HAWAII continues to be the golf capital of the world with the inaugural Sony Open this week at the Waialae Country Club. Mercedes got
PGA Tour off
to a good startThe PGA Tour began its season last week with the exclusive 30-player field Mercedes Championships at Kapalua, Maui, involving only the 1998 tournament winners. Now it's the Sony Open in Hawaii -- the tour's first full-field event with 144 players.
Structuring the 1999 schedule so that the season started here was all part of a game plan by the PGA Tour, according to its commissioner, Tim Finchem.
"The strategy seems to have worked, or is working. We'll have one of our best fields, if not the best, on Oahu in history.
"Hawaii used to suffer, being right in the middle of the West Coast schedule. We've taken care of that problem," Finchem said.
"We're here with the best players in the world for a month -- the PGA Tour for two weeks, the Senior Tour and the Senior Skins. It's been a good partnership with Hawaii over the years and it has really taken off now.
"Prime-time (television) coverage seems to be working well. It has given a lot of promotional lead-in for our tour on TV. It's quite significant to have our golf in Hawaii during the middle of winter."
FINCHEM was particularly pleased by how well the Mercedes event went off, praising the host Kapalua Resort.
"They invested significant resources to improve it (the Plantation Course) to get it ready. They passed up fair amount of revenue to reduce the play. They've been extremely cooperative with everything we've asked," he said.
"The only thing is, the wind isn't blowing. The golf course is designed for the wind. When we come back next year, it will probably blow. We're very pleased with the whole situation here."
No wonder Mark Rolfing and the Kapalua staff were celebrating with Dom Perignon hours after David Duval won the first Mercedes there by nine strokes over an elite field.
The PGA Tour, Mercedes and the resort had a four-year contract for the event to be held at the Plantation Course. But there was an option to cancel after the first year, if the event didn't go off to everyone's expectations.
Not exactly a "disaster" clause, it sure had the Kapalua people antsy. So they went out of their way to make it a first-class event, which shouldn't have been surprising, since they've had a great track record hosting the unofficial Kapalua International for 15 years.
So everyone wound up happy. Especially when the skies cleared on the final two days and Kapalua put on its prettiest face for ESPN's prime-time national television coverage.
HERE'S hoping that things also go well this week for Sony, the new title sponsor for the PGA event replacing the United Airlines Hawaiian Open.
With the purse upped to $2.6 million and a $486,000 payoff to the winner, the Sony Open should continue to draw a quality field as a result of the tour's one-two punch to start the season.
"It really helps that the tournament of champions is played here the first week," said Tom Watson. "It allows us to spend two weeks in Hawaii. Just to come one week made the (Waialae) field lacking in quality players, which they're going to get now."
"Yeah, it's great, having two tournaments here," added Scott Simpson. "I wish a few more guys were playing the second week."
Imagine if Duval stayed and won the Sony Open. Not that the odds are favorable on that happening. As Mark O'Meara put it, "The game of golf is just not that easy."
But another victory would have given Duval a mind-blowing $972,000 in two weeks.