Sal Johnson, editor-in-chief and publisher of Golf Observer, has finished his e-book previewing the entire 2008 PGA TOUR season and has it available for download at Golf Observer.com for a mere $12.95. Considering you’d pay $8-15 for the tournament program of any particular tournament during the year, Sal’s 52-week guide is not only a staggering bargain, but an indispensable tool for handicapping the field at any event: from the majors to the “Fall Series,” from Kapalua and the Mercedes to the rest of the silly season, Sal covers every pro tournament of the year.
Sal has been the major championships’ and major TV networks’ go-to stats guy for the PGA TOUR for an entire generation. If you have a stats question in the media tent, Sal is your man. His book breaks down the top 105 players not just year-to-year, but tournament to tournament, tracks trends in scoring, money, all phases of the game – driving through putting and everything in between – and injury history. If you need any information, micro to macro, the player guide is an essential digest. If there is shortcoming, the information on the foreign players is not as thorough as it is for the American players. It would have helped to see stats for Padraig Harrington or Justin Rose form the European Tour to evaluate them in PGA TOUR events, but hey you can pick up one more newspaper for that. You sure won’t find this info in any of the major monthlies. Moreover, Sal has stats and personal info on every Q-school and Nationwide Tour grad so you won’t be caught ny suprise when some new faces emerge from the pack on any given Sunday.
Next, not only is there a review of each tournament on the calendar, but the e-book contains a special section on the majors written by such eminent golf writers as Len Shapiro, Jeremy Chapman, Gary Trask, Bob Harig, and David Barrett. While the reviews of the golf courses for the majors and the Ryder Cup – Augusta, Sawgrass, Oakland Hills, Torrey Pines, and Valhalla are all broken down with regard to what type of player performs well there – again there is a lack of analysis of foreign players. For example, I disagree with Shapiro that Harrington is best suited for a U.S. Open Layout. Swashbucklers like Harrington play better at the British Open and Masters, not the U.S. Open. I’d pick Harrington at Augusta, but I agree that no one stops Woods at Torrey, a course he flat-out owns, with four victories in six starts. Also, more attention should have been paid to Justin Rose, last years winner of the Order of Merit as the Open Championship returns to Birkdale, site of his coming out party in 1998.
Nevertheless, Shapiro nails down the nuances of each venue, from Augusta’s lengthening and slow movement away from some of the design elements of Mackenzie to the flattish fairways amid the dunes at Royal Birkdale, from Oakland Hills’s wasp-waisted fairways to Torrey’s expected change in setup from the Cali Swing event to the national championship venue. His crisp analysis and smooth writing style make his chapters an easy, yet informative read. Trask gives us a great breakdown of recent trends of players in his who’s-hot-who’s-not column, David Barrett, winner of last year’s GWAA Internet Writing award, dissects the newcomers from the Nationwide tour and Harig, one of our most venerable golf writers, gives critical details on the playing trends of the Q school grads.
So for $13 – about the same price you would pay for one tournament preview program – you can buy a 173-page, detailed volume from Golf Observer. Every player, every field, every venue, every tournament history, expert analysis from the leading lights on both the Golf Observer masthead and the golf writing industry in general. There’s even terrific photos of your favorite player and some comical pix as well, (Good lord, wait until you see Tim Clark’s new moustache. He looks like a Banana Republic dictator! The picture of Fred Funk is hysterical too, catching his colorful and energetic nature.), there’s no downside here. So get yours today and smear all the chumps in your fantasy league like the floppy grapes they are!
Leave a reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.