The Week That Was, november 8, 2015

     Put a microphone in front of them, and golf’s institutional leaders will on occasion say the darnedest things. Take Keith Pelley, the still wet-behind-the-ears CEO of the European Tour. Pelley thinks that China’s most recent attack on golf -- just weeks ago, the nation’s Communist Party prohibited its 88 million members from even setting foot in private golf clubs -- is, in his words, “an incredibly positive decision” and “an incredibly positive move by the Chinese government” that will eventually be viewed as being “incredibly supportive of the game.” Such an analysis is either complete nonsense or an incredibly shrewd interpretation of the doublespeak practiced by Chinese bureaucrats. Either way, my head is spinning. If the constant streams of negativity directed at golf in China are actually expressions of support, then truth and fiction have become indistinguishable. Keep an eye on Pelley. If he starts spouting lines like “war is peace” or “freedom is slavery,” run for the hills.

     When it comes to calculating the value of his golf holdings, Donald “The $10 Billion Man” Trump might be prone to exaggeration. On the one hand, he tells the federal government that his golf club in Briarcliff Manor, New York is worth at least $50 million, while on the other his lawyers say it’s worth only $1.4 million. Is it possible to determine the truth? Probably not, but Forbes, which has long antagonized Trump with its calculations of his net worth, has given it a try. The magazine has estimated the net value (the value minus the debt) of Trump’s golf properties, and they range from $3.5 million (the venue in Colts Neck, New Jersey) to $144 million (the Doral resort in Miami). After Doral, Forbes figures that Trump’s four most valuable properties are his clubs in Los Angeles ($92.5 million, thanks largely to the accompanying residential real estate); Turnberry, Scotland ($60 million); Bedminster, New Jersey ($40 million); and West Palm Beach, Florida ($32 million). The bottom of the barrel are his clubs in Colts Neck; Hopewell Junction, New York ($4.2 million); Pine Hill, New Jersey ($4.9 million); Aberdeen, Scotland ($14 million); and Doonbeg, Ireland (also $14 million). For the record, Trump says that Forbes’ reporters are “incompetent” and fixated on making him look “as poor as possible.” On this year’s 400, Trump checks in at #72, with a net worth of $4.5 billion.

     The European Tour’s real estate arm has added what it believes is “one of Ireland’s finest parkland courses” to its fast-growing collection of “world-class” golf communities. Mount Juliet Estates, which features a Jack Nicklaus “signature” golf course, has become the 16th link in the chain of high-prestige spreads marketed by European Tour Properties, the Continent’s equivalent of PGA Tour Properties. The group includes London Golf Club in England, Golf Club St. Leon-Rot in Germany, Black Mountain Golf Club in Thailand, and the Dutch in the Netherlands. Mount Juliet, in County Kilkenny, is the chain’s first property in Ireland and the third that the tour has signed this year. Mount Juliet’s course, ranked #13 in the nation by Golf Digest, hosted the Irish Open three times in the mid 1990s.

     The identity of the “international investment group” that recently purchased one of Scott Oki’s golf properties in suburban Seattle, Washington has been revealed. It’s an entity called Kung Fu Panda, which Northwest Asian Weekly says is “owned by a Chinese American” and whose “owners” -- note the switch to the plural -- “also develop golf courses and hotels in China.” KFP, which has no apparent connections to the animated movie or to Pablo Sandoval, paid a still-undisclosed price for Golf Club at Echo Falls, which features an 18-hole, Jack Frei-designed golf course. The newspaper describes the 155-acre property as “a natural paradise with few people,” and one of KFP’s representatives says it was acquired because “it makes people feel comfortable and relaxing.”