Kevin Clark joins 5 Clubs on Golf Channel

Kevin Clark joins 5 Clubs on Golf Channel

[Music] good morning welcome in to five clubs here on Golf Channel of course you can also listen that is PJ Tour Radio channel 92 on SiriusXM and I am Gary Williams and of course this program is always brought to you by our great partners starting with Century Insurance right by you the things they invest in in the game of golf from the USGA to the first TE they’re always doing things that make perfect sense specifically to the game of golf golf Pride when it comes to grips they are trusted by more players at every level i just got fitted last Monday with the new Align Max grips on all of my new clubs of course Peter Mar everything I wear this excursionist flex hoodie you can have it yes including the logo right there you can get it at petermalar.com and of course the cradle of American golf that is Pioneers when it comes to making a trip and doing everything you can do on the course and off nobody offers more than Piner Resort all right you’re going “Where are you?” Well I’m going to explain exactly where I am colorado Springs Colorado just after 6:00 a.m local time of course we have been very fortunate at Signature Sports Group to be a part of the underrated golf tour which was the brainchild and vision of Steph Curry i’ve got some thoughts on that coming up a little bit later on we’ve got a lot to get to kevin Clark is going to be joining me his program This Is Football on ESPN of course that is an Omaha Productions show is going to be joining me because he is somebody who understands who the PJ tour is getting in their new CEO uh so we’re going to get to that we are also going to get to the Travelers in just one second but I must share with you because you’re you’re going “Okay he’s in a hotel room.” I am indeed little story time as we get started here 15 years ago I was the host the first morning host on Mad Dog Radio i was also hosting on the PJ Tour Radio Network and was doing my show from Pebble Beach and so the show my radio show started at 6:00 a.m on the East Coast so in Monterey California from a hotel room I was doing my show on Mad Dog Radio at 3:00 a.m for four hours can you imagine having the room next to me you thought I needed to be institutionalized because I was literally talking for four straight hours this only an hour but I wanted to share that with you all right what happened yesterday at the Travelers is why the signature series has a chance to be very valuable to the PGA Tour but you have to have all the things conspire to get what you got and when you take a look at this final leaderboard it’s not just to give you the the contextual nature of looking at this leaderboard it’s also looking at what transpired and how this happened keegan Bradley wins for the eighth time on the PGA tour he does it at the expense of Tommy Fleetwood and that is a gutting of epic proportions for him to not be able to cross the line he actually shot the highest score along with Windham Clark of anybody in the top 25 shooting a two over par round that opened the door for Keegan Bradley he stepped right through russell Henley chipped in on the last to share second harris English jason Day finish in a tie for fourth then you see Scotty Sheffller that is nine straight top 10s rory Mroy might have gotten kind of the psychological cleansing that he needed as he heads to London where he’s going to be for the next month and of course that’ll include playing the Scottish Open and the Open Championship at Royal Port Rush more on those two guys uh before we’re done here on this Monday brian Harmon eighth alone and there you see Justin Thomas uh who had a good week another top 10 for him and Lucas Glover lucas made a nice move as it relates to the the FedEx Cup standings going from 34th uh to 30th which that is important this time of the year you need to be as far inside that top 30 as it relates to the tour championship as possible so that is the top 10 back to the top of this leaderboard let let’s start with the fact that Keegan Bradley won this golf tournament but we’ll get to all the other things that matter around this uh also the guy who finished in a tie for second Tommy Fleetwood as well because he’s been so close and this is very different from the Canadian Open because Nick Taylor made a bomb uh to to win that and that was extraordinary to see that that was his not only home game that was his national open in an unleashed an unbelievable celebration the Keegan Bradley win that’s his home game he is a Vermont kid he is New England through and through so to win this for the second time to make a birdie on the last because the door got opened because Tommy Fleetwood made five on the last and like I said he shot 72s so he let not only Keegan Bradley but he let others back into this golf tournament for Keegan Bradley let me say this as far as his career goes when when he won his major championship and that was something that also he shared with somebody who was a New England kid truly and Francis we met to show up at his first major championship and win it as he did in August of 2011 at that PGA championship he needed help and he got it from Jason Duffner he needed a little bit of help yesterday from Tommy Fleetwood and he took advantage it’s one thing to be given a little bit of help you have to then take advantage of that help by executing which he did by producing a three on the last hole here’s the other part of Keegan Bradley’s career that to me is wildly impressive he was along with Webb Simpson the two guys you could add Carl Peterson I think to a lesser degree Tim Clark these guys who had made a career for themselves with an anchored putting stroke and then it was taken away from them and you could say for Keegan Bradley was in his prime unequivocally was in his prime it was 2016 that was nine years ago and Keegan Bradley at that time when they instituted the anchor ban the USGAA and the RNA he had won three times he had won a world golf championship he had won the Byron Nelson and he had won that affformentioned PGA championship for him to figure out a way to not just make a living but to win now more times after the ban than before the ban is a testament to fortitude resilience determination and commitment and process and that is a term that sometimes when I hear that I used to find it to be a little bit too glib i’m a huge believer in process uh I think process is important personally and clearly process is is something that is invaluable professionally for professional golfers so that alone is very very impressive now when it gets to what this means in the bigger picture because we have not necessarily danced around the idea of Keegan Bradley being a playing captain on the on the RDER Cup since the beginning of the year because one he’s a guy who’s in his mid to late 30s he’s somebody who was a relevant player he was not the profile of what most Rder Cup captains are whether it be the European side the American side it’s twilight it’s purgatory it’s that period in your career where the organizations that lead the RDER Cup on Europe it is the DP World Tour/European Tour it’s a small council of primarily former players and on the American side as we know it’s the PG of America and the PG of America has become a little bit more elastic with the way that they look at at the the profile of the captain look Steve Stricker was the first non- major winning captain that the Americans had ever appointed but he was a guy and and even back then several years ago people were like well he could make the team that was never very realistic but he was such a competent player later on in his career meaning late in his 40s that you go well I guess you know he could hang around the conversation but it wasn’t realistic with Keegan Bradley it it was realistic and that speaks to a couple of things one why did the PG of America make the choice to do this to appoint somebody who could very plausibly be on the team and then you create what some people may not think is a quandry or a predicament i personally think that it is and if you feel differently that that that the idea of Keegan Bradley being a playing captain shouldn’t be a big deal that’s fine i I’m not here to arm wrestle you to to my position that I think that the the weightiness of the job the responsibility of the job uh is is too significant and and too grand to try to do both but they made that choice and and here is now here is a quote from Keegan Bradley because for the first time and to his credit Keegan Bradley has tried to avoid this conversation and in his mind he was thinking to himself I’ll entertain this conversation if I win a golf tournament because it’s going to put me in a position to where I am in terms of the quantitative data I’m going to be like right on the doorstep i’m going to be you know maybe in the top 12 well he was just outside the top 12 before the week started and now he’s very much inside the top 12 he’s now ninth on the points list now he said he wouldn’t pick himself but now he’s in a position where he’s clearly one of the 12 best American players that is inarguable so here is what Keegan Bradley had to say here’s a quote from from Keegan yesterday and he said “Yeah it’s insane my whole life every year I was out here I wanted to play on the RDER Cup team and then this would be the first year where maybe I didn’t want to i just wanted to be the captain and of course you know this is what happens but we’ll see i’m going to do whatever I think is best for the team whether that’s me on the team this certainly changes a lot of things i was never going to play on the team unless I had won a tournament and so that’s changed but we’ll see and look I I applaud the manner in which he’s gone about this because I first of all I I absolutely believe him that he was thinking to himself one I’m probably not going to be that close unless I do win a golf tournament unless I just have this wildly productive year where I have you know 10 or 12 top 10s which by the way would be the most he would ever have in a single season in his career and even if he didn’t win a golf tournament he would have been close especially if he had performed well in the majors and he has you know one good result in the PGA Championship he missed the cut at the Masters he finished in the top 30 uh in the very recent US Open here is where the conversation about him being the captain here is where I I fall on this i think when you accept this appointment you disqualify yourself in your mind of being a player because I have talked to virtually every captain uh especially the captains on the European side uh about the idea of a playing captain and not one of them has said to me with any hesitation or or any pause that you know I think it’s something that you know depending on the player and the personality the player that maybe it’s something that that we could see without hesitation every single one of them has said to me “No way there’s too much that has to be done.” Now I understand that if you want to say that well look this is something that these guys don’t do it’s not like they’re people who who spend their lives trying to be coaches or captains they’re players and it’s a ceremonial ceremonial appointment it’s not that anymore this is not an exhibition of golf and people who are holding on uh to that you don’t need to hold on to that anymore it’s not an exhibition of golf it’s evolved it is it is one of the most important properties not just in golf but in all of sports it draws in a casual audience when you draw in a casual audience it means that you have expanded the curiosity to now an interest level and a passion from people who otherwise could say “I’m not that interested.” And that’s what the RDER Cup is exhibitions don’t do that exhibitions are are NBA All-Star games exhibitions are what used to be the Pro Bowl and that is the other part of this conversation about the construct of making up RDER Cup teams i never thought it made any sense that a Ryder Cup captain if you’re going to give them this responsibility well damn it give them responsibility let them pick half the team it’s their team and so by taking data that is put together over the course of primarily one year but then you add that the first year of this two-year cycle which is really built on major championships and the players you are doing it based off of yes I get it we have to do it somewhat on performance that is stroke play performance we are not putting 12 guys out there when I say we whether it be Europe or the United States we’re not putting 12 guys out there to go post a stroke play score and at the end of three days you add them up and go “Hey guess what your 12 guys had a lower aggregate than the other 12.” That’s not it that’s why when they made the decision to give half the team in terms of constructing the team to the captains one as somebody who covers the sport I went “Thank you you’ve just made this more interesting for all of us because you’ve allowed us to have a more thorough conversation about the merits of one player over the other two is boring and also two is not reflective of how different this competition is including the captaincy itself i’m going to talk more about this when we continue by the way Mji Lee won a major we’re going to discuss that i mentioned Kevin Clark he’s going to join me he is somebody who loves the game of golf has a a real real determined interest to know as much about it as he can but he covers the NFL and he knows the guy who’s getting ready to take over and be the boss of the PGA Tour and there was something shared about him getting career advice from that new CEO a couple of years ago that I think’s important to share we’ll talk to him as well some observations from the weekend and yes we are not in the friendly confines of our five club studio in Charlotte North Carolina we are in Colorado Springs uh very proud to be a part of the underrated tour this vision of Steph Curry it is now season 4 we hope that we’re going to be able to maybe originate from the Eisenhower course on the campus of the Air Force Academy where I’m going to be for the next couple of days we appreciate you watching on Golf Channel listening on channel 92 on SiriusXM we continue with you on this Monday on Five Clubs right after this [Music] welcome back again to Five Clubs here on Golf Channel you can also listen that’s channel 92 on SiriusXM of course that is PJ Tour Radio this segment brought to you by Golf Pride when it comes to grips I had a buddy over the weekend text me “All right I’m getting new clubs what should I get?” I gave him I gave him like nine options of course they’ve got a million because they are the grip company trusted by more players at every level around the world it is Golf Pride and you can see not in the friendly confines of our studio in Charlotte North Carolina i’m in Colorado Springs going to be out at the Eisenhower course on the campus of the Air Force Academy which is a spectacular place i’ll have some thoughts on all of that before the end of the program miley Lee won another major championship let me give you some thoughts on that and again Kevin Clark coming up at the bottom of the hour miley Lee is somebody who now has the most major championships in the 20s meaning since 2020 she now gets her third different major championship she wins the for the 11th time on the LPGA and you know when we talked about this event last week we had Mel Reed on and Mel uh clearly is is showing if you watched any of the coverage on Golf Channel and all of the the live that they had there I thought they did a fantastic job by the way uh it was furnace like hot there uh you could tell you could tell by the players uh it was blowing you know 25 30 35 miles an hour it was a a battle of attrition and for Miy Lee to now win her third different major is is wildly impressive she won the Evian she won the US Women’s Open at Pine Needles a couple years ago and now she adds her third different major championship the KPMG Women’s PGA and she does it at Frisco and there’s a lot to discuss here let’s let’s start with her and the fact that at 29 years of age uh she’s now a three-time major champion she is becoming and she’s already been one of the best players of this particular generation but when you start to pile up majors and you now have more majors than anybody of of your particular kind of pedigree or vintage then you’re starting to separate yourself and now you’re start you start to talk about her and you start to discuss well is it possible for her to get all of them why wouldn’t it be possible she is she’s shown the ability on all different types of setups and that’s part of this conversation is setup you know setting up major championship golf is is a very interesting endeavor and I had a conversation last night with Sinclair Edy who’s actually our our our chief referee on the underrated tour and he’s been a part of what we’ve been doing here as our our primary rules official and he is also on the executive committee of the United States Golf Association and he was a rules official last week at the US Open and I had a conversation with him in the hotel lobby about the setup of Oakmont and the particular challenges that Oakmont presents and he was telling me that he was situated over the course of the week he was on the 18th hole he was on the sixth hole he was on the ninth hole think about that ninth hole at Oakmont if you can remember there are ditches right and left and you know you’re playing them as penalty areas and you’ve got a blind t-shot and then you had you know areas outside of that and that’s one thing when it comes to rules but then when it gets back to setup of major championships it’s supposed to be the sternest examination that these players face it’s not just knowing how weighty the accomplishment is because that’s part of why doing it and winning it is bold type on a player’s resume undeniably but the other part of winning the major championship it is not what they see week to week and and while some people do want to see players on the men’s side and to a degree on the women’s side during the US Opens be tested to where it’s different even from the Mast’s tournament and the open championship um is because that is the one major where I think the general public still has a sensitivity and a curiosity and an interest in what the actual total is there are no other majors when it comes to what do you think the winning score is going to be it’s a talking point but it’s not a driving storyline as you see as we had last week and maybe just maybe the women’s PGA is going to be that but maybe just maybe it had to do with where they’re playing and that gets to the future of the site itself because as we discussed last week it wasn’t the first kind of beta test and I’m not calling the KPMG Women’s PGA a beta test that’s a major championship but but and I mean this respectfully but having club the club professional championship there having the senior PGA championship there which they’ve already had and now having the KPMG women’s PGA there it’s not accidental the cadence of them delivering these events is to build their their procedures and processes because what’s coming next there is the PGA championship in 2027 and setup is going to be a very interesting thing and you had a golf course that in the month of June Texas is going to try you even more severely in the month of June than it will when the PGA is played in the middle of May because it’s going to be more oppressively hot and the golf course is going to experience in Frisco Texas in the absence of trees and the wind’s going to blow in Texas every single day no matter what it’s going to blow 15 18 20 consistently and then you’re going to get days where it’s going to be ripping 25 and 30 and how do you set up a golf course and the person who set up the KPMG women’s PGA which became a major talking point for a couple of reasons one scoring was as bloated as we’ve seen it in a long long time and secondly pace of play when you have Tusomes going out and playing nine holes in three hours and 18 minutes you got a problem you got a problem when it comes to the interest level of a viewing audience you got a problem for fans who are on the grounds like “Okay let’s go out and watch some golf.” Yeah I know it’s 98 degrees and it’s uh you know it’s blowing 35 but I feel like it’s it’s a hot heat that’s blowing on me and it’s unrelenting let’s go home why well because we’ve been out here for three hours oh I I forgot we’ve only watched nine holes these things are superior challenges for people and the guy who set up the golf course is Carrie Heg widely considered by most people who play the game at the elite level the premier setup man uh in the game and you had a lot of players who thought that the setup was too much and last night I don’t know if you heard it but Mel Reed had what was a very compelling interesting position on setup and she did what was a comparative study between the LPGA and the PGA Tour now you don’t have to accept it as being you know the best but what I said was it was compelling and and the reason it’s compelling is that I think it’s going to drive the conversation things that are compelling advanced conversations so that you finally are going to get to whatever happy medium you can get to but here’s the thing about happy mediums when it comes to setups it ain’t easy so for them to try to figure out what is the right yardage the the right pin locations based on the firmness of the greens all of those things are why golf is interesting to begin with because unlike everything else that’s been pretty much including the NFL most of it now it seems like is played indoors even markets that you historically associate with being oh gosh nothing like playing a game in Minnesota back at Metropolitan Stadium you’re going indoors the environment is exactly the same that’s why golf is different that’s why it’s interesting and that is why getting back to the champion her doing what she did is so impressive she separated herself on as difficult and a challenging a setup as as maybe the winner women are going to see forget this year who knows maybe five years that’s why the conversation about setups is interesting and I think you know getting people who do this for a living and getting players who are current players and getting people who played at an elite level like Mel Reed who was a four-time Solime Cup participant on the European side uh to have you know good discussions or are why they should be had but Miy Lee winning that’s the story because she has not only now won her third different major she said “You know what all this talk about setup I’m going to do what nobody else can do i’m going to be as steady i’m going to be as rock solid as anybody out here and I’m going to go on and win.” So congratulations to her and again I think at 29 years of age you know by the way Nelly Cord who’s the number one player in the world finished tied for 19th it’s a it’s a it’s a fine result but it’s not representative of of certainly what she wants to be and she shot 76 on Sunday she’s got two majors left and it’s not to salvage the season but coming off what she did last year these next two are going to be particularly interesting all right we take a break now when we continue i had a long conversation with him on the Five Clubs podcast a couple of years ago now we bring him to Golf Channel you see him regularly on ESPN you’re going to see him a ton when football season is here and it seems like football season never goes away this is football’s host Kevin Clark why his view on the new CEO of the PGA Tour is most interesting to me and I think it will be to you as well it is a Monday edition of Five Clubs i’m in Colorado Springs wherever you are thank you for making time for us on Golf Channel and on PJ Tour Radio channel 92 on SiriusXM we’re back with Kevin right after this [Music] back in on this Monday on Five Clubs on Golf Channel you can also listen that is channel 92 on PJ Tour Radio’s SiriusXM this segment brought to you by Peter Malar this excursionist flex hoodie that I’m wearing right now you can have it you can have it with that five clubs logo right there below that neckline it’s yours at petermalar.com all right joining me now he’s very stylish uh he generally uh wears a tie uh for his program which I greatly appreciate it uh from ESPN this is football Omaha Productions he is Kevin Clark he’s a passionate golfer the last time I saw him in person he was at the park in West Palm taking that in for the first time joining us from the Leafy suburbs uh the shadows of New York City kevin my friend good morning how are you uh I’m doing great i have to say uh I’m a golf channel power watcher and so I when I when I’m working when I’m doing anything I always put the golf channel on on a TV right here and then I realized it was going to be me so I turned it off i don’t want to see me it’s the only the only way for me to get me to turn off the golf channel Gary is if I’m on i don’t want to see my face up there well we hope you’re the only one uh who made that made that choice this morning uh you know I love having conversations with you i we don’t have enough uh you’re you’re in your lane and I’m in mine but here the lanes cross because the guy that the PGA Tour is getting as the new CEO is somebody you’ve been around and I want to get to a little you know piece of career advice that James Kogan had in a piece he wrote at at golf.com last week but give people an idea as somebody who’s been around this guy what is the PGA Tour getting in Brian Rolap they’re getting someone who understands the balance between new media and old media as well as anybody I’ve ever seen at the executive level as far as leagues go they’re getting somebody who understands how to balance reach and revenue uh and what I mean by that is I mean Gary yesterday I was at a a baseball game a Yankees game my son loves baseball the game started at 11:15 or 11:20 a.m and it was on a TV channel that frankly I I don’t I don’t know i think it may have been Roku and that’s an example of something the NFL would not have done where you’re you’re selling off a package that nobody really understands uh to Morning Baseball and by the way my my son was very happy because it was before his nap uh but that was that’s the kind of thing where you exchange revenue for eyeballs revenue for reach the NFL doesn’t doesn’t do that um they get both and everything needs a proof of concept you saw that with Thursday Night Football where they they test it out for a few years they test it out on different networks and they say “Okay Amazon is a fit for this.” Which by the way was a huge leap because no streaming package had ever been that robust before but they wanted to see a proof of concept they wanted to see that people were going to be able to change their behavior and tune in for a big Thursday night game if they put Lamar Jackson versus Joe Burrow on Thursday night they want to see that they’re not going to rush into anything i think that’s the most important thing in this era because it’s really easy to go out and say “We’re going to sell to the highest bidder.” But in an increasingly fractured media environment you got to figure out okay if we take this package if we do this if we do this initiative is this going to reach people who’ve been watching us for 30 40 years while also gaining new fans who are just seeing it because they just got into YouTube golf i I I think this is a home run this was sort of rumored last year a little bit and and I was I was stunned because it would have been such an amazing hire for someone I thought who at that point uh you know he’s number two in the NFL maybe at some point he’s Roger Goodell’s successor maybe that’s still the case you know Roger Goodell is going to sign an extension we’ll see what happens there the future is so unknowable but I just think this is a grand slam for a sport that I just I love this sport and I cover football and so knowing how effective this marriage is going to be I I’m I’m really excited you know Kevin it’s interesting i used the term last week you know there’s a coup and I and I mean that in a good way like like for the PGA Tour which as you know is very viable uh professional golf uh is very attractive to all the most important advertising categories it’s not like they are some fledgling enterprise not at all but this is a national football you just said a couple of things that I think need to be amplified this was not somebody who just happened to have an important title at the NFL legitimately a potential successor to the to the commissionership of the National Football League why do you think he’s doing this so I first of all I think that it’s a great opportunity i mean like you mentioned how viable Pro Golf is they have they have deals with all of the major networks to speak of um they’ve got events where people want to tune in and they’ve got opportunity i mean you want to talk about blending the old media and the new media who’s doing that right now as a sport and obviously it’s fractured and splintered and all that stuff because you have YouTube creators and Tik Tok and all that stuff but as a sport golf has a ton of opportunities to merge those two things and then you add in the investments that PJ Tour has gotten from NFL owners like an Arthur Blank maybe there was some some conversations as far as that goes but it’s an amazing opportunity i mean I I don’t know um a sport that I think is is is going to be more uh enticing to dive into and not save i doesn’t need saving is the wrong word uh but to reinvigorate right uh when you think about the last couple of years and some of the roadblocks that the sport has had in general I just think it’s a really good opportunity uh and and I think that his understanding of TV deals and how to balance everything and how to um how to grow things I mean that that that to me is the most important thing i think that’s what he’s going to do and the one thing the NFL is really good at generating stars making making sure it’s a TV show you know I once heard somebody in league office say that they know for a fact that uh when when it’s a close game and there’s a high score uh in the game so if it’s 45 42 that’s the the literal recipe for amazing ratings in football like they know that in the league office and I think that that’s because they’re able to create these compelling characters where you tune it on it doesn’t matter if you’ve been following or not but you say “Hey wow Mahomes is playing Justin Herbert it’s Sunday afternoon it’s 3534 i gotta watch this and I think that you can you can go into other sports and try you can’t do it because there’s no mo you know Mahomes is one of one burrow’s one of one josh Allen’s one of one but I I think you can take those stars and you can take them to the masses in a more effective way i think there’s an NFL model i think they can go to go to the PGA tour quite quickly i I want to get to this career advice that Brian Rolap gave you because I I think it says a couple of things i think it says something you know about him i think it says obviously something about you as well um when you went to him at a time when maybe you had a level of security that made you feel just that secure and and you were considering doing something that was maybe less secure now people I I mentioned this last week about the ringer and people are going “What come on it’s the ringer it’s Bill Simmons.” is like “No at the beginning this is this is this it’s not a sure thing you went to him and you asked him what he thought about you making this choice i want you to share what his response was and then you tell me what you think that says about him it’s probably the advice that I’ve repeated most in my life to other people when people ask me for job advice I say this and essentially the setup was it was March of 2016 there was an NFL owners meetings which is really one of the only places where everybody in the league is in the same place at the same time um and it’s at these luxury resorts and there’s all sorts of of events where where you get to talk to whoever you want and and I had talked to Roll App a handful of times uh the first time I interviewed him actually was in 2014 when they were starting the Thursday night package and we talked a lot about uh different viewpoints he had and a lot about the reach and all that stuff so we had we had kept in touch and and I ran into him in in Arizona at the Builtmore and I explained to him that I had gone the month before in February to LA to meet with the ringer i was working at the Wall Street Journal at this time so the Wall Street Journal was the biggest newspaper in America there’s there’s a security there there’s still a security there it’s still a huge newspaper my wife works there she’s extremely happy there she’s not going to leave um but I I was looking at it and and again you talk about reach we were able to reach whoever we wanted in the Wall Street Journal so I go out and I meet with Bill Simmons in the ringer at that point that he have five employees and it felt great i I Bill was is still my idol was certainly my idol at that point when I didn’t even know him um and so I’m thinking about it and I’m saying “Hey this this seems like a good opportunity but but I think a lot of people would have pause of giving up the uh the safety of being able to call somebody and say “I’m from the Wall Street Journ right please meet with me for 20 minutes because I’m from the Wall Street Journ.” You go somewhere else and all of a sudden you you lose that access you lose that gravitas I guess you could say so I see Rolap in Arizona and I and I know how well he views modern media and again this is 2016 this is not 2022 2023 and I said “Brian what do you think here?” And he said “You know in this era any job in the world can be the best job.” And what he explained basically I mean you look Gary at someone like Pat McAfee what was his job his job was YouTuber right and like it it was to be a YouTube host which 10 years ago you would say “He’s a what he’s a what?” Well he’s the biggest thing in media now sports media now right because any job can be the best job in the world and you don’t have to be the sports columnist for the New York Times you don’t have to be the uh the anchor for uh NBC Sunday Night Halftime right you don’t have to have that you create your own value you’re even even if you’re a part of something and part of Legacy Media um which I love being by the way you’re still an independent contractor you’re still growing your brand you’re still sending tweets and creating Tik Toks that are that are your own and you’re trying to grow it and I think that what he was trying to say what he was trying to say was that you can take any platform and grow it into the biggest platform now it is not 1994 where you have to work for the LA Times or the Miami Herald or the New York Daily News it ain’t that in some cases that’s going to hurt you now so you go to the ringer and you make it the best job in the world or conversely by the way you could stay at the Wall Street Journal but you got to make that the best job in the world and you create a job to where the next person who takes it is going into a dream job right because you grew it because you grew it and you go on to great greater things because you grew that platform right and so I just think it was such sage advice Gary because I don’t think anybody was thinking about it like that back then it was still very much who are you with what are you doing what’s your reach how often are you traveling uh what what what access are you able to get just just based on on who you’re with right that was still kind of the age of newspapers was the end of the age of newspapers but the idea like hey go to the internet and just start creating just start creating and start thin slicing stuff and just start building yourself i think that’s I I I I think that’s that was really really precient advice and I don’t know I don’t I I I assume and not having not thought about it I assume I would have gone to the ringer without that advice um but I would have had a different mentality i would have had a different mentality i would have been a little more scared frankly i would have been a little more uh hesitant and saying “Oh my gosh oh the coach of the Broncos doesn’t want to meet with me.” No no no no no just give it time just give it time and build it and build it and build it and build it and and one of the things I think with Rollap in the PGA tour I think is important to know is that just from his time on the NFL they don’t skip steps they’re going to build it and they’re going to they’re going to build it the right way and and I think that’s that’s the most important thing is I I I would be very surprised if in a year they come out with all sorts of crazy bells and whistles and new plans and new strategies no I think it’s going to be one step at a time building it into the best that they can be and and again that conversation with with Rollap uh just changed the way I looked at media we any job can be the best job in the world and I think that anybody in media understands what that means now or should understand what that means now you can you could just throw on a podcast Mike and change your life in in a day in a day and that’s all it takes and he’s understood that for a long time yeah i think it’s you know the fact that that you had the comfort to be able to to approach him to ask him that knowing one that you thought you would get an authentic uh and invested answer it wasn’t a line it was something that he believed uh I I think that people who are fans of the PGA tour should think about that and they should be encouraged by that you you mentioned about not skipping steps um do you think that he will bring some people with him um do you expect that to be the case that that based on knowing kind of the makeup of of the NFL office that it wouldn’t surprise you if some people that he trusts that he believes have the chops to apply it somewhere else are going to be going with him i I I would assume so Gary um I actually I asked a couple people I knew who just on the media side last week if they were going um and I think it’s a little too early for for specific names i didn’t I haven’t heard any nor do I know I didn’t get any oh so and so is going i think they’re they’re in the early stages what I will say is there’s two things that that are important here number one is that there are a lot of smart people on the media side of the NFL that that proof is in the pudding when you look at how much money they’re able to wrangle uh the different TV packages they’re able to have and also even the bells and whistles as far as something like Amazon’s Thursday night Prime Vision where you’re it’s all 22 when you can which means you can kind of see all 22 players at once and the alternate feeds and and and you know whether or not a player is blitzing before the snap that all that stuff is so cool that I hope that some of those people are able to come to to to golf uh but then the other thing is there’s a lot of golf fans at the league office there’s a lot of golf fans in the NFL like there are a lot of GMs who who probably raising their hands saying “Man if you need a number two I’ll come with you.” Um you know a lot of people on the media side a lot of people on the OP side that’s just how it goes um you know I don’t think I play a lot of golf here in the tri-state area and I think that 80% of the time I’m there someone says oh so and so from the league office is a member here and it’s like yeah that tracks and so my guess is unlike a lot of places when someone leaves from league office Gary I think there’s going to be people raising their hand saying yeah I want to go help the sport of golf become to to reach its potential listen I really appreciate the time thank you for giving everybody your perspective on the new boss of the PGA Tour uh next time I see it let’s not just cross paths at a golf course that’s actually play golf thank you my friend baby thanks Gary okay there is Kevin Clark Omaha Productions ESPN we take a break come back i’ll give you a few thoughts on where I am and why it’s important when it comes to the the game of golf we’re back on Five Clubs Golf Channel and on SiriusXM’s channel 92 right after this [Music] back in with a couple minutes to go on this Monday again from Colorado Springs Colorado on this Monday not only on Golf Channel but on SiriusXM’s channel 92 this segment brought to you by Pinehurst the cradle of American golf an anchor site for the USGA for the US Open all their other great championships and of course with Piner number 10 the new clubhouse and restaurant that’s opening soon the new cottages at number eight always a good reason to be booking a trip to Pinehurst now I mentioned being out here in Colorado Springs and the underrated tour is something that I’ve been very fortunate uh to be a part of Signature Sports Group at large uh to contribute in a modest way to what Steph Curry has built what he’s built is is something that it honestly is changing lives through the game of golf and we had an event in London several weeks ago that is the European side of things will be having another event in Scotland but the domestic event the United States schedule begins tomorrow practice rounds today and where are we we’re on the campus of the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs Colorado because the vision of Underrated is not just to give kids an opportunity to play tournament golf at no cost by the way and travel the country doing it with their parents and to relieve them of that burden but it’s also to expose them to places that may inspire them academically and so last year was the University of Notre Dame and this year it is the Air Force Academy we can’t wait to continue to take these kids to places that they’re going to look at and go “Yeah golf i’m going to hit my ceiling but at some point golf can be a vehicle a vehicle to to change their trajectory of my life.” So Steph’s not here this week but he I can promise you is heavily invested in everything that is going on on Underrated so it begins tomorrow we hope that we’re going to be able to originate and there is a little tweet from Steph just a few days away from season 4 for our new players welcome to the family to our returning players we can’t wait to see you again to all the players go get it this season new champs loading underrated yep so it is uh starting tomorrow from the blue course the Eisenhower golf courses on the campus of Air Force tomorrow Tyler Ray is going to join me we have had an extended conversation in our studios at Five Clubs with Tyler he’s one of the best young golf course designers in the business well when the Rocket Mortgage ends next Sunday his team’s going in to do an extensive renovation to that Donald Ross gem he joins me tomorrow so we got that conversation and much more to get to with you have a great Monday for all of us here at Five Clubs we’ll see you tomorrow everybody have a great day

Kevin Clark joined the program and talked about his relationship with the new PGA TOUR CEO Brian Rolapp and what he knows about him and the career advice he gave him years ago and what that means about how he thinks. Host Gary Williams also talked about how the Traveler’s Championship unfolded with Keegan Bradley winning and Tommy Fleetwood letting one get away and what that now means for Bradley as captain of the U.S. Ryder Cup team.

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