"The neatest moments in golf are when you’re not thinking about money at all, and for both fan and player the world becomes ball, hole, club in hand."

Strong stuff from Golf.com’s Michael Bamberger on the flat Tour Championship vs. the Solheim Cup:

You can’t have professional golf without prize money. Golf without prize money is amateur golf. But the neatest moments in golf are when you’re not thinking about money at all, and for both fan and player the world becomes ball, hole, club in hand.

That’s why, in no particular order, the four men’s Grand Slam events are so enduring, as are the four women’s majors (sorry, Evian), the three senior majors for men, plus the Ryder Cup and Solheim Cup and (some years more than others) the Presidents Cup. In Toledo on Sunday, the earth was shaking when Jennifer Kupcho do her thing and then Mel Reid did hers. As pure sport-as-theater, it was hard — you could say impossible — not to be more drawn to that.