Buick & PGA Tour Make Official Their Awkward Break Up

Reggie Bush & Kim Kardashian made quite a splash last week in the sporting world when they announced that they had amicably split after two years of dating.  Supposedly, the rationale behind the break up was that they never saw each other.  Reggie was busy with filming Subway ads and not living up to his potential.  Kim was too busy filming a useless E! reality show and doing way more than anyone ever expected of someone whose only discernible talent is having a big butt.

Anyway, that kind of amicable split is exactly what was made official today by the PGA Tour and General Motors.  More specifially, the PGA Tour & Buick released a joint statement that pronounced their decades long relationship dead.

The PGA TOUR and Buick jointly announced today that as a result of the recent court-supervised restructuring of General Motors, all agreements between Buick and the PGA TOUR have been withdrawn. This brings to an end the Buick Open and Buick’s sponsorship of the Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines.

This is how celebrities break up.  They get their PR people together, highlight the positve, and are extremely careful with their words.  Notice that the Buick Open is clearly done.  Meanwhile, the Torrey Pines event - guaranteed to get Tige & Phil almost every year - will not be going away as the Tour is sure to find a replacement sponsor.  Unfortunately, Michigan is considered a title sponsor cesspool.  Not even Jerry Kelly & Steve Stricker can concoct a plan to save a tournament there.

Yeah, Buick would love to keep sponsoring golf tournaments.  Unfortunately, they are not making any money, are owned by the federal government (ergo, you and I), the UAW, and others.  The federales - proxy for the biggest shareholder group - put the kibbash on the Buick sponsor deals.  They can run commercials, but can't sponsor golf tournaments. 

It is like a couple that breaks up to date other people but says it is because they don't have time for one another.  Buick has a lot of other things to focus on, like surviving.  The PGA Tour had to get out of Michigan, find two new title sponsors, and worry about the reaction to the Greenbrier tournament that they're going to announce tomorrow.

Perhaps the worst part is that the friends that the couple shared were told about the breakup second hand - from Golfweek's Adam Schupak.  The PGA Tour skirted town and let CBS Sports personally thank the fans for the memories.  They kind of leaked what was going to happen without directly confirming or denying it.  Buick was not nearly as transparent.  In fact, as Jim McGovern mentions, Buick executives could not even muster a direct yes or no about the death of the Buick Open.

Buick and the PGA Tour will move on, but now it becomes awkward for the fans.  With a half century of history between the two, it will be awkward to not see them together in public anymore.  Yeah, they'll get together for brunch from time to time and flirt a little bit about how rekindle the flame.  But after they meet, Buick will get into their Lacrosse sedan, blast Jeff Buckley's "Last Goodbye," and cry as they leave the Denny's parking lot.