When Golf Pros Push Back: Steven Bowditch Edition
Sean Zak at Golf.com backed up his case that Steven Bowditch made an extraordinarily large amount of money (Nearly $500k) given some historically poor play on the PGA Tour.
Nothing about the item was personal, but given the sensitive nature of pro golfers, who are coddled by the tour to believe they are doing the Lord's work, Zak received social slaps from giants in the game who apparently hold tour cards, notes Michael Shamburger at The Big Lead.
Steve Wheatcroft, Andres Gonzales, Colt Knost and Hudson Swafford all expressed their dismay, while an all-out blackout threat came from Graham DeLaet, who, while suffering through the yips this summer, blew off all writers at the Rio Games.
And I can tell you, none of us have been the same since.
Anyway, maybe Zak should have moved the dollar amount and easy-WGC money up higher in his item to not bury the lede exposing Tim Finchem's grand vision for rewarding something worse than mediocrity. Zak, because he's a nice fellow, actually portrayed it as good news in trying to find some silver lining in Bowditch's season:
Bowditch was 3.209 strokes worse than the field average in the 55 rounds he recorded last year. Robert Allenby finished 184th in strokes gained, albeit in 14 fewer rounds, but lost just 1.95 strokes per round. So the second-worst golfer, strokes gained-wise, was still a stroke better per round than Bowditch was. Just one player in the ShotLink era (David Gossett in ’04—sorry, David!) finished a season with a worse average. Those 3.209 strokes lost per round looks like this.
Alas, there was some good news among all the gloominess. Bowditch still managed to earn $458,891 last season, good for 158th on the money list -- a far cry from his 185th-best form.
Bowditch’s Tour wins in 2014 and '15 earned him spots in the no-cut WGCs that ensure a paycheck. Those three starts alone helped him rake in a cumulative $158,500, slightly more than 34% of his season earnings.
Bowditch took to Twitter to push back:
Hey @Sean_Zak @golf_com thanks for the public humiliation article. I might suck, but a lot of my peers are pretty good. #burnthosebridges https://t.co/vzb9RsIuNC
— stevenbowditch (@bowdo83) October 26, 2016
DeLaet's threat mentions something about a sit down, something (A) players rarely do anyway (B) no one but maybe some Canadian press, are dying to do with DeLaet:
@bowdo83 @Sean_Zak @golf_com and the media wonders why players don't like them. Good luck getting a sit down with a player ever again
— Graham DeLaet (@GrahamDeLaet) October 26, 2016
Thursday, October 27, 2016 at 09:26 PM
Reader Comments (38)
It's the type of click bait nonsense that is bound to grind people's gears. He got into big money, no cut events on the strength of last season's win. Big deal. Now go and write a real story with useful information and get your clicks there. Next step would have been for the headline to read "You'll never BELIEVE how much money the World's worst golfer makes".
That said, the whole thing is a complete non-event. That it's received the (over)reaction it has is testament to A) How sensitive these guys are and B) the high esteem they hold Bowdo, who has handled his poor form with grace.
Come to think of think of it, I have as many wins as all the current Canadians who hold tour cards combined. Wonder what the sum total of their earnings have been for the last five years?
http://www.nypost.com/2016/10/27/the-night-john-daly-took-his-car-to-a-cliff-and-almost-drove-off/
I'm not sure it's fair to call that an 'article' - that is a slap to people who actually write articles. However - as James said, it is click bait. It is the same as the dozens of other links that show up on that page like: "Fred Couple's net worth will shock you" "14 stunning tennis players" "14 female athletes that make Kim Kardashian look plain" "you won't believe what so and so looks like now"......
In the NHL alone there are many players sitting at home collecting paychecks on multi-million dollar contracts, so contrary to what the author thinks..it can get much much better than life on the tour.
The guy made more money than some guys who, at least by one statistical metric, played better than him. News flash: life's not fair.
I think the media gets a bad rap sometimes, but focusing on the guys wallet when he's playing poorly seems really low.
If that had been the crux of the article it would have been much better.
A final paragraph highlighting the career rebounds (Stenson and Westwood spring to mind) would hvae been of interest too
AMONG SPORTS GOLFER
earned the least for on field performance
On the other hand, anger is a great way to get out of a funk, so here's hoping Bowditch is appropriately inspired.
All that said, the article wasn't meanspirited or petty, just tough to read if your name is stitched on your golf bag and you happen to have a unibrow.
This article was just awful. Bowditch had a top 10 in the Tournament of Champions. So what if he sucked the rest of the year? One good week goes a long way in many sports. The arctile makes it sound as if being on the PGA Tour is a golden ticket. It is not. Just look at Robert Allenby. 23 starts, $25,000 earnings. That's not enough to make a living out of it. Mr. Zak should have written a better article. I wish you would hold him to the same standard, you hold the pro golfers to.
The punters want to read about history being made, about rivalries, stories of underdogs or of triumph over adversity, about exceptional performances and achievements... A sportsman being picked to pieces over a run of poor form is neither interesting nor enjoyable to read, particularly for those of us that have any sense of empathy.
It was a very poor article. For those familiar with the expression, it's what I'd call "putting the boot in".
If his point was that the PGA Tour is a closed society that is hard to get into but is rather protective once you get in, that would be more than acceptable.
Barring Tiger's retirement or Bubba adopting another child, the golf writers would be better served taking a nice, long siesta until sometime late Feb or March.
Sometimes, before you make a post, you should read all of the article referenced or at least the summary below the title. You actually make the point of what the writer was informing everyone of: The only reason he made the amount of money he did, after a horrendous year per his stats, was because of the non-cut events. Allenby played in 23 events, played horribly, and barely paid for his adventurous night in Hawaii. He made the amount of money he deserved based on his play. Bowditch made a half million dollars playing at the same level.