Trevor Immelman and Kevin Kisner are two of golf TV’s largest stars on the Presidents Cup — and neither is on the decision this week.
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MONTREAL — It has been mentioned {that a} hundred senators look within the mirror each morning and see a president.
On the Presidents Cup, there’s one thing related occurring with management: 100 Presidents Cup captains look within the mirror and see a TV star.
However on this case they might have some extent. One wanted only some minutes at Wednesday afternoon’s Vice Captains’ press convention to see on-screen expertise in motion.
On the dais, from left to proper, sat near a half-dozen of golf tv’s most notable voices: Ogilvy, Immelman, Leonard, Kisner. Usually, some mixture of these 4 professional talkers is a typical sight for Wednesday afternoon at a big-time occasion; we watch as they spill via the fairways with bright-colored inside-the-ropes lanyards and keep on playful chitchat with gamers, caddies and brokers. However on this Wednesday, these faces and voices had been carrying totally different hats, on-site as short-term staff of the Presidents Cup, every of their respective roles as vice-captain.
As a chilly, grey afternoon bled right into a gusty night in Montreal, the 4 males spoke, and earlier than lengthy it was arduous to disregard the sensation that the tv voices had been in all places. There was Todd Lewis on the lectern, asking questions. And TV screens blasted the back-and-forth being recorded a couple of thousand ft away in NBC’s hulking broadcast facility. Quickly the sensation had change into a suggestion: Golf TV’s stars are in all places on the Presidents Cup. Now just one query remained: Why is that this week so necessary to them?
We’ll begin with Trevor Immelman, the genteel voice of CBS Golf. Final time we noticed him carrying the INT protect, he was weeks away from beginning in his present function as lead analyst. Immelman, a popular however, on the time, not significantly distinguished voice, was the captain of the Worldwide facet again in ’22. LIV had spent the prior summer season decimating the Worldwide facet, main Immelman to pick out a report eight rookies to the roster. As the 2 sides ready for what was anticipated to be a massacre, Immelman confronted a possibility to face out. He delivered seven days of impassioned press conferences, struck each proper be aware, and captained a staff that proved endearingly pesky. When it was over, Immelman was a golf supernova, and he rode the wave of goodwill straight right into a well-regarded opening season on CBS.
Geoff Ogilvy isn’t any such TV star — at the least not but — however he has been the attention sweet of the business over these final 18 months. It’s straightforward to neglect that Ogilvy was the primary distinguished identify tied to the seek for NBC’s (still-vacant) lead analyst place. The previous U.S. Open champ has lengthy been considered considered one of golf’s most incisive audio system, and can be a welcome addition nearly anyplace, ought to he determine he’d prefer to work a full schedule.
The issue, although, is that Ogilvy appears completely content material retaining TV at an arm’s size, pitching in for ESPN’s Masters responsibility and as a visitor on numerous different podcasts, reveals and tales.
“NBC was scratching round however that doesn’t really feel proper for the time being,” he informed Golfweek in April. “I’m not able to commit to twenty weeks.”
Not working TV full-time provides him the liberty to work with out hesitation as a vice-captain at occasions like this one (with the runway clear for the Australian to step right into a management function when the Cup shifts to his native Kingston Heath in ’28). The flip facet of work-life steadiness is that, at occasions like this one, Ogilvy showcases the oratory items that may be so nicely suited within the sales space.
“We don’t hate the opposite staff,” he mentioned Wednesday, his tone bone-dry. “It … seems to be enjoyable to win this event.”
From the opposite facet of the dais, the remaining two members of our TV crew — Justin Leonard and Kevin Kisner — laughed. These two gained’t be interviewing for any TV jobs this weekend; because it stands now their place within the TV panorama is evident. Leonard “stepped away” from NBC at first of 2023 to pursue a full-time taking part in schedule on the PGA Tour Champions and hasn’t been again a lot, whereas NBC has overtly courted Kisner to step away from full-time PGA Tour duties to take the lead analyst job, however Kisner has rebuffed them.
Nonetheless, their place within the vice-captaincy — a literal interior circle of males’s professional golf — spoke to a reality shared by all 4 males, and by every of the 24 gamers within the discipline this week: the world is watching a little bit bit nearer this week. And when the world is watching nearer, nicely, so are the TV cameras.
Perhaps it goes with out saying that a part of being a golf TV star is being within the interior circle, and possibly this week reveals the celebrities greater than it creates them. However one member of this week’s Presidents Cup really right here for tv duties — Bones Mackay — sees it otherwise. The golf world is plagued by tales of these whose careers reached a unique stratosphere through staff golf efficiency, together with two members of this week’s discipline (Max Homa and Tom Kim).
“There’s nothing like these weeks,” Mackay mentioned Wednesday. “The depth is ratcheted up, it’s getting a little bit chippy. It’s nice.”
Mackay, whose tenure on the bag overlapped with two of the golf world’s nice match play showmen (Phil Mickelson and Justin Thomas), has witnessed firsthand how these weeks can change lives and careers. They’ve helped to alter his — main in some oblique technique to his present gig as an on-course reporter with NBC’s staff.
I requested Mackay why he thought so many TV stars had been within the combine this week, and he spoke about Leonard, suggesting these occasions are sometimes a symbiotic relationship: put good in, get good out. Then he paused.
“From a TV perspective, they’re a number of the greatest weeks of the yr.”
Perhaps in additional methods than one.
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