Fairway Rollin' - Rickie Fowler on the Olympics and Love for Stewart Cink

Episode Date: April 21, 2021

House and Hubbard have recovered from their Masters hangover to talk about the latest in the golf world. They give a little love to Stewart Cink after the RBC Heritage (01:17) before they're joined by PGA pro Rickie Fowler to discuss his latest performance and the competition of the Olympics (33:10). Hosts: Joe House & Nathan Hubbard Guest: Rickie Fowler Producer: Steve Ahlman Engineer: Erica Cervantes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

friends and welcome to this golf podcast unlike any other. Oh yes, we have done it, my friends. We are back. This is Faraway Road. The Golf Podcast on the record podcast Network. I am your starter, Joe House, my par saving pals. What a show we have in store for you today. Straight on the heels.

of spring break. We got Ricky Fowler on this podcast this week, my Eagle enthusiasts. Of course, I'm joined by our PGA tour correspondent on the ground. Nathan Hubbard, we're going to talk about the postmaster's hangover, a little bit of Stewart's Sinklove,

and then maybe a couple picks for this Zurich team event. And then, and I mean, God bless, Ricky Fowler, unbelievable. The first T's wide open. Me and Nate are going to throw a peg in the, the ground and try and stroke something down the middle.

All right, Nate Dog. How you feeling, buddy? I got an egg salad hangover. How about you? Egg salad hangover. Well, I will confess, I on the heels of that Masters, which was dramatically undramatic. It was dramatic and not dramatic. It wasn't dramatic.

It was dramatic. I still felt like I needed to recover. And I left the country. Whoa. Yeah. I went down to Mexico. My wife and I, we've been lucky enough. We were fortunate enough here in the DMV.

They've been pretty great about making vaccine available. We both got our shots. And we had not traveled as a family for, you know, like lots of families for over 20 months, almost coming up on two years, you know, going anywhere with the kiddos. They were like, we're just going to do it. We're just going to go. And we went down to Mexico and we went down to Myacoba. Did you swing the sticks down there?

I, yes. I mean, this was all an important part of my spring break, my recovery, my own recovery. House 2K21. Exactly. Now, it was just me and El Tucan. Me and everybody will remember, of course, Al-Tucan from his unbelievable stewardship of Matt Couture to a wind, Coutcher, not nearly thankful enough

for the hard work that El Tucan put in. But El Tucan was a wonderful companion. I can't say enough good things about the experience with him. If you go down there, my birdie buddies, please look him up. He is available. I saw him at the beginning of the week

and told him I wanted to play at the end of the week, so he made time for me. But man, he's got a lot of stories. Did you tip him? I tipped him extremely well, I believe. Not PGA Tour level well, but well by Joe House Staters. Well, it depends on which PGA Tour Pro we're talking about, obviously. He's still, you know, every year the tournament comes down and he gets, you know, top-notch guys.

He just had Johnny Vegas. And his guys are always top 15, top 20. Nice. He's putting in the work. Okay. How'd you recover over the last 10 days? I mean, I'm with you. I've been sort of thinking about where the season goes from here, getting over the

exiled hangover, obviously. But now we really do turn our attention to spring golf as we get ready for PGA ahead. And look, for me, this last week, you know, when we rolled in to this event last year, there was a lot of eyes on it because it was one of those first ones back and we were really focused on it. This is the RBC Heritage. Yeah, at Harbortown. You know, this year it felt like maybe there was a little bit less attention on it, even though the field was really strong.

But House, I mean, the craziest thing is we got a guy who's 47 years old who's got as many wins as beefy-ass Bryce and DeShambo this year. Only two guys on tour have to have two wins in this 2020, 2020, 2021 season. It's just as the golf gods, you know, when we sat down in September, when we did our card, we're like, oh, of course, it'll be Stuart Sink and Beefy Bryson was the low-hanging fruit, and Stewart Sink was like a million to one odds to be a guy with two wins on tour.

But that is this season, right? It is. I mean, we've had Sergio, we've had Brian Gay. We've had, you know, we got a lot of grizzled veterans who are just outlasting. Yeah, Martin Laird. A lot of the young guys on tour. Now, we've got to say, Stuart Sink has won this event now three times.

And this is a course that historically has a lot of winners like this. It ostensibly doesn't put as much of an onus on long hitting, and therefore it's about shot making. And Stuart Sink is leading the tour this year in Greens and Regulation. Now, he's also 26th and driving distance at 47 years old. What's happening? He's been talking a little bit about his swing and some of those. almost accidental changes he made working with a coach who saw, he's a tall guy who saw sort of

the plane of his swing and said, no, let me help you use the strongest muscles in your back. But this is a significant jump. And that driving distance is part of the reason why his approach game is so good. And he's hitting these greens because he's being accurate with those drives. He's got shorter irons in. That's how the thing works. It does sometimes start with the drive, even on a course like this that supposedly doesn't put a premium on quality driving. What did you see? I mean, let's just talk about that driver distance and the driver accuracy. Obviously, it's the equipment and the ball.

Like, there's no mystery behind it. I continue to be, and we keep threatening to get on this show and get somebody in that's really been on one side or the other of kind of the distance advocacy and the sort of status of equipment. And we should try and have that conversation before the governing bodies come down with their new guidance because there is going to be some kind of limitation restriction imposed in some form or fashion. It's pretty apparent. But I, he's got access to the same stuff everybody else does. He's just doing it better. Well, and, you know, this is the thing that that I personally like.

It has a kind of leveling the playing field effect. When you have a guy that's 47 years old, and we look at all of our sort of young heroes like Ricky Fowler, our guest today on the show, is 32 years old. He has 15 years if he wants to, if he's able to stay healthy, to continue to be as competitive as he wants to be. everybody that we you know you can't ride off anybody because it could be the case that a golf career now with the way the equipment and the ball is can be a 30 year career nearly right i mean

that that's pretty much the that's phil had a 30 year career and he didn't have the benefit of the great equipment at the beginning of his his career he just had the benefit of of an ungodly god gave him um physical talents physical flexibility to allow him to compete at a high level for all these years. But it's really, it's really amazing to see a 47-year-old guy playing like this, though, when you have this next generation of players that are all coming up, who had, you know, all of the video they could possibly want of their swing,

all of the data and analytics available to them. And nowhere was it more evident of the sort of dichotomy than Stuart Sink playing a final round with Colin Moracawa, right? who is the next thing. He hurt my feelings. Colomarcawa was a heavy favorite on Sunday to have a superior fourth round than Stuart Sink. And I thought we were going to get a little bit of Sunday drama out of Colin Warcawa coming out.

And he held up his end of the bargain on the first hole. He made, you know, it wasn't quite a bomb, but he made a birdie putt that like, you know, I was like, oh, good. He just put Stewart on notice that it's going to be a dog fight. And all I asked Colin to do over the course of that round was, you know, compete and then beat Stuart by a single stroke and he couldn't do it. But, you know, this is the classic thing that we always come back to. Golf is hard.

Golf is hard. And Colin lost a lot of strokes with his putter this week. With his putter. His first round was great. But the putter just wasn't there. And this is going to be his white whale through the course of his career because nobody strikes the ball better.

We talked about it. He had all of the benefits of video and analytics and everything coaching from an early age coming up and you see it in the swing. But man, when you're sitting over that four, five, six footer, all that's out the window. And he still struggles with that a bit for as great a golfer as he is.

Stuart Sink was calm, collected. He managed the last round. He made good. decisions. Obviously, I don't ever need to hear anything else about his relationship with his caddy son. It's been overdone. I get it. It's a cute story. But, you know, he really played that last round like a veteran. And that's a course that benefits guys who can think their way around a golf course. That's a, I mean, that's a fact. And that's what he did. Now, it helps to just go out and shoot 63, 63, the first two days. And then turn on autopilot. And I actually thank him for that.

meant that I didn't really have to watch a ton of golf over the weekend. Well, so that means one of the things that you missed was DJ's Sunday round then. Okay. Tell me about it. He picked up a brand new putter. Yeah. He shot 66 making 145 feet of putts. He's been a little off with that thing of late.

Yeah. Well, he missed the cut of the mother effing masters. Yeah. But I think as we look ahead to South Carolina, you know, we'll see him in Quayle hollow to be sure. That's going to be a really interesting, you know, signal for whether he found something with this new putter that he picked up on Sunday. But the reason that we talk about DJ here is there was a really interesting announcement this past week from the tour. Yes. So let me ask you this. Do you think, and let me go ahead and share the news. Obviously, deep golf nerds know what you're

talking about, but I'll let you go ahead and describe it. The tour announced. a $40 million bonus for the top 10 guys who, through a very complicated algorithm that basically incorporates how often they're on screen, their appeal on social media, the Nielsen Q scores, which are sort of generic measure of their influence with the public, that those guys are going to distribute an additional bonus of $40 million. So do you think that the time So part of the announcement included the fact that this was established January the first. The players have known about this since the beginning of the year, right? Yeah.

Even as Faldo was banging on Ricky Fowler for doing commercials, Ricky didn't even talk about it. But yeah, this has been, I think they may have retroactively set the date back there. I'm not sure that everybody knew about it from the first of the year. What I was curious about is the timing because it falls. right in the middle of this enormous fracas over in Europe having to do with the announcement and then apparent dissolution, abandonment of their super soccer league, super football, super whatever, a bunch of teams banding together to create their own league with its own television contracts and all the rest of it. And just like that in the course of a week, because of

it seems like the fan reaction, they've already abandoned it. Half the teams have already pulled out. House, that sounds a lot like the PGL, doesn't it? Indeed, which is why I'm putting to you, do you think the tour's announcement, this revelation by the tour of this $40 million bonus pool, was deliberately a shot at the PGL to remind everybody

as it relates to the game of professional golf, we are already in the place we want to be. We don't need no stinking PGL. We don't need to give, you know, have a separate marketing channel. Yes. I mean,

when you compare the top earning golfers to top earning athletes and other sports, in particular the ones who carry the ratings, on course, they don't get paid in the same way that athletes and other places do. And the reason the PGL got, a tiny bit of interest in momentum is just that. There's some guys there who are like,

look, I'm not getting paid what I'm worth. And is there a better system for paying me what I'm worth? Now, the tour, because it's a nonprofit, has some struggles to pay guys. You know, they don't have contracts with these guys. They can't architect it in a direct way, which is to say, Tiger Woods, you're going to be on salary for 30 mil, period, right? And you're not going anywhere. And then the next one guy. Except they could do that. They could. Well, I think it's a little bit harder.

I mean, the FedEx Cup was ostensibly a way to reward the guys who are playing the best with a big chunk of money down the stretch. Right. And that has been somewhat successful. But I think it didn't put the PGL to bed. And so this is another way to reward the guys who are most popular. And let's be clear that even though they're, you know, Tiger Woods may not see a golf course this year. Tiger Woods is going to be number one on that list. Ricky Fowler, you know, as we'll talk to him about, he's struggling with the game right now, working through it.

He's not going to be on a whole lot of leaderboards. He certainly hasn't been so far. Let's hope that he's going to be. But even if Ricky isn't on a lot of leaderboards, he's going to be in those standings. Bryson, for all his goofiness, is going to be in those standings, right? Do you think Justin Rose is going to be in there? I mean, I swear to I've seen more Justin Rose through the first part of this year on the commercials I'm talking about.

They have got to publish this because the guy who's 11th is going to, I just can't wait for the argument about the algorithms and the relative weighting of all these different things. And to see if some guys are like, all right, I got to do a couple commercials a year because that will push my overall money score up high enough and it's worth it to me because, you know, on average, you're going to make $4 million. It's like winning two majors. I will give you my reaction, and I'm interested in years. I thought $40 million felt a little light to me.

Me too. I have to be honest. Me too. I mean, it could be $100 million, couldn't it? We need to understand how it gets distributed and whether it's clustered at the top, like in the FedEx Cup, and then sort of there's little bits down the way, or if they evenly distributed. distribute it. That's going to be fascinating. I really want them to publish this because, I mean, you know, we just said his name, but the guy who's going to take this seriously and turn it into a fucking competition is Beefy Bryson. I mean, that dude is. Goes with what I saying. I promise you, he's going to have Jason Derulo on a TikTok in the next five days. What are they going to be doing, Nate? Who knows? Leg day, probably. Leg day. Exactly. Lord have mercy.

All right. Well, we are in this stretch now. Today is April the 21st. The next major commences on Thursday, May the 27th. So we have basically like a four and a half week little run here, five week run where everybody's catching their collective breath postmasters. And then we kind of ramp up. We have the Byron Nelson. We have Quill Hollow in there. I'm interested in getting your thoughts. on this very fun event down in New Orleans this week, the Zurich Classic. And I applaud the tour, the USPGA tour, for it seems like taking a hint, getting a, you know, taking a cue from the European tour and coming up with some different formatting and some different kind of approach to the entertainment aspect of professional

golf. Do you like this event? I do. I mean, look, my favorite team is Commander's Palace and Arnos down there. And like, I think that this is as much about the fun as everything else. Remember, in a normal year, this is one of the weekends of Jazz Fest. Oh my God, that's right. So you're down there and you're eating and there's music and, you know, you stumble in from a late night Tipitina's club show and you get on the bus and go see the golfers play and I don't know when you sleep. It's a really fun weekend when everything is totally open. If you look down the list of this field, you know, they got they got some guys at the top, but there's also some guys you don't normally see who get into the, get into this event because a lot of people rested out. But I love the way that they're thinking about

it. I love something that's not traditional with the teams. I do wish we had a little bit of a rider cup style thing where you just put like Cantlay and Xander as captains and they drag. raft people, but we'll take this as a start, won't we house? Yeah, they could definitely get there. There's no reason that they couldn't, you know, come up with some kind of even. What if we've got the eminences? Even if Tiger and Phil won't play, I'm sure you could come up with, Zurich can cough up a couple million bucks to get each of them go pick some teams,

don't you think? I mean, look, of all of the events that you and I want to get out and be at, really for non-majors, this would be the most fun. Because all we would do is... is go out and eat and watch a little golf. Like this as a spectator is a really fun place to have a golf tournament, even if the field isn't as strong as, you know, your standard major. And they know it.

I mean, they publish the Twitter feed is already resplendent with beautiful. I saw alligator sliders yesterday. Wow. Yeah. I mean, you know, they go all the way in. They know exactly what this is really made for you. I mean, I'm actually surprised you haven't been to this event. I'm trying to talk it up for you.

I've been invited in the past, and I just couldn't make the schedule work because of how approximate it just is so close to the Masters. But one of these years we'll get there. We're looking at some teams, but before we get to our selections, your brother's playing this week. He's playing with Sebastian Capelin from Denmark.

What's Sebastian's nickname? Well, Seabass. Seabass? He's not Cappy. Well, we should start calling him Cappy. All right. So how do Homo's Hobbs and Cappy know each other? Well, look, they're friendly through the tours over the years.

This year, Sebastian hasn't been able to get as many starts just because of all the guys playing tournaments. And so what you see through the field this week is a lot of guys who had entry into the tournament for sure, who picked up some guys who don't always get as many starts as a way. to give him a chance to do what they can up on, you know, on the big tour in these events. Sebastian is a, he's a tour member, but he's just outside. I mean, his FedEx Cup rank right now is 168. He's just outside that top 125 of guys who get into every tournament.

And so this is a way to sort of bring your buddy in and give him a chance to get some points. So what is your sense? How would you handicap? Because homeless just had a baby. I mean, it's not even, the baby's not even a month old yet, right? No, not even. Homeless is just a couple weeks in. He ducked home last week after a less than stellar performance in South Carolina to hang out with the baby. So I don't know. Sebastian's probably hoping that Ryan Palmer drops out so he can switch up and play with John Rom this week. That's rude. That's rude to homeless. Homeless deserves a baby bump. Well, he does. And it's going to come. Sure is Sunday.

you know. So the format for this, it's 80 teams start out and then the cut goes down to 35 teams and they alternate between 33 and ties, I think. 33 and ties. Okay. And they alternate between best ball and alternate stroke, right? Right. And so strategically, how do we then think about that? I mean, we need guys who can make a lot of birdies in the best ball format. Yes. I'm interested in two particular angles to this event. and this is influencing my wagering strategy. So in the first place, I love this undercurrent that I've seen in some of the stories of particularly rest of world players participating in a way as potential auditions for the President's Cup.

And there are three teams that fit this, right? So Sung J.M. and Ben-I.N. is one of those kinds of teams. Ustey and Schwartzel from South Africa. That's one of these combinations also. And then Mark Leishman and Cam Smith and the PGATor.com had a good story this week about Mark Leashman and Cam Smith in the 2019 President's Cup.

Ernie else froze him out. He froze him out. Ernie would not put Leash and Cam together because he had his analytics. He had his analytics. Now, look, they did have a lead. The rest of world team had a 10-8 lead going into the single. So you can't fault Ernie and his data logs.

But it did seem kind of natural that Leashman and Camp Smith on their own home turf and they had competed in the World Cup thing the previous year, again, in Australia and done very well. Yeah, I don't know how you say no to the mullet. I mean, that was, it didn't exist back then. Well, that could have been it. If he'd had the mullet, he might have got his way, Cam Smith. It's fair. But that team is absolutely going on my dance card.

I'm going to try and look up odds while we're talking. But I just love where both of them are in terms of their games. I agree. Cam Smith is for real now. Exactly. He's going to be competitive in every tournament. He was played great last week. He was hanging around the Masters.

And speaking of hanging around the Masters, Mark Leishman? Yes. Yeah, exactly. She snuck in on Sunday, but it was a backdoor top five for leash. No doubt. So, I mean, look, they are, they should be considered one of the very strong favorites. I doubt we're going to get odds that feel awesome. But listen, I don't want to bet on Thomas Peters and Tom Lewis, even though they're coming

over to do the same Rider Cup audition. Yeah, so they're 10 to 1, which is not great, Camp Smith and Leashman. Chalk does not win this golf tournament. There's been three iterations with this four. format and Cam Smith is one here paired with Jonas Blix was that that year yes yeah so that that makes sense but like yeah so it's it's guys out of nowhere your your wind show place are our guys way down the card we should be we should be fading zander and can't lay then I mean they're six to one so you that there's absolutely no return whatsoever run away from that yeah that's right so I have

obviously Leashman and Cam that's kind of a chalky pick. I'm looking at two things as informing my approach to this. One is relationship. Like, are these guys going to have fun together? Have these, do we know that these guys know each other? Do we think that they've competed before for money? You don't want any speith, Patrick pairings, is what you're saying. That's right. Definitely not, although that would be intriguing. And then form. Like, who do we just see? Who does my mind? I see rolling in Puts from all over the place. So I love on the great vibes tip,

I love Joel Damon and Atlanta Griffin. Yeah. I mean, you know they're going to have a good effing time. Why not? The concern I have with that team is, are they going to have too good of a time? It's possible.

I mean, Joel's been having a lot of fun since he won. I kind of wish he was playing with homeless hubs, but that's just me. I think, look, he and Lanto get on fine. I don't know that they're super boys. So I think they can be focused and play well. Well, I like Lantau.

He's in form in this 2020, 2021 season. He's got seven top 40s in 11 starts. And the particular thing that was compelling to me about this team, Lantau has won in Houston, Alabama, and Nashville. So there's something about this portion of the earth, this part of the world that that's clearly suits him. Ah, the geo, the geo debate. That's it. I mean, you know, it's an angle.

We're looking for angles, always Nate Dogg. Why not? You know, along that line, you know, two guys who are like that are Max Homa and Taylor Gooch. Okay. Interesting. And they are very good friends. If you remember in the last round at Riviera, Max was paired with Taylor. And Max will tell you that that was the best possible pairing he could have had

because he's friendly with the guy, really friendly with the guy. And it made it easy to navigate that last round. Didn't make it easy on the 18th put, but he kept his momentum and positivity into that playoff with Tony in one. So I didn't love

the way that Max played at the Masters, but neither did Max. And so I suspect that those two guys in their chemistry are going to carry well into this week. And look, I just talked about Tony Fienow, I mean, we're not suddenly, Tony Fienow was on a heater of near win. Second place finishes only a month and a half ago, you know, he almost won the Rive.

He's playing with Cameron Champ. I mean, the knock on those two guys is not that they can't make birdies. They make shitloads of bernies. It's just that they follow them with bogeys. So I feel like if they can sequence, they can ham and egg house like you and me, then this could be a team to really go out. And this is the kind of tournament that Fienau is going to win. Because then everybody will say, oh, it's not a real win.

Asterisk. Asterisk. Well, they're sitting there at 15 to 1. I know that, like, in featured group or whatever, that's the team that I want to see the most of. That one is, because they're going to annihilate. There's no reason for either one of them to tap the brakes, I don't think, right? They're going to, they're gunning for the flag on every single hole. I have another chemistry.

You have to, if you're. building lineups if you're able to do DFS or you're going to wager, you just could not participate in anything with this tournament and not have Scott Brown and Kevin Kisner on your dance card. They lost in a playoff in 2017. They've never finished outside the top 15 in this event, the three years they've competed in this event. But most importantly for those two guys, those two guys have been out hustling. They've been playing in cash games as a team for 20 plus years. So you got to roll with those boys. They know how to do it.

A couple other pairings that are worth looking at further down the dance card, Wyndham Clark and Eric Van Royan, you know, Wyom Clark shot a 63 in Phoenix. He has a tendency to make a lot of birdies. He makes a few mistakes every now and then. And look, we saw EVR play decently well in Austin the last time we saw him. So I really think he's starting to come into his own maybe a year later than we thought. But I don't hate that pairing

even if there isn't the massive friendship chemistry that we're used to. I could see a lot of solid alternate shot. Wyndham Clark hits the shit out of the ball. That's one of those pairings. It's like, how many words do you think those two guys have said to each other

on play? And maybe there's a funny story. Like, you know, this is the thing that's always interesting to me about the tour. Guys know each other. They have connections through agents, through endorsements, through all kinds of stuff that we're just not aware of of right windham clark from denver evr from south africa not a whole

lot of background overlap but but they definitely uh have some overlap in their life that brought this pairing to life so that's one of those to look at i don't hate fratellian streelman streelman great last like streelman can go on those runs where he makes five birdies in a row

fratelli does the same i love the guys who are capable of a lot of birdies but what sometimes fells them is those bogies on those holes because you know if if they sequence them right with their partner, they can really put up a number. Well, I, on that very point, and this is me rooting a little bit with my heart rather than my head, I absolutely will be rooting for Brandon Grace and HV3. Nice. We just watched Harold Varner. Loved the HV3 back to a second last week.

His ass off at Harbor Town. He putted his ass off. And that has been the thing historically that's held him back because we know about his ball striking. Grace is an obviously good form. He won in Puerto Rico, you know, as an alternate field event up against a WGC earlier this year, and has top 30s at like the API at Arnold Palmer. And I think he did it also at the Honda. I'm not positive, but definitely in form. I like riding a hot hand for an event like this. So those guys are getting a little tickle from me. Well, is there anybody at the top of the board who you feel like we really need to look at?

I mean, there's a lot of hype around the Watson and Schaeffler pairing a little bit of talk around Brendan Todd and Chris Kirk. We've been on Chris Kirk for a while. He's really back playing great, which is good to see. Rahman Palmer, of course, the defending champs. Does any of that make sense to you? Or do you just stay away because they're going to be at Commander's Palace the night before? And like, this is not about chalk. I don't think that there is any value whatsoever in any of those names, but I do expect Rahm and Palmer

to be top 10. Like I'll try and find a top 10 for them where that's better than it'll be better than even money, but probably not much better than even money. Rom's got the baby bump thing happening too. Maybe he's, he might be out at patios all night just trying to burn it off.

His Sunday at the Masters was awesome. Like he gave us a, because he shot what he's shoe six under that really felt like it could have been 10 under. And I mean, because there was very makeable. I think he made par on 13. It was not a difficult 600.

No, no. So it was like a reminder of what he brings to the table. And Palmer quietly had a good master's going and then had kind of a crappy Sunday, I think. But Palmer's quietly been informed this 2020, 2021 season. So I'm looking forward to it. I'll have, I'll come up with something. I'll go run out and get the DMV version of a Ben-Yea and watch some of this over the weekend. I'm in with you.

Well, that's it. Let's jump over and talk to homeboy Ricky Fowler, very kind to make his inaugural appearance here on Fairway Rowland. All right, my buddy buddies, it's an absolute honor and a privilege. This gentleman needs no introduction whatsoever. Ricky Fowler, welcome to the Fairway Rowland podcast. Sounds like we're about to have a party. I'm ready. Well, you can't see me because my camera's not working, but I have a gigantic

ice coffee from Duncan. So the energy is high. I have a question, not relating to anything having to do with being high. Where are you right this second? I'm currently in our office at home looking out over the river. So the question I have is, why aren't you on spring break?

What happened to spring break, Ricky? Well, we did have like a modified spring break last week. It was actually the first time. All four guys have been together probably since Jordan's wedding. I think that's about right. So, yeah, we just did three days. The other guys kind of stayed. They had a bunch of friends that were coming in.

They did a guy's weekend after. But we had three days where all four guys and four girls were hanging out. We were up just outside Nashville at Trubidor. So we had some fun. in golf. A little different than the original spring break, a little less social media involved. Well, I was going to ask you, you and I both lost something very dear to us. It got caught in a storm, and there's question as to whether it's ever going to come back. When are we getting back to Baker's Bay? I mean, Allison and I just went back, what was that, about a month ago for

her birthday. It's on its way back. It's a special. place. Is the Sip-Sip rebuilt yet, or is it not totally done? Sip 2.0 is awesome. Yeah, that's what I heard. Yeah. So, I mean, it used to just be kind of the house up there with a barbecue and some tables out on the grass. Now it's a bigger indoor space, a full kind of wraparam bar with full kitchen and barbecue, full patio with covered tables. It's, yeah, 2.0 is a lot better than what the first one was. So I think that's what they're going to be doing with a lot of the amenities and the club awesome restaurant. Stuff's going to come back bigger or better than it was before. Maybe 22 will be the best spring break yet.

Never know. So Ricky, we have a whole bunch of stuff we want to cover with you, but thought since this is an Olympic year, we would take the occasion to get your perspective, because, because it's pretty well established that you had an awesome time at the Olympics in 2016 down in Brazil. And there's kind of a link here this week coming up on the PGA tour, the Zurich tournament in New Orleans is a team event. Now, the Olympics are competed so far on like just a regular old individual stroke play basis.

I'm interested in whether or not you have a view on the possibility of like a team approach to the Olympics. I mean, it's definitely a possibility. We're only there for, you know, the one week, but the Olympic goes on for those two weeks. So you could look at a way of having, you know, the men's and women's played in that first week or maybe the first nine or ten days. and then there be some sort of team aspect, whether it's two men, two women, or mixed. I mean, there's time to do it potentially. But I think that first of all, the Olympics was just awesome. Got to walk in opening ceremonies, which as a kid, it was like a,

you kind of looked at it and it was like a dream to be able to do that and walk with everyone. But it wasn't a legitimate dream for me because golf wasn't part of the Olympics. So I'd always watch it, both summer and winter, and you just thought, like, how cool would that experience be? And to actually get to do it, yeah, it was awesome. You handled the, I want to ask you about the bonus that's just been announced. I mean, you handled the ridiculous criticism about the commercial stuff with a ton of grace. How badly at the time did you just want to say,

hey, there's a $40 million algorithm I'm playing for you, fuckers? I mean, did you know that this has been in the works? And it's a really interesting additional opportunity for guys like you who do a lot to lift the game outside of just what happens on the course. No, it is a great incentive. Like you said, it's about growing the game, you know, leaving it in a better position than it was before my generation was here playing. I'm lucky enough and honored to be in a position where I have a great young

following to be in a position where kids look up to me and be a role model. It's not something that like that was, hey, I want to be out here to be a role model or anything like that. It was my dream as a kid was just to be able to, I want to play on the PGA tour. The things that come with it and the bonus of being someone that kids look up to is special because I remember as a kid, like guys that I looked up to, I grew up riding and racing and dirt bikes. So like Jeremy McGrath was with my guy and to be, you know, close friends with him now because he loves golf and we've spent a lot of time together over the last, say, 20 years or so

for the roles to kind of like reverse and now I'm that role model and kids are looking up to me. I know what that position is about. I know what, you know, kind of the power it holds. So one, I need to start playing a little bit better so I can continue to be out there. but no, it's a lot more than just about playing golf, you know, growing the game and making a difference. So I want to pick up on what you just mentioned, which is, you know, the status of your game. You are in the midst of a process.

You've been talking about it. You've been working. There's lots of news out there about you and you're still working with Tilleri on your swing. And, you know, Nate and I want to explore that a little bit. what's like the current status? How do you feel about where you are right now and whether there's light at the end of the tunnel

or you're still just sort of pushing? Yeah, I feel like in the last couple months it's finally heading the right way and seeing the light. It's been tough. I mean, we all know golf is a very humbling game. It is up and down. It's not just some golf, but in life as well.

Unfortunately, this has been a little bit longer downtime than you'd ever want to go through. It's a grind, but I like the position that I'm finally in. And I feel like over the past year and a half, it was a little bit too much of playing golf swing and not going out and playing golf. So getting back to a little bit more of the old school, myself, just going a lot more and hitting shots. And we've put time in on the golf swing.

Now it's time to go play golf and still work on things, but play golf hit shots. Rick, when I think about some of, you know, moments that are memorable Ricky Fowler moments, obviously the players, the win at Phoenix was huge. They're also for a lot of fans is you there on 18 at Quail Hollow and showing up for JT. And you, look, there's been a lot of mental toughness to get through how you've handled this. You know, guys on tour will all say that you show up for them. I guess I'm wondering, you know, are your people showing up for you?

you in this moment and sort of more critically, like it kind of seems like outside of golf, you're happy. Are you happy? And where does golf fit in your life right now as you go through this overhaul your swing? Yeah, no, it's been, I mean, on course, it's been tough. Yeah, of course. Like I mentioned, we just mentioned earlier,

like golf is probably one of the most humbling sports out there. But no, I mean, lifewise, because we've had meetings with, like, my agent, caddy, and people that are part of the team, And, you know, they wonder, like, is everything, you know, and Allison will be there with us and talking about everything. And they're like, we want to make sure, like, you know, personal life or like life's way from the course. Like, are you, everything all good? And how's dealing with everything? And it's like, I just, I just, I just wish I could hit the ball, you know,

a little straighter, a little closer. And everything's fun. Right. So, no, yeah, life's awesome. You know, we're lucky to get to do what we get to do. I'm just at the end of the day. I'm a golf nerd. I love to play. I think some of it has kind of been like adjusting and figuring out like how to be efficient, not out playing too much, wearing myself out, making sure we're taking care of the body, you know, getting the workout soon, being on a good routine. So yeah, it's just, you know, a different part of life. It's not, you know, single me, hanging at home, go play golf every day,

grab some food and go do it the next day. which is fine. It's where I'm at in life. And now everything's great. Like I said, just needed to a little straight or a little closer and makes more bucks. Great. When you figure that out,

let me in house know. We're working on it too. It's perpetual. One of the things that I know that's kind of showed up on the radar lately, at least for me, is something that you've put into the mix, is CBD oil, which I'm very, like, intrigued by.

you're a brand partner with Cadenwood with Level Select is their brand. And I am by nature an excitable person, big energy kind of guy. Tough for me to be calm on the golf course and especially tempo-wise. I'm just wondering what sort of attributes of the CBD oil were appealing to you. Why did you sort of put that into the mix? I think kind of two sides for me would be, I mean, a big part of it is, like I mentioned, was kind of taking care of the body. That's the big part of, you know, especially starting to not getting any younger.

So recovery is huge and then the anti-inflammatory side of it as well. Now, I was someone I used to take, you know, if I was sore or, you know, sometimes just it got to be almost a routine sometimes, you know, take some ad, you know, take some. or agrofen before playing and they're not exactly the greatest on your body. So, you know, use and be able to use, whether it's the oil, the cream or the roll on, you don't have those bad potential side effects of a painkiller type of thing. So that was kind of the initial starting to look into the CBD space and then try and some different companies and ultimately ending up with level selects.

The thing that sold me with them, obviously quality of product, but they control their product from start to finish. They grow, they extract, they bottle. They are, like I said, in control from start to finish. So that's a big thing when you're looking at quality control. They know exactly what they're putting out and I know what I'm getting. I mean, Stuart Sink has won twice on tour. He's 47 years old.

that bodes well for the length of a career. Sounds like you're starting to think about how to extend your career. Can you talk about what else you've changed as you think about longevity? Does it change right now the way that you think about your schedule, how often and how frequently and consecutively you play, for example? Yeah, that's, I mean, definitely something that probably started, I mean, definitely more than a couple years ago. I typically don't like to play more than three weeks in a row, you know, go out for and try not to have many times where it's just one tournament.

So try and go for two or three weeks and then get a week or two off. No, I mean, that's what it's all about is the longevity. I think, you know, someone like outside of golf that you look at who's done a great job with him. Yeah. You invest in your body or invest in recovery. Ultimately, you're going to get, you know, more on the back. Yeah, he goes to bakers too, so that might be what it's about. That is part of recovery.

You need a little R&R. It can't be, you know, golf, golf, golf, 24-7, go beat balls, go play. Like, you got to have, you know, you've got to be able to get away. You got to be able to relax. You got to let the body chill out. So it's all about the kind of the management of that and being efficient when you're on. I want to ask you about, um, the past year, both from your own personal sort of experience and also just your view of how the

tour has done, because Nate and I have been really complimentary. Effusive. Yes. Of how amazing the tour has, it seems to us, has done in terms of rebuilding the traveling circus, getting it out midsummer last year and getting off these events, with it seems like a minimum of impact. Now, obviously, the testing regime and everything that everybody has to go through, it's a true partnership. Everybody has to be on board with going through all the protocols and everything. You yourself have observed that it was disconcerting

in terms of where your game was and what you've been working on to have that kind of drop into the year, the way that it did. But I'm interested in both kind of your own experience over the last year and also your view of how the tour has done and whether it matches up with what Nate and I think we've been seeing. Yeah, they did a great job and continue to do so. I mean, you look at it, you know, we got shut down and players and then three months later or so that we're back up and running. I don't even want to start to think about the logistical nightmare of trying to kind of

reorganize and re- kind of think of how you're going to set up a golf tournament. Yes, like the sites were there. Like we're still at the courses that we were going to play. Um, you know, other, I know, workday stepped up and did the second memorial event, um, last year, which was huge. But you bring up testing, like, just to have that setup to, to test that many guys. Um, and then the turnaround period, which is typically,

around two to three hours. There's just so much that goes into a golf tournament behind closed doors that a lot of people don't even know about. And that's just on the normal side of things. And then you add all the testing and limited people and whatnot. Yeah, I wouldn't have wanted to be a part of that. So however, they figured it out and made it work. And then like you mentioned, not having many people who tested positive.

doing a good job of keeping everyone safe. Yeah, I think it was done awesome. For me, the bummer is not having fans because I'm someone that loves to be out there and I feel like, you know, I want to show off in front of people. I want to hate good shots. You know, I want to make this put. You get the rush from not only making a pot

or, you know, making birdie, but when you hear the crowd go crazy, like you get an extra boost of energy and you can start riding that momentum and riding that wave. Yeah, we haven't really had that up until, you know, a couple of tournaments. We had a couple of people out in the fall and then, you know, started to filter in a little bit early this year. And we'll definitely have a lot of fans coming out this spring. When do we see you next?

Valspar or Quail Hollow? For me, I'm going to play Quail into Dallas on PGA. Three in a row. We know that you are about to join our colleague, our ringer colleague, Kevin Clark, on his inimitable slow news day. And one of the things Kev does occasionally, depending on the guests and whatever he has in mind, is horoscope.

I hope he doesn't mind me stepping on his toes a little bit. But I looked up your horoscope, Rick, and I just have to, I mean, I have to share it because today is a fantastic day for you. This is what it says. Your sensual caring nature will be appreciated, Ricky Sagittarius, whether you actively pursue it or sit back and relax, you will receive the love and good fortune you desire. Your creativity is also at a peak during this time.

You should take advantage of this energy and actively use your talent to create something beautiful and meaningful. I think we've done it. I think that's what this podcast is all about. I think we just created something beautiful and meaningful. I hope you agree. I'm with you. I felt strong in the gym this morning. I knew it was going to be just a different kind of day. I was going to say, maybe he needs to grab Smiley and enter the New Orleans tournament at the last second here.

God. Before we let you go, we need your pick. Who do you like for New Orleans? He doesn't know who's playing. Come on. There's a lot of teams out there. I'm looking at Cam Smith and Mark Leashman, the Australians. I was just going to say, a little Ozzie connection,

Cam's been playing well. Leash always plays well. Yeah, I'm going to I'm going to go there. Okay, done and done. Great guys and they got they also, I mean, amazing caddies and good people. So I think they're going to vibe this week.

It's how could you not have a great vibe down in New Orleans? Ricky Fowler, we very much appreciate the time with us today. I'm sorry that it took us so long to get you on here, but it was a beautiful and meaningful podcast. So thank you. Thanks for coming on, Rick. Yeah, enjoyed it. All right, my Eagle Enthusiast, there we have it.

Big, big thanks, of course, to Ricky Fowler for coming on and sharing a little bit about where he's at. My birdie buddies, hopefully a couple of those picks that Nate and I gave out. And Rick, Rick endorsed the Leishman-Camsmith combo. So maybe run like hell. I don't know. We will be back next week, of course, with the results of the Zurich Classic. and we'll be doing a little preview of the Valspar down there, Copperhead in Tampa Bay.

Until then, my birdie buddies, let's hit them straight out there.