Fore Play - “How It Happened” with Seth Waugh, CEO of the PGA of America

Episode Date: April 9, 2020

Seth Waugh, CEO of the PGA of America, joins the show (43:12) to walk us through how the revised golf schedule came to be. He discusses the process of all of golf’s governing bodies and organizations coming together, what that room was like, the factors that were considered, and the complications now facing the PGA Championship and Ryder Cup. Frankie also details another “disagreement” he and his buddies had on the golf course, and we react to Tiger’s “quarantine champions dinner” photo!You can find every episode of this show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube. Prime Members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. For more, visit barstool.link/foreplaypod

Hey, 4Play listeners, you can find us every Tuesday and Thursday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Boy, is quarantine getting to everyone on the show, especially Frankie? We had Lurch came in with the Golden Gate Bridge behind him. He's a Bits guy now. He's a buffet of bits. He's doing his thing, which is, God, that's awful. That's so awful.

I feel like he's trying to run a work meeting and be the cool guy who just everybody fucking makes fun of him behind their back and says is the worst and never invites to drinks or everyone to hang out with under any circumstances. That's you right now with your little space background. Appreciate that. I just got to say this is definitely the most tense the podcast has been in terms of, everyone's a little stressed out. Beforehand, everybody was freaking out because we couldn't get the Zoom links to work.

Somebody's internet sucks and everybody sounds horrible. We're here now and we're going to do a podcast and it's all going to be okay. I'm for sure on edge. There's no denying that I'm on edge right now. The quarantine is hitting everyone in different ways. and today I'm just, I woke up angry. I woke up mad, frustrated. Nothing's working smoothly today, but we're going to get through it.

We have a good guest joining us today, and that was awesome to get in touch with our friend who's going to be joining us. Either he joined us already when you're listening to this or he will be joining us. I do not know where we're going to be putting this in. That's a pro podcast mover move there, podcast doer move there, where you don't know where it's going. Well, you also, your brain doesn't, you don't do well with this kind of stuff in general, so it's kind of a disclaimer of you just say, you know, it could go anywhere. But Seth Waugh, who's the CEO of the PGA of America, we have him on the show.

He, of course, they oversee the PGA championship. This week they unveiled the new kind of revised schedule of the big events and golf, the majors, the Open Championship got canceled. So we have Seth Wile, who's awesome. We chatted with him at the PGA at Bethpage last year. Really, really, really good guy. He runs the show. He's one of the more, probably the more, one of the more,

one of the more connected, important people that, like, we know that we discuss with. And he's just on our show. For sure. He's got to be one of the most connected and well-known people in the world in my phone book. Like, it's, like, Dave Portnoy is super famous and he's my boss. And, like, I've been his right-end man. Like, that's always been, like, cool to have, like, a connection to a power for a company that we work with.

But then, like, you leave that zone, like, and you get into, like, real stuff, like, leaders of banks. and actual corporations, like the PGA of America, making massive decisions, like political stuff and all, like, just crazy stuff. And, like, Seth Wah, me and him talk about pizza and Seminole and Florida. And we talk about getting together with the boys and having a drink. And it's, it's just one of the,

it's one of the crazier things that's happened to me in these four years at Barstool, where it's just like, yeah, Seth, like, you drop Seth Noah's name at a golf course. And they're like, well, yeah, I mean, that's like, that's one of the guys. Also, like talking about Bud's Sealing of baseball. It's funny in our show who, like, different people have different, like, connections with. That's also, like, oh, if we need a PJ of America information, it's like, we got to go to Frankie who's got, like, so wild. It's so random. Crazy.

We're like, oh, the PJ Championship is like, a PJ of America is, like, going to move the PJ Championship. Like, the PJ Championship is moving and all, and the Rider Cup is like, everyone's talking about that. Who should we talk to? Oh, the guy that's, like, running everything. Who are we going to go to? Frankie, the Pizza Maker. Oh, sure. That makes sense. It's weird. It's very bizarre that that's reality, but it is.

So we have Seth Wild on the show. It's supposed to be Wednesday of Masters Week right now. It's supposed to be the Part 3 contest, part three tournament at Augusta. There's supposed to be families walking around, kids hitting putts. Everybody having a good time, hole in ones, aces. Everybody's kind of relaxing before the stress of the week really ramps up and begins tomorrow morning. Thursday, the beginning of Master's Week. How's everybody going to start? what times tigers tea time what time can we watch people finally you know it's supposed to be we're

supposed to be like 20 hours removed i would say right now from when boom that uh live coverage of amen corner finally kicks in because the groups that teed off on one are finally getting to like 11 that's supposed to be kind of we're going to be we're within 24 hours of that nope nothing we got fucking nothing we got uh max homo made that very clear on the show on monday when he's like yeah no it's supposed to be my first practice round ever at augusta playing in the max and instead I'm in my apartment talking to you morons. Now we got Seth Wa. We're going to get more information about how it all kind of went down,

what those negotiations were like, what are the chances that the PGA can really happen in August, the Ryder Cups, anything going to change. So just chat with him will be very, very interesting. But, yeah, I've got one powerful metaphor right now for Foreplay. We're going to have to cut this off and then restart the meeting. So what everyone's hearing right now is about to jump to the next clip. So we've been doing the show with Jake for,

yeah, it's the first time I've ever heard Jake just jump in and start talking in the middle of the show. So it's pretty fitting that we were having all sorts of fucking Zoom issues. We're talking about Zoom issues. And then we just had to cut out because of a massive Zoom issue where there's, we can only do four. Who knows? Point is we're back. And as you were talking about Zoom issues, you were having Zoom issues right there.

Right there. As you said the word Zoom issues, it was going in and out like crazy. It's just, we're just, that's kind of, we're just having a Zoom issue kind of day. It all started wrong. Every time you say the word Zoom issues, you cut it out. What the fuck? When you go back to the center of the room. I feel like the other days you were in the center of the room.

It's all Brendan's fault. It's because it's his birthday. Yes. Brendan, our producer's Brendan said. Oh man, this is the most stressful birthday ever. Just a classic Michael Scott move to call up someone and be like, hey, happy birthday. Oh, it's not my birthday, Michael.

Oh, I thought we shared the same birthday. Okay. So, yeah, happy birthday to Brendan. And I mean, your Wi-Fi rings is a vomitable no man. Yes. No. Rolling in slow motion, I think. Fuck.

Oh, my God. What the hell is. Hello. Holy shit. I wonder why I got so bad it would last like 10 minutes. You can't hear a word you're saying, bro. Not a word.

What the fuck? Can you hear any? Nothing. All right, man. I think we're back. I think we're doing it. I think the show is working. I don't know.

Every time I talk, apparently, every time I say the phrase, Zoom issue. It's happening. It's happening again. You just, you were just talking perfectly, and then you said the word Zoom and you stopped working. No.

It was awful. God damn. This is the rest of the podcast. That's it. This is all we're going to do is just listen to this robotic, absolute mess. It sounds like Wally is scissuring himself. It's so frustrating. All right.

Okay, I'm now on a fucking phone. is the situation because my internet, when you've been working great for two weeks, just doesn't work anymore, I guess. It went all the way through a Seth Y interview, not perfectly, but way better than now. So can you guys hear me? You sound phenomenal compared to what you sounded like

about five minutes ago. It was one of the more frustrating things. We already started out the show on a weird note where everyone was a little on edge. I know myself included. And then we just can't get this thing out. We can't get it to roll. Seth Wilex used a lot of analogies.

Like this, this, this, uh, boulder's trying to get down the hill and like, and there's a lot of obstacles. It's fall, it's falling in little creeks and nothing's fucking, nothing is rolling nice. I can't see. That's why I'm not a CEO. I can't think of an analogy. Yeah. Imagine me being up there.

Ready to me being up there. Be like, all right, guys, man. We're just this like rolling ball and there's a couple of creeks ahead of us. And we got to get through that. They're like, fully crushed this quarter. Yeah. No. That was really bad.

We finished that interview 50 minutes ago. 50. It has been an absolute struggle to get Riggs back on the line. So I'm so thankful to hear your voice. It's been a battle. I'm glad that you guys are happy to hear my voice. That's really, that's cool. It's exciting.

It makes me feel great. Seth Waz awesome. The interview's lovely. I don't remember what we've said or haven't said because we've had to restart so many fucking times. It's supposed to be Masters Week. Supposed to be sitting in my couch, watching the part three,

watching people just hit wedges tight, make hole in ones, go nuts. It's supposed to be fucking jacked up for the coverage in the morning. And instead, I'm just grinding over these goddamn Skype, Zoom shit with you guys and struggling. But we're still going to do on Sunday, we're going to do starting at 1215 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

We're going to start a live YouTube stream of us watching, rewatching the CBS coverage of the final round of the 2019 Masters. I mentioned it a little bit. But it's going to be excited. I watched it. Last time I watched it was on the plane to Australia, reliving the whole thing, watching shit that you totally forgot about, kind of putting yourself back in that position where it didn't look like Tiger was going to win the Masters for a while and then knowing that he did, it's going to be great. So people can watch it along with us.

I will say we're talking a lot about the Masters and we are going to do that live stream on Sunday, 1215, check it out. It really didn't hit me that it was Master's Week until Tiger's tweet last night where he was like, I'm having my own little self-quarantine, Champions dinner because we couldn't do it this year. He looked great. He's got a quarantine beer going on. He had the red mock neck on under the green jacket. He was there with his whole family and his dogs.

But that one is when it really hit me like, wow, we're really not doing it this year. What about the hair? I didn't want to talk about the hair. I think the hair looks better. Really? No, no, I think it's, no, no, it looks like it's going through a phase right now in which it's not, doesn't look good, but it's getting to a point where I think he got some work done or something and it's coming back, right? Like, he's in that awkward phase right now where, like, he has more hair on the top of his head than he ever has in the last, I don't know, four or five years, it feels like.

It is. There was just something going on up there. It was nice to see. Usually it's just like a dead bear in wasteland. Now it's like, you know, maybe. Some sort of something up there. Someone sprits in a little something up there. You see what I'm saying, Trent?

I see you looking. The pillar, though, was right behind his head. so I feel like it was darker, like where Trent is right now. Now you can't see this, obviously, but he looks in a dimly written room. So he can't really tell how much hair he has on his head. I think he had that effect. It was perfectly placed. Whoever the photographer was had the pillar of darkness right behind his head,

so it looked like more hair. So I'm not fully sold on it, but I do think there might be, as Riggs said, some growth and rejuvitation. I also think it might be a result of him. He's clearly growing out the beard. He's like kind of let it all go. He's like, I'm not going outside. I don't have to make public appearances.

I'll let the beer grow. I think he might have just let the hair go too, and it just looks a little more full. Maybe when he is like a normal tiger, he does get it shaved down a little bit so you can't tell. But now it does feel like he's letting everything grow, and I think that's why it's looking like there's more up there. So somebody asked me the other day, they asked kind of a hypothetical of your PGA tour, golf or pro golfer, what would be your top three? You could get any endorsement in the world. What would be your top three? and I just immediately blurted out Peter Millar,

and they all laughed, and we're like, that's really funny because Peter Millar is legitimately already one of your sponsors. And I sat there, we kind of talked about it for a while, and I was like, well, you have to wear clothes every day as a human being. Like, you just have to. That's a part of being a person. And then when you're playing golf, half, maybe more than half a battle is like what you look like and what you feel like.

People talk about that all the time. Feeling good, looking good is half a battle in golf. That's when people show up, they comment on your outfit. It's huge. People ask me, I've been posting all these videos about myself playing golf all the time. What shirt is that? What pants are those? What shoes are those?

It's Peter Millar. They do, honestly, genuinely make. And there's a reason that we put this stuff all over our store. There's a reason that we could choose any company to really work with when it comes to are pullovers, the different polos, and yeah, we like to mix it up. We go with Peter Millar all the time. Their pants, their five pocket pants. I've told the story about how it's the only thing my brother asked for for Christmas.

Every single year, he says, I need some of those five pocket Peter Malar pants. It's all he wants from me. Luckily, I'm able to get them for him. I have some connections. You folks can go to petermalar.com slash four. We've got a bunch of our favorites on there. The Kirk pants. I've been wearing those.

Those are kind of one of the pair that a lot of folks have been asked me about are the five pocket. They're the Kirk. I even have been rocking their polos. They've got the different kind of styles when it's really hot here in North Carolina, North Carolina, where I've been. They've got the featherweight that feels like you're not even wearing anything. Polos, the crown sport stuff. So Peter Millar, you can layer up, okay, when it gets a little chillier, you can layer up. I'm rocking vests.

I'm rocking longsleeves, short sleeves. Petermalar.com slash four. Check them out. They really do make you classiest, most comfortable, best golf wear, professional wear, any kind of wear, you name it. They've got it. Thank you, Peter Malar, for supporting us. Thank you for creating the best clothing.

Petermalar.com slash four. Frank, what happened to you on the golf course the other day? I have that in my notes. Oh, so I played with one of my buddies out here. and we like to argue on the golf course. They are, so I play with my two friends. Social distance did the whole thing. Didn't talk to each other, didn't touch each other.

Very serious little match. Just saw each other on the first tee and then didn't lock eyes until one of was drained of big put. Yeah, be weird. Yeah, we didn't touch each, we don't touch each other on the golf course. These are the same guys I got into the good, good argument with last year, or maybe, it may have been two years ago or last year. For at this point, everything just blends together.

But, you know, we get in our fair share. share of debates on the golf course where I think I'm completely right and it comes down to more of like what is like my thinking on the world as opposed to like the actual ruling of golf and that's what this was. So we're playing at this place that is under some construction where they're redoing some holes. They're restoring some T-boxes and they're taking away some trees and putting in some bunkering. So on a couple of the holes there's different things like there's actually on like the 11th hole. There's a pin right in the middle of the fair. and you have instead of it a par four because the whole green is closed you play it as a par four but like you play it with a wedge and then like it's four club lengths from this pin it's basically like a fake golf so they have stuff like that going on so what happened here is on the sixth hole is another one of these situations in which the whole fairway is under construction is all these workers and stuff so they put this tea box up all the way in the middle of the fairway to an 85 yard wedge and they have the fucking blue yellow red white mark

all there on the left side of the fairway. It's over two bunkers, whatever. It's usually one of my favorite par fours in the golf course. So what we're doing is we get up there and I'm like, all right, we'll play this as a par three because we're like we're going to, we're going to like hit the ball to par that many times on this hole. It's an 85 yard wedge shot from the Teabok. And my one buddy Andrews said, well, no, like we're going to play it to like what the score

card is. So we're going to act as though our drive came here and this is our second shot. and I said, well, now it started to get real contentious to the point where I said, well, I'm not in the business of adding strokes to my golf, to my golf score. Like, why I understand that we're playing a fairyland gumdrop unicorn type hole. But at that point, like, I hit the ball. So I end up making a, I end up hitting the ball. I hit a way, I bladed a wedge over.

Then I hit one. I ended up making a four and they wanted to give me a five. And I said, well, I hit the ball four times. So at the end of the day, this is what I can say, I hit the golf ball four times. So at the end of the day, if I shoot a 79, you want to now give me an 80 with some fairyland drive that we all hit to this fairway. and his argument, and actually my other buddy, too, Kyle and Andrew, their argument was that, like, when you input this score into, like, the Grint or any of these other applications or, like, the gin or whatever handicap system you want to use, that that application system does not understand that you only hit, that there was, like, a fairway T-box and that you made a three, it was supposed to be a four, like, you just play it to what the scorecard is because relative to handicap, it all shouldn't matter, right? It should be, uh, a four on a par 37, but I wanted to make it a three on a par 36. And they're saying, well, if you're plus 10 or plus 10, it doesn't matter at the end of the day. And I said it doesn't matter.

And they said, but logistically and literally and figuratively, it doesn't matter because you shot plus 10. It doesn't matter. And I said, if you polled America of golfers, how many people say, hey, what did you shoot today? If I said, would you shoot today? Do you say, oh, I was nine over? Or do you say I shot at 79? Like, you never really like saying, what you were to par. You don't say, I shot out 78, but it was par 71. You don't ever, like, throw in that little wrinkles. So, like, I'm all about your number.

You say your final number. That's it. I'm all about the number, baby. And if you're telling me that I hit this mythical fade off the T-box and I'm hitting two from the fairway and that that is like, what got me, man, was like, it was like I was doing the wrong thing for golf. Like, that's where the argument came in. It was almost like the word golfing.

And I also said, like, would you golf the other day? And they got mad at that. I think people are getting a little character. away in my friend group with like they want to pick point every word I'm saying now and saying it's incorrect because they want to get on the joke but here's the point that I got made I said it's it is the same thing plus 10 is plus 10 but I wanted to see what you guys would have done in this situation would you have played it as a par four to the score card because of that whole handicap system or would you have done what I said and just play the amount of strokes he had hit

because it got into like more of like an ethical like argument where it's like what is right Well, I think posting, in terms of like, in terms of what score you should post, yeah, I think they're right. But like, in terms of the 19th hole afterwards and you're talking with the boys about what you shot, that would be one number lower. You would be right in that sense. The best part about this whole thing, though, is the only person you're hurting, like technically removing that mythical shot is you. because like instead of you should have shot like an 81 or 80 but without that mythical you shot you shot a 79 so if you inputted that into your handicap system is a 79 you'd then lower your handicap when actuality you would have had to hit a good drive to even shoot an 80 so like

the only person you're potentially hurting in this situation is you which I love so like honestly put whatever the hell you want in there um you know like with your buddies after I don't care if you say like yes or no to it doesn't matter as long as you're playing all under the same rules and it's like match play but like yes to your point if they were trying to go on the stick of like no no no you shot 10 over like if i sat down with anybody and they were like what did you shoot today and they're like 10 or four over you'd be like no no no what was the pause you were a 76 three par fives in the front and two on the like what what happened like i actually i actually don't know if i had like like what a pros say did they ever say like oh yeah it was four over today like a

scratch golfer somebody that's like always around that number right because like we're never you know as a bogey golfer you would never shoot like say like yeah i was 18 no like even never even like i know scratch players yeah they're always saying the number they're always saying 71 or 74 whatever yeah yeah just that's what i was wondering i was wondering if you're down there so much does it change right because i've never like when you get down there you're so excited to say like yeah i shot 78 today it was sick right but like you know like I ended up shooting a 78. I ended up shooting a 78, and I know, like, they think it was a 79.

Like, and that's what makes me mad. But, I kept saying, I kept saying the, dude, we were fucking screaming at each other because I'm like, I'm not in the business of adding strokes, Andrew. He's like, well, I'm not in the business of shaving strokes. And I was like, well, okay, like you say, that's what I do. And I said, I started galloping down the T-box and the fairways saying, you want to play fair-re. I'm like, the grint doesn't know. it's a fairyland gumdrop golf course we're teeing up a wedge i put a tea in the ground it hit a 58 degree

does a grint know i did that like no it has no idea we hit over this pond uh a mythical drive like the grit doesn't know that andrew so my question to you though is if you play a par three and you get a hole in one does that count as a hole in one for you i mean yeah what does that fucking mean well no on that specific hole yeah because i'm going back So now, just so to play out my argument so you can actually answer it with like a, you know, watching Frankie try to figure out if that was a riddle or not was amazing because he was like, because he was just thinking it was like every hole. Like if I hit a hole in one on a part three, is that a hole in one?

Like I think so. I thought he meant like what to say it was like an albatross or something shit. I was like, what the fuck? No, because my only point with that is like without putting you in a pretzel is like if you believe one way on that, like saying no that wasn't a hole in one but in this case you know leaving a golf course and saying you shot 79 when they advanced you like 250 yards into the center of the fairway is you know that's a line itself like saying no but it isn't because that is how many strokes he took like that's just what it it like there's no I hit one ball right hole and went in the hole dude in the hole imagine the nightmare

if one of you guys had gotten a hole in one there how about on the night ball I played with another group the other week. And on the ninth hole at this golf course, they have these pool noodles sticking out of these holes. And the pool noodle is not below the top of the hole. It actually comes out. So it's almost like a raised cup, but it's inside.

There's a little room for the ball to fall to go in, like, over the edge, but it still bounces back to, never goes in the hole. And someone hit on a 215-yard hole into the wind, a perfect five-iron right at the pin. and it went right to the right of it, to the point where, like, it was such a long haul, we didn't know, hit it, had it hit it. And like, there's a, and I'm giving a real percentage chance.

There's an 85% chance that this thing hit the bottom of this pool noodle, and we'll never know. 85% chance. That's how much this was online. And it was sitting on the edge when we got up there. It was sitting under a foot, like half a foot away from this, from this hole. So that's, that's fucked up. That is fucked.

that's tough that's the tough break i think you shot whatever you shot it however many strokes you took is what you should stay you shot but i do think like when you do the handicapped system and you plug scores anyway you already do mythical shit like you already take a nine down to a six like because of the way the handicap system works so you do the same thing for this you would like tweak it but if if if i go out and i know like if if me and lurch are having a uh a little battle amongst ourselves, and I shoot 83 with a quad, and I have to post, you know, 80, whatever, I have to post 81. I'm not telling everyone at the bar afterwards I shot 81.

I'm like, no, I shot 83. That's just what happened. But I would have to post 81. I think it's the same thing for that. But my question, Rakes, you said something, and then, I don't know, some other part of the conversation pieced off. So say you played pebble, right? like obviously a course that everybody dreams are going to.

They had one fairway under repair, so they advanced you 220 yards and you played a par four as a par three. Leaving Pebble, you shot a 79 with that advancement. If, like, and you would not have broke 80 had that T-box been in place. So leaving, would you tell me- You don't know that.

Well, all right, but you would have had to hit one more shot to get there, right? Is what I'm saying? Do you follow that? Well, to get, but like you could have, it's butterfly effect. Like everything could have been different. You don't know that. All right.

So maybe you made birdie on that hole. I guess, yeah, you could have made Eagle. All right. But either way, are you telling people that you broke 80 at Pebble Beach? Yeah, and people are saying, what did you shoot? I'm telling them the total number of strokes I took. We like 79. And then I'm sure we'd get into the round.

But, yeah, I mean, on this hole, it was playing as that. So technically our par was like 71 instead of, 72 or whatever, but like all I can do is take the strokes that I can take. Why would I, to Frankie's point, why would I mythically add as, why would you tell me to mythically add a stroke to my score? And it's not your fault. You didn't, you didn't want that fairway repaired. Yeah, you broke 80.

Totally. And also my point is like, who's on the other side. Why, why? Here's my other point is why does what the golf course looked like in your brain last week have any indication of what my score cards should be today? So the T-box today is 85 yards away from the hole. Why should you be like, well, no, a month ago, it was back there, 415 yards over a green?

I'm like, well, what if they never did that? Like, are you going to be like, well, the architect actually should have made this a par three, so we're going to place this apart three. Like, no, it is what it is that day. It's a par three that day. You can't just like say, oh, it's usually a par four. What do you mean it's usually a par four?

It's not. It's just a par three today. Right. I 100%. I 100% agree. They did that at Chambers Bay. They changed the 18th hole from like a part five to a part four. And like when they do that,

Jordan Speed doesn't have to mythically add a stroke to his score. Like, no, he's like, no, that's just how many shots I took to play the course that was in front of me. Lurch doesn't agree. No, I'm on the other side. I just because it's. Andrew was on the other side. And then he was muttering under his breath.

And I was like, would you stay up there? And it was like, it was very contentious. Frankie, do you feel, do you feel tougher that people have to social distance so you don't think it's going to get physical? I've been tougher because I know people can't come up to me. Yeah. And also, Andrew was pissed off. I didn't give him, like, I'm not giving him the platform to argue his side.

He thinks I lie about all these stories. And he thinks that every time I come on here, I give it, I give it my, my, I give my piece and I don't give him his side. And that I always screw it to the point that it fits my narrative. This is all coming from his mouth. And maybe that's true sometimes. I mean, I don't know. I just say it the way I perceive.

it. Like my side of the story, that's the way it went. And I think that he got very bad at the point, Andrew. Right. Like, I don't know what else to tell you. Like, like, I, that's the way that I saw it. I saw him get angry at the point where I was like, I knew that I was going to, that I wanted to shoot a low score that day. And I was playing well. And to the point where, like, you're just going to add a stroke at the end of the day, I thought that that that made me met. And also the fact that it looks like if I want to play it the way I thought was correct, that's where I was getting these. huge debate. I thought I was morally and like legitimately correct, not to the point

where I want to shave strokes off my. Like, bro, I'll do anything I can to make myself better. You want to do what, like all these little tricks and, but whatever. I was playing legit. I thought that was the right way to do it. And I don't know how much more I could say about it. I think that Riggs is correct. He is a savant. And I think that Trent is somewhere in the middle. He's, uh, I mean, where, where are you falling on this trend? No, I'm with you. I'm with how many. Yeah, of course.

I mean, of course, in the way that, like, how many strokes do I have that day? And, like, that's it. Everything else to me is completely errone. You know, I actually beat in the argument. What did you post in my system? So I'm actually, I have a brand, I'm actually brand new to the gin. This is a big news, actually. I just got a gin system.

I just got a gin account. I've always been on, like, this free grint thing. And I wasn't, like, like, I was inputting my scores to the point where it's, like, whatever I shot. So, like, Riggs was actually walking me through, like if you make a seven you have to post a six and all this stuff and like i've i've always just put in this like into the grint like i shot 88 and i shot 88 so i've always taken it off my scoring average my scoring average up until last month was like an 88.8 um definitely significantly going down now because i've been an absolute stick during this quarantine but um i'm now going back

and doing as much as i can on this gin account i joined some like online long island club so whatever what are you going to post in the system? I think you have to post the 78. That's how many shots I... All right, so I think that's idiotic. But I'll go back and check. I think that's how many times I hit the golf ball. So there's a middle ground.

But then the course wasn't set up to be a par 71 that day. It was a par 72. I get that point. You're only hurting yourself. So that's the only point where you're just flat out wrong of what you should post. The other stuff you can argue, you know, both sides.

Where I thought I had a kill shot in the debate is when he said that it's all relative to par and nobody cares about the number, 79 versus 80. It's just plus 10 is plus 10 regardless of it's par 71 and par 72. And I said Trent has never broken 100. And if you're going to tell me that like the difference between a par 71, let me do the math here, and he's 29 over and a par 72, if you're going to tell me that that doesn't make a difference for our friend Trent Ryan, then you can go straight to hell because that makes all.

because that makes all the difference. A 99 to 100 is significantly different. Very different. Significantly different. If he's plus 28 on a par 71 or plus 28 on a par 72. And people talk about golf goals all the time of like trying to break 90, trying to break 80, trying to break 70. They don't talk about it as like trying to break eight over par.

Can I be right? Seven over par or better. Nobody ever talks about that. Never. Never. All right. We're about to get to, we're about to get to Sepwa. I do want to say.

Hold on, hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Before we get to this, I need to share the news about Kevin Kisner talking about the John Deer Classic. I know you guys are probably just going to skate right through that. All right. I actually have to go do a podcast. I'm not leaving because you're about talking about.

I'm breaking up again. I actually do. No. No, I do have to leave. I have to go do a pizza review. I'm sorry. I don't know what you're about to say. I'm sure it has no validity.

at all. I'm sure Kisnan was probably drunk during this quarantine because he has nothing else would do. So I don't know. I got to go. I love you guys all. Seth La is a golden brown cookie. He's in my phone book. We talk about things of life. We talk about pizza. We talk about golf. This is fucking horseshit. And I wish I could talk like a CEO one day. I'm actually going to learn how to start using analogies. And that is about it. I got nothing else for you. I hope that you have a great day. Can you just stick around for one second? And here's just a real quick fact is the term lunatic actually comes from the word lunar. Have you ever figured that out?

Like the moon? Like the moon. The word derives from lunaticus, meaning of the moon or moon struck. So maybe with a full moon, people used to turn into lunatics. You know, full moons make people go a little crazy and loopy. So when you see a lunatic, you know, there may be a full moon out there. I kind of like that one. I kind of like that one, don't you?

And actually, back in the day, way back in the day, people who studied long, longitude were called lunatics. So if you were like into longitude, like that was the term, like you were a lunatic, which is crazy. Astronomer Royal Neville Mesculin, the artist was a longitude lunatic. All right, Trent, great fact by you coming up. I gotta go. Have a great time. I'll see you on Sunday for the live viewing of Tiger Woods winning the master. Yeah, wait, 12.15, we're going to start. So, bye now.

So underscore Dano. 17 tweeted at Kevin Kisner said, I know there's a lot of uncertainty right now, but with the Open canceled, can we rely on you to compete at the fifth major, the John Deere Classic? I had nothing to do with that. That is just clearly a listener of the show,

tweeting at Kevin Kisner, to which Kevin Kisner responded, I guarantee it will have the best field in its history. I just want people to know that. I had blogged about this about a week ago, saying that since the Open is probably going to be canceled, the RNA is essentially postponing their tournament to the next year.

This is going to open the door for the John Deere Classic to have an incredible field at their tournament. Last year, it's pretty well known that they went over 50 with the top 50 players in the world. That is going to change this year, provided. Not one of them. Couldn't get one of them. Not one of them wanted to play in the John Deer Classic. Couldn't do it. But the only reason that is is because it's always the week before the Open Championship.

The players, no, no, no. It's because it's a week before the Open Championship. The players like to get across the pond so they can get acclimated to the time, change. They want to get a few practice rounds in over there, get used to the golf courses. But now that's not happening. So the John Deere Classic and Frankie, who went away, who ran away like a coward, and Riggs, who is still on the line, you guys are going to have to eat Crow when this is a gigantic must-see tournament. It's going to have like a WGC type of field in it, and it's going to be magnificent watching you guys have to watch the Giard Classic with excitement.

Hey, Trent, congratulations. Do you have a global pandemic funneling golfers to your golf tournament? You know, I can't control what viruses take over the world at what times, but this is, it is working, you know, in quotations, working out to the point where the John Deer Classic, a TPC deer run in Silvas, Illinois is going to be a must see event. Again, provided that, you know, the coronavirus doesn't take over to the point where they have to cancel tournaments. I know they're optimistically saying the PJA tour that they want to have tournaments mid-June, no fans.

The John Deer Classic is scheduled to be July 6th through the 9th. So hopefully all that happens, and we are going to have some top-tier talent at the John Deer Classic, and it's going to be amazing. I will say what would be Musil is Kisner in a huge John Deere tractor. You know how that thing off to the side and the big putter coming off the fulcrum and him just smacking balls in it all?

would be must-see TV. But besides that, you know. You might be coming at it from the wrong angle, though, Trent. I think the headline is you're loving the coronavirus, so it helps. No, no, don't put those words. Do not put those words in my mouth. That's what I heard. Do not put those words in my mouth.

I'm saying an opportunity is there because of the horrific coronavirus that the John Your Classic might have a few more top players. Trent, your boy, Zach Johnson. now. He's going to go out and post his like 24 under that he always posted to John Deere and then think he's walking away with the trophy. But there's actually real golfers there now. So like 37 under is going to win the thing. He's going to be tied for 40th or something. Listen, if he is the sacrificial lamb that is like that makes the John your classic won by, I don't know, maybe Tiger Woods or something that would, you know, I think we're all okay with that.

Zach Johnson's won it before. He'll win it again when the Open Championship rolls. around and the coronavirus is out of here in the next couple of years. But for this one moment in time, we might have the John Deere's here. Trent, let's make a bet. Okay. Give me a number of the top ranked player that enters the John Deere. Oh, that's a good one. I mean, honestly, if you think about it, the, dude, golf will just be coming back.

They will, like I said, they want to play tournaments in mid-June and going forward, just keep playing the tournaments. Like, what's to say that these guys don't want to just play every week? It might be like one and a half. The number might be one and a half. That's essentially what I was getting to. So you say one and a half? Yeah.

And so you have, you think the top ranked player is going to be there in the world because I'm on the negative side. So you've got to be on the positive side. So you're taking- No, I'm just saying, like, I don't know that it's fair to do that. I don't know that it's fair to do that because you have like every player in the world then. But I just think, like, if you were setting the odds, that would be a pretty good, that would probably be a pretty good number.

They're literally going to need to play. Yep. Lurch, I'll fucking take your bet. All right. I'll take, how about the line is three and a half? So if one of the top three ranked players

at that time in the world show up, you win. So we'll have to figure out something on the line. We don't have to decide that right now. We'll decide that when we do the master's deal. Loser has to, Loser has to carry the winner's bag next time we play around the golf. It can be something like that. Yeah, let's work on the fight.

I'll do that right there. Okay. That could have really hurt pace of play. So we've got to think through this. We can come up with a good one for master's game. Oh, my God. No, Joe. What's my favorite part about this whole John Deere Classic thing,

other than it potentially legitimately being like a must-attend vent for golfers who want to just play is I have a large platform in Barcelona. Sports where I can take a Kevin Kisner tweet where he was just offhandedly responding to someone and I turn it into an entire blog and then what they do is they tweet out our blogs from Barcelona sports Twitter that has like 2.2 million followers on it and there's people tagging me there's no listen to this there's people tagging me under the tweet being like Trent did you see this it's perfect it's like you can just you can just create storylines because barstool has such a large large platform and this story is so to most people seemingly insignificant but it's it's fantastic.

Look people you know there's different ways to wield power and to really capitalize on the power that you may have and Trent just chooses to use his to elevate the status of the John Deere Classic and the mind of men. I put in I put it in the blog and there's and it's true there's a little bit of buzz now surrounding the Jondar Classic. I like how you say buzz. A little bit of buzz. It was like, this tournament doesn't get a ton of buzz,

and now we have created a situation where we got a little buzz going on. Every tournament, every event's trying to create buzz. That's their goal. It's true. So I'm very, again, I don't want Lurch to put words in my mouth where I'm being like, oh, the coronavirus is the best thing that's ever happened to John Deer Classic.

That's not what I'm saying. I'm looking at all the facts and that just happens to be the situation that we're in. Well, congratulations, Trent. It could be a very cool thing to see. I hope you win the bet because watching top three player in the world play that shit tournament would be interesting. It'd be kind of like when we talk about one of these pros, maybe Tiger coming and playing your muni course. It's not like that.

It would just be fascinating. It would be fascinating to see. So I'm rooting for you, and I'd like to see Lurcha have to carry your background. That'd be nice. I see a lot of terrain if I did. It's not like the scenario you just laid out, but I get that, I get what you're saying. So speaking of analogies, next up, we have the CEO of the PGA of America. Seth Wise, a very impressive person.

They've done some great work the last couple of weeks trying to revise, reorganize, create kind of a brand new fall, late summer schedule for all of golf's biggest events or all the ones that they could. We talk with him kind of through that process and about a bunch of different stuff. So enjoy, Seth Laugh. With all the uncertainty in the world, feeling safe at home has never been more important. That's why I want to talk to you about Simply Safe home security. They are longtime friends of Fuller Play as any and all of you listeners know.

And for very good reason, Simply Safe has made it easy to finally get comprehensive protection for your home. no technician or salesperson that needs to come disrupt your house. That's very good right now with all the distancing going on. You don't need to pay any outrageous monthly fees. You don't have to sign a two-year contract. All you've got to do, you just order online. You set it up yourself in under an hour. Your home will be protected 24-7 with emergency dispatch for break-ins, fire, and much more,

all for just 50 cents a day. How much is your home security, your home safety worth? All simply save costs is 50 cents a day. We're not the only fans of Simplisave US News and World Report named SimplySafe best overall home security of 2020. Right now, you can head to SimpliFatcom slash foreplay. Our listeners are going to get free shipping and a 60-day risk-free trial that is Simplicef.com slash foreplay to make sure that you know our show sent you. I'm sorry, that Simpliceave knows our show sent you from Simpliceaf and all of us here. We wish you safe and good health.

simplysave.com slash 4Play. All right, folks. We were joined by a very special guest. The second time, we actually had him on at Beth Page last year. He did a nice little chat right by the driving range at the PGA Championship. He is the CEO of the PGA of America. Seth Waugh, welcome to the podcast for the first time. Yeah, thanks for having me, guys.

It was more fun being on the range of Beth Pages than being in your bedroom, Rex. But I'll take what I got. I mean, you're not the first person to say something like that. like that. It's, look, there's a ton going on. Hopefully it's not to last either much. Zing. Yeah, I hope so. I hope you're right. There's a lot going on. It's supposed to be the Wednesday of Masters Week. It's obviously not because of the entire COVID-19 situation. The schedule, the new kind of revised schedule was released on Monday. My first question is kind of what was it like for you guys to work with all the different organizations to make that happen because

that's that's kind of rare that we see a bunch of different organizations come together and be able to kind of pull something like that off. Yeah, it was, it was very cool. I mean, you know, you'd be proud of the room. Like, you know, I've said this a few times, but like if you were setting up golf today, you wouldn't set it up the way it is, right? Like you kind of can't explain it to your mother, right? Like what, USGA and PGA and PGA and PGA tour and RNA and, you know, obviously it can get confusing. But it, you know, everybody's partners in the room. That's how we, after it. We kind of, as we started to go through it, you know, the tennis world had kind of been every person for themselves to a degree and ended up in being a bit of chaos. We wanted to be

the anti-tennis, if you will, and kind of come out of it, you know, with something that made sense, something that had the best interest of the game involved. And Jay Monahan is just an amazing partner. He's doing a great job with the tour. You know, every time they give up a date, it costs them money, right? And so for him to, you know, have the respect of, you know, trying to have the four majors, which is so important to the ecosystem of the game, the Ryder Cup in this year,

and squeezing all that in to, you know, 20 pounds of flour into a 10-pound bag, right, is hard to do. But everybody approached it in the right way, and, you know, it's kind of no jerks allowed. And if somebody acted out, you know, you kind of, you know, not shouted out, but it became obvious that everybody, you know, was working in the same way. And so, and, you know, look, there were some hairy moments, no doubt about it. And a lot of money on the line, a lot of,

a lot of everything on the line with, you know, zero certainty, right? Like, so we're hopeful now that we have something out there. We also wanted to make sure we weren't tone deaf and that we were talking about golf when that was the least important thing on the planet. And I think our timing was about right. I feel like, you know, the feedback we've gotten is we kind of gave a lot of hope to people. And that's good news. It helps that the world feels a little better the last few days. The market's been doing well.

But anyway, you know, I'm proud of having been in the room. And I'm glad, you know, we all had a year and a half or so under my belt and with each other. So we knew each other. And we got the right things done. Yeah, we were talking a little bit pre-show about just kind of the nature of golf, I think, more than other sports. It seems like to a lot of people would lend itself to being able to maybe come. back earlier. It's not contact. You're not kind of bleeding and sweating on each other. You can even, a lot of states now have courses that are open. You can social distance on the

course, this, that. So how big of the factor was that? And even like when we had Kevin Kisner on, he said, you know, he's on the board with the PGA Tour player board on deciding during the player's championship whether they're going to call it or not. And he was telling us how they had legitimate discussions of like, no, golf can kind of be the beacon right now where we can play. We can kind of adhere by social distancing while still playing. How much does the actual characteristics of golf as a sport factor into you guys being able to decide maybe when we can come back? Yeah, I think it's a very fair point. It's true in the participation side of things, unless you're playing with Frankie.

And then there's a lot of sweating and bleeding going on, mostly from neighbors. But, you know, you're absolutely right. you know, they, they, that if you assume it in its purest form, then obviously there's natural social distancing, you're outdoors. So if you have whatever many people, you know, out of place, let's say even if you had 40,000 fans, that's different over 200 acres than it is, you know, over in an arena, right? Um, uh, having said that, you know, we all have to be, you know, very aware of, not aware of, like, respectful of this disease, right? And, and, you know, And, you know, the only, I've been through a few crises,

you know, ran a bank through 9-11 and ran through the financial crisis. And like the cure here is totally opposite of the cure and any other crisis that ever been. Whether you're trying to create activity, confidence here, you're trying to kill it, right? Like, so it's economic suicide. Isn't the only cure to get to disease. And you hope you don't kind of kill the patient in the process, right?

And so, you know, my point on saying that is, like, we all have to understand that, like, you know, shutting down is the only sort of patriotic thing to do as a citizen of the world. And so we want to be respectful of that. We're always going to be. We're going to listen to the local authorities and do, you know, what we're supposed to do. And we're not going to kind of bend the rules around that. On the other hand, you know, people want distraction. And, you know, golf could, as you say, be the first one back and in a lot of ways for all the reasons you say. We also have approached it with the idea that, look, if, you know, we have our PGA championship in August,

and I sure hope the world is relatively normal and we can have fans. But if we can't have fans, we're going to do it anyway, right? We're going to do it for TV and entertain people in that way because we think that's important to get the players back on the field, if you will. And if you're talking about that, then you're talking about, you know, 150-odd players. And we think you can keep it around maybe a thousand people on site. You can do that. You can do it hopefully with, you know, testing everybody, having real social distance and do it in a way that, you know, is safe for everybody and safe for the community.

And so we hope that's not the case. We hope there's, you know, the grandstands are packed and it's kind of normal. And we've found, you know, but to have that. that you might need to have certainly a cure. You might need to have a vaccine before we really get back to, you know, what we were all doing two months ago, right? And so, but you're absolutely right, Riggs, the game lends itself in a way because of where we play in these outdoor vines, and because there isn't natural contact other than the handshake at the end of the match between, you know, the combatants, right?

And so we do think we can do it in a safe way. Yeah, with the, you know, you guys are now scheduled to be the first major championship with the open canceling and the U.S. Open September, Masters in November, how you kind of mentioned it a little bit that, hey, if we can't do what fans are going to do it without, but how come to you guys to making that August date? Do you have contingency plans if we're not there yet? We can't host something like, you know,

Do you have a contingency plan? Are you kind of pretty confident that we'll be able to pull off the August dates? Yeah. So look, you know, you always, you know, so look, everything's a bit of a hope at this point, right? Like you don't, you don't really, nobody knows, right? Like this is the first time we've ever gone through this. It sounds reasonable to us. We're, you know, talking to every health expert, we can and listening to everything that we can.

And we think it's going to peak, you know, kind of in the next month or two. and then there'll be hopefully in Ed this summer and allow us to do these sort of our event and others. And then there may be a blowback in the fall, right? And so who knows how that's all going to play out. So plan A is to have our PJ championship at Harding Park with 40,000 screaming fans, and that would be amazing. plan B is to have it at Harding Park with no fans and in a safe way and plan C we don't have yet

but if there's if the city is uncomfortable in hosting the event but there's someplace else that makes sense to perhaps get to and hold our championship we're going to do everything we can to do our championship right and we don't have a contingency per se but we certainly have a mindset to try and figure it out. So, you know, and we kind of have drop dead dates in mind of when we'd have to, you know, pull that card if, in fact, San Francisco is not a safe place to do it in any form. How much of a logistical nightmare is it just having to even postpone and how, you know, because we know just from having different people on and meeting people,

whether it's the USDA, whether it's PGA of America, like, you guys begin. preparing and kind of building this city that it is for a week at these venues years out, a couple of years at least out. Like how, what is that process like moving the logistics? How kind of harmful is it to the bottom line? And just talk about a little bit of the logistical nightmare of even postponing that. Yeah, that's a great question. I mean, we have people's lives, right?

We have a full-time staff that's been out there for two years selling it, getting ready to go, all excited about, you know, finally there, two years, you know, two year, just a, you know, pregnancy, and now you're finally going to give birth and suddenly, you know, you're not, right? And we are at the point when we postponed, we were spending just, you know, financially about a half a million dollars a day on our buildup, right? So grandstands are going up and, you know, and corporate hospitality and all sorts of things are being built all day long. And so, you know, pulling the plug is is is painful in a personal way, but also painful financially. But, you know, you do what you have to do.

You know, it was at that point, you know, what also happens is a little bit of a traveling circus, right? So we don't own those grandstands. We rent them. We have people that put them up. They're scheduled to go to the U.S. Open or wherever they're going next. And so if we stop building, they need to go to the next stop or, you know, do we leave them in place? You know, and then if you say, okay, well, if we aren't going to have fans, does it, you know,

the buildout isn't the same, right? Or, you know, let's say we're going to have fans, but socially distance fans, what does the grandstand look like, right? If you have six feet apart from everybody, or do you have a grandstand at all in that case? So these are the kinds of things you're talking about all the time. And it's a little bit of like the old, you know, can God build a rock so big, but he himself can't move it, right? There isn't really an answer to a lot of this stuff because you don't, you don't know, but you're making the best guess as you can. I've learned in going through crises that, yeah, it's the old, the famous general one said,

you know, every plan is a good one until the first shots fired, right? And so you have a plan, and then every day, you know, particularly in a thing like this, you know, the world changes exponentially by the time you wake up the next day. And so, you know, you have to call a lot of audibles along the way. And actually, the quality of those audibles basically defines how well you do, you know, in a, you know, through the crisis. It's probably true. It's certainly true in war. And it's, I mean, you know, make a bad analogy worse.

But, you know, it's true, you know, in sports, right? Like every, you know, you hit one in the bunker. And now, you know, okay, you got to hit it out of the bunker and, you know, put it up and down, right? Yeah, don't follow. I went golf and, you know, there's a course that was open by us. I was able to get out, you know, by myself went out there, played my social distancing rules, and it was great to actually be able to walk outside this little room here with my master's flag on a wall for the last month. But it was kind of similar to what you just said where it's like, oh, finally on the T and I have a great plan here, man.

Like, I have a driver in my hand. That's one of my best clubs. And I'd rip the driver and then everything becomes real once that wedge gets in my hand. And I duff, duff, duff, duff, blade. we're talking a seven up to the next team and then plans over plan is done like you can have all these things on the range and on the punting green and then you step up to that first tee and you have that that one bad club in your hand and everything goes out the window that's a fact that is a fact and by why how come there's no pga flag behind instead of the master's you know so here yeah i thought of this

i thought of this i i have i have i have i have two pGA of america two pga championship flags at my apartment, but when this all hit and everything, in New York City was like the epicenter, I grabbed everything I could, all my essentials. Not saying that the PGA flag is not one of my essential. No, no, no, but my point is that this was our, no, this was already here at my house. You don't make us non-essential?

No, it's not, this isn't even essential. I didn't, I didn't carry this, this master's play. I'll never watch the masters again if it won't. This is an audio podcast. For all the listeners at home, Frankie's face is beat red right now. He did say in last podcast, though, he can help himself out that that was in his room prior. These are things that were already in his room. Just stick to the guns and you'll be fine.

You don't have to dig yourself into a hole. I got to open up a window in here. I have a great defense. The flags you really want you keep in your apartment at home. I have no flag you don't like you just gave to your parents. I have. the ones at my apartment, they're framed, they're on the wall, and I just couldn't, I, I wasn't thinking about the wall stuff, you know, this stuff was, this, this old little flag here was a ball,

you know, in my childhood home, I had dust on it. Yeah, well, so you've matured over the years. So give me your adverts and I'll send you some good swag. Ooh, I'm going to work out well for you, Frank. I'm so stupid, I almost just turned to a positive. I got a question, though, so I mean, as fans were pumped that, you know, that there's three, plan A, B, and C, as you said, you know, hopefully there's no D plan where things just can't happen because this virus has got to a point where we just, you know,

anyways, there is no option for you. I'm just wondering how much, if at all, you've looked into C by working with, you know, San Francisco and the local surrounding area of any and all options or if you've not given that, any look at this time. Yeah, look, San Francisco is our partner. We want everything we can to do it. They've been great.

You know, Harding Park's a really special place. We haven't been on the West Coast in, I don't know, 40 years or so, something like that. I think it's going to be cool in terms of prime time on the East Coast, which, you know, another cool part of this thing. And so we're going to do everything we can to do that. And we certainly would never act without them as our partners, right? And so, you know, the plan C is more, you know, like, you know, what you think of as you're going to bed at night. Like where, you know, could you, could you play a, you know, know, if it makes it easier, if you're playing with no fans, you know, that makes it easier

to imagine other places, right? But we haven't had any conversations with anybody. You know, we, you know, our broadcast partners would obviously have to be fully on board. And San Francisco would have to say to us, like, we just don't see any way we're going to be able to do this in August. And then if we could find a place that we thought was safe and responsible and obviously they want to do it too, you know, I mean, everybody wants to reopen in any form they can, right? And so, you know, that's, you know, a constant conversation. I don't, I don't mean to get off the rails here, but like, you know, yeah, it'd be, you know, we're going to do everything we can to play in that August date because we think it's the right

thing for the game and the right thing for us and right thing for fans. And it's, you know, our responsibility to do everything we can to play it. Yeah, and it's, I think a lot of people probably understand either that when you guys bring these events to places, like the event immerses itself with that city. Like you said, you're communicating with the township, with who runs that, the government, the large organizations that are at play in those cities. So it's like it's much of a celebration of that area as it is the golf course. 100%.

We become the fifth sport, right, if you think about it. Yeah. So and in that town and our people, you know, literally are Barry Deitchie's our term, which, you know, he's lived there for the last two years. And we have, you know, some people that are locals and some people that move. from place to place. And, you know, that's, that's hard, too, right? On those folks, as I said earlier.

So anyway, we, you know, you know, you become part of the community. You've got the, you know, the golfers out there. You get, you know, I don't, the last thing I'm going to do is let them down as our partners after, you know, we've worked on us. And I don't know the exact date we committed to it, but it's got to be a decade ago, right? So, you know, this has, you know, it's been a long time coming. It's not surprising if you have two or three high interest credit cards in your wallet right now. That's very common.

Why not pay them off with a credit card consolidation loan from our friends at Lightstream? We have talked for years now about how illiterate, how stupid, how out of the loop we are when it comes to finances, credit cards, interests, not knowing where we're at, needing somebody to help us out, somebody to point us in the right direction, somebody to just make it easy and save us money. Whitestream believes that people with good credit deserve a better loan experience, and that's exactly what they deliver. Quickly roll balances from multiple credit cards into one single monthly loan pay. get a low fixed interest rate and free more money in your monthly budget say goodbye to credit card bills and take even more control of your money light streams credit card consolidation loans have rates from just 5.95% APR with auto pay and there are absolutely no fees you can even get your money as soon as the day you apply that is the same day you apply apply today get a special interest

rate discount and save even more only way to get this discount is to go to light stream.com slash four. L-I-G-H-T-S-T-R-E-A-M dot com slash four. That's lightstream.com slash four. Subjects of credit approval. Rate includes 0.50% auto-paid discount. Terms and conditions apply and offers are subject to change without notice. Visit lightstream.com slash four for more information.

I want to give you guys, Seth, a little tip in terms of how to knock this thing out of the park. And there's a guy called Tiger Woods, and he loves to fade the ball. So if you just put all those pins in the right side of those greens, on your ratings will be through the roof. You guys will be crushing TV. Keep in mind, he hits those little buttercuts, especially those mid-iron's at those right pins all day long, all day long. Patrick Greed goes the other way.

Catch it on, exactly. But the, yeah, but how do you explain Augusta, then? Isn't that a draw? That's a draw course, isn't it? Yeah, well, he gets like eight months to work on the draw. It's pretty good, man. He's pretty good. Yeah, he's figured those out.

With the dates and with all that, I mean, what is in that room, like you said, you know, people would be proud of the room. People would be happy the way that it went. Who runs the room? Does anybody get to run the room? Like, can Fred Ridley say, hey, this is when the Masters is going to be and you guys figure it out outside of that? or how does it, you know, who's running the room and how does all it get to shake down? Yeah. Well, look, I, you know, no one runs room is the answer.

But I think the game runs the room is probably how I'd answer it. And I mean that. And it, and it, that's certainly how it worked here. But, you know, Jay's got, you know, the most chess pieces on the board, right? He's, you know, he's got a full schedule. And, you know, I feel like I'm an invited gags. right, to that schedule, right? And I think, you know, we're all grateful to be a part of it.

We borrow his players, you know, kind of our players, once a year and throw these, you know, these majors, right? And so, you know, I would say that, that, you know, he's got the most moving parts for sure, and therefore we all defer to that and make sure that we're all being fair to that part of it, but, you know, there's a whole ecosystem. I mean, you throw the European tour in here, too, right? And the LPGA, who are also in the room, and as you say, Augusta, right? So, you know, it is, it is, it's, it's, it's, it could be Lord of the flies. If, you know, I know you went to Harvard rakes. You might have read that one back in the day. It's a good one. Where, you know, it's, you know, there's, there is nobody ruling and it's chaos.

but instead it's you know it's more it's more like we're the board of directors of the game that the company is the game of golf and our fiduciary responsibility is to run it in a way that's in the best interest of all our stakeholders which are you know the players the fans sponsors you know that's the other thing we haven't talked about right you know just moving date and you've got sponsors that have paid, you know, a lot of money to be at, you know, Harding Park in May or all of a sudden, you know, we've got to move them to August, right? And, and that's complicated. There's tournaments that are getting canceled, sadly, right?

And so, thinking about all those moving parts and then throwing, you know, broadcast into it, which is, you know, multi-party as well. There's, you know, there's not like one network is doing the whole thing. thing. There's multi-parties there. And then the whole sports world has gotten, is a mess. So, you know, baseball needs to get their season in. The NBA still wants to finish theirs in the NHL and then football starts and college football starts. And, you know, in the Olympics, you know, which was a big piece of the pie, you know, obviously, you know, being delayed, you know, that changed the landscape, you know, not only for golf. You just communicate with them.

with the other sports leagues too. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And, yeah, Jay does more of that than us because, you know, he's a commissioner and I'm not. But, but, yeah, we're, you know, we definitely are in touch and know what everybody's kind of doing. I have personal relationships with all the commissioners. So I've talked to each of them, you know, at some point in this crisis and kind of how they're thinking. But, you know, absolutely.

And then you're more or less communicating with them through the broadcast, right, because they're trying to figure out, you know, by the way, I didn't mention NASCAR and, you know, MLS and, you know, and, you know, everything else that's going on in the world, right? Like this whole ecosystem, which in a normal world, you know, everybody's got their places and kind of respect each other and try not to compete, you know, against certain things, gets thrown, you know, into the mixer, right? And, and figuring out how to how to do all that. You know, our first priority is certainly to our game, right? But you have to be aware of kind of everything else that's going on. So, you know, it's a good question who's in charge. And, you know, again, you wouldn't have set up the game

and the way that it did. But, you know, again, that kind of, you know, that the no jerk policy works, right? If somebody, I'm not saying anybody did, but if somebody acted out, he'd get called out by the group, right? Because we're all doing the right thing. Yeah, and I think amid all this, It was kind of a small little positive that I think people should have focused on is when that joint release was made and all the different logos from the different organizations were at the top of it. I thought like, wow, that's really cool that they're all able to come together and put forth a schedule because of logistics, because of dates and how complicated that is for one organization to figure out, let alone a handful is incredible. And then, you know, the other massive event that you guys run this year is the Ryder Cup. And we haven't even talked about that yet, but the Ryder Cup currently slated with its same dates. And, you know, I don't want to call it kind of a positive necessarily, but you could look and say this, the different, based on the unique circumstances, there's a significant difference running into the Rider Cup this year, which is the U.S. Open at Wingfoot.

You know, how is that going to change the way that you guys approach it in any way, kind of having that big of a tournament? of a major championship, the U.S. Open just beforehand. Does that change anything for you guys? You know, first of all, thanks for the comments on the logos. That was, you know, very intentional. And you and my mother are both proud of us that we were able to pull that on. But, you know, that was very intentional that we, you know, we wanted it to come out.

And we worked really hard and kept it together in some tough moments to make sure that we came out as one because we do, think that's really important, right, to be one game. And that's how we operated throughout. And so, you know, that, I'm glad you noticed it and, and thanks for comment it, but it was, it was very intentional that we, we did it that way. So, thanks. The, you know, in terms of the Rider Cup, look, Rider Cup, as we all know, is, is a different thing, right? And, and I hope, hopefully the world is, is normal and some kind of normal. And we can have a, you know, it would be an amazing celebrating, of the game, right? Because it is, it's tribal, it's different, particularly without the Olympics

happening this year. I think it makes it even that much cooler that you have this kind of international competition where you're playing for your flag. And so, you know, that is really cool. And what a kind of, I was going to say a capstone of the season, but it won't be because, you know, you've still got the masters coming after it, but it'll feel like it, you know, at the time. And I could have make an argument that the U.S. open the week before makes it cooler because, you know, you kind of have, like if you're a junkie, right, like golf's going to kind of own the stage there for a couple weeks in a row, you know, and obviously football is gone at that point and, you know, that's part of things, but, but I think, you know, we're different and those events are different.

Yeah, you know, it'll, it, you know, they're going to have, you think about the players, we talked about our players being tired in Paris, right? right? Well, now you're talking, you know, if it happens, which hopefully it all does, you get PGA championship, you got Wyndham, then you get three FedEx Cups, you got a week off in there, and then you've got U.S. Open Rider Cup, right? That's a lot of golf. Now, hopefully they're resting up right now. They've got, you know, a couple months to kind of get themselves organized. I know I've talked to a bunch of them. They're anxious to get back, obviously, as you can imagine. But, you know, What a great lead-in to the brighter cup, too, right, to have the U.S. Open, you know,

it'll probably be a small advantage to the Europeans because they won't be jet lag. They'll be here, right? They'll be here for a couple weeks. You know, some people like to play competition before a major competition. Some guys like to take a week off. They're not going to have that choice, right? So, and, you know, the U.S. Open is always a grind, and Wingfoot is a grindy place, right? So they'll be a little beaten up by the time they get to Wisconsin.

But I just think it could be an amazing kind of exclamation point to the season if all kind of goes as well as we hope it will. How close are you guys going to be watching, you know, the tour? Again, how important it is going to be for you guys to kind of watch out that unfolds and, you know, adjust your plans accordingly? Hugely, right. And, you know, I hope, you know, for J-SIC, I hope. he gets going as soon as he possibly can.

And it's hard to imagine that some of the first events will have fans. But hopefully, and I know he's, they are planning on both ways, you know, with or without. And, you know, it would be nice to have, you know, we're going to be the first major, right? But it'll be really nice to have some benchmarks before we get going, right? And look, I hope the other sports can open too. Like, we're not trying to, you know, we have some advantages, as you said, as you talked about earlier in terms of, you know, being an outdoor, truly outdoor sport. But, but boy, I hope, you know, I'm a sports fan. Like, I, you know, I'm sure you guys are going nuts.

I know I am, right? And I just, you know, I've got this nervous twitch every Sunday afternoon that I don't know what to do. but it you know so absolutely we want to watch what other people are doing and we have no pride of authorship so we want to figure out as I said earlier you know safe sex of you know playing the game and playing it with you know at the highest level so learning from what everybody else is doing and creating best practices absolutely something we want to watch well look I um I think we're all kind of sitting around doing the same thing you're doing just hoping wishing for something to come on i think if golf could do it i mean did you guys consider any any kind of wacky or silly like format changes

or anything to get golf going again or did you know did jay ever um kind of communicate anything like that to you yeah we've talked about it a lot so stay tuned i think you'll i think you'll i'm hopeful that you'll you'll get a little fix or something here before the real season gets me ahead got to give us one My one hit would be, it will be for the benefit of COVID-19 relief. Let me say that. Okay. Yeah, I don't, you know, I, like the players want to help. Everybody wants to help.

Everybody wants to put the peg in the ground. And I think you'll see some form of, you know, an event of some form. You know, we're doing some stuff with, with gaming leagues. So some, you know, online kind of stuff. that we may are trying to do for relief and you know just trying to create any content that you can because people are tired of watching you guys. For sure. Look at my mentions and comments there.

Watch, pause. You guys got to do stuff. Are you, how many of you are playing golf, you know, in the last week? Not me. I'm in New York City. I'm in Manhattan. Trans in the epicenter, if you couldn't tell by his surroundings. I was, I played a course.

I played a course of the day where they had pool noodles sticking out of the holes, but all the way above the hole, it was nuts. I was like, I was draining these things from all different distances. I got to tell you. That would be something cool to see also. Like when you guys come back, if there's any little changes to the actual golf course that like amateur players are also going to see. Like I know like at Pioneers, they put in the little PVC pipings inside the hole

where the ball's not going all the way in, like little things. Like would you guys ever adopt any of those? think in the professional game or yeah maybe you know you know maybe where you take it out with your glove exposed or whatever right you know it uh you know again we're like this thing is going to change the world right for a while the question is how do we make that for the better as opposed to the worst right and so what can we learn from it that that'll be better and you know we've been you know schizophrenic about the game a little bit because you know you kind of one hand you want to keep the game open, you know, our 29,000, that's how they make their living, right? And so,

you know, they're getting shut down like restaurants and everybody else. In other hand, you don't want to be part of the problem. You want to be a part of the solution. So how do you, how do you end? You want, first of all, want everybody to be healthy and safe, right? So we don't want to put our folks in harm's way by, you know, being open in a way that's not safe. And, and so figuring out a way to play it as, you know, if you think about it in its purest form, like golf's a walk in the park, right? And, you know, that should be something people should be able to do and are going to want to do. And like, you know, is it a safe refuge or is it part of the problem?

And people, people, you know, I think, you know, if you don't respect it, you know, it can be part of the problem, right? And so what, you know, what we've tried to do is sort of think of it through the prism of, like, if we were the CDC, what guidelines would we recommend to be able to play the golf in a safe way that allows you to get some exercise and get outside and, you know, not go nuts, right? And, and so, you know, walking only, you know, not touching the pins, you know, safe distancing on the course, not, you know, in the parking lot, whatever it might be, maybe only twosomes, you know, those sorts of things are things that we're sort of suggesting and we put up a bunch of, you know, guidelines on, you know, that sort of safe way to be in the game. But it's, you know, I also think, look, you know, we talked about it from professional spaces,

but, you know, this may be the first thing that people go back to, right? And I think it could end up being, you know, that beating ready for that sort of V recovery that we're talking about in the economy, talking about it in golf. people are going to have the Joneses, right? And new players may come because they realize it is a safe way to be outside and doing things. And could you see, you know, ironically, a gross bird out of this in the back end. And I think that's possible, right? Yeah, I definitely do.

And I think, you know, I mean, I've been here, obviously, at Pinehurst, which is well documented for three or four weeks. And it's in North Carolina, I think that's in their mandates with the shelter in place that, you know, golf is considered an essential. outdoor activity. So I think a lot of people have kind of thought, I mean, even among my other golf buddy group techs and stuff, people have floated like, why don't we have a 64 man match, play bracket, get where they play one match a day, and it's on TV, because then it's just two people in a park, like you just said, walking around playing. So I think a lot of people are kind of looking at and thinking golf could be kind of a sign of one of the first things to come back. So it's just fascinating. It's fascinating to hear about it from your guys's vantage point. I'm sure

you're having these discussions as you talked about on a much higher level than we are. Yeah, well, we're trying. And we're trying to get, you know, make sure golf's in the relief fund bill and, you know, to make sure that, you know, our small, you know, it's an $85 billion business, right, with a couple million people in it, right? We think about it, it's this great, beautiful game that, you know, we're running around in, but there's, you know, people that are lives are depending on it, right? And so making sure that we do everything we can every day to kind of get everybody to the other side.

That's what I wake up worrying about. I have 29,000 people that are kind of counting on me to make their lives better, not me, but us. And how do we do that, right? Like how do we get them to the other side of this thing? So they survive. And, you know, it's kind of like I said I used the analogy the other day. It's kind of like we're all in this ship at sea that's in trouble. and we've got to get to the shore.

And if we all jump into one lifeboat at once, it's probably going to sink, right? If you try to swim ashore, you're probably not going to make it alone. But if we take our time and think about it and use all of our resources and put everybody in a lifeboat, you know, in a thoughtful way that we'll all kind of get to the other side. And that's, you know, how we're thinking about the game. And we're going to launch a golf industry relief fund, which we're going to give a major lead gift on, hopefully later this week,

to support a lot of those people that are struggling right now because we think that's the best way to kind of get everybody to the other side. So we're thinking about, you know, a lot, all these things all day long. So where are you hungered down right now? Where are you coming to? Yeah, I'm struggling down here in South Florida. It's awful.

You know, it's interesting. everybody goes like how you doing and I the days are grindy long you know this one's longer than normal because I have to spend an hour with you guys but the but it uh you know the and you kind of come out of my cave I sort of whatever start trying to get a little exercise in the morning and then just kind of sit in my little my little office for you know 12 hours whatever it is and then I come out and I've got five kids and we've got a couple other strays that came from New York City, a goddaughter and a niece and, you know, beautiful 20-something-year-olds. And we have 17 to 25.

And so I get out at about, you know, 7 or 7.30, and there's usually a nice little crisp, you know, glass of white wine wait for me and an open bottle of red. And the nights are like these magical nights. And I hope, you know, people are getting that thing. I mean, so this thing is awful. Don't get me wrong. But the opportunity to kind of, you know, get these stolen moments, these magical moments with my whole family under one roof, which, you know, never happens. You know, it's like high school all over again. It's, you know, where TV barely goes on. You know, you sit around the dinner table for, you know, longer than you should. You play a game. We're having theme nights. You know, we've had a, we had a, we had a, we had a, we had a, we had a, you know, the, you know, the, uh, uh, Anyway, we had a backyard barbecue and we've got movie night.

Anyway, my point is, like, there's something going on here, which is pretty special. And having lived through, again, 9-11 in New York and run out of bank, but more importantly, losing two of my kind of top five best friends and hundreds of other people that I knew, you know, New York was changed, right? It changed. It was different for, you know, a while afterwards. People were kind. and people took care of each other.

York's like that. It's a place that you don't know anybody until you're in trouble, then everybody knows you, right? It's going to take care of you. And I feel like that's going on, and that we're kind of like its Little House in the Prairie with internet, right? Like we're having this amazing time

that we never thought we'd have. I thought early on that we were a week away from being a reality TV show, and like we had to have some order because this was kind of get really weird. But like so far it's been amazing, you know, where the days are forever. And then the nights are just as forever and beautiful. You know, I hope people are fine, magical moments in this whole thing because we certainly are. Yeah, I think it's sort of similar also to like what you were saying before Riggs and

Seth about like the logos and everyone coming together and an organization standpoint. But like for us, like, you know, family members are coming back from different states and different you know, cities and stuff, people that you may not have seen in years and they're all hunkering back down at their old family house. And it's like, it is amazing. Like without something like this, like that wouldn't have happened ever, you know? Like I wouldn't be back here at my city, at my house right now worrying about my family's restaurant. Now like I'm, I'm like going and making deliveries for our pizza place and stuff like that. So it really is. Amazing, right? Bringing us together. Like I went on a podcast. Our CEO actually,

Erica has a new podcast and she had my dad on. And it was waterworks. Like within the first two minutes my dad was a was a wreck he was just crying he's a prior you guys are a boy car just talking about what the what what like what the community means to like something like this really shows you like when you run a small business and you and you're something in the community it shows that like it means something right like when all these big big organizations or big companies are all forced to shut down and you're still plucking away and you have to open up the door and make the pizza and deliver it to the needy family or the hospital like that makes you feel like i was like working in the city three weeks ago, four weeks ago, and everything was just so like robotic and everything was like,

you wake up, you go to work, you talk about golf, you talk about how you can't hit a wedge, and then you go home and you don't like ask your family how they're doing. And now you're back home, it's like survival mode and like playing monopoly and like, you know what I mean? It's like, it really makes use, like if you can get through it, obviously there's so many people getting sick and so many people dying and it's scary time. But like if you're able to follow the guidelines and hopefully stay healthy, it is like, something to take away from for the rest of your life, the way I feel. You'll never, you know, you're never going to get this, whatever, 60, 90 days, like,

where you're with your family and that's it. Like, what? You know, what? Like, that would never, ever happen. And it's sort of like, you know, we also talked about, like, if you ever had something you want to do, do you want to run a marathon, do you want to play to piano? Do you want to, like, write a book? Like, now's the time, right?

Like, you know what I mean? And so, anyway, I couldn't agree more, Frankie. It's, there's something incredible about this thing that we just, you know, that's, you know, a gift, right? And we've got to be grateful for that part of this thing. And it's just, I hope we don't forget it when we go back out and start being knuckleheads again, you know. I agree. Well, Seth, look, it's been, it's just been fascinating, hearing about the entire thing. And it's been cool to see among all the terrible things that are going on.

It is important to kind of try to take some positives away from it, try to find some hope, try to find things to look forward to. And I think golf did about as well as the job as they could this week coming out with that. And you guys working together with the PGA tour, the USDA, Augusta, the R&A, PGA of America. It's just been, it's been, I think, cool and interesting to see. And hopefully it does play out the way that kind of the revised schedule is looking. So we appreciate the time and enjoy the time with your family while you've got it. I also want to say you are the probably arguably the most important person

that comes on this podcast. I mean, we talk, we talk to a bunch of just idiots a lot of the time, not to call Max, not to call Max Homa, idiot. Kevin Kisner,

Max Homa, idiots. Yeah, Kevin Kisner, but like just a bunch of guys that, you know, yeah, Kisner's like driving his car or whatever. Like,

yeah, I got to go pay Dewey. Like, something like, you're out here, like, in charge of 29,000 employees. Like,

what are we talking about here? Like, it's crazy. But we really appreciate you spending the time with this because we know that you're you got a lot of things on your plate well you're nice to say look I'm I'm flattered to be on and thanks for all you're doing and you're reaching an audience that needs to be reached right and they're out there listening and and you know we appreciate what you're doing you're a big have become a real part of the ecosystem

which is important and by the way it was a good trade on the sale by the way that was that was good timing yeah yeah it's a really good tell hello Mike drop. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Big time. Good time. All right, Seth.

Well, you guys deserve it. And thanks. And good luck out there. Be smart. Be safe. All right. You too. You're very well.

Thank you, Seth. Bill. Thanks. Great chatting. Trying to hang up. We still got you. Yeah. I want to say if you're going to talk about it.

Yeah. Man, that set guy sucks. So I'm going to say one last thing, boys, and I should have said it on there, but, you know, having lived through a few of these things is, like, the key is to be smart and to be human. And if you can kind of come out of it with a brain and a soul, like, that's what matters, right? And that's what we've got to remember, like in peacetime, we've got to all remember the same thing. And so good luck out there. And I will talk to you all soon.

I hope. All right. Appreciate it. See it. Thank you.