Rozner: Even with Women's Amateur, Augusta sells Augusta

If you've been watching golf at all for the last month, then you know the inaugural Augusta National Women's Amateur will take place this week.

You know this because NBC and Golf Channel have promoted it relentlessly throughout their coverage.

Yes, it's a great moment for women's golf. It's just not nearly as great as it ought to be.

First understand that Augusta National Golf Club does nothing unless it's good for Augusta National, and if you believe that it has intentions of doing anything other than promoting Augusta National, think again.

Rounds 1 and 2 will be played at Champions Retreat Golf Club on Wednesday and Thursday, before the ladies get one day to practice at Augusta, and the final round takes place Saturday at the home of the Masters, with coverage on NBC for three hours beginning at 11 a.m.

It's great that they get the opportunity, but if you're going to host the ladies, why not three rounds at Augusta? And if the answer is the men take over the course on Sunday for the most important tournament in golf and you don't want it chewed up, why do it this week when it could have been any week?

The answer, naturally, is it gives Augusta the spotlight for an extra four days leading into the Masters, five if you include Sunday morning's Drive, Chip and Putt, another made-for-TV production that allows children very little access to the course but makes Augusta look altruistic.

Perhaps most disturbing is when Augusta chairman Fred Ridley made the announcement a year ago, it's obvious his group cared not at all that the ANWA in Georgia would be going up against the one of the LPGA's signature events of the year, the ANA Inspiration in California.

That major championship should be the focus of women's golf, not to mention the ANA holds several spots for top amateurs, meaning a choice between a chance to play in a major - perhaps four rounds with the best players in the world - or a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to play Augusta, which is hallowed ground to anyone who's ever held a club.

It's a major insult to the LPGA.

But look at the attention the Green Jacket people are getting for this magnanimous gesture? It's already been well worth the single day they will allow women to play tournament golf there.

Consider in all this the history of Augusta, which did not have a female member until 2012, when it invited Condoleezza Rice, the former Secretary of State, and Darla Moore, a powerful name in the business world and a friend of former Augusta chairman Hootie Johnson.

This is the same club that barred black players from the Masters the first 41 years until Lee Elder participated in 1975, and Augusta did not have a black member until 1990, when TV magnate Ron Townsend was invited to join.

It's no coincidence that 1990 was the year of the Shoal Creek controversy, when the Alabama club's founder said he wouldn't be pressured into accepting African-American members, but Shoal would have lost the PGA Championship that year if it didn't change its discriminatory policy.

That's when golf's governing bodies finally stepped up and ruled that no club would host an event if it did not have a program of inclusion.

The point is Augusta National doesn't do anything without a reason, and that reason is always to benefit Augusta National.

That's why it's allowing amateur women two days on the course this week, for one round of tournament golf.

It's not about growing the game, which is what you will hear over and over again this week on Golf Channel and NBC. It's about promoting Augusta National.

Don't get me wrong. I'll watch every moment. I can't get enough of the place. The Masters is the greatest golf tournament on the planet - though The Open at St. Andrews is a close second - and if the Masters weren't so stingy with TV coverage and access, I'd watch even more.

But the ANWA has nothing to do with encouraging more women to play or being more inclusive. It's an advertisement, plain and simple.

That doesn't mean the Augusta National Women's Amateur is a bad thing. It's just that it could have been so much more.

When it comes to Augusta National Golf Club, it is almost always that way.