Faldo Avenges Tilghman's Attention Draining Remarks With His Own Off Base Comments

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Nick and Kelly have a Bill and Hillary thing going. He just can't take all the attention she's getting, so he sticks his foot in his mouth. Touching, except perhaps to the Golf Channel Apologies Department which has already spent years defending Mike Ritz. 

Lawrence Donegan sums up the comments that came during Sunday's early morning telecast of the WGC Match Play:

During coverage of the WGC World Match Play in Tucson the six-times major winner, who is paid a reported $3m (£1.5m) a year to host coverage of the PGA tour, made unfavourable comparisons between balls made by TaylorMade and the Nike balls used by Tiger Woods, below, and Stewart Cink. Faldo signed a sponsorship deal with TaylorMade last Wednesday.

Steve Elling added this:

Golf Channel play-by-play analyst Kelly Tilghman noted on the air that it was an all-Nike final. That, in itself, sounded like a free plug, since Tilghman last December emceed a Nike outing for Woods in South Florida.

But Faldo, who also works for CBS Sports, went a step farther on the conflict-of-interest front. A few weeks after signing a new endorsement deal with TaylorMade, he launched into a lengthy discourse about the superiority of the TaylorMade golf ball, and noted how only certain players with high skill levels should bother using the Nike ball, lest it fall out of the sky. Faldo once endorsed the Nike line.

Hot off the Apology Dept. presses:

"Nick Faldo is one of the best in the business because of his experience and insight, and viewers enjoy that," the network statement read. "But his opinions do not always reflect those of the Golf Channel. In this particular instance -- although he referenced published research -- using the Golf Channel in this context was not appropriate. Nick realized this and set the record straight with our viewers in a timely manner."

A Nike spokesperson said the company was surprised that Faldo would take such a stance, but otherwise took the high road.

"We were disappointed in Nick Faldo’s comments, especially given the fact that he referenced golf product that was totally unrelated to what was happening during the competition itself," Nike spokesperson Beth Gast said Sunday night."These comments were all the more inappropriate having come just days after he signed with TaylorMade-adidas. He has apologized on air and we consider this isolated incident as closed."

Sure, after another week's worth of debate. And that's before Golfweek runs a cover featuring a pair of Taylor Made balls replacing Faldo's testicles.

Bush Denounces Use Of "Lynch"; "Back Alley" Left Open To Interpretation

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Certainly not timely, George Bush seems to have Kelly Tilghman on his mind:

"The noose is not a symbol of prairie justice, but of gross injustice," the president said. "Displaying one is not a harmless prank, and lynching is not a word to be mentioned in jest."

As a civil society, Americans should agree that noose displays and lynching jokes are "deeply offensive," Bush said.

"They are wrong. And they have no place in America today."

 

Kikuyu At Torrey Pines

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Over the last few days, I have heard Tilghman, McCord, Kostis, Baker-Finch and Faldo all note that the kikuyu will "take over" this summer at Torrey Pines and create much heartier rough. Several have noted it will be an entirely different course.

Apparently the memo didn't reach our friends in the broadcast booths, but the Torrey Pines roughs were overseeded with rye this fall and rye grass will be the predominant grass at this year's U.S. Open, contrary to what they are proclaiming hourly on the broadcasts.

Yes, kikuyu is out there and it will be most noticeable in the fairways this June (which would also contradict a lot of the talk about how fast the fairways will be since kikuyu is spongy). However, the combination of rye grass being the one thing in the world that stifles kikuyu and the cool climate at Torrey Pines means it will be a blend of grass, with rye grass dominating the roughs. (A good thing by the way. Kikuyu is silly as a rough.)

Here's what Mike Davis had to say about it in a recent piece by Brian Hewitt:

Kikuyu grass is very ‘grabby.’ And as a result, said Davis who was at Riviera in 1998, “it made the players, at times, look almost stupid around the greens. That blade of grass at that time of year is just too strong.”
 
The greenside roughs at Torrey Pines are also primarily kikuyu. But Davis says the plan is to overseed and create a friendlier blend of ryegrass and kikuyu to give the players a fighting chance around the greens.
 
Greenside kikuyu at the Buick Invitational, played at Torrey Pines this week and at the Northern Trust Open, played at Riviera next month, isn’t healthy enough in winter to present the kinds of problems it does later in the year.

"The two-network average showed an increase of 111%, or 4.0 compared with 1.9."

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Thanks to reader Hugh for emailing this Thomas Bonk piece picked up in The Age, but run originally in today's L.A. Times. These numbers may cause dangerous health effects in tournament directors who never see Tiger Woods: 

According to research that traced Woods' effect on television ratings in 2007, tournaments in which he finished in the top five had a 171% increase in CBS' ratings over those in which he did not play or wasn't in contention.

The ratings were 4.6 compared with 1.7.

In similar tournaments on NBC, the ratings increase was 59%, or 3.5 compared with 2.2.

The two-network average showed an increase of 111%, or 4.0 compared with 1.9.

Tilghman Should Take Another Week Off

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There has been no official word that Kelly Tilghman is returning to the Golf Channel booth for next week's Buick, but given the amount of press coverage that will be devoted to Tiger and Phil's first official event and Dave Seanor firing, it would be wise if Golf Channel gave her another week off.

The consensus in the Hope press center was that she's a good person who did not have any ill-intent, but if she were to come back next week it'll be a circus. A quiet return at Pebble Beach or Phoenix or Riviera would be the wiser strategy.

Finchem Blasts Golfweek

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Jerry Potter reports that Commissioner Tim Finchem made the unusual move of issuing a statement on Golfweek's noose cover:

"Clearly, what Kelly said was inappropriate and unfortunate, and she obviously regrets her choice of words," Finchem said. "But we consider Golfweek's imagery of a swinging noose on its cover to be outrageous and irresponsible. It smacks of tabloid journalism. It was a naked attempt to inflame and keep alive an incident that was heading to an appropriate conclusion."
Jeese, tell us what you really think.
 

Meanwhile, Ryan Ballengee makes an interesting point about the irony and hypocrisy of it all:

Golfweek's own Jeff Rude was among the first asking fans to drop the issue and forgive Tilghman for her gaffe. His own publication is not dropping the issue, though. They are devoting a cover to it - a cover that contains the image of a symbol that is becoming reborn in the southern influenced parts of the country as notice of racial deference, e.g., the Jena 6 case.

In essence, the cover propagates the coverage of the comment. It is continuing the news cycle on this particular story. I think that is unfortunate and inappropriate. The media should not be in the business of continuing to cover itself. It happens in varying forms, from when ESPN says that their reporters are reporting a story that someone else broke, to a magazine drawing other ink for making a controversial cover about a controversial media story. It can be enough to make the average sports fan's head spin at times.

The irony of this post is that the ploy is working. Elling, myself, and others are writing about what is being written and shown as a symbol of what Kelly Tilghman said. Maybe I should be lumped in with the crew that I am lambasting, but I thought this issue deserved a special comment.

"Rev. Al has more juice than Tiger Woods"

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Loved this perspective from Alan Shipnuck's Hot List, which shows just how absurd our little world can be sometimes:
2. Al Sharpton. One of the lessons from the Kelly Tilghman situation is that Rev. Al has more juice than Tiger Woods, who seemed to have saved his friend until the Golf Channel brass caved within minutes of Sharpton entering the fray.

"You mean black people are watching the Golf Channel?"

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Four minutes into Bill Maher's monologue, he took on the Kelly Tilghman episode. If you don't want to go through the first four minutes, here's the joke:

And of course Al Sharpton got involved. I was shocked. And he said this was offensive to all black people. You mean black people are watching the Golf Channel?


Golf Announcers Come Clean: We Say Stupid Things All The Time!

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Yahoo's Steve Eubanks quotes some of the biggest names in the television business who weigh in on Kelly's Tilghman's behalf. In other words, Kostis and Clampett aren't quoted.

Loved this from Bob Murphy:

Bob Murphy, NBC: "I don't know her that well, but I watched the replay of what she said, and it is really, really nitty-picking to try to knock her out of the seat for something like that. My goodness, Johnny Miller might say three or four as good as that every day. We all try to be funny, and sometimes it doesn't work. That is what this was. To try to make something more out of it is just wrong."

He's right, let's talk more about these three or four good ones Johnny says a day! Does Bob know something about Johnny that we viewers don't know?