Hunter Mahan Seems Pretty Cool

I saw an interview with Hunter Mahan over at golf.com (and is in the latest edition of Golf Magazine). I didn't know much about the guy before this interview other than he is a talented golfer. He seems to shoot from the hip, though, and I like that about him.

Most interesting to me is this part of the interview.

Most of you guys still aren't household names. If Tiger pulled an Annika and decided to retire, the Tour would be in deep trouble, no?
Monumental trouble. The Tour would never admit it but they need Tiger way more than Tiger needs the Tour. It's tough — people don't know the younger players. If you ask most fans following a tournament to write down who they know, they'll write Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods.

So shouldn't the Tour do more to promote up-and-comers like you?
Personally I think they do a lot more for the international players. They try to get Camilo [Villegas] out there as much as any player I've ever seen, basically because while he's good-looking and young, he's also Colombian. He's Latin. They don't do the Americans many favors.

Do you feel slighted?
Yes and no. I understand where the Tour's coming from. They want as much parity from different countries as possible so they can hit each market and gain as much money as they can. But when it comes to American players they don't do as much as they could. As in anything, money talks.

Interesting that Mahan feels that the Tour could be doing more for their American players not named Woods and Mickelson, especially considering that the Tour has done so much to dig its trenches in the United States. I understand that there is a lot of money to be made by marketing international players that come to the States to play. But, does that money make up for the fact that most people have no clue who is going to be on the Ryder Cup team?