The Florida swing heads to the Tampa area this week for the Valspar Championship. In a book I recently read – The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America, Tampa is used as the prime example of a city representing the decay of the greatest generation, the causes of the ’08 housing bubble, and what’s happened to the American Dream. Basically, everyone lives in suburbs that are half-full of over-leveraged families or half-developed with abandoned cluster castles. In this largely unplanned sprawl exists a public transit void, leading to a population addicted to finite/foreign oil, and the city itself is void of pedestrians and diversity (which leads to a lack of new ideas brought about by interaction and innovation in diverse urban areas). All in all, a pretty uplifting read, though I digress…
The point being, Tampa, with two and a half professional sports teams (the Bucs were relegated to fractional status thanks to the efforts of Greg Schiano), millions of rust belt transplants, a significant metropolitan area (2.9 million in 2011), and site of the most recent 2012 Republican National Convention, is a hot bed for three things: golf, lots of extremely old people, and a variety of strip clubs (more on those later). So you have a warm weather locale, with tons of old, conservative, white males who have the resources (over-leveraged or not) and time to play golf – so why does no one care about the Valspar Championship? Let’s dig into the preview to find out why…
Innisbrook: Copperhead Course
The course sure as hell ain’t the problem. In fact, it might be the main reason why this event still exists. Located in the relatively random Innisbrook Resort (a Florida resort near the beach without beach access?), the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Resort is like the grown-up ballstriker’s version of Chuck E. Cheese. This is literally the only valid explanation for why this event has a solid field. Guy’s like the course.
Designed by Larry Packard, who passed away at the age of 101 back in January, Copperhead seems out of place in central Florida. Framed by trees, old school “lines,” featuring smallish greens, and some subtle elevation changes that catch you off guard, this course demands accuracy and precision. At 7,300 yards it’s definitely not short, but it doesn’t discriminate against the shorter guys in the field, either (the list of past champions is all over the place (most recent first): Streelman, Donald (RIP), Woodland, Furyk, Goosen, O’Hair, Calc, Choi, Petterson, Vijay, Goosen (again), Choi (again), and NLU favorite John Huston in the inaugural event). Aside from Woodland, the formula seems to be fairways, greens, and avoiding big numbers (the poop brown color will be out in full force on PGATour.com this week – there’s an inordinate amount of big numbers here). It’s not really a birdie fest; it’s a tactician’s track.
That thing is legitimately scarier than a hat-less Jim Fury
The big feature is the closing stretch of holes 16, 17 & 18, which is glossed “The Snake Pit.” A long-ass par-3 stuck in between two man-sized par-4’s, this stretch regularly ranks amongst the toughest on Tour. No word on how long it’s been named this: we like to pretend it was dubbed the (Trouser) Snake Pit after the ’11 event in honor of Woodland’s tour de force. The only thing holding this stretch of holes back is the mandatory nickname. After the “Bear Trap” a few weeks ago, this one seems corny (even though it’s probably a harder stretch).
Vibe
There really isn’t a vibe. Here we’ll touch on the main reason why this event has a negative Q-rating: this event has been wronged by Corporate America. You ready for this?: It started as The Tampa Bay Championship, an almost-silly season event in 2000 opposite the President’s Cup in the fall, was cancelled in ’01 due to 9/11 (it was to be played opposite the WGC American Express Championship), and returned in ’02 as the Tampa Bay Championship presented by Buick when Buick execs decided they weren’t sponsoring enough golf events (and probably because the demo’s for old people with disposable income for a new LaSalle in the region made them swoon). From ’03 to ’06 the event doubled down on being an almost unrecognizable car event as the Chrysler Championship (amongst other Chrysler events in Greensboro, Palm Springs, and Tuscon), playing in a vacuum the week before The Tour Championship (Florida, middle of football season – people probably didn’t even know this thing existed).
In ’07 Finchy’s cronies moved the event to the middle of the Florida Swing and Kirk Triplett brought his PODS swag to town in the the form of a two-year stint as the Portable On Demand Storage Championship (no word on whether spectators received free bucket lids). ’09 brought with it the advent of the Transitions Championship, which was essentially a week long celebration of Trevor Immelman and Kenny Perry. Transitions lasted four years, bailing out really hard in ’12. EverBank, a regional bank out of Jacksonville, magnanimously stepped in as a stopgap and essentially saved the tournament. Valspar came to the rescue this year, and we the fans get to learn about paint products. It’s a win-win! Somehow, amidst all of this corporate tomfoolery, this tournament has always managed to pay a substantial purse. Respect that.
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Last Year
Boo’s final round 63 stole the show and the wait must’ve been agonizing – dude was done with his round ridiculously early. In the end, Streelman was rock solid all day and his win elicited a lot of goodwill and well-wishes from all over the world of pro-golf. A former looper out at NLU’s future HQ (Whisper Rock), Streels is one of the nice guy’s on Tour, so it was a feel-good Sunday. His ballstriking was on-point.
Anytime DubP, Spieth, Harris English, Sergio, Harman, DeLaet, and Coetzee (stupid long) are on the first few pages, you’ve got yourself a girthy final board. All are in the field this week, except Coetzee and Serg who are skipping…
Fantasy/Gambling Insights
(all lines courtesy Ladbrokes.com, the Official Bookmaker of NoLayingUp.com)
Horses for Courses
Jordan Spieth (16/1) – By this point on the schedule he’s a grizzled vet. This time last year he was fresh off a runner-up performance in Puerto Rico, fighting the non-member sponsor exemptions shot clock, starting to build cred, and from this event on played almost every event. Think about that–he balled out so hard last year while playing almost all of these courses for the first time. That’s insane. The oddsmakers are obviously putting stock in local knowledge, posting him just behind favorite Harris English (Too Big to Fail), and lumping him with Kuchar and the rotting corpse that is Luke Donald’s game.
Jason Dufner (20/1) – He’s almost there – the guy might as well be playing with latex gloves, goggles, and a lab coat on, because he’s been in the lab for months. He was right in the mix last week before fading a bit on Sunday and this course rewards fairways and greens. That’s his secret concoction. Fairways and greens.
Webb Simpson (25/1) – Thrives on difficult tracks like this. In fact, hasn’t finished outside the top-17 here since 2009 (runner-up in 2011). Guy has a US Open, he’s at his best when the conditions are tough. Having a really solid 2014 too. Pretty good value here.
Pat Perez (50/1) – He’s been on siesta since Riv, per usual. His game was in form before the break and one shouldn’t expect that to change. It’s obvious he found something in his swing and he’s primed to win an event. He plays this event nearly every year, which has to say something about his affinity for the course, right? 7th here LY, we’ll take the DubP every week (on reasonable tracks) until he wins one this year.
Value Fliers
Paul Casey (66/1) – Seems to me this would be a track that suits his game. He’s tidy. And his game is back on the upswing. Strong T-12 at Honda (72-68-69-67), could he be building for a second stint inside the OWGR top 20?
David Toms (80/1) – Showed well in PR last week (which was somewhat depressing – Toms is barely a notch below elder statesman), and has a decent track record here ( lit himself on fire in ’13, T-20th in ’12, T-37th in ’11 (was taking it deep before a final round 74), T-2oth in ’10 (2nd rd 63!), 33rd in ’09). We’ll take a flier – seemed like he had a little spring in his step last w
Source: https://nolayingup.com/blog/valspar-championship-preview