Bring back the noise, bring back the funk at Zurich Classic

AVONDALE, La. – The team format isn’t the only thing that makes the Zurich Classic of New Orleans unique.

This is a city with its own soundtrack – the tournament usually coincides with the Jazz Festival, though that’s not the case this year – and you don’t have to go very far to hear live jazz in the French Quarter.

For the past several years, this has been the only PGA Tour event where golfers have chosen walk-up music to the first tee. But this year at TPC Louisiana, that quirky tradition has been replaced by a DJ who will play music. So it’s not quite Don McLean singing “the day the music died,” in his classic hit “American Pie” but it might as well be.

Let’s be honest, in the grand scheme of things, first tee music isn’t the Tour’s most pressing concern at the moment, but half the fun of having music played on the first tee was that the players selected their walkup music, something usually associated with a batter stepping into the plate at a Major League Baseball game. Not only did it give a window into their musical taste – are they a fan of heavy metal like Viktor Hovland? – but it gave a glimpse into their personality. Golf needs more of that.

Erik van Rooyen likes to play the guitar in his spare time and since the Valero Texas Open has been marking his golf ball with a musical note so it may not be all that surprising to hear that he wasn’t in favor of the switch.

“I think it sucks,” he said. “I think it is such a fun idea. It makes the tournament a little different.”

When asked to name the song he would’ve used for his walk-up music, the South African swiped and tapped his phone and it began playing the ‘80s classic “Africa” by Toto.

“Just tap your foot,” he said. “Makes me think of home.”

LIV Golf, with its club music blaring during play, touts itself as “Golf only louder,” which implies that the PGA Tour is less cool and in the ongoing effort to engage a younger audience and stimulate interest in the game, playing some hip-hop and rock at the range isn’t the worst idea.

“This is not a LIV vs. PGA Tour thing so please don’t make it about that,” Max Homa said before turning it into a big joke. “I heard Monahan talking about it in our last PAC meeting. We went over the golf ball going too far, we went over accessibility to the designated events and we went over music being too aligned with the LIV Tour.”

In case his sarcasm was too dry, he was joking, but I think he…