muirfield Village and it was one great golf hole after another. Desmond Muirhead did the golf routing and the housing and roads, and Jack did the course. Its’ tremendous, it’s in my top 10.
Then there’s Pete Dye. I like Sawgrass. I love Kiawah’s Ocean Course. I know this is a minor thing, but he hides his cart paths well and that’s an example of how he does the little things right. I think he’s a lot like Seth Raynor.

JF: Why and how?
S. Kay: He tends to do grass down bunkers. He tends to do his bunkers in geometric patterns, which Raynor did because he was an engineer. His holes have the playing characteristics of famous holes like a Redan and an Eden and a Long, and they have a look to them that reminds me of a modern looking Raynor.

JF: Tell us what important lessons you learned from the architects who gave you your first jobs?
S. Kay: Newcombe and Lite taught me the routing first, along with the safety issues. Then, when you are bidding out a course, what drawings and blueprints do you need. On a green, what are the basic concepts of designing a green to hold a golf shot, yet drain properly: basically GCA 101 and 102. Then, it was me renovating courses that taught me a lot as well.

JF: What courses that you have played inspire you to imitate the same design concepts?
S. Kay: First here are some I had nothing to do with:
Anything at National. The whole thing is a masterpiece. Then, Bethpage Black. I love 4 and 5. Next is Pine Valley: there are no specific holes, but if you want to make a course look natural – not manicured like Augusta – if you want to see two polar opposites in that regard, see Pine Valley and Augusta.
In the Bronx, Split Rock influenced me a bit in the early part of my career. I loved the mounds and berms that connected into the bunkers. Now it’s way overgrown with trees, but if they ever get it away from being stupidly narrow, there is a lot of architecture there.
Then there are the places that I renovated and then used things I saw and used in my own work. There’s Tillie’s Hempstead. Ross’s Oyster Harbor and Winchester C.C. in Boston, and Knollwood – both Raynor and Tille worked here. There are a number of Raynor courses I have seen around d the country. Then Seawane on L.I., a Dev Emmet design with wonderful green complexes and contours. I started doing work there in the ‘80s and then did a radical extreme makeover from ’01 to ’06. We took all the trees down, we added 10,000 yards of fill per hole and went from a flat course to one that looked like the Ocean course at Kiawah.

JF: Tell us about some of the most interesting holes on the public courses you have designed.

Photo: © Jay Flemma #11 at the Links of North Dakota - contours on the green are Natural! We simply dug the bunker.

JF: Where do you go to play golf for fun? For Vacation?
S. Kay: I love the North Dakota trip of Hawktree, Bully Pulpit, and LND. There is an Arnold palmer/Ed seay course called Fossil Creek – the name may have changed – but whenever I’ve been at the Superintendent’s show in Dallas, I try to visit my college roommate and play Fossil. I also like what Nicklaus did at Grand Cypress in Orlando, Florida. He has three nines of his own, and then he has the copy of St. Andrews called “The New Course.”

JF: Yeah, but that’s a $500 round.
S. Kay: It’s high. Then there’s my trip to Scotland for Gleneagles, St. Andrews, and North Berwick.

JF: What public courses do you think people should go tom play to learn about what makes for great golf design?
S. Kay: One of the golf magazines took their top 50 daily fee courses and compared them for value and LND was number 2 in the country. Bandon is great, but it will cost you a couple thousand dollars. The North Dakota trip is a fraction of the cost. Friends of mine that have done Whistling Straits and Pacific Dunes said that all told 36 holes at Hawktree, Bully Pulpit, and Links of North Dakota was $1,100. You can even play 54 holes, because you’re at the end of the time zone and far north, you can play till 10 at night. One day we played 72 holes at LND! I couldn’t move much the next day!
Next, you have to play Bethpage. You have to play both the Red and the Black, and add the green if you can. It has terrific greens and it’s a nice easy warm up.
Then go to Atlantic City. As a golf destination, it has a large quantity of large golf courses within 30 minutes, and there are about a dozen terrific courses. I challenge any other destination besides Myrtle Beach and Hilton Head with a dozen courses or more to prove they have better courses with a greater variety of design than A.C. There’s Blue Heron Pines, McCulloughs, Twisted Dunes, (the rates have come down and you can get good package rates), and then you have Seaview, (Donald Ross and William Flynn), and Atlantic City Country Club (Willie Park and William Flynn with a Doak redesign).
Then the two complexes at Boyne Mountain and Boyne Highlands in Michigan are also nice. Boyne Highlands has the Donald Ross Memorial Golf Course. It’s a replica of Ross’s best holes and it’s really good.

JF: What is the first duty of a golf course architect?
S. Kay: To design a golf course that’s safe. You can’t design where people are ducking balls and feeling like they need a batting helmet. I’ll walk away from the job instead of risk someone getting hurt on a cramped site.

JF: What mistake would you like to have over again?
S. Kay: What? Like that girl I dated in college?
[Laughter]
Well let’s see
get everything in writing!
[More laughter]
Okay, besides that, trees are a big issue. If I could have a dollar every time someone said, “the tree makes the hole,” my wife and I could go to on some nice vacations! People fall in love with trees. Thank goodness for Oakmont and Winged Foot that in the last seven years! Those golf course have done intense tree clearing, which has made it easier to cut down trees at courses around the country.
So at plenty of courses, I’ve had arguments and difficulty to convince clubs to cut down trees, and so its easier now to get clubs to cut down trees than it was twenty years ago. Well about 15 – 17 years ago, I was at a course which put out proposals to renovate the course. They got 15 proposals, and I got one of 5 interviews. After the interview, the Greens Chair called me and said that the members and the chairman liked you, and they wanted to go see what you renovated recently. Well one job had a couple key trees on a couple holes that the club fought to not cut down. They didn’t allow me to remove them, and they were just stupid trees. Well the chairman of the course of the job I wanted visited this course and asked about my work.
Two weeks go by, I hear nothing. So I called them and they had decided on someone else, but the green chair said the fact that I didn’t get the stupid trees down, they couldn’t use me. He said that their course had a lot of stupid trees that needed to come down, and he needed a strong personality to get some of their trees down. He told me I needed to get stronger and tougher. He said I should have been tougher on getting the trees cut down at the other club, or walked away. Because I wasn’t more forceful at the smaller course earlier in my career, it cost me a nicer renovation job at a more prestigious club because I didn’t have the chutzpah to stand up and insist stupid trees come down.

JF: What is the strangest, zaniest thing you have ever had to deal with while trying to build a golf course?
S. Kay: Well I was doing a master plan at a country club, and one night the green chairman and the super and I are having dinner, and out of the blue the green chairman, who normally was quiet and reserved, said the funniest thing right while I was drinking some water. He made me laugh so hard, I spit up water all over the him, he was drenched! I was sure that when I turned in the plan I wouldn’t get invited back, but he had a good sense of humor about it. That was without question, my most embarrassing moment.

JF: Some architects say that you have to compromise and make trade offs pretty much at every course. Can you recall some moments that you had to make some trade offs that you were concerned about initially that actually might have worked, just specific examples from some courses that you built?
S. Kay: At Blue Heron Pines, the first hole was originally 360-370 from the back tees. Then, because of wetlands, we had to make the first hole about 325 from the back tee. Then, I also had to angle the par-3 2d hole. But also, the course is public, and many players who play munis with no practice ranges might need a warm up. So at first, I thought the beginning at BHP was too short, but since most people like starting with an easy bogey, par, or birdie, it worked out even though I though it might not at first.
I have also had a few courses where we had to shorten a hole due to environmental restrictions. I was perhaps hoping to get a long par-4, but then a letter comes back saying that we can’t use that land because of environmental concerns, and I have to build a short par-4, but it works out in the long run because I still get to design an interesting hole, just a par-3-1/.2 not a par 4-1/2! Plus it’s a lot of fun to design short par-4s, because you have a playable hole for everybody, but it still it has to have interesting strategy and options. They can drive it or hit short clubs and not take the chance on driving into trouble, but I leave it to them and the hole ends up working anyway even though it’s rather short.

JF: Examples?
S. Kay: Blue Heron Pines number 7 and at the 6th at Scotland Run.

JF: How do you deal with the dilemma of restoring a course to its old design, but with technology advances, still making it challenging to the best golfers?
S. Kay: Is the old style from someone famous and is it worth preserving? Next, was the architect actually on the site or did he mail the work in? As an example, let’s look at the character of the bunkers. Tillie in his drawings just did simple egg-shaped ovals to tell the builder on site where to put the bunker, but he didn’t draw shapes on his plans
but he did more ornate work when he went into the field. But his foremen just did what they saw in the drawing
but when Tillie was on-site a lot the bunkers had more ornate details. But when he wasn’t on the site, you could tell because the bunker shapes were much more simple. So when I restored Lakewood, for instance, we made them more ornate because we wanted to create what Tillie would have done if he were on site during construction.
Next, I sometimes need to move something to get more yardage for the course, and get the bunkers into back into play for who they were intended to be in play. First I try to move tees, then move the bunkers if I can’t move the tees back. It’s a very conscious thought. If Tillie, Ross, or Mackenzie could come back today, the first thing I thing I think they would do is examine the game for three months if not a year. They’d play the courses, try the new clubs, and then see the pros and watch the speed of the greens and how the ball flies. After that, how would they renovate their course? That’s how I try to think

JF: Do you think that television has a bad impact on architecture because people tend to associate prettiness and opulence with great design?
S. Kay: Unfortunately, the Masters tends to be the most watched and most liked major, everyone wants to copy it. Also, the timing of the Masters being first signals the start of golf season in the north. Then you get greens chairmen around the country trying to play monkey see-monkey do and have an unbelievably pristine and green golf course, which costs too much money and is next-to-impossible to reproduce. TV shows “green is good” and that hurts golf.

JF: Tell us about the Architects Club, where you did holes in the style of 17 different Golden Age architects.
S. Kay: The last thing I did with Bill Newcombe was routing plan for Donald Ross Memorial G.C., and my mom called during lunch and she told me how excited she was that the MOMA (Museum of Modern Art) was having exhibit of greatest architects of the 20th century, so I got the idea to have a museum of great golf architects that you could play. Photos of the great golf courses aren’t enough. You have to play a golf design to experience it; there’s no other sport like it except maybe skiing.

Photo: © Courtesy of Jim Krajecik Architects #10

JF: What about LND?
S. Kay: It’s my highest ranked course nationally.

JF: Why?
S. Kay: Because the site was so awesome. The only problem is not enough people have seen it.

JF: It used to be called Red Mike Resort? After a rustler who they tied to a chair and lit a fire under it, but he endured the torture and didn’t tell where he hid the stolen cattle?
S. Kay: That’s right. We were going to have an air strip and 36 holes and a resort and a lot of other attractions and lodging and even a little park, but we didn’t get enough investors to make all that happen.
To fill you in on how I got to build the course, I teach four classes in a two year professional turf program at Rutgers where they learn how to be golf course superintendents. It’s ranked number 4 in the country. In 1994, one of the students approached me and asked if I would be interested in doing something in the Midwest. I said my wife just had a baby and I’m not interested right now, but out of curiosity, I asked where and he said N.D.
Well it turns out that one of the best shapers I know was born and bred in N.D. So I told the student about the shaper friend and said if I don’t have to be there a lot, he knows me and he does my work really well. If the two of us can do this together, maybe we can do this project.
Well then the student tells me he doesn’t even have a site picked out! I though there was nothing that could come of this.
Well it turns out he was already super of a 9-holer in Williston, up in the furthest northwest corner of the state near the Canadian and Montana border.
Well, long story short


JF: Too late

[Laughter]
S. Kay: The site where the course now sits was found by my student and others. It looked like Ireland with all the hummocks. The soil was U.S.G.A. spec, and six feet deep there were still no rocks and it’s on the water! Just unbelievable: a dream come true.
So I did several plans before settling on a final version, and Weeks went to meet the owner of the land, a 90 y/o guy from Montana. He drove out to meet him, and
he’s not selling.
They had left the plan in the car – we didn’t want to scare him off telling him it was for a golf course – so they go out to the car and get ready to back out and leave, when they notice in this guys back yard, he has a golf cart. So they go back in, tell him it’s for a golf course, and show him my drawing. His eyes get as big as saucers and he sold the land for 
guess how much for 250 acres?

JF: $250,000 S. Kay – $76,000! Under $200 an acre! Can you believe it? For lakefront property! In order to afford building the course I waived my fee and so did the shaper and irrigator. So we built that course for $300,000. We moved only 7,000 cubic yards of earth. We hardly had to do anything. Six greens I didn’t change any grades, we just seeded it to existing grade. We also just pushed up greens and pushed up tees. It was a dream come true for everyone involved and a bit of Heaven I love to visit time and again.


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John Huggan had a chance to sit down with Wally Uihlein, CEO of Acushnet Company, which is comprised of the Titleist, FootJoy and Cobra Golf brands, for an exclusive interview in April.

Their discussion focused on equipment advances and regulation, and also ranged to Tiger Woods, Uihlein’s battle with cancer, and other topics. 

Below is Part One in which Uihlein talks about technology and the problems that have been associated with this.

Photo: © Courtesy of Titleist Wally Uihlein was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts in 1950. In 1973 he earned a bachelor's degree in marketing from the University of Massachusetts and completed graduate courses in business management at Suffolk University in Boston. In 1976, he joined Acushnet as a regional sales representative and within a year, Uihlein became Titleist's national sales manager. He was named vice president of sales and distribution in 1982, and was eventually named chairman and chief executive officer in May 2000. Under Uihlein's stewardship, Acushnet and Titleist has evolved into a truly global company, registering more than $1.3 billion in annual sales with an operating income of $125 million in 2008, and employing over 4,000 associates worldwide. In addition to its worldwide headquarters in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, Acushnet has operations in California, and in more than 20 countries across the globe, including several offices and distributorships throughout Asia and Europe, as well as Australia, Canada and South Africa. In 2005, the PGA of America recognized Uihlein with its prestigious Distinguished Service Award which "honors outstanding Americans who display leadership and humanitarian qualities, including integrity, sportsmanship and enthusiasm for the game of golf." It is the PGA of America's highest honor. In addition, Uihlein has also contributed many professional and personal hours to junior golf through his long-term commitment and involvement with the American Junior Golf Association.

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Below is Part One in which Uihlein talks about technology and the problems that have been associated with this.

JOHN HUGGAN: How do you feel about the coverage you get in the media with regard to the technology issue?

WALLY UIHLEIN: There has been an imbalance there. Anecdotally, we used to dread the last round of the U.S. Open. The president of the USGA would walk with the leading group, which frequently contained an outspoken player like Jack Nicklaus, and so we could confidently predict the content of the commentary for the next 60-90 days.
This morning we met with Peter Dawson [chief executive of the R&A] on the groove issue. I asked Peter which players he talks to for feedback. His response was, “just Tiger.” Anyone else? “Sometimes Vijay.”
The end result is that there is no balance, with voices from a number of constituencies represented: young, old, high-skilled, low-skilled, players who have benefited from technology, and those who haven’t. Which only reinforces the impression we have that the regulatory bodies are very insulated in terms of who they talk to.
So we’re not surprised that there is a media imbalance. When we defend technology it is easy to write, “Well, what do you expect them (the equipment manufacturers) to say?”

JH: I’ve never understood why you care about the R&A and the USGA knocking, say, 30 yards off the ball for the elite players when the average guy would lose maybe two or three yards and not even notice. I don’t see that affecting your bottom line.

WU: That’s a fair assumption. We’re actually more comfortable dealing with percentages. Let’s say they wanted to reduce drives by 10 percent. The leading driver on the PGA Tour is something like 312 yards on average. And last year Trevor Immelman was 150th in driving at 274 yards. So Bubba Watson goes to (around) 280 yards and Trevor goes to (around) 240.

JH: But what difference does that make to your bottom line?
WU: It’s a fair question. But there is no instance in any sport where there has been a rollback of the instruments used. Track and field isn’t going back to bamboo poles for the pole vault. So there is no precedent.

JH: I’m speaking as a life-long golfer here. None of what you have said so far is going to make any difference to the ball I buy and play with. I’m still going to buy a Titleist.
WU: I can’t say I disagree with you. We’re not that intransigent.

JH: So what’s the problem then? If the R&A and the USGA knocked 15 percent off the ball tomorrow, would you sue them?
WU: The grounds for litigation would only be absence of due process. It wouldn’t be the result. It would be a why are you doing that? Which would leave the burden on us to prove that by doing that they were affecting our business.
There is a fine line between the rulers and those who are ruled upon. We are prepared to be ruled upon as long as there is due process and as long as those rules do not influence the commercial landscape.

JH: How much should the R&A and USGA concern themselves with the commercial position of your company?

WU: They shouldn’t. But if they make a decision that results in a change in the competitive landscape and favors one company over another, we would be forced to act. The way that the private sector and the courts are set up give us grounds to say, hey, because of that regulatory meddling the free market enterprise has not been allowed to prevail.

JH: But you have no evidence that such a ruling would hurt you?WU: No. Which is why we haven’t litigated anyone.

JH: But they haven’t done anything yet.
WU: Quite the opposite, actually. The last 10 years have seen more rulesmaking than any other decade in golf.
But let’s get back to the issue of the commercial sector. One of our problems is that we are seen as something of a technological leader. The fact is that the last 10 years have been the most activist phase in rules making.

JH: Is it not a chicken and egg situation though? Haven’t you forced them to make more rules?
WU: They will say that. Which is somewhat true. But if we look at the last 10 years maybe six milestone events have combined to pretty much corral the field.
First of all, we have lost some of the distance tolerance we had. I feel we are 99 yards down field in that respect.

Photo: © Courtesy of Titleist Uihlein talking with golf instructor Butch Harmon and British golf writer Alistar Tait.

JH: So the ball is maxed out in terms of distance?

WU: That’s basically what I’m saying.

JH: So will you close down your R&D department?
WU: No. Because there is still a lot going on. They are going to change the grooves. You are soon going to be playing with V-grooves and wondering how much of your loss of spin—between 30 to 50 percent—can you get back from changing the ball. Then you’ll want to know how much distance you will lose as a result of that change.

JH: Surely the ball is an easier target for change. Why are they causing more expense for the consumer rather than introducing the possibility of affecting your bottom line?
WU: I can see that from where you sit. But let’s use the tour as an example. I see launch conditions off the tee from eight degrees to 13 degrees. I see spin rates from 1,900 to 2,800. Now suddenly you want to re-toggle. So you have to decide what to roll back. Is it going to be velocity? Is it going to be spin? How are you going to roll back the ball? You have to decide.

JH: Isn’t that what you should be talking to the R&A and USGA about? Shouldn’t you come up with the best way of doing just that?
WU: But there is a real conundrum involved in all that. In the 1980s, how many golf ball patents do you think were issued? It was 50. In the 1990s that figure was 500. And in this decade it is projected that there will be 2,000. So if you start re-toggling the specifications you are going to enter someone’s patent-protected universe to the exclusion of others. There isn’t a company out there—and certainly not us—who is going to say they are happy to give everyone a paid-up license.

JH:
So whatever they do, someone will get hurt?

WU:
Yes. And they will sue. And that is the untold story. Trust me, it boggles the minds of our shareholders. It boggles my mind as a businessman that the golf ball category—which is only $1 billion in wholesale—has 2,000 patents in this decade. It makes no sense. We’re talking about a regulated product category. We’re talking about a category where weight, size, velocity, and distance are already capped and there are 2,000 new golf ball patents in less than 10 years? It makes no sense.

JH: How about the bifurcation argument? Isn’t the grooves thing a step down that road?
WU: It is a de-facto bifurcation, yes.

JH: So why not have a tournament ball for the professionals? And a ball for the rest of us. Then we can stop screwing with all these great golf courses.
WU: You have to capitulate to me a little bit when it comes to saving the great courses. The professional game is only played on about 100 of the great courses.

JH: True. And believe me when I say that I have no desire to hurt your bottom line. I’m all for you making lots of money.
WU: I know. But there has been a lot of hyperbole written and spoken about us obsoleting all these courses.

Photo: © Courtesy of Titleist On the balcony of the Titleist technical service vehicle, Uihlein with Mac Fritz, tour technician Guy Smith and Jonathan Loosemore.

JH: The trouble is that it tends to be the great courses.

WU: I understand that. But who is going to decide the specifications of the tournament ball?

JH: Sit down and talk about it.
WU: OK, but trust me when I tell you that it will favor one player over another. When you deal with the range of launch conditions I mentioned earlier and the spin rates, someone is going to be disadvantaged. It will lead to a bias and not just in distance. The short game will be affected too.
Take Geoff Ogilvy. In the short game, he is a “slider.” And someone like Mark Calcavecchia is a “trapper.” Once you decide on what ball you are going to use, the differences between those two types of players are going to be magnified. Wherever you land, one is going to be favored over the other. Take that to the bank.

JH: I can live with that though.
WU: (laughs) I know you can. But you don’t want to be the player who is disadvantaged. And I don’t think you want to go to that guy and tell him that his competition is going to have an edge. Or that he is going to have to adjust.

JH: Wouldn’t that just be a short-term thing though? People do adapt.
WU: That’s a good lead into the wedge thing. Right now, there hasn’t been full disclosure to the tour players about exactly how much spin reduction they are going to be facing. I told Peter Dawson that. His reaction was that they will have to learn to drive the ball better. Maybe, but the first thing they are going to say to us is, “Can you make me up a ball that will recover half of the spin I have lost?” Then they will see if they can learn to live with the loss of distance that ball will cause.
Every player is like that. They all try to solve problems with technology first. Only if that doesn’t work do they change something they are doing.
I asked Peter if he really thought that there guys out there who don’t think they drive the ball well. I mean, come on. They all think they drive the ball well. They’re not convinced that this groove thing is going to improve their driving accuracy.

JH:
On a practical level, do you think this will lead to courses growing more rough or less?

WU:
I think the first thing that should happen is that tournament setups will change. They can start putting the pins back on the greens for example. And I’m not in favor of rough. I’m a minimalist. The disease of American architecture is the high cost of maintenance caused by some of these modern designs. And that is where I get polarized by some of the architects who take the bully pulpit on technology.
I’ve served on a number of greens committees, and courses are not meant to have multi-million dollar maintenance budgets.

JH: This is perhaps an unfair question, but if you were in charge of golf what would you do?
WU: The czar for a day question?

JH: Yes.
WU: The first thing you have to understand is that my powers would be a bi-product of those being ruled upon being willing to assign me power. So I’d have to open things up. The whole idea of the benevolent despot doesn’t work here.

JH: Forget being benevolent. Let’s do what you want to do.
WU: Because of what I do, I’m too sensitive to all of the variables. There are all those legal issues, for example. All those patents. I spend 20 percent of my time on patent administration. That is not why I went to school. That is not why I am in the golf business. I’m in this business because I love the game.
A sidebar. I shared with Peter Dawson today how much we spend to engage the compliance activities—ball and club—that we now have to because of rules that have come down over the last decade. We invest over $1 million in testing equipment and $500,000 per year in on-going compliance expenses. We’re a big company. How do the smaller guys cope with all that? They have no chance.
The point is, as I said to Peter, is that none of this is free.

JH:
You’re going to have a hard time getting anyone to feel sorry for Titleist.

WU:
We don’t make an effort to bring that about. We see ourselves as the loyal opposition in all of this. Plus, the ball can’t talk. When people start whacking on the ball, whether I like it or not, I have to become the voice of technology. In all fairness, no one is representing technology.

JH: I’m still mystified by this reluctance to bifurcate when the difference between the game we play and the game the pros play has never been more marked.
WU: But, again, you have to admit that if you and I took the top 10 money winners off the European Tour circa 1987 versus 2007, we would be dealing with bigger people. The game is polarized by that alone. We can’t be telling these big guys that they have to play like the smaller guys of years ago. That ain’t going to happen. If I stand next to Ernie Els he feels like an aircraft carrier.

JH: But aren’t we just protecting the marketing slogans used by companies like yours—the “this is the longest ball” stuff? Isn’t that a small price to pay if we can get the top players playing a more interesting game?
WU: While the game may be a little less interesting at that level, I think we are overreacting. Here at Augusta National is a good case in point. They have never needed rough here. But they grew it anyway. Then again, these guys are pretty good at what they do. I still stand on the 15th fairway and from only 150 yards it is still a pretty daunting shot. I’m not sure I agree
.

JH: Feel free to disagree, but I just feel that, at the top level, the price we are paying for a ball that goes too far is too much. The courses are being changed—not for the better—and the game is just less interesting to watch and, I have to assume, play. The ball doesn’t go sideways enough, for example.
WU: It doesn’t. The tour balata ball used to spin at 4,000 rpms. The ball today spins at 2,200 and, as a consequence, disperses 50 percent less.
But to get back to your point, the ball is held to have committed crimes against the state because that is the thing that moves. We have research that shows that the contributing variables—driver, ball, and size, which is a major factor through clubhead speed—are all part of what you think is a problem.

JH: Doesn’t it break your heart that finding the middle of the clubhead means less than it ever has, at least with the driver?

WU:
You are right about that. When was the last time you heard a commentator say that a guy was swinging “within himself?” Payne Stewart used to do that, but no one does now. Every piece of equipment is matched up with the player and so he can hit as hard as he can. We are playing with over-sized tennis racquets.

JH: You are far too good at what you do. But have you turned what should be an art form into too much of a science?
WU: I think that was inevitable. But we are not in this alone. We are not the black-hooded guys who have been driving the train into the abyss. Everyone is part of this. By playing for so much money the tours now attract a different segment of the population.
I know you have been quick to whack on some of the golf academies we have now. But when I go to places like Korea, there is an academy on every street corner and parents are hoping they have girls rather than boys so that they can avoid the military commitment and provide the family with a meal ticket through golf. That is part of why the LPGA Tour is today dominated by Koreans. It has nothing to do with the U.S. academies. They are innocents compared with what is going on in some other countries.
But it is inevitable. Look at all the money being played for all over the world every year. What are we talking about, $600 million? That’s going to attract a lot of kids who used to go into other sports.

Part two of the Wally Uihlein interview

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The Wally Uihlein Interview - Part Two

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Tuesday, September 29, 2009 4:06 pm (Eastern)

By John Huggan

John Huggan had a chance to sit down with Wally Uihlein, CEO of Acushnet Company, which is comprised of the Titleist, FootJoy and Cobra Golf brands, for an exclusive interview in April. Their discussion focused on equipment advances and regulation, and also ranged to Tiger Woods, Uihlein’s battle with cancer, and other topics. 

Below is Part Two in which Uihlein talks about the state of golf, the future of golf companies and his life, his son Peter that played in the Walker Cup matches and his battle with cancer.

John Huggan:
Moving right along, is the game better today?  

 
Wally Uihlein
Yes It’s different. It’s a good question, but I can’t answer it.  

Photo: © Courtesy of Titleist Uihlein with Master Wedge Craftsman Bob Vokey on the 18th fairway at the Turnberry Ailsa Course.

JH: OK, specific to the ball. Is the game at the top level better or worse because it doesn’t move as much in the air? Or is it less interesting?

WU:Where we sit, the equipment has become so specialized and customized—and I would argue Tiger is the best example—frequently the superior athlete is winning. It has nothing to do with technology. The guy playing the shortest ball on tour is dominating.

JH He’s a bad example.  
WU: No, he’s a wonderful example. He has contributed to some of the things we have talked about.  

JH: But the way the game has gone actually hurts his chances. If the ball moved around more and there were smaller heads on drivers, he would win even more.  
WU: Sure. That’s right. But it works both ways. It’s the classic fork in the road: when you get there, take it. On the one hand, because everyone has been optimized, it does come down to who is the better athlete. Not just in the body but in the head.
But you are right, the changes made to Augusta National are in Tiger’s disfavor. Having guys who can lay up to 75 yards for four days and shoot 11-under takes away his advantage. It’s like I tell my son: when he is playing on a 6,400-yard course all the work he has done on his physique has been neutered.  

JH: But leading players can’t go to a 6,500-yard course and play it like it is supposed to be played.  
WU: That’s a combination of him, the ball, and having a 460cc head on a 45-inch driver. With all that you can swing much faster.
Think of the times when you used to play with a small, persimmon-headed driver. If you hit four or five on the screws you thought you had driven the ball well. But now, you can hit it all over the face and still be in play.  

JH:
What can the rules makers do that would not provoke litigation?    

 
WU:
You would have to go in and buy up all the patents and put them into the public domain so that everyone can practice them on a paid-up license. Then, whatever specification changes they came up with, no one would have any legal downside consequences. That’s the reality. And that is the element of the discourse that has never been acknowledged by anyone in the media.
This is not about private sector versus public sector. It is not about private sector versus regulatory bodies. When you roll it back, it will not only prejudice the performance of the players, it will also prejudice the patent portfolios of one company over another.
We are dealing with multi-million dollar investments. So it’s not just about the sensibilities of those who profess to care about the game and them questioning why we wouldn’t support that view. It’s not that simple. It’s almost like it is beyond our control. When I get into a court—and they have little to do with truth, justice, and reason—they are 80 percent about theater. It comes down to who has the best trial lawyer.
Unless the regulatory bodies are prepared to create a super-fund, buy up all those patents, and tell us all what balls we can make, nothing is going to change.  

JH:, You mentioned Tiger. Any regrets on letting him go?  
WU: Well, we didn’t let him go. It’s a free-enterprise market.  

JH: OK, try harder to keep him.  
WU: It was economics. Nike is a big company. Let me answer the question by giving you our perception of the changes that have taken place in the industry over the last ten years. They are profound.
Six seismic changes have taken place. Number one was the arrival of the deep-pocketed sporting goods companies. Before the arrival of Nike and Adidas, we were a big company. We’re not a big company any more. Nike is $20-25 billion. Adidas is $15 billion. That is a meaningful change on the golf industry landscape.
The arrival of the 1.62- to 1.68-inch ball change brought about the arrival of Bridgestone on an international basis. These are deep-pocketed Japanese industrialists. Bridgestone is a $30 billion company. They are here for the long-term and there is nothing we can do about that.
Then there is the cluttering of the patent landscape we have already talked about. It’s hard to explain 2,000 patents in a product category that is already adequately regulated.
Lastly, there has been regulatory suffocation over the last 10 years. The boundaries have been drawn in the sand, firmly and rigidly. Whether it is the statement of principles, or the capping of the COR, or the capping of moment of inertia, or the size of clubheads, or the length of the club, or the roll back of the overall distance standard, or the upcoming grooves changes, those are six meaningful and material events in the history of regulation. All of which changed the golf industry today.
We are a $1.5 billion company. It’s going to be challenging for us to compete with companies that have ten times that in sales. That’s the way it is. We are the Oakland Athletics playing the Yankees.
Our tactics have always been more about pluralism than populism. We are the most played. And no one player is bigger than our brand. Only when we don’t need anyone else will we be prepared to pay $15 million to one player. When that happens we’ll go the other way.  

Photo: © Courtesy of Titleist Uihlein watching the process of balls being manufactured

JH:
Have you sent a shorter ball to the USGA for them to look at?  

 
WU:
In response to the 25-yard rollback, we sent them combinations of balls and drivers that will produce the same benefit. It isn’t just the ball. We felt that both club and ball should be addressed. They understand our position. They want us to submit some additional balls and we’re working on that. It isn’t the most important thing in our queue, but we’re working on it.  

JH: Have you tried any of them?  
WU: We had some players hit them.  

JH: Did you?  
WU: I have.  

JH: What’s your handicap?  
WU: Five.  

JH: What difference did it make to you?  
WU: The ball curved more. So if you are not playing that well, the impact of off-center hits is more marked.  

JH:
Did it ask more of you as a player?  

 
WU:
That’s a leading question.  

JH: Of course it is, that’s my job!  
WU: It was different. The ball felt different. It was no different from being in a fast car, then going to a slow one. When you step on the pedal, you notice the difference.  

JH: So it made a difference at your level?  
WU: Yes. But whether it was a performance difference or an aesthetic difference, there was a difference.  

JH: And at the top level?  
WU: We haven’t tested it with them. Until they use it under the gun, they’re not going to be able to test it properly.  

JH:
I watched Geoff Ogilvy using an old Toney Penna 3-wood at Kingston Heath last year. He hit it beautifully and I asked him if he would consider using it in a tournament. His reaction was, “Wally may not like that.”   

 
WU:
No one likes to be singled out as the whipping post.  

JH: He only used your name because he is contracted to Cobra.  
WU: But I’m the whipping post of technology. But I only adopt that role because the equipment can’t speak for itself.  

JH: You have had more grief than anyone else.  
WU: It’s not a position I covet. But, at the same time, I inherited it because we are the technological leader. And we have also made cogent and rational arguments in response to certain positions or allegations, whatever you want to call them.  

JH: Would you make a wooden 3-wood for Geoff Ogilvy and let him use it in a tournament?  
WU: We’ve always taken the position, with all of our players, that anything that helps them put the ball in the hole in the least amount of shots, we will provide.  

JH:
So if he came to you and wanted a 3-wood, you would make him one?   

 
WU:
We would. But we would caution him by saying that there is no telling, with today’s balls, how long such a club would last.  

JH: Time isn’t an issue though. You could always make him another one.  
WU: A persimmon 3-wood? (laughs) I’ll call you to grow the trees.  

JH: But you wouldn’t stand in his way.  
WU: If he came in and explained that a particular course required him to shape the ball more or that he needed a softer, higher flight on his fairway wood shots, that is certainly a discussion we could have. But I’d want to know what the endgame was.  

JH: He’d have more fun.  
WU: I’m not suggesting he wouldn’t. But he is part of a very select community.  

Photo: © David Cannon/Getty Image Uihlein embracing his son Peter after he won his Walker Cup match at Merion last month.

JH:
Another leading question: who does the best job of running golf—the R&A, the USGA, the PGA of America, or the PGA Tour? Or are you running golf? I’ve accused you of that before.  

 
WU:
I know you have. And when you do that, you hit on a key issue. There is no global czar. Unfortunately, golf is lacking that. Which is good and bad. The good part is that we have a number of parties who should be working together to protect the game. You’ll notice I said “protect” rather than “grow” or whatever.
I don’t think the manufacturers are running the game. I do think the professional game has become golf’s chamber of commerce. We have to be careful not to confuse the professional game—which is entertainment—with the game that we all play.
There is a big gap between the amateur and professional games. But the latter is an entertainment. Which is why we pitch our advertising the way we do. We don’t have players saying, “I play this, you should too.” We’re not saying you should use our equipment just because the professionals do. But we want you to take note of the fact that so many do.
Now, that may make us a little anachronistic. But we take the view that their using Titleist is a pretty good endorsement of the quality of our products. Professionals don’t use stuff that isn’t going to make them play better.
Marketing approaches can go into one of two buckets: the “how many” or the “who?” Most companies employ a “who” strategy. We go the other way. They are different messages. “How many” is more subliminal and sophisticated.
But you are never going to get me to agree that the manufacturers are running the industry. Not when I’ve just sat with the ruling bodies today and told them I am out $1 million in capital expenses, and $400- to 500,000 per year, because we are coming out of the most activist phase in the history of the regulatory landscape.  

JH:Are there too many people involved in running the game?  
WU: The interests are too disparate. While everyone may claim they are rallying around the same axis, I don’t think that is the case. Those in the professional game are in the entertainment business. That is altogether different from those of us who rely upon the number of golfers and number of courses and number of rounds played and how much discretionary income is being spent on the enjoyment of the game.
I can sit here and tell you how many golfers there are around the world, how many courses there are, and how many rounds are being played. By country. By facility. But I’m not sure some of the other bodies can.
Another sidebar: five, ten years out, we have to decide in advance how much money we want to invest in plants. We’re not dealing just with tomorrow. So it is important for us to understand why the U.S. had a participation level of 10 percent. And what that rate is in places like Sweden and Germany.
Four things drive those rates and determine their levels. One, you have to have a middle class, broadly defined. Two, the presence of a teaching structure. Three, available places for play and practice. And four, the presence of a professional game that titillates the population and makes the game exciting to watch and inviting to play.
We have studied countries to see how deeply rooted those variables are. And we have tried to share that with other bodies. But they look at us as if we are speaking Greek or Latin.  

JH: What do you think your next job will be?  
WU: Hopefully retirement. My next job will be spending time with my family, even if they have no desire to spend time with me. So, no next job.  

JH:Your son [Peter] is a good player [a member of the U.S. Walker Cup team], what has been your approach to guiding him?  
WU: Hands off. My father-in-law was a club professional in the Baltimore-Washington area. My wife was an accomplished player. So Peter was swinging a club at a young age. He played locally and regionally. He played with Rory McIlroy in the under-10 group at Doral, his first national tournament.
At age 13, he went to the IMG Academy in Florida. My wife moved down with him. My elder son, who is two years older, stayed with me. So I’ve been hands off with Peter since then.
Peter Kostis and I are best friends. His kids are the same age as mine. We discovered long ago that none of them listened to us. So I used to talk to his kids while he talked to mine. So, from an early age, Peter’s golf guidance has come from other parties. But I’ve handed him off to good people.
I’m happy to say that, whatever Peter has accomplished in golf, he has done by himself. He calls me with equipment questions. I watch him on weekends when I get the chance. So it has all been a lot more hands-off than people imagine. And, for me, quite a difficult thing.  

JH:
Did your cancer change you as a person?   

 
WU:
It’s true when you are first told that you are looking down a gun barrel at your own mortality that your life flashes before you. I was 55 when I was diagnosed, and all those years flashed in front of me.
I’m a big believer in preventative intervention. We think we have one of the more progressive corporate wellness programs in America. Our goal is to get 100 percent of 4,500 associates having an annual physical. Keeping healthcare costs down is all about preventative intervention. I was thrilled that in the 12 months after I told everyone I had prostate cancer, our number of PSA screens went up by a huge percentage.  

JH: Confronting your own mortality is never easy, though.  
WU: It’s like watching your name being taken off the leaderboard. My goal in life is to look up at the end and think I did something to improve the situation. But, while my illness was revealing, I don’t think I have changed.  

JH: How much should Titleist care about what is good for the game?  
WU: We do care.  

JH: That isn’t in question
but how much? 
WU: It’s not that we pick our fights, but we need to be benevolent when appropriate. For example, we looked after Moe Norman at a time in his life when he needed help. I was at the back of the teaching summit in 1995 watching Craig Shankland making a presentation. He was using Moe as an example of how to swing. Everyone was transfixed by his accuracy.
I asked Craig afterwards about Moe and discovered he was sleeping in his car. So I went back to the office and arranged to give him $5,000 a month for the rest of his life. We got no commercial benefit from that. Nor did we want any. We just did it on behalf of the industry.  

JH:
Moe was a golfing freak.  

 
WU:
We have pictures of him swinging from all angles. Until him, we had never had a guy on the launch monitor with zero sidespin. That should not be humanly possible. He was the first person to master a swing that produced perfect backspin and no sidespin. From an efficiency point of view, he was at 110 percent.
It was all about what happened in the last 18 inches before impact. He was riding the railroad track you see in instructional articles. The club reached its lowest point and rode into the ball horizontally. You can’t teach that.  

JH: Last question. Where do you think the golf equipment industry will be in five years time?  
WU: I think there will be fewer tertiary-level companies. If you are not at $100 million and don’t have some meaningful niche, you are not going to be able to afford the advertising and promotion and the R&D to just stand still. Distribution costs are going up too.  

JH: Won’t you save money now that the ball can’t go any farther?  
WU: (smiles) No. This groove change is opening up a whole new re-optimization of players. It will change the type of ball they play.
Bifurcation doesn’t work because the golf industry worldwide is not in a position administratively to enforce two sets of rules. First of all, we have to re-fit about 400 pros around the world. And what about all the club pros and amateurs who enter the U.S. Open? Are we telling them they have to buy new sets of clubs? It’s not going to happen. So we remain opposed to bifurcation. We are saying that, if changes have to be made, let’s make sure we encourage a continued connection between the professional game and the marketplace.  

JH: Will the players all go to higher-spinning balls in the wake of this change?  
WU: Take it to the bank. As I said, their first request will be that we get back half the spin they have lost with a softer ball, leaving them free to determine how much distance they are prepared to lose. It’s a balancing act.
Their next stop, of course, will be to the driver guy. They’ll be asking how much of that distance they can get back with longer shafts or whatever. Don’t worry though. This game will never be mastered, even if it beguiles us into thinking it can be. Which is where we come in.  

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Comparing Tiger With Sam and Jack

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Tuesday, September 15, 2009 1:13 am (Eastern)

By Sal Johnson

Dave and Sal talk about Tigers stats compared to Sam and Jack as well as the Cog Hill being an important benchmark, the playoff systems ups and downs, and the Walker Cup victory.

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Sal Johnson and Dave Seanor with a video edition of Barely Inbounds

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Wednesday, September 9, 2009 1:28 am (Eastern)

Sal and Dave discuss the merits of Steve Stricker's win and id he can win Player-of-the-Year, look at the captain picks for the Presidents Cup and if Phil Mickelson will play at the BMW.

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Sal Johnson and Dave Seanor with a video edition of Barely Inbounds, with special guest Mitch Voges

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Monday, August 31, 2009 11:02 pm (Eastern)

Sal and Dave with U.S. Amateur champion Mitch Voges discuss the Barclays, the merits of the FedEx Cup, lift, clean and place in the rough and the U.S. Amateur championship.

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A look at how the Golf Channel did at the Solheim Cup and how this week will be the last time for ESPN to cover a LPGA event

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Tuesday, August 25, 2009 3:14 am (Eastern)

By SAL JOHNSON
Publisher, GOLFOBSERVER
E-mail me at: Golfersal@aol.com

A inside look at why ESPN is signing off from LPGA coverage after this week and surprise, surprise, Golf Channel had a first class show from the Solheim Cup.

It’s been a tough year for the LPGA, for reasons that have been well-documented. Thank goodness for the Solheim Cup.

At last, the LPGA was the beneficiary of some positive headlines. The Solheim Cup caught the imagination of golf fans at home and abroad, thanks to competitive matches and genuine enthusiasm among the players – most importantly Michelle Wie.

Photo: © Michael Cohen/Getty Images Golf Channel had a very good week at the Solheim Cup

It didn’t hurt that a competing event, the PGA Tour’s Wyndham Championship, was plagued by weather delays and failed to produce a name winner after Sergio Garcia folded down the stretch. That gave Golf Channel a chance to showcase its superb coverage of the Solheim Cup.

Golf Channel’s performance at Rich Harvest Farms was well timed, because next season it becomes the primary TV outlet for the LPGA. When ESPN signs off Sunday from the Safeway Classic, it will be the end of one era for the LPGA and the beginning of a new one.

The Safeway will be the last LPGA tournament televised on ESPN for the foreseeable future. The “Worldwide Leader” has been an LPGA partner since the ‘90s, giving women’s golf a global reach. The machinations that led to ESPN’s departure and a 10-year deal with Golf Channel serve as a great example of how former commissioner Carolyn Bivens mishandled the LPGA’s business affairs and limited its opportunities for growth.

Bivens didn’t grasp ESPN’s value. Her miscalculation of the TV/Internet landscape should have gotten her fired sooner than she was. A competent commissioner would have fostered a better relationship with a partner like ESPN, instead of driving it away like Bivens did – which ended up diminishing her bargaining power during negotiations with Golf Channel.

Photo: © Andy Lyons & Doug Pensinge /Allsport Jim Ritts and Ty Votaw were two of the LPGA frontmen that helped create the business model for ESPN to do golf.

The original ESPN deal was struck in 1998 by then-commissioner Jim Ritts and his VP of business affairs, Ty Votaw. Working with ESPN executive Chuck Gerber, they crafted a very creative time buy scheme, in which the LPGA would pay ESPN for the TV slots and the cost of production. The LPGA sold the commercial time.

The partnership worked well. LPGA got a bulk of their telecasts televised when nobody else was willing to gamble on the women while ESPN made a small profit on the LPGA at a time when the networks were losing money on their PGA Tour and Champions Tour contracts. In 2003, Gerber boasted that the ESPN-LPGA relationship was the only one that eked out a profit among all of the television partners that did golf.

When Votaw took the commissioner’s reins from Ritts in 1999, he kept the ESPN relationship going. It was a win-win for both parties. But that wasn’t good enough for Bivens, who succeeded Votaw in 2005. She inherited an LPGA that was on the ascent in a hot marketplace. It featured a 35-tournament schedule (compared to 27 today), and Bivens was determined to eliminate the time buys and persuade the networks and cable channels like ESPN to not only pay a rights fee, but to pay production costs, as well.

The smart money was on Bivens to pull off respectable rights fees from networks for some of their big events, but it was considered an impossible task for her to get a network or a cable channel to pay for an entire season.

Bivens didn't understand the economics of how the PGA Tour pulls off its TV deals, plus she overvalued what the LPGA package was worth. Both NBC and CBS pay a substantial fee to cover PGA Tour events, but the Tour helps defray their costs by requiring event sponsors to buy significant advertising time from the networks. Thus the networks aren’t on the hook to sell their entire ad inventories.

Even in the best of times, viewership of LPGA events lags far behind the PGA Tour, meaning the LPGA doesn’t have the clout to leverage sponsors into making significant ad buys on telecasts. And when the economy began to implode last year, any chance of replicating the PGA Tour model was dead.

Insiders say Bivens blames the Votaw administration for saddling her with long-term deals through 2009, which prevented her from striking deals during the first couple of years of her tenure as commissioner, when the economy was hot.

Photo: © Andy Lyons/Getty Images Carolyn Bivens and Golf Channel President Page Thompson after signing a ten year deal in February.

Maybe so, but Bivens’ hard-line negotiating style did nothing but alienate partners like ESPN. Plus she never changed her business model when the economy went south last year. Bivens did manage to secure a 10-year deal with Golf Channel, which included a small rights fee, but it came with a cost. Tournaments now are responsible for paying Golf Channel production costs to the tune of $250,000 per event. That burden is one of the reasons the Corning Classic folded its tent and the Jamie Farr Classic is on the bubble and probably won’t be back next year.

The Golf Channel deal will be great for the LPGA in the first couple of years, but when the economy recovers and the LPGA (hopefully) regains the popularity it had five years ago, its opportunities for growth will be hamstrung by the cost of doing business with Golf Channel (or should we say lack of revenue coming in). And that’s what the new commissioner will inherit from Bivens.

Bottom line, Golf Channel is overpaying short term but it will do very well in the last six or seven years of the contract, especially if Michelle Wie lives up to her potential and some more Paula Creamer types make their way on tour.

By dumping ESPN, Bivens sacrificed the vehicle best positioned to distribute the LPGA brand around the world. Golf Channel wants to be a global player but right now it comes nowhere near matching ESPN’s reach.

During her first month of office, in her first official meetings with ESPN executives at the Solheim Cup in 2005, Bivens made it known not only to Gerber, but also to ESPN vice president John Wildhack, that the existing deal would not be on the table and that ESPN would have to pay a rights fee. For two years, Bivens had little communication with ESPN. Apparently she didn't see the value of trying to create a deal like the R&A and ESPN forged for the British Open, in which they partner in the distribution of coverage on television globally and on the Internet.

Photo: © Sam Greenwood/PGA Tour The announce team of Judy Rankin and Terry Gannon will be missed after this week.

Essentially, by alienating ESPN, Bivens lost any leverage she might have had when negotiating with Golf Channel. I realized very early in Bivens tenure that she never learned the lesson of negotiation in which you want a lot of folks trying to get your product, this tends to not only get the price up but you can get better terms. So both television deals that Bivens did with the Koreans and Golf Channel were one on one, so she had no leverage. Honestly if the board of directors of the LPGA would of realized all of this they could of released Bivens last year when her contract ran out and saved themselves a million dollar buyout fee.

Too bad ESPN will be out of the picture after Safeway. Watch the swan song and see how great Terry Gannon and Judy Rankin work together. Gannon is a pro at doing golf; unfortunately, he’ll work only three or four events in 2010. Golf Channel would be smart to snatch Gannon once his ESPN contract runs out next year. As for Rankin, she is a big LPGA cheerleader and will be missed in that role. Of course Golf Channel would love to get Rankin for 2010, but ESPN still has work for Rankin next year with their British Open, Senior British Open and Women's British Open coverage along with early coverage of the Ryder Cup, U.S. Open and U.S. Women's Open. No contracts have been signed yet and who knows, maybe with the limited non-LPGA events that ESPN has they will let her do some Golf Channel shows.

There are a lot of people behind the scenes who have been doing ESPN's LPGA coverage for years. What a waste that John Delvecchio, one of the best golf directors in the business, won't be a part of LPGA coverage. Producer Chris Ohlmeyer will be missed, too along with the production and engineering staff that he has put together. People tend to forget that every time a TV package changes hands, people lose jobs.

Photo: © Golf Channel The two men responsible for the change of production at Golf Channel Tom Stathakes and Jack Graham

Of course, the folks at Golf Channel will say they have an equally talented staff. Thanks to their efforts last week at the Solheim Cup, you’ll get no argument here. Golf Channel’s coverage was very good and it demonstrated how much the tournament shows have improved since Tom Stathakes took the reins early in 2008 and brought Jack Graham aboard as head of production last year.

Journalistically, the Solheim Cup story was well told. The right shots were shown and the pictures were perfect. It was a huge improvement over the last time Golf Channel produced a Solheim Cup in America, in 2005. That year Golf Channel struggled to show every shot, resulting in coverage that was terribly out of sequence and reliant on tapes of shots that had happened 15 minutes earlier. Producers were so disorganized that they dropped commercials, which is a cardinal sin in the TV business.

This year it was totally different, Golf Channel captured the excitement of the event and how much the crowd was a part of the drama. Better yet, the commentary wasn’t overbearing. The producers were smart in getting Judy Rankin involved and splitting duties with Rankin and Rich Lerner working the morning matches on Friday and Saturday, followed by the team of Brian Hammons and Dottie Pepper covering the afternoon matches. Both duos were fresh and had a lot of different information to pass along.

As for the other announcers, I love Tom Abbott. He’s a fresh find by Golf Channel who came across as being knowledgeable but not annoying. I also enjoyed Phillip Parkin. He did a nice job along with Kay Cockerill, who is still informative and has a special bouncy and friendly style.

Photo: © David Cannon/Getty Images Phillip Parkin did a great job as one of Golf Channels roving announcers at the Solheim Cup.

Donna Caponi-Bymes and Val Skinner gave for them a good week, but that is being very kind on my part. They still are from a different generation and their ways aren’t as compelling for an audience that is different today than it was a decade ago. Even at her best, Skinner is very annoying, her voice is terrible and shrieks plus she has a tendency to talk down to the audience. She tries too hard to impress viewers that everything she has to say is so very, very important. She would do well to study Rankin, who makes viewers feel like she’s there with them in the family room, just talking golf.

On a scale of 1 to 10, I think Golf Channel deserves a 8 and a half compare to NBC's 10. Not bad considering that just a year ago I would of given Golf Channel a 2 or 3. The only weaknesses at the Solheim Cup were Rankin’s lack of airtime Sunday (only on once for ten minute piece with Rich Lerner in first hours of show) and the infrequency of match-by-match updates on the final day. Why they didn't provide a crawl on the bottom of the screen every 10 minutes is beyond me.

It should also be noted that for three hours Friday the action was streamed live on GolfChannel.com because the cable channel had to honor its contract with the PGA Tour to show live coverage of the Wyndham Championship. That tact gave us a glimpse of the future, as streaming video on the Internet will become more commonplace in the next couple of years. It also underscored the LPGA’s problem with losing ESPN, which doesn’t make the claim of being the “Worldwide Leader” for nothing. Golf Channel still has a way to go outside of the United States and they would be very wise to possibly rekindle their Great Britain operation especially now that PGA Tour rights are up in the air in England after this year. This could open up a very valuable stepping stone for presenting the Golf Channel brand outside of the United States.

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