Matt Kuchar Wins Ryder Cup (in Ping Pong)

APPARENTLY, MATT KUCHAR, a Ryder Cup rookie on the American side, is the man to beat in Ping Pong. Kuchar whipped everybody on both the U.S. and European teams, according to Melanie Hauser’s Quick 18 column at PGATour.com. Melanie quoted a Golfweek source:

Golfweek reports that the man of the Ryder Cup ping-pong matches was ... drumroll, please ... not one of the usual suspects. Not Tiger Woods. Not Phil Mickelson. It was Matt Kuchar. According to the magazine sources, Kuchar took Peter Hanson—and the team’s deep pockets—in a winner-take-all match. “The Euros had no idea just how great a player Matt Kuchar was,” said Golfweek’s source who was in the team room. “At one point, there were thousands of pounds on the table.”

Kuchar posted a 1-1-2 record in his first Ryder Cup. The Ping Pong victory wasn’t exactly a suitable consolation prize, but at least it sounds like Matt offset some of the week’s expenses.

−The Armchair Golfer

(Image: Dustin Baxter/Flickr)

Sea Island Mafia Invades McGladrey Classic

THE INAUGURAL MCGLADREY CLASSIC tees off on Thursday at the 7,055-yard par-70 Seaside Course at the Sea Island Resort in Sea Island, Georgia. This coastal golf community is also the known territory of the “Sea Island Mafia,” a a group of golf mobsters who will exert their local influence on the second event in the Fall Series.

They’ve been ID’d as follows: Davis Love III, Zach Johnson, Matt Kuchar, Jonathan Byrd and Chris Kirk. They’ve made this pleasant corner of Georgia’s Golden Coast their domain. Several of them are represented by an outfit called Crown Sports Management. Love is considered to be the Godfather. They are armed with clubs and dangerous on the golf course.

(Photo: Sea Island Godfather / Keith Allison, Flickr)

Actually, Love, a longtime Sea Island resident, is the host of this week’s event. (Love and others are known as the Sea Island Mafia. I didn’t make that up.)

“The St. Simons/Sea Island area has been home for Mark and me and our families for a long time, and we’re extremely happy to support the community that means so much to us,” Love said at Golf360.

One by one, several of Love’s peers migrated to Sea Island.

Wrote Stan Awtry at PGATOUR.COM: “...many of the TOUR’s best players make their home, or second home, at Sea Island—partially because it’s a nice place to live and partially because of the unequalled practice facilities at the Sea Island Learning Center.”

Three of them—Love, Johnson and Kuchar—hustled home from the Ryder Cup to participate. One thing’s certain. Sea Island will be a much more friendly and relaxed atmosphere.

−The Armchair Golfer

Strange Grass Patterns Detected at Tour Championship

MATT KUCHAR WAS THE FIRST to see them as he was walking to the 2nd hole, a 214-yard par 3. Then Martin Laird, Charley Hoffman and Paul Casey. By the end of the first round, nearly all 30 players in the field of the season-ending Tour Championship reported sightings of a bizarre grass pattern at East Lake Golf Club, sort of golf’s version of crop circles.

Oddly, no one besides the players noticed anything unusual about the East Lake turf, a combination of zoysiagrass fairways and bentgrass greens.

The grounds crew had no explanation.

“The course is certainly in pristine condition,” said a supervisor, “but otherwise everything is normal, including mowing patterns.”

(Image at left is simulated based on players’ descriptions.)

Aerial photography also failed to reveal any unusual phenomenon.

“If I had been staring at the ground since the Sony Open, I would probably be seeing things, too,” offered a spectator.

−The Armchair Golfer