Some compelling storylines for the 119th U.S. Open

More so than the usual week in/week out PGA Tour events, the majors lend themselves to speculation about possible outcomes well in advance of the event itself. With the biggest of the three North American majors, the U.S. Open,  just around the corner, three compelling potential story lines arise:

• Brooks Koepka wins his third consecutive U.S. Open (and second major in a row)
• Phil Mickelson completes his “career slam” with a U.S. Open win (after six second-place finishes)
• Tiger racks up his sixteenth major

In an informal poll that I conducted on Twitter, Phil completing his slam was ranked “most compelling” storyline by 39% of respondents, narrowly beating out a Koepka three-peat, at 37%; only 24% ranked a possible 16th major for Tiger the most compelling story. When asked what they thought of the likelihood of any of these storylines coming to fruition, my Tweeps ranked Koepka as the most likely to come through, with 63% picking the three-peat; only 11% felt that Phil would come through for the win.

Let’s take a look at each of these potential headline-makers:

Brooks Koepka “three-peat” 

Brooks Koepka is on a hot streak. He has won three of the last five majors, and four of the past eight that he has played (he missed the 2018 Masters with a wrist injury). This run of major victories includes an amazing “double-double” – back-to-back wins in the U.S. Open and the PGA Championship. The inevitable question that arises is “Can he keep it up?”

To be honest, it doesn’t look good. Koepka’s only history at Pebble Beach is a T-8 in the 2016 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. With its small, subtly contoured greens and variable weather, Pebble is a course that rewards familiarity. The fairways have been narrowed, and skewed to take away the best angles into some of the more difficult greens, and the rough will be lush and deep. Koepka’s brute strength may get him out of some deep green next week, should the need arise, but you don’t win at Pebble—especially in U.S. Open nick—out of the rough.

Purely from a number-crunching point-of-view, the odds against a Koepka three-peat are pretty long. Winning the same event three years in a row has happened, and probably more often than most golf fans are aware of—in the post-WWII era only Gene Littler, Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Billy Casper, Johnny Miller, Tiger Woods, Stuart Appleby, and Steve Stricker have all done it. In fact, Palmer did it twice, at the old Texas Open, and the Phoenix Open; and Tiger four times, at the Memorial, the WGC-Cadillac, and two runs of three at the WGC-Bridgestone.

As far as majors go, there have only been two “three-peats” since 1900: Willie Anderson’s run in the U.S. Open, from 1903 to 1905; and Walter Hagen’s remarkable four-year run in the PGA Championship, from 1924 to 1927. The talent pool was much smaller in those days, so there was a better (but still small) likelihood of a really dominant player going on that sort of run.

So what about Brooks? Koepka has demonstrated a remarkable affinity for the big events (coupled with a relative disdain for non-majors, where he has recorded only two PGA Tour wins: the 2015 Phoenix Open, and the 2018 CJ Cup, an offshore PGA Tour event held in South Korea), but will he pull off a three-peat in the U.S. Open and  back-to-back majors? He has already shown the capability to bust up the record books, so we will just have to wait and see.

Phil finally wins the U.S. Open

There are a number of factors weighing in both for and against Phil Mickelson finally achieving his career “slam” – a win in each of the four majors – with a victory at Pebble Beach next week. In the “For” column is his record at Pebble Beach – five wins in the AT&T Pro-Am, two in the last five years—including the 2019 event; a sentimental attachment to the course, where his maternal grandfather was one of the first batch of caddies when the course opened in 1919; and the knowledge that he is running out of time, at age 48 (turning 49 on Open Sunday), to close the door on his career Grand Slam.

Oddly enough, the last last item in the “For” column is the first one in the “Against” column. Only seven players have won a major at age 44 or older:

• Harry Vardon, 44, Open Championship – 1914
• Roberto de Vicenzo, 44, Open Championship, 1967
• Lee Trevino, 44, PGA Championship, 1984
• Jerry Barber, 45, PGA Championship, 1961
• Hale Irwin, 45, U.S. Open, 1990
• Jack Nicklaus, 46, Masters, 1986
• Julius Boros, 48, PGA Championship, 1968

This accomplishment occupies even more rarefied air than winning three of the four majors—a feat that has been achieved by 16 players in history.

Also working against Phil is his recent playing history: five missed cuts out of 13 events since the Safeway Open, in October; only two Top 10s (the AT&T win, and T-2 in the Desert Classic); and only one of the remaining finishes inside the Top 20.

A win in this U.S. Open for Phil—to close out his career slam, at the golf course where his grandfather caddied as a 13-year-old, on his 49th birthday (which is also Father’s Day) to make him the oldest to ever win a men’s major—would eclipse even Tiger’s recent Masters win as the golf story of the year, and maybe even the decade. At the end of the day on Friday, June 14th we will know if he’s got a shot (by making the cut), and if he accomplishes that, the eyes of the golf world will be watching his every move on the weekend.

Tiger gets his 16th major

There are people out there who are putting Tiger Woods at the top of their list of potential winners next week at Pebble Beach. Much of the reasoning that is being used to support this view is based on the accomplishments of a very different person than 2019 Tiger: the blowout 2000 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, when he won with a score of 12 under par, an amazing 15 strokes ahead of second place. Some of this support for a Tiger win is based on his having won the Masters last April, and the rest is rooted in pure fanboy-ism.

From where I stand, all of these lines of reasoning are spurious.

First, there’s age. Forty-three-year-old Tiger is not 24-year-old Tiger. Sure, he just won the Masters, but the Masters was always the best bet for Tiger to notch up another major victory. It’s a course he knows well, where he had won four times before. (To be honest, he didn’t win the 2019 Masters so much as Francesco Molinari lost it with his back-nine-Sunday collapse.)

Second, there’s his history of injuries. As Indiana Jones told Marilyn, “It’s not the years, honey, it’s the mileage”. The violent action of Tiger’s golf swing has, over the years, resulted in back problems (and three corrective surgeries), knee problems, and even a stress fracture in his left tibia (the larger of the two bones in the lower leg.) Injuries add up, and athletic injuries can force changes in a motion sequence, to avoid pain or re-injury, which result in unaccustomed stress in another part of the body, leading to new injuries.

Tiger has played eight four-round events since December–who can say when (or if) the accumulated stress will catch up with some part of his battered body? One lunge at a ball buried in the deep, lush U.S. Open rough may be all it takes to push yet another tendon or ligament past its capabilities.


The fanboy enthusiasm that inundated the world of golf after Tiger’s Masters win earlier this year was tempered somewhat by his missed cut at the PGA Championship, but the embers flared again with his T9 finish at the Memorial, two weeks before the U.S. Open, when a fourth-round surge (70-72-70-67) shot him up the board from 25th to T-9, sending his fans into fits of ecstasy.

It must be remembered, however, that Tiger doesn’t really like Pebble, despite the events of June 2000. He has cited the late-in-the-day bumpiness of the poa annua greens as one reason, and the lengthy rounds typical of the pro-am format have kept him away between Opens. Taken on balance, the factors working against Tiger taking the win in the 119th U.S. Open are tipping the scales away from this Open becoming Tiger’s 16th major.

Only time will tell

All of this pre-event prognosticating may turn out to be for naught, of course. Pebble Beach has a history of turning up early-round leaders who have the media folk looking around and asking, “Who  is that guy?”, and turning to their players guides for background details—and sometimes one of those guys wins (remember Vaughn Taylor, in 2016, and Ted Potter Jr. in 2018?). And it can even happen in the U.S. Open, as it almost did in 2010, when Frenchman Gregory Havret came within a stroke of taking eventual champion Graeme McDowell to a playoff. All I know for sure is that I can hardly wait to see it all play out.

Three share the lead after first round of LPGA Mediheal Championship at Lake Merced GC

The former GM of Lake Merced Golf Club, Donna Lowe, used to remind me to dress in layers when she knew I was coming up from the South Bay for a tournament or a media event at the club. This is tribal knowledge to a native of the Bay Area, a given when visiting San Francisco, and it is especially true in the area around Lake Merced—golf’s golden circle in San Francisco, home to Lake Merced Golf Club, the Olympic Club, TPC Harding Park, and San Francisco Golf Club. I like to tell people that I have experienced three seasons in a day on a summer’s day here, and none of them was summer.

That being said, Thursday at the LPGA Mediheal Championship was the kind of day that almost justifies the area’s sky-high property values: clear blue sky, light breezes, and temperatures that had me leaving my jacket in the media center. Lake Merced is a joy to walk on a day like today was. A tree-pruning program undertaken in recent years has left the course with fairways that are well-defined by lines of weathered and wind-knotted cypress and pines, while at the same time leaving an open, airy feel with great visibility from hole to hole, and open, sunlit greens.

Thursday was a day when many of the bigger names were lying low, with two-time major winner So Yeon Ryu (2011 U.S. Women’s Open, 2017 ANA Inspiration) being the most recognizable name in the Top Ten through the morning rounds.

Catching early-round leaders can be difficult at Lake Merced. The ubiquitous afternoon breeze is a chilly onshore waft that turns approach shots on east-facing holes into knuckleballs, and knocks down west-running shots short of the green, making a come-from-behind effort a tough proposition.

Of course, tough does not mean impossible, as was demonstrated by the Netherland’s Anne Van Dam, who overcame two bogeys in the first four holes to turn in two-under 34 after birdies at holes 5 and 9, and an eagle at the par-4 eighth hole. She continued her run on the second nine with a birdie on the 14th hole, and closing back-to-back birdies on 17 and 18 for a five-under 67 and a share of the lead. This is the Dutch player’s first lead after any round in an LPGA Tour event.

While the top of the leaderboard was lacking in the more-familiar names, it did display the international flavor that characterizes the LPGA Tour, with nine countries represented among the top twelve players.

Among players with a Northern California connection, former Stanford Women’s Golf standout Mariah Stackhouse posted an even-par 72 and sits at T-23 after the first round. Monterey’s Mina Harigae carded a three-over 75 for T-88. Pleasanton’s Paula Creamer closed with a bogey six, after pulling her tee shot into tree trouble on #18 and rifling a low-running second shot over the back side of the green, for a four-over 76, and San Jose native Christina Kim, whose record for becoming the youngest player to reach $1 million in earnings (in 2004) was broken by Paula Creamer the following year, had a rough day on the course, carding eight-over 80.

The weather forecast for tomorrow’s second round is for continued sunny, and slightly warmer temperatures—another great day for golf.

Stanford surges in final round, doubles up in Western Intercollegiate

The San José State Spartan men’s golf team, hosts of the Western Intercollegiate, took a one-stroke lead into the final round of the 73rd running of the event after leading for 36 holes, and Spartan junior Sean Yu came into the final round three strokes back of Stanford’s Isaiah Salinda in the race for the individual title. These numbers set up a final round that Spartan golf fans hoped would be reminiscent of the 1996 event, the last time that a Spartan player, (then-SJSU junior Arron Oberholser) took individual honors, even as Stanford took home the team trophy.

Wednesday’s final round, played under sunny skies that showcased the long views across Monterey Bay that are a feature of many of the holes at Pasatiempo Golf Club, saw cross-bay rivals Stanford and Cal surge past their South Bay hosts, posting team scores of 340 and 341, respectively, while San José State slipped back to third place with a 352 team total.

Stanford’s Isaiah Salinda blasts out of a bunker behind the 10th green at Pasatiempo Golf Club during the final round of the 2019 Western Intercollegiate golf tournament. Salinda went on to take individual honors after a five-hole payoff with San José State junior Sean Yu. (Photo by author)

In the individual competition, Stanford’s Isaiah Salinda went wire-to-wire for the win, completing the third Stanford sweep of team and individual honors in the last six years (2014, 2016, and 2019), and the fifth in tournament history—but San Jose State junior Sean Yu made him work for it, posting a 66 to Salinda’s even-par 70 as the pair came to the end of 54 holes tied at 202.

What followed was the longest playoff in the tournament’s 73-year history. The duo traded pars for four holes, playing the 18th hole twice, then 10, and 17, before returning to the 18th hole, a uniquely situated 169-yard par-three finishing hole. Salinda dropped a flag-seeking tee shot to seven feet below the flag on the fifth playoff hole, while Yu’s ball came to rest 12 to 15 feet above the flag. When Yu’s birdie putt slipped past the hole the door was left open for Salinda, who walked through it with a firm, center-cut birdie putt to cement the win.

Salinda is the ninth individual champion from Stanford in the tournament’s 73-year history, and the Cardinal’s team victory is the 11th since they won the inaugural event in 1947.

Pasatiempo will play host to a number of these players again on May 13th, when USGA local qualifying for the 2019 U.S. Open takes place at the Alister Mackenzie masterpiece in the hills above Santa Cruz.

This year’s event was sponsored by TopGolf entertainment centers, and televised, for the first time, on Golf Channel.

Spartans lead Western Intercollegiate after 36 holes

The Western Intercollegiate is one of the longest-running college golf tournaments in existence. Starting in 1947, the event has been played each year at Pasatiempo Golf Club, an Alister Mackenzie masterpiece which lies in the Coast Range hills above Santa Cruz, California. Hosted by San José State University, this year’s edition is sponsored by Top Golf entertainment centers and features, for the first time, television coverage by Golf Channel.

Pasatiempo Golf Club, Santa Cruz, is the site of the 73rd Western Intercollegiate golf tournament, hosted by the San José State University men’s golf team.

The 2019 lineup of collegiate golf teams in the event are:

·      University of Arizona

·      University of California 

·      University of California-Irvine

·      Colorado State University

·      University of Hawaii

·      University of Oregon

·      Pepperdine University 

·      San Diego State University

·      San Jose State University

·      University of Southern California 

·      Stanford University

·      University of Texas-El Paso

·      University of Washington

The combination of Pasatiempo Golf Club, the renowned Alister Mackenzie golf course in the hills above Santa Cruz, California, and a big collegiate invitational golf tournament is a win-win. Pasatiempo, a 1929 Mackenzie masterpiece that was restored by Tom Doak between the mid-1990s and 2007, is a stiff test even at a short-by-modern-standards 6,500 yards. Cost-related changes that were made over the years included filling in dozens of bunkers, and worst of all, the planting of hundreds of trees in the 1960s, a move that fundamentally altered the course’s structure. In the wake of the Doak restoration, which was based on a collection of photos of the original course which were discovered by former club historian Bob Beck, the course again plays as Dr. Mackenzie designed it,

The Western Intercollegiate has been played at Pasatiempo since 1947, through the changes and the restoration, producing a list of champions filled with familiar names: Ken Venturi was a two-time champion as a San José State golfer, in 1951 and 1953; Ken Miller won the event in 1968 while at BYU; other familiar names on the champions list include Peter Jacobsen (Oregon), Mark O’Meara (Long Beach State), Bobby Clampett (BYU), San José State’s Arron Oberholser, and Stanford’s Patrick Rodgers and Maverick McNealy.

Pasatiempo is the type of course that rewards course knowledge as well as great play, and the Spartans’ weekly practice rounds on the course showed their worth as the host team led the first two days of the tournament. Two SJSU players, Sean Yu and Kevin Velo, were among a group of four tied for second in the individual rankings after 36 holes, behind Stanford’s Isaiah Salinda.

Salinda, who leads at eight under par, had these comments about Tuesday’s second round: “I definitely thought it was a little tougher than yesterday. The pins, the wind was up. It was a little firmer too, even with the rain yesterday. I had to work for everything today, whereas yesterday everything came a little easier. I kind of made it hard on myself but hung in there on the back nine.” 

San José State’s Kevin Velo reinforced the importance of familiarity with the layout: “It really helps to know where to hit the golf ball off the tee. You have to play the golf holes from green to tee kind of. You have to look where the pin is to make sure you are in the right spots, and I think that really helped me out today. I was able to put it in the right side of the fairway and get my approach shots decently close and get a lot of looks.”

Final round coverage of the 2019 Western Intercollegiate will air Wednesday on Golf Channel from 4 to 7 PM.

Dan Jenkins and Me

Dan Jenkins, one of the finest American sportswriters in history, and arguably the finest ever to write about golf, died Thursday, March 7, 2019. He was 90 years old.

In the days following his death, better-known and more-accomplished writers than myself have written, and will be writing, about Jenkins and what his work and career meant to them. Among them there may be other besides me who can make this statement:

Dan Jenkins is the reason I became a golf writer.

I might have run across one or two of Danֹ’s golf columns in Playboy in the mid ’80s, thumbing through the pages of the magazine on the way to perusing the photos of the “shapely adorables” (as Dan would have called them), but I first fell in love with his work in 1987, when I read his golf novel Dead Solid Perfect. The father of the young lady I was dating at the time recommended the book to me, footnoting his recommendation with this piece of advice: “Don’t read it anyplace where laughing out loud will bother other people.” I picked up a copy, read it straight through over a weekend, and was hooked.

Though I was born and raised in Salinas, California, I flatter myself that I have a connection, at two removes, to the part of the world that shaped Dan—a native of Fort Worth, Texas—in early life. My paternal grandfather was born in nearby Krum, Texas, growing up there before moving to Oklahoma, where both of my parents were born. And while some of my attitudes and beliefs would probably have struck Dan as a little liberal and “PC”, as a “CIO” (California-Improved Okie), in many ways I can relate to the point of view of a native Texan like Dan.

Prior to reading Dead Solid Perfect my sole exposure to golf had been one round with some 8th-grade friends on the local nine-hole muni in Salinas, and a few P.E. classes in high school—from which I took away a decent understanding of the Vardon Grip and little else. Even after falling under the thrall of Jenkins’ words, reading and re-reading his fiction and non-fiction books, it was years before I picked up golf clubs again. I was knee-deep in an engineering career; had embarked upon what is, to date, a 29-years-and-counting marriage (to a different young lady…); bought a house; started a family—all the usual things.

Most important of all was the fact that I didn’t know anybody who played golf, so I hesitated to take it up with serious intent (and am still shy about inflicting my game on strangers.) So, my investment in the game stalled out at reading about it, and watching the occasional tournament on TV. For years then, while I probably had more golf trivia at my fingertips (from reading Jenkins’ work) than most people who actually played the game, I had no one to talk to about golf, to share my interest with. As an outlet for that interest, which all started with Dead Solid Perfect, I started this blog.

On February 2, 2011 I posted the first, introductory column on Will o'the Glen on Golf, wherein I wrote:

I have only been playing golf with any level of intent for about a year and a half, so I am relatively new to the game, but I have been reading about and following golf for nearly 25 years, having gotten that bug when the father of a friend of mine recommended that I read Dan Jenkins’ book Dead Solid Perfect. I quickly set about getting hold of as many of Mr. Jenkins’ books as I could track down (golf-related and otherwise), and have read everything new that he has come out with since then. Mr Jenkins’ writing, and viewpoint, set the tone for my own viewpoint on the game of golf, so expect to hear a lot about Dan and his golf writing, and Ben Hogan—the mid-20th century golf legend who Mr Jenkins was privileged to know, and whose career he covered from 1951 until Ben’s retirement from competitive golf in 1967.

Jenkins and Hogan have been with me ever since. After an initial two columns about the 2011 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am (“Crosby Weather”, and “Cinderella Story”), I took it upon myself to pen a story about Ben Hogan and his record at Riviera Country Club (the event there followed the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am at the time): “Hogan’s Alley — Riviera Country Club and Bantam Ben”. I continued to read, and review, every book by Dan Jenkins, or about Ben Hogan, that I could find.

In 2012 I responded to an ad on the Monster.com jobs web-page for an events website called Examiner.com, applying for a part-time, freelance position as a writer covering golf for the San Francisco Bay Area and Monterey Peninsula. I was accepted, and with the legitimacy conferred upon me by being affiliated with a recognized media outlet, in June of that year I found myself in possession of a media credential for the 112th United States Open golf tournament at the Olympic Club, in San Francisco.

I was 55 years old, with 30 years’ of experience as a mechanical engineer, but in the world of golf writing I was a wet-behind-the-ears newbie. I was a little star-struck as I walked into the huge media-center tent and looked around, spotting a double-handful of golf writers whose work I had been reading for years—and more so when I spotted Dan Jenkins himself, three rows up and half a dozen seats to the left of my work station in the cheap seats in the back row.

It never occurred to me to walk up and introduce myself to him—I was afraid of tripping over my tongue and looking like a fool in front of the man whose work I revered above all others in the field. 

I did have a face-to-face encounter with Dan during the Open—accidentally. Walking up the steps to the fancy portable restrooms that had been installed next to the media center tent, Dan stepped out of the door just as I reached the landing. A quick recollection of the story of Ben Crenshaw’s first time meeting Jack Nicklaus—in the bathroom of the men’s locker room at Merion—flashed through my mind, so I just stepped back out of his way with a muttered “Excuse me”, clearing the way so he could walk down the steps.

****************************************************************

As melancholy as the news of Dan’s death made me, there was a glimmer of brightness in the column written by his daughter Sally Jenkins—a supremely talented sportswriter in her own right—about her father, in which she stated, “A new manuscript of a novel my father just finished is still open on his desk[…]. The novel, titled The Reunion At Herb’s Café, tells readers where his major fictional characters ended up.”

Dan’s words have made me think and have made me laugh as over the years I read and re-read my collection of his books, and delved into the Sports Illustrated “Vault” online archive—a wonderful resource—to read past articles of his that reside there.

His body of work—a treasure trove of sharply etched observations and finely tuned sentences, all delivered in take-no-prisoners style by a man who saw the humor, and the humanity, in sports and in life—has inspired me for years, and I expect it to continue to do so for many years to come.

Cleveland RTX-4: A versatile performer from a well-known name in wedges

The Cleveland RTX-4 wedge line has been on the market for a few months now, and you have probably already read a number of reviews of this new offering from Cleveland Golf. I might not have bothered to add to the list, but I have enjoyed this club so much that I felt that I had to chime in.

Of course, Cleveland Golf is a name that golfers associate very strongly with wedges. Roger Cleveland, who now designs wedges for Callaway Golf, built the company largely on the quality of the wedges they produced. Now a part of the Srixon family, Cleveland continues to produce innovative products that keep the company on the leading edge of the wedge market.

The RTX-4 features “Tour Zip” grooves, which Cleveland describes as “sharper and deeper” (though we all know that the USGA and R & A define groove configuration limits); laser face milling in the spaces between the grooves that takes face roughness right to the conforming limit; and additional Rotex face milling that extends to the toe of the club for that extra little bit of bite.

I was lucky enough to obtain an RTX-4 test club from Amazon.com through their Amazon Vine program. The club I got for review is a bog-standard mid-bounce 56/10 Cleveland RTX-4 in the Tour Satin finish, with a Golf Pride Tour Velvet grip on a True Temper Dynamic Golf Tour Issue shaft—straight-up, no bells and whistles. It felt good in my hands as soon as I took it out of the box, and that good feeling carried over to its performance on the golf course.

The Mid-Bounce grind is advertised as being suitable for medium to soft conditions (which describes my usual daily-fee course to a tee) for players who want stability on full shots and who like to open the face when the shot warrants. I played the RTX-4 from sand, rough and fairway lies, and was very happy with its performance. It flowed smoothly through moderate rough, glided cleanly across tight fairway lies, and worked through the not-always-ideal sand conditions in my local course’s bunkers with ease.

While I am a decent wedge player, I have never had the kind of wedge shot that zips the ball back on a string—I just don’t get that kind of super-spin on the ball with my slightly shallow angle of attack. The combination of swing weight (D5), well-situated center of mass, and optimized face milling in the RTX-4 seemed to suit me, however, and I was hitting beautiful drop-and-stop shots from bunkers and on short-approach fairway shots, with both straight and open face.

A nice illustration of the RTX-4’s drop-and-stop capabilities. This was a straight-face, 3/4-swing, 80-yard approach from a fairway lie to a slightly elevated green (≈six feet). (Photo by author.)

The Mid-Bounce RTX-4 is available in 2° loft increments from 46° to 60°, with the Full grind in 56° to 60°, Low in 56° to 64°, and Extra-Low in 58° to 62°. Retailing for $139.99, the RTX-4 is available in Tour Satin, Black Satin, Tour Raw finishes. A wide range of optional shafts are offered, in both steel and graphite; numerous grip options are available, as are loft, lie, and grip customization, all at additional cost.

As the most versatile grind in the RTX-4 range, the Mid-Bounce is probably the best all-around choice for most golfers. The RTX-4 is recommended for low- to mid-handicap golfers (three dots on their four-dot low-to-high handicap range), but it suited this 24-handicap player quite well.

Bay Area golf fans face a decision next September

2019 holds the promise of being a very good year for Bay Area golf fans. The 119th U.S. Open will be played at Pebble Beach Golf Links, in the storied seaside course’s centennial year; a new PGA Tour event sponsored by the Golden State Warriors’ Steph Curry will appear on the schedule, played at Lake Merced Golf Club in Daly City†; and the LPGA will return with the second year of the reboot of their Bay Area tournament of recent years, also at Lake Merced.

However, a week before the Steph Curry event, in the last week of September, Bay Area golf fans will have a decision to make. In late September, as the 2019-2020 PGA Tour season is starting up, and the 2019 PGA Champions season is winding down, both tours will be playing in Northern California, at the same time, 160 miles apart. The PGA Tour will be kicking things off with the Safeway Open, at Silverado Resort and Spa in Napa, and the PGA Champions will be bringing along the next generation of golfers in the PURE Insurance Championship Impacting the First Tee, at Pebble Beach and Poppy Hills in the Del Monte Forest.

How did this happen? Aren’t the PGA Tour and the PGA Champions part of the same organization? Do their scheduling people talk to each other? Do they own a calendar—and a map?

Call it a first-world problem for Bay Area golf fans: Which world-class destination do we head to that week to watch golf—the Silverado Resort & Spa in America’s most venerated wine region, the Napa Valley; or Pebble Beach, the ne plus ultra of American public golf, on the picturesque Monterey Peninsula? Do we want to see the young guns of the PGA Tour (but probably few, if any, big stars), or the old-pro PGA Champions, playing alongside youngsters the same age as their grandkids?

What’s a golf fan to do?

Actually, there’s no wrong answer here—either choice results in a great time at a beautiful venue. Late September is prime time for visiting either the California coast or the Napa Valley; the weather is ideal: neither too hot nor too cold, generally sunny and clear, and there’s rarely any fog at the coast. It’s a shame that this scheduling conflict prevents local golf fans from possibly enjoying two weeks of great golf, but we’re still lucky that we have the choice of these two great events at beautiful destination venues.

† (Correction: In early January it was announced that talks with the potential title sponsor of the Steph Curry-sponsored event, Workday, had fallen through, and that the event would not be held in 2019. There is hope that the event will appear in the schedule in 2020, potentially at TPC Harding Park, in San Francisco.)