He Has Women’s Purses Looking Stylish

Ty Votaw, LPGA commissioner, offered his state-of-the-tour message Wednesday at the Nabisco Championship, but it came with a warning label.

“I can be accused of being a Pollyanna,” he said.

Think Tim Finchem would ever start his speech like that? He probably would assume his listeners already knew he was selling them a reheated seafood platter and just get on with it. So give Votaw some credit for honesty.

In his third year on the job since succeeding Jim Ritts, Votaw has already succeeded in his most important mandate--larger purses for the women players who hired him.

There are 41 LPGA events in 2001 with a total prize money package of $43.5 million. For the first time in LPGA history, the average tournament purse is

$1 million. There are 23 events with prize money of at least

$1 million, nearly double the 12 from last year.

What’s more, Votaw says the minimum purse should be

$1 million by 2003.

Of course, these aren’t even close to PGA Tour numbers, but Votaw continues to recite his familiar litany/disclaimer: Don’t Compare Us to the PGA Tour.

The LPGA has 250 hours on television this year, but the vast majority are “time buys,” which means the LPGA has to buy air time from its broadcast partners. That is decidedly not the case on the PGA Tour, where a new television deal now being negotiated may bring in as much as $1 billion in revenue over five years.

One important new revenue stream that Votaw has managed to find for the LPGA: International television dollars from Korea, Australia, Sweden, the United Kingdom and Japan have doubled in five years.

TY THIS ONE ON

No U.S. player has won an LPGA Tour event this year.

Votaw says, so what?

“No player from Australia, England or Japan has won either.”

So there.

HIGH VOTAW WIRE

The U.S. Women’s Open is played the same week as the Memorial, but other than the Nabisco, which is being played opposite the Players Championship, none of the LPGA’s other three majors compete against “marquee PGA Tour events,” as Votaw called them.

“The people at the Memorial would take exception to that,” he said.

Like, uh, that Nicklaus guy, maybe.

BUSINESS-SPEAK

Votaw, a former LPGA counsel, showed he was a veteran in the verbiage department with some of the heavy metal he was throwing around.

Not only did he use the words “excited” or “compelling” a total of 16 times, he also sprinkled his state-of-the-LPGA message with such terms as “band values assessment,” “points of differentiation” and “proactively verbalize.”

Impressive.

WEBB CAMERA

It may be not be the best mental frame of mind to begin defense of a major championship, but Karrie Webb is fried. The Nabisco is her ninth tournament this year, her seventh on the LPGA Tour, plus she has played four consecutive weeks. She is taking the next five weeks off.

“I need a break,” she said.

“The last two years have caught up to me and taken a lot out of me.”

Last year, she was the player of the year, the Vare Trophy winner, the money champion and a seven-time winner, which probably would make a lot of players tired just thinking about.

Webb says she feels good about her swing and has been spending time working on her putting, it’s just that she doesn’t have much left in her tank right now.

“Other than that . . . other than that, of course, that’s the whole thing.”

SNEAD ON TIGER

Sam Snead said Tiger Woods proved once again last week that the best combination is to be lucky and good.

“That’s luck, that ball was going out of bounds,” Snead said of Woods’ drive on the last hole at Bay Hill, when Tiger’s ball struck a fan in the throat. “Then it would have been another story.

“They should have people away from it, when a player has a driver in his hands, so as not to stop the ball. Spectators shouldn’t have anything to do with it. But I’m not going to say anything against Tiger. He’s the best there is right now out there.”

TIGER ON TIGER

Woods held a brief meeting with the media after his practice round Wednesday at Sawgrass and recalled those dark days when he hadn’t won a single tournament this entire year.

It was so very frustrating, he said.

“How can you not be frustrated if you hit snap hook after snap hook?” he said. “I hit some shanks, some quacks and some quails. It was just not fun hitting shots like that.”

MORE SNEAD

Snead, who will be 89 in May, has pulled out of next week’s Legends of Golf tournament, but he says he intends to be at Augusta National in time to hit the ritual first ball at the Masters.

He is recovering from dental surgery in which all of his lower teeth have been replaced.

“It’s not supposed to affect me,” he said. “The doctors have said it’s all going to be OK by the end of the month.”

Snead, a three-time Masters champion, says his legs are bothering him, a condition he blames on taking the wrong medication for an enlarged prostate. He is looking forward to his first-ball duties on Thursday morning of the Masters, though.

“You bet I am, but sometimes, I can hardly walk,” he said. “I might go up there and try to hit it too hard and fall down.”

Snead and Byron Nelson, 88, will hit the first balls to start the event. Nelson has said that this will be his last year to perform those duties.

CALL IT HOME COOKING

Not that they’re managing the news over at the PGA Tour’s headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., but you have to question how the Buy.com tournament in Monterrey, Mexico, could possibly be the top story on PGA Tour.com and GolfWeb the same day Annika Sorenstam shoots a 59, the lowest score in the history of women’s professional golf.

Could it be that the PGA Tour runs the Buy.com Tour and Sorenstam plays for the LPGA? Nah.

ACE MOVE?

Sorenstam was also slighted by ESPN, which broke away from the tournament at its scheduled 3 p.m. signoff, with her still on the course. Instead of golf, viewers saw Lleyton Hewitt and Nicolas Escude play a quarterfinal tennis match in the Masters Series at Indian Wells.

ESPN returned to golf at 3:27 and had live action--of Sorenstam signing her scorecard for 59. The network showed videotape of her playing her last two holes, then returned to tennis.

MONEY UPDATE

The $4 million reportedly being dangled in front of Woods by the New Zealand PGA is New Zealand dollars, which is about $2 million in U.S. dollars.

NO TANK FOR SHARK

Greg Norman is not willing to go away quietly. At 46, he doesn’t figure to be much of a factor week in and week out, but there he was last week at Bay Hill, finishing tied for fourth in a group that included Sergio Garcia, who is 25 years younger.

“I’m quietly happy,” said Norman, who should be.

Bay Hill was Norman’s first event this year in what has been a very limited playing schedule since he had shoulder surgery in 1998. Norman played only three events in 1998, nine in 1999 and 12 last year.

Norman hasn’t won in four years, but he says he is confident he will win again, now that he’s playing again.

“It’s just a matter of getting that comfortable feeling again playing on the golf course,” he said. “All the signals are pretty good, right now.”

FLASH! THIS JUST IN!

The week’s most overcooked media release was contributed by Nike, after Tiger’s victory at Bay Hill. The media alert said, in part: “Slump? No juice in the Nike Tour Accuracy TW?

“[Nike hopes] that when you write your stories . . . you’ll remember which ball . . . and what player . . . started . . . and will continue to further to lead (sic) this ball and equipment revolution.”

WILD, WILD CARDS

Sure, the Ryder Cup is still six months away, but if the matches were held today, the European team would be in one huge fix. Captain Sam Torrance has only two wild card picks and would have to choose among Jose Maria Olazabal, Miguel Angel Jimenez, Bernhard Langer, Nick Faldo, Jean Van de Velde, Robert Karlsson, Andrew Coltart and Paul Lawrie.

BIRDIES, BOGEYS, PARS

The Tom Sullivan Blind Childrens Center tournament will be held May 7 at Riviera Country Club. Details: (323) 664-2153.

Keyshawn Johnson is hosting a celebrity tournament April 23 at Malibu Country Club. The event benefits the education fund of Johnson and his wife, Shikiri. Details: (310) 265-8465.

Calabasas Country Club will host an LPGA Golf Clinic for Women March 26. Details: (800) 262-PUTT.

The 19th Tom Flores Boy Scout Invitational tournament will be held June 26 at the Ocean Course North at Pelican Hill. The event benefits the Los Angeles Area Council’s Scouting with Disabilities Program. Details: (213) 413-4400, ext. 238 or (909) 444-8680.

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Nabisco Championship

* Site: Rancho Mirage.

* Schedule: Today-Sunday.

* Course: Mission Hills Country Club (6,520 yards, par 72).

* Purse: $1.5 million. Winner’s share: $225,000.

* TV: ESPN (today-Friday, 12:30-2:30 p.m.) and ABC (Saturday-Sunday, 1-3 p.m.).

* Last year: Australia’s Karrie Webb won the fourth of seven 2000 tour titles, beating 1999 winner Dottie Pepper by a tournament-record 10 strokes.

* Last week: Sweden’s Annika Sorenstam shot the first 59 in women’s tournament history and broke the tour’s 72-hole record with a 27-under 261 total in the Standard Register Ping in Phoenix.

* Notes: Sorenstam won two weeks ago in Tucson and finished second in her other two starts this year. She’s winless in six appearances in the tournament, with her best finish a second-place tie in 1996. . . . The tournament, first played in 1972 as the Colgate Dinah Shore, became a major championship in 1983. . . . Webb tied for seventh in Phoenix, extending her tour winless streak to seven. She spent the previous two weeks in Australia, winning her fourth consecutive Australian Masters title and finishing second in the Australian Open. . . . Pepper set the tournament record of 19-under 269 in 1999. She also won in 1992.

* On the Net: https://www.lpga.com