BlogMalaysian Preview and Picks

The Buzz:

Already, we can see a better field this week with the new change of date.  Last year there were only two top-50 players and 12 top-100 players in the field.  This year there are nine top-50 players and 16 top-100 players.  So the change has already paid off.

One other organization that is getting “paid off” is the Royal & Ancient Club of St. Andrews who has decided to make a major change in their television partners.  For 60 years the BBC has been the television partners and for almost 90 years the Beeb has been a part of the British Open with their radio shows.  In 2017 Sky Sports will complete their 20 year journey in dominance as they have won the rights to broadcast the British Open.  Sky will be able to telecast all four majors, the Ryder and Presidents Cup, all the World Golf Championship events and every major event on both the PGA and European Tour.  As for the BBC, who 25 years ago aired all the majors, the Ryder Cup and all the big events on the European Tour that was in the British Islands it’s a near collapse as the only big event they will have is the weekend shared telecasts of the Masters.  Since that is a short-term contract, it’s not guaranteed to have the Masters in the future.

Golf-wise it’s a good and bad move by the R&A.  Sky has come a long way in the last 25 years in becoming the best at doing golf in Europe.  While Sky has constantly gotten better each year, the BBC has gone in the opposite direction and not kept up technology wise. The only real advantage the Beeb has is the voices of Peter Alliss and Hazel Irvin, but with Alliss in his 80s he doesn’t have many more years left in the booth.  Matter of fact it wouldn’t surprise me if Alliss retires after the Open at St. Andrews.

Now I say Golf-wise it was a great move by the R&A but for the overall health of golf, and the British Open it may turn into a dark moment.  Sky is a paid service and for people to watch golf on it the cost is about $50 a month.  While in the United States ESPN has made great strides to be in everyone’s home since it’s usually part of basic cable packages, Sky is a different story you have to buy that package to get it.  So on big events organizations aren’t afraid of putting marquee events on ESPN, just look the National Championship game was on ESPN last month and it got big viewership.  ESPN has been the exclusive home of all live British Open telecasts since 2010.  We say it’s the live home, ABC which was the home of the British Open since 1961 still shows the weekend rounds on tape, same day coverage so in a way it’s the best of both worlds in the United States.

Despite the great coverage Sky provides, they have one dirty little secret that they try to hide and that is viewership and that is the crux of the problem.  A couple of years ago the Beeb did the Masters and Augusta realized the shows could be better on Sky.  But Augusta was smart, it’s not about money for them; they want to be seen by the maximum amount of people.  So when Sky came looking for a contract in 2010, Augusta said it would love to have them for the four days, but the BBC would also televise the Saturday and Sunday shows.  So the Masters have been on both Sky and the BBC and although the Beeb isn’t as good they outpace Sky in audience by a five to one margin.  So that is the problem, do you go with better telecasts and get paid more from Sky or stay on BBC that offers many more viewers.  A sad example of this is the switch that Formula One racing did going from the BBC to Sky.  Worldwide audiences fell over 5% for a net loss of 25 million viewers over 2014.  Audience numbers of the Masters show that BBC gets 80% more viewers than Sky.  So the big question for the R&A was why they didn’t do the same with the British Open that Augusta National does with the Masters.  If they could of spilt the British Open telecast the same way it would of been a win/win for everyone (except for Sky) but the R&A choose taking about $5 million dollars a year more with Sky.

Still, the big question for all, in a time that golf is collapsing business wise and golf clubs are now starting to close in England, is this a terrible move?  The job of the R&A is not making money but to make golf accessible to the masses and grow the game.  So this bold move is not in the best interest of golf as many millions will be deprived of watching the British Open in future years.  As Lee Westwood told the Daily Mail, “many of us starting playing golf by watching it on television with the BBC”.  Many kids may never get exposed to golf while it’s on Sky.

So this is really terrible news for the business of golf.  I don’t know how the contract has been done, but the only thing I can hope for is that the R&A will broadcast the shows live and for free on their internet site.  Last year I noticed that the R&A made Iphone and Ipad apps available so that those folks could watch the Open over the internet.  Not only does the R&A have a big footprint on their sites, but Sky is also big on the internet.  So in a way I guess this is the future of golf, it’s not pretty.

Tournament History:

The event was first started in 1962 and became a co-sanctioned event with the European Tour in 1999.  It was the first tournament in Asia to be jointly sanctioned by the Asian and European Tour.  The tournament has had some marquee winners like Harold Henning in 1968, Graham Marsh in 1974 & ’75, Mark McNulty in 1980, Jeff Maggert in 1989, Steve Aloes in 199, Vijay Singh in 1992 & 2001 and defending champion Lee Westwood who also won it in 1997.  Since its inauguration in 1962, there has never been a Malaysian winner.  Kuala Lumpur Golf & Country Club has been the annual site of the tournament since 2010, it also held the 2006 event.

The event has been bullish on getting good players, even in years when it was the week after the Masters.  It was able to lure good players with appearance money and private jets flying the likes of Rory McIlroy, Lee Westwood, Charl Schwartzel and Louis Oosthuizen the Sunday night after the Masters.  This year the date changes to February with the hopes of getting a good field with three events in a row in Asia with Thailand next week and India the week after.

Course Information:

Played at Kuala Lumpur Golf & Country Club (west course), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Par:  72 / Yardage: 6,967

• The club opened in 1991. There are two 18-hole courses, the West course and the East course, both designed by Nelson Howarth. Since the 2006 Malaysian Open, the West course at Kuala Lumpur Golf & Country Club has undergone a total redesign. Nelson & Haworth originally designed the West course, which opened for play in 1991, but brothers Ted and Geoff Parslow of design company E&G Parslow and Associates extensively reconstructed the layout over a period of eighteen months. The revamped West course reopened in October 2008.
• The club hosted several major tournaments. The Maybank Malaysian Open was played at the West Course in 2006 and since 2010. It has hosted the Sime Darby LPGA Malaysia on the LPGA Tour in October since 2010. The CIMB Classic on both the PGA Tour and Asian Tour were played on the West course in 2013 & ’14.  So it’s safe to say that the course has seen much of tournament action in the last couple of years.
• This course is a parkland style course. Designed to reward the intelligent golfer, the length, layout, and toughness of this course along with lots of risk/reward holes makes the course interesting. The course features impeccable fairways and greens, challenging elevation changes and tough bunkering. Water comes into play on 11 holes and the back nine has three of the hardest holes in 11, 12 and 13. The finish is perfect for risk reward with the short par four 17th with water guarding the right side of the fairway and green and the reachable par 5, 18th

Here are some of the secrets of what it takes to play well at the Maybank Malaysian Open:

Key stat for the winner:

It’s always hard to fly long distances to get to Malaysia.  So you have to be fit and ready to go.  Marquee players always seem to do well at this event, Lee Westwood won it last year, with Louis Oosthuizen finishing 2nd.  Don’t be surprised to see someone like Westwood or Graeme McDowell do well this week.  Also, a good chance for someone who is just outside the top-50 to do well and find their way into the Masters and WGC events.

Here are some more key stats to look to for this week:

• One thing that you see at Kuala Lumpur is good scoring but not extreme scoring.  Look at the winners and you see that they are shooting between 65 and 69, as only three winners since 1999 have shot over par and winning, the last being the first round 74 by 2009 champion Anthony Kang.  Also, important if you can go low on the par 5s like Louis Oostuizen did in 2012 playing them in 10 under that makes the journey so much easier.
• Length is not important but again hitting greens is important.  Lee Westwood hit 55 of the 72 greens last year and that made the event easy for him.
• Best not to get in trouble, a combination of water, and deep bunkers makes things tough for those that hit into them and easy for those that avoid them.
• One thing that players will experience is warm and humid conditions.  The bad news, every day of the tournament will be in the low 90s but the good news lack of rain for every day except there is a 50% chance of rain on Saturday.  Again dealing with the hot, humid weather is a very important part in playing well this week.