Category Archives: News – Houston Local

River Oaks Country Club

Posted on by
Reply

It’s been awhile since I’ve passed along another in my series of posts on the best of Houston’s many fine golf courses (see the side panel to the right for the other courses reviewed to date), so what better way to start the week than to take a look at one of Houston’s most venerable tracts, River Oaks Country Club.

A couple of months ago, my old friend Ty Sponsel, Jr. invited me for a golf outing at River Oaks, which is Houston’s premier golf course among the relatively few Houston tracts that were designed prior to World War II. Even with the Houston area currently experiencing its worst drought in a century, River Oaks was in fine shape for our outing.

Designed by legendary Donald Ross, and updated in the 1950’s by Joe Finger and in the 1990’s by Rees Jones, River Oaks is a Houston treasure. Built along the bluffs overlooking Buffalo Bayou just a few miles from downtown, River Oaks is a freak of nature – a course with substantial elevation changes despite being situated squarely within the flat coastal plain of southeast Texas.

Jack Burke, Sr., Claude Harmon and Claude’s son, Dick Harmon, were all former head professionals at River Oaks. Moreover, Jimmy Demaret used to wade across Buffalo Bayou to play the course before convincing Burke to hire him as an assistant pro at the club. Consequently, River Oaks is without question one of the clubs that established the strong Texas thread in the fabric of golf in the United States.

My favorite holes at River Oaks tend to be the ones with elevation changes, such as the 2nd — a downhill par 4; the 3rd – a downhill par 3 on the banks of the bayou; the 5th – a wonderful downhill and then uphill par 4; the 13th – a careening par 4 along the bluffs of the bayou; and the 17th – a sharp dogleg to an elevated green with water left making the tee shot one of the most perilous on the course.

At just over 7,000 yards from the championship tees, and a pleasant 6,800 from the men’s tees, River Oaks is a refreshing throwback to the golf course designs that place a premium on precision and shot-making. It is a reminder that the timeless golf courses are those that take advantage of the native terrain to test the golfer. It is an outstanding test that needs to be on the “must play” list of any Houston golfer.

Below is a slideshow of the course accompanied by the Mavericks’ rendition of “Dream River.” 

Enjoy!

 

Project Ecclesia

Posted on by
Reply

EcclesiaEcclesia is a creative and community-centered inner-city church on Taft Street just outside of downtown Houston. As noted in this earlier post, Ecclesia’s heart is in the right place.

Ecclesia has outgrown its current location, so the church has acquired the old Houston Fire Department warehouse just outside downtown, where the church will move once renovations are substantially completed. Ecclesia’s members are handling a good part of the renovations and raising money to cover the repairs that need to be performed by specialists.

As the video below delightfully notes, Ecclesia is currently in the phase of refinishing the warehouse’s floors. Making a contribution to help Ecclesia renovate its new home would be a wonderful way to give something valuable back to downtown Houston.

 

Ecclesia Houston

Posted on by
Reply

Ecclesia2.jpgEcclesia is an inner-city church in Houston. Its heart is in the right place, as reflected by this video.

So, what’s next for the Stros?

Posted on by
Reply

With the announcement that Drayton McLane has finalized the sale of the Stros to a group of investors led by Jim Crane, my sense is that an overhaul is around the corner.

As regular readers of this blog know, I think McLane held on to the club way too long. He probably should have sold after the 2006 season failed to repeat the excitement of the 2005 World Series run and certainly after the disastrous 2007 season, when Crane’s first attempt to buy the club went awry, probably due to tightening credit markets at the time. Nevertheless, if McLane had sold then, he almost certainly would have gone done in history as the best owner in franchise history.

However, Bill James’ “Law of Competitive Balance” set into the Stros organization after the club’s improbable 2005 World Series appearance and McLane never fully recovered from that syndrome.

He did finally clean house and hired GM Ed Wade and scouting director Bobby Heck to resurrect a farm system that McLane had allowed to deteriorate from one of MLB’s best when he acquired the club in 1992 to one of the worst over the past five seasons. Although the Stros appear to have picked reasonably well over the past three drafts, most of those players are still developing on the lower-level farm clubs.

Rebuilding a barren farm system takes a long time. Just ask the Devil Rays.

Now that McLane’s dubious decision to allow the Stros farm system to erode has been fully exposed, that detracts considerably from the legacy of success that the club enjoyed under his watch during the Biggio-Bagwell era. Ballpark and television network assets aside, no one in their right mind could argue that the Stros baseball operation is in better condition now than when McLane bought it in 1992.

So, what should one expect from Crane, who appears to have paid a premium price for the club?

I think there will be big changes. Crane has more baseball knowledge in his pinky finger than McLane ever had, so Crane understands the importance of rebuilding the farm system. My bet is that Crane will take a run at keeping Heck, who is well-regarded in baseball development circles. I don’t think there is much chance that either Wade or team President Tal Smith will be retained, though.

Long term, Crane will emphasize a baseball operation that measures performance statistically much more carefully than McLane’s baseball operation, which flubbed in that area frequently. I’m not suggesting that Crane won’t make mistakes. But my bet is that they won’t be of the nature of paying Kaz Matsui $16.5 million or Brandon Lyon $15 million over three years. Or Clint Barmes almost $4 million and Bill Hall $3 million for one season. Or Brad Ausmus, ever.

And for that, Stros fans should all be thankful.

Expensive Toy Trains

Posted on by
2

Houston Metro-1Cory Crow posted a good overview this past Friday on how Houston’s Metropolitan Transit Authority has failed to develop and operate a transit system that meets the special needs of the Houston metropolitan area (Metro’s debacles have been frequent topics on this blog, most recently the here and here).

Cory’s post coincided with this Richard White/NY Times op-ed in which he previews one of the themes of his new book on the financing and construction of the the 19th-century transcontinental railroads – that governmental guaranty of the bonds used to finance the construction meant that “if there be profit, the [private] corporations may take it; if there be loss, the government must bear it.” As White notes, that dynamic is again at play with regard to the Obama Administration’s high-speed rail proposals:

Proponents of the transcontinental railroads promised all kinds of benefits they did not deliver. They claimed that the railroads were needed to save the Union, but the Union was already saved before the first line was completed. The best Western farmlands would have been settled without the railroads; their impact on other lands was often environmentally disastrous. For three decades California commodities could move more cheaply, and virtually as quickly, by sea. The subsidies the railroads received enriched contractors and financiers, but nearly all the railroads went into receivership, some multiple times; the government rescued others.

As more astute members of Congress came to recognize, the subsidies were a mistake. .  .  .

After 1872, the country turned against the subsidizing of large corporations. It was a little late. Fraud and failure left a legacy that would lead to four decades of government attempts to get back what had so carelessly been given away. In the 1890s, Congress was still trying to recover money from the Pacific Railway.

Yet here we are again. The Obama administration proposed a substantial subsidy, $53 billion over six years, to induce investors to take on risk that they are otherwise unwilling to assume. Such subsidies create what the economist Robert Fogel has called “hothouse capitalism”: government assumes much of the risk, while private contractors and financiers take the profit.

The reality is that virtually all light rail systems and most high-speed rail systems are unsustainable without massive federal subsidies, which are hit and miss, at best. Besides, the financial benefit of these rail systems are highly concentrated in only a few interest groups. Unfortunately, those groups do not include one that is comprised of a substantial number of users.

A strategy of "build as much light rail as possible now and then figure out how to pay for it later" is not a coherent transit plan for the Houston metropolitan area.

What is it going to take for Houston’s local governmental leaders to understand that?

As the Rockets’ World Turns

Posted on by
Reply

So, the Houston Rockets let Hall of Fame coach Rick Adelman go after yet another season in which the team was reasonably competitive, but again only the third best in Texas, much less the NBA’s Western Conference.

Interestingly, the Rockets’ move has generated polar opposite reactions. The majority view is that Adelman did a good job under difficult circumstances and should not be faulted for the Rockets’ continued mediocrity. After all, in four seasons with the Rockets, Adelman had a 193-135 record, the best winning percentage (.588) of any coach in franchise history. His 945 wins are currently eighth among NBA coaches.

On the other hand, some folks – reflected in this Chris Baldwin’s piece – think that Adelman was a bad fit for a young team trying to develop into a mature NBA contender.

As with many controversies, the truth is somewhere in the middle.

The reality is that both Adelman and Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey have done reasonably good jobs piecing together a competitive team while dealing with the obsolescent team model that they were handed by Rockets owner, Les Alexander.

Alexander – who is viewed by the mainstream media as a competent owner primarily because of the relative incompetence of Houston’s other professional sports club owners – handed both Morey and Adelman a team that was based on the talents of two physically brittle superstars, Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming.

When the injury risk took away both McGrady and Yao, Morey and Adelman performed admirably in developing a group of reasonably productive complementary players into a competitive NBA unit. Not a playoff caliber team, mind you. But one that at least won more games than it lost and generally played hard.

However, that competitiveness does not hide the truth that Alexander is the main problem with the Rockets. Despite the gibberish that is written about him in the local mainstream media, Alexander is a quite mediocre owner.

He did have the good fortune to inherit a strong roster when he bought the team back in the mid-1990’s, and that group promptly won two straight NBA titles for him in the first two years that he owned the franchise.

And Alexander did have the good sense five years ago to hire Morey, who has rebuilt the Rockets’ roster with relatively cheap, mostly young and productive complementary players who would probably provide a fine supporting cast for a true superstar, if only one or two were available.

Nevertheless, under Alexander’s management, the Rockets have now won precisely one playoff series in the past 14 seasons. That is a streak of futility that is matched by only a few other NBA teams.

So, as with most things, it’s important to place matters in context when thinking about the Rockets.

Neither Daryl Morey nor Rick Adelman had anything to do with the dubious decision to hitch the club’s wagon to Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming. They did the best that could be expected when that decision went awry.

Blame Les Alexander for the Rockets’ failure, as well as for making the team the third best NBA club in Texas for the past decade.

It’s SHO time!

Posted on by
1

1G Seventh Hole teeThe PGA Tour makes its annual trek to Houston this week for the Shell Houston Open at the Tournament Course at Redstone Golf Club. It’s always a fun event and well worth attending.

After a rocky divorce from The Woodlands and its popular TPC Course, as well as a difficult transition period in which most of the best PGA Tour players avoided the event, the 2010 tournament attracted the best field in the history of the event.

The 2011 tournament does not have quite a strong a field (four of the the top 10 players in the World Rankings are playing as opposed to six last year), but the field is as good as any of the non-major, non-World Golf Championship event on the Tour.

Phil Mickelson (6 in the World Rankings), Lee Westwood (2), Matt Kuchar (9) and Steve Stricker (10) are the highest ranking players participating this year, while defending SHO champ Anthony Kim (41), Ernie Els (13), Retief Goosen (18), Francesco Molinari (16), Padraig Harrington (36) , Hunter Mahan (19), Charl Schwartzel (26),  and defending British Open champ Louis Oosthuizen (24) are other well-known Tour members in the field. In addition, local fan favorites and past SHO winners Fred Couples, Stuart Appleby and Robert Allenby (30) are playing again this year.

The Houston Open is one of the oldest events on the PGA Tour and the event has really got its mojo back after picking up the week-before-the-Masters-date on the Tour schedule five years ago. The first tournament was in 1922, which ties the event with the Texas Open as the third oldest non-major championship on the PGA Tour behind only only the Western Open (1899) and the Canadian Open (1904). This is the sixth Houston Open to be played on the Tournament Course at Redstone and the ninth event overall at Redstone, which hosted its first three Houston Opens on the club’s Jacobson-Hardy Course while the Tournament Course was being built.

This year’s strong field is further confirmation that the tournament’s move to the week-before-The Masters-date was the right one (32 participants in the SHO will play in the Masters the following weekend). The Houston Golf Association continues to do a fine job of promoting the tournament with Tour players by grooming the Tournament Course as much as possible to resemble the conditions that they will face next the following weekend at Augusta National. However, the course is a flat-land course that bears little resemblance to the hilly venues of Augusta, so that grooming only works to a limited extent.

Moreover, even with its superior conditioning, the Tournament Course is a not a favorite of either players or spectators. Although is has a decent variety of interesting holes, the routing of the course is an unmitigated disaster, with 16 of the holes separated by a long walk and a drainage ditch from the 1st and 18th holes, the driving range and the clubhouse. Unfortunately, there is not much the Houston Golf Association can do about that routing problem, so let’s just hope that the course’s superior conditioning and the SHO’s attractive tune-up date for The Masters keeps prompting the top players to overlook the course’s less appealing characteristics. Here are a few tips on watching the tournament at Redstone.

The following are a few of the back stories to follow during the tournament:

Houston will be well-represented in the field. Steve Elkington, and The Woodlands’ Jeff Maggert and Roland Thatcher lead the local veteran contingent, while two new faces – Johnattan Vegas and Bobby Gates, both from The Woodlands – are legitimate contenders for a top-10 finish this week. Vegas already won the Bob Hope Classic earlier this season, and both he and Gates already have two top-10 finishes each this season. Vegas and Gates are students of Kevin Kirk, who is the head pro at The Woodlands Golf Performance Center and another in Houston’s long legacy of outstanding golf instructors.

Although Mickelson and Tiger Woods still are ranked higher in the World Rankings, Matt Kuchar is currently the most consistent American player on the PGA Tour and arguably the most consistent player on the Tour over the past two years (although Bay Hill winner Martin Laird is coming on strong in that category). And, as with many things in golf, there is a Houston connection to Kuchar’s rise to the top.

Defending SHO champion Kim and British Open champion Oosthuizen are both coming back from injuries that cost them a portion of theie 2010 season. Although neither has contended yet in the 2011 season, both players are extraordinary talents who could burst into contention at any moment.

Scott Stallings, who contended at The Transitions Tournament a couple of weeks ago – is a top-20 Tour player in driving distance and maintains an interesting blog Chief Executive Golfer and likely will be passing along thoughts about his experience during the tournament.

Three of the top-10 drivers in terms of distance on the Tour will be playing, J.B. Holmes (4), Angle Cabrera (5) and Transitions Tournament champion Gary Woodland (9). 

Although I’ve had my doubts that the HGA would be able to turnaround the SHO at Redstone, I’m happy to be wrong on that score. Houston has a rich golfing tradition and the HGA is a fine charitable organization. It’s going to be another great week at Redstone, so sit back and enjoy the SHO!

Touring Rice

Posted on by
Reply

A video tour of one of Houston’s most beautiful places, Rice University.

If I Needed You

Posted on by
Reply

The late Townes Van Zandt from the mid-1970’s, around the time that he was regularly performing in Houston at the Old Quarter on Market Square.

The sad reality of Metro

Posted on by
2

metro-map-2012-revisedMetropolitan Transit Authority CEO George Greanias makes his best case for building expensive light rail systems here. It’s all about investing for what will eventually be a “first-class public transit system.”

But there is also the here and now. And the stark reality is that light rail systems are utterly unsustainable without massive federal subsidies, which are hit and miss, at best.

Metro is in desperate need of leadership that will develop a transit plan for the Houston area based on something other than a strategy of “build as much light rail as possible now and then figure out how to pay for it later.”

Greanias does not appear that he will be providing such leadership.

So it goes with Metro.