Roll of dice on Vegas comes up a big winner

NBA summer league grows into 'July Madness' for fans, budding young prospects

LAS VEGAS — It all started simply enough.
The year was 2004, and summer league basketball leagues for NBA players and prospects were spread around at number of locations, including Salt Lake City and Long Beach, Calif.
“A couple of them were looking to have more of an anchor place,” says Warren LeGarie, a San Francisco-based sports agent who represents a number of NBA coaches and management types. “They challenged me, ‘Why don’t we find a place with better proximity to more players?’ Vegas was the place that made a lot of sense.”
LeGarie secured financing and a sponsor (Reebok) and organized a six-team summer league at UNLV, each of the teams playing three to five games.
“In the beginning, it really was a little simpler,” says LeGarie, 61, who represents general manager Neil Olshey, coach Terry Stotts among others from the Trail Blazers organization.
Though only a few thousand fans turned out to watch the low-key affair in 2004, NBA coaches and executives liked what they experienced. The next year, the Las Vegas Summer League expanded to 16 teams, including Portland.
A decade later, the LVSL has partnered with the NBA and expanded to 24 teams, crowns a champion and dwarfs the only other existing summer league for NBA teams in Orlando in both size and eminence. Games from both leagues are carried live on NBA-TV, but the 10-team league in Orlando is closed to the public and staged at the Magic’s training facility.
In Las Vegas, games are held at UNLV’s Thomas & Mack Center and Cox Pavilion, side-by-side sites five minutes from the famed Las Vegas Strip. A $25 daily ticket allows the fan to watch as many as eight games between the two arenas. Each NBA team is guaranteed to play at least five games through the 10-day schedule that covers two weekends. About 430 media credentials have been issued.
“Call us ‘July Madness,’ ” laughs LeGarie, 61, who acts as a combination maitre d’/public relations man, greeting officials, coaches and players while taking care of their needs. “We had 9,500 for our championship game last year. People set their vacations up so they can attend the event now.
“We never expected this to become a happening. I’d be lying if I said we did. We had no idea.”
A good portion of today’s NBA stars — including Dwight Howard, Chris Paul, Rajon Rondo, Blake Griffin and John Wall — have showed their talents in the LVSL. Blazers Jarryd Bayless and Damian Lillard have won most valuable player honors.
“It’s been a ‘Walk of Fame’ type of thing,” LeGarie says. “The thing that resonates most is that the fan has incredible access. It’s as close to an NBA game-like experience as you’ll get next to a regular-season game. And we don’t even charge for air conditioning.”
It has become a time and place where plenty of NBA off-the-court business is covered, too.
“Most of the NBA executives are here,” Olshey says. “It’s almost become like a convention, with agents, executives and team officials. You can conduct a lot of business. You can interview for positions.”
Olshey did just that soon after he became Portland’s GM two years ago, hiring then-Dallas assistant Stotts as his coach.
The LVSV provides a service to many on a variety of levels.
“It’s of great value in terms of coaching development, player development, the ability to see a lot of people in the same place,” says San Antonio GM R.C. Buford, the NBA’s executive of the year in 2013-14.
“This setting is as representative of an NBA game-like atmosphere as you can get,” says Cleveland GM David Griffin, who signed LeBron James to a free-agent contract last week. “They’ve done such a good job of building the league into something where there’s a great deal of attention brought to bear on it. That puts kids in a situation where there’s a heightened sense of urgency. It’s a win-win for everyone involved.”
“It raises the bar for the players,” Olshey says. “You can’t simulate a real NBA game, but it’s as close as you get for the five to six months of our offseason.”
The players are predominately young — rookies or second- or third-year players, though veterans such as Josh Howard, Shannon Brown and ex-Blazer Jeff Ayers dot the rosters, looking for another chance to prove themselves.
Some of the summer league players are draft picks. Many of them are free agents, looking to earn a contract or an invitation to training camp.
“It’s a great venue for players to develop and be seen,” Oklahoma City coach Scott Brooks says.
“I wouldn’t call it a tryout camp, but it’s definitely a proving ground, especially for your rookies and younger players,” Denver coach Brian Shaw says.
If there are no available spots on one team’s roster, a player enhances his chances of landing elsewhere by playing well enough to get noticed by the dozens of officials representing all 30 NBA teams — and international pro teams as well — who are watching from the stands.
Says Nuggets assistant coach Lester Conner: “Brian told our guys, ‘We have 13 players with guaranteed contracts, so two of you might make the team. But you’ll be showcasing yourself for other teams and teams in Europe.’ The NBA is not for everybody, but there are other places to play. And all the big shots are here — Phil Jackson and his (New York) staff, Gregg Popovich and his (San Antonio) staff. If you want to get seen, this is the place to come.”
Each of the games is 40 minutes long, with 10-minute quarters. Referees are provided by the NBA — budding NBA officials, many of them who work in the Development League. The LVSL is a proving ground for them, too.
“They do a great job in terms of trying to grow officials,” Griffin says. “And part of it is our kids learning to adapt to that part of the game.”
Coaches use the league to evaluate their players in an organized setting without the pressures of a regular-season game.
“You get a chance to develop your younger players and to see some veterans trying to make the team,” Brooks says. “You can implement your system and evaluate everything without worrying about wins and losses.”
The majority of the players in the LVSL never play a game in the NBA. Those who shine aren’t necessarily destined for an NBA roster.
“It’s a chance for coaches to get to know them, to start getting a hands-on impression,” says P.J. Carlesimo, the former Blazers coach who is an analyst for ESPN. “I’ve always said, you may not find out who can play (in the NBA) in summer league, but sometimes you can find out who cannot play.”
Coaches generally allow their younger assistants to run the LVSL team. Nate Tibbetts and David Vanterpool are sharing that responsibility with the Blazers.
“It’s a great opportunity to put the game plan together, draw up plays, handle end-of-game situations, talk during timeouts and before and after the games,” Tibbetts says. “It’s easy as an assistant. You just make suggestions. As a head coach, you have to make decisions.”
Jefferson High and Portland State grad Ime Udoka, who earned a championship ring as an assistant with San Antonio this spring, is coach of the Spurs’ LVSL team for the second straight year.
“To a young, up-and-coming coach, the experience is invaluable,” Udoka says. “It’s great to get a chance to run practice, look at some of our guys in a different environment, expand their roles and add my own wrinkles to our offense.”
“Attendance has increased through the years, and we’re looking at being 10 to 25 percent up this year — somewhere in the high 80 (thousands) to the low 90’s,” LeGarie says. “We had 9,500 for our championship game last year.”
Though the bright lights of the Vegas Strip can be alluring to players, most of the coaches says they’ve had little trouble with incidents here over the years.
“There’s temptation everywhere,” Shaw says. “We remind the players all the time what they’re here for. I went to UC Santa Barbara, one of the biggest party schools in the country. It taught me discipline. You have your time to play, but the guys who take it seriously and understand the responsibility that comes with being here have a better chance to make it. You either sink, or you swim.”
By: Kerry Eggers

The power of live content: World Cup 2014 social media winners and losers

It’s official. The 2014 World Cup has become social media’s biggest ever sporting event, with a staggering 35.6 million tweets about the game sent during the Brazil vs. Germany match alone. 

Sports coverage is evolving all the time and seems to move at a faster rate every year that goes by. Smart phone ownership and usage, plus the popularity of social platforms, has created a huge new playing field where anyone can have a voice. The fact that 72.4 percent of fans were actively discussing the World Cup on social networks whilst watching the games on TV is testament to this evolution.

As click through rates and display become less effective, brands have been quick to identify the huge potential for engagement that creative, reactive content can have during a live sporting event.

However, reactive content marketing isn’t without its risks. Exposing your brand to an audience of millions of engaged twitter users means that if the tone and execution isn’t perfectly balanced, it can have a negative and potentially damaging effect on your brand.

With audience engagement the name of the game, which brands and sponsors managed to effectively embrace live content as a strategy during the #WorldCup2014 and which failed?

Winners 

Adidas: #allin? Or Nothing?

Adidas had a point to prove at this year’s tournament having been whooped by Nike at the 2010 World Cup. Its response was the #allin or nothing campaign anchored by a star studded video featuring the likes of Messi, Alves, Suárez, Özil and RVP and supported by the company’s biggest ever media spend.

At the end of the video, viewers are given the option to be #allin and guided to a hub of Adidas’s social output or to be nothing and subsequently left alone. Through a vivid dichotomy, the campaign placed a bold emphasis on quality of social audience over quantity.

A key element to the Adidas campaign is athlete activation, with sponsored  athletes pushing out live content at key moments before crunch matches.

Here are a couple of examples from Arsenal/Germany star Per Mertesacker, and Real Madrid/Brazil’s Marcelo Vieira.

 The campaign resulted in Adidas being the most talked-about brand on Twitter during the World Cup, with over 1.6 million tweets, retweets and replies mentioning the brand, according to Rob Hughes, Adidas’ senior global football PR manager.
#allin was the most-used brand hashtag on Twitter, with 570,000 mentions since the Cup began June 12. The company’s YouTube audience has also doubled, with more than 200,000 new subscribers since play started. Not bad at all.

Nike: Risk Everything
With the debate around the long term value of sponsoring the World Cup raging on, Nike once again demonstrated how innovative marketing can deliver huge cut through.
That, alongside ensuring that 10 out of the 35 teams at the World Cup were wearing its famous swoosh logo.To-date the Risk Everything campaign, built around “The Last Game” video on YouTube, has generated 6 billion impressions, with more than 2 billion of these via mobile devices. “The Last Game” video alone has generated nearly 65 million views.

Nike: #AskZlalan
Combining video content with social is obviously a key area for Nike and with the #AskZlatan campaign on Twitter and Facebook, they combined the two to great effect: 

The ‘Ask Zlatan’ series, invites fans to ask questions to the animated version of Swedish great Zlatan Ibrahimović, who gives third-person, megalomaniacal answers. The best part – Ibrahimovic isn’t even at the World Cup.
Nike report that the #AskZlatan series has received 18.4 million views and 1.3 million social engagements.

Nandos/Snickers/Spec Savers:The Suarez bite
Moments after Luis Suarez sank his teeth into Italy’s Giorgio Chiellini, Twitter exploded with brands looking to take advantage with some witty, reactive content.  

Losers

McDonalds: #FryFutbol
Unlike Adidas, McDonalds was one of the official sponsors which didn’t quite marry-up that real-time content/football strategy as well.   McDonalds waded into this year’s brand war at the World Cup with some pretty decent firepower. It had the first ever Global Promoted Twitter Trend with #FryFutbol, appearing in 57 markets.
But unlike Adidas, McDonalds failed to really connect with the football audience:
Despite getting 17,000 mentions on the day, it was a classic case of a # not being simple and effective enough to get the brand message across.

KLM: Adios AmigosKLM Royal Dutch Airline’s now infamous ‘Adios Amigos’ tweet, which the company quickly deleted, is an good example of where reactive content can have a potentially negative effect. 

As an international brand, KLM’s use of geographic stereotyping within this tweet certainly didn’t chime with everyone and provoked a sweary rebuke from Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal – broadcast straight to his 1.95m followers.

The fact that the airline quickly deleted the tweet was evidence that its in-house team knew it made a blunder. The quickness with which a post can be picked up and critiqued demonstrates that real-time marketing is fraught with complications.

Brands have to have the strength to stand by their social posts, and perhaps KLM could have responded with a witty apology tweet rather than delete it and pretend it didn’t happen. You can see why real time marketing is a dicey game to play, as it often requires a cultural change within a business. Otherwise you can risk stifling creativity.

 

By: Sarah Groarke

 

 

Tiger Woods withdraws from consideration for 2014 U.S. Ryder Cup Team

By The PGA of America Tiger Woods has informed the PGA of America and United States Captain Tom Watson that due to his current health situation, he has taken himself out of consideration to serve as a Captain’s Pick for the 2014 U.S. Ryder Cup Team.  “While I greatly appreciate Tom thinking about me for a possible Captain’s Pick, I must take myself out of consideration,” Woods said. “I’ve been told by my doctors and trainer that my back muscles need to be rehabilitated and healed. They’ve advised me not to play or practice now. I’m extremely disappointed that I won’t be ready for the competition. The U.S. Team and the Ryder Cup mean too much to me not to be able to give it my best. I’ll be cheering for the U.S. Team. I think we have an outstanding squad going into the matches.”   “My primary wish is for Tiger to be healthy and competitive, and I hope that he’ll return to the game very soon,” said Watson. “Of course, I’m disappointed that Tiger Woods has asked not to be considered for the U.S. Ryder Cup Team, and that his health is not where he would like it to be. However, I think we can all agree that we need Tiger Woods in this great sport, and he has taken the high road by informing me early on in the selection process. My focus will remain on identifying three players to join the U.S. team and give us the best chance for success at Gleneagles.”  Woods has appeared on seven U.S. Ryder Cup Teams between 1997 and 2012. He did not compete in 2008, due to injury.   “By making this decision, Tiger has put the U.S. Ryder Cup Team and his health first,” said PGA President Ted Bishop. “And although we’re disappointed that he will not be part of this year’s Team, we respect Tiger’s decision, and wish him all the best for a speedy and successful recovery. This is a classy and respectful move by Tiger that allows Captain Watson plenty of time to formulate his team plans accordingly.”  Nine automatic berths on the U.S. Ryder Cup Team were secured following the conclusion of the 96th PGA Championship. The Americans clinching a spot on the team are: Five-time major champion Phil Mickelson, two-time Masters Champion Bubba Watson, 2003 U.S. Open Champion Jim Furyk, 2007 Masters Champion Zach Johnson, and PGA Tour stars Rickie Fowler, Matt Kuchar, Jordan Spieth, Jimmy Walker and Patrick Reed.  Watson will announce his three Captain’s Picks during a news conference from New York on Tuesday, Sept. 2 at 7 p.m., which will be broadcast live on Golf Channel.  The 40th Ryder Cup between the United States and Europe will be held at Gleneagles on the Jack Nicklaus designed-Centenary Course in Perthshire, Scotland, Sept. 26-28, 2014. NBC and Golf Channel will combine to broadcast the event live in its entirety in the U.S. for the first time ever from European soil.

FC Bayern Munich Plots American Invasion After World Cup Success

Six of Germany's 11 starters in the World Cup final on July 13 play together for the powerhouse Bundesliga club Bayern Munich. A seventh Bayern player, Mario Götze, came off the bench to score Germany's game-winning goal in extra time and power Die Mannschaft to the most coveted trophy in team sports.
Now, after many of its stars helped Germany conquer the soccer world, Bayern Munich has its sights set on another goal: America.

 

Bayern Munich on Thursday launched a USA-specific website — what it says is the first of its kind in global soccer to offer specific content for American fans, as opposed to simple English translations of more general content. The site launch comes after Bayern opened its first overseas office, in New York City, earlier this year. And later this month, the club launches a brief American tour highlighted by a match against Chivas Guadalajara in New Jersey on July 31 and a showcase against Major League Soccer all-stars in Portland, Oregon.
"There are 60 million soccer fans in the U.S., 15 million of those are fans have shown interest in FC Bayern. For us it is about fan engagement and staying in close touch with our supporters," Rudolf Vidal, Bayern's managing director in the States, told Mashable in an email. "But we also want to reach out to the other 45 million who have set viewership records in the U.S. during the World Cup to start a dialogue."

Much of that dialogue will begin with the new U.S. site, which will include articles about Bayern's iconic senior men's team, as well as unrelated soccer content geared toward American fans of the sport and information on Bayern's basketball and women's soccer teams.
Vidal says Bayern "absolutely" sees the U.S. as a more of a soccer market now than it was five years ago and that "global engagement and a global presence is part of the club's natural progression."
Bayern also has an ace in the hole that will make many American soccer fans pay it special attention in the coming months and years: Nineteen-year-old Julian Green, a highly touted German-American prospect who plays for Bayern, famously committed his international future to the U.S. over Germany this spring and two weeks ago scored a stellar goal for the USMNT against Belgium on the very first touch of his World Cup career.
As soccer continues to grow in popularity Stateside — at the same times as MLS still has quite a ways to go to rival Europe's best leagues — Bayern's strategy is one other top clubs would be wise to replicate.
Just how well Bayern's plan for an increased American footprint works remains to be seen. But it's already proof of one thing: As soccer's profile continues to grow Stateside, the sport's top global brands will be looking to cash in on that increased interest.

McIlroy captures fourth career major after winning dramatic shootout at Valhalla

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- The challenge finally arrived for Rory McIlroy, and he was better than ever Sunday to win the PGA Championship.

On a back nine filled with clutch shots and as much tension as a major can provide, McIlroy emerged from a four-man race to outlast Phil Mickelson and the darkness at Valhalla to capture his second straight major.

McIlroy closed with a 3-under 68 and became only the fourth player in the past century of golf to win four majors at 25 or younger. The others were Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus and Bobby Jones, three of the game's greatest players.

 

Boy Wonder appears on his way to belonging in that group.

"I didn't think in my wildest dreams I'd have a summer like this," said McIlroy, only the seventh player to win the last two majors of the year. "I played the best golf of my life. I really gutted it out today."

But one of the greatest shows on soggy turf came with a most peculiar ending.

Three shots behind going to the back nine, McIlroy rallied to take the lead and then hit a 9-iron from the fairway bunker to 10 feet for birdie on the 17th hole for a two-shot lead going to the par-5 18th. Because of a two-hour rain delay earlier, darkness was falling quickly and it wasn't certain McIlroy would be able to finish.

McIlroy was allowed to hit his tee shot before Mickelson and Rickie Fowler had reached their drives. Both were only two shots behind, still in the game. McIlroy came within a yard of hitting in a hazard right of the fairway.

Then, the PGA of America allowed McIlroy to hit his second shot. Mickelson and Fowler had to stand to the side of the green.

"We were cool with hitting the tee shot," Fowler said. "We weren't expecting the approach shots."

Fowler had a 50-foot eagle attempt to tie for the lead. He was well off the mark, and missed the short birdie putt attempt that cost him his third straight runner-up finish in a major. Mickelson was short of the green, and his chip came within inches of dropping for an eagle that would have tied him for the lead.

Mickelson appeared upset that they had to wait to finish the hole -- not standard procedure in a PGA Tour event -- and he made two references in a TV interview that this is the only championship the PGA of America runs all year.

"It didn't affect the outcome of the championship at all, I don't think," Mickelson said. "It's not what we normally do. It's not a big deal either way."

Mickelson closed with a 66 and was runner-up for the ninth time in a major.

Fowler became the first player in history to finish in the top five at all four majors without winning one. He closed with a 68 and tied for third with Henrik Stenson, who fell out of a share of the lead by missing a 3-foot par putt on the 14th hole. Stenson shot a 66.

 

PGA Championship: Rory McIlroy holds off the field in dramatic final day at Valhalla. Thru rain delays and darkness at the end of the day, McIlroy made all the clutch shots needed to win his second career PGA Championship and 4th career major.

 

McIlroy hit his second shot into a bunker, and he had to two-putt from 35 feet for the win. He lagged the first one to tap-in range, and the major was his. McIlroy repeatedly pumped his fist before letting out a scream above the gallery that had been treated to one of the best shows ever in a major.

He won his first two majors by eight shots at the 2011 U.S. Open and 2012 PGA Championship. Only a month ago, McIlroy took a six-shot lead into the final round of the British Open and completed a wire-to-wire win with only a brief scare.

This was his first big test, and it took some of his best golf to come through.

"I think I showed a lot of guts out there to get the job done," he said.

The winning shot turned out to be that 9-iron from the bunker and the birdie putt on the 17th hole that gave him a two-shot lead, the largest margin for anyone on a day when as many as five players claimed a share of the lead.

It might not have been possible without a 3-wood on the par-5 10th hole.

Standing in the fairway, McIlroy watched Fowler drain a 30-foot birdie putt to take the outright lead. McIlroy was 281 yards away, slightly uphill, and his short caught the left side of the fairway and rolled onto the green before stopping 7 feet away for an eagle that got him back in the game.

Mickelson holed a 10-foot birdie putt on the 11th hole to tie Fowler, and it looked to be his day when he rolled in a 30-foot par putt on the 12th. Stenson hit a bold shot to the island-green 13th for a short birdie to tie for the lead, only to fall back.

McIlroy caught the leaders with a birdie on the 13th.

None of the other contenders made another birdie the rest of the way until it was too late.

All that was left after an exhausting day of raw emotions was the coronation. Not since Woods in 2008 has anyone won three straight tournaments, and they were big ones for McIlroy -- the British Open, a World Golf Championship and the PGA Championship. He played them in a combined 48-under par.

"He's better than everyone else right now," Mickelson said.

By Paul Newberry

How Sports Venues Should Use Disney’s Magic Bands

Want to open your hotel room door? Just wave your wrist.
If you haven’t been to Disney lately, you probably haven’t seen the newest technology from the entertainment and hospitality industry giant. MyMagic+ is a $1 billion technology experiment in crowd control, data collection and wearable technology that could change the way Disney guests experience their beloved them parks.
Disney has inserted the MyMagic+ technology into bracelets called “Magic Bands” which link electronically to an encrypted database of visitor information. Once activated, these bands serve as admission tickets, hotel keys and credit or debit cards which help create quick and easy payments at restaurants and shops. Additionally, the bands help keep track of FastPass+ reservations, which allow visitors to pre-book popular rides and attractions and sync the photos Disney takes of guests at their parks.  The bands have radio frequency identification (RFID) chips, which gives Disney the ability to monitor people and things.
While some may claim this technology is intrusive and a violation of privacy, the theme park reminds critics and visitors alike that the use of the bands is voluntary and serve to help Disney determine when to add more cast members at rides, what restaurants should serve, which souvenirs should be stocked and how many cast members should roam around the parks at any given time.  The data collected also enables Disney to craft more personalized messages to their guests based on their customer preferences like sending a text message to let a guest know about wait time at Magic Kingdom favorite, Space Mountain.
In activating these bands Disney has made it not only  easier to plan how you spend your time on your trip but also how you spend your money and amazingly, all it takes is a swipe of the MagicBand.
"When you make (the logistics) easier, people tend to spend more time on entertainment and more time on consumables -- be that food and beverage, merchandise, etc.," Disney Chief Financial Officer Jay Rasulo said in a November investor call. "We do expect this to be a . . . growingly positive impact on our business in the years to come."
Many Disney fans are already sold on the new technology and why not?  Once visitors were noted that the band was water proof and took the worry away about carrying identification, room keys or credit cards and/or cash it was a no brainer. Gone are the worries of valuables getting lost or wet in Blizzard Beach’s lazy river. A Disney World spokeswoman says 80 percent of the comments on social media about MyMagic+ have been positive, and just 2 percent have been negative; however, not all of Disney’s enthusiasts are excited about the bands.
Most of the negative press concerning the bands centers around the fact that they are confusing to set up and may be intrusive in a “big brother” way.  There are reports of visitors having difficulty in setting up the bands through the average phones lines and over the Internet. To accommodate this, Disney has provided additional customer service. Guests can even have their bands set up in-person at one of Disney’s theme parks.
Disney is still in the testing and tweaking phase; however, if the system works, it could be copied and used in a variety of venues such as other theme parks, museums, zoos, airports and malls.  Even more intriguing is the concept of using these bands at sporting events and arenas.
Think about it…
Similar bands would offer arenas and teams the ability to sell them for merchandise purchases, track buying trends and collect other data to give their fans a better in-game experience. Similarly to Disney, the bands could expedite ticketing and concession lines and increase sponsorship activation opportunities. A great way to validate this theory would be to start with season ticket members – a smaller, consistent group of fans rather than the occasional, less dedicated ticket buyer.
There are many advantages to implementing the band during sporting events not only for the organization but the fans as well. First and foremost, there would be opportunity for sponsorship activation. This would be accomplished when a company pays to sponsor and distribute the bands to fans for free while marketing their product. Additionally, they can use the bands to set up special giveaways and contests. There is also room for the teams to make money from the bands as well.
Disney provides the bands in basic colors but makes allowances for guests to customize their bands through their selection of a favorite character. Teams can also do this by allowing fans to purchase different bands or customized bands outside of the “free or basic” bands given out by sponsors. Similarly, fans are more likely to spend more on merchandise and concessions like visitors at the Walt Disney World because they enjoy using the technology.
The bands could even expedite the entrance process. Fans would simply swipe their wrists to enter the stadium and assist facility and security managers with maintaining crowds in regards to entrances and exits, along the concourse and when fans need to use the restrooms.
Bands could also alleviate the long lines for concessions as they would alleviate the need to fumble around in your pocket for cash or credit card. With a band, fans could just swipe their wrist against the technology and collect their food. This would make it easier for arena food services providers to gather data about providing the right amount of food, measuring the success of a stand and shortening the lines at stands.
By Alana Shlifer

Louis Oosthuizen takes long drive title; Rory McIlroy steals show

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The buzz surrounded Rory McIlroy, but by the end of the day, it belonged to Louis Oosthuizen.

Well after fan-favorite McIlroy hit his tee shot, and as Jason Day’s mark of 338 yards looked like it would be enough to win the title, Oosthuizen hit one to 340 yards to claim the 2014 PGA Long Drive Competition.         

With the practice round winding down around 5:45 p.m., Oosthuizen took aim at Day’s distance and beat it by two yards. For his drive, Oosthuizen will receive a gold money clip inspired by the one Jack Nicklaus won in 1963 and still uses to this day. There will also be a $25,000 donation split between two charities in Oosthuizen’s name.

While McIlroy’s may not have walked away with the title, the day belonged to him. For hours, people were wondering when McIlroy would tee it off at Valhalla’s 590-yard, par-5 10th hole. That anticipation only grew as arrived at the first hole around 1 p.m. EST. By the time the 25-year-old from Northern Ireland reached the contest, the crowd had grown to line the fairway in anticipation of seeing the world’s No. 1-ranked golfer swing – not that they were entirely ready. McIlroy quickly got to the tee and pretended to tee off as the walkway across the fairway was still open, and people were still crossing it. When McIlroy did take his swing, the ball sailed wide of the fairways and therefore McIlroy was credited with a distance of 0. He didn’t need much encouragement from the fans to take another one, and this one sailed even though its distance wasn’t counted.

After the second shot, McIlroy headed to the clubhouse, having finished his day by participating in the competition. It was that type of loose atmosphere and eagerness to compete that was consent on No. 10. For most of the morning, golfers took aim at Adam Scott’s mark of 320 yards, which was hit on the first swing of the day. Some did so in a laid-back manner, like Keegan Bradley, who was the first to overtake Scott with a 326-yard drive.

Bradley’s record was short-lived as maybe a minute later, Rickie Fowler bested his playing partner by two yards. No player exemplified those two attitudes in the contest better than Padraig Harrington. Harrington decided to do a ‘Happy Gilmore’ style hit that missed the fairway. Afterwards, he took another shot that traveled 335 yards and would have put him past Gary Woodland for the lead. Upon hearing his second shot would have put him in the lead, he was a bit disappointed that he hadn’t done so on the first try. This was the first time a long drive contest was held before the PGA Championship since 1984. The setting of the return was fitting, as the first one was in 1952 at Big Spring Country Club in Louisville. No one was able to top Nicklaus’ winning mark of 341 he set in 1963 – the first of his back-to-back wins – that he got using a persimmon driver and a wound ball. The day was not without some disappointment for fans as Bubba Watson only used a 3-iron and did not register a distance.

That did not stop others from having fun with the event, even if they were not in a position to win it. Rich Beem celebrated as if he set the standard when his ball traveled 289 yards after being mishit.

Fan-favorite John Daly and his multi-colored pants also made an appearance. Daly hit one to 314 yards that at the time put him in third, but dropped him outside of the top 10 by the end of the day.

Local favorite Kenny Perry gave his sizeable early-morning supporters something to cheer about when his drive went 291 yards. But by the end of the night, the bragging rights and the title of longest driver belonged to Oosthuizen.

By Andrew Prezioso