Interesting things about Golf!!!

[Atithee]

Just when you thought you have heard the dumbest thing ever, this pops up:

LPGA to require English for intl players

Thoughts?

[BSharma]

Just when you thought you have heard the dumbest thing ever, this pops up:

LPGA to require English for intl players

Thoughts?

I can understand the issue from a sponsors' point of view, but the article mentioned that LPGA is not losing sponsors money. Some ideas are just good old plain dumb. Next thing we will read is that spoken English should have American accent ... no British or Korean or Indian accent.

[suresh]

Just when you thought you have heard the dumbest thing ever, this pops up:

LPGA to require English for intl players

Thoughts?

Long live racism! I am all for it -- these foreigners(read Koreans) have the temerity to win tournaments without speaking a word of English(US)

Seriously, this kind of nonsense should stop. If LPGA found that it helped their sponsors if the Koreans learnt to speak English, I would have preferred a quiet back room discussion where they provided support to help the Koreans learn English.

[BSharma]

There is no official appearance money on the men's side of the PGA Tour, but golfers such as Vijay Singh, Phil Mickelson, Els, etc can earn approximately $100,000 to $250,000 just to attend the party thrown by major sponsors and make small talk with people with the invited guests.

The golfers on the LPGA Tour make small change compared to golfers on the PGA Tour as far as prize money is concerned, and I do not know if these lady golfers get much money to mingle with guests of major sponsors. My city hosts a LPGA tournament every year and if I read the articles in the local newspaper (or hear the local TV sports announcers clearly) and can read in between the lines, I get the impression that they have trouble getting interviews from the Korean golfers. The tournament organizers want publicity for their tournament and big write-ups in the media and the Korean golfers do not give interviews because they do not speak English. But these kind of problems can be overcome without forcing these golfers to learn English. These golfers do not live permanently in USA and return to Korea at the end of the season every year. I would expect them to learn English if they were to live in America for long periods of time.

[BSharma]

The golfers on the PGA Tour have criticized the English-only policy of LPGA Tour.

LPGA’s English-only policy draws criticism

[ajay]

Next, they will ask for American mannerism so that LPGA golf is more presentable to American audience. Well, why ask for English, why don't they make LPGA tour only for Americans. This is so absurd.

[jayakris]

Let me take the contrarian view, then - as you all are into a feeding frenzy on this.

They were not asked to speak AMERICAN. They were asked to speak ENGLISH .. Let us make that clear first.

Out of some 37 tour events, except 2 in Singapore, 2 in mexico, 1 in france, and 1 each in CHN, KOR, JPN, the remaining 29 evenst are held in English peaking places, including UK, RSA and CAN. 25 are held in the US. I am sorry, but you better LEARN TO SPEAK the language of the places where the sponsors put in money. Sure, they put in money to see you play, but it is not a one-way street. It is not just THEY who should make an effort. You, the player, also has a duty to think of the sponsors. It is even worse when most of the sponsors are really not fans of the 45 Korean ladies (out of 121 tour players) and are NOT putting up money to see them (only 1 Korean is in the golf top nine, and the second is at #10). It is just a quirk from the influx of players from Korea in the last few years that has caused this situation (the fans of the tour over so many years are not going to pull their money out that fast, as long as the Sorenstams and others are still active) .. It is a pretty bad situation for LPGA tour's health, frankly, unless the Korean players can take steps to become fan favorites of Americans who throng the 25 events they hold in the USA. They will walk away and you the player will not have the money your are looking for down the line. The tour had a duty to tell that to the players from Korea (and other places)

If American sponsors are footing the bill for 25 of the 37 events - and those events are held in the USA, they can and SHOULD insist that the players should learn English. I find nothing wrong with it. If it is called discrimination, SO BE IT.

Not an issue of political correctness. It is an issue of being fair to the fans and sponsors who have not objected to non-English-speaking players so far, and would like to see some effort from the players' side so that they can even try to get to know them.

I am not a Golf expert or a close fan of the sport, so factual errors above may be corrected by you all ...

Jay

[BSharma]

I agree partly with what Jay has written about golf and use of English language on the LPGA Tour.

First, golfers get paid mainly from three sources - prize money, doing ads, and getting invited by sponsors to their exclusive parties during tournament week, including playing in Pro-Am's. Non-English-speaking Korean golfers are missing out on the second and third sources of money by not learning English. It is their choice. They are already getting punished for not knowing English. The other golfers who speak English well earn the money that these Korean golfers are losing.

Secondly, none of the sponsors care about golfers who are not ranked in the top ten in the world. Daniel Chopra won the season opening golf tournament (Mercedes Championship) and another tournament last year and he does not have a single sponsor. One would think that he would make an interesting subject due to his Indo-Swedish heritage, being able to speak Hindi, Punjabi, English and Swedish well, and having played golf in over 40 countries.

Thirdly, many Korean golfers do not get to do ads in USA because they may be good in golf yet are not well known in this country because they do not give interviews on TV or to the newspaper correspondents. A smart golfer will learn English right away and start raking in money. Isn't that the American way of doing things?

Why I have chosen to oppose the LPGA Tour is that golf in USA has often discriminated against the minorities - blacks, non-white foreigners, Jews, etc. Things changed on the men's tour after Tiger Woods came on the scene - the Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa suddenly gave two memberships to a black guy and a Jew because Tiger Woods threatened to pull out of the PGA Tour Championship in Tulsa in mid 90s. The LPGA Tour has not changed as much. Do you think LPGA Tour would be forcing the Swedish golfers to learn English if they did not speak English?

[jayakris]

Do you think LPGA Tour would be forcing the Swedish golfers to learn English if they did not speak English?

I know you partially agreed with me, and this was a smaller point. To answer this - do we really think there would be a Swedish golfer who would not have picked up English within a couple of years of making a few trips to the US? .. Has there ever been a single European player on the tennis or golf tours who did not pick up English in a couple of years?

Let us face a STARK reality - many Asians just do not bother to pick up the language, and they stay within their own cliques .. Sure, English is a bit more difficult for Koreans to learn, but it is a country where everybody goes through a whole bunch of English in schools - it is just the lack of effort on their part, that causes many of them not to pick up English conversation, even after being in so many US events for so many weeks .. In fact, when I went to Korea, i found many Koreans there who speak much better English than the students who come to our universities who seems to get scared, become shy, and withdraw to their own Korean cliques, not using even what they know! (I have a classic case of a Korean PhD student who progressively became worse and worse and I can hardly understand her anymore after 3-4 years in the US .. I am not kidding!)

Sometimes we have to call a spade a spade. LPGA tour made a call because the situation is a pretty grave. I didn't know there were 45 Koreans among the 121 players. The tour had no choice but to make a clear statement to the Korean ladies - "GET YOUR ACT TOGETHER. We know you all have learned English in schools. We know you can read and understand a fair bit. Stop hiding. START FRIGGIN SPEAKING" .. Well, they didn't put it that way .. But that is the point.

Jay

[BSharma]

do we really think there would be a Swedish golfer who would not have picked up English within a couple of years of making a few trips to the US? .. Has there ever been a single European player on the tennis or golf tours who did not pick up English in a couple of years?

By the way, the Swedish golfers on the PGA Tour speak with each other only in Swedish and do not give too many interviews in English because they do not feel comfortable expressing themselves in English.

Angel Cabrera has been playing on the PGA Tour for over eight years and won the US Open last year? What language did he speak when he gave his interview after winning the US Open? Not English. He spoke in Spanish and a translator helped the media people to understand what the US Open champion had to say!

KJ Choi and Shigeki Maruyama have been members of the PGA Tour for many years and speak some English, yet they give their interviews in Korean and Japanese respectively because they fear that they will misspeak in English or will not look good speaking in broken English.

Are the Korean golfers similar to their graduate student counterparts in USA?

I do not know if all Korean golfers learned English while they were students in Korea but my guess is that they did not because if it was so, the current problem would not have occurred. The Korean graduate students enrolling in American colleges must pass TOEFL and cannot gain any education unless they know English. The Korean golfers do not require English to play golf at a professional level.

It will make the life of a golfer easier in USA if he or she spoke English, and they should be encouraged to learn English. Those who do not speak English are paying the price by not getting ad money or sponsors’ money (I am sure Angel Cabrera would have gotten some ads in USA if he could speak in English).

Why are PGA Tour and LPGA Tour different in enforcing the English only policy?

Is it because the Koreans now dominate the LPGA Tour? Se Ri Pak did not speak English when she joined the LPGA Tour and the LPGA did not require her to do so. Later she learned to speak English because she could make more money by knowing the language.

My hopes and fear

I would urge the Korean golfers to learn English because it will make their life easier in USA. I wrote in my previous post that I can see the argument from a sponsor’s point of view, but what I am afraid of is that the LPGA Tour may have something greater in mind. Is this policy being developed to curtail the number of Koreans on the LPGA Tour? I hope not.

[arjun2761]

Secondly, none of the sponsors care about golfers who are not ranked in the top ten in the world. Daniel Chopra won the season opening golf tournament (Mercedes Championship) and another tournament last year and he does not have a single sponsor. One would think that he would make an interesting subject due to his Indo-Swedish heritage, being able to speak Hindi, Punjabi, English and Swedish well, and having played golf in over 40 countries.

I don't know if the LPGA has taken the best route but the above example of Daniel is kind of meaningless in this context. The sponsors the LPGA is concerned about is the sponsors of the tournaments (and not of the individual players). For a lot of these sponsors, their main marketing opportunity is the pro-am, where they invite their clients and prospective clients etc. TYpically, each pro-am group includes at least one pro. It is in this setting that the Koreans don't sell and I think the LPGA has begun losing some tournament sponsors (although that may also be a result of the softening economy). On the other hand, the LPGA is gaining fans in Korea (and in Japan).

Perhaps, one solution is to have country specific cards -- more Koreans eligible for Korean or Asian events but fewer in the US. The EPGA effectively does the same with their co-sanctioned events.

[BSharma]

I don't know if the LPGA has taken the best route but the above example of Daniel is kind of meaningless in this context. ... For a lot of these sponsors, their main marketing opportunity is the pro-am, where they invite their clients and prospective clients etc. TYpically, each pro-am group includes at least one pro. It is in this setting that the Koreans don't sell and I think the LPGA has begun losing some tournament sponsors (although that may also be a result of the softening economy). On the other hand, the LPGA is gaining fans in Korea (and in Japan).

Arjun,

I am sure that you are aware that there are several types of sponsors at PGA/LPGA golf tournaments – (1) the ones who come up with the majority of prize money (main sponsor(s); (2) the ones who put up big sums of money that help in running of the tournament; (3) the ones who hold private parties for their clients and invite selected top named golfers (this is where Vijay Singh, Phil, Tiger Woods, Ernie Els make a few hundred grands for an hour or two of mingling with invited guests, (4) and the ones who buy tickets for their important clients or top employees to play with the pros at Pro-Ams. This list of types of sponsors is not complete. Many people who participate at pro-ams pay their own money, especially on LPGA Tour where the ticket to play the pro-ams is comparatively cheap.

The place where Daniel could fit in is in the third category in my list. Despite winning two PGA tournaments in last one year and having an interesting background, he does not get invited by any sponsors.

Do any of the Korean golfers get invited by sponsors in my third category? Yes, but only if they are Se Ri Pak or a top ten LPGA golfer or a winner of a major tournament. These Korean golfers speak English quite well and that is not an issue. The rest of the Korean golfers’ interaction is while playing pro-ams. The LPGA Tour makes a small sum of money from pro-ams compared to PGA Tour. If LPGA is losing money from pro-ams, it is because of the slow down in economy and there are not too many individual people signing up to play with pro golfers, whether these golfers speak English or not.

What irks some LPGA officials and many Americans is that the Koreans are winning many tournaments. The international women golfers (a Mexican, a Taiwanese and two Koreans) won all four majors this year.

What did LPGA Hall of Famer Carol Mann and winner of 38 LPGA titles had to say about the Korean golfers and use of English language? “I have friends who will turn the TV off or find other things to watch if Koreans are in the lead,” Mann said. “A couple of weeks ago, there were seven or eight of them. . . . Carolyn Bivens has to protect the business of the future and the television package she's trying to design. So I think it is terrific.” Koreans condemn LPGA's English-only rule

Does it smack of anger and frustration that the Koreans are dominating the LPGA Tour? Inbee Park of Korea won the US Open, is only 19 years old and speaks good English. She is not the problem that LPGA Tour is making out to be. Several Korean golfers on the LPGA Tour do speak decent English and I believe that the ones who do not, are the ones who joined the LPGA Tour a year or two back, are not among the top golfers and travel together in a group to save money. Unlike the ATP or WTA Tour in tennis, the PGA or LPGA Tour does not pay prize money to those who do not make the cut (about half the field of golfers), does not pay for hotel stay by golfers, and the golfers have to pay about 10% to 20% of their earnings to their caddies.

The LPGA Tour should help the golfers who do not speak English to learn English by providing tutors and interpreters to them (see the example of foreign players in basketball and baseball) and assist the foreign golfers to learn the American ways of interacting with the sponsors. Working in partnership with the golfers is better than trying to take away their ability to play. The latter approach sends a wrong message that LPGA Tour does not want Korean golfers to win tournaments.

[BSharma]

It appears that LPGA is changing its tune after one of its sponsor's (State Farm Insurance Company) spokesperson "said publicly the company was "dumbfounded" by the proposed policy" and perhaps pressure from many other places.

(I've played in pro-ams where my English-speaking, 100 percent American pro wasn't exactly friendly. They essentially used the rounds as practice for the tournaments, spending most of the time charting the course with their caddies. Would the LPGA suspend them for being, uh, unsocial jerks?)

I have heard the above mentioned comment from quite a few friends who have paid money to play the Pro-Am on the PGA Tour, and some of the unfriendly guys are top American golfers.

I do feel strongly that non-English speaking LPGA Tour golfers should learn English if they plan to play on the Tour year-after-year.

Bravo for Bivens -- but she did not go far enough

[Atithee]

I posted the original news and I am astounded by the support of this policy by some of the stalwarts of this forum. Golf is far too popular in the US and you can also bet that no sponsor wants to lose money. If one pulls out, another one will be lined up behind them. If you think the sponsors care about social interaction at golf courses during sponsored tournaments, I urge you to think again. As long as they can sell products in foreign countries (for which, BTW, the buyers speaking English is not a pre-requisite), they couldn't care less if Korean ladies gave their victory speeches in Korean or English or Swahili. Furthermore, there are enough Korean conglomerates who would be happy to pick up the sponsorships for such tournaments (Samsung, Asiana Airlines, and Hyundai to name three) as well as the many Nikes, Titlelists, Callaways, IBMs, Coca-Colas, etc.

I am hopeful that LPGA will be strongly rebuked for this stunning skullduggery. As the Doc speculated, it is more about resenting the Koreans' success on the LPGA tour than sponsorships. Americans are the most genereous and welcoming people that I know, but they are also some of the most sore losers I have known. Also, the Koreans are among the people who take a lot of pride in their heritage (in my opinion one of the staunchest ones that I have come across) and if a global conglomerate were to come out in the open in support of this policy, the Koreans (both in the US and Korea) may likely boycott their products and the sponsors will lose far more than in a tiny sponsorship issue. That's why probably I have not heard any big names being mentioned yet. In fact, StateFarm is the last one I'd have thought would oppose it but kudos to them for standing up to this voodoo economics.

This is more about sour grapes than commercial success of the LPGA tour although I cannot ignore the commercial aspect completely. There is no question that the game and the Korean ladies themselves would benefit if they spoke good/better English. I am all for urging them (as if they need a reminder) but vehemently opposed to sanctions of any kind.

P.S. Have you ever heard Nadal trying to speak English? I'd rather he speak in Spanish where he is so natural and have a translator for the non-Spanish speakers. BTW, Miss Universe, a truly global "sport" largely underwritten by the American conglomerates doesn't have this policy. In fact, some have speculated that the sudden rise of Indian beauties has as much to do with selling more cosmetics in India as with showcasing their pretty faces and intelligence.

P.P.S. I clicked on the link that Doc had posted below after I posted my reply and I could swear that this writer almost mirrored my exact thoughts. What a coincidence! One of the comments below that blog stated what I was thinking maybe part of the reason for the people in suits who represent the sponsors advocating this policy-- For %$#@ sick, these are top professional athlete and NOT Escorts !!! American corporations are still largely headed by people who grew up in their beer-happy world and cannot understand why young attractive foreign women would not develop a "casual" social relationship with them. However, they must remember that this is not a hospitality suite in a national convention or a bar. If the sponsors' agents showed more interest in the pros' golf game, then the pros may actually show more interest in conversing with them in English!

[beval]

Hello,

And yes really it is great about golf....

Thanks!

[inline url to a betting site removed. Inline "advertising" url's are discouraged here. You mod, Jay]