Iss. #184 | D1 Collegiate Golf Was In Our Reach

Iss. #184 | D1 Collegiate Golf Was In Our Reach

(Sigh) What could've been...  

D1 COLLEGIATE GOLF WAS IN REACH

What you see here is a breakdown that Golf Digest put out of all D1 men's college golf teams and the scoring averages by player.
 
What you see here is definitive proof that I (and a decent amount of you) could've been a D1 college golfer.
 
What we don't see is what happens between Creighton and St. Francis on this list—and whether it's literally just the St. Francis College-NY team I potentially could've joined and challenged their 5-7th best players.
 
And the flip side of this chart, seeing an entire Pepperdine team averaging below par, is mind-boggling. 
 
Speaking of mind-boggling...
 
I toured Pepperdine, actually, when I was looking at colleges in high school. Well, let me back up, my family drove onto the Pepperdine campus when I was looking at colleges in high school. I took one look at the string of Porsches, BMWs and Mercedes lining the winding road up to the campus and literally turned to my parents and said, I don't think this is for me.
 
I'd have to imagine a pasty kid from suburban Chicago, still sporting a pair or two or cargo shorts, driving a Mazda Protege 5 hatchback onto the hallowed grounds might have stuck out a bit.

Come. Watch with me.  

FULL SWING S2: EPISODE 2 THOUGHTS

We picked up this week with the now infamous June 6th announcement where Jay Monahan and the prince announced a merger between the PGA and LIV on... CNBC. 
 
I wonder if there will come a day when I suddenly become a CNBC viewer. It's ESPN for money. I get it. And I do have a high yield savings account so I like to think of myself as a finance guy obviously.
 
But also, who has time for that when Summer House is back? Carl is so screwed. Lindsay's not the one, man.
 
EPISODE TITLE:
The Game Has Changed Part 2
 
TAKEAWAY 1:
What a joke that June announcement was. It's made even more of a joke as it's now March 2024 and Jay has nothing additional to say about the MERGER that he dropped on his members last June.
 
I might as well go on IG Live and announce I'm joining the broadcast team for the next iteration of The Match if we require zero amount of evidence or timelines for these kind of things.
 
You could feel the animosity in so many of the one-off moments this episode, too. Tom Kim giving some major 'tude at the check-in table. The light disappearing from Rahm's eyes as he realized that he better take that LIV check while he could. Not good.
 
TAKEAWAY 2:
Butch Harmon. What a G.
 
My man just said screw it, I'm not traveling with these pros anymore. If they want to learn from me, they come to my compound. And Rickie said, yep I'm on my way.
 
I guess that's the respect you get after coaching Tiger and Phil... but still you can just see in the footage that he doesn't give a single F anymore.
 
AND his son is an equally elite golf coach as well? I Googled it about ten times because I felt like I was being duped.
 
While Butch gives off that sage, older wisdom kind of energy. Claude... Claude seems like an intense guy. That's all I'll say. 
          
TAKEAWAY 3:
I really don't appreciate the sensation that is Rickie Fowler. Rickie left motocross, donned full-on neon orange outfits, and wore flat brim hats so low they literally covered half his ear... and was immediately one of the better golfers on Tour.
 
Another thing I didn't appreciate about Rickie until this episode? His hops!
 
At one point, we join Rickie for a backyard workout at his Florida home and he's doing these jumps over hurdles. Only, it isn't like mid-shin hurdles like I used to jump over during my F45 days. (Life update from me, after a 4-year hiatus, "Operation Lose the Dad Bod" has begun and I've joined a boxing-style workout class situation. It's once a week, but I think I'm already seeing an ab start to poke its way through. Like that little lima bean we all planted in a wet paper towel in grade school. Jusssssst a peak.)
 
Back to Rickie, he's like a f*@#^^& kangaroo. Legit bouncing over these hip height hurdles with ease. I paused the show I was so stunned.
 
Another point of appreciation for Rickie, the olympic rings tattoo is legit. I'm not a tattoo guy. There isn't anything I really like looking at enough to wear always, for the rest of my life, and watch slowly deform as I grow older and my skin sags.
 
But the forearm rings are so bada$$.
 
Finally, and I fully recognize it's because I'm a dad now and can hear my mid-20's self rolling his eyes, but the presser moments at the end of tournaments where the champion has their toddler with them? Priceless.
 
I was imagining holding Jack-Jack up as he screams his newest favorite phrase "Dinosaur eggs" at poor Amanda Balionis. And you just got to smile. Kids do say the darndest things.
 
EPISODE GRADE:
B
 
Didn't love the split focus with the first half being largely around the June 6th news, followed by a DJ and Rickie Fowler showcase. Honestly, I could've gone full Rickie and seen another 20 minutes of his life on Tour, what's he doing during off days, what's the story with that friend who travels with him... there was meat on the bone.
 
But overall, the storytelling leap from season 1 to 2 has been excellent. Way beyond the surface level sound bites we got the first time around and it's already made a huge difference for me.

You sand baggin' son of a—

GOLF'S TED LASSO?


AppleTV+ announced the star of their new comedy series set in the world of golf—Owen Wilson.

Here's all we know so far about the series...

Wilson will play Pryce Cahill, whose golf career ended prematurely 20 years ago. After he gets fired from his job at a sporting goods store in Indiana and his wife leaves him, Pryce sees a troubled 17-year-old golf phenom as his way back.

The creator is the guy behind Ford v. Ferrari which didn't strike me as a funny movie but I never saw it so... maybe I missed it.

And the producers are NUMEROUS but some solid comedy chops in Ben Silverman and Lee Eisenberg, both were involved during the peak seasons of The Office.

I think the nugget I'm most excited by in this entire project is that it's set in Indiana. It's giving me some Parks and Rec quirk and license to have some super odd but good natured supporting characters in the town.

I'm picturing Stephen Root (aka the Stapler guy from Office Space) as the sporting goods store manager maybe?

Who reads?

GOLF BOOKS ARE HARD


In preparation for what should be an EPIC trip to Bandon Dunes with some buddies in September, a buddy of mine lended me a copy of this book.

As you can probably tell, it details Mike Kaiser's backstory and how Bandon Dunes came to be.

And I have to admit, I've been pumped to learn as much as possible about Bandon before I go. But I was skeptical about how a book could accurately capture the feeling of golf. I have tried a few that didn't really attempt to capture the look and feel of a course, it was just more the plot of whatever people happened to be golfers.

I'll say this, I'm a quarter in so far because the hours—scratch that—minutes that I have each day to read are around 9-9:30p each night in bed and I make it roughly 5-10 pages before I fall asleep. Not ideal.

But from what I've read so far, this Goodwin guy's got it. I'm only at the part where he describes Kaiser's nine hole project in Michigan called The Dunes Club and I'm already drooling over trekking to New Buffalo to try and see it.

All this to say, send me some good golf book recommendations!

A final fun reading anecdote. On our first date, my wife asked me somewhat judgmentally, "So do you, like, read?" Apparently my talk of loving Tom Hanks and writing a fan blog about his and Tom Cruise's movies led her to the conclusion that I wasn't the sharpest of minds...

And honestly, I bet I've subconsciously wanted to read in front of her ever since.

A lesson in niche-ing down

GOLF BAGS FOR TODDLERS


Quick story to wrap things up.

I came across this super small golf bag company called Charlie Golf Co. From what I can gather it's a dad in the midwest who is making these premium-looking waxed canvas and leather golf bags... for toddlers.

The entire thing measures about 20" so kids aged 2-5 can carry with ease.

The style is on point and it seems like he can only produce like 300-400 at a time so they sell out within hours.

I won't get too deep here as I worry my father-son content scale has already tipped way too far this week on the Rickie section. But just major respect to someone who is bootstrapping it from their garage. Bad Birdie didn't start too different... so who knows, in a few years maybe they'll need someone to write a newsletter too.

Have a Breakfast Balls-worthy tip? Secrets to teaching a toddler to love golf? Want to play some G?

Hit me up! The hot line is always open. 

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