PINEHURST, N.C. — For an organization that has long labored against the perception that it’s led by austere, nerdish killjoys, the U.S. Golf Association must be comforted by the fact that, in these discordant times, it has a CEO who could talk a dog off a meat truck. Mike Whan is a highly polished presenter — a notch shy of slick, but trending that way — with more upbeat aphorisms at hand than a sales clerk in a Hallmark store. It’s a skill particularly well suited to our current moment.
