While I was away, I missed out on a pretty revolutionary thing.  The LPGA Tour issued a Blog Policy for the 2009 season.  A couple of my fellow bloggers commented on the development, including Jay Busbee, Geoff Shackelford, and our own LPGA blogger Hound Dog.

In my mind, this is the culmination of a lot of work done in the blogging world to gain some legitimacy for the good content produced.  Admittedly, some blogs don't do very well, but they don't last.  The ones that produce good content, are original, and develop a decent audience do last and can thrive. 

The golf blogosphere has produced some wonderful blogs and I link to many of them each day.  Some of them don't do anything related to professional golf.  Sites like Waggle Room tend to do more professional golf, and less about playing the game.  It is sites like ours that the LPGA was probably thinking about when they developed this policy.

In a post at the beginning of the year, I talked about how I thought golf blogs like this one could evolve into a one-stop-shop for local golf coverage that was slowly being demolished by the fall of the golf beat writer.  It seems to me that this was the intent of the LPGA Tour in creating this policy.

The LPGA Tour has been out in front of the sport on a couple of notable issues lately.  They were the first to introduce drug testing to the sport, though with hiccups.  As it turns out, we have not found out about any golfer that has tested positive.  Critics would say that the steroid policy is unnecessary because golf doesn't lend itself to that kind of thing.

Likewise, the LPGA Tour is out in front on this issue.  Critics will say that golf blogs are not much more than (mostly) guys in their underwear, at a laptop, in their mom's basement.  For your information, I own my condo and I don't have a garage. 

File photo...of me.

I think that the LPGA's policy will help establish a network of locally based LPGA reporters that may have national - or international - audiences.  They can cover golf with the freedoms of bloggers and share the stories of the tour and its players with their readers.  Instead of having LPGA headlines buried on the back pages of the Sports section, they can be featured prominently on the front page of a blog.  It's a ploy that will likely work.  After all, it's a win-win.  Bloggers get legit media attention and the LPGA gets some extra coverage.  Count me in.

Not every blogger will get the ok.  There are some standards that the policy establishes.  They may seem complex or confusing, but that is because golf companies are still learning how to deal with bloggers.  Which ones are worth the effort in forming a relationship?  Which ones won't be gone in 3 months?  Who is just going to the event for the free food, great drinks, air conditioned tent, and Golf Channel in HD?

The LPGA Tour is taking a chance that this will pay off and, at the same time, setting a precedent for how other golf tours will likely deal with us blogger types.  I guess I'll have to put on some pants and get out of the house.