Stray Shots: Taking stock as winter looms
ANGC worries, distance regulation, deals, old favorite concerns and Matty McIce
By Peter Kaufman
Hurricane Helene took a toll on Augusta National (Ed Bodenhamer via X)
Here are some of the topics Stray Shots will be following during golf’s version of baseball’s “hot stove” league over the next few months.
1. Augusta and Hurricane Helene. Augusta National leadership is usually so close-mouthed about topics it does not feel like sharing with the public that it can make the Kremlin appear voluble.
For club chairman Fred Ridley to comment even a little bit about Hurricane Helene’s damage to the course seemed like a big deal.
“As far as the golf course, it really was affected just as the rest of the community was,” Ridley said in Japan during the recent Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship. “There was a lot of damage and we have a lot of people working hard to get us back up and running.”
He added that the club will be up and running “sooner rather than later.”
C’mon Mr. Chairman — so many of us Masters fans want to know the details. How many trees? Which trees? What kind of damage on which holes? Etc.
We will stay focused on this the next 175 days until Masters week.
2. USGA and distance control. Where is USGA now on rolling back distance gains in the modern game? They announced prospective changes to roll back the golf ball in December 2023, but in June 2024 at a press conference around the U.S. Open, USGA CEO Mike Whan suggested other equipment changes were under consideration as well.
For example, Whan suggested that both he and Martin Slumbers, his R&A counterpart on the way out the door, are considering regulations around the driver as well. Head size? Clubface power? Shafts? Something else?
Again, we will stay tuned as the world awaits.
3. Phil Mickelson’s future. When it comes to the Ryder Cup, the Presidents Cup or anything else such-like, does Mickelson have one?
Polarizing … a golf genius … fan favorite … the first most outspoken LIV defector … is there a path for him to be cured of his heretofore incurable “LIV-itis?” Future Ryder Cup captain? Or permanent PGA Tour pariah?
When captain Keegan Bradley won’t even consider his regular partner in those events for vice captain at Bethpage Black, the tea leaves don’t read well.
4. PIF/PGA Tour negotiations. Endless talks. And, to date of course, fruitless. Will there in fact ever be a deal between the rival factions? If so, will the welcome mat be laid out for tour defectors as part of any deal?
We will be all over even a whiff of developments here.
5. The Boys Club. Is it the end of the line for the remnants of the SB2K17 crew? Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas and Rickie Fowler are all three popular and arguably generational talents and still relatively young even though they’ve traded communal spring breaks at Baker’s Bay to married-with-children lives. (Fowler is the gray beard at 35 with his mates just 31).
But all are struggling with injuries, confidence or perhaps other issues.
Golf is a far more interesting place — and the PGA Tour much more compelling — with them right in the fray and producing great golf. And with the tour down a lot of star power these days, these are losses not to be wished for.
We will keep a close watch on reports emanating from their camps this winter.
Matt McCarty and his girlfriend, Madi Moore, have a lot to celebrate (Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
6. Matty McIce. Who knew that anything interesting could come out of the PGA Tour’s Black Desert Championship last week? But it did.
Matt McCarty — just 26 years old — won the tournament going away in only his second start as a PGA Tour member after a dominating summer on the Korn Ferry Tour. He is a long-hitting lefty who was promoted from KFT courtesy of three wins in six weeks and is now suddenly No. 47 in the world.
It’s always nice when opportunity knocks and someone kicks in the door the old fashioned way — by earning it. McCarty is officially one to watch going forward.