Anna Rawson, who is in her second year on the LPGA, was in Scottsdale, Ariz., last week, filming a commercial for Go Daddy. She is one of the company's "Go Daddy Girls."
As for her golf, she's missed six cuts in seven starts and has earned a paltry $6,436 this year.
-- John Strege
Who knows what Jerry West will bring to the Northern Trust Open in his new role as executive director of the tournament, though if there is a pattern to everything he's done in his life it's success.
His naming to the position does seem to be an effort at damage control for the misguided PR hit Northern Trust took at the hands of politicians looking for an easy target and easier headline.
Still, if you're looking for someone to represent the face of a Los Angeles event, Jerry West is a good place to start. West, meanwhile, sees his role as something greater than glad-handing, and that's a good sign, too.
He seems to have made it a priority to entice Tiger Woods back to the tournament that he has not played since 2006. It seems a likelihood that he can do so. It's hard to imagine that Woods is done playing the professional tournament that gave him his first exemption, despite the fact that he's never won there. He has tied for second once, lost in a playoff (albeit when the event was played at Valencia Country Club in 1998) and had other top-10s.
Plus there's this: Woods is a Lakers fan, and though he was too young to have seen West play, he no doubt is aware of West's reputation and the stature he still commands in the game. West and Woods seems likely to be a good fit.
-- John Strege
How impressive was Ian Baker-Finch's round of two-under par 68 in the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial on Thursday?
It was his first PGA Tour round in the 60s since the GTE Byron Nelson Classic in 1996. Should he make the cut on Friday, it would mark the first cut he's made in a tour event with a cut since the Sprint International in 1994.
Baker-Finch, 48, is making his first PGA Tour since the Colonial in 2001.
-- John Strege
The PGA Tour's silence on John Daly's suspension, even to the point of declining to acknowledge it ever happened, is amusing and brings to mind the episode of "Seinfeld" in which George Costanza is being interviewed for the job of head of scouting for the New York Mets.
MINKLER: Now, unfortunately, league rules prevent us from making you an offer while you're still under contract.
MOONEY: You understand what we're talking about?
GEORGE: So you're talking...
MINKLER: No, no.
MOONEY: We're 'not' talking. We're just, talking.
GEORGE: So, you need me to get fired.
MINKLER: We didn't say that.
MOONEY: We couldn't say that, because even if we did...
MINKLER: ...we couldn't say that we said it.
MOONEY: You see what we're saying?
Officially, we still don't know why Daly chose to play European PGA Tour events in recent months, rather that accepting sponsor invitations to play PGA Tour events. An Associated Press story has this:
"PGA Tour spokesman Ty Votaw said the Tour does not comment on player discipline; it never confirmed that Daly was suspended, and now cannot confirm that a suspension has been lifted."
Yet on the homepage of the PGA Tour's own website, pgatour.com, there is a headline that says, "Daly's suspension ends; plans to return to PGA TOUR in Memphis."
But if the PGA Tour never confirmed that Daly had been suspended...
Sigh.
-- John Strege
A lot, where LeBron James is concerned.
Michael Allen, who won the Senior PGA Championship in his Champions Tour debut outside Cleveland on Sunday, was at the Cavaliers-Orlando game Friday night, but left with the Magic ahead by two with one second left.
"Yes, I left the building with one second left," Allen told the Cleveland Plain-Dealer. "What could happen in one second? So I didn't see [James's] shot. We were outside, but we heard the explosion inside, and all the bars around there exploded about four and five seconds later and I'm like, 'What happened?'"
James, as most know by now, his a three-pointer from the top of the key at the buzzer to give the Cavaliers the victory.
Apparently, it was the only notable error Allen made all week.
-- John Strege
