The Shotgun Start

We are back for a delayed Memorial Day edition recapping the weekend that was in golf, muscle cars, kitchen appliances, and stock Crate & Barrel silverware as trophies. We begin with Kevin Na’s win in Fort Worth and his comments that he knew he had “zero chance” to win at Bethpage but felt renewed confidence at a place like Colonial. We discuss this variety of courses on the PGA Tour and how to protect it. Then we move to the Senior major at Oak Hill and the possibility that a cellphone ringing cost one participant the title. On the Web Tour, Scottie Scheffler continued his torrid run and that has Andy lamenting the current structure that prevents him from taking that form to the big leagues. On the LPGA, Bronte Law gets her first win and then drives overnight to Charleston for this week’s major, which prompts us to debate how worse for the wear we’d be in contrast to that. With Oklahoma State up by some 25 shots, we debate whether there should even be a match play portion of the NCAA title this week in Arkansas. For a special Monday scaries, we discuss the one senior tour player that flew home on Friday only to land and discover he’d actually made the cut in Rochester.

It’s Friday going into a holiday weekend so this episode meanders through some far flung corners of the golf world. We begin with a story time segment that piggyback’s off our discussion on Brooks Koepka’s equipment proclivities from Wednesday. Our next story comes from a tipster on the amateur days of Dru Love, who had himself a rough first round out at Colonial. We get into some of the different exemptions this week, how they’re performing, and how Colonial builds its field in a quirky way. We ask if there are any pro golfers out there that would start turning down exemptions if they were in Dru’s shoes and struggle to come up with an answer. In Fan Vote Friday Jr, we get into the story of Ben Silverman and how it’s a stark contrast from his two playing partners, Love and Tucker Wadkins. Our third and final story from this Friday storytime episode relays a fun anecdote about the elder Wadkins putting in an angry call to Arizona during Tucker’s playing days. In news, we hit on Tiger’s commitment to Memorial and a potentially mattress-related WD in Fort Worth. Flashback Friday focuses on 2003 Colonial champ Kenny Perry, who has an odd agreement to donate a percentage of his career earnings to a small college that helped fund him when he was broke and trying to make it as a pro.

The Cat’s in the Cradle at Colonial this week and we will be watching the sons of some former pros closely at one of the PGA Tour’s classic stops. We get into the schedule for the week, which prompts discussion on: Lee Westwood’s activities at the resort and spa hosting in Denmark, the great Kinsgmill setup on the LPGA, why there are stand-up mixer appliances in the middle of the course for a senior major, and the importance of the Evans Scholar program. In the Event of the Week segment, we discuss some of the results so far from the women’s NCAAs and whether it’s fair for the title to be played on a school’s home course. In a Brooks segment, we bat around the official over-under major total and also get back into his choice to go without an equipment sponsor. It leads us to propose a few other nominees that should shun equipment deals in favor of freedom. In an all-USGA segment, we discuss some early results from the first sectional qualifying site and when it’s OK to withdraw before the second 18, media day at Pebble Beach and Andy’s fear of horrible photos from the day, and the USGA contracting Iron Man to grow the game. We finish with the resolution of our PGA head-to-heads that might have Andy worse for the wear.

Andy and Brendan review a more dramatic-than-expected final day at the PGA Championship. They discuss Brooks Koepka losing his cushion and if they ever thought it was in doubt on Sunday. They assess Brooks’ future and the over-under for his career major total now that he’s won four of his last eight major starts. They also get into the tough Sunday conditions and how the course setup dramatically favored one very specific skill while eliminating others. Then they pass out grades and discuss the performances of DJ, Spieth, Rickie, HVII, the CBS production, and the New York fans. We also look forward to Pebble Beach and how that might set up for Koepka and others. In our Sunday Scaries segment, Andy wonders if they’re sweating at the PGA Tour given how the game’s best player only seems to be illuminating the superfluous nature of everything that’s not a major.

Brooks Koepka, as you might expect, stays atop the leaderboard and by a significant margin at the PGA Championship. We review how he got it around in even-par on Saturday and our disappointment at the chasers’ inability to close the gap. Then we rant on CBS not being prepared to pronounce Jazz Janewattananond’s name even though he started the day in the top 10. We assess the likelihood of Brooks not winning on Sunday, the numbers it might take, who could shoot them, and why Bethpage won’t exactly promote it. We wrap with Andy going off again about the career earnings list and its misrepresentations to the general public, as well as some of the painful stakes some listeners sent in for our Kraft v. Kang head-to-head wager.

Andy and Brendan are set up in their home base and return for this lively Friday night review of the 2019 PGA Championship at its midpoint. They begin with Brooks Koepka’s dominating performance, even though Koepka thinks he didn’t “hit it good” in the second round. They discuss how and why Koepka’s style works so well at this setup, using some illuminating quotes from Tiger Woods, who watched Broosky carve up Bethpage over 36 holes for a new major scoring record. The playing style and bombers’ success chat also ties into some quotes from Bryson DeChambeau, who seems less than thrilled with the setup both at Bethpage and at majors in general. Then they get into Rory citing how he showed “character” getting back on the right side of the cut line after an abominable first 27 holes. They also hit on an odd penalty for one player not showing up on time and CBS deciding to call the final four holes this week “The Power Hour.”

Andy has returned home to Chicago but not without relaying one final misadventure from his immersion in New York life. We get into the opening round from the PGA, leading with the obvious news of Bruce/Brooks Koepka rocketing to the top of another major leaderboard with a course record round. How far down the board do you go to find names still in it? Then we get to the anomaly of Danny Lee’s 64 as well as Rory’s day on the putting greens. A “contender or pretender” segment covers some of the, well, less publicized names on the first or second page of the leaderboard. In news, we hit on the PGA board’s big day out at National Golf Links of America in the middle of their biggest week of the year as well as the cheap ticket prices this week and if it means the NYC area has been oversaturated with majors. We also briefly discuss John Daly’s day rolling around a major on cart. Flashback Friday wraps up with a past PGA from the NYC area that left Tommy Tolles on the outside of the Ryder Cup roster.

We return for this Wednesday edition with a special live recording with an audience at B. Draddy’s Manhattan headquarters. We start by running through the schedule for the week, which leads us into a discussion of whether the governing bodies need to get on the same page together and whether that will ever be possible. Our PGA preview begins by addressing two of the favorites this week, Tiger Woods and Brooks Koepka. We get into Tiger’s choice to take the last month off and how it might pay off at Bethpage. Then we get to Brooksy’s comments that the majors are actually the easiest to win, and his calculus for eliminating most of the field before it even starts. We then move to this week’s host course, discussing our favorite and least favorite aspects of Bethpage and whether it’s more of a USGA or PGA venue. Then we are joined by Billy Draddy to make some PGA picks, discuss New York golf, players getting their own logos, and Bethpage’s Warning Sign brand. We wrap with a discussion on some fun tee times to watch the first couple rounds at the PGA, including the fascinating “Cart Boy” and Beemer duo.

Brendan and Andy return from the weekend ready for the second men’s major championship of the year. But before looking ahead, first they review Sung Kang’s big win at the Byron Nelson, giving Andy a chance to play his walk-up music one more time. They also get into Matt Every’s comments on Kang’s pace of play and the sudden death of #ToddWatch. The subject of Trinity Forest being “easy” simply because of scores relative to par is addressed with vigor. On the Euro Tour, they rejoice at the confirmation of Westy hosting the British Masters again as well as his trip to the States for the PGA. Now comes the question of whether he’ll play or just do appearances at parties. Andy also gets off a rant about a soccer game impeding the Sunday morning coverage on Golf Channel. They sprinkle in some thoughts on a few early PGA topics before diving headlong into the major later this week. We wrap going over a listener submitted document purporting to list every single FedExCup No. 1, ever.

We begin with an edict from Andy about complaints over next week’s PGA Championship coverage. This leads to Brendan reading some of the amusing and terrifying show descriptions for TNT programming during the season’s second major. Then we get into Danny Chops’ big moment, and ponder if a pro has ever gone from announcing PGA Tour Live to a featured group on PGA Tour Live within a month. Then we review Tony Romo’s day, which was not great, but still came in below the over-under line set for his first round score. The results of Fan Vote Friday Jr. have us discussing the derivation of Kris Blanks’ name, a past tweet about coitus that had him apologizing, Beau Hossler’s shoulder injury, and the little mountain town where Jimmy Knous hails from in Colorado and if he should be rightful PGA Tour scientist, not the “fraudulent physicist.” In news, we hit on the footage of John Peterson doing Happy Gilmore swings on the range of just his second event in his comeback as well as a backboarding scandal erupting at a major championship. We wrap with a Flashback Friday that takes us down memory lane to the Brendon Todd era.