Con – you got more out of that Baldry piece than I did – though I do have to take up for her just a tiny bit. She only has a 750 word space and trying to include tours around the world in an article based in the Duramed Futures Tour is pretty tough.

That fluff piece sounded more like a shot at Vicky Hurst than anything. I would love to know what “celebrity” status Hurst was getting on the DFT. What recognition she got was similar to what Pressel and Creamer got as junior phenoms. Hurst’s problem was her age. She couldn’t go after the LPGA Tour at age 17 and she had pretty much outgrown the amateur juniors. She didn’t whine and complain – she just went to the DFT and started beating people there. (hmm – who could’ve learned from THAT lesson ? oh yeah – that 6’9" chick from Hawaii who hits the ball 485 yards off the tee)

What the heck was Baldry talking about when she made Mindy Kim sound like a griping teenager, saying that she was overlooked this year ? Once again – you’re on the DFT – NOBODY follows the DFT. Baldry didn’t even follow the DFT until Hurst closed out with another win last week. What the heck was Kim talking about when she said that people “underestimated how she played.” ??

Baldry wrote this article like the DFT was the hottest women’s tour on the planet. Unless you read the DFT website, there was almost no news about the tour – even about Vicky Hurst.

Con – you sure got more out of this than I did. She took a miscellaneous word in the opening – and we don’t know if the word “bogus” was actually connected to what she’s writing about. And the other sentence fragments were used to make Kim sound bitter. I just don’t get it.

I’m sure Mindy Kim won’t appreciate being portrayed this way, nor Vicky Hurst. Sure, including even half the names I mentioned would have undermined the premise of the entire piece—and that would have been a good thing. But I singled out Baldry because she’s a pretty reliable bellwether of how the US media’s going to cover Q-School in December—as if proven professionals from other tours and amateurs with lots of international experience don’t exist. By mentioning only Wie and Lewis—who have not yet qualified for the Class of 2009—Baldry unintentionally opened the door to all the other Q-School favorites. Hope she learns from her oversight and does her homework in the next month-plus.

hmmm…I was thinking more that she and Dougie Ferguson had been collaborating on articles lately. (ouch !) ;-)

Baldry does what most of the media does – lean on the “popular” names. Wie is a given, and Lewis was a fun and good story this year and people are pulling for them.

Outside of Japan, nobody has heard of the women you mentioned – they are just not in view, being halfway around the world on another “minor league” tour. (compared to the LPGA)

having LPGA.com as its own news source would be very handy, particularly with TC as a lead writer! I know the LPGA reads this site, so just take me up on my suggestion!

…is if there’s an academic conference going on at the same time where I can give a paper. Then I can apply for a few hundred in travel money—less than usual this year b/c of the SUNY budget crisis—to offset the thousands in costs. Wait, that doesn’t sound like fun at all!!

…you get the job writing for Golfweek !!

I’ve learned a lot about college golf and amateur golf (in the US) from them. I like their ranking system and make use of it. They even get around to posting scores from many international tours, even women’s ones. (Although Daniel Wexler does a better job all by himself on the men’s and most women’s tours.) Which makes their shortcomings even more disappointing. Lisa Mickey is light-years ahead of any golf writer I’ve read on women’s golf. Why is that?

…we keep seeing more and more that having media people actually on site doesn’t necessarily guarantee getting the story right !