HARRIS COUNTY - HSA INSIDER
A weekly look at all things Houston sports from the Harris County-Houston Sports Authority: It's Houston Open time
By Patti Smith
Mar 23, 2018, 7:58 am
The Houston Open begins play next week. Houstonopen.org
The Harris County – Houston Sports Authority Insider will take you inside Houston Sports each Friday because #WeAreHoustonSports!
If you’re like most of us, you’ve caught your mistake the second it rolled of your tongue.
Are you going to The Shell next week? I mean Houston Open?
Old habits die hard. Especially ones that date back to the early ‘90s. As in 1992.
Shell Oil Company stepped in as title sponsor of Houston’s PGA TOUR event in 1992 and stepped out at the close of the 2017 event. And, yes, the search is still on for a title sponsor.
The last time we called next week’s PGA TOUR event the Houston Open was 1986 when feisty Curtis Strange beat Calvin Peete to win the second of his three Houston Opens.
Houston was between sponsors then, too. Coca Cola had bowed out and the Independent Insurance Agents had yet to bow in for a five-year run that ended in 1991.
As with other events, sponsorship is cyclical and Steve Timms, the Houston Open tournament director and president of the Houston Golf Association, is making the best of his search for a new title sponsor and the tournament’s last – for the near future – time as the lead-in to the Masters.
He’s already got a strong group of headliners coming to the Golf Club of Houston including Texan Jordan Spieth, Justin Rose, Rickie Fowler and fan favorite Phil Mickelson, all of whom will be intriguing storylines here as well as at the year’s first major.
And he’s putting Houston front-and-center too.
“We’re celebrating Houston,’’ Timms said earlier this month. “The Houston Open is here for Houston and we’re showcasing the city on national television. We want to put a great foot forward hopefully if we don’t have a title sponsor by then we’ll have some prospects who will be impressed by what we’re doing in the community.’’
In addition to the tournament, the HGA has almost completed the renovation and restoration of Gus Wortham Park and runs hugely successful junior programs through its Junior Golf and First Tee programs.
But the place to be this last week in March is at Golf Club of Houston for this 2018 Houston Open, an event that dates back to 1946 when Byron Nelson beat Ben Hogan and Sam Snead finished third. It was the only time those three golf legends finished in that order in any event.
This year’s legend is Mickelson who beat Justin Thomas last month to win the WGC-Mexico Championship to win the 43rd tournament of his career and his first since the 2013 British Open. He is now fourth on the 2018 Ryder Cup points list and needs just seven wins to hit the magic 50 mark.
“Seven more wins and I'll be there,’’ he said after the WGC win. “I don't have the month or the time, but I will get there."
Mickelson has been a regular here since 2008 and won the Shell Houston Open in 2011 – the year after he won his third Masters.
Spieth won three times last year, including the British Open where he beat Matt Kuchar by three shots. In 2015, Spieth and Johnson Wagner lost a three-way playoff at the Shell to eventual winner J.B. Holmes, but Spieth went on to win his first major the following week in Augusta.
Rose, the 2013 U.S. Open champ, won the 2018 season opener – the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions—and just had back-to-back top five finishes at the Valspar Championship and Arnold Palmer Invitational. Fowler won the 2017 Hero World Challenge, but hasn’t finished in the top 10 since a tie for fourth at January’s Sentry Tournament of Champions.
Timms could still pick up a few more big names Friday since the deadline to commit is Friday night.
The event has done a great job of attracting players the week before the Masters by setting the course up with quick greens and recreating the quick green speeds and special mowing. The course has different turf than Augusta National, but the similarities help players prepare.
But Houston loses that spot in 2019. Next year, San Antonio’s Valero Texas Open will be the week before the Masters. It’s all part of a schedule shakeup for next season that will include moving the PLAYERS Championship to March and the PGA Championship to May.
And Houston? The full schedule has yet to be determined, but Houston would be played sometime after the Masters.
“We’re just not sure how deep into the spring we’ll be,’’ Timms said.
No matter what, Timms plans to put on a great show in Houston next week.
See you next week – at the Houston Open.
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If the Astros were going to win one series and lose the other on their six-game road trip out of the All-Star break, they got it right in taking two out of three games at Seattle then losing two out of three to lousy Oakland. Had they inverted those results, the Astros would not be alone atop the American League West starting this weekend’s series against the Dodgers at Minute Maid Park.
By the schedule the Astros’ sledding now gets tougher. The Dodgers are rolling toward their 11th National League West crown in 12 years, despite their pitching staff having been battered by injuries every bit as much as the Astros’. The Astros will face three rookie starters this weekend. National League Rookie of the Year candidate (non-Paul Skenes division) Gavin Stone goes Friday. Saturday it’s Justin Wrobleski making his fourth big league start, Sunday River Ryan makes his second. 325 million dollar addition Yoshinobu Yamamoto last pitched June 15. Tony Gonsolin is out for the year without throwing a pitch. Clayton Kershaw’s first pitch Thursday marks the first of his season. Tyler Glasnow’s Wednesday return from the Injured List means the Astros won’t face him this weekend.
Aside: Astros’ fan favorite Joe Kelly is back in the Dodgers’ bullpen. He was activated from the IL out of the break, so the opportunity to welcome him back to Minute Maid Park looms!
After the Dodgers, the Pirates hit town with Skenes slated to pitch Monday opposite Jake Bloss. Gulp. Hey, in one game, you never know. Skenes has been the most electric rookie pitcher since Dwight Gooden with the Mets in 1984.
Sleepless in Seattle
The Mariners’ unraveling has reached historic proportions. It’s not easy losing six straight matchups with the lowly Angels but the Mariners were down to the challenge and pulled it off. The M’s have stumble-bummed their way to a 9-20 record over their last 29 games. That’s actually a better winning percentage than the Astros’ had after staggering from the starting gate to a 7-19 mark. Like the Astros did, the Mariners can right their ship, though if they don’t add quality offense before Tuesday’s trade deadline it seems unlikely. Seattle has scored more than two runs in one of its last eight games, the only win among those eight when the Mariners got to Ronel Blanco and Seth Martinez Sunday to avoid an Astros’ sweep. Meanwhile, the Texas Rangers whipping up on the laughingstock Chicago White Sox this week has their World Series title defense very much alive and a threat to overtake both the Astros and Mariners.
The trade deadline is this Tuesday
Tick-tock toward Tuesday’s 5PM Central Time trade deadline. General Manager Dana Brown is on the clock. Let’s start with starting pitchers. Tarik Skubal! Garrett Crochet! Jack Flaherty! Any would be a fabulous addition. If Brown acquires one, he will have done phenomenal work cajoling the trade partner into thinking the Astros’ offer the best. Frankly it seems impossible. The Orioles are in the starting pitcher market. Their farm system runs laps around what the Astros have. Numerous other teams on the hunt for pitching have higher rated minor league talent. The Triple-A Sugar Land Space Cowboys are having a fabulous season, but until the Astros Thursday moved up soon to be 24-year-old Jacob Melton (who was batting just .248 with a .307 on-base percentage at Double-A Corpus Christi) there was not one non-pitcher of any consequence younger than 25 on the roster. Pedro Leon, Shay Whitcomb, Will Wagner, and include Joey Loperfido: it would be shocking if any of them can be the best player in an offer good enough to land one of the potential big trade fish. All four of them wouldn’t be enough to land a Skubal or Crochet.
On the hitter side, if the Blue Jays shop Vlad Jr. and/or the Rays take offers for Paredes, of course Brown better try. Either would be a sharp upgrade over Jon Singleton, and Guerrero can’t become a free agent until after next season, with Paredes under team control through 2027. Reality check time. Seattle’s offense is in dire straits. The Mariners have four prospects rated higher than any Astros’ prospect. If the Mariners didn’t make a winning offer over what the Astros proposed, Seattle GM Jerry Dipoto would look like a timid clown.
That said, there will be several second and third tier starters and relievers moved who would boost the Astros. If Spencer Arrighetti and Jake Bloss are both still in the Astros’ starting rotation after the deadline, Dana Brown will have failed. That said, the Astros could well stand pat and win the Mild, Mild West. They could also finish third.
Go for the gold!
With the Olympics underway, a medal podium-style ranking of the Astros’ greatest trade deadline acquisitions:
No medal but cannot be omitted: Randy Johnson. It was a brief fling with “The Big Unit” in 1998 but it was spectacular. It elevated Houston as a baseball city. In 11 regular season starts Johnson went 10-1 with a 1.28 earned run average. He threw shutouts in his first four Astrodome starts. He spiked attendance like no other player in franchise history. Even though the San Diego Padres beat Johnson twice (Johnson pitched fine, the Astros scored two runs total in the two games) and bounced the Astros in a National League Division Series, and prospects Freddy Garcia and Carlos Guillen included in the deal both went on to have excellent careers, it was a trade that in hindsight you make 100 times out of 100.
Bronze: Jeff Bagwell. Reliever Larry Andersen was outstanding in helping the Boston Red Sox win the AL East in 1990, but the BoSox got swept in the ALCS and Andersen left as a free agent. Bagwell has the greatest offensive resume in Astros’ history (I know, I know, postseason aside) and is quite arguably one of the 10 greatest first basemen of all-time.
Silver: Yordan Alvarez. He has longevity to prove but to this point in his career, while not the all-around player Bagwell was, Yordan is clearly the more destructive force in the batter’s box. Throw in his three monstrously significant home runs in the 2022 Astros’ title run, and his awesome 2023 postseason, and what could still lie ahead for him and the Gold could be his if we revisit this topic 10 years from now. Imagine the Dodgers if they hadn’t gifted Yordan to the Astros for Josh Fields.
Gold: Justin Verlander. Astros’ World Series championships pre-JV, zero. With him, two. Even though his World Series resume is terrible. The finishing piece to the Astros’ initial championship winner in 2017 with a 1.06 ERA in five starts ahead of winning the 2017 ALCS MVP, a second crown in 2022, two Cy Young Awards and a Cy runner-up. Interesting decision to make for the cap on his Hall of Fame plaque. Much more body of work with the Tigers but the championships and legend cemented with the Astros.
*Catch our weekly Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast. Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and I discuss varied Astros topics. The first post for the week generally goes up Monday afternoon (second part released Tuesday) via The SportsMap HOU YouTube channel or listen to episodes in their entirety at Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.