Iss. #137 | Augusta Hangover Week—Grab Your Advil & Gatorade

Not gonna lie, was feeling pretttttaayyyyy good about myself last Sunday when Brooks and Rahm, two of my top five Masters dinner picks, battled it out.

Better yet, Rahm is already discussing his dinner plans and better BETTER yet, he took my celebrity chef advice! 

“Chef José Andrés is a really good friend of mine, so I'll be working with him. I think I have one of the appetizers down, which would be jambon [Spanish square pastries with ham inside], the dessert, which I won't be disclosing, and the wine. Everything in between is still up in the air.”

Mystery dessert???

Some light-to-moderate googling about José Andrés dessert specialties has me circling two possibilities here. 

The first and most likely possibility is a basque cheesecake. Available for the low low price on Goldbelly of $120! - this is apparently a must-order from José's Mercado Little Spain. Golden on top with a creamy center and overall nutty caramel notes. It's got a direct connection to Spain as well which I think will be crucial in Rahm's final menu offering.

The second and least likely possibility is the iconic, experimental dessert from José's Beverly Hills restaurant—The Bazaar. How epic would it be if Rahm and Andrés roll into the clubhouse dining room and drop a Dessert Graffiti on everyone's table. The Jackson Pollock-like dessert is an explosion of chocolates, sweets, and sauces that's plated directly onto the table itself. I'm picturing some azaleas scattered around, heavy emphasis on the masters green and gold. Pops of red. 

Just sayin'.

I wish I had more text threads

BIRDIES & BABIES

A delightful story from Rahm's victory speech was around a text he received from NFL star Zach Ertz before teeing off in Round 1.

As you see in the screenshot above, Zach sent: "First hole green looks like a walk in the park."

Now, we all know Jon went on to 4-putt the first for a double bogey so he gave Zach a healthy amount of crap for the jinx.

Zach, however, claims that Jon said he has never smiled or laughed more after a 4-putt in his life. So really maybe Zach deserves credit, not the blame, for ensuring Rahm didn't mentally crater after a nightmarish start.

But what I was most interested in was the actual thread itself... as it only involves three people. Rahm, Ertz... and JJ Watt.

And they've dubbed the thread, Birdies & Babies. I assume this is a result of Rahm being an Arizona State guy and Watt and Ertz being Cardinals so there's at least some connection.

But if this is some larger fatherly support group for dads who golf—then let me be the first to ask for a hook-up to any SD area dads who golf. Going to need a support group out here and I see a world where it becomes some sort of a kid-share/weekly foursome kind of thing. Lot of possibility. Hit me up.

PGA v. LIV? Weak sauce.

THE REAL RIVALRY BEGINS

As it turned out, the whole PGA v. LIV rivalry turned out to be a non-factor for on-course shenanigans. Did it make Sunday more interesting for the viewer because of the additional drama? Sure. But functionally, I don't think we really heard any stories of animosity between players. Just some heavy shade thrown by way of tee time pairings and countless hours of talking heads making it into a thing.

The REAL rivalry to emerge from Augusta was the age-old battle over pace of play. Not sure what the average wait time for pros is on the tee, but 97 minutes is creeping up on Los Angeles muni wait times—and trust me, no one wants to deal with that.

In the same way baseball finally acknowledged it had a wait time problem, golf could easily adopt the same and standardize the process across its tournaments. 

And for anyone who thinks about siding with Cantlay (the alleged slow play god), take a look at this video from Zire Golf... YIKES.

Took me a while to be convinced it wasn't some trick, looped video. It is not. 

'Cuz if you got the poison...

I'VE GOT THE REMEDY

Dropping Jason Mraz lyrics in a Breakfast Balls?? They said it couldn't be done!

In the spirit of solving pace of play issues, I surface this golf course concept I saw on golf.com about a month back.

Yes, what you are seeing is a Choose Your Own Adventure-style golf course.

Which sends me back to my days in the back seat of our family's Dodge Caravan heading to the Wisconsin Dells. (Slight tangent, the Dells easily is one of the best dollar-to-fun ratio family destinations the world has ever seen. I've spent many summer days in the Great Wolf Lodge arcade or begging the ride operator at the Noah's Ark water log ride to let us go back to back to back to back at the end of the day. Also, excellent go karting. But anyways, back to the actual point.) And in that back seat I'd be flipping madly between the pages of my Choose Your Own Adventure book trying not to die a gruesome death as seemingly every decision I'd make led to peril.

Well, this course is like that. Kind of.

Basically, they plotted two nine hole courses running side by side with adjacent tee boxes. The holes would differ slightly in bunkering, hazards and slope. Two foursomes could play the side by side holes, and whichever foursome finished their hole first would get first choice at the next hole to play. Essentially allowing fast groups to skirt around slow groups on the subsequent tee box.

I'm sure people who know more about golf routing will tell me this is an insane idea that would practically never work. But hey, I appreciate people trying new things.

Full Swing: Episode 7

MY WATCHALONG RECAP-APALOOZA

And now for the penultimate edition of the section that readers have stopped commenting on entirely. These are my Full Swing Episode 7 thoughts.

In this week's edition, we follow the newbies—Sahith and Mito. And before the episode even begins, we kinda know where this tale is going to go... pobre Mito!

- Again there's mention of PGA cliques and guys sharing houses as they travel. Would love to get a complete rundown of these cliques. Though the Mito-Joaquin connection makes their jump to LIV all the more obvious.

- PG-13 content warning!! Absolute master class in Bart Simpson-style pranks from whoever these pre-teens are. Mike Oxlong. Classic.

- Sahith. My dude. The cardboard box hamper is painful to watch. I hate laundry. Everyone does. But even I, at the depths of my college, DGAF laundry days, still had a proper hamper. Hey, Pottery Barn, can we get Sahith a little in-kind partnership deal here?

- Meanwhile, in Scottsdale, we've got Sahith's 8th grade PE teacher reppin' HARD. Homemade shirt and everything. I guess heartwarming from an "everyone loves Sahith" story perspective—but also, kinda creepy. 

- Master class in golf dad role modeling here from Sahith's dad, Murli. <Taking notes for Jack.>

- Mito-chondria joke?! Mr. Smiley, my AP Bio teacher would be so proud. AP in high school flex? You better believe it. CREDITS ON CREDITS FOR YA BOY.

- That's going to be about as close as we get to Tiger in this series, I think. I will be stunned if he ever agrees to be on this series. 

- Mito and Joaquin kinda turn up at these BBQs. Bell peppers with eggs frying inside. Steaks that go on for miles. And a mysterious piscola recipe that I have to assume is just Pisco and Diet Coke?

- The rest was really just car-crash level squirming around the Mito collapse at the PGA. And while I admit I don't know the finer points around game management and player-caddie relationships, after seeing that 18th hole collapse... kinda-- sorta-- maybe-- seemed like the caddie dropped the ball. Call your boy off the driver. Maybe have him walk a full circle around the chip on 18. Maybe offer some more line reading tips on the putting? But what do I know?

OVERALL RATING: 6/10 - It was fine. Sahith seems like a great dude and probably in the top spot for pros I'd be most likely to get along with. Reminded me of a few buddies I had in high school. Would've loved about 15% more background on Sahith's family or 15% more around what Mito and Joaquin mean to Chilean people as I understand they're a big deal. 

Your homework for this week:

Episode 8—RORY TIME

Have a Breakfast Balls-worthy tip? Secrets to teaching an infant to love golf from day one?

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