My wife tells me that I'm a bit sappy. You'd be hard pressed to see it if you weren't her, but she has me pegged. Today is one of the more emotional, non-wedding/funeral/birthday days of my life. In this year in which more wonderful and natural-feeling changes have taken place since puberty, two more changes take place today.

I'm leaving Waggle Room and I'm moving into a brief blogging purgatory - bloggatory? - before joining the great team with NBCSports.com.

It really is one of the happiest days of my life. A dream is being realized, one I've fought for so long and is coming true. Nothing really will change about how I approach writing, but how I approach getting to write will be. It'll be my full-time job, my responsibility, and my career. Still sounds pretty staggering.

I want to let you know that I swear not to disappoint. Having all my energies dedicated to this will - hopefully - only make me better. We're going to have some cool things up our sleeves at the new blog that I think you'll enjoy. The podcast will come back. Maybe a morning video blog. Weekly chats. There will be more ways to interact than ever, and I hope you'll take the time to join in on them. Again, it's a personal invitation from me.

At the same time, though, this is a bittersweet occasion. I've achieved one of my biggest goals, but it comes at the expense of the place that helped make them a possibility. Waggle Room is in great hands, and I'm sure we'll see each other again, but things will be different. More eyeballs means less chances for me to read the thoughts you all share here that are one of the more entertaining parts of being here. The diatribes about politics and fairness, lengthy debates in the Queen's English that I sometimes simply cannot follow, and TXQ's supreme ability to make me audibly groan at a pun - these I will miss.

So, bottom line is this: please, stay in touch. I'll be off of the radar for a couple of weeks until things get started with the new site. Don't hesitate to find me on Facebook, or e-mail me, or whatever. I'm changing neighborhoods, but don't be a stranger. As I was recently reminded, good neighbors are hard to find.

And to complete the segue/ripoff of Mr. Rogers, it's been a pleasure to be your neighbor. Thanks for everything and see you soon.

Love,

Ryan

Last month, it was eight years ago that I began on this journey of covering golf. It began in the basement studio of a friend of a friend's house - just me and a mic, for an hour, with an audience of probably one or less. The dream, though, was that I could one day cover golf and share my passion for the game with a real audience as my job. 

It probably sounded kind of odd to people that I was a J-school dropout (on the first day, no less), but still had this aspiration. Frankly, it didn't make much sense to me at times. But, over the years, I've been fortunate enough to find and work with great people that have been willing to give me a chance to prove my worth. They understood my goal, my singular focus and gave me the opportunity to work hard for a hobby I hoped would become a job.

On Tuesday evening, that dream became real. I have accepted a role with NBCSports.com as their golf blogger. Full-time. It begins next month.

The details aren't 100% done yet. The name is going to be Pro Golf Talk, in the model of their other sports blogs. It'll launch probably in mid-November.

I'm extremely grateful to everyone at NBCSports.com for the opportunity to build a community that hopefully resembles the one we have here - intelligent, thoughtful, engaged. What I have done here will be done there.

This unbelievable opportunity would not be possible without the good folks here at SB Nation. Jim Bankoff, Tyler Bleszinski, Kyle Ragsdale, Chris Mottram, John Taylor, Chris Haines, Trei Brundrett - and others - these men make SB Nation work. Their passion and savvy for what the sports fan craves is potent and tangible. They've turned their collective energy into a remarkable business and are growing every day. I truly believe SB Nation is changing how sports fans engage with their obsession and how they get their fix.

Invariably, though, this new gig means I will be leaving Waggle Room. I hope that you'll add another bookmark for my new home in your browsers, RSS readers, and such. Consider it a personal invitation. I love all of you that come here each day (or at least pretty often), read and comment, e-mail me, and are a part of the dialogue that makes Waggle Room go. You're a big reason why this site is what it is.

When I came to Waggle Room, it was because Mulligan Stu could no longer commit to this site, and he made the decision he had to make. Unfortunately, in the time between him leaving and me joining, the site had a gap in direction. Keeping that in mind, I want Waggle Room to continue to grow after I leave. That's why I'm entrusting Waggle Room to Charles Boyer - the man you know here as Old Man Par. Charles has agreed to take up Waggle Room v. 3.0 and do his thing here. I love Charles' writing style and how he thinks. He's a perfect fit to be the next leader here.

This is all still so surreal to me. I can't believe my dream has come true, but inside, I always believed it would. Thank you to all of the people in my life who have supported what likely seemed a Quixotic quest. We still have more windmills to fight, so I hope we can do it together.

Hey everyone, I hope you're doing well. I also hope you were able to spend some time over at Ryder Cup Talk at NBCSports.com. I had a blast cranking out posts and analysis about the matches from Celtic Manor. I'm very thankful to the whole staff over there who made me feel so welcome and like I actually had some writing talent.

Starting tomorrow, after a long nap tonight, I'll be back here taking you into the new year. You'll also be able to find me sometime soon at Yahoo!'s Devil Ball Golf, here and there. 

I can't wait to get back into talking Fall Series, enjoying the Q-schools with you, and taking the LPGA season to its close.

The last couple of days have been like watching a media glass menagerie. Washington Post columnist (note: columnist, not reporter) and local sports talk host Mike Wise tried to conduct a rather unscientific experiment. If he made broad, unsourced, fake claims about rather innocuous stories, who would pick them up without doing the proper follow-up?

The answer, in the end, was mostly Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk. When Wise boasted on his radio show about his Weekly World Sports News lab project, the burnt Florio called for Wise's head. (He probably still is.) Instead, Wise was suspended by the Post for a month for what he said. At least Wise still has his radio show to keep him occupado until the MLB playoffs.

In light of the situation, I did a whole bunch of reading on the subject - ranging from Wise's conversation with Dan Levy, to Florio (albeit briefly), to Barry Petchevsky at Deadspin, who has turned into a really solid beacon of reason. All made great and salient points.

Yesterday, WaPo teammate and DC Sports Bog proprietor Dan Steinberg then went on the offensive when discussing the Wise situation with hyperlocal outlet TBD. Admitting later that he was flamed about the Wise suspension, Steinberg laid into SB Nation DC - one of this company's city-based sites - by saying they "steal shit." That's a pretty specific jab though Steinberg (and almost every blogger on the planet) does such a thing now and again. His point is about aggregation and, to an end, in line with Wise's about sites running with things that are reported in the rush to be first. For what it's worth, a lot of outlets do that - some more egregious than others, but run the gamut from independent and niche, to completely mainstream.

There's a modest set of points to be made in all of this, I think, though. And they all center on one thing: respect.

Continue reading this post »

While I was nervous as all hell last Sunday morning when producer Alan pointed at me to say my mic was live on FOX Sports Radio 1370, I thought the show turned out pretty well in the end.  We had Golf Channel's Scott Walker, Steph Connelly came by, so did Big Break player and buddy Seema Sadekar, as well as Jim McLean.  

I guess it turned out ok because I'm going to be guest hosting again.  This time, though, it's on Sunday night from 7-8pm ET on WCBM 680AM.  Our pal Jamie Watson asked me to guest host her primetime show with a much larger (potential) audience.

We will talk about the Bridgestone Invitational, a little Turning Stone, the Camilo-TMAG-Cobra-Acushnet suit, and anything else we can cram into an hour.

Click here to listen to the show!

As I told everyone a little while ago, I'm going to be making my terrestrial radio show hosting debut this Sunday here in the Charm City.  (Not the City That Reads, 'cause we all know that's a lie.)  I'll be filling in for Jamie Watson on FOX 1370 from 10-12a ET. 

Click here to listen live to the show.

Now, here's the rundown for the program so far:

• Golf Channel's Scott Walker checks in from Greenbrier with a final round preview
• World renowned instructor Jim McLean joins me to talk Lexi Thompson and Cristie Kerr
• One more guest TBD

Also, we're going to field some hot topics that I want to keep secret for the morning.  But, here's what I need you to do: pepper me with questions and phone calls.  Unlike the podcast, I have the chance to field calls, and definitely want to have a good conversation.

So, friends, readers, media, players, or whoever - call the station at 1.866.933.1370 to chat with me.  You can even try to fool me with your alias.  Let's have some fun with this and blow the station's mind.

It's kind of a slow news day today.  Michelle Wie suffered heat stroke during a pro-am in France.  The Canadian Open starts tomorrow.  Tiger has lost $22 million in earnings in '10 compared to '09.  None of those stories really interest me all that much, so I figured I would tell you a little bit about myself.  

Why?  Well, in recent weeks, I've had the pleasure of getting to know some more people associated with this site - readers, some media, and people at other golf organizations.  In those meandering chats, some stuff comes up that surprises people.  So, I thought I would summarize.

The most common misconception about me is that Waggle Room is my full-time job and I am a full-time reporter/blogger/whatever I am.  I'm not.  I actually have a day job involving technology.  I run this site as a passion for writing, reporting, and golf.

That leads into the natural follow-up: how do you post so often?  Honestly, in most cases, I have what I want to say in a post already written in my head before I type it.  I'm fortunate enough to not have word counts, particular sourcing requirements, or anything like that behind each story that I do.  And since I can dictate the topics, I cover things that appeal to me.

After that, I usually get: would you like to write about golf full time? It's a long answer with some caveats.  Let me tell you the journey to here.

Continue reading this post »

This morning, I was alerted by reader Frank Iovine (who has some pub cred in his own right) that I was in this month's issue of Golf Digest.

Thanks, guys!