Orlando Sentinel Dropping the Ball on Covering This Week's Event...IN ORLANDO

Our good pal Sal Johnson at Golf Observer dropped me a line to bring something to my attention.  The Orlando Sentinel - former employer of personal fave writer Steve Elling - has almost zero coverage of this week's season-ending PGA Tour event in Orlando.  How the Orlando Sentinel could simply ignore a PGA Tour event in their backyard, the Children's Miracle Network Classic, is mind-boggling.  Seriously, ming-boggling.

Here's some of Sal's take.

[T]he Sentinel, the local paper of record [is] a joke. I also have gotten a laugh on the Wednesday Sentinel because on the bottom of the front page is a paid ad for the tournament. Guess the Disney folks, Childrens Miracle folks and the PGA Tour forgot to tell the sports department that they were having a tournament.

Honestly in all of my years in golf I have not seen as much disrespect or irresponsibility from a big city newspaper. No report on Saturday or Sunday who was in the field, no report on the importance of the event, no preview of what is happening. I know that times are tough and the Sentinel is part of the Tribune group which has run several papers like the Los Angeles Times into the ground. Still no matter, if it's a Champions, LPGA or Nationwide Tour event in your town you have to cover it, to image that this paper has not done a single story on the last event on the PGA Tour is more than a joke, it's something in which sports editors have to be replaced. Who knows, seeing how bad all of the Tribune papers have gotten, maybe the sports department is being run my some guy in Chicago (via a Blackberry of course) who doesn't realize that a PGA Tour event is being played this week in Orlando.

The Orlando Sentinel gets my vote for the worst, most irresponsible paper to have a PGA Tour event in their town and not for this year but for the 30 years that I have covered golf.

Well said, Sal. 

He does note that this morning the Sentinel finally put out a little diddy on what is at stake for Rich Beem this week.  The author, Chris Harry, also screws up some facts (but not as bad as Matt DeBord).

No such hidden drama will be there for the likes of Zach Johnson (No. 4 on the money list), David Toms (14th), Heath Slocum (31st), Justin Leonard (42nd) or defending tournament champion Davis Love III (51st), each of whom has either locked up a spot in the enviable Top 30 — where players can pick their tournaments — or put themselves within striking distance to do so.

Actually, DL3's exemption criteria is that he has won in the last two years.  After that, then it would be his standing as a past champion of the Disney.  Then, it would be that he has won 20 or more times on the PGA Tour, which gets him a lifetime exemption.  That puts him in criteria group 17.  Criteria group 18?  The top 30 on the prior year's FedExCup.

Harry also notes that players outside of the top 150 have to go to Q-school.  Nope, that's top 125.

But, hey, at least there's an article!