Last weekend was a double first for me–first time at a Champions Tour event and first time at a USGA championship (as opposed to sectional/local qualifier). On both accounts, it was a freaking blast. I’ll leave it to the national outlets to tell the story of the golf action, what I want to do here is convey the event as I experienced it. Specifically, my plan wasn’t to follow ‘the action’ as much as it was to follow a handful of players I really wanted to see in person. What follows is a casual report of sorts on my experiences, separated out by day. I hope you enjoy, but more importantly, I hope you have the chance to get out and watch some golf wherever you are.
View of the 9th green at Scioto.
Thursday:
-Got to the grounds early. Hot and humid, even before 9am. Was going to be a scorcher! Up first on my to-do list was catching up with the Tommy Armour III/Mark Wiebe/Scott Hoch trio. Main draw being TA3. Guy is old school cool. For my money the best hair/visor combo in the game. Much more on him to come.
-Didn’t take long walking with the group to notice Scott Hoch seems crusty AF. Exudes saltiness. Can certainly understand why he has a reputation of sorts, which made the following interaction even more enjoyable. Scott is walking off the 8th green when this jolly middle-aged guy, beer in hand, enthusiastically turns from his buddy and hollers at Scott, “Hey Scott, remember #11 at Muirfield the year you won? That was awesome!” Scott kind of double-takes the guy, gives him a curt, “yeah,” and keeps on moving. I assumed the guy was trying to wax nostalgic about a Hoch win at the Memorial several years back, but it wasn’t until I got home that night and looked up past Memorial champions that I realized Hoch never won the Memorial. I’m not sure if the guy had him confused for somebody else (Hale Irwin maybe?) or was just messing with him, but I sincerely hope it was the latter. And if so, guy is a first-order legend and I missed an opportunity to hang with him.
Quick word on Mark Wiebe. Unlike Hoch, I liked the energy Mark was putting out there. Big fella was battling the heat, though, and all jokes aside had me a little worried. What I liked most about Mark, aside from the crisp Cherry Hills visor and sunglasses hanging off his back pocket, was the Jerry Tarkanian sweat towel he kept on him at all times. GREAT look.
The vastly entertaining trio of Scott Hoch, Mark Wiebe and Tommy Armour III.
-You know what you don’t hear these days? The click-clack of golf spikes on pavement. It’s a fantastic sound, always transports me back in time. I got to hear it following TA3. The OG spikes meant extra duty for his caddie. After TA holed out on each green, his caddie would go about meticulously trying to retrace his footsteps across the green. Looked like a penguin doing a little shuffle out there. Hope he got an extra point or two on that check from Boss Man.
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-After about nine holes with the fellas I showed myself out and went in search of Monty. As it was, I found the great man and his group around the 6th green, heading to 7 tee. Grouped with Monty were Kenny Perry and Olin Browne. Guys, Kenny Perry’s hat rides high. I wish I could do justice to how far up on his cranium that thing rests. It was perched. I tried to capture it in the picture below.
Perry’s hat
-Thursday afternoon was my scheduled time to follow a couple amateurs that piqued my interest, Pat Tallent and Mike McCoy. Pat is a former shooting guard who played collegiately at George Washington and could straight fill it. What I learned quickly, too, is he puts a buttery move on his ball. In essence, he’s out there doing everything I’ve ever wanted to do in life. Big fan of Pat’s. I stayed with his group for several inauspicious holes on the back nine before hitting the eject in search of McCoy. I found him in 8 fairway where he proceeded to pump a long iron to about 15 feet. Alright, alright, alright!
-Here’s my summary of McCoy: most importantly, he’s beyond chill. Enjoys a cigar (or two) out on the course and would get outside the ropes at about every opportunity to chat up the folks in his traveling party. Honestly, it seemed like he was out there playing a weekend money game with some friends, not competing in a US Open. His game is very aggressive, or at least was this week. I think he hit Driver on every hole. While not crazy long, he was getting it out there past Romero and Chapman. Iron play was very crisp, gets steep on a short iron. He didn’t score very well on Thursday (75, +5) largely due to a couple of three putts (at the 8th and 9th) and two big misses with short irons coming home (on #16 his ball just missed checking up to a back pin with shaved run-off past the hole–greatly respected going after the pin). All in all, after having read about his numerous accomplishments in the game and curious to see what he was all about, both in person and as a shot-maker, I can say he did not disappoint in either respect and I left with even more admiration for him.
Mike McCoy enjoying a cigar and some golf.
-Amusing scene with this group on the par-3 17th. Eduardo Romero had hit a good, not great, shot that ended up hitting in the middle but running through to the back collar. Anyway, these two older gentleman posted up next to the box really enjoyed the shot (I don’t think they could see where it ended up) and started congratulating Eduardo. Oh man, what a great shot! Best we’ve seen all day and we’ve been here for a few hours! That type of stuff for maybe 15 to 20 seconds. Really mild, good-natured congratulations. While this was going on–Romero is politely nodding and smiling–Chapman has pegged his ball, is standing there looking at the guys, and finally shoots an icy, “we ready, guys?” at the older gentlemen. That was enough to get me laughing to myself when Romero catches my eye and gives kind of a half nod/half eye-roll Chapman’s way with a big smile on his face. Kind of a, ‘how bout this guy?’ look. I make a quick yikes face and we both laugh a little and then everybody carried on. Point of the story here is twofold–completely random little situations like this are my favorite part of going to golf tournaments, and guys, Roger Chapman would like to play his damn shot.
-Coming down the 18th I got to chatting with McCoy’s girlfriend. Extremely nice lady. Couldn’t believe I was actually out there to watch Mike play. In fact, when she asked me why and I started rattling off his golfing resume I think she may have been a bit concerned……just kidding (kind of). For my effort she insisted on introducing me to Mike after the round, which was a pleasant surprise. We exchanged a handshake and a few words. He had bogeyed #18 so I made sure to keep it short and sweet. I say all this to highlight another of my favorite things about going to golf tournaments–trying to guess which of the people in the hole-to-hole walking crowd are in which player’s travelling party.
Saturday:
-First up was Monty. Again. Needed him. He’s so much fun in person because you get to take in the whole act of him getting miffed by the slightest noise and smallest misstep in the gallery. After this weekend he’s comfortably in my top-5 for favorite golfers. On this day he was playing with Takeshi Sakiyama (awesomely kind dude who loves cigarettes) and Billy Andrade (sports the MLB hat a la Spence, so you know he’s good people).
These people Saturday may not have been conscious.
-On 5 green Monty was in full force. There was some DEEP background activity that had his attention prior to his 4 to 6 foot par putt. I mean deep, like 15 yards off the green to a cart path, and then up a decent little hill to a concession area. He probably spent 45 seconds with his hand up in the air just looking in the general direction. Wasn’t going to get the entire concession area dead silent, though, so he finally missed his putt (obviously) and then snatched the ball out of the hole and marched off the green all petulant and unbelieving of the tragedy that had befallen him. It was tremendous theater. He really hams up the injustice for the gallery. The absolute best.
-What’s easy to lose in all of Monty’s actions is the guy detonates his woods and long irons. Flushes the shit out of them. Tremendous ball striker and a definite treat to watch in that regard. Short game doesn’t do much for me, but I could watch him pierce 3-wood off the tee hole after hole.
-I left Monty after 9 holes to once again follow TA3. He was matched up with Mike Small (Illinois golf coach) and Grant Waite. And I gotta say, TA was going about things more than a bit deliberately on Saturday. First, his walk never goes beyond a casual stroll. Second, he’s using Aim Point on the greens, so he was feeling around with his feet quite a bit (poor caddie). Anyway, I think it was really pissing off Mike Small. At one point coming off 5 green he mumbled something about pace of play to the wa
Source: https://nolayingup.com/blog/musings-first-two-rounds-us-senior-open