Up & Down: Hope for Wie and LPGA, plus the obligatory Tiger downers

Doing the Conde Nasty
We'll probably never know who made the editorial call and why, but the game's most popular publication, Golf Digest, has benched playing editor Tiger Woods indefinitely in the aftermath of his trysts with various women in various towns at various times in various positions (hey, that's about as nice as I can phrase it). After enduring ridicule for having Woods on the cover this month with a photo-shopped picture of President Obama -- the cover was in production weeks before the Woods scandal broke -- the monthly magazine elected to give the world No. 1 some time off to plot his personal and professional course. Besides, the next cover story was probably something like, "Tiger Woods: Escaping the Ultimate Bad Lie." Just wondering aloud: How many of these firms that have, somewhat controversially, stood by Woods have signed binding contracts they cannot escape from?

Watching golf on Sundaze
The Golf Channel takes over next year as the primary outlet for LPGA broadcasts, which means there hardly will be enough hours in the day for most of the packed Thursday-Sunday coverage, given the network's existing commitments with the European, Nationwide, Champions and PGA tours. With more tournament content than ever, an interesting notion was broached over lunch a few days ago with a trio of Golf Channel honchos: moving away from the traditional Sunday finish. Page Thompson, who runs the network, said he has mentioned to the LPGA that a Monday finale at select tournaments would give the tour an unfettered and unfiltered audience -- and it's a point worth pursuing. Volunteers would swap working Thursday for Monday, so the logistics seem doable. The men's U.S. Open used to end with 36 holes on Saturday. LPGA events have ended on Saturdays in the recent past. Like with movies distributed on CDs, the second-tier tours need to consider adding alternate endings.

Remarkably remaking Wie
The president is taking a few days off to decompress in Hawaii over the holidays, and no doubt the golf-addicted lefty will bash a few balls around while enjoying the warm weather. That said, he's clearly the second-most famous golfer on the islands at the moment, and based on the success of Michelle Wie's career makeover, the second-most popular, too. While IMG has rightly been savaged for its handling of the Woods affair, there's little doubt that the mega-management firm has steered Wie back onto the rails. On Christmas Eve, Wie and some of her former high school classmates distributed toys and Walmart gift cards to ailing kids associated with the Ronald McDonald House. Now 20 and in her third year at Stanford, Wie won for the first time as a professional in 2009 and definitely is a star on the ascent once again. Woods and Wie: two ships of state heading in opposite directions.

Yuta man?
Since there are no official tournaments this week around the globe, the final 2009 top 50 in the world ranking has already been finalized, locking up berths in the 2010 Masters for a slew of folks who had not otherwise already qualified, including Robert Allenby, 2008 Euro Tour money leader Robert Karlsson, Adam Scott, Ryder Cup stalwart Miguel Angel Jimenez ... and some dude named Yuta Ikeda. If the latter doesn't ring a bell, you are hardly alone. Ikeda plays almost exclusively in Japan, where he has won four times in the past two years. But he has not often left Japanese soil. In that same 24-month span, he has played in two events sanctioned by other tours, missing the cut at the British Open and finishing T51 at HSBC Champions. In his past 33 official events over two seasons, he has 11 top 10 finishes, which sounds pretty good until you consider he finished outside the top 20 a total of 16 times against weak fields. Japanese teen Ryo Ishikawa won over doubters at the Presidents Cup matches, and Ikeda will have plenty of convincing to do at Augusta National next spring. Starting right here.

Not too proud to say, "We told you so"
The news was all too predictable. We have been waiting for the other Nike to drop, and it already has plopped onto the final floor. In a study released this week, a pair of UC Davis professors have determined that Woods' marital infidelity has already cost between $5 million and $14 million in losses to those owning stock in companies with which Woods had endorsement deals. Summarized the report: "Because most of the firms that Mr. Woods endorses are either large or owned by large parent companies, the losses are extremely widespread. Mr. Woods' top five sponsors (Accenture, Nike, Gillette, Electronic Arts and Gatorade) lost 2-3 percent of their aggregate market value after the accident, and his core sports-related sponsors EA, Nike and PepsiCo (Gatorade) lost over four percent. The pace of losses slowed by Dec. 11, the date Mr. Woods announced his leave from golf, but as late as Dec. 17, shareholders had not recovered their losses." In other words, the scandal quagmire is so deep, Woods is hurting folks both when he is present (as a pitchman), and when he isn't (as a player).

When the messenger trumps the message
Continuing in the same vein as above, Dan Neil, a Pulitzer-winning writer at the Los Angeles Times, gave the PGA Tour a vicious kick to the groin last week, claiming it was time for advertisers "to break those links," as the headline read, to the professional game because of the Woods fiasco. It almost didn't matter that Neil whiffed on several key points -- that sponsoring tournaments spreads a brand name as well as anything on the sports-marketing platform, and at a relatively cheap price. Just the fact that a guy with a pedigree of that nature pulled the chain on the tour tank was damning enough. Then he called Woods a "philandering golf god, emotionally retarded frat boy and straight-up liar" and suggested that all sponsors jump ship because golf's wholesome image had proven to be a complete canard.

The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, sort of
Someday soon, in journalism schools across the land, entire semesters will surely be devoted to the media's groundbreaking and confidence-shaking handling of the Woods affair. Non-traditional news outlets or celebrity websites often led the way, paying for news tips, printing stories without bylines so that writers were not held accountable for mistakes and identifying few sources that could be vetted -- it might have changed the face of media, albeit not always for the better. But this week, the new-media nadir might have been reached with a completely unattributed and un-sourced e-mail that was casually distributed to hundreds of writers and fans nationally and posted on at least two websites, like here and here. Whatever happened to credibility? As one of my editors put it, "this has not been American media's finest hour."

What we think, vs. what we know
Since I have saddled and straddled my ethical high horse, what about the report last week in the New York Daily News that claimed that LPGA veteran Helen Alfredsson had knowledge that Woods was having an affair? The publication, citing quotes the LPGA veteran gave a Swedish station, said she "became the first of Woods' peers to breach the green wall of silence." The headline said that golfers knew he was being unfaithful, but said nothing. Oh, really? As it related to Woods' dalliances, Alfredsson told the Swedish station, "I heard it last summer during the British Open." Was that the men's or women's version of the British Open? So, she heard a rumor, in other words, which is a long way from having hard facts. Which is an even longer way from actually knowing anything.

Inhale, exhale, cough
Happened to be looking through a Baseball America report the other day when an interesting note on a top minor leaguer all but leaped off the computer screen. It noted that one of the Milwaukee Brewers' top pitching prospects had twice tested positive for marijuana and was one more positive test away from a lifetime ban. Let's compare that standard to the PGA Tour's 2-year-old system. First, players who have tested positive for street drugs on tour have not been identified and no suspension, if any, has been announced. Second, the office of the commissioner has complete authority to hand down sanctions -- or do essentially nothing. Thirdly, penalties for performance-enhancing drugs and street drugs are not treated the same on tour (the LPGA made no such distinction when formulating its testing plan). The Brewers' kid is a puff away from getting the boot for life, but the PGA Tour system looks more and more like a smokescreen to create the illusion of accountability

 

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