This NY Times article reports on the progress of the new Liberty National Golf Club, which is located just across the Hudson River from Manhattan. With its breathtaking views of the Manhattan skyline and the Statute of Liberty, the golf course is generating quite a buzz in golfing circles, although not among the crowd that I normally play with:

[T]he lush and very private Liberty National Golf Club has sprouted across from the Manhattan skyline. This $150 million project by Paul B. Fireman, the property’s owner and the chief executive of Reebok; his son Dan; and the golf-design tandem of Kite and Bob Cupp is creating a buzz less than a year before the first players tee off.
Built on 160 acres and covering 4,000 feet of waterfront, the course stretches 7,400 yards from the back tees, with small rivers running through it and a $1 million cart path built with Belgian stones. . . The course will offer a 15-minute luxury yacht service from Manhattan and, for those with quicker needs, a helipad.
Each member will have a custom-made set of clubs that will always be available at the course, a kind of thank-you gift for joining a club with an initiation fee of around $500,000.

Sure am glad they put in that helipad. ;^)

Houston-based Redstone Companies‘ Tournament Golf Course — the new home course for the PGA Tour’s Shell Houston Open Golf Tournament — opened for play this week, and the Chronicle’s Doug Pike gives the 7,500 yard Rees Jones tract a stellar rating in this review. Inasmuch as the new course is central to the Houston Golf Association’s plan to revive the Shell Houston Open, which had one of its weakest fields in years during this year’s tournament — I am hopeful that the course turns out to be popular among both Tour players and the golfing public. I am scheduled to play the Tournament Course later this month, after which I will post a review, so stay tuned.
A note to Redstone Golf — the website for the Tournament Course is about as unimpressive as a website can be, with hyperlinks that do no work and a paucity of visuals of the product. Might want to spend a few bucks to upgrade that resource, which will be the first impression that many folks will have of the facility.

In summertime, thoughts turn to golf, and the August issue of Golf Digest is called it’s All-American edition. That theme gives columnist Dan Jenkins an opportunity to provide his wit and wisdom on America’s contributions to golf in this hilarious article entitled What America gave Golf — We might have burned the edges, but the good outweighs the bad (previous posts on Mr. Jenkins’ work are here, here, here, and here). The entire article is a must read, but here are a few Jenkins pearls to peak your interest:

It’s easy enough to blame America for the six-hour round, . . . but ask yourself this: What would the game be like without the gimme, the mulligan, the shapely cart girl and a chili dog at the turn?

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In this Washington Post column, noted author and columnist John Feinstein comments on Jack Nicklaus’ farewell to the British Open and, in so doing, observes that 2005 British Open champion Tiger Woods — while likely to break Nicklaus’ record of winning 18 major championships — has a much more difficult task ahead of him in equaling Nicklaus’ qualities as a champion:

Woods seems to think that Nicklaus’s legacy is only about numbers, that winning golf tournaments is the only thing that measures a champion. Nothing could be further from the truth, especially in golf.
Woods already holds many records. One of them, which is unofficial, is that he has been fined for using profanity publicly more than any player in history. While using profanity in the crucible of competition is hardly a great crime, it is indicative of Woods’s attitude that, rather than try to curb his use of language, he has complained that he is being treated unfairly since there are always microphones following him when he plays. Last month, during the U.S. Open, Woods missed a putt and childishly dragged his putter across the green, damaging it as he did so. When he was asked about the incident later, he shrugged and said, “I was frustrated,” (no apology) as if he was the only player among 156 dealing with frustration. In recent years he has allowed his caddie, Steve Williams, to frequently treat spectators and members of the media rudely, not only defending him but also appearing to sanction his misbehavior.

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The John Deere Classic PGA Tour event this weekend lost much of its luster after Michelle Wie came close but failed to make the cut on Friday. However, the tournament turned out to be highly entertaining even without the Big Wiesy as 23 year old Sean O’Hair — whose troubled life was profiled in this earlier post — fired a six under par 65 in the final round to break through and win his first PGA Tour event.
This has been a fascinating PGA Tour season so far, as young players such as O’Hair and Ben Crane have acquitted themselves in such a superb manner under difficult circumstances that they are now among my favorite players. In fact, it was a very good weekend for my favorite golfers as Peter Jacobsen — one of the genuinely nicest men in the game (see this recent Golf Digest interview) — won his second major championship in his second season on the Champions Tour as he fired a final round 66 to win the Ford Seniors Player Championship in Dearborn, Michigan.
Although he had been a solid player on the PGA Tour from the late 1970’s through the early 1990’s, Jacobsen’s golf game had fallen on hard times for several years when he revived his career in 1995 by changing from a two-plane swing (think Tom Watson, Hale Irwin, and Davis Love) to a one-plane swing (think Ben Hogan, Ernie Els, and Michelle Wie) with the help of his longtime business partner and Houston-based teaching pro Jim Hardy. Hardy recently used his experience in changing Jacobsen’s prior two-plane swing to a one-plane swing as the basis of an exceptional new book on golf swing instruction, The Plane Truth for Golfers (McGraw-Hill 2005).
In this new book, Hardy identifies the two-plane swing and the one-plane swing as the two basic — but much different — golf swings. In so doing, he makes the brilliant insight that much of golf swing instruction over the past generation has been counterproductive because of the failure of golf instructors to tailor their teaching to the particular golf swing that the student is using or should use. Inasmuch as the key elements of the one-plane swing are quite different from those of the two-plane swing, Hardy points out that attempting to teach two-plane concepts to a one-plane swinger (and vice versa) risks having the student adopt swing elements that are ill-suited for the student’s particular swing.
As with Hogan’s classic golf swing book Five Lessons, Hardy’s Plane Truth for Golfers is only a little over 100 pages. However, take it from a self-taught golfer who has read dozens of golf instruction books over the past 25 years, Houstonian Jim Hardy’s Plane Truth for Golfers is a landmark book in the area of golf swing instruction and another of the many contributions that Houstonians have made to golf over the past two generations.
Finally, long John Daly has not won a golf tournament this season, but this touching Bob Verdi/Golf World article tells a wonderful story about something far more important that Daly won for a family that was devastated by the death of its father 15 years ago. The overweight, chain-smoking and problem-laden Daly will never be the cover boy for the PGA Tour, but he is certainly in the competition for having the biggest heart among PGA Tour members.

With the terrorist attack yesterday in London and all, potentially the most remarkable sports story of the year is flying under the radar screen today.
Question: What do the following PGA Tour golfers have in common:
Billy Andrade
Aaron Baddeley
Jeff Maggert
Scott Simpson
Steve Stricker
Kevin Stadler
Skip Kendall
Woody Austin
Robert Gamez
Harrison Frazer
David Duval
Lucas Glover
David Gossett
Answer: They all trail 15 year old Michelle Wie after the first round of the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic taking place this weekend in Silvis, Illinois.
Now that state of affairs will certainly generate more than a few barbs among the men in the tournament locker room this morning.
After posting a one under par 70 in her opening round (the leaderboard is here), Ms. Wie (nicknamed “the Big Wiesy”) is one stroke off the projected score for making the tournament “cut” — i.e., the reduction of the players in the tournament for the two weekend rounds to the 70 players with the best total scores after the first two rounds. If she makes the cut, then Ms. Wie would be the first female player in 60 years — since Babe Didrikson Zaharias in the 1945 Tucson Open — to make the cut in a PGA Tour event.
Ms. Wie is 6 foot tall, possesses a flawless one plane swing, and hits the ball far enough to compete against men on the PGA Tour. She is the real deal, and it’s only a matter of time until she makes the cut in a PGA Tour event. Today may just be the day.
Update: After getting to five under par for the tournament during her round on Friday, the Big Wiesy faltered on the back nine and shot an even par 71, leaving her at one under par for the tournament and two shots off making the cut. Still, quite a remarkable performance by the 15 year old Ms. Wie, who beat a third of the field in the event.

One of the highlights in the development of the blogosphere over the past several years has been the emergence of specialized blogs. As an inveterate golfer, an interesting part of the blogosphere for me has been the golf blogs, a number of which are listed in the blogroll on the right.
One of the golf bloggers who I particularly enjoy is Jay Flemma (he actually maintains two blogs, here and here), who is a New York City-based intellectual property and entertainment lawyer who is carving a name for himself in writing about golf course design. In his latest post, Jay addresses an issue that this Ron Whitten Golf Digest article explored earlier this year: Is well-known golf course designer Tom Fazio good for the game?
Jay’s analysis of Fazio’s latest designs is timely in this neck of the woods because Fazio’s new course here in The Woodlands, Texas — where many folks still believe the Shell Houston Open should be played — will open on a beautiful piece of land in the western part of The Woodlands later this year. After noting that several analysts of golf course design are observing that Fazio’s recent designs are boring and excessively expensive to maintain (much less play), Jay observes the following about the direction of Fazio’s course design:

I stuck up for Fazio here. I love World Woods, Barton Creek, Pine Hill, PGA, TPC-MB, Ventana. . . lots of Tom. Then I played Atunyote in Utica and was underwhelmed. There was nothing of interest except two good risk reward par-5s, 5 and 12, and 9, 11 and 18 were good. The rest was nothing I had not seen before. This is $175. Casino Golf – nuff said. The design was muted, the natural setting was ordinary farmland and the price was twice what it’s worth . . . That’s why architectural echo is an important factor in rating a golf course. It offers a way to compare courses to the greats.

Jay covered the U.S. Open last weekend and his blogs include interviews with players and a level of analysis that you simply will not see in the mainstream media. If you are interested in golf, take a moment to check out the golf section of my blogroll, particularly Jay’s blogs, Geoff Shackelford‘s, and Texas Golf. The golf blogs are another reflection of how the blogosphere is redefining the way in which specialized information and knowledge is communicated.

Check out this Golf Digest interactive map of the Pinehurst No. 2 golf course, which is the Donald Ross masterpiece that is the site of this week’s U.S. Open Golf Tournament.
By the way, in regard to the Rory Sabbatini-Ben Crane incident discussed here yesterday, Stuart Appleby had the best quip:

“Rory made an interesting decision to speed up play and didn’t invite Ben along.”

By the way, Sabbatini publicly apologized for his conduct on Monday.

With the U.S. Open Golf Tournament gearing up this week at Pinehurst, S.I.com has this interesting roundtable discussion on the state of golf between golf writer Geoff Shackelford, PGA Tour player Brad Faxon, USGA Executive Director David Fay and Callaway Golf spokesman Larry Dorman.
While the entire discussion is interesting and worth reading, the following comment indicates that Mr. Faxon and Jack Nicklaus probably aren’t playing many practice rounds together:

SI: Why is everybody talking about the ball? Deane Beman, Jack Nicklaus, Greg Norman, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player — they all say the ball needs to be rolled back in the pro game.
FAXON: If Jack Nicklaus had a successful ball, he would never say another word. But he’s never sold a ball that’s made a dime. There are so many other, more important things to worry about. Like allowing the putter to touch a part of your body other than your hands. . . .

By the way, an interesting incident occurred yesterday during the final round of the Booz Allen Classic at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, MD. On the 17th hole, Rory Sabbatini, who is a fast player, got tired of waiting for his playing partner Ben Crane, who is a slow player. So, Sabbatini hit his second short on 17, walked up to the green ahead of Crane, chipped up and putted out of turn, and then left for the 18th green and teed off out of turn before Crane putted out on 17. Subsequently, on the 18th green, Sabbatini barely acknowledged Crane during the traditional post-round handshake and then walked to the scoring tent spewing expletives. In short, over the course of about fifteen minutes, Sabbatini established himself as a first-class jerk.
Then, ABC on-course reporter Judy Rankin interviewed Crane after the incident. In a truly remarkable moment in this day of self-absorbed professional athletes, Crane exhibited grace and depth by refusing to criticize Sabbatini, acknowledging that he is a slow player, admitting that he is working on getting faster, and essentially downplaying Sabbatini’s infantile reaction.
Thus, in less than a one minute interview, Ben Crane became one of my favorite PGA Tour golfers.
By the way, ABC commentator Paul Azinger appropriately proceeded to do what Crane would not, which was to hammer Sabbatini on the air for his conduct. Good for you, Zinger.