A Hawaiian teenager made the cut at the Sony, and no, it wasn’t Michelle Wie. The kid’s name is Tadd Fujikawa and he’s just sixteen. Moreover, he’s five foot one and a hundred thirty pounds.

I wonder if this will make Team Wie reassess their strategy of playing in men’s events.

I’ve been reading a lot of snide comments by Tour players about Michelle Wie’s appearance at the Sony. (No Vijay is not among them). It seems mean, but I think there’s a lot of economic self interest in those comments.

One of the reasons that so many Tour players are upset with the tournament slot given to Michelle Wie is that—unless you are among the top players on Tour—it’s not always easy to actually get into an event. Each player on the Tour is ranked according to their accomplishments, and spots in a tournament are awarded on the basis of that ranking. You can find the current exemption system here.

It’s an interesting system, in that it appears specifically designed to protect the incumbents. The established players are given every opportunity to stay in, and never have to worry about being able to get into enough tournaments to stay on the money list. The flip side of this is that it is sometimes difficult for new faces to break in. The next great player may be out there, but just doesn’t get enough opportunities to settle in and get established.

I don’t think it’s a particularly great system for two reasons. The first is that Tiger won’t play forever, and they’re going to need new blood. New blood needs to be encouraged, but the system really doesn’t do that. Again, I’ll point you toward a book on the struggles of new players called Rookie on Tour. Your library may have it.

The other is a little more subtle: I think it reduces the competitive spirit. Davis Love doesn’t have to put forth his best effort each week (not picking on Davis. It’s just the first name that popped into my head), because he knows that he can always get a slot at whatever future tournament he wants. A player toward the bottom of the list, on the other hand, can’t afford to have an off week, because he doesn’t know how many opportunities he’ll really have.

Now given all of that, the slot Wie has is a “Sponsors Exemption”—one of the slots reserved for the tournament organizers, who can give it to anyone they want. The spots typically go to a local player, or someone else that the tournament thinks will be good for the event’s bottom line. And ultimately, if Wie is good for the Sony’s bottom line, that’s all good.

But I am sure that some of the players who didn’t get in are wondering if she didn’t take a spot that might—- possibly—have gone to them.

While I don’t intend to comment on The Golf Channel’s coverage every week, I thought that their general lack of coverage Michelle Wie last night was notable. It certainly was helpful that she laid a huge egg on the course, and that she didn’t play in “prime time”, but they showed restraint nonetheless.  Unless I had fallen asleep, it seems to me that Wie coverage was mostly limited to a relatively short sequence of highlights.

We’ll have to see how it turns out tonight. She is not in contention, and it’s pretty obvious that she’s not going to make the cut. So TGC would do well by pretty much ignoring her.

Vijay Singh was the last guy other than Tiger to hold the number one position in golf. He just might be the next guy to do it, too. A column in the LA Daily News speculates on a possible Vijay ressurection.

Teezer Tags

Ridiculous Golf Item of The Week

I ran across this press release today:

Dallas, TX (Vocus) January 9, 2007—Haynes and Boone, LLP announced today that it has finalized the $1.8 billion sale of ClubCorp to KSL Capital Partners.

ClubCorp—the leading operator of golf courses and country clubs in the world—reached an agreement to merge with KSL last October. KSL is a private equity fund with $1 billion of committed capital in the resort and leisure industry.

The conclusion of the deal ended months of work by a Haynes and Boone team that included Garrett DeVries, Tom Yang, Matt Zmigrosky, Randy Colson, Vicki Martin-Odette, Ken Bezozo, Brandon Jones, David Shinnick, Susan Wetzel, Greta Cowart and Mary Mendoza.

In a separate but related transaction, ClubCorp also closed on an agreement to sell The Pinehurst Resort and Country Club to certain members of the Dedman family, owners of about 70 percent of ClubCorp, in a $325 million transaction. Thompson and Knight represented the Dedman family in that transaction and Winston & Strawn represented a special committee of ClubCorp’s Board of Directors.

ClubCorp’s renowned resort properties include Barton Creek Resort & Spa in Austin, Texas (site of two Canadian Tour events); and The Homestead in Hot Springs, Virginia (America’s first resort founded in 1766); Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio (site of the World Golf Championships—Bridgestone Invitational); and Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, California (home of the Kraft Nabisco Championship).

The company also holds more than 60 business clubs and business and sports clubs, including the Boston College Club, City Club on Bunker Hill in Los Angeles, Columbia Tower Club in Seattle, Metropolitan Club in Chicago and the City Club of Washington, D.C.

The interesting thing here is to note that the deal includes The Homestead and The Firestone. The Firestone itself had apparently just been acquired by ClubCorp.

KSL already owned ski resorts like Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge and Keystone—as well as the Doral Golf Resort & Spa .

There’s no word on what effect, if any, the sale will have on the Bridgestone WGC event held at Firestone.

Reading a recent USA Today article that hinted that the Tour may actually increase the number of events leading to the Fedex Cup Playoffs got me to thinking about how to increase interest and exposure in the PGA Tour, while staying out of an immediate (and unwinnable) conflict with fall football.

Here’s the GolfBlogger Plan to Restructure Professional Golf: stagger the seasons of the PGA and Nationwide Tours.

Under the GolfBlogger Plan, the PGA Tour would run from January through August, culminating in the FedEx Cup playoffs. The Nationwide would start the first week of April and run to November, culminating in the (Insert Name of Sponsor) Cup. The prize on the Nationwide, however, would not be $10 million (although a couple of million would be nice), but elevation to the Big Show. Lets say that the final six or eight would earn their tour cards. The overall winner would get an automatic spot in the Players Championship the following May.