While you recover from your Thanksgiving food hangover caused by massive consumption of turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, rolls, cranberries and assorted other goodies, we offer these Friday-after additives from the world of golf.
Friday after Thanksgiving is one of the days that finds golf courses in warm-weather climates crowded to the max. It is golf’s equivalent of Black Friday where every course and club make some money. Dogleg News supports and encourages fast play and keeping with that theme, we offer these quick and easily digestable shorts from the world of golf.
BUBBA FOR MAYOR?
Okay, everyone needs a great post-Thanksgiving laugh and leave it to the Attention-Deficit-Disorder mind of Bubba Watson to supply us with one. In a recent chat with a scribe from the Associated Press, Bubba came up with this:
“I had a dream. I moved back in the city limits of Pensacola so one day I can run for mayor.”
Once you stop laughing, Bubba does have pretty decent community involvement in Pensacola. He owns part of the minor league baseball team — the Pensacola Blue Wahoos. He has a car dealership, a candy store (Bubba’s Sweet Spot) and is contemplating adding a robotics company to his endeavors.
Still, you would have to wonder how Bubba and politics might mix. He could be a Wahoo out of water.
MATTHEW’S CLIMB TO 29
After his victory in the European Tour’s season-ending DP World Tour Championship, former U.S. Amateur Champion Matthew Fitzpatrick of England has broken into the top 30 in the Official World Golf Rankings. Fitz is now no. 29 and has set the table for a big push in 2017.
MACKENZIE ON THE MOVE
Mackenzie Hughes, who changed his life by winning the RSM Classic in Sea Island in a Monday playoff, jumped form no. 287 to 110 in the world rankings. He also jumped into a higher tier on the PGA Tour and guaranteed himself a two-year exemption along with spots in the Masters, the PGA and all the big invitationals like Jack Nicklaus’ Memorial and the Arnold Palmer Bay Hill.
KOEPKA SHOOTS 21-UNDER
Brooks Koepka picked up his seventh professional win last week in Japan at the Dunlop Phoenix Cup. He beat a field of 84 players, most of them from the Japanese Tour. He closed with a 65 to shoot 21-under par but he only won by a shot over hard-charging Yuta Ikeda who thrilled his homeland with a final-round 61 that put the heat on Koepka.
ARNIE’S YOUNGER BROTHER PASSES
The golf world lost legend Arnold Palmer on Sept. 25. The Palmer family had to deal with another passing last Saturday when they lost Jerry, Arnold’s younger brother who was only 72, 15 years younger than his famous brother. Jerry was a long-time member of the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America and was the superintendent at Latrobe Country Club. He was a Penn State grad with a degree in turf grass management.
PEGGY KIRK BELL DIES AT AGE 95
One of golf’s most famous ladies died this week at age 95. Peggy Kirk Bell was one of the early pioneers in women’s golf as a player and a teacher. She owned and operated the Pine Needles and Mid-Pines Resorts in Southern Pines, N.C. and played host to three women’s U.S. Opens at Mid-Pines over the years. She won a major championship on the LPGA Tour as an amateur and became a Hall Of Fame instructor.
Her children will continue to own and operate the family-owned facilities in Southern Pines.
SPIETH’S EPIC VACATION
Jordan Spieth took an unprecedented six-week vacation then went to Australia and won the Aussie Open, again. The last time he won, he had his monster year on the PGA Tour in 2015 when he won the Masters, the U.S. Open and had himself in position to win the British.
He could be the guy to watch next week when Tiger Woods makes his return at the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas.
