Event Down Under a Ratings Downer

So how big a dud was last week’s $5-million Match Play Championship in Australia?

Let’s just say that several kangaroos pulled muscles when they tried to climb inside their own pouches so they wouldn’t have to watch.

At ABC, things were so bad, it almost made Dennis Miller look good. The overnight rating for Sunday’s telecast was a 1.5. Last year’s rating for the match-play final featuring Tiger Woods was a 5.6.

The $1-million winner was Steve Stricker, ranked No. 90 in the world, and seeded 55th in the 64-player field. He beat Pierre Fulke--yes, the actual Pierre Fulke--in a 36-hole final.

Stricker, to his credit, didn’t back off when asked if his victory was sort of tainted, mainly because six of the top 10 players weren’t there--including Woods, David Duval, Phil Mickelson, Colin Montgomerie, Lee Westwood and Davis Love III.

Hey, they all could have come, Stricker said. That’s just what Hal Sutton did. Sutton hauled his aching back from Shreveport, La., to Melbourne, and it only took him 33 hours to get there. Coincidentally, that’s also about how long he lasted in Melbourne. Sutton went out in the first round, but at least he made $25,000.

FINE, BUT IT DOESN’T EVER END

Noting that Woods is an exception, Gary Player says he is disappointed in U.S. golfers who don’t seem to want to travel around the world to play.

“These guys are almost isolationists,” Player said. “I hope it is just a phase . . . and the next generation will honor the great game of golf around the world and not just make so much money and think that golf starts and ends in the United States.”

IS GRANNY FREE FOR LUNCH?

Player, 65, is playing the Senior Skins Game along with Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer and Hale Irwin the last weekend of the month and at his age, he remains convinced that money is the root of all evil in pro golf.

“There is no question that money is ruining the game,” said Player, who used as an example the $5-million special event last month in Sun City, South Africa.

“The [players] say it’s too far,” he said. “We had to travel 14 hours on a plane with five children and no disposable diapers. And now they [can] play for $2 million and they say [instead], ‘I’m going to have lunch with my granny.’ ”

THE BUTLER DID IT

Woods makes his 2001 debut beginning today at the Mercedes Championships at Kapalua on Maui, where the Ritz Carlton is making sure that he and the others in the 33-player field are, well, pampered in the manner to which they are accustomed.

For instance, on arrival at the hotel, the players were greeted with scented oshibori (hot) towels. They were offered a welcome drink of passion fruit, orange and guava juices.

If that isn’t enough, a new bath has been added to the bath menu. (Yes, the bath menu). The butler-drawn bath of bath salts and eucalyptus oil also features music, a towel warmer, champagne and chocolate truffles.

It’s rough out there, all right.

TIGER UPDATE

Question: What was Woods doing instead of getting ready to play the $5-million match play event in Australia?

Answer: Scuba diving in the Bahamas.

IT’S IN HIS COURT . . . AGAIN

Casey Martin has another day in court Wednesday and it’s a big one--the Supreme Court will hear the PGA Tour’s appeal of the original 1998 ruling that was upheld on appeal in 1999, allowing him to use a golf cart while playing.

Martin, who will listen to arguments before the nine-member panel in Washington, wants to get on playing golf; he will make his season debut this week at the Tucson Open. Martin has no exempt status on the PGA Tour after he missed retaining his 2001 Tour card by one shot at qualifying school, so he has asked for sponsor’s exemptions until he starts playing the Buy.com Tour that begins March 8 in Gainesville, Fla.

“It’s a chance to make some money and you never know what’s going to happen,” said Martin, who will not split time between the tours once he starts playing the Buy.com regularly.

Martin can accept seven sponsor’s exemptions on the PGA Tour and has asked for one from Nissan Open tournament director Tom Pulchinski.

As his date with the Supreme Court draws closer, Martin has been practicing nearly every day at Eugene (Ore.) Country Club near his home. Although he ranked No. 6 in driving distance last year on the PGA Tour, he was No. 179 in putting and he took lessons from Jim McLean at PGA West.

“I know I have the talent to compete out there,” Martin said. “But there’s no quick fix. I’m just trying to be patient.”

A decision is expected before the end of June.

COME TO GRIPS WITH IT

This just in . . . Lamkin has come up with a new line of grips, made of the same kind of shock-absorbing material used in running shoes.

MONEY NEWS

Two reasons why it might be an easier decision for top players to skip the Nissan Open at Riviera this year:

* The $5-million Match Play Championship, which followed last year’s event at La Costa and kept many of the top players around, won’t have the same effect since it was played last week in Australia.

* Sure, the prize money at Riviera is pumped up to

$3.4 million, but it’s $4.5 million the following week at the Genuity Championship at Doral. (And just this week, the MasterCard Colonial increased its purse to $4 million and the Memorial to $4.1 million).

One reason why the Nissan Open will be a huge success:

* Woods hasn’t announced it yet, but he’s going to play. The Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines is also on his still-unannounced schedule. But it was announced Wednesday that Woods once again has entered the Deutsche Bank/SAP Open in May in Heidelberg, Germany.

WEBB WILL WIN THIS WEEK

The LPGA’s 51st season begins Friday with the YourLife Vitamins LPGA Classic at Orlando, Fla., where last year’s sensation, Karrie Webb, positively will win.

That’s because she has entered, which is rude of Webb because it means that nobody else has a chance now. Webb won seven times last year, two of them majors, and she led the LPGA’s money list, in scoring average, rounds under par and top-10 finishes.

The scary part for everyone else: Webb is only 25 and ready to go again.

“I think I can always get better,” she said. “Can I maintain this pace? I might. You never know.”

DESIGNATED DRIVERS

Callaway has been receiving most of the headlines because of its controversial, non-USGA compliant ERC II driver, but TaylorMade-adidas got into the act when it introduced its own noncompliant driver in Japan, the 300 Series Type R.

A USGA compliant version of the 300 series driver has been available in the U.S. since October. Ernie Els, Mickelson, Tom Lehman, Sutton, Larry Nelson and Meg Mallon are some of the pros using the 300 series driver.

YIPPEE!

News item: Researchers at the Mayo Clinic, who surely must have better things to do, are looking into a cure for the yips. Experts in the clinic’s sport psychology and medicine center say the yips are most likely the result of anxiety.

Reaction: Duh.

YOU EXPECTED SOMEONE ELSE?

Unofficially, which caddie made the most last year?

If you figure caddies get 10% of a winner’s share, 8% for a top-10 check and 6% of everything else, then add the usual $1,000 per-tournament fee, the caddie who made the most last year was . . . Steve Williams ($880,000) . . . who works for Woods.

Reaction: Double duh.

YOU EXPECTED SOMETHING ELSE?

Here’s a real stunner: In the latest issue of the USGA’s Golf Journal, there are five letters from readers about Palmer’s controversial endorsement of Callaway’s noncomforming driver--four are solidly anti-Palmer and the fifth is only mildly in his corner.

STAR POWER

Woods is a Capricorn and, according to Michael Zullo’s book titled “Golf Astrology,” he “will receive positive influence from both a Scorpio and a Taurus.” We’ll see about that.

So what’s Duval, a Scorpio, going to do? Give Tiger strokes? And Westwood, a Taurus, is he going to share his double cheeseburger?

AND THE SUPREME COURT

WAS NOTIFIED

From Dan Jenkins in Golf Digest: “What happened after People magazine ranked Martin No. 9 on its list of Most Eligible Bachelors in America?

(a) More golfers started to limp.

(b) More golfers started to drive carts.

(c) The PGA Tour appealed it.”

BIRDIES, BOGEYS, PARS

If anyone guesses the exact number of birdies at this year’s Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines, he will win a trip for two to Monte Carlo. Hint: Last year, there were 1,538.

Remember “Rudy?” He’s still playing . . . golf, not football. The first Rudy Ruettiger celebrity tournament, based on the feature film about his walk-on football career at Notre Dame, will be held Feb. 12 at the Anthem Country Club in Henderson, Nev. The event benefits Ruettiger’s foundation for children’s health programs. Details: (702) 263-0088.

Rebuilding work on the 18th hole at Ocean Trails in Rancho Palos Verdes, which was lost in a landslide in 1999, is scheduled to be completed by this summer. Meanwhile, it’s being played as a 15-hole course and offering unlimited play at $125 Monday through Thursday and $195 Friday through Sunday. Total cost of the 18th hole, from design through the rebuild: $30 million.

Woods will hold a junior clinic April 14 at El Dorado Golf Course in Long Beach. Details: (714) 816-1806.

Macdonald Smith, the only player to win the Los Angeles Open four times on four courses, will be honored as a past champion at the 75th Nissan Open. Smith, who died in 1949, won at Wilshire Country Club (1928), Riviera Country Club (‘29), Hillcrest Country Club (‘32) and L.A. Country Club (‘34).

The $1.4-million SBC Senior Classic, which has moved from Wilshire Country Club to Valencia Country Club and will be played March 9-11, needs volunteers. Details: (661) 295-4690.