This past weekend delivered a boatload of intriguing golf stories beyond the usual tournament reports. Herewith, in no particular order, some Monday morning blather.

Tough choice for Monty. With three wildcard picks to complete the European Ryder Cup team, Captain Colin chooses another Molinari, Paddy Harrington and Luke Donald. That means he has to leave Paul Casey and Justin Rose off the team. Casey is ranked #9 in the world, one spot ahead of Donald while Rose is ranked #22 and has two wins on the PGA Tour this year. That’s two more than either Harrington or Donald. The toughest bit for the Scottish Captain may have been trying to choose amongst three Englishmen and an Irishman.

Some people still haven’t figured out that the LPGA Tour is not an American product anymore. Apart from the huge contingent of non-American players, twelve of the twenty-six events are played outside the US. So there’s no valid explanation for the idiotic comment from one late night pundit who suggested that Michelle Wie “still hasn’t proven anything since her two wins on the LPGA Tour were in Mexico and Canada. She still hasn’t won on US soil.” One suspects he’ll be eating those words pretty soon.

While we’re on the topic of word eating, perhaps the CBC should re-think their choice of Ron McLean as host of the CN Canadian Women’s Open telecast. McLean is clearly not a golfer. Otherwise, how to explain “the 17th and 18th holes are the 18th and 19th hardest on the course.” He certainly has a gift (curse) for inane chatter as evidenced by all the throwaway lines like the one he made after a great bunker shot by Michelle Wie. “How can you grow up in Hawaii and not be good in the sand?” Apparently Mclean has never met a silence he couldn’t fill. Gail Graham does a fabulous job as second banana, delivering solid insight and very capable commentary. Her performance is all the more laudable given that she has to teach McLean about women’s golf during commercial breaks.

Kind of a ho-hum finish to the the US Amateur at Chambers Bay yesterday. Peter Uihlein (son of Wally, head honcho at Titleist) took an early lead over David Chung and never let up, finishing 4&2. The real excitement was provided by the golf course which sits hard on the shores of Puget Sound, south of Tacoma, WA. The links course is scheduled to host the 2015 US Open and the Amateur was a test case. It has all the bluster of a typical seaside links in the UK but features several holes that might be all world. If the USGA sets up the course to play as designed (hard, fast and dangerous), then that will be one US Open you won’t want to miss.

Another decent outing for David Hearn on the Nationwide Tour. A little slippage on Sunday dropped him out of the top 10 finishers but the $10,000 pay cheque moves him up to 19th place on the all-important money list and still comfortably inside the Top 25. Hearn needs a win or a couple of top three finishes over the next two months to ensure a return to the PGA Tour next year. Apart from Jon Mills, who is still lingering in the neighbourhood, the other Canadians on the Nationwide Tour are at least a long distance call away.

Larry Smich, a journeyman caddie on the LPGA Tour has alleged that two Korean players cheated and tried to cover it up. Both players were DQ’d in Winnipeg. This particular caddie has made other allegations about conspiracies amongst the Koreans. Add recent comments made by LPGA Hall of Famer Carol Mann concerning too many Koreans on the Tour and one has to wonder if there isn’t another xenophobic brouhaha pending. If it isn’t Muslims building a mosque near Ground Zero, it’s Koreans trying to steal the Women’s Tour. Stop the insanity!