Fairway Rollin' - Hanging Out With Brooks Koepka, Plus the PGA Embraces Sports Betting | Fairway Rollin’

Episode Date: March 3, 2020

Joe House is joined by GQ writer Daniel Riley to discuss his recent profile on Brooks Koepka, including the many shades of his personality, his role as an outsider, and pushing the boundaries in the game of golf on and off the course (2:45). Then, Jason Sobel of the Action Network calls in to discuss their just-announced gambling partnership with the PGA Tour and offer their picks for the Arnold Palmer Invitational (35:15). Host: Joe House Guests: Daniel Riley and Jason Sobel Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Yes, indeed. You've made it. We are here. It is another green edition of Fairway Roll. in the golf podcast on the rigger podcast network presented by calaway golf i am your starter joe house my eagle enthusiast jam-packed show this week we were fortunate enough to pull in the author of a profile of brooks keppka that has been making the rounds gq correspondent daniel riley is on to tell us about what went into this story about brooks

and we had to grab our pal Jason Sobel from the Action Network because the Action Network and the PGA Tour just cut a deal where the Action Network is serving as the platform, the betting platform, the golf gambling platform for the tour. I can't wait to hear what it is that Sobel and the Action Network have cooked up. But let's talk to our man, Danny Riley, first and get a little insight into Brooks, Kepka. The first tea is open. Let's go over there and throw a peg in the ground.

All right, my birdie buddies, now on the T. This gentleman authored a magazine profile last week that caught the golf world by storm because we have an insatiable appetite for all things. Brooks Kepka. He is a correspondent for GQ magazine, Daniel Riley. What's happening? Danny boy. Hey,

House, thank you for having me on. I can't wait to talk about Kepka with you. Yes, well, thank you very much for writing the story and springing it on us. It is an interesting time

to be sort of looking at Brooks and his place in the game and what 2020 might hold for him because on the one hand, he is still working his way back off of injury. and has been complaining recently about his knee affecting his performance. On the other hand, we don't have any majors coming up yet.

So we're not going to make any rash judgments about where he is. But he's been plenty candid in interviews and wherever folks are sticking a microphone in his face about various aspects of the game, his opinions on a whole bunch of things. And your story was a top to bottom treatment of that. I want to begin with this. You said on your very own tweeter that Brooks is probably the most interesting athlete profile that you've ever worked on. Well, what's interesting about Brooks is that you have this player who is not like, you know, 22 years old or anything like that. he's 29. He's been around.

He's no longer number one, but was for much of last year, number one player in the world. And still had that thing following him around of just not quite being a household name yet. People not fully knowing who this guy is, he keeps his cards pretty close to his best, although he was starting to use the megaphone a little bit more liberally last year, talking about things like slow play or just kind of little jabs at the game of golf in general. And so in that sense, I had never worked on a piece where it was an athlete who had succeeded so much and was literally the number one player in the world when I was working on the story and who had simultaneously not had hardly anything written about him in a sort of deep revealing way.

Certainly there had been, you know, lots of coverage of his victories and certain things that were known about him. But both he and I acknowledge the fact that for that coverage, there still was not a ton that had gotten way beneath the surface and some of the, you know, not just the way that he thinks about golf and other sports and his sort of reputation, but also just little innocuous things about how he lives his life and the things that he, you know, considers important to him. whether that's in the piece, sort of this group of friends that he has that have nothing to do with golf and the way that he kind of likes ordning himself off among a non-golfing set

when it comes to free time, the way that he thinks about how to kind of organize his life, the fact that he, you know, acknowledges that he could walk away from golf. If, you know, his time was up and it would, you know, he'd miss it, but it wouldn't be like some of these other guys

so you really understand that to be the only way that they can kind of think about their life. And just as an athlete who's as dominant as he is, you just don't hear that very often. And so for me, it was sort of like this opportunity to get this person who is at the top of the game, but who so little had been kind of spoken about,

again, beyond the, you know, 10 or 12 things that everybody kind of thinks they know about them. Yeah. And the story, you know, leads with this idea that he is the sports most dominant, most inscrutable player. And he is indeed both of those things, at least in terms of,

you know, major victories over the last couple years here on the dominant side, certainly inscrutability. And you kind of reference this. We've only really gotten to know him over the last 12 months or so. And that maybe 18 months. And it has been coincidental. with his sort of taking the game by the throat

and putting himself as an item of interest because he's doing relatively unprecedented things like only Tiger, only Jordan Speeth in kind of recent memory with the kind of number of majors that he's built up. But now that he's, you know, now that he's a lead item of interest. And the sporting public at large is always curious when somebody comes, what feels like out of nowhere and sort of takes over a sport. The sports fans at large want to get to know what it is about that person,

what's going on with that person. And so we have this really interesting kind of two-side personality with Brooks, it seems to me, where on the one side, he's very, like, deliberate in how he appears at the golf course, the press conferences and interviews that occur in that venue. And then the way that he has been candid over the last 12 to 18 months in different kind of fora podcasts and other kinds of interviews for different media purposes. What did you, did you encounter anything in terms of the two sides of this persona or do you even agree that there's two sides? Maybe there's more. No, I do.

And it's kind of like when I was talking with Brooks, it reminded me of one other person that I'd written about who has had similar things said about him, which is Russell Westbrook and the way that is sort of, you know, maybe it's too strong to say disdain,

but just his skepticism of the kind of beat reporters and their questions, and that's sort of the innocuous kind of grinding on the same five or six things or, you know, starting every question with, how do you play today? he seems to have zero patience for that kind of thing. And so on the one hand, there isn't a scrutiny that is both with that kind of coverage of him combined with this fact.

And he gets into it in the piece about the way that he is so deliberate about not showing any emotion when he's playing, not reacting to shots positively or negatively because he's watching all the other competitors who are within, you know, kind of the periphery of him. And he's assuming that they're watching him. So to give them anything visual beyond, as he puts, just the one sense and the sound of the ball, that would be like giving them an athletic advantage in this competition that he, maybe he's the only one that's playing it quite this way in the sense of like he's trying to win a one-on-one that maybe the other person doesn't know that they're playing,

but he's thinking about it in those ways that really turns them into this sort of like icy block that I think I get why fans, I was one of them were kind of like, I just don't get this guy. Like he's so dominant, but you don't see any of the emotion that you get from any of the other players with the ups and downs, the disappointments or that sort of like, you know, euphoria with a great shot coming down the stretch of one of the majors. It was just so cold-blooded that it's challenging to, and makes one think like, oh, I wonder how much is going on in there. At the same time, apparently, this was all just sort of, you know, roiling beneath the surface. surface and he was kind of waiting for people to start asking about this sort of stuff. And once he got that platform, he was really, it seems like the feedback has been very positive for him, whether it's sort of, you know, tussling with Bryson Duchampo or Rory McElroy

or people that kind of come out of him about things, the kind of positive feedback to that sort of sharp elbowed way of just talking to some of those other guys or, you know, coming out being like, oh, I think I can say some things about the game of golf or maybe some of these announcers or maybe the way that courses are set up, you know, the things that you saw dominant players of their time always kind of pushing on the boundaries of those things. And it seemed like I just felt it and just kind of going back to my experience writing some of these sports profiles where I get to be a bit of an outsider. I'm not covering these guys daily and they sometimes say things and sometimes they don't.

I could tell that he saw this as an opportunity to really kind of go long on some of these answers and really talk about some of the stuff that I'm sure he's been thinking about, you know, since he was a young, a young player, but just kind of hadn't had the opportunity to be like, okay, I'm just going to really start to say that stuff. And so I totally agree with you that there are these two things. And sometimes they're contradictory. That's another funny thing about him is sometimes the things he says, you know, he can be like, you know, this way about golf is not the way I want it and kind of turn around. And I'm just thinking about even some of his criticisms of private golf and country club

golf and the piece. But he himself, of course, belongs to clubs that he plays out of as a professional and things like that. So I think he's working through a lot of this stuff and really adapting to the spotlight. And I've kind of enjoyed watching it. Yeah. And there are a couple of things that you touched on that I, I want to follow up on. There is kind of this psychological aspect to his competitive instincts

that kind of serves as a through line throughout the story. It touches on his relationships with other players on tour and it touches on his demeanor. And it definitely affects the relatability that we've been looking for, you know, golf fans in the first place and then the greater sporting public at large as Brooks's successes have put him on a more prominent worldwide kind of stage. But I'm interested, I want to start with a little bit of like behind the scenes if it's okay because I'm just like the some of the sort of interaction that came through in the piece felt like kind of new information relating to Brooks. And I use that literally like we're relating to Brooks. I'm trying to, you know,

see him in his daily existence and then, you know, try and put that together along with the great success that he's had, you know, as part of the, you know, as a fan of the game. How did you, like, reach out to him? And what was the initial interaction like? I had kind of had my eye on a potential story on him for those reasons that I was mentioning earlier of just sort of like I couldn't remember the last time we'd done, had the opportunity to really do the first big profile on an athlete of that stature. Sometimes you get people when they're just starting out or coming up or maybe on the comeback or whatever it is.

But to get somebody at their, you know, what feels like a peak or maybe the early part of a peak and kind of be able to tell that story for the first time was really exciting. I think that they understood that. And kind of, I think his, the fact that it was a venue like GQ instead of a Sports Illustrated or an ESPN, which he had done certain things with or a golf digest, but that in a lot of these pieces is to get that off, off field, off arena,

off course life in there. And I think that that was interesting to him, too, that I was interested in kind of in his life in Southern Florida and, and what he does in between tournaments and things like that. And so in that sense, our interests align. I remember thinking,

I was telling somebody after I came back, I'm like, this is one of those rare stories where, like what Brooks thinks is interesting about himself and I think is interesting about him, actually a line, which is not always the case with athletes. I think he just kind of felt like there was a lot more that he wanted to say, and that was sort of what we wanted to get at. But in terms of just like interacting with him and personality-wise,

one thing that I found refreshing also, I mean, just we had dinner the first night I was in town, which is in Jupiter, Florida, which many of your listeners will know as the home of probably a quarter of professional golfers on the LPGA or the senior, corn ferry or PGA tour. And so, you know, it's the total hub of these places, of these guys living down there.

And he kind of keeps to himself in the area. I think he hangs out with Justin a little bit. But otherwise, it's him. It's his girlfriend, Jenna. It is these buddies from West Palm, where he grew up, which is about 20 minutes south of Jupiter. And so he's very, very comfortable, though.

The first night we went out to dinner at this, Michael Jordan and Ernie L's owned restaurant in Jupiter, which is kind of funny in and of itself. Gary Player was hanging out there. They had a nice little interaction. He was like super loose, comfortable. The hostess was somebody who went to high school with upstairs, had, you know, three or four cocktails, ordered, ordered, you know, plenty of food. There was none of this sort of like, oh, I don't want to, you know, get loose in front of the reporter kind of thing, which I really like that. You know, it's the opposite of, okay, you can meet us at the locker room and, you know, do a half hour or something. You know, that dinner was a few hours and then it's more stuff. As I described in the piece, you know, he's kicked back for a lot of the afternoon, you know, with a lip or a codiac and kind of just kicked off in politics and all the stuff. His Dog Cove is running around the

yard. He's got his boat tied up down on the little river there. He's always out on the boat. You know, if I'm not mistaken, one of his sponsors, only sponsors is Niccolo Bultra, which kind of like tells you something about him, but that's like the one he went after. And so you get a sense of this sort of like, he was talking about like how he never wears sunscreen. He didn't, one of the, when they were taking his photo for the, for the magazine, the dialist had suggested that he put some boat shoes on for the shot. And he looked at her like that was the craziest thing. the world that he would own a pair of boat shoes. So there's just like funny little little things that, yeah, you haven't got from him. But when you kind of think about it, it's like, oh, this makes sense. As a person who grew up down here, played golf down here, went to Florida State. Like the Florida of it all is very much a part of the sort of the low-key aspect. Also like his kind of criticism of some of the stuffier elements of golf, I think comes from really regarding himself as being very laid back, very, very pool.

about kind of just hanging out, except when he's on the golf course. I mean, you know, just once. Yeah, right. So I'm interested, one of the things that maybe it was deliberate, but it's also consistent with, you know, some of the persona that we've seen out of him in these moments of candor that are, you know,

sort of increasingly, increasingly frequent. Like he's kind of on a heater lately. But is the role of an outside. that it seems like, and this came through in the story, which is why I'm asking you about it, because of his relatively unique bursting upon the scene and the way that he developed his talent, which was, you know, he was a talented golfer

and, you know, played in college, but didn't go from college immediately on to tour, instead went to Europe. And he was not super dominant in high school or as a junior, he wasn't playing in the kinds of tournaments where he would be in proximity to other guys that are now on tour. And then, you know, leaving the country as, you know, a new graduate from college and going to Europe and touring around Europe had him necessarily not, you know, sort of in the circles

of other aspiring PGA professionals. And so his sort of return to the U.S. and his bursting on the scene with this enormous amount of incredible success and what feels like a relatively compressed time frame. He has, you know, he gives off this vibe of, you know, sitting on the outside of the inner Gulf sanctum with one eyebrow raised. Is that accurate? Did you encounter that with him?

Yeah, definitely. And there's something interesting. This kind of goes to the, the slight contradictions where he very much has that. I think I said in the piece like when I was with him, he talks so much about basketball and football and baseball and those other sports and really talking about the athleticism of the kind of golf he wants to play, that it reminded me of, you know, happy y'emores.

I'm a hockey player, but I'm playing golf today sort of thing where it's like, well, you know, you're not, you're not actually that. Like, this is the sport that you're the number one player in the world that, but it kind of can't totally, you know, deal with that yet. And that's kind of interesting. At the same time, I remember reading pieces a few years ago when he first emerged on tour, where he was saying things like, in my mind, I'm already in that group with Jordan, Rory, and Jason, even though I'm not in it, nowhere near it yet. Like, he had this sort of irrational confidence. As you mentioned, he wasn't a dominant junior player. He played a Florida State, but

it's not like he was, you know, the consensus number one all-American or anything like that. And so he has this combination of, you know, kind of being that outsider and maybe a chip on his shoulder from not having that success, but also having that irrational confidence. I mean, even just we were talking about, but not a lot, I hadn't seen a lot about his high school days. And I was asking him, like, when he kind of first knew that he could be a dominant player. and he really wasn't winning junior tournaments even. And yeah, I don't know if you remember Ty Tryon who turned pro when he was 16. He was a poor kid.

And he was looking at Ty Tryon being like, oh, that's what I want to do. Like, then I can skip college and just go straight to the PGA tour. So this was like a young kid. It wasn't winning junior tournament, but was, you know, had planned out this route without even going to college. So there's this funny combination of, again, like being almost like the ultimate insider, which is like I can take this inside track and kind of beat beat golf while also maintaining that credibility of not just like we were talking about of the kind of outsiderness as an athlete, but in the piece, we spent a lot of time talking about other golfers, other pro golfers and how, you know, he says, he was kind of proud of the fact that he doesn't really hang out with those guys at, you know, Tiger's restaurant, the woods, or a square grouper and in Jupiter, those places where, you know, a lot of these guys will post pictures from once they win and come back to Jupiter or whatever.

Like he really likes that sort of separateness. And I think that it probably fuels him a little bit. I mean, like, it's not in the story, but I remember he was telling an anecdote where, like, his worst nightmare was like, would be being in a sharehouse where, like, he would come in from the round and, like, talk about the course with, like, some of the guys who's competing with. You know, like, it's very important to him to be, like, very separate from that. And, you know, when he goes to major, he gets a house and it's a very small group of people is Caddy Ricky Elliott, his girlfriend Jenna, maybe one or two reps or something like that.

But it's very different than some of those guys who, you know, maybe pile into a big, big house to share costs or whatever. And I found that really, really interesting. And maybe, you know, that's part of the secret of the majors, even. He mentioned they even started bringing a personal chef. with them on those sorts of things. And I found that interesting, just that sheer, like, focus of, I'm really not interacting with these other players. Yeah, I'm interested in, in, uh, one aspect of that, which is,

there is kind of a fine line between the, the swagger that he, uh, unmistakably gives off and that he, he exudes. He's clearly confident. He shows confidence. And, um, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and I, this is not a Joe House word. This is more of a sort of traditional golf media kind of thing where there are folks wonder aloud whether or not Brooks is carrying around and arrogance.

And arrogance doesn't necessarily have to be a bad word in this context. It could be in the same as swagger. But, you know, when he's out there naming names, like he's called out Bryce and Deschambo, he called out Patrick Reed. you know, he was asked about slow play in the context of playing with J.B. Holmes, and he was, you know, quite candid. He didn't say J.B.'s name, but he definitely was candid in sharing his views on the impacts of slow play and how little enthusiasm he has for it. Do you think that it's deliberate for him, you know, with this swagger slash kind of arrogance and his own standing amongst that group? I have to imagine it is. It reminds me, I'm sitting here smiling as you say all that stuff because it does seem, it's such a rare thing in golf.

And yeah, that's the sort of stuff that gets me excited about him is that he, I really think, again, like he's sort of like, how can I make this a little more like basketball or something? You know, this guy who loves the NBA. And that's the sort of thing that you can imagine, you know, sort of his favorite players in the NBA doing and the way that, you know, when he talks about, athletes that he that he models himself after worship. I mean, our reporting was kind of later in the fall. And we talked a lot about Kobe and just the way that there was so much sort of internal

focus. But when the time came to say something or speak up, and from that platform, you know, that was the way to do that. And I don't know, there's just something about that that I find very refreshing and to kind to have people finally bigging up a little bit. You know, we'll see how, what kind of effect it has. But it's important when, I think that he probably, as he would say, like, what's feeling all these things for a while, but just kind of nobody was asking about it.

Because when you're, you know, before you're a guy who's won four majors, you know, maybe they're less interested in some of those, some of those things and want you to tow the tour line a little bit more or whatever. but I find it very very kind of refreshing to have a little more conversation going on about things like that. Yeah, for sure. And it's the point you make is exactly the right one, which is you don't really hear it from other guys. There are not a lot of other guys out there calling out names. Or, you know, responding to questions where players are named and, you know, giving a candid answer in response to that. I'm going to let you go in a minute, but I have one thing that I absolutely

positively need to hear about, which is you're a golfer. You grew up playing competitive golf in high school, and you mentioned in the story that you were able to get out to the golf course just to sort of catch him in his element, you know, getting a little practice in by playing. Did you have your sticks with you? I had them in the car, but I wasn't going to I wasn't going to impose myself on that practice round for him. Okay. It was pretty great. It was pretty great, though, to be able to, you know, obviously we all see these guys from

outside the ropes or get a close look, but it is kind of fun to really be right on top of it like that and go holes and watch him on the range. But no, it didn't get to play directly with him, but got to see him. He joined up with his brother happened to be the course that we were at. got to watch them play a little friendly match together. Yeah, you mentioned that. I was hoping that you got him to rate your swing. I was hoping you got some books, Kepka feedback,

because you know that he'd tell the truth. He definitely would. It's a great story. It's in the March issue of GQ magazine, available online and at newsstands everywhere. Danny Riley, I'm going to let you go, but in the same way we've been talking about the duality of Brooks, you have a whole other persona, a whole other professional interest,

and that is, as a novelist, you have a book coming out. That's right. So it's magazine stories and these books. And so the new novel is coming out in a couple months here. It's called Barcelona Days from Little Brown, and it's a fairly different world than professional golf in southern Florida. But hopefully, if you like what you read, you'll check that out soon. What's it about?

You're allowed to say? Oh, sure. Yeah, yeah. It's about some young Americans in Barcelona who get stuck there when, do you remember that Icelandic volcano that went off and kind of trapped people for a little while in Europe a few years ago? And so kind of premised on that, but it's about kind of late 20s relationships and these four Americans who kind of are trying to figure out their lives and blowing things up a little bit. Oh, I love it. And if you had known that you were going to interview Brooks Kepka, you could have maybe gotten some research for him because he did spend some time. That's right. The Americans in Europe, it's a favorite topic of my. Maybe that is what ultimately was the difference maker for Brooks is he has a little, he has a little flavor from those years abroad.

Well, there we go. Daniel Raleigh, the next time you write about golf, you have to come on again. Yeah, yeah. Thank you, House. I really appreciate this. This was a lot of fun to do. Thanks, buddy. Talk to you again soon. All right, there we go. Thank you, Danny Riley.

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platform, this collaboration between Action Network and the PGA Tour. And we're also going to get some picks on the Arnold Palmer invitational with our boy, Jason Sobel. But before we get over there, I want to talk to you about Nobu Los Cabos. Nobu Hotel Los Cabos, the first Nobu Hotel in Mexico, the 200-room property, seamlessly blends contemporary Japanese minimalism with locally sourced natural Mexican materials and finishes. Gessonobu Hotel Los Cabos have access to two exclusive golf courses designed by golf legends.

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Call 8664-8-8-5-7-5-99. All right, my par-saving pals now on the T. From the Action Network, he's also a contributor to SiriusXM PGA Tour and Sirius XM Fantasy. Jason Sobel, what's happening, buddy? Life is good. I'm doing well. If we're now on the T, I always take two off the T.

So I get a first one if I duck hook it, right? you are at home. This is exactly, we are all about a breakfast ball just to get ourselves situated. There we go. Speaking of breakfast ball, I feel like I might need to grant you a mulligan because, first of all, that's way too many dumb golf jokes. But this, this just announced collaboration between Action Network and the PGA Tour in this co-rated collaboration.

and golf bet. You were on this show like a month ago. We were talking golf betting and there was, you didn't give any hinting. There was no hints. But it obviously had to have been in the works.

It was definitely the work. It's funny. I've had people come up to me and let the Arnold Palmer Instational today. And I've had a bunch of people come up to me saying, did you know this was happening? I'm like, yeah, I know what happened. I knew it happened for a long time.

Of course I knew. And I was trying not to drop any hints, maybe some subtle ones. But yeah, it's a great move for us. A great move for the PJ Tour. It's an even better move. I'm going to sound like a press release here, but even a better move for golf fans out there and betters

and people that want to be more informed about the game. It just means more data, more information, more content, both on our site and the PGA Tour site, work together. So golf bets can be really, really good. So help me understand. What is it? It's a great question.

Basically, it's a content sharing platform where we're going to keep doing what we do except more of it and more on their space as well and they're going to be sharing stuff with us as well. So basically we'll put together sort of an all-encompassing platform where if you want to bet every day and very soon, very, very, very soon, every shot out on the PGA tour, we're going to be out here watching everything that goes on. We're going to be able to help people who want to have all action on stuff. And as I always say, I told you house last time, even if you don't want action, even if there are people out there that say, I like golf, I just don't want to put my money on it.

fine. You know what? I think it makes you more personally invested. What's going on? I think it gives you more of an interest in day-to-day going on on the PGA Tour. Like we said last time, there are four days a week. Every seven, there's a PGA Tour event going on. It's really fun to sweat some golf. But even if you're just a golf fan, it makes you smarter about what you're watching. So in the first place, it will be a source of information. And you'll be able to access it from both Action Network and from the PGA Tour.

Will they be buttons on both sites? Correct. Yeah. I don't know that all of our content will be on their site. All of their content will be on our site. But yeah, it's going to be a collaborative effort between the two of us. And like I said, it's just all good things, all good things. And, you know, quite honestly, I think they wanted to get into the gaming space. I don't know if they wanted to do it themselves. They want to farm it out a little bit.

So we form this partnership where we're working with a BGA tour. And it's really progressive from them. I don't think this is happening. In fact, I know. wasn't happening a year ago. They were not ready to get into this. In fact, they are now. They see the benefits of getting fans more invested in what they're watching, more engaged.

It's a really good thing moving forward. Well, as you know, and in fact, you just documented in a great story that's on Action Network right now that everybody should go check out about this most recent weekend at the Honda Classic, you had a pal in town. you have an annual convening of pals, and you wrote in heartbreaking detail about the personal relationship that we gamblers, people that have a little skin in the game, even DFS, you know, if you have entering daily fantasy lineups,

the personal relationships we develop with the players on tour competing in the events and the up close and personal interaction that you and your buddy had with Brennan Steele last week, right? So I've been out here for 16 years. I've never had a more fun piece that I've written. I've probably written better pieces. This is more fun to write than anything I've ever done. Basically what it was, a buddy of mine came down playing a golf tournament

for the weekend of the Honda Classic. And I'm buddies with Brendan Steele. I was walking with him during the program on Wednesday afternoon. I said, hey, by the way, you got any extra tickets? My buddy's coming down. Yeah, yeah, here you go. So I texted my friend. I said, hey, Philly just gave me a few tickets.

So you're all set for the weekend. And he texted back immediately $100 on Brennan Steel outright to win at 100 to 1. And so he knew he was coming. We were going to sweat it the whole weekend. Didn't know how much we'd be sweated, but still made a really good run at it. He was leading after two rounds. He was one back going into the final round and came really close, finished the share of fourth place.

But, man, it was a cool sweat. I documented everything. So it's on Actionnetwork.com. The Action Network app, you want to check it out. So up there, like I said, about the most. fun thing I've ever been able to do out here on PJ tour as far as something that I wrote, really bringing a firsthand experience to the users out there. Yeah, but that's what Golf Bet represents in terms of the opportunity here,

in terms of, you know, the kind of information that the tour will be sharing, that Action Network will be sharing, where you can identify some longer shot guys, you know, and try and create this idea of value. and I know you have your Arnold Palmer invitational entry up on the site right now and that it begins with this idea of value. But this is, I think,

if, now let me ask this question, golf bet is just going to be information, right? You can't also from the site go and attempt to place bets. Is that correct? You will not be able to place bets, but we do have affiliates where you go kind of through us and click on to the affiliates and place bets through there.

So there is that. You can't place bets, but we will, yes, we'll give you the information. And fairly soon we're going to have a whole lot of data up there as well, I think. I think that's going to happen in the very near future where you say, hey, look, I want to listen to the stove, I want to those other guys, I want to make my own decisions. You want to pour through the data. You want to pour through the numbers and stats. We're going to have that available on our site as well.

Well, one of the things that I'm excited about, and this also fits the story with your past, is a couple things. In the first place, this feels like we are ushering in the kind of golf gambling menu that we only get four times a year at the majors. And really, the biggest gambling major menu is at the time of the masters where there's a whole variety of things that if you're interested in gambling on golf, you can gamble on whether or not there's going to be a hole in one, what the lowest score will be. All those kinds of things are only right. now available in the majors, but I'm really looking forward to that menu expanding and that ought to build some interest, but also included in that is the idea of the each way bet, which is

popular in Canada and Europe and not available with any of the books that I mess with domestically. And also some live bet opportunities, both of which the Each Way bet and a live bet, and a live bet opportunity might have helped your boy hedge a little bit with steel on the back nine. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like if you're looking at 10 grand, there's a hedge out there on a 10 grand bet. Yeah, that would have been really nice. Again, I'm pumping out some more content here, but I did a Q&A with Jeff Sherman, who's at

golf odds on Twitter. He's fantastic. He's the manager of risk management, VP of Risk Management at the Superbook USA. I did a Q&A with him. I said, you know, where's the future of golf betting? He said very soon,

basically right now, the Masters is sort of like a playoff game in any other sport. And, you know, the weekly events are kind of the regular season games. Very soon, weekly events could look like playoff games, and the Masters looks like the Super Bowl. And I think that's what we're inching towards gradually right now.

And we're getting there pretty quickly. So like I said, I think there's going to be way more live betting options very soon. I would love to see each way betting available here in U.S. books. I would love to see. We talked about last time. I want to be able to fade guys. I want to be able to short guys.

If you don't like a guy going into an event, I want to do matchups, not just the one or two guys that you find in your book against that guy, but I want 100 matchups against the guy if I really don't like him on a given week. I think that could be something that has a ton of value to bettors out there. So, again, we're getting there. We're in the process of it. I think we had this pot three years, five years from now, not even that far down the line.

It was like, you remember a time when if you had to bet against a guy in a PJ tour event, there was only one other guy you could take him against. That was ridiculous. We are really in the rudimentary stages right now of what golf betting is and is becoming, and it's going to get much bigger. This is not going to stay stagnant for much longer. Yeah,

the legendary make the cut and miss the cut parlays that are going to be available through this. It's just going to be so much fun. The whole cottage industry of cut sweat and everything along those lines. I want to talk about the API, the Arnold Palmer invitation, will get your feelings. It is in your backyard. But before we get there, I just have to make one last plea. Can we, on this collaborative information platform, figure out some way that doesn't make the guys feel self-conscious or, you know, discloses any confidences?

can we get an injury report of some kind, something that just says like when guys, like the last time somebody had a knee surgery or something. We have, because the fact we heard just a few weeks ago, Brooks Kepka played the Genesis and complained on Thursday that his knee hurt more than any time other than when he had the surgery. And that would have been good.

good information to know if you were somebody invested a little bit in Brooks that week. I think that as far as we'll get is so-and-so had surgery and he's out for four to six weeks. I think that that's a very good possibility in the near future that, you know, if a guy isn't playing golf, that he will be on some injury report. I can't see, though, where a player shows up Monday afternoon at the tournament, registers at the tournament, and there's a line on his registration that says injury status. And the guy says, well, my elbow kind of hurts this week. I'm going to play, but, you know, I don't feel great.

I just don't see them giving up sort of that sort of personal information. And quite frankly, I don't know if the surgery type injury reports really help you because if the guy's not playing that week, you're not betting on him anyway. And so if Brooks Kepka has knee surgery and he's out for two months, you're not making a bet on Brooks Kepka, you know that he's out. And so Brooks saying, hey, my knee's hurting. more than it had in the past. Boy, that would really help you on Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday when you're going into the event.

I just don't envision us finding out that information without guys like me out here talking to 120, 140, 156 players in the field and finding out the injury status of every single guy, which, quite frankly, is absolutely impossible. Sobel, but that's what I'm asking for. I mean, this collaboration has to be helpful in terms of building out of, additional resources. I mean, let's, let's, we can split it up. Each, each, uh, journalist gets 10 guys. Anyway, I understand. And I, but I do think through an information platform like this, to the extent that, um, there is information, this happens quite a bit with Jason

day where he's always candid. And this is one of the things I admire about him. He, people give him a hard time because he's often, uh, in some kind of physical distress, but he also does disclose it in, in kind of real time. and lets you go ahead and navigate around him appropriately. Well, without a coach or without a trainer, really, I mean, in the NBA, the trainer will check out a guy at the morning shoot-around, and he'll say, you know, this guy's questionable for tonight. Hopefully, if, you know, his ankle looks better when they get there at the game,

you know, hopefully he'll give it a go, whereas it's all opinion, basically, out here. So Jason Day is a guy who you're right. He's very upfront, very honest about what's hurting him, what's ailing him at the moment. And Jason Day would probably consider himself questionable on any given week just because he's a little more pessimistic than other guys, whereas other guys might have the same injury or something worse and say, yeah, I'm fine. Don't worry about me. I'll be fine. I'm playing this. Okay.

Well, we'll just, we'll agree to have it a work in progress. I mean, it's just information. All we're after at the end of the day is any unique information that might help, because this is such splitting hairs. as as everybody knows who reads your columns on the Action Network and building DFS lineups and what we try and do here on Fairway Rowland, which is trying to give out a couple winners. I want to talk about the API and begin with this week in Tiger Woods. Tiger, Tiger, Tiger. And this week in Tiger Woods, he's not playing the API.

He's not playing. I don't pick them this week. How does that sound? It's a great call by you. can see this collaboration with the tour is already paying off. Just real quick, what is the word? Your boots on the ground there with, you know, the tour machine. The players is next week and the indications are that Tiger wants to be ready for the players

and for the match play event before the Masters. What's the sentiment on the ground about Tiger? Well, first things first, before he didn't commit last week and when we were still kind of up in the air as to whether Tiger would play this week. I remember telling someone, if he commits, that means that last year when he said he had a little bit of a neck injury and didn't play here

last year, after being an eight-time champion, that, you know, okay, he really had an injury. If he didn't play last year and came back this year, it really was something that was bothering him a year ago. Instead, if he wasn't going to play this week, then that just means, I don't know that he's ever

playing the Arnold Palmer and Citational again. I just don't know that it's on the schedule. Based on where it sits in the schedule right now. And they're going to change things up a little bit next year. It was reported that Honda's going to move after the players' championship. But I don't think that helps Tiger's chances of playing the API at all because the API is still going to be one week ahead of the players' championship. I just don't know that we'll see him back here.

And maybe ceremonially in a few years when he's up there a little bit of age and wants to reminisce a little and come back here and relive those old memories. But I'm just not sure we see Tiger back here. So, yes, he wants to get ready for the players. Yes, he wants to get ready for presumably the matchplay. But honestly, he wants to get ready for the Masters. They had a teleconference call as they do every year with the Masters champion last Tuesday. And Tiger outright said, I need to get myself ready for the Masters.

And that's the foremost thing on my mind right now. And according to him, the Arnold Palmer Invitational is not going to get him ready for the Masters. And it's hard to argue with him. I mean, obviously, it worked in past years when he won here and went to the Masters and played really well. last year didn't play here and won the master. So how are you going to argue he should come back here this year and try to play and try to give it a go and maybe packs his body a little bit too much before he gets to Augusta in April?

Right. And we are at this juncture of his career where he has to be so selective because even when he is in shape and in form, he experiences fatigue. And, you know, we saw it at the president's cup. He was out there kicking ass on Thursday. and Friday and had to completely shut it down on Saturday so that he could participate in the single match on Sunday. I mean, I think that is just a sheer function of the numbers game.

That is Tiger Woods potential schedule on tour now, right? Yeah, absolutely. And for as much as we would love to see him come to the Arnold Palmer invitational this week and win this event, and go play the players and play well. and then go play Tampa where he finished second place a couple of years ago. And then play a few more and get into the Masters with a whole bunch of starts under his belt. We as fans, we as people in the game would love to see that. I just don't think, first of all, it's feasible.

And secondly, if you want to see Tiger go out and try to defend his Master's title, the best way for him to do it is take some rest and take some weeks off and not be playing right now and be ready for the Masters because you don't want a tired tiger, a worn-out tiger. a worn out tiger going to Augusta. Obviously, that's not going to work well for him. No, and we know what that looks like. We saw it at the PGA championship last year

where he didn't have any time at all to recover after the Masters win. And it was enormously draining, physically, emotionally, spiritually. So that's not a knock. But, you know, we know what it looks like when he's fatigued. I think the same was true of the Open Championship.

I think, you know, he'd done some worldwide international travel and he was having a hard time getting his body, clock synced up even though he was he did a uh i don't remember his instagram post or something about setting his alarm clock but um in any event okay so i i we're on the same page we want tiger healthy and at the height of his powers for the masters and if the price that we have to pay in the meantime is seeing him in in some regular tour events that he's previously put his stamp on i'm willing to pay that price because i want to see him perform well uh at the majors Speaking of performing well and kind of streaky behavior, though,

I want to talk about the fact that the international players have won each of the past four of these events. And we're in this kind of international moment right now because a whole bunch of guys from the international team at the President's Cup. Yeah. In December, keep kicking ass on tour this year, including Sung J.M., who just won the Honda, a handful of days ago. So what are you expecting? He's unbelievable. I am kicking myself for not having anything on him.

I've had him in lineups for a year now. How did we miss? I'm right there with you. A little bit on S.J. He's a bomber. He's a killer. And to his great credit, speaking of. of guys in the numbers game and he plays every tournament that's available if there's a golf tournament

on the calendar a professional golf tournament he's in it he's plays the most rounds of anybody he doesn't have a home seriously i that's right he doesn't have a home he doesn't live anywhere you know where you live he lives he lives wherever the tour is playing that week and he goes and stays in a hotel and then he goes to the next event and he lives there for a week that's unbelievable to me i mean i as a guy who's out on the road following the pGA tour right 15 to 18 times a year, I'm telling you, when you get back home, there's nothing like you. You get to sleep in your own bed. You get to see your friends.

You get to just be away from the game a little bit. I love not being on the road after doing this for so long. I love being on the road, but I love being off the road as well and being at home. And the fact that he doesn't even have a home because the guy just wants to go out and play golf every single week is really, first of all, impressive. Secondly, it goes to show. And I think a lot of young players today, a lot of the 21, 22, 23-year-old, up-and-coming superstars, tend to look at the blueprint set by Tiger, by Rory, by guys who are very selective in their schedules.

And they say, look, you've got to get your downtime and you can't go out there every single week. Maybe now some of these young guys look at Sungay and they say, you know, the more events you play, the more chance you have it winning. And it's just a numbers game. And Sungay might have looked at if he was playing a selective schedule. And I said, you know, the Honda, it's leading into a big stretch. It's always windy there.

and I don't know if I want to, you know, go after it that week and tax my body. And he very well, if he was being more selective like other guys his age who are really good players out here on tour. He might have said, you know, I'm going to skip it and move on and he wouldn't have won that golf tournament. But instead, going out there every week gives yourself a chance. And he took that chance and he ran with it. And he's now a PGA tour champion. And I wouldn't be surprised to see him win one or two more times for the rest of the year as well. Yeah, I am in the exact same position as you.

And you hit on the sort of the key factor, which is his age. He's only 21. And, you know, living this kind of on the road lifestyle, that's definitely a young man's game. And I, from the stories that I've seen about him living this lifestyle, he has his parents, you know, support. I don't know how much they actually are traveling with him from venue to venue. But I know I've seen stories that suggest he has decent infrastructure. and that he's just grinding. You know, it's just he's singularly focused.

He recognizes that this is an opportunity for him at this stage of his life, and he's just happy grinding. So that's what he does. Yeah, and at some point, he's going to say, look, I need a break. At some point, the guy's going to get tired. He looks like an absolute machine right now. First, the number of events he plays. And secondly, the swing looks like an iron, iron.

It looks like he's just out there with the exact same swing every time. he hits the ball. But at some point, you grow up a little and he say, look, I want to live somewhere. I don't want my parents around all the time. You know, we all get to that point. We're like, hey, it's time to, you know, fly away from the nest a little bit. He's certainly got enough money to go do whatever he wants to do now. And you would think you'd get away from it at some point a little bit. You know, now that you can set the schedule he's in every major championship, every WGC. And that's really, that's a big nut for a lot of these guys out here. It's not just the check that comes with winning.

It's not just the prestige and the trophy. It's being able to set your schedules, being able to say, all right, well, now I can go wherever I want, whenever I want, and play the tournaments where the big boys are playing. And the fact that he's going to go out presumably, and maybe he changes his strategy now based on the fact that he's won, but presumably keeps playing every single week. Again, he just gives himself more chances. and if his body can take it and his mind and his heart are still into it, then more power to him.

Yeah, that's exactly right. All right. Let's talk about some guys that you like for this week. It's a packed field, notwithstanding Tiger not being part of it because the guys, the euros are all here now for this run from the players championship next week up through the Masters. So we have the potential for great international fields, plus all the U.S. guys.

Who are you looking at for the Arnold Palmer Invitational? Well, first of all, before I get into it, Rory's going to wreck all our cards, isn't it? I mean, Rory is five to one, five and a half to one in a field of 120 players. He's just very, very well going to win this golf tournament. He's selling so well. He's got six straight top five finishes around the world. And, you know, if you're playing DFS lineups, absolutely throw them in there and then try to get a couple of cheaper guys to balance it out later in the lineup. But I can't bring myself to bet on the guy

who's five to one, five and a half to one. Maybe guys out there that are betting big money on events and can have a little return on investment can go out there and say, hey, look, I think he's going to win. And even at those short odds, I'm still going to take them. But I'm starting the card a little bit deeper. I love Bryson Deschambeau. I think Bryson's about to go on a run. I spoke with him for about 15 minutes after he finished in fifth place at Riviera a few weeks ago. And he said, look, I put on about 25 pounds of muscle in the offseason. We all know that. He said almost immediately I was hitting my drives much further than I ever had before,

which is great. That was the whole reason I did this. But my wedges weren't where I needed them to be. And my short game was not the way I had been playing it for the last few years out here on tour. And so it took him a while to get dialed in with the short game. But he told me after Rivieri, he goes, I got it now. I finally got it dialed in the next week, finished runner-up in Mexico, had a chance to win that one.

Got knocked back at the stretch, down the stretch by Patrick Reed, who won that golf tournament. But a fifth place and a second place finish for Bryson in his last two starts, he was runner-up here a couple of years ago to Rory, so he's got some good history at this event. Like Bryson a lot, I like Hideki Matsuyama, another guy trending in the right direction, six or better in his last two starts. He's never missed the cut here at the API. two guys who, quite frankly, I'm looking for them to build on those good recent trends and maybe go into Augusta as guys who aren't necessarily favorites,

you know, aren't way down the board, but aren't favorites of guys that we could bet at Augusta, and we have a good feeling about going into that one. And then I look a little bit further down because each of the last three winners of the primary events, take out Victor Hovlin in Puerto Rico, because he was the favorite there, and he won the primary event from the PJ Tour. So you had the Genesis where Adam Scott won. He was 30 to 1 pre-tournament. You had Mexico, Patrick Reed was 40 to 1.

And last week, Sung J.M. at the Honda, he was 30-to-1. So there's a little sweet spot there. It's these guys that are kind of 10th to 15th on the odds board coming in, certainly names that you know, but not necessarily the favorites in the field. And so I'm looking in that area, and the guy that I look at that I really like this week, again, with some course history finished runner up here last year, Matt Fitzpatrick. He's been good but not great this year.

expect him to have a really nice kind of Florida swing moving in towards the Masters. Again, another guy that I think can play well at the Masters. I'm not sure I go as far as to pick him to win, but DFS lineups, top five, top 10 bets. I like Matt Fitzpatrick a lot. And I'm picking him to win based on that recent trend that we've seen over the last few weeks. I like that. And I especially like it because you took the pressure off of me from having to take Bryson because Bryson is very high on my card also. I just didn't want to have to to confess it. All right.

I'm going to do my Calloway Golf Maverick driver pick of the week for the Arnold Palmer invitation. So Calloway knows Sobel, you can't create new distance by doing the same old, same old. It takes unconventional thinking to create something transformative, like picking a winner. And that's what Calloway did with this brand new Maverick driver. it has a flash face technology that was designed using advanced artificial intelligence. And the Maverick driver is off to a dominant start in 2020, helping Calloway lead the way as the number one driver brand across the major worldwide tours this year. Okay, so I liked both Bryson and Hadecki.

I'm glad you gave them out. Fitzpatrick is terrific value at what is he, would you say, 50 to 1? 40. 40 to 1. That's great. I'm looking at another guy at 40 to 1 that also fits a couple of the top line trend lines here, a guy that's a little bit off the beaten path just in terms of showing up on our golf radar screens, but has an impeccable resume here at Bay Hill. I'm going to go with Henrik Stenson. You haven't heard his name a ton because he's been playing in Europe and hasn't been over here

in the States doing PGA tour events, but he did just win Tiger's event down in the Bahamas in December, which suggests good form as the New Year arrived. And he had played in both Dubai and Saudi Arabia and was perfectly competent at both of those venues. The reason I'm taking him, he loves Bay Hill, he owns Bay Hill, five top tens in the last seven trips to Bay Hill. and, you know, a guy that you don't worry about if the wind picks up because his ball striking is always the thing.

And his experience there, he is not going to feel out of place if we get weird wind like what occurred at the Honda last week. And by weird, I just mean intense. It's not weird that it's windy at those venues sometimes. I just mean, you know, it was a little unexpected and it changed directions over the course of the four days. So if that happens here at the API, Henrik can handle it. What do you think about Hendrik Stenson? I hate that pick because I'm totally on the same page with you. And this is going so wrong so far because you and I are just agreeing on everything.

And that can't be good. I like him. I haven't picked him to win or necessarily the top five. He's my favorite matchup that I'm already on record. My favorite matchup this week, Henrik Stenson plus money against Jason Day. We mentioned Day earlier. He's got all these ailments. He can't put for more than half an hour at a time because it hurts too much.

And, you know, he's actually played okay this year. He's only played three times. He's got a 16th place finish, a fourth place finish, then missed the cut in his last start. But, you know, a little inconsistent. I know Day has played well here, but Henrik Stenson plus money in that matchup to me is a really, really nice matchup for him. So, yeah, I'm on the same page with you. I really like Henrik Stinson based on the course history.

And a lot of people look at him and say, well, another foreign guy, you know, a guy from Sweden coming over here to the States. This is a home game for Henrik. He lives over at Lake Nona, has for a long time. So the fact that he can just roll up here in his own car, park right in a lot, sleep in his own bed. I think that really helps him. And it has over the years.

I think that is a perfect way for all of our Eagle enthusiasts out there. Try and build some lineups. Those are some names that aren't necessarily not chalk names. Rory is the chalk name. And if you have to have something on Rory, wait till, the live odds market. Do something a little bit longer shot. Pick a guy in that 40 to 50 range. And then if Roy is just going to kick everybody's ass, go ahead and bite the bullet, cover your bet with a live bet on Saturday or Sunday morning. Maybe that's a strategy out there for all the

birdie buddies. Jason Sobel, always a pleasure. His Twitter at Jason Sobel, S-O-B-E-L-T-A-N, the Action Network, right? So at Jason Sobel T-A-N. Thank you for coming on, buddy. We're going to keep an eye out for some of the very first entries here on Golf Bet. We're very excited. Thanks so much House. Golf bet's going to be awesome. You and I are either going to win big or we're going to lose big together this week because we're on the same page

with everything. Best of luck to tell everybody out there on a little bit of R.O.I. All right, my par saving pals. There you go. My thanks to Daniel Riley and Jason Sobel. We are back next week. We're going to recap the API. We're going to preview the players championship. I think I'm going to have an actual live human player on the pod next week. Megan

Schuster is ready. Golf Social has been building her triumphant 2020 debut with Golf Social. That's next week. And we have a giveaway. You're going to have to listen to the next week's show. It's something Maverick. It has to do with bombs. If you want a Maverick that hits bombs, you have to listen to next week's show. We're going to do a massive Maverick giveaway. way. Until next week, my eagle enthusiast, let's hit them straight out there.