The “battle” was last weekend and I’ve waited a week for Ron or Steve F. to post this, but I guess they’re sore losers! Yes, Steve B. is the new “Fall Family Champ”! Can you believe that? Steve F. and Ron must have really had an off weekend!
Coaches vs Cancer
This past weekend was the annual Penn State Coaches vs Cancer golf tournament run by the Nittany Lion basketball team. I used to play in it but the cost has gotten a little prohibitive (I was ok at $250, still played when they went to $325, but when it jumped to $500 three years ago, I elected to retire from competition). My contribution is now limited to volunteering to help out on the course.
You can catch me making a background appearance at the 6:30 mark in this video (I’m the guy in the bright red volunteer shirt – wearing three layers I might add so despite my earlier post about putting weight back on I’m not quite as big as the video would suggest).
The guy who shot the video also took this photo which he just sent to me (I’ve got FOUR layers on here – the weather wasn’t cooperating much). The girl in the photo was my partner on the hole that we worked for the tournament. She is the daughter of a girl that I used to live with (platonically) in Pittsburgh in the late 70s.
I could have been on TV
Missed out on a great opportunity today. PSU played Wisconsin in a Sunday afternoon hoops game covered by the Big Ten Network today (unfortunately, we played terribly and got beat). My standard routine for a basketball game is to TiVo it and come back and watch the game afterward.
Another standard routine of mine used to be to get up at half time and walk around the arena to stretch my legs. For most of this season I haven’t done that because walking up (the arena is sunken) the 30 some steps from my seat to the concourse was just exhausting. However, within the last two weeks I’ve resumed my half time exercise routine.
So after the game I come home and am watching the game replay. Just as the second half is about to start, the TV camera gradually zooms in on the fans behind the Wisconsin bench. They zoom all the way down to one fan who is standing by himself as the announcers talk about him. It was two time US Open champion Andy North who is a HUGE Wisconsin basketball fan and catches as many games as he can. The cameras zoom in so far that the only thing that fills the screen is Andy’s upper torso and the two empty blue seats behind him – my seats.
I was literally seconds from sitting back down. Blown opportunity to get some TV face time.
Golf Followup
It looks like I never followed up on this post from a year and a half ago.
“Two friends of mine are playing in a local first round qualifier at Scotch Valley Country Club in Altoona for the US Open today so I’m headed over to watch them. There are 39 players contending for 3 sectional qualifier spots…
I’ll be back later tonight to fill in details of their rounds.”
The details are – they sucked. They both played terrible, tied for dead last with two other guys (although seven guys didn’t turn in cards so they might have beaten them).
You are probably asking yourself why I’m following up on this now. We’ll there’s a reason. During our friend RJ’s round, word filtered back to us that a guy in the group just in front of us was playing pretty well (it was a brutal day, the wind was blowing incredibly hard and scores were skyrocketing – by days end, only three of the pros managed to break 75 – and the guy in front of us was two under at the time). So my friend Tom Minsker and I decided to move up and watch him (RJ was playing so bad that we felt he was probably self conscious that we were watching).
There really weren’t any people following any of these groups around, just a couple of friends and family. There was no one following the guy that we moved up to watch, so we were able to strike up several conversations with him and his caddy. His name was Brad Adamonis and he was a small time 30-something Nationwide tour player from Rhode Island (he had earned all of $3531 on the Nationwide tour in 2005). He didn’t used a driver but he consistently smacked his three wood 280 or so off the tee. He seemed so much better than any of the other guys that we had seen that day that Tom and I were dumbfounded that this guy was a nobody.
Adamonis wound up being one of the three guys to claim a sectional spot and we kept an eye on him when he went on to the sectionals. At the sectionals, he came in sixth among 33 guys and thus did not qualify for one of the two available slots from his qualifier.
Every now and then though, Tom or I would check up on Brad. He finished 2006 at 71st on the Nationwide tour earning $81,000. In 2007, he won one event and moved up to 33rd on the tour with $170,000. Then this past fall he finished ninth at the Q school to earn his PGA card.
So yesterday, I’m sitting home working on my computer with the Golf Channel’s coverage of the Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines on in the background. I’d occasionally look up to catch one of Tiger’s shots. Tiger finished his round at -5 two shots back of the leader. Shortly after Tiger finishes they flash to this guy whose lining up his birdie putt on eighteen. He drops it to go six under one back of the leader and they flash his name – Brad Adamonis. Whoa – that gets my attention.
Then the announcers talk about how Brad’s made a nice start on his first year on the tour, making the cut at both the Sony and the Hope tournaments and earning $40k to date. His now in a good position to take home a nice paycheck this weekend and to hang onto is card.
At 35 years old, Brad makes a nice human interest story and not surprisingly, the press has picked up on it today. Here are some:
SignOnSanDiego.com > Sports > Golf — Adamonis in unfamiliar territory – The Spotlight via kwout
Adamonis shoots 66 in Buick Open, bolsters sick father — South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com via kwout
SignOnSanDiego.com > Sports > U-T Golfblog via kwout
Success comes in bunches for rookie
By: DAN HAYES and BRIAN HIRO – Staff Writers
LA JOLLA —- Brad Adamonis couldn’t help but grin after a friend high-fived him following a birdie on the 18th green at Torrey Pines’ North Course.
The 35-year-old PGA Tour rookie has been all smiles recently, especially after a 5-under-par 67 in the opening round of the Buick Invitational on Thursday.
Consider that after eight previous tries at qualifying school, Adamonis finally reached the PGA Tour this season and has made the cut in each of his first two tournament. Then there’s the improved health of his family and friends. And then there’s his beloved New England Patriots, who are headed back to the Super Bowl after last Sunday’s win over the Chargers.
…
I’ll be paying close attention to the guy for the rest of the tournament.
Carnoustie memories
Anyone watching the British Open today. It brought back a bunch of memories from my trip to Scotland with Tod Jeffers in 1984 when we actually played Carnoustie.
. Here’s a shot of us playing the 17th hole. I’m on the far right in the red sweater. Upon close inspection you will note that I am wearing knickers, which I wore for pretty much every round in Scotland (Tod remarked that my choice of apparel was like a guy from New York City wearing a rhinestone cowboy shirt in Dallas). Tod has the light pants on and the other guy and girl were a couple of newlyweds from the US who were on their honeymoon and were matched up with us (the guy played, the gal just walked along).
Here’s a piece of a map of the Carnoustie golf course that shows the finishing holes at the course. I’ve placed a red X on the may where our friend Glen Durso stood when he took the photo above. The direction of the photo is toward the upper right hand corner of the map. In the photo you can see the wall of the Barry Burn running along the forefront. From the map you can see how the burn snakes around on both sides of 17. On the photo at the top you can just make out the burn behind us. If you look close you can see the walk bridge across the burn on the left side of the photo and you can also notice that bridge on the map above.
If you watched the open today, you saw Ernie Els hit his approach shot fat on 18 and it came up short of the burn (notice on the map how the burn runs right in front of 18). That reminded me a little of my shot on the finishing hole. When Tod and I played it, the pin placement on 18 was in about the same location as today, i.e at the very front of the green, about 10 feet onto the green and maybe 10 yards past the burn. When I hit my approach shot, I thought I had hit it perfect but it came up about 10 yards short – I don’t know if I misclubbed myself or the wind got it but the ball came down in the burn – but only momentarily.
Here’s a closeup photo of the Barry Burn. Notice how the bank on the left is made by bricks that form a kind of stair step up the side. Remember playing stoop ball as a kid (I’m talking to the second generation here, I’m not sure the third generation ever played anything as unorganized as stoop ball 🙂 )? You would throw a ball against the steps and it would fly backward. Well that’s exactly what happened to my ball when it landed in the burn. It didn’t hit the water but rather came down against the bricks. That caused it to ricochet back down the eighteenth fairway toward me coming to rest about 20 yards short of the burn (if I remember correctly I got safely on and two putted from there).
The big hotel in the background of the above photo wasn’t there when Tod and I played the course. There was actually no clubhouse. There was a small shack that acted as a pro shop and a gravel parking lot where you could change into your spikes. Of course that meant we couldn’t roll of the course and have an immediate brew. So after we finished our round we headed back to St Andrews where we were staying.
The route back to our hotel took us through Dundee, a working class town on the River Tay. It was about a 30 mile drive and by the time we got to Dundee we were a little thirsty. I was driving and spotted a bar just off the road. I pulled over and Tod ran inside to get a six pack for the road (how times have changed? – you just wouldn’t think of doing that these days). A couple of minutes later Tod comes out of the bar laughing his head off.
While we were in Scotland we had been trying all sorts of different beers. Since we didn’t have a clue what most of the brews were we’d simply ask the bartenders in each of the establishments we’d hit, what their recommendation would be. So that’s exactly what Tod did when he went into the bar. The bartender responded (imagine a thick Scottish brogue “Ahh, we’ve got this great imported beer – RRRolling RRRock.” Tod could not keep a straight face and was still laughing as he came back out to the car (and no, he didn’t get the Rolling Rock).
I have bunches of other stories but I’ll save them for another day.
Bergquist Blasts thru Battle Creek…
…and wins the Fall Family Cup! Unfortunately, having the humble husband that I do, I have few other details. And I don’t think we’re going to get the usual blow-by-blow, hole-by-hole write up that Steve F. usually gives (for two reasons; he lost and his computer crashed)! I do know that Steve B. also came in 3rd for the entire Battle, apparently blowing his chances for 1st place on one hole (with a score of 15 on that hole).
I think there will be a challenge by Brian very shortly. Steve and he actually played golf two weeks ago and Brian beat the pants off Steve. He is very anxious to play his father again…especially if he can win the “Cup”…any interest Steve and Ron?
Oakmont Memories
Watching the US Open being held at Oakmont Country Club just outside of Pittsburgh brought back a TON of memories the last few days and I’d like to share a few.
The 1978 PGA Championship was held at Oakmont while I was living in Pittsburgh. At the time my buddy Tod Jeffers was working at WMAJ a radio station in State College. Tod and I had quite a scam going. Tod was the sports director for the station and he would write to the PGA and USGA for media credentials to some of their golf tournaments and he would regularly get two (one press and one photographers – oddly enough, they never asked why a radio station needed a photographers pass). The 1978 tournament at Oakmont was one of the first where we pulled this little act (btw – they have wizened up and no longer give out press credentials to radio stations outside of a 50 mile radius of the tournament site).
The access that the credentials provided us was incredible. Not only could we enjoy the numerous benefits of the press tent but we also had access to the course. The way that most media covered the tournament was to sit in the media tent and watch the tournament on TV (more on that later). Then, following competition of their round, each player would come into the interview tent and handle and questions by the media. Rarely did they venture onto the course. Not Tod and I though. We would spend the day on the course walking along with the players.
Friday was the first day that we hit the course. I took a vacation day from work. Because hosting a major championship in town was such a major deal many of our office sales team took customers to the tournament so there were a lot of fellow IBMers at Oakmont. Early in Fridays round Tod and I decided to follow Jack Nicklaus. After Jack’s tee shot on two, Tod and I are strolling up the second fairway about twenty feet behind Jack and his caddy when I here this voice yell “Yo Fall”. I look over and there’s the IBM Branch Manager, Scotty Theissen, behind about five rows of spectators lined up along the fairway. Scotty was about 6’6″ so he stood out from the crowd and could get a good view from behind the others. As soon as I see him, Scotty says “you’d better write a good story” (the press credentials back then were a little different than today – today you hang a placard off of a belt loop, then you had a yellow armband that said PRESS – so Scotty was obviously commenting on the armband). My first thought was “I hope he isn’t upset that I took a day off to come to the tournament”. When I got to work the following Tuesday (more later on why I wasn’t in on Monday), he called me into his office and his comment was “How did you pull that off? I’m impressed.” I think his opinion of me jumped a couple of notches that weekend.
What Tod and I would do for the most part was tag along with the official group that walks along with each golfer. Normally, you’ll have 2-3 golfers, their caddies, a scorer, a standard bearer, a rules official, and maybe a few photographers. The group of us would walk just behind the golfers, and when we got to the green we’d find a spot near the exit walkway and kneel down so we wouldn’t block anyone’s view. We’d do the same thing on the tee when the golfers would tee off.
During one of the rounds, Tod and I were following Tom Watson. We walked up to the 15th tee and before we even got a chance to kneel down a guy standing directly behind me started mouthing off to his friend next to him “Goddamn press. I wait here for hours to see Watson tee off and they come stand right in front of me”. Without hesitation, and with a totally straight face I turned around to him and said “Hey buddy, you’re out here having fun. I’m out here trying to make a living. Cut me a break.” Jeffers had a hard time keeping a straight face.
I mentioned the press tent before. It seems like nothing today with the way that modern technology has advanced but I was really impressed with the IBM computer systems at Oakmont. Remember, there were no PCs then and computers ran in heavily air conditioned back rooms – also there was no such thing as wireless access. At Oakmont though, IBM had wired the entire course. A data entry person would sit just off of each green and they would enter players scores as they completed each hole. That would be immediately transferred back to the main computer that sat in a refrigerated trailer just outside of the press tent. In the press tent there were a series of terminals hooked into the mainframe so that the press could check on the stats at any point in time.
One of the afternoons, Tod and I were in the press tent when we heard a roar go up out on the golf course. A hole in one roar at a major tournament is different than any other. It was immediately obvious that someone had sunk one somewhere out on the course (actually from the direction it came, we were reasonable sure it was hole #8. I walked over to one of the terminals and typed in the request for current stats for #8. Sure enough within seconds, up popped a 1 next to Gil Morgan’s name (the eighth hole is the one that’s playing at around 270-280 for this tournament – Morgan dunked his tee shot on the fly for his one with the hole playing at 242). At the time that absolutely amazed me. Of course, with today’s technology, the exact same data, and much, much more, is instantly available to everyone around the world via the internet but in ’78 that was quite impressive.
By Sunday, Tod and I pretty well had the course mapped out. We knew exactly where to stand to get on camera – and we did. All the TV shots came from fixed cameras on the tees or behind the greens – there were no roving fairway cameras then. Since we could walk with the players, we would make sure that we stood behind the players so that they were always directly between us and the camera on the hole. That meant that we got on MANY times. There was one memorable shot that I can remember quite well.  It came on #3 when Johnny Miller put his shot onto one of the mounds between the church pew bunkers.  Johnny stood on top of the mound to take his shot and Tod and I were directly behind him.  Because the camera shot was a telephoto from behind the green it looked like we were about two feet from him when the reality was we were a good 20-25 feet.
About an hour or so after the tournament was over I got a phone call from Mother and she went on to repeat the following conversation she had with Dad to me.
DAD (from the TV room watching golf): “Eileen – get in here!”
MOM: “What? Why?”
DAD: “I think I just saw your son on TV”.
MOM (now in the room with him): “Where?”
DAD: “Wait a second until this guy tees up. He’ll be standing right behind him.”
MOM (with the camera now on us): “Well. I don’t know. That sort of looks like him – I guess it could be… Wait a minute. That’s definitely he’s friend Tod next to him so it must be.”
My own mother doesn’t recognize me but recognizes Tod.
John Mahaffey won the tournament in a three-way playoff with Tom Watson and Jerry Pate shooting a 276. Mahaffey made up 7 strokes on Watson over the last 14 holes to take the title. Tod and I followed Watson around for the final nine but not didn’t hang around for the playoff.  In those days, tradition called for dropping the ropes behind the final group as they came up 18.  The fans who rushed in behind the players were quite careful to respect the players space but they had no such concern for us “media” types. It was too much work fighting our way through the masses to get inside the ropes coming up 18 and we knew it would be the same way for the playoff so we bailed (in those days the playoffs weren’t set up just for TV either – players went right onto the first tee and played from there – the didn’t follow any of the weird playoff formats we have now).
So while the tournament ended on Sunday for most of the participants, it didn’t for us. Another tradition for the majors is that on the Monday following the tournament, the host course is open to the media for free play. THAT was an opportunity that Tod and I were not about to pass up. Unfortunately, Mother Nature did not cooperate. Come Monday and it was pouring rain. We went out and tried to play anyway but it was just too much and we had to quit after nine. Still it was an incredible experience, one that I would love to repeat sometime.
Tomorrow, I’m going to be able to relive part of it but it won’t quite be the same. Randy Woolridge and I are headed to Oakmont to watch the Sunday round. The bad news is that we don’t have press credentials.  The good news is that we have VIP privileges (Randy got the tickets from a big time banker friend in Pittsburgh) which includes access to the Pittsburgh Steeler corporate hospitality tent located just off of the eighteenth hole. I’m looking forward to the experience and will report back on Monday.
Look what I stumbled upon!
in my never ending crawl through the depths of the internet I occasionally find a gem – and this is one of those times.
Here are the original rules for the Fall Family Cup competition at the Battle of Battle Creek.
Thanks go to Gary for the wonderful header photo (and me for sanitizing it).
Fall Family Champion
There is a new champion. Ron, Steve B, Nick (Ex champion), and I played Tuesday. We had three pretty nice days of weather here. Anyway, we played a points game. Six points for low man, 4 for 2nd, 2 for 3rd and zero for 4th per hole net.
Nick started slowly taking only 2 points in the first 4 holes, but made a charge on the last 4 holes of the front nine. I believe he picked up around 17 point for those holes. He was still trailing Ron and I, but was defending valiantly. Unfortunatly, he started the back nine about the same way. With five holes to play Steve B. and Nick were pretty much out of it. I was trailing by about 5 points and could have jumped to the top of the leaderboard if I was just able to knock down a couple of putts on the next 2 holes. Too bad for me, I wasn’t up to the task. On 16 I pretty much handed the championship to Ron by knocking 2 tee shots OB, but Ron let me back in the game by moving a 20 ft chip about 1 foot. He took 3rd on the hole for 2 points. I got zero.
Two holes to play and I was down 5 points. (By the way this is all by memeory so I may be a little off.) Ron bogeys the hole to lock up 2 points. I have a 6 foot parr putt to tie Nick to give me a much needed 5 points. MISS AGAIN, DAMN. I tie Ron and we both get 3 points. I need a miracle on 18. It doesn’t happen. Ron wins and is now the proud owner of 2 shirts and a hat. We still need the 2nd shirt embroidered Ron. Congratulations to Ron.
Get ready for your chance next year boys and girls. You know you can pretty much depend on an opportunity to win this coveted title at The Battle of Battle Creek. For those not aware I beleive The Battle will become a mandatory 4 day event next year.
NEW Fall Family Champion
Sorry this has taken a while to get to all of you. As you are all aware Ron is not the Fall Family Champ and neither am I.
Nick and I played about 4 weeks ago. Since Nick had not played all year, and if you’ve ever seen his game, I figured match play a stroke a hole would be pretty easy for me to retain my title. Well, unfortunatly, I was wrong. I beleive the final was something like 6 and 5. He shot 103. I shot 94. His 103 wasn’t a real indication of how well he shot during the match play. Once he had it won he wasn’t quite as focused as he was on the first 12 holes. He should have broken 100 easy.
Anyway, he has both the shirts and the hat. I have tried unsuccesfully to get another match this year, but Nick is going to school full time and putting in about 25-30 hours a week at IKEA. By the way, his emploeyee discount is 15% if anyone was to take advantage.
Since the weather is changing rapidly I beleive Nick will have this title into 2007. Get your plans together now to challenge him before Battle Creek or we may not have our tournament in a tournament event next year.
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