In the October 24, 2005 issue of Sports Illustrated, Alan Shipnuck ends his Michelle Wie / Michael Bamberger story with this amazing graf:

Last week Bamberger picked up an unlikely supporter in B.J. Wie, Michelle’s fiercely loyal, protective father. He knows that his daughter, for all her prodigious physical talents, is still a teenager with [...]

SI.com’s Rob Stanger says there’s plenty of blame and questionable decisions for everyone including SI senior writer Michael Bamberger, caddie Greg Johnston, and tour officals.

I saw Anna Sorenstam’s televised conversation regarding line of sight, and at the time it seemed like it was going on for a lot longer than it should. Stanger explains it…

All [...]

From Hooked on Golf Blog:

Should fans, press or persons other than players or officials be able to “report” possible rules infractions? There have been a few cases on the PGA Tour where fans actually called in after seeing a rules infraction on TV, and in some of those cases the players were penalized or disqualified.

Fans in [...]

From GolfBlogger:

Now the truth may be that the ball was closer to hole. (Although it strains credulity that they could determine that a day later). But it certainly looks an awful lot like LPGA officials doing their best to put the 16-year-old non-LPGA member in her place.

It does smack of LPGA having their moment of [...]

WIEblog reader Kris Corbridge offers a concise explanation of Michelle Wie’s disqualification as an error on the part of tour officials, and hits on something I haven’t really seen explored in the media except for our local news broadcasts in Hawaii.

The disqualification itself went against Rule 34-1 which states that a player can only be [...]

AP Golf Writer Doug Ferguson, having had a similar experience watching K.J. Choi making a bunker shot to the 18th green at this year’s Bay Hill Invitational, has some pointed words on the actions of Sports Illustrated’s Michael Bamberger:

Should golf writers do anything when they think they see an infraction?

They obviously can’t ignore it, but [...]

Chris Baldwin over at TravelGolf makes a good argument on why Sports Illustrated reporter Michael Bamberger isn’t at fault:

Most sports reporters could care less who wins and loses. Sports reporters worry about deadlines (they hate TV pushing important games to late at night). They worry about their access to the athletes, really the fans access [...]

Here’s a quick early round up of the internet chatter this morning after Michelle Wie’s professional debut:

If I had thought there was any situation that was questionable, I would have said it on air. I watched the whole thing, and it looked fine to me. In my 19 years, I’ve never seen anything like this [...]

So it wasn’t a home viewer in this case.

The updated Associated Press wire states that it was Sports Illustrated reporter Michael Bamberger who informed tour officials about Michelle’s Saturday round drop.

Johnston was bothered that Bamberger, who was at the seventh green when Wie took the drop, waited a day before raising it with tour officials. [...]

One of the great things about Professional Golf is when people at home recognize penalties and call the Tour. No note if this what happened in Wie’s case, but you simply don’t see things like this happen in other professional sports do you?

Wie hit a 5-wood into a Gold Lantana bush Saturday and was barely [...]