LPGA charts a new course

LPGA Hall of Famer Patty Sheehan can't believe it's been 25 years or so since that old car packed full of elite women golfers, clubs and suitcases popped a tire during a trip from a tournament in Nashville to another one in Norfolk, Va.

"I knew how to change a tire; that wasn't the hard part," said Sheehan, a tour rookie in 1980. "The biggest problem was taking all the luggage out of the trunk to get to the jack and the extra tire. We had to pile everything right there on the side of the road."

Nobody recognized them. Nobody stopped.

"No help at all," said Sheehan, laughing. "Changed it myself."

Today's elite players don't change tires. They don't car pool. They don't even travel by car. And some of the flyers don't do so commercially.

Cristie Kerr, the defending U.S. Women's Open champion, travels on private jets because, well, wouldn't you if you had $8 million in career earnings and an annual seven-figure endorsement portfolio?

"Sometimes, I wonder how many women playing today appreciate how far we've come thanks to those who have come before us," said Kerr, 30. "I've always had a sense of appreciation for those women. I didn't get to see the early pioneers of the sport play, but you can't help but appreciate what they did for us."

From June 23-29, the present and future stars of women's golf will intersect with an integral piece of their past when the 63rd U.S. Women's Open visits Edina's Interlachen Country Club. A field of 156 of the world's best women amateurs and professionals will merge onto 180 classic, tree-lined acres that served as the home course of the late Patty Berg, Minneapolis native, a charismatic founding mother of women's professional golf and the winner of the first U.S. Women's Open in 1946.

From a spectator's standpoint, it promises to be a highlight of Minnesota's shortened golf season.

Open is majors' major

Lorena Ochoa, the world's No. 1-ranked women's golfer, could complete the "Lorena Slam" by winning an unprecedented fourth consecutive women's major championship. Then, from July 15-20, two-time Masters winner and Champions Tour rookie Bernhard Langer is expected to make his 3M Championship debut at the TPC of the Twin Cities in Blaine. Fast-forward another 13 months and that Tiger fella returns to Hazeltine National for the 2009 PGA Championship.

But first things first. The U.S. Women's Open will be the first United States Golf Association (USGA) men's or women's open tournament played in Minnesota since Payne Stewart's U.S. Open win at Hazeltine in 1991.

"The U.S. Open is, quite simply, the tournament that all the women want to win and all the men want to win," said Hall of Famer Betsy Rawls, who joined the LPGA in 1951, its second season, and is tied with another Hall of Famer, Mickey Wright, with a record four U.S. Women's Open titles.

"A lot has changed over the years in women's golf. Field sizes were smaller back in the beginning. We didn't rope the fairways off. There were no bleachers, no leaderboards. It was more like a typical Ladies Day at your local golf club. But the Open has always been the biggest tournament."

Rawls won her four titles from 1951-60, collecting a combined $7,510 for those four majors. Compare that to what's happening today in women's golf, where 18-year-old golf prodigy Michelle Wie reportedly makes $12.5 million in endorsements and appearance fees without having won a tournament, let alone a major.

Wie isn't a member of the LPGA and probably will have to play her way into the U.S. Open this year. But she is far from the only youngster who is changing the face of women's golf. In fact, Wie is being left in the dust by Ochoa, a mass of intensely hard-working South Koreans and a group of young, attractive and successful Americans such as Paula Creamer, Morgan Pressel, Natalie Gulbis and Brittany Lincicome.

"It's definitely changing out here," said Pressel, who last year, at 18, became the youngest woman to win a major when she captured the Kraft Nabisco Championship. "It's kind of what happened with women's tennis. I think in the next few years, we can see great things out of the LPGA Tour."

Endorsements find LPGA Tour

Examples that more women golfers are appealing to wider audiences are abundant. According to Golf Digest, 12 LPGA Tour players made seven figures from appearance fees and a diverse listing of endorsements in 2007. That was quadruple the number from 2004.

Kerr's portfolio includes designer clothiers and the French watchmaker Audemars Piguet. Ochoa has 10 endorsement deals from companies all over the world. Creamer, who has found a niche by wearing pink and playing final rounds with pink golf balls, is designing her own clothes. And then there's Gulbis, who has her own reality show on the Golf Channel, a guest column in FHM men's magazine and a swimsuit calendar that's doing quite well, for obvious reasons.

Of course, those old enough to remember the 1970s can recall how the LPGA Tour promoted Jan Stephenson more as a sex symbol than a talented three-time major champion. The mid-1980s poster of her in a bathtub with nothing on but some well-placed golf balls was frowned on by some of her peers mainly because the tour was driving it.

"I don't think the LPGA should be doing that, but I think whatever Natalie or these other young girls do on their own, whatever makes them happy, within reason, of course, that's all right," said Hall of Famer Kathy Whitworth, whose 88 victories are the most in professional golf, male or female. "I'm happy to see how well the girls are doing today. It's great, especially when you consider what it was like when we started out in the '50s."

Whitworth was a regular on tour for 33 years. She made $1,731,770, less than half of Ochoa's record $4.36 million earned in 2007. Meanwhile, Rawls won 82 tournaments, including 13 majors, and made $368,770 in career earnings.

"I don't object at all to how these girls market themselves," Rawls said. "I haven't seen anything that's been in bad taste, and it probably creates interest among people who wouldn't otherwise be interested in the LPGA. Natalie is such a sweet person, always so friendly, warm and nice. And what she did with the calendar wasn't as risque as what they did with Jan."

LPGA Commissioner Carolyn Bivens said today's players are making golf "very contemporary," "chic," and "hip."

"For a long time, to be a world-class athlete and let me say a 'girl's girl' were viewed as being mutually exclusive," Bivens said. "It was seen as you couldn't do both. It was one or the other. The mold has been broken."

The effect that has had on the popularity of women's golf -- or the level of that popularity compared to previous eras -- is hard to quantify. Some, such as Rawls and Whitworth, say it's tough to overlook the huge boost in television exposure and general acceptance that fellow Hall of Famer Nancy Lopez created when she joined the tour in the late 1970s.

Attendance and television ratings for women's golf still lag far behind men's golf. But attendance in 2007 was up 34 percent from 2003. And page views on lpga.com were up 48 percent over the same period.

NBC's coverage of last year's U.S. Open drew a 1.4 rating with a 4.0 share. That tied NBC's second-worst rating and share for a U.S. Women's Open since 1995. The rating is the percentage watching a program among all television households, while the share is the percentage tuned in among those homes with TVs in use at the time.

The LPGA Tour has, however, enjoyed a tremendous increase in international TV exposure. It now airs in 40 countries reaching 135 million homes.

The biggest reason for the increase is the emergence of the Korean players. From 1994 to 1997, there were none on tour. Today, there are 45.

By any measurement, women's golf has come a long way since Berg beat Betty Jameson 5-and-4 in a 36-hole final to win the first U.S. Women's Open at Spokane (Wash.) Country Club. It was one of Berg's 15 women's major titles, a record that still stands.

"I met Patty a few times, and what a great lady, great player and a great ambassador for women's golf," said Sorenstam, a 10-time major champion and a member of the European Solheim Cup team that lost to the Americans with Berg looking on at Interlachen in 2002.

"I've always thought it would be fun if you could go back and play in a different era. I wish I could go back and play against the great players of the early days. But I don't know if Patty's record will ever be broken."

Berg died Sept. 10, 2006, at age 88. One of the 13 founders of the LPGA, she claimed the last of her 60 victories in 1962. Over the years, she became more famous among women's golf fans for her motivational speeches, Wilson-sponsored clinics and the annual "Patty Berg Swing Parade" exhibition during the week of the U.S. Women's Open.

Whitworth, who called Berg a close friend and mentor, now conducts the "Patty Berg Swing Parade/Legends of Golf Exhibition." This year's exhibition will be held at 1 p.m. June 24.

"I sure wish Patty was here to enjoy this and to see all these exciting girls coming to play the Open where she grew up learning the game," Whitworth said. "It will be a special tournament. We'll all be thinking a lot about her that week."