GC’s Morning Drive

[Hawkeye77]

I'm accustomed to Gary asking questions that are really lengthy run-on sentence paragraphs that never seem to end. Comes with the territory, and he's a nice guy and just a reminder that I miss the normalcy of the regular morning group on this Saturday morning.

 

But coming out to turn on the lights on the tree after I'd been listening in the kitchen while making coffee and seeing Gary's herringbone sweater sport jacket just made me laugh out loud. I mean it's not a tuxedo t shirt, but it's the Project Runway version of same. I'm not sure what to call it, but his wife needs to step in when he's picking something out of the closet and asking her what she thinks of his "top".

[caniac6]

What a great looking dog! I miss my setter, Clancy, and not a day goes by when I don't think about him.

[Hawkeye77]

Sorry to hear that - and yep, they are family!

[zonadub]

Seriously? Half hour into the show the day of the first tournament of the year and the discussion is 99% Tiger!? News Flash!! Tiger is not playing this weekend. How about you talk about the Tournament of Champions first and what is going on THIS WEEK!

[Hawkeye77]

Well in fairness, the tournament doesn't start for about 4 more hours ----- that was sarcasm, by the way, lol.

 

Didn't tune in this morning, Linus is still on his Hallmark jag and he'll get plenty of RDD as the season revs up!

 

But will be watching on of my favorite events as soon as I get home from work today - love the views, great way to start the year!

[LICC]

It is the first show of the year. Tiger has been the most compelling figure in golf for decades. Maybe ever. You start with whatever the most viewers would be most interested in hearing about.

[QuigleyDU]

What is the morning drive?? haha.

[Irishman1979]

Golf Channel was much better when it first came out.

Had much more coverage of golf tournaments all over including leaderboard reports of the top mini tours in the country with highlights.

I remember watching a recap of Two Gloves Gainey when he was out there making a name for himself winning back to back tournaments on the now defunct TearDrop tour out at Bears Trace in TN. This was when they also covered the finals of Q-school. and many of us watched Scott Verplank win at Grenelefe in 1997. That was such a cool tournament to follow every year.

Now the golf channel is all about pointless reality shows to fill their schedule.

[tbowles411]

And the dirty little secret is when they talk about him, people watch to see what they're going to say, no matter if it's his practice routine or how he takes his eggs. It's all about eyes, even for two minutes. It all counts in the end.

[Hawkeye77]

Yep, like the Sentry Tournament of Champions I'm watching in an hour! Real as it gets.

 

 

[KRAMER1997]

Morning Drive's ratings would go through the roof if Paige Spiranac gave putting tips in a bikini once a week.

[Titleist99]

Now you know that they had to get their Tiger Woods quota in for the day....LOL!  They've done that for the last twenty years on the GC.

I see they continue to fan the flames on the Reed incident.....Acting Holier than thou. Let just hope no one finds a compromising video on one of them....LOL!

[Titleist99]

Yessir!!!!!!!!

[Holy Moses]

They don't have reality shows anymore

[RDD]

Not gonna happen.

[Irishman1979]

What? How about that one on Travel that just showcased the Palm Beaches? That's a reality show.

[Holy Moses]

Reality shows are normally competition formats with winners and losers

[Bad9]

That was basically an infomercial.

[paulj826]

Morning Drive is so so bad. Haha glad so many people agree. Its beyond low budget they have a super hard time even getting PGA pros on the show. The trivia questions and headline things they do on like every show now because they don't have enough content. The show just lacks substance , some of the cast has never even met some of the players on the tour. Its almost like they are so far removed from the tour that there opinions are no better then fans watching from home. Things need to change , the format needs to change I think they need to do it more like a radio show. Have fans call in speak there mind (have other broadcasters call in). I think they would get way more content out of that. I think that's how it kind was when the first show aired.

Better said just hire Freddy Couples to do the show , golf fans would listen and watch that.

[RDD]

At least you didn’t ask for Holly back.

[RDD]

We’re not going back to the old format, and the games like trivia are to keep it fresh. Only so much going on in the world of golf, and we gotta cover 2+ hours a day

[OldTomMorris]

A lot of people are very dewy-eyed about the original format but it wasn't very good and got tired extremely quickly unless you like motormouth radio jock types.

Also, the original format was before social media exploded and from my point of view I don't want to hear what Joe Public thinks as we are constantly bombarded with what Joe Public is saying on social media but if you are the type of person who does then just go on to Twitter.

The current format is much better, of course I'm sure they constantly consider ways to improve it but its the first week of January so there would be a struggle for content regardless of the format.

There are segments that I don't particularly enjoy but for the most part I really like Morning Drive.

[Neurotica]

Quit watching years ago. No content worth watching.

Not related to morning drive but as far as GC content still watch the “live from” for majors/big tournaments and of course the live golf action but yeah that’s it. Might watch reality golf shows if they came back but otherwise...

[Hawkeye77]

Radio call in show first thing in the morning idea is stupid and it wasn't viewer call in before. They had the "faux" radio look when it started but that was actually pretty lame and got old pretty quickly. EKK was terrible. Best person they ever had hosting that format was the occasional sit in by Jerry Foltz, who could actually carry on an intelligent conversation about golf in a "radio" format.

 

It has evolved and the folks on there right now are good (not sold on the new seemingly obligatory English accent person, but give her time).

 

You want it to be what it was but don't really know what it was, think it's bad now but watch - sounds like usual "informed" viewer, lol.

 

There was a time I quit watching for a long time, just like there was only so much "Mike and Mike" I could watch a few years ago, but it's golf stuff and it is something to watch (for my pup) or listen to (from my dining room table) early in the a.m. making coffee and hanging out on the laptop and the current folks on there the past couple of years are nice folks.

 

 

[FOOTJOY16]

Damon Haack needs to go. He was okay at first, but now really annoys me with his high drama. And he needs to quit screaming all the time.

 

I think they need to rethink the whole show.

[zonadub]

Much prefer having RDD and Paige, both seem to have become more comfortable in front of the camera. The rotating 4th chair during Paige’s maternity leave was often not a good blend with the rest of the cast (especially Coachman), and might have been better if they had been able to fill the spot with a regular from one of the tours. But it is probably difficult to find someone who wants to get up at 3 or 4 in the morning for a short gig while she was out. Amanda Blumenhurst is good, but apparently didn’t want to do it for an extended time.

The show is better than it was at first, most of the time. Understanding they have 2 hours to fill every day, it has to be tough to come up with ‘great’ material to fill 14 hours a week 50 weeks a year about golf, but I think this is significantly better than the radio show format.

[LICC]

Does it seem like they used to do more instructional pieces on the morning show than they do now?

[zonadub]

I pretty much ignore mass-appeal instructions, so could not say. Too much clutter in my old brain. My signature comes from an old video by an instructor named Chuck Hogan that was geared toward allowing your brain to do what it needs to do to produce the shot required. Much like the theme of 7 Days in Utopia’s See it, Feel it, Trust it. The instructional shows just confuse me and I basically ignore the instructional segments of Morning Drive.

[RDD]

Absolutely. By design.

[RDD]

Thanks. Paige is wonderful to work with