2007 Ginn Tribute

A couple of years ago, few on the LPGA had heard of the Ginn Clubs and Resorts or its owner, Bobby Ginn. But in 2006, he made a bold offer to sponsor an event on the LPGA tour, to take place at his resort in South Florida. What made the offer bold was the amount of money he presented for the purse: over $2 million, which at the time made the Ginn Clubs & Resorts Open the second most lucrative event on tour behind the US Women's Open. As it turned out, the inaugural Ginn event, and its huge first place check, was won by Seoul Sister Mi Hyun Kim (pictured), who, in capturing the title, finally broke a four year winless streak.

This year, the Ginn organization has increased its commitment to the LPGA tour. Besides sponsoring the Ginn Open a second year, they have added a second event to the schedule, the Ginn Tribute hosted by Annika (as in Annika Sorenstam, who is sponsored by Ginn). This event was played at RiverTowne Country Club in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, from May 31st to June 3rd, and featured a $390,000 first place check. Once again, a Ginn event was one of the most lucrative on tour.

The big news coming into this event was the reappearance of two injured golfers, making their first tournament starts in some time. The first was Annika Sorenstam, who had been forced to take a month and change off due to a back ailment. The second was Korean American golf sensation Michelle Wie, who had not played golf anywhere since early in the year. She had been struggling with wrist injuries that had prevented her from playing in the Kraft Nabisco Championship earlier in 2007; it was the first Major she had missed in years. Wie's appearance at this event was ill advised; she clearly was not ready to compete with the women, having barely recovered from her injury before the event. The controversy she generated filled most of the news reports about the event, and doesn't need to be thoroughly rehashed here. But in brief: she played horribly, and after carding a ten on one par 5, was in danger of running afoul of a little known LPGA rule called the '88 rule'. This rule had been implemented long ago to prevent players who are not capable of playing in tour events from dragging down the rest of the professionals. The rule mandated that any player who was not a tour member who shot an 88 or worse in a round would not only be instantly disqualified from the event in question but would also be prevented from playing an LPGA event for the rest of the calendar year. Wie dropped out of the event when she was 14 over par with two holes to play, well in danger of hitting that 88 score. Was she aware of it? Did her manager warn her to drop out to avoid the penalty? Controversy raged. Our only comments about this rule is that it seems essentially useless. If anyone who is in danger of shooting 88 can simply drop out to avoid the score, what's the point of having that rule at all? Regardless of whether Wie's injury legitimately forced her to stop, or she quit to avoid the rule, the rule itself would seem to be hard to enforce.

Lost in the hype surrounding Wie's struggle was the actual event, and another teenage pro who played quite well during the week. That teenager is 18 year old Angela Park (pictured), who has led the LPGA's Rookie of the Year race for much of the season. And with good reason: coming into the Ginn Tribute, she had yet to miss a cut all year and had racked up an impressive number of solid finishes in those events. Angela got off to her best start yet on Thursday, day one of the Ginn. She produced a 6 under par 66 that included 6 birdies, an eagle, and two bogies. While the rest of the field struggled on the tough course, the rookie showed them how to get it done. By the end of the day, she held a two shot lead over the field, and was well positioned to make a run the remaining three days.

Angela Park is a young golfer who has succeeded on every level of golf to date, so it should be no surprise that she would be a success on the LPGA. Although her parents are Korean, she was born and lived much of her early life in Brazil, in the shadow of the magnificent Iguazu Falls. In her early teens, her family moved to the Los Angeles area. Thus, Angela is trilingual, fluent in Portuguese, English and Korean. Angela took up the game of golf, and quickly became quite good at it. She became a mainstay at national amateur competitions in her teen years, winning five AJGA events and making it to the semifinals of the 2005 US Women's Amateur. She was a first team All American among junior golfers in both 2004 and 2005.

Park decided to turn pro while still 17 years old, but at the time, it looked like there would be nowhere for her to play full time, at least in this country. But then fate intervened. Song-Hee Kim destroyed the field at the 2006 Futures Tour Qualifying School as a 17 year old amateur, winning the qualifier by five shots. Kim petitioned the tour to be allowed to join even though she was too young (the Futures Tour, like the LPGA, had a minimum age limit of 18 years). The Futures Tour decided to change the rules, allowing 17 year olds to be full time members. This enabled Kim to become a member, but also allowed Angela, who had also qualified through Q-School, into the league as well. But before she joined that tour, she had one more amazing accomplishment as an amateur. She was given a sponsor's exemption into the LPGA's first Major of 2006, the Kraft Nabisco. She did extremely well, playing in one of the final groups on Sunday and eventually finishing tied for 15th. The day after the event, she turned pro and began her second career.

Park played very well on the Futures Tour in 2006, although she was not able to get a win all year. With one event to go in their season, she was fifth on the money list, but had only a narrow lead over three other golfers. The top five on the money list at year's end automatically qualify to play on the LPGA tour, so Park needed to play well in that last event to secure her card. Alas, she did not play well and was passed by several other golfers. She would have to go to Q-School to get her card. But she proved her mettle by playing very well there, finishing tied for fifth to easily earn her LPGA card.

As one of the youngest players on tour in 2007, Angela has had a lot of success. In just her second event, the Fields Open, she put herself into contention and had a shot at winning right until the end of the week; she eventually wound up third. Although she put together five more top 25 finishes in the next few events, she was not able to get another top ten. Still, her consistency had allowed her to open up a large lead in the Rookie of the Year race. And now, at the Ginn Tribute, she was in the lead after one round. Could this be the event she finally broke through? If so, it would make her the youngest golfer in tour history to win a multi-round LPGA event. There was a lot of history riding on the next few days.

Park would have her work cut out for her. Tied for second at 4 under par were top tour players Lorena Ochoa, Pat Hurst and Paula Creamer. Among the Koreans, Sun Young Yoo was also at 4 under, but would struggle much of the rest of the week and not be a factor. Jeong Jang, who had not been playing all that well in 2007, managed a 3 under par 69 and sat tied for 7th, while Sarah Lee continued her great play of late with a 2 under par 70. On the down side, Se Ri Pak shot a 3 over par 75, and never was able to get her game in order the rest of the week; she would go on to miss her second cut of the year. Pak later admitted that her impending Hall of Fame qualification (which happened the following week at the LPGA Championship) was distracting her mightily. Rookie Na On Min, who was third on the Rookie race list, also played poorly.

In round two, a familiar result occurred. Lorena Ochoa, who had been in contention almost every week of 2007, put herself once again into a prime position to collect a win. She shot a 5 under par 67 to move to 9 under total. Angela had an up and down day and was only able to shoot an even par round, but that was still good enough for second place at 6 under. She still had two days to try to make something happen against the world's number one golfer. Creamer shot a 71 and was at 5 under, so on Saturday, Park would be sandwiched in the final group between two of the best players on tour, Creamer and Ochoa. At the least it would be a learning experience; but hopefully, it would be much more! Among the Koreans, Young Kim had a good day. Coming off her win at Corning, Kim shot a 69 to follow her first round 72, and sat at 3 under, tied with Karrie Webb for seventh place. JJ did not have a good day, but her 73 still allowed her to remain in the top ten, tied at 10th with Seon Hwa Lee and Sarah Lee among others. Mi Hyun Kim, coming off of a second place finish in Corning, had a lackluster 74 in round one, but a 70 in round two moved her into the top twenty. But it was doubtful she was going to be able to catch Ochoa from nine shots back.