Max Homa and a guidelines official on Friday on the thirteenth gap at Torrey Pines.
CBS
Max Homa first had a phrase for Trevor Immelman.
“Part of I wish I had your accent,” Homa mentioned, in response to a query from the South African about what he thinks about in between pictures.
Homa then jabbed Colt Knost. Homa had simply hit towards a left greenside bunker on the thirteenth at Torrey Pines, and Frank Nobilo commented to Homa, tongue-in-check: “Keep as far away from Colt Knost as possible.”
“That’s usually at least a minor goal,” Homa mentioned. “Only watch him have to walk around here with no cart.”
And then Homa plugged his golf ball.
CBS’ PGA Tour season debut got here Friday throughout the Farmers Insurance Open third spherical, and with it got here a wrinkle — a walk-and-talk, the place a professional would, sure, stroll and speak with the announce sales space throughout a gap. Homa was first up; he’s personable, and in spite of everything, as he told the No Laying Up podcast recently and confirmed afterward, he had had a hand within the characteristic.
So off he went on 13, with an AirPod in his left ear, and CBS cameras close by. He talked with Immelman, the brand new lead analyst, and Nobilo and Ian Baker-Finch, different analysts, and about Knost, the hole-by-hole announcer. But then Homa hit towards the bunker along with his second shot on the par-5, and his ball disappeared, and CBS couldn’t get its cameras in place fast sufficient. Memorably, the sequence was much like a second two years in the past, additionally on the Farmers, the place Patrick Reed had hit left on the tenth, then checked to see if his ball had plugged by selecting it up and touching the bottom, earlier than calling for a guidelines official, who would deem that Reed’s ball had been embedded.
And Homa? On Friday, he and caddie Joe Greiner discovered their ball buried simply above the bunker. Homa referred to as for a guidelines official. He dropped a tee close to the realm. He stood up.
“I’m not going to touch it!” Homa mentioned, holding each arms up, as if he had simply been caught robbing a financial institution. Homa’s dad, John, is an L.A.-based appearing coach, and his son was digicam snug.
Immelman laughed.
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From there, an official drove over, Homa picked the ball up, the official checked and confirmed there was an indent, and aid was given, under rule 16.3. All of it was picked up by CBS, together with moments the place each Homa and the official virtually slipped.
“You all good? Be careful,” Homa mentioned to the official.
Homa then pitched on, and the walk-and-talk ended with some pleasantries between the professional and the sales space. It’s right here, although, the place you will have some questions. Like why. What’s all of the fuss about? The reply is layered.
TV innovates on a regular basis, and that is that, after all. Then there’s golf TV, and a few of us will inform you it wants greater than an additional digicam or two. Then there’s golf TV in lately of PGA Tour v. LIV Golf, which is able to present its play on the CW Network beginning subsequent month. (Just in case you’re new right here, the struggle may be described in a sentence this fashion: The PGA Tour and Saudi-backed LIV Golf are coming into their second calendar yr of a struggle that has seen LIV supply assured cash to Tour gamers, the Tour create adjustments in response, and the perimeters sue one another. Let’s proceed.)
Add that every one collectively, and also you get things like walk-and-talks. Afterward on Friday, whereas describing that he had been pitched the concept about two months in the past by Tour official Andy Pazder, Homa talked at size on the larger image of all of it.
“He [Pazder] had sent me a clip of Trea Turner being mic’d up for an inning in a random baseball game,” Homa mentioned. “It was superior as a result of the ball involves him in the course of them speaking, he sort of fumbles it, finally ends up getting the man out at first and says, you recognize, hey, I’ve been lazy recently; I didn’t get my knee down or no matter. I was like, man, I simply discovered so much in 15 seconds.
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“He mentioned we should always do something like that. We’ve been going backwards and forwards as a result of I was attempting to offer him the participant perspective, that we don’t love doing 18 holes mic’d up — we think about that each single phrase we’re saying is being broadcast and it’s simply not very snug.
“So sort of got here up with this concept with him and the CBS staff. They had been sort of determining the expertise, if an AirPod could be a good suggestion. And who is aware of if that’s how it will end up, however one gap, two holes at a time isn’t so dangerous.
“Like I said, we’re entertainers and I’d like for the players to be flexible. If it makes you super uncomfortable, that’s all good, but it wasn’t so bad; that was the first rendition. Hopefully, like I said, people at home appreciated it and enjoyed it because I just think it’s a little different than in an interview. You’re learning about a hole, about not just the player but about the tournament and the golf course and what it takes to be playing, you know, high-level competitive golf.”
Will it proceed? Stay tuned. But Homa did have some ideas on whom he favored to see put within the AirPod subsequent.
“Man, a lot of guys,” he mentioned. “I don’t assume J.T. [Justin Thomas] will ever do it, however I believe he’d be phenomenal. I truthfully assume plenty of guys could be nice at it. I believe Jon Rahm could be — it will simply be fascinating to listen to him.
“Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t assume — that’s sort of what I see the sweetness in that is I don’t assume there’s a flawed man to make use of. Even for those who don’t wish to be tremendous outgoing about it, even when we may simply hear you speak by the shot together with your caddie very clearly, even for those who weren’t having like a backwards and forwards and you can possibly even, for those who did simply have one query, simply clarify what occurred on that shot — hey, I necked it as a result of clean — and go about your online business.
“I don’t think that there’s a bad person that would be on that.”
