Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-07-10
PAST HAPPENINGS
SUPPORT FREDDIE
Golfer Who Has Led at End
of First Round Always
Has Gained Title.
BY WALTER R. McCALLUM.


the national open golf
championship are much
too long and do not settle
anything that an 18-hole play-off
would not determine, in the opin-
ion of Fred Mcleod, veteran golf
instructor at the Columbia Coun-
try Club and one of the keenest
minds in the game.
Freddie was out at Toledo, suffering
from the heat like the rest of the
combatants and perfectly willing to seek
shade and rest after the golf was over.
He is an 18-ho.e man, firm believer
in that distance as z test of golf and
one who holds that a one-round play
off would have settled the issue as
definitely as the protracted 72-hole
struggle through which Billy Burke and
George Won Elm went with only one
stroke separating them at the finish.
Look over your list of play-offs for
the national open championship"
Freddie says, land tell me if an 18-
hole play-off would not have settled the
championship the same way it went
at the end of SO holes or 70 holes
either?"
The United States Golf Association
started these 36-hole play-offs back in
1928 when Farrell and Jones tied for
the title at Olympia Fields. near Chi
cago Perhaps they were influenced in
stretching the distance from 10 to So
by the lengthy play-off three years
previously at Worcester in 1925 when
Jones and Willie MacFarlane played
their scheduled 1S-hole play-off to an
other tie, and then had to run through
another round on the same day before
a decision in favor of MacFarlane. But
in 1927 Tommy Armour and Harry
Cooper tied for the championship and
it was settled, and well settled, in 10
holes.
Offers Cases in Point.
"Then came Olympia Fields and the
tie between Jones and Farrell. You
know how Farrell finally won in the
36-hole play-oti with a total of 143
against IA for Jones. But do you
recall how Farrell led Jones by three
strokes with a 70 over the morning
round against 10 for Jones. Farrell
finally won on the thirty-siXth green,
but the verdict would have been the
same in 10 holes.
The next year Jones tied again with
al Espinosa at Winged Foot and again
the same situation resulted Jones shot
90 over the first round of the 36-hole
play-of and was so far in front that
Al couldn't have caught him over So
more holes. So again the winner at 18
holes was the winner at SO holes.
And now just the other day we had
Billy Burke and George Won Elm play
ing scheduled 36-hole play-of for
the championship. Here again the
same situation repeated itself. Burke
the ultimate winner-led Won Elm bv
strokes at the end of the first Is
holes, with 10 against Won Elm's rs.
No matter if they tied at So holes. or
that Won Elm led Burke by one shot at
the end of the third round of their
72-hole play-off, the ultimate winner
IN " notes.-the longest play-off on
record-still would have been the win
ner at the end of 10 holes.
Look over your records and see II
that Is not true. I think that 18 holes
IS round of golf, and if man is not
good enough to win at 18 holes, he IS
not good enough to win at So or 70.
And l don't need any support for my
Judgment in this. The records back
me up. Let's get back to 18-hole play
offs and see if we don't have worthy
champions just as We always have had"
Speaks of Commercialism.
Then Freddy depressed to the subject
of commercialization of the modern
game and the way the championship has
Cranged from an a1du That had more
or less the nature of big family party
into highly comercialiZed tournament
where the money is the big ambition of
most of the top-notchers.
He then went into the subject of
how the big golf concerns have COM
mercialized the winner. Wasn't it
funny" he said, "to. watch the followers
Of Burke and Won Elm and the business
men who would profit from victory by
either of them?"
The fact of the matter is that Won
Elm played a set Of steel Shafted clubs
made by a Detroit firm and bearing
the name of famous golfer who has
won the championship. Burke. on the
other hand, played a set of steel shafted
clubs made by an Eastern golf concern.
Clubs of the same make have won other
championships this year, among them
the British open, in the hands OF
Tommy Armour. The Eastern steel
shafts won, but the Detroit products
gave them quite rub.
What change" Freddy said, from
the days when we all played with
wooden Shafted clubs. All mongrels.
might have half q dozen makes OF clubs
in my bag back around 1910. and it
didn't make any difference. But now
adays most of the winners play par
ticular brand of club. I'm not saying
they are paid to play them, but you
can guess for yourself"