Greetings!
I estimate that it will take you around 7 minutes to read today’s newsletter, but it’s impossible to measure things like that so really … who can say?
Name drops today: Blockie (always), Garrick Higgo (of course), Scottie (duh) and unripened bananas.
I’m sorry to whoever we had slotted in today’s sponsorship slot, but I’m going to have to run it back with yesterday’s sponsor, Garmin.
Garrick Higgo, my man, can I interest you in a Garmin S70 for the remainder of the year? Sure, it keeps things like heart rate (yours seems low) and step count (probably high), but it also keeps hours and minutes, and even seconds (!) to keep you from incurring a 2-stroke penalty at your next major championship round.
During your casual golf, you can also measure distance to the front, middle and back of greens — I’m sure all the courses you play are among the 43,000 preloaded into Garmin’s library! — and keep your score right there on the watch face.
It’s a phenomenal device, and given that you’ve made over $7 million in your career, more than affordable for someone in your tax bracket (and most others, too). If you’re reading, you should check it out right here.
OK, now onto the news.
[Jason here] This round 1 scrapple leaderboard goes to six because I would need many more seconds to find a visual that captures Alex Smalley.
1. I did not think we would be leading Round 1 of my PGA thoughts with … Garrick Higgo, but we may have gotten the most normal sport moment(s) of the year about an hour into the golf on Thursday.
Higgo shot 67 but had it bumped up to a 69 because at 7:18:00 a.m. local time, he was not standing on the mown-down green rectangle where his playing partners were teeing off.
Higgo, if you somehow haven’t heard by now, was seconds late to his tee time on Thursday. What is difficult for me to understand is that he actually showed up early, left to hit some putts and then didn’t make it back before the watch of the official running the festivities (maybe he had a Garmin S70?) struck 7:18:00.
I couldn’t get enough of Higgo’s explanation(s). Here were just a few of the sentences he said, with corresponding links to either video or the transcripts.
1. “I was obviously there on time, but late.” (link)
2. “It's unfortunate that golf has these kind of situations where ... things we get penalized for ... things.” (link)
3. "One second is tough to define." (link)
Me reading that third one …
We’re not even close to done!
4. “I wouldn't have been late if I knew I was running late.” (Link)
5. “I was just trying to get evidence. I feel like any of you would have done the same. It's kind of … I was there on time, but the rule is, if you're one second late, you're late. So if you think about it, I was there on time, if you know what I mean.” (Link)
Me …
6. “Like, I was there at 7:18, 30 seconds, you know what I mean?” (Link)
7. (7:18 was the tee time?) “Yeah, or something like that, 7:19, whatever it was. I don't know.” (Link)
Just over here howling at all of this. Completely insane.
Although it led to some all-time commentary on Twitter.
Part of me feels like we should just end the newsletter there. Nothing this week is going to top that. The undercurrent here is that majors always bring about weird stuff like this because majors make for such a strange and uncomfortable environment for players. They are often unaccustomed to how major weeks feel, and so bizarre moments like this that sometimes happen at regular events always seem to happen during these four weeks.
Never miss a f̶a̶i̶r̶w̶a̶y̶ tee time again with the Titleist ProV1 Second.
2. And since we’re talking rules … I know there are probably plenty of purist reasons why this rule exists, but I’m just not sure anyone will ever convince me that a ball hit into the thick rough off of the fairway should be allowed to be placed on the fairway for a second shot like Rahm did on No. 10 today.
Where Rahm hit his tee shot.
Where he hit his second shot from.
That’s not a Rahm subtweet. I said the same thing about Scottie at Oakmont last year and J.J. Spaun at the Players last year, as well.
In a game defined by single shots and often even inches or millimeters (or seconds!), I do not understand how the positioning of a sprinkler head can have such an effect on the outcome of such an important event.
What if Josh Allen slipped on 4th and 1 at the end of the third quarter in the second round of the NFL playoffs next year, and the referees said they were gonna do the play over because there was paint from the Bills logo where he stepped. That’s not that far away from what happened here!
Extreme normal sport behavior, and a rule that I have yet to be convinced makes any sense at all.
This post will continue below for Normal Club members (all 1,049 of them) and includes thoughts on Scottie’s 6-7, an amazing majors course (so far) and more on one of the great performative athletes of our time (somehow not Bryson).
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The way Kyle has been able to mold a silly Twitter joke (normal sport) into a must-read newsletter on the weekly happenings in our silly game gives a great look into why he's one of the smartest people in golf.
Kyle sees golf in a way that no one else does—and we're all fortunate to get to share in that view through Normal Sport!
There’s been no one else in golf that has tickled my funny bone as often as Kyle Porter does. He’s been instrumental in ushering in a new era of golf coverage and it’s been a pleasure to be along for the ride in that.
Kyle is one of the best in the golf world at finding and synthesizing the absurd, the thoughtful and the fun things that make being a golf fan worthwhile.
Few make the sport feel as fun and as thought provoking.
Kyle's content is a product of a sick sense of humour, a clear passion for golf and unquestionable dedication to hard work. That's not normal!
Kyle is the best columnist in sports. That he has channeled those talents through strokes gained and Spieth memes is a blessing to golf.
Kyle approaches coverage of the game with both conviction and curiosity
It's a treasure trove of the important, the seemingly important, and — importantly! — the unimportant stuff. It's an asset in my inbox.
I’ve always enjoyed your love for golf. So often I see favoritism showed to golfers in the social media world, but I enjoy reading you telling a situation how it is regardless of the person.
Normal Sport is exploratory, sometimes emotional, always entertaining. It also has one of my favorite writers in the biz at its foundation.
Kyle is a perfect curator of the necessary moments of levity that accent a sport that will drive most of us insane.
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