Too many Journeyman Pro's?

Journalist Graham Spiers has brought up this point in his blog for the Golf Show on BBC Radio Scotland. Namely; Are there too many 'Journeyman' Golf professionals, making a comfortable living without really competing at the business end of any tournaments?

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/golf/18108832

Almost certainly the answer is yes. Spiers goes onto namecheck a couple of Scots who have been making a good living from golf without really winning too many events; Stephen Gallagher & Scott Jamieson, but you could add to that list probably another dozen or so names who play on tour but rarely compete.

However, forgive me for picking out Scots as guilty parties here, players from all nations are in the same boat and I'm sure most who were confronted would say the old sporting cliche 'Don't hate the player, hate the game' - i.e. why criticise someone for making good from a flawed system.

What solutions are there?

Well the 1st & most obvious answer that springs to mind would be to cut the number of players in  tournaments - say down to 50 or so, perhaps with another 5 or so invites to local players, or for sponsors. 55 guys, no cut. Most tournaments will have an entry list of 125 to 140 players at present.

Would that work? Well I'm sure dozens of 'journeyman pro's' would lose most of their income stream overnight as they would struggle even to get into tournaments. Many I'm sure would not stay on tour & probably all golfers would play fewer events. However, more than a few just might get a bit of a boot they need to pick up their game and get better results. I'm sure I remember English Golfer Paul Casey talking of the mentality of 'there's always next week' - meaning that quite early in a tournament, you may realise you won't be competing and immediately start thinking of making a better start in the next event.

However, probably having fields of only 50 would rob most younger players of a chance to gain much experience playing in the bigger tournaments as places would be at such a premium & they would inevitably take most of them years, rather than months to get half a dozen events under their belt.

I suppose another solution would be to keep tournaments in the same format, but only to dish out prize money to the top 25 or so (rather than all players who make the cut). Most players would still comfortably afford to play with sponsors generally covering their costs but it would make it much more important for lower ranked players who make the cut to score well in the weekend to try & get paid. Although you could also argue that guys giving up 4 whole days to play in an event, deserve to get some cash. It would be absurd if your boss asked you to give up 4 days of your time for a project with perhaps no money at the end even with limited success (no matter how well paid you were the rest of the year).

So it seems we are struggling with solutions to the curse of the Journeyman pro. I guess golf is just such a lucrative sport that even guys who are 200 or 300 in the world will still make good money. Probably thousands of footballers around the world make a good living despite playing at a modest level (some may not even play at all) and simply because there is no clear ranking - it goes relatively unnoted.

The format is also very inclusive as most tournaments will have local qualifying events, sponsors exemptions and dozens of other ways to qualify and it must give tremendous hope to guys on the fringes of the game who are only ever 3 or 4 good rounds away from a big pay day and entrance to other events.

It seems that as long as there is so much money in the sport, there will always be Journeyman pro's making a good living for anything from 2 to 20 years without really bothering too many engravers over the years.
 

European Ryder Cup - Who will make the team?

If the Ryder Cup team was selected today, European Captain Jose Marie Olazabel would have a few big decisions to make. 

The automatic selections would be as follows; 

Rory McIlroy

Peter Hanson

Martin Kaymer

Justin Rose

Paul Lawrie

Luke Donald

Lee Westwood

Graeme McDowell

Sergio Garcia

& Gonzalez Fernandez-Castano.

That looks like a pretty strong side with only one rookie (Fernandez-Castano) and 6 of the 10 with either major wins or experience as World No 1 to their names (or both in the case of Kaymer & McIlroy). 

But who would be the two Captains picks? There are some big Ryder Cup names missing out - Ian Poulter, Padraig Harrington, Thomas Bjorn the Molinari's and Miguel Angel-Jiminez? As well as Open Champion Darren Clarke.

Not to mention other less experienced players, who probably have a bit more form - Robert Rock, Michael Hoey, Simon Dyson, Nicholas Colsearts & Alvaro Quiros (all winners in the last year).

My personal feeling is that the picks would be from the list of 'bigger names'. Poulter would be a shoe in given he is a match-play specialist and Olly would have to make a decision based on form of other experienced guys towards the end of the season.

Also - we have to consider that the 10 automatic places will change before selection is due. Guys will now really start to focus on selection and build their schedule around getting enough points - even if that means playing more often than they would like. Probably Fernandez-Castano will struggle to stay in contention and also Garcia got most of his points right at the start of qualifying and hasn't really been in contention much in 2012. Rose & Kaymer likewise.

I would expect Poulter to 'get it done' somewhere and get enough points and it is inevitable that someone will find a bit of form over the summer and get a win to seal the deal. 

However - whatever the outcome it seems likely that we will only have 1 or 2 Rookies and a real nucleus of the team who have big wins and play mainly in America (which will rob the opposition of one aspect of home advantage). 

So what of the American's? Well without going into too much detail, it seems almost certain that they will have a more experienced side than last time. In the summer last year, Darren Clarke had just become the 5th non-American major winner in succession and post moretm's were being written about American golf & 'life after Tiger' etc. They have now won 2 Major's in a row (Bradley at the PGA & Watson at the Masters) and Matt Kuchar has just wrestled the Players Championship from an international field who had won 5 in a row at Sawgrass. 

No doubt the big names like Tiger & Mickelson will feature (no matter their form) but they will still have a strong team - even if they have 3 or 4 rookies (as they usually do).

Roll on September and expect to now be bombarded with points updates and Ryder Cup slanted interviews during all Golf coverage for the next few months. Excellent!