By:
Dylan Dethier
December 16, 2022
Jordan Spieth talks to NBC Sports activities’ Steve Sands on Friday on the PNC Championship.
Getty Photos
In the event you didn’t tune in to Friday’s PNC Championship pro-am, I get it.
The golf season has stretched previous its restrict. It led to August, however not likely, and once more in September, however not likely, and definitely it ought to have ended by November, proper? But it surely didn’t actually finish there, both, and so right here we’re with the PNC on the telly, a event that finishes every week earlier than Christmas and simply two weeks earlier than the 2023 {golfing} yr begins once more. So, once more, no onerous emotions in the event you sat this one out.
However you missed some good tv in the event you did.
Golf Channel took us to Orlando, the place Dan Hicks and Peter Jacobsen quarterbacked a free-wheeling, feel-good medley broadcast. Free of the stress of exhibiting essential golf pictures, they turned a two-hour broadcast into an interview carousel as a substitute, tossing out to Steve Sands and Kay Cockerill and Gary Koch, who wrangled main champ after main champ plus their keen relations, the interviewees as younger as 11 years outdated and as skilled as 87, whereas we obtained to see golf’s largest names as fathers and sons and moms and daughters.
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Lee Trevino is 83 and appeared as delighted to be there as anyone. He loves being round Tiger Woods and buying and selling swing ideas with Charlie. He’s blown away by the depth of the sphere and made positive to remind title sponsor PNC that the event has develop into “the best factor they ever fell into of their life.”
And hoo boy, does he love golf.
Requested whether or not it’s true he nonetheless hits balls each day, Trevino nodded.
“Day by day,” he mentioned, and defined why. “Look, I by no means had a selection. Once I was a younger man, with my academic background, that is the one factor that I may do and do effectively. And the Good Lord gave me an amazing quantity of expertise and I don’t need to disappoint him once I see him. That’s No. 1. No. 2, I’ve no different choices. I can’t do anything. I may search for balls… however I find it irresistible, I do. I’m going out each day. I hit balls for an hour, possibly two. I chip and putt.
“I don’t play a lot anymore,” he added. But when there was any wistfulness, he breezed previous it. “I really like the sport. Nonetheless find it irresistible. Can’t play it practically as effectively, however I find it irresistible.”
This week’s solely contestant older than Trevino is 87-year-old Gary Participant. He performed all of the hits in an interview of his personal: The significance of lifting weights. The truth that quickly, somebody will drive the ball 500 yards. The declare that he nonetheless travels greater than anybody else on the planet (!). He, too, careworn how grateful he felt to be right here.
“It’s an training,” he mentioned, “and I can not consider a greater way of life.”
The youngest contestant obtained in entrance of a mic, too. Annika Sorenstam’s son Will is an 11-year-old left-hander with a easy quick sport and no scarcity of on-course character. He discovered his membership twirl from Tiger Woods, he mentioned. As for the best way he walks in putts?
“If I see it on a great line, I simply begin strolling,” he mentioned. Easy as that.
John Daly was there, too, defending his title earlier than he will get his knee changed subsequent Wednesday. He had recommendation for his son — “do the alternative of your daddy, and also you’ll be simply high-quality” — however appreciative for the second, too, calling it “a beautiful experience.” Along with his personal Daly aptitude, after all.
“If I knew that I used to be going to stay this lengthy I might have taken worse care of myself,” he mentioned.
Mark O’Meara was requested how usually he’s reminded of 1998, when he received the Masters and the Open Championship in the identical season.
“Not sufficient,” he mentioned with fun.
However Padraig Harrington, one of many sport’s nice talkers, mentioned he’s having fun with basking in his previous accomplishments.
“All the things is a mirrored image on whenever you had been in your good days,” he mentioned. “It’s slightly good.”
Nonetheless, he balked on the assumption that he’ll be taking part in principally PGA Tour Champions occasions come 2023. Harrington is keenly conscious that if he wins on the DP World Tour or the PGA Tour this coming season he’d be among the many oldest to have ever achieved so.
There have been execs of their prime round, too. Nelly Korda has been busy; she teed it up on the QBE final week and obtained at some point off earlier than prep started for the PNC. She’ll be certain to not see a course subsequent week, she mentioned, when all of the Kordas get collectively.
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She additionally shyly accepted phrases of reward from Spieth, who she mentioned she seems as much as. That’s on high of reward from Harrington, which comes on high of reward from Max Homa and Kevin Kisner and numerous different taking part in companions final week. However she additionally tried to unfold that reward round to her friends.
“It’s been actually cool to see the form of suggestions that I’ve gotten from the blokes,” she mentioned. “They need to come out to an LPGA occasion and watch all the ladies play on the market as a result of they’ll be equally impressed with everybody on the market.”
Justin Thomas is a brand-new husband; between his marriage ceremony and a trio of December occasions — the Hero, the Match, now the PNC — he’s been a busy man.
Jordan Spieth continues to be a comparatively new father; he dished on the most recent with Sammy Spieth. “Joyful child, good sleeper, what extra may you ask for?”
Their fathers spoke to digital camera, too. Mike Thomas mentioned his golf preparation concerned extra fishing than he’d initially deliberate and joked that his son’s swing recommendation is “a protracted listing.”
“Extra of a pocket book,” Justin added.
Shawn Spieth, in the meantime, reminisced on how a lot his proficient {golfing} son had fended for himself as a teen. That ended up serving to him down the highway.
“As soon as he was out right here professionally it was second nature to him,” he mentioned, including that Spieth felt little or no stress from his mother and father. “It’s not like Chris or I competed on the best stage, so it’s not like they needed to comply with us,” he mentioned.
Oh, proper. There was one other well-known father on property, taking part in alongside his son. These of you that did flip on Golf Channel might need achieved so with the intention of catching a glimpse of the event’s two headliners, the Woodses, 46-year-old Tiger and 13-year-old Charlie. They limped across the course facet by facet, the elder Woods battling plantar fasciitis plus [gestures generally] and his son combating via some rising pains.
Tiger gave us some flashback moments as he carved spinny wedge pictures across the greens, dialing in his quick sport. And he gave us some new seems, too, like Tiger the Golf Dad, taking a large stance to seize his son’s swing down the road after which reviewing the iPhone footage instantly thereafter.
“That’s an ideal, good backswing,” Tiger instructed Charlie. “You’ve by no means been there. How superior is that?”
After their spherical concluded, Golf Channel lower to Woods’ press convention. One reply — to a query requested by our James Colgan — caught out: Has the best way he thinks about his legacy modified this season?
“Sure. Yeah,” Woods mentioned. “The golf ecosystem has compelled everyone to rethink how we take a look at the sport and the way we have to make the sport higher. So this entire yr, for all of us who’ve been part of golf, we’ve had to take a look at it from a unique lens.”
He was speaking about LIV Golf, after all, and its impact on the complete professional sport. Throughout the hour, a number of bits of LIV-related information hit: the New York Instances reported that the breakaway league’s COO had stepped away, all whereas LIV and the PGA Tour clashed in court docket and known as one another liars.
The PNC isn’t resistant to the consequences of the skin world. Take Henrik Stenson, whose LIV defection possible price him a return invitation this yr. However this can be a one-off, a celebratory golf event, the place contributors play from 4 completely different tee bins simply to ensure everyone has a great time. It’s an pleasurable bubble involving the who’s-who from {the golfing} world. There aren’t any world rating factors at stake. Extra to the purpose, there aren’t any debates about world rating factors.
That’s to not say it’s not essential, although.
“The final couple years have been magical,” Woods mentioned. “And to have the ability to do it acquire, we’re trying ahead to it.”
Ought to make for good TV, too.
Dylan Dethier
Golf.com Editor
Dylan Dethier is a senior author for GOLF Journal/GOLF.com. The Williamstown, Mass. native joined GOLF in 2017 after two years scuffling on the mini-tours. Dethier is a graduate of Williams Faculty, the place he majored in English, and he’s the writer of 18 in America, which particulars the yr he spent as an 18-year-old dwelling from his automobile and taking part in a spherical of golf in each state.