No Laying Up - Golf Podcast - NLU Podcast, Episode 431: AT&T Byron Nelson Recap & Andy Roddick Interview

Episode Date: May 17, 2021

K.H. Lee wins in Dallas, and we discuss his emotional win, his rise, TPC Craig Ranch, Sam Burns, Spieth, Berger, Kiawah, Richard Bland, the NCAA Women's Regional fiasco, Korn Ferry Tour, and a lot more. On the back end, Soly chats with Sweetens Cove co-owner Andy Roddick (58:45) about his golf journey, an awesome Sergio Garcia story, what makes Sweetens special, and more.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm going to be the right club today. Yes! That is better than most. I'm not in. That is better than most. Better than most. is traveling and we are welcoming in Cody McBride, my friend and colleague, if you will, many people in the internet are asking, who is Cody? So please help us out, who is Cody? That's right, first hello friends, how you guys doing. I mean, where do I start? I think more no laying up specifically from the Traptor-Assadirabia fame or maybe Taurus-Auskaren-Linas,

where we walked around Southern Pine's golf club with Justin Hubert who by the way had an awesome week out on the Corn Ferry Tour. But who I am, I guess you would say I'm the newest member of Nulling Up, started the beginning of the year doing a lot of back-end stuff and slowly migrating my way up to the front-end to get more involved in content as we go. But excited to be here. First big pod and I'm so happy that it's with you. Well, we are excited to have you.

You're going to be in charge of keeping me positive for this week. We got a lot to get to. Before we do that, no-ling up is brought to you by our friends at the Draft King Sportsbook. You can get 100 to 1 odds on Bryson DeChambo recording at least one birdie this weekend. That's right, turned $1 into $100 in free credits.

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or Indiana 1-109 with it. Quick run of show here. Cody and I are going to recap everything from this past week and golf, and then on the very end of this podcast, I did an interview with Andy Roddick earlier this past week in Dallas talking all things Sweden's Cove, golf, Sir Joe Garcia, Sweden's Cove, Bourbon, all kinds of things.

So stick around for that at the end. A lot to get to, KH-Lee has won the AT&T Byron Nelson, Dick Bland wins on the European tour, Grayson Sigg wins on the corn fairy tour, Dickie Pride wins on the champions tour. And of course, Matthew Fowdo wins the Sonny Dale Golf Club Spring Meeting, Nine Hitty Cap and Under Division. Cody, where do we start? That's a heavy list to start there. I am so impressed with KHLI though. I mean, I know that's not the direction that everybody wants us to go, but phenomenal win for a guy who's literally been out there grinding at it for a long time. And if you want to look at the path

of where he started, you know, being born in Korea and not from the best financial standpoint, to grind it out, playing, you know, Japan tour, back to Korea, finally making enough to come back to the States, pick it up, play corn fairy, and then move up, secure his PJ tour card now as a PJ tour winner. It's a phenomenal story, and I'm so excited that, you know, people are actually gonna get more involved with it. He's been quietly playing some good golf,

but doesn't have a ton of great finishes. He's been one of those guys that kind of pops up in the leaderboard either Thursday, Friday or Saturday has, you know, they go a bad round on the weekend. It, you know, kind of helps them fly under the radar a little bit, but having a guy like Brett Wallman on the bag, I don't know when exactly Brett got on the bag, but it's, I feel like I see a lot more of KH Lee ever since Waldo got on the bag,

who he's a tremendous caddy and has had a lot of success and a lot of various on the PGA tour. But gosh, his post-round interview kind of got to me a little bit just like how excited he was. Of course, he's excited. He just won his first tour event, but really trying hard his best. He looked nervous as heck trying to speak English, and we know he've covered this in the past with other international winners that maybe aren't that comfortable in English, but

are willing to brave themselves and put themselves out there. And potentially, I mean, it's just a, it's something that, you know, a lot of people probably don't appreciate, but that moment kind of got to me a little bit. And what was otherwise, if we're being honest, a very boring weekend in golf? I completely agree with that. I mean, the course set up wise probably wasn't what everybody expected, you know, especially the first year in moving from Trinity Forest. But when you're running Zoyja, you know, fairways with bank greens and you get that much water, there's not a lot of options you can do.

To happy there's a great champion, the interview afterwards, I'm right there with you. I mean, for a guy who was kind of struggling to get through it, but he actually worked and fought through it. You know, you actually got to hear how his thoughts and feelings were on it. I do want to give a quick shout out to Jim Park, who is right there. So I don't know if he's his full time instructor,

but phenomenal player at Arizona State University, full time instructor now out in Scottsdale, and his bend with cage for a while now. And it's so cool to see the Korean delegation at the back of the green. And I know other times whether it's Bubba or Ricky or anybody else, you know, we like to give it a lot of shit. But in instances like this, it shows how much

it actually means to them, you know. A win is huge, not only for their standing and points wise on the made up, you know, FedEx couple list, but also, you but also how they stand back home in their country and financial security moving forward. It's just great to see and I could not be more happy for him. Well, and speaking of which, Ryan loves golf won Synthesis Over and I was trying to look this up while we were in delay, but I didn't realize he won the gold medal at the 2010 Asian

Games and that exempts him from two-year military conscription in Korea, which I was looking up when he was going to be doing his service. And I did not know that he was exempt from his service. That just found that very interesting. That's true. So, when you talk about Sun Kang defending champion here and what he kind of has in the back of his head and the mandatory two-year service. When we talk about mandatory two-year service, however, we wanna think about in the States or not,

but I kinda think it's kinda cool and I know that that's part of my military background and service is a big part of it, but once they go and complete their service, they're kind of lost for a little bit. I mean, where is Samu? I mean, I am still searching for him. I know he's

had a couple of starts on Cornfairy, but can't wait for a guy to get back out there because I can only imagine how difficult it is from being one of the top 50 players in the world having two years off and then trying to come back and pick it up immediately again. Yeah. And Sungjae's got that looming as well, but you know, there are things you can achieve in your sporting career that exempt you from military conscription in Korea. I believe it's winning a major as one of them. I don't think the players counts in that regard.

That's, I think the Olympic gold would work there. But it's an interesting, interesting dynamic. I think if, yeah, there wasn't there something with Sang Moon that he was really close to winning near the end of his time before he was time for constriction. I don't know if I remember that right, but well, I think there's also a caveat on there where it's it's a you know, O W G R ranking. And I think he was very, very close to it.

The silly thing about is when we talk about the players, so you hit it right on the head. Four majors obviously ranking if you get a medal in the Olympics now. But also everybody's fighting to get the players at it in there. And this is outside of the conversation of a fifth major or all that hogwash. That's not what we're talking about here, but an elevated event and where does it really stand on the global stage. And right now it's kind of funny that for Korean military service it's not accepted. Some fun notes that got working with the broadcast about K-TL. He loves karaoke. Did not see that one. See that one.

It was a former shot putter and he was inspired by Brooks Keppka to get in shape. He got into golf because he was overweight. He himself said he was overweight and he got into golf at 13 when he wanted to lose weight. You don't see people getting into golf to get themselves from being overweight. It can be a sport for people that are overweight. That's 100% true. Maybe that's the American coming out. On the Craig Ranch front, let's get into that now. Google asks, what is the identity of TPC Craig Ranch just overall thoughts on the course? You talked about with Zoysha Farawroway's bent grass and that much water

that the tour didn't really have a lot they could do there. I personally don't have any fault with any setup or anything they really did with the week. I think my question would just be about TPC Craig Ranch in general, it does seem, I mean, it doesn't seem like a golf course for the PGA tour. I mean, maybe it does seem like a golf course

for the PGA tour and that might be the problem. It seems like the most generic PGA tour course you could possibly draw off. Honestly, it kind of reminded me of TBC Twin Cities. I know why it's wide. They plan for these, you know, Dallas wins that are frequent, but just aren't frequent in May. So I'm just kind of left to be confused as to the identity of this event. And I want to throw something at you eventually about a date change potentially for this event. But first, your reaction to Craig Ranch. I thought it, it looks good. And I know I was lucky enough this week

that I actually talked to quite a few members from Craig Ranch. And they said that, hey, the courses in the best shape that they've ever seen it, which is surprising after the showing that it put on TV. But did they slow the green stone for the tournament? They definitely slowed the green stone. I'll say this. It's very weird that I think timing-wise, like I said earlier, the first year of moving

from Trinity Forest in Craig Ranch was not taken off guard by the move by any means. But you see there's some fresh saw out there and I know Dallas has had a very tough spring. I saw that when we were out there a couple weeks ago. I think what saved Craig Ranch from everybody else is that they actually had bent greens. When we were out playing, you know, courses that had bermuda greens, they were completely fried out. It almost looked like there was like veins growing underneath the surface. It was a crazy sight. And that's from that late frost heavy snow that they had. But Craig Ranch, it just doesn't really do it for me. I know a lot of people are complaining

because it tips out at 7400 yards. I'm pretty sure that they previously either had a Q-school held there or US Open Local Qualifier, but they did not play at its 7400 this week. So a lot of teas were up The greens were slowed down and when you play ball in hand for Quite a few of the days it just becomes a target range out there Which I honestly don't mind birdie fest now and then, I just hate when there's almost no bite to a course that there's no risk involved with it. I mean, we roll out that first round, and it's 68.75 scoring average.

Like the field averaged three and a half shots under par. I get the par is irrelevant. It's probably really a par 70. I mean, just for these guys, they're hitting irons into some of these par 5s and the scoring average on all the par 5s was below 4.5, you know, on that opening day. It just isn't like, I don't know.

It's not interesting if you don't have a great field and you don't have an interesting golf course. It just is gonna turn into a birdie fest. And I don't know, it just doesn't really activate a whole lot within me. And it Phil Kydell asked, he said, when was the last time the tour was this non-descript, these leaderboards since the masters

have been hard on the eyes. And I think it's just as a result of, you know, I'm kind of combining a lot of things here with Craig Ranch and this little stretch of golf we've had here, but it's just a result of oversaturation in the calendar and we've talked about this quite frequently on this podcast, but yeah, it definitely felt like one of those weeks, it hurt by weather delays and having to stream it online, but it felt like it was a little tough to get some mojo going for this event today. How completely agree? I mean, what is elevated when everything's elevated? Where do things stand on the schedule when everything's supposed to be super important? And I know it's just a weird year for it, but the decision from Charlotte

to Dallas back to Charleston Then we're gonna go back over. I mean, mean, it just is a weird spot in the calendar. And I think there could be some working and shifting around there because the Byron Nelson has an incredible history behind it. And I think the amount of money that AT&T has put into it definitely deserves to be recognized and have somebody, you know, spot on the calendar this little bit more comfortable for them.

And that's where everyone says, well, you know, I was in Dallas this past week. I experienced some of that awful weather. Every time I go to Dallas, I feel like I get, you know, we're there a lot in May with our relationship with Fort Worth and the Schwab. And it just seems like we get a curveball thrown at us every time I'm there.

And everyone I talk to, this day, like yeah, our May weather is just weird. It's always weird here. Well, I'm like, well, shit, why do you have two tour events there this month? Like what if I asked everyone there What's your favorite month to play golf in Dallas and everyone said September and October and I just wonder if it makes more sense I know the fall series kind of just gets Goes up against football and kind of has this you know moniker is being a a backseat venue or backseat event and I don't want

to relegate the, the buyer Nelson to that at all, but I just wonder if it doesn't make more sense to have like a Dallas Houston swings. I thought Houston played great this fall at the Houston Open and just wondering if this, if an event in Dallas makes more sense in the fall. I completely agree. I think if you're going to be in Texas and you want to try to attempt to get anything of firm or fast and get a little wind in there where every course is designed to be the number one,

opponent against it is the wind. It has to be later in the schedule. And I don't know how they would look at the fall schedule. I know that would be great for golf fans. I don't know viewer they would look at the fall schedule. I know that would be great for golf fans. I don't know, viewer-wise, if it would improve because I doubt there's that many people that watch this week anyway, not just with delays and everything else and phenomenal job for them

trying to work through the weather delay this afternoon. But when you're sandwiched in between some pretty big events from Wells Fargo to PGA and then really going to Schwab and then into June, it's just hard to figure out what the true identity of it is. And that's what, like on the surface, I think it's easy to say, May is a way better spot. You know, you want to be in the prime PGA tour calendar season, but now we've got, you know, playoffs, I guess it's a weird year for when playoffs and other sporting events are popping up and stuff. But up against a major in how these schedules

are now falling out, I don't feel like this is a great spot on the calendar, right? I'm not trying to move it to a worse spot on the calendar. I'm trying to move it to a better spot for everyone involved, but I know those decisions are way, way, way above my pay grade, but just doesn't quite seem right. If we're at a venue that's well outside the city that, you know, I,

Trinity Forest did not work out great. We've documented kind of our reasons as to why it probably hasn't and probably wasn't a great PJ tour event. But now we're moving it to a very nondescript event that I want. I hope like the locals still have a great time there. And I know that people did not like attending it at Trinity Forest for a lot of reasons, lack of shade, you know, the heat there, lack of viewing angles and stuff like that, but gosh, it really just didn't

pop on TV and it's, I think the four seasons kind of had a better vibe around it, at least from what transpired on television, but I could be wrong there. Real quick on it though, I think, you know, cool to see, I know Trinity Forest and viewing, it was rough out there. Number one, because it was so hot, Number two is hard to put any hospitality or spectating areas around the property. But Craig Ranch and if you got a look at the 17th hole, I don't want to call it a mini 16 from TPC Scottsdale because it's not, but it has a really cool vibe and it was actually nice to see people out there all week and join themselves having a good time with proper precautions. I'm sure still in

play but awesome to see the people come out and actually you know support the event because it does mean a ton to Dallas and that's what like I said every single one of the members that I talked to they were just raving about it and could not be happier. So I don't know if Craig Ranch is a place for it. We talked about how much weather and water comes down in May that makes me kind of concerned for for scale in a couple of years, but I know Gill did a great job and they got a ton of sand over on that property. So hopefully drainage will not be an issue, but it'll be interesting for sure.

Yeah, that's again, the sandwich around the PGA with the two Dallas events or Dallas and Fort Worth events. It is hurting everyone involved. That's kind of the point, I think, in everything we're saying. So, yeah. Sam Burns had a hell of a week. He finishes in solo second.

He is in his last two starts gone one, two. And but you gotta have kind of probably sense that he's walking away with a little bit of regret on not being able to get it done today. Final round 70 after shooting 69 and 70 on the weekend. Just didn't look quite as sharp on the weekend, but man, this guy is playing some very, very serious golf. And we got a question from Evan, Evan Atkins. He says burns in the Ryder Cup discussion.

And usually I roll my eyes at any kind of flash, immediate, you know, judgment or leap like that, but this one kind of got my attention. And I think at minimum, at absolute minimum, he should be in the discussion. What do you think? Yeah, I agree. I mean, I don't know why you wouldn't at least give him a look.

I don't know, where's the ad actually on the look on the list right now. Oh, don't cite the points. Come on. Don't give it a fire up about the points. I'd rather. I would say first year. I mean, coming out of this year, at least come, you know, leading up to Masters and up to PGA. I would say, I'm going to hold out any, any say on it until we, you know we were through PGA, but he is definitely a man on fire. His finishes are right there. I mean, outside of the little skid that he had of three most cuts in a row from Texas, the players to Arnie's event. I mean, his solid performance at Genesis earlier this year definitely has him

in the thought process for Captain Stricker this year, but future wise, I mean, he's an absolute star. I mean, he kills the golf ball. He's such a good iron player. Um, and, you know, he has a really good personality and I can't wait to see that come out more if, you know, telecasts will allow it. Well, worth noting, and I always kind of cite, try to look at these things whenever we talk rhetoric up this far in advance. It's like, all right, is, you know, his, this so-and-so's performance on this golf course in these conditions indicative of how, you know, he would play at Whistling Straits this fall, you know, in a totally different scenario.

And usually, the answer is no. It's like, all right, RBC Heritage is going to look nothing like Whistling Straits. However, I'm not saying, you know, to not visually, Craig Ranch is not going to look visually like Whistling Straits. However, I'm not saying, you know, to, not visually, Craig Ranch is not gonna look visually like Whistling Straits will, but I do not think the US is gonna set up the golf course different. I do think that someone has,

that has the ability to take a long-ish golf course, completely obliterate par-fives, and really just kind of beat it. Beat the golf course of death with ball striking. Dacket translate really well to Wilson Straits. And he's done that at Innis Brook, and now here he's taken it extremely deep. Twice has made birdies and bunches

and has done well on quote unquote, easier setups in the last several weeks. And if that trend continues to the summer, he would be worthy of being discussed for it. Again, he's got to play a lot of really good golf that looks a lot like this, very, very, very consistently to be in the discussion, but at least at minimum in the discussion. So he had, he had also had a sick chuck, he chucked his ball after missing a short birdie on eight and I had no rewind capabilities on the CBS sports website or whatever it is.

And I couldn't get, couldn't capture it, but I don't know if you caught that, but that was sick. Now, I saw as soon as you were talking about it, luckily for me, for some reason, my spectrum, and this isn't a shot at spectrum, but my spectrum is on a delay. So I am a good 20 seconds behind everything else that happens in this world. So it usually works out pretty well for me, but incredible 10 out of 10 on the throw there, because it was impressive. It wasn't like the casual tour pro flip it off to the side.

It was like full on Chuck it, you know Henry Vrow and Gardener style from the from the bleachers to home play. It was that was a he showed off a little arm strength on that one. A couple more before we get a couple more things I want to close out from Craig Ranch. We got to talk some speed got to talk some Schwarzel. We got got to mention I believe so our friend Brad at at Walker Trolley's he mentioned that you know Neil and I used the Walker Trolley in my US Open local qualifier and to his knowledge he just wanted to point out He thinks it's the first time it's been that a Walker Trolley push card has been used in anything USGA related They've got the upgraded Cape 1.5. It's now available for delivery and continues on the success of the original Cape model

It brings a classic style with ample use of modern technology. The Cape 1.5 has got a polished aluminum frame and its use of waxed canvas and leather creates a trolley that stands out all over the golf course. Go to walkertrawlys.com, you get $20 off any purchase by using the code NoLangUp20. And while you're there, make sure to check out the great head covers and custom accessories for your trolley. And since the walkertrawley is the official push cart of the push cart mafia, you need to make the co branded no laying up and Walker trolley push cart mafia head cover a part of your collection. You can get it black and red in the driver three wood hybrid and putter.

So to show your push cart mafia pride, head to walkertrolleyes.com. today. Use code no laying up 20 to get $20 off your entire order. Charles Schwarzel, runner up at Zurich, T14 at the Wells Fargo and T3 here. At least, I would just have to say, at least worth noting as we head to Kiwi, he's a hundred to one heading into it. And I just would be remiss if we, you know, he's played this good a golf for several weeks in a row and we didn't at least mention that.

I don't know if you have anything more to add on Schwarzel. I he he's hitting the ball again and rolling that rock. We got to have a butter. Oh my god. You've seen that butter. I mean, it's it's so funny. When you put that tweet out, I was like, yeah, that's that's a great point. I don't really get it. I've never understood when you have a shaft that you know, it's fixed to the back of the putter, but hey, it seems to be working for him. and he is coming into form at the perfect time. And it's kindly, you know, reminiscent of when he went on that crazy run and just started picking up majors left and right.

The odds look good for him. I don't know how he's gonna be. I know he plays very good in the wind and hopefully, you know, out at Kihei, we get a little bit of wind next week, but that's a big boy course. And I don't know if he has the horse power anymore to be able to keep up with it. I wouldn't, I wouldn't put him at the, you know, I'm not flagging him to win the tournament, but if he is somewhere in the top 10, that would not surprise me at all.

Just because of how well he's trending with the ball striking, right? And, you know, I think the past pal, I'm going to be, you know, a bit of an issue for guys puttin this week. I just don't think guys are going to drain putts like they usually do on that kind of grass. And just just want to worth note that. But one guy who I do think is going to drain some putts this week, of course, just blind optimism. Jordan's speed. He successfully did it this time around in his last start before major. He did not win, but played pretty well. He tied from 9th. I'd say that's pretty much, you know, a standard week for Jordan's speed at this point, which is I have to point out top 15 in every start this year, except for the, he missed the cut

at the, at the farmers to start the year. It was like T48 or something to players, but he's been the top 15 of every other start this year and we're into May. So AD Ram 24 asked, has Speed had the most consistent year in terms of average finished thus far on tour or is that just my speed and see bias? I mean, it has to be close, right? I haven't checked him against everyone else, but I don't know if anyone else is putting up

that consistent in numbers. Yeah, it seems like going back to really, not the beginning of the year, but the end of January, moving into February all the way up to this point. I mean, he is always in the picture and he is finally putting things together. It was so, you know, great to hear him actually share a little bit about that with you in the process that him and his team have gone through in the last couple years to get him into the position. But if he starts feeling himself, which you, it looks like by all means he is,

I mean, he's going to be the man that everybody's going to be trying to be. I don't know what your big takeaway was from the podcast we did with him earlier this week. And if you haven't listed that, please do go check it out. It just seemed like, I don't know what I was expecting in terms of him speaking about his, you know, struggle and getting through it and everything, but it seemed to be such awareness still that he wasn't fully all the way there, which both concerned me and like got me excited in terms of like, oh, this isn't like the best we can expect from him.

It was still like, you know, we've kind of not banded, but not, I don't want to say bandated together, but have come up with a plan and a swing that is not going to blow it off the planet. And he is basically trusting his instincts out there and not thinking too much swing, which is what we've been dying for him to get to. But you know, it just made me think like there is still another gear that he could reach, right? And that we haven't quite fully seen as good as he's played. And I don't know if you got that impression at all from listening to him, but that just kind of stuck

out to me. I've been like, oh, I kind of thought, hey, we're back-ish, but he just seems to think like, I don't know, there's one more step he can take. And I'm wondering if this coming week is the week. Yeah, I definitely say he sounded like, you know, if you had a dog and there's a little bit of meat left on that bone, he's trying to fight and get to it. I couldn't be more excited about, you know, the rest of the not only the year for him, but where we're going in the next three, five, ten years, because, you know, being as open as he has been, really, since he let the cat out of the bag with the injury and trying to figure out a swing to get around it, and then just pure resiliency to just stick to his team,

stick to the process, and know that they're doing the right things, and it might not be showing immediately, but once they keep battling it out, the results are going to come, and that's where he's really at here. And I was one that was calling for changes too. And of course, it's going to blow back in my face. And that's why, you know, I have money on him next week. And he's my guy. I don't know who else. I guess we could, you know, I don't want to jump too far ahead,

but we could talk a little bit about Rory and how the ocean court is going to set up for him. But if you look trends wise and how Jordan can roll the rock once he gets ready, you know, it seems to be going in that direction. I could not be more excited. Well, if there's gonna be a PGA site, I'm not saying necessarily Kee-A-Woo tees up perfectly for him, but it seems good on the good side to me compared to Beth Page and Harding Park.

In terms of if we're looking to close out the career grand slam here. Kiwa makes more sense to me than a lot of other courses we've seen in recent years. Just something that doesn't have long rough and isn't a driving contest, I think is going to be a very, very good thing for him. But we're going to have a full PGHM chip preview podcast coming out later this week. So don't let us pull too much of that. Just mentioning a couple more guys.

I guess one guy that has his good play sticks out and his worth mentioning going into a major championship. Daniel Berger seems kind of primed to win a major. And again, I don't know. I have no idea how well playing well at Craig Ranch is going to translate to Kiwai. I really don't, but obviously Berger has a stellar resume as is and is coming in swing in the golf club well and thought that was one worth mentioning. But how about Dustin Johnson pulls out of the AT&T Byron Nelson this week, the week before major with the knee injury.

That seems hashtag not good to me. Now I agree, especially when you have Brooks actually in the field with a legitimate knee injury and kind of wondering what's going on here. The good thing that I know about Dustin's campus that I don't really ever put too much into it because if he was hurt, you know, he's not going to play, he's not, you know, afraid of taking long stretches off when he needs to. I think he just, you know, probably looked at it and wanted to make, you know, the folks

in Dallas happy, but ultimately wanted to prepare for for PGA. And I hope a strong showing comes from him, but I'll be honest, I thought that going into a gust of two and it didn't really work out that way. I mean, we're talking no top 10 since February. I mean, since the Genesis. That's a good three months, but since DJ has been in the top 10 as the number one player in the world, that's not normal. That's not a normal thing. That's, that's not nothing

to, you know, just to brush off as a, as a short little slump. Something just seems a little bit off and it's got me a little bit worried. No, I agree. And hopefully, I mean, we'll see what he comes out. I hate to say a home game, but I know he's played around there a ton. And, you know, I want to jump on your point too about Daniel Bruder. I I mean just absolutely golfing his ball off If there is a course you know a major whether it's US Open and US Open or PGHA Championship category I think you know Keioa kind of sets up perfect for him because it's goofy and kind of quirky and you got to hit your ball You know hit some fairways and scramble your butt off and you, you know, that kind of seems to be what he is very, very good at.

So, 67, 64 this weekend. And in prime form, another person that strangely jumps out the page of me who's been spending a ton of time down in Charleston playing Kiwa Scott Stallings. I mean, 63, 66 on the weekend. Could not be more impressed. And if somebody's going to reach out and try to grab their first major, I mean, he's somebody to look at. Interesting. I'll just say burger was third in strokes, gain off the tee this week and seventh in strokes, gain approach to green. So he is he is smacking the shit out of it right

now. Did you see the sun, Kang and John Rom incident, by the way? No, what happened? So this was from Brian Phillips on Twitter had tweeted this video out, but Rom standing over like a birdie putt from like 15 feet and Kang is like taking practice, putting strokes like, no, like kind of within his eye line or whatever it was and like walking around as Rom is putting,

it's called cotton camera. And then Rom goes to line up another put later on and finally backs off. And he's like, you're like 15 feet away from me and walking around, you've been doing, he said something else to him, but it was very much, there was a little showdown between Sun Kang

and John Ram this week. So I don't know if there's any history there or more to come on that, but it looked a little bit uncomfortable. So I'm gonna have to get some sources on and see what we can find out. We'll find that on, Brian Phillips on Twitter has that, I can looked a little bit uncomfortable. So I'm going to have to get some sources on it and see what we can find out. We'll find that on it. Brian Phillips on Twitter has that.

I can send you that afterward. But I think that's a wrap on Craig Ranch for me unless there's anything else we're forgetting. I asked whether delay wise, you know, it was a struggle of a Sunday. Did you have any issue with anything, how the tour handled any of that or how all of that unfolded? No, I mean, I put them in threes, dual teas, move them up early. I think that that, I mean, you know, put them in threes, dual teas, move them up early. I think that kind of fits, you know,

and I think they played their cards right there. I do wanna say, so impressed with the absolute hustle this afternoon from the ground staff of trying desperately to get these last three holes in before it got crazy. And I don't think without lightning finally coming in. They probably would have stopped. They just would have been out there squeezing away and it's good to see people hustling because the last thing that they want to do is it get delayed and potentially push to

a Monday when everybody's trying to get on flights over to Charleston. I just didn't think they were at any risk of a Monday finish from everyone could see that gap in the radar coming in that in the later part of the afternoon, right? It was, you know, stopping for a little while was not going to be a total washout. I didn't think at any point. So they just seemed to be very aggressively trying to push to finish when it was dumping. I mean, we're talking about a guy as a putt, you know, to keep a three shot lead with three holes to play and they're out there trying to squeegee his line before he puts. And that just didn't, like if that was Jordan's speed, I think people would have had a little issue with that, you know, and I'm very thankful that it didn't end up affecting the championship.

The lead didn't change hands after the rain delay. None of that. It just seemed a little bit like, gosh, this doesn't seem like a championship right now. This seems like they're trying to squeeze this in. And I just, I hate seeing a tournament and kind of like that. If I was there in the lead, I would have been probably causing a little bit of a stink.

Of like, guys, can we pause this? Cause this is not really golf right now. It was absolutely dumping, too, right? There was so much water coming down. That's actually what I like, too. I mean, it's kind of refreshing watching PJ tour live just from the commentary standpoint, but that's a separate topic that we'll get to a little bit later on. But the their microphones picking up the amount of

water that was actually coming down, it was insane. I just can't I can't play golf in the rain. I don't have a lot of mudder. I've said this before, I'm like an elite 11 quarterback. You put me in shorts and short sleeves. I can play a little bit, but you throw anyone, any blitzers coming at me, any defensive line getting through the off, I'm toast. I just, I don't have it. I just don't have it in me.

But. And what's the call there? You go, you don't go out of rain jacket, so you rely on Caddy with hopefully a dry umbrella under there. Nobody's going, Wrangles or anything else. I can't believe the lack of rain gloves. I mean, I guess it's right warm enough that you didn't need the the jackets of the coats or anything, but no rain gloves. That was as somebody with glandular issues. That was bothering me greatly.

I was waiting for a club to go flying. So happy when Leesh pulled around the backwards hat. I was like, okay, now we're talking about some serious downfall here. So speaking of downfall, why don't we go to this next big, big kerfuffle on the social media this past week about the NCAA women's regional and batten rouge that was just canceled after no shots were hidden. No shots were hit. I believe it would be the proper way to say that. They were rained out for the first two days. And then I forget the name of the official that

comes out onto the steps. And it's all caught on video golf week. I think it was the first to share this video. Just saying that although the course is in playable condition, it's not in championship condition. And they canceled the the regional and the top six teams advanced automatically with several other individuals advancing automatically, but several careers came to an end based on this decision by the NCAA. And gosh, did they just get absolutely roasted for it? I love a beat down session on the NCAA who doesn't love it.

But gosh, it just seems super, super questionable. It was a great article by Tom Von Heron at ESPN.com. It just kind of broke down all the feedback from everything on it. But before I just keep going and hammering in them on this, Cody, your thoughts here. Yeah, for us talking about earlier about maybe groundscru doing a little bit

putting too much hustle into it. Maybe we should have had some of those guys out in Baton Rouge. Oh my God. They did nothing. If they're going to make the call and say that due to the amount of water that it's still the course is playable but not playable to a championship level, we're going to have some issues when multiple reports of ground staff, you know, not really out there doing much. No pumps saw, you know, on the course at all, no attempt to squeegee anything, no attempt to shorten any of the holes just to get it done. And this goes completely against what's actually in the NCAA guidelines for this of, yes, it's supposed to be a 54-hole event, but you can shorten it to 36 or 18 as long as the championship is helped.

And ultimately, you know, kind of a self-imposed rule of regionals had to be completed by Wednesday evening, even though that was still nine days prior to nationals actually taking place. Seems kind of stinky to me. Seems like there's a lot of things that they could have done. And outside of the initial outrage, I was more shocked watching golf today when our friend Shane Bacon had the actual director of, I'm pretty sure she was the director of the NCAA Women's Championship Committee for golf, on who of course stood by it, but said said you know, there's nothing else Possibly that they could do and you're left with a million questions of well

Why didn't you try to find another venue why didn't you try to get additional staff out there? Why didn't you try to shorten the course just trying to get some form of round done because I got it top six and You know the individuals who were within you know the slots are going to go through but you got to think for that seventh team who knows where they're actually at standings wise going in they got screwed. And I mean this is on the heels of just a topsy turvy you know year well for everyone but, but for college golfers have had very few things to play in across the country and to have this reigned out or canceled without hitting a shot and people's careers ending.

Especially like you said, once the details started coming out of the course is, first of all, the PGA Tour has turned par fours into par threes before. The highest level of professional golf has turned par fours into par threes before. Like the highest level of professional golf has turned par fours into par threes and worked around weather stuff and shortened events and played, you know, just kind of almost abbreviated events and given out trophies and awarded a champion of those. So it's not like this is unprecedented. And, you know, especially not at this level, right?

And in college golf, you should be able to figure something out or move some stuff around, even if it isn't, if it's less than ideal, it's better than nothing. I played a mini-tor event this summer that the entire course was casual water. It was such a joke. It rained so much and everyone just kind of waited out the rain delay and went out and just played and took drops 50 yards left of where they needed to or whatever it was. Nobody said a word about it.

It was very far from ideal, but people were just super thankful to have something to play in last summer. And I thought that was just very interesting. I have a surprise. There was no bitching or anything like that. And so like players can stomach this stuff. They want to play. They want to compete.

They want an opportunity to do something like that. You can put them on a put put course. And they're still going to want to compete and get come out of that top six in advance. And so to sit, you know, the coach of Sam Houston, I'm getting his name here, Brant Kishnik said, I walked a bit of the course. It was playable. The water had receded a little bit, but there was maybe one hole that we'd have to move from a par four to a par three.

A few of us coaches mid afternoon went to the committee with questions and said, what can we do? We'll do whatever we have to to play. I specifically asked the head rules official, why we can't play? What do we have to do? The answer was that, well, we don't think you get the right champion if we don't play the bunkers because the concern was basically that the bunkers were unplayable, which they would have had the option to mark them as unplayable and have it take a free drop, whatever. And so that was like a huge hang up for me. I'm like, wait a second, just because you can't play with a bunker doesn't mean you're not going to have a golf tournament.

Like that is not, that's insane. You can have unplayable. You can take a free drop out of it. You can do so many different things that if everyone here is saying that we can play, why would you not let them play? Right. Let them play. I think that's the biggest thing here is that people are stuck on this championship level or championship conditions thing where I think they wanted the course to be

absolutely perfect when they're missing the point of the whole thing is that as long as it's an even playing field for all competitors that are in that field, they can still host that championship. It's not a competitive playing field against any of the other regionals. And the fact that they pulled out, oh, we couldn't head out of bunkers is just completely wrong. And they're looking at it from the wrong optic here. And again, the seniors, the fifth year seniors, not only this year, but last year,

not even having any championship, because of COVID and everything else like that, just completely heartbroken for them. Yeah. And just as you mentioned, the Kishnik said they did not witness any maintenance crew attempting to get the golf course ready for play, which if that's going to be the case, if you're told the players like we're concerned because we don't have anyone there that can get it ready for play, they would have gone out and got the pumps themselves and they would have squeegeed

the golf course themselves and raked the bunkers and done anything. You know, you could divide it between that many teams, divide up whole by whole, give them some equipment. They would have probably done that if that was, you know, the last option to, you know, allow them to play. Yeah, it's a terrible situation for everybody involved and bad, bad, bad look for the NCAA. On a much, much more pleasant note, Richard Blant wins for the first time in 478 starts on the European tour at the Bet Fred British Masters presented by Danny Willett. I believe it's the name of it. Tim, did you get a chance to catch the end of the FaceTime interview he did with his parents

after where they played it on golf today? And gosh, it was just like, my wife walked in right at the end of it and she was like, are you okay? I was like, yeah, I was crying. Like I was just crying, my wife walked in right at the end of it and she's like, are you okay? I was like, yeah, I was crying. Like, I was just crying at this interview. Did you catch that? Yes. Very emotional.

It's so cool to see. It seems like the ultimate grinder too. I mean, I don't know. That is a long, long time playing professional golf at a very high level and ultimately chasing it. I think it not only shows how hard it is to win on any tour but really the ultimate pursuit of just you know having professional golf is your job the toll that it takes on you and the family

support system that you have to surround yourself with because it's a grind And it was so cool that he was actually, you know, not only able to share, but they shared the interview with all of us. I mean, yeah, just the pride his family had in that call and how proud his dad and mom were. It was, that just hit me right in the field. Imagine how many, how much travel and how many hotel nights are in 478 starts?

Like literally like 2000 hotel nights, is that a fair estimate? Like how many years, six years or whatever, just truly away from home and gone traveling, like following a white ball around forever and never knowing if this is ever gonna happen. How many hundreds and thousands of not millions of miles flown to all these events

got 32 top 10s in his European tour career. Play the challenge tour two years ago at 46 after losing his status and got his card back for it. Gosh, it's just a fantastic story on the European tour. That was an uplifting one from the weekend. So cool, the post-round interview, too. I know. Tim Barter's instructor did the post-round interview for Sky.

And gosh, it just brought a smile to my face today. structure did the post-round interview for Sky and gosh it was it was it was it just it just brought a smile to my face today so congratulations to Richard Blant he joined the golf today folks for an interview today as well so he said they bacon estimate it was over under 1 a.m. and over under 8.5 drinks had last night and he had see he probably said the over on both of those which I think we can come to understand. Right. The other thing too, you know, probably not a shock to most of people, but Richard Blan with this win, even though it's an awesome win.

And a pretty, you know, premier event on the European tour is not coming to Kyuwa. It does not get exempt of that, but did win their little mini merit for qualification and entry into the US Open. So looking forward to seeing him next month, teaming it up there. So going to be really cool. Hey, man. Are you ready for a hamster, damn? Love it. For those that aren't aware, hamster, damn is where we try to isolate our coverage takes into a certain section of the show so they don't bleed into other parts, which I think

we've done a fairly good job to this point, but the big highlight from the week, finally blocked by Nick Fowdo. Did I deserve that one? I don't even know what his issue was with it. You pointed out a very good point of why was that even in the coverage? And you know, it seems like he just kind of finally got fed up with you.

So congratulations. I've had many, many, many shots at Sir Nick Fowdo over the years, critiquing his commentary, which all I think would have been, and maybe it's a lifetime achievement award, I got this week, but all would have been much more, you know, apt moments

to finally pull the cord and block me. This comment was not directed at Nick Fowdo. This was that production crew that approved or what I am sure the idea probably came from Fowdo, but somebody approved that, you know, is worth spending time on the broadcast to congratulate his son for winning the Sunday Dail Golf Club Spring Meeting, 9 handy cap and under division. His 32-year-old son, by the way, not like a nine-year-old son that won a golf, it's not a Charlie Wood situation here. Right.

Listen, all right. So many bad comments came on Twitter from this. A lot of people that are just FALTA worshipers were all up in my ass. And I just didn't even have the heart to reply to some of them of like trying to explain like, do I have to explain to you why it's an issue? So much of what we've had an issue with television coverage

in the last several years has been addressed by both PGA tour and CBS and even NBC of saying like, look, here's what we're restrained by. We have to do this. We have to do this. We have to do this FedEx cup thing. We have to do this many commercials. We pay this much in rights for the commercials, you know, for the broadcast. So we have to do AT-MENT commercials, blah, blah, blah.

All these things are all reasons why they don't show us live golf. There is nothing forcing them to insert themselves into this story like they insist on doing. And it was honestly, my tweet was pretty lighthearted about it. I was just like, look, no one's asking for this. I wasn't actually really that upset about this instance in particular, but I just want to point out the hypocrisy that comes with saying they can't do these things because of this, this, and this, and this is what they spend their time on. It's just like, just maddening. No one is asking for this, and they just keep,

it serves their interest and not the viewer's interest. I'm actually more, and you know, maybe I'm putting too much emphasis on the negative comments that came afterwards, but I'm more surprised that more people don't care about this, like, why is this not a very clear evidence that, you know, they're gonna put their priorities in front of yours or what they think you want to hear versus what people actually want to hear.

Why aren't more people upset by this? I don't know. I mean, people actually enjoy watching that telecast. I can't imagine. I guess I don't know. I get a lot of feedback and why do you watch it then? It's like, well, I'm trying to cover golf. I'm trying to cover professional golf.

It's very hard to do sometimes when the golf isn't covered. And CBS has made very, very, very tangible and strong improvements to their golf television coverage this year. And we have not been short on praising that, complimenting that, it's a whole new branding. I think their coverage has been better. But listen, it's not ever going to be perfect, but there's very clear things that you probably just should not do

with your broadcast. And it's little things of all the birthdays, it was Frank Novel's birthday the Friday, it wasn't even Saturday, and they're wishing him a happy birthday and all this stuff is just like, I don't get it. I really don't, and maybe that's just different strokes for different folks.

Maybe that works for a lot of people. It doesn't work for me, and I'm gonna share my opinion at all times. You can welcome to disagree with it, but gosh, it just got under my nerves a little bit this weekend. Yeah, whatever other people are taking to become immune of it and they're okay with only watching a handful of golf shots, not even per commercial break or segment, but per hour. I would love to know whatever that is so we can get on it because it's difficult at times.

Just show the golf and I said it earlier, that's why I kind of enjoyed PJ Tour Live this morning. I think they got the biggest get out of jail free card when weather actually did come in and coverage caught up with taped-to-lake coverage and they actually showed it, you know, 16, 17, 18 live. So good for them for finally finning it in. I don't know what Faldos issue is. Obviously you guys got some beef. I don't know if you're ever gonna squash it,

but I'm sure there's a long list of people who are blocked by this Cernic Faldos account and you're just the newest one. So congratulations. I guess so. And like I said, maybe I deserved it over a litany of shots, more pointed shots, but like that, I didn't think this would be the one.

It was mostly just like his response was like, oh, sorry for having a little bit of fun. It's like, yo, you are missing the point here. Like you have taken 18 minutes away from us to start and then you hit us with a bunch of peromos and all this. So then when you do this self-serving stuff on top of all that, do not much of a middle finger that is to the viewer, that is what gets me worked up.

And so that his response just really pissed me off. And that's, I got the block after I responded to him because he got ratioed into oblivion and that hurt his feelings, I guess. So yeah, we're no longer neighbors. He moved out of his, he used to live in the longer neighbors. He moved out of his, his, he used to, we used to live in the same neighborhood. He moved out of his house and I moved out of our apartment as well. So I won't, I won't be running into him nearly as often. But lastly, Steven Yeager

was close to getting the battlefield exemption on the Cornferatoric race and sig won the visit Knoxville open by one shot. Cornfairy Tour, it was not on TV, but they did pick up with some video coverage there at the very end on Twitter, which was nice. But Grayson's SIG locks up his tour card. Steve Nieger's of course got his tour card locked up, but that would have been sweet to get the battlefield

promotion up to the PGA Tour, but just came up one shot short. Plenty of time left. He's obviously playing such good golf already this year. One more win and I know we talk about how difficult it is to actually close some of these out, but, you know, he is golfing his ball and it wouldn't surprise me if by the end of summer

this is locked up for him. And, you know, he gets the exemption, promotion, whatever we want to call it. But he's going to be on the PJ tour. Either this summer or when the season actually ends and you know, congratulations to him. Gracie and SIG actually, you know, absolutely playing clutch down the end. I know scorecard wise, great par is on 17 and 18 knowing that Yeager's in the clubhouse in 19 and he's just kind of holding it together with that one shot lead.

So happy for him to bring the victory home and we'll see what happens. Well, one last final segment here before we get to our Andy Brodick interview. But you've recently, recent addition to the knowing up team here, recent addition to your bag, I believe has been made. Why don't you tell us about what that addition has been and what that transition has been like for you. Right, so, you know, thankfully we have a master fitter in our ranks and that's Mr. TC himself. So I spend quite a bit of time with Tron

as it is working on either Crash Course Podcast or Crash Course Video Series, which, hey, you should check it out as well. But I switched over to the, you know, the new Epic Speed driver and working with Tron and going in getting on the simulator trying to figure out what actually fits me dialing in my numbers and how honestly was shocked when I took my old driver in there and you actually look at the numbers of what it was you know what it was producing. So my spin numbers with my old driver

were like in the 35, 3600. Yikes. It was crazy. It was for listeners that don't know, and me. What's ideal? Yeah, anywhere between 2000 to 2500, that's where you want your spin to be. And I always knew that I hit a really spinny ball.

And I am kind of one of those weird guys where even with the driver I feel more confident. I can hood the club face and kind of trap it in and hit this low little running draw. Well the issue when you play a ball like that with it gets super spinny is I also have a big right miss. So, Tron absolutely diled me and figured out with, you know, went through the whole suite of Calaway heads from the speed to the max, to the max LS, got diled in on that max LS,

figured out my right shaft options, and, you know, I'm happily, you know, not only putting it in play, but I want to say, I'm kind of hitting some bombs out there. So, Neal's gonna be up this week. We're gonna play a little bit of golf. I know I can't keep up with him, but I'm gonna try to impress him a little bit.

So we'll see what happens. You can keep up with him. Neil has claiming that he's second serve guy. And actually I will say he doesn't fall into the traps. I keep trying to bait him into a long drive contest because I'm swinging out of my ass, but he has ceded the title, even though he still hits it longer than me. He claims like, yeah, you can hit it farther than me. That's all you want, which I'm swinging out of my ass, but he doesn't, he is seated the title, even though he still hits it longer than me, he claims like, yeah, you can hit it farther than me,

that's all you want, which I'm proud of him. He doesn't need to just bash it. He's learned that, you know, getting it in play is plays to a lot of his strength, but, you know, we talk a lot about tour players on how like bombing it and hitting it really far is the play and not really caring where it's going. It's a little exaggerated when we say that because, you know, it's just, it probably isn't emphasized enough by us of how straight the tour guys are. And, you know, I've been chasing distance a little bit and feeling a little bit exposed with how inaccurate I've been. My thinking was, I don't hit that far and I'm also not straight.

So I might as well hit it further. And then when I get into tournaments now, I'm like, I don't, I don't feel the need to swing really hard right now. So I'm kind of questioning my strategy just because I'm not straight enough to justify swinging it super hard. But if you're talking about eliminating a big right miss by getting it less spinny and having more draw bias, which I assume is in that max LS, then I'm very intrigued to tee it up with you the next time to see how much you've gotten that straightened out.

Absolutely. I mean, I used to be scared to pull driver. And you, I remember the first couple of times we played you like, man, you hit a lot of three woods. And I hit my three wood really good off the tee and I know that I'm going to hit a little baby dry and I can move it the other way too and hit a little fade if I need to, but I know it's going to go on the fairway. And I used to be so afraid and

Like I said when you actually look at the numbers of that old driver and launch angle was pretty good, but that spin Was just out of control and all that means is that people if you're struggling to hit the ball You know struggling with consistency and it's been enough this you know, the side of the earth go out and get fitted and you can either, you know, find an authorized fitter or actually find somebody who actually has a monitor because you're going to learn more from the numbers coming out of a track man or or a episode or anything else and it'll actually get you, you know, pretty dialed in. But the numbers do not lie. So anything else you want to get to before we get to Andy Roddick? No, pumped.

I'm excited to hear this interview. I know you had an exciting week. Alan Dallas, a little bit weather was some concern. So I'm happy that you finally made it back to Florida and down to Jube for your tournament. But yeah, I think it's going to be a great week. I'm actually going to be down in Charleston, so be down a couple of days this week

to be on grounds at the Ocean Course, and I'm very excited to see the course, catch up with some guys during practice rounds, and overall, I think people are going to be a little bit surprised at the Ocean Course that they remember from 2012 is not going to look exactly the same. So on what way? Now you got me intrigued in what way?

Yeah, I think, you know, if you go back and, you know, if we go all the way back to the Ryder Cup podcast and the history lesson that you put us all through there, which is phenomenal, you know, Pete died in an amazing job working with property that he not only had to build once, but rebuild twice because of Hurricane Hugo, but you know, the Ocean Cores was built with a ton of teeth and jagged edges on it. And over time, I think just because of its resort property, fairways were widened, some trees and dunes were softened. And specifically, bulkheads kind of worn down over time,

just from wind and water and natural runoff things. So over the last two years, Scott Sherman, who used to work for Pete Nallis, has been doing a ton of work there, trying to put all the little nooks and crannies back into place. And I think you're going to see specifically a couple holes on the front nine, six, seven, and eight. And then really the biggest changes on the back nine are going to

be what you see on 17 and 18 coming in on not only green complexes, but bunkers looking the way that peat actually intended bunkers to look. And a lot, you know, tighter fairways running off into the waste areas. So I'm pumped. I know all this because I love Kiwain, Yari and I go down there quite a bit. And if you want to learn a little bit more, Andy Johnson over at the Friday and Garajus did an awesome overview of changes that they've done

and really all things leading up that's going to be, get people squared away for it. Hey, man, we got a crash course coming out this coming week on it as well. And of course, we got a tourist sauce episode from November or October 2019, forget when it was, which is recent enough, I'd say, sure, the course look a little different. But if you want to see every whole Vag golf course, we've got that as well. So all right, next up, spent some time in Dallas. As you mentioned this past, we got a little rub of the green situation, got a chance to interview Andy

Roddick. It was supposed to be Andy Roddick and Peyton Manning. Peyton did not make it in part of the reason I didn't make it out on time was the weather that was going on in Dallas this past week. But awesome time with Andy. We have a common love of sweetens cove. We talk a lot about that and how he ended up getting involved in the ownership group there and involved in starting a bourbon The sweetens co bourbon and just a fun interview. I love chatting with athletes about golf You know athletes from other sports about golf. It's got a great Sergio story in here as well So enjoy that Cody. Thanks so much for joining us and we will see you all

Many times on the coming week as we're gonna be doing live shows and podcasts after every round this week from following each round to Kia with so cheers Cody thanks for time buddy. Cheers. Where if we're talking golf if we're talking sweetens cove where does where's the sweetens cove's sweetens cove story start for you. For me it was so with Mark Rivers who's a co-founder. We had kind of done some other business type stuff and he kept coming back where we had seen the bottle of two bottles of wine one night And he goes I'm just telling you there's this there's this nine hole public golf course And there's something to it and I don't know what it is. I don't know what the bigger play is. I don't know You know we're we're not looking to get into the nine hole golf business

Because the golf business is not Yeah, so I am going you keep coming back to this. Like, we've talked about it, you know, since our last meeting two months ago, you're mentioning it again. So you're obviously attached to it, like, but why? He goes, you gotta be there. Like, you gotta feel it, you gotta see it. It's a great course, but it's like the most natural golf

experience. And so we went there and I go, I get it. None all of a sudden there's, what's your golf level interest? And are you a nut? Are you a sicko? Like how do you end up there first to begin with? No, I'm a psycho.

Love it. I played a little bit when I was playing tennis, not a lot, be like months between rounds. And then when I stopped tennis, I was like a five day a week guy. Just absolutely loved it. So it's kind of the center of my social universe now. I'm so happy that my retirement golf was a part of it.

Otherwise, you hear the pitfalls of athletes like, miss it and they want to go back and they can't get past it. I was like, you kid me, I get to play golf all the time. This is phenomenal. And without making a joke of it, it was a huge part of that transition being easier. Anyway, so we go there and then we kind of notice people

taking a shot, leaving a bottle and we're going, well that's cool, that's something that's unique. First tea you're saying is good. Yeah, it's sweet. And so I'm going, okay, so we do that a couple times. And then we kind of noodle on a little bit more. It's like, okay, we got this golf course now.

One, let's not mess it up, right? I mean, which is important. And I was mortified that. I remember when we announced that we had purchased it, I'm reading some of the responses, they're gonna make it a private thing and do it. I'm like, oh, no, guys, I wish I could just tell you we weren't. I wish you'd believe me.

We don't wanna get in the way of the culture, obviously the New York Times, and then you all frankly kind of launch this thing. Let's be additive and let's not take away from what's already there. And so, and then anyway, the conversation goes further and are we stupid enough to try our own bourbon because of this tradition?

We landed on yes. Here we are, it's very good. Yeah, and we just got lucky, you know, it was, yeah, cheers. We're currently sipping it. And it kind of fell into place like okay, we have this Is there space for a premium Tennessee product? I? Think there is we don't know how to make it so then Mary and Eve comes along and she's an absolute rock star You know the first in the only female master distiller and Kentucky's history since prohibition ended up

She grew up 10 minutes away from sweetens cove. So she wasn't doing anything and her big thing was like, I just kind of want to go mad scientists on something. And I'd worked for the bigger companies and they had a lot of opinions about what she'd be put out. I said, we know enough to know that our opinions on whatever you would make would be irrelevant and dumb anyways. So we just want to provide you the tools to make something great and you can switch

it up. This year's 2021 blend is completely different than last year's. And I actually think that's kinda cool. It's almost like, you know, winding a sense where one year differs from the next and I think it's a lane for it. So long-winded version of saying it was probably

a bad idea the whole time and it seems to be working out. I was gonna say, dude, it's so hard for me. My first time to Sweden's was April 2018. It's so hard to like imagine three years later that we're sitting here in Texas drinking bourbon talking about Sweden's coat. Like that is so far fetched from where this place started. Playing golf at the Cotton Bowl. Exactly. Because there are people who like, you know, bourbon and golf. It's been kind of crazy. It's been, you know, a bit of a whirlwind. And then, you know,

it's like, well, I mean, in the strategy is so lame like you'll you'll get that over the course of this podcast now Ridiculous it is but it's like Tennessee. Yeah, we need that presence if it's gonna be a Tennessee product We have Mary Ann the golf course obviously sits on its own, you know who else is like well, Peyton plays golf He's a legend here and so we approached him and a day later. He's like yeah, I'll do it I'm like really like Had you been before but no, no, it's like oh yeah, I'll do it. I'm like, really? Like, had you been before? No. No. No. It's like, oh, no. I've heard about it. It's awesome. I hear it's really cool. Like, I'd like to do it. And he's a member at another course up there. And he's like, yeah, you know, we go, we go there in the summer and the month we're normally there. They're punch in the green.

So I need some place to play while I'm there. Oh my, great. Like, that's just phenomenal. It's a, you know, it's it's phenomenal. It's a super intended problem. You touched on it there that, you know, it's phenomenal. It's a super-intended problem that you got among. You touched on it there that, you know, there is an essence about it. There's something about it that makes it very special. But at the same time, it kind of needed some upgrades. So how did you go about, you know, not having a bathroom was kind of charming

when it was, you know, just starting up, but probably should have a bathroom. And not having food was kind of like, that's, you won't believe this place. You have to bring your own food and you have sandwiches. That's good. So how did you go about like deciding what was gonna happen? Because you and I were talking earlier too,

you guys are not figureheads in this. You're involved in the nitty-gritty details. So I'd like to hear kind of what all that process has been like. Yeah, so the first question, first of all, we knew we weren't gonna do. It was never gonna be privatized. You know, if there was a price fluctuation, it had to be to cover costs just so that Sweden's code could live on.

And nothing more. We didn't need to put it in our own pockets. We had to keep the culture. We didn't want it to be this station where you couldn't bring your kid for less than some ridiculous amount and you'd have to wait. So we knew we didn't want to do. We were never going to build some big fancy clubhouse. That was not a priority.

It's a very social place kind of culturally. Like you'll end up making friends and have some whiskey with another group that's there from Indiana who you'll never see again in your life, but for that day, your friends. It's like, how do we promote that? How do we add more to that? So let's think about the social spaces, right? So if there's a cool lookout where we could build a fire pit and outdoor, you know, if someone does get a sandwich, you know, meeting spots, the putting green, we don't have a driving range, we can't have a driving range, there's not enough land. What if we build a badass putting green and like where at least people can warm up a little bit and kind of get into the flow and talk and maybe give them an excuse to show up an hour early. And so Rob worked with Brad Faxon on that, which was like, I'm like, this is crazy. And so then obviously the Heckled deck, which when you tee off on one,

and then when you come in on nine, just building a very basic wooden platform deck where there's nothing better than if you bring a group and you're in three or four separate groups, everyone listening to this has been on some crazy golf trip where some match comes down to the last hole and everyone's involved no matter who's on the trip.

And so let's find a way to kind of celebrate that moment of kind of going off of one and coming in on nine. And we had a general idea of it, but we were very clear about what we didn't want to do. More so than what we would do to be additive. Because it's again, a problem that I couldn't have imagined happening is the place is so insanely popular. Now that you have almost too much demand for it, yet, the same time part of the essence is being able to show up and play all day and do whatever you wanted.

How did you guys go about protecting that or reestablishing that even? Well, one, and the other thing we did was invest in conditioning, because that's the easiest thing. Nothing is lost from the golf course being in great shape. But yeah, it was, it was a little bit difficult. I mean, Mark, Mark came out of the idea. He goes, listen, and especially with a nine hole thing, when you want to play it, no one goes there and plays it once.

You play it two or three times, four times in a day. So it's like a turn from nine and the pacing isn't an 18 hole pacing. So all of a sudden, the T times, you know, doing the math between, you know, it was a 10 minutes, it's a 15 minutes, do we need 20 for some lead time, but then you're not getting any music. Yeah, so it was a real problem. And so it's like, well, what do people, when people come here, what do they want to do? They want to play as soon as the sun's up.

They want to leave as soon as the sun's down and they want to get in as many holes as possible. So let's just match what we would make by jamming it. Maybe, you know, make, make the cost appropriate to what we need to make to operate on a given day and make it an all day pass. That's what people want to do anyways. And that seemed a streamlined traffic a little bit because demand is great.

But as soon as there's too much demand, the shine kind of wears off and we were pretty aware of that. We didn't want to get at the point where you all who are fans of the place and who have a damn house there like man this place is a zoo now this sucks. It's not the same. And so we were pretty hyper aware of those problems. So the all day pass seems to have solved for that at least for the for the most part. Thank you for not having me. It's turning into you know, oh they went so many. They went some mainstream. We still have time. We know. We're not yet. Name me one song off their first album.

We need to get you in the house. You guys got to stay in the house up there. Where do you guys stay when you go? A lot of times we do, we'll bring in our investors. We have our big bourbon launch there. And we stay in downtown Chattanooga. I didn't know there was a bet available next door. There's 16 of them.

There will get you in there. We can make that happen. But I want to, so you talked about it earlier about golf becoming your retirement. And I'm curious, just talking to athletes about, maybe it's just because I work in golf that I sense the gravitation towards it, but it seems to be more and more of a thing of what you do

after your professional football career, your professional basketball career, professional tennis career, you play golf. What is it about golf that scratches an itch for you? Is it competitive? Is it leisure? Is it a mix of all those things? I just, where did your passion for golf come from?

Probably all of it. I think athletes in general, especially if you're someone like Peyton who's insane, like you're process driven. And so it was weird when I retired from tennis, I didn't miss the traveling. And obviously those moments of walking out on like a big court when it's slammed is like great. I'll never have those moments again.

But I miss like the cold day when you're on a track at 7, 30 in the morning. And there's like a process to your day and you get through it and it's hard, you know, but at the end of the day, you feel good about kind of getting through something. And golf kind of filled that process. Like, oh gosh, I'm a little bit better than I was yesterday,

but I still need to, and then mix that in with kind of social engagement. And like my best friend's post career, are people I've met through golf. You know, you add in something you're working on, like a lot of our investors in the brand, I was able to kind of, our vision of saying, hey, we have a golf course, we're gonna make a bourbon brand in 30 seconds,

is a horrible idea. If I can get you for four hours and explain the place and kind of walk you through it, the branding and listen, there's a real lane in Tennessee to make a premium product. But I kind of need four hours for that. So golf's a nice excuse for conversations like that also. No, that makes a lot of sense.

I think it's just, I keep falling back on it being a sport you can play for that. So golf's a nice excuse for conversations like that also. No, that makes a lot of sense. I think it's just I keep falling back on it being a sport you can play for life. I mean, do you want to play much tennis these days? Like, what is your relationship with the sport that you grew up playing professionally? I'm always curious because pro golfers play forever, even if you're not playing competitively anymore, but I don't get the sense in other sports that's always the case. I don't play at all. and running is really hard too. You know, it's not for running goals. Bourbon and tennis maybe don't go together as well as golf.

I enjoy playing. I'm not one of the people who, there's a lot of players who stop and like, I don't even want to see a racket. Like that's not my relationship with it. I love it. Anything that I'll ever have for the rest of my life is a byproduct of tennis. I'm certainly aware of that.

But we were kind of talking on the way down here. We were walking through the concourses of the Cotton Bowl down to our podcast bunker here. I'm jealous of golf where you can go out and play with your buddies. One's a 20 handicap, one's a six, someone's a two, and you can find a game that is relevant. And as long as you play fast, it really makes no difference.

I can't do that with a lot of people in tennis. It's a chore at a certain level. You're playing against them in tennis. Yeah. And in golf, you're all playing against the golf course. Yeah, and in sweetens is one kind of venture that I'm involved with. But a lot of the guys who are starting to play like the,

I guess the version of the senior better, like rolling lot of the guys who are starting to play like the, I guess the version of the senior band are like rolling off of two or like a year or two when they still, I don't think I was like, live at tennis academies and play four times a week. And I play like five times a year. And so it's work. And at a certain point, you just don't really feel good. It's a grind.

And, you know, so I don't play much. I'd like to, I'd like to play more, but golf wins the day most, most times now. I'm sure yeah, golf is just more, I guess tennis has, you know, different court surfaces and things like that, but it doesn't have the different venues like golf does. There's not an excuse to travel to the San Hills of Nebraska to exactly to play tennis. Exactly. Well, all right, I got Neil was begging me to ask you this question. So he has something that he calls his second serve drive.

So he's a big long hitter, but has crazy big misses. Yeah, yeah. And he's tried this mindset of second serve, right? I've already faulted. Now I'm getting one in play here. Like, he just wanted me to ask you, like, does that translate to a golf swing at all in terms of how you approached your second serve

after faulting in tennis? Is that makes sense? I get where you're going and I wish there was that control mechanism. I always tell my friends, I wish just for one day I want to be able to do with a golf ball what I was able to do with tennis just to see what it would be like. Towering cut or high draw or you play one low and like I wish like tennis I just you just kind of had to think about it right? It's like in grain because it's something you've done forever and I wish I could just translate that for a day

Just to see what it feel like because I'm the same like I you know I'm kind of please just find a fairway. Are you getting better? I got you what's your handicap? What was it when you really got into it? I'm a gosh. I was I, double digit. I'm down to, I'm normally set around a one or two. Okay. So you can do some of these things. You're saying you wish you could be. No, no, but it's not, it's just not, it's not even close to the same.

Like you can do it one day for three holes and then all of a sudden you pull the next three drives and it's like, you know, whatever. But I'm good enough a golf to know that I'm not very good at golf. That makes sense. It's almost like that kind of, uh, whatever that graph is of, you know, this stupidity graph or whatever you're very willing to make an argument when you

know a little about a topic, but then like the more you learn, you're like, oh, wait a second. Yeah. Yes. Yes. Perfectly put. Do you play? Who do you, who do you mostly play with?

I mean, is it, do you play with other pro golfers frequently or? I don't play with a lot of a lot of row golfers. No. I always had this thing where for a while, the first two years when I was kind of in the process of trying to get better, I wanted to be the worst player in the group. You learn so much from playing right next to good players. Yeah, and so I really kind of pursued that, because I wanted to see different shots.

If you don't see him, how you're going to know the process of hitting him, what they would do when they would lay back. Why? So I was very interested in playing with guys that were qualified for the mid-AM. So I was always the worst player in the group and they just, I guess, suffered through my learning curve. Well, what is, so take me to kind of like what the hands-on details are like for the club. From what I understand, you guys have Monday meetings,

just like we do actually. And it sounds like it's not always, you know, it's not all bourbon and roses every day, right? It's managing a golf club, is there's a lot of work? Well, I mean the golf club, you know, damn, he did, that's probably the least of our worries. I'm trying to have something with the golf that was established, that people really love,

that has already said it's office culture for lack of a better term. Okay, so we should probably be a little bit more organized about retail, you know, we should make sure we have stuff all the time, you know, so the golf course is probably less of a conversation. We raise money in a certain amount of that with the whole bourbon I was set aside

to take care of the golf course conditioning. But beyond raising and committing dollars, the golf course was set, the culture and? The culture and the greetings and we were never going to move the trailer. So going into a really intense space in the spirits industry with not a lot of know-how, that was probably the, that's a much bigger stress point than the actual golf operations.

And what is Jim Nance's involvement? Is he a member's owner? Is he part of the group? I don't know what any of us are, but Jim is one of our, so we had our core founding group of, you know, Peyton, myself, Mark, Tom Nolan, Skimbronson, who kind of like jumped on the crazy train early with this, let's try this in that, oh, in Rob, obviously,

was part of that group. And then we raised from, was it 30, including us, so it's probably 34, 33, 34, other individuals, who came on and mostly focused on the bourbon side, but are involved on a small piece of the golf course as well, and Nancy's on those next, so basically, we had our marching orders of us core, you know, five or six guys. We all have to go out and it's the same deal for every person.

Go out and find, you know, five, six, seven investors and let's regroup in a week and let's hustle. And that was kind of how it went down. And, you know, it was easier than you thought it would be to. Well, I don't know. I say to find the investors. I have a friend of mine in Charlotte named Jonathan Ishi. And he's like, your pitch was the worst I've ever heard.

He's a pretty like, you know, successful entrepreneur. He's like, that was the worst. He goes, I don't know. I can be convinced of most things in golf. Like, I figured worst had me. I said worst case is like a friendship tax. I'm like, God, I thought I was really good for a second. I was terrible apparently.

On the retirement note too, of, you know, it's gotta be weird. You're retired from tennis, right? But you're not retired from work, you know, in life. You're not sitting on a beach anywhere like that. So I guess, yeah, do you consider yourself in retirement or what do you, what are your goals? What do you wanna achieve as tennis? Knowledge, I think.

You know, I think you get enough things. You, I'm kind of addicted to information. But no, I mean, even during my career, my main business post-careers commercial real estate company that I'm in one other guy and it's the most boring business you would not be doing a podcast about it. I promise you. But the one thing that I had during my career,

and I've continued to have, and have pursued, is access to brains. Right. You play with someone, you have them, you know, kind of hostage for four hours. They don't mind you asking questions out on the golf course and so that's been a huge, huge thing. And so building things is fun, you know, and starting at the ground level of things where, you know, it's not a given. There were so much of my life revolved around. It was planned out for me. So kind of moving into different business spaces has been almost a bit of an awakening.

Where I don't know exactly where I'm going to be next July, late July is London, and then you come home, then you have a week off, and then from the time I was a kid that's been pretty planned out. And so it's nice to kind of have a little bit of freedom to operate and hope that sweetens goes great and react to successes. What's your go-to or favorite hole at sweetens?

What kind of defines what makes you love that place? So hard. Nine's great. That's fun. It's the most fun because it gets the most reaction. Right, like it's the, I because it gets the most reaction. Right. I say it's like the oh, like oh, oh, oh, oh. One, I love one.

One's a great hole. I think one is amazing. The new back tee box because there's so much you're looking at, but there's a little more space than you think on the drive. The second shot, you have to know it and play it to know that you can actually bail out pretty far left. Like what's in front of you is not really what you're dealing with. You can take kind of the easy way out left and then, you know, where you play it, you're going to get the roll off the bat.

I think you have to have the most intimate knowledge. No one says one unless they've played it 20 times. It's one of the coolest green complexes I've ever played in terms of what exactly what you're saying. You don't have to be perfect with your shot, right? If you can aim it right at the pin, if you hit it right at the pin, it's gonna go near it. And also if you kind of veer to the left,

it might funnel off the hill and go to close to the pin. But also you get like the reaction, I'm like, oh, you can play it in the back of the hill. And then, you know, sometimes we've all hit it on the hill there and it goes 40 yards right. Like it's just not even, they're like, dude, you told me I was gonna go there. I'm like, well, you know what?

I know what to tell you. There's a couple, number two I love when they put that pin in the front, like it's very accessible. I think that's the best pin there, yeah. Yeah, it's accessible, well, you know, I don't want to tell you. There's a couple, number two, I love when they put that pin in the front, like it's very accessible. I think that's the best pin there, yeah. Yeah, it's accessible, but like you can mess it up pretty bad. If you miss it, you can make a bogey pretty easily. Well, that's not the whole thing, it's like, you can go out and be like, I can dominate this place.

And then you play it again, it's like, I can get dominated by this place. You can end up in all the wrong spots or all the right. It just seems to always happen consecutively too. What were you playing Charlotte? I played a place called Charlotte Country Club. And what's that like? Yeah, it's great.

It's an old Donald Ross course. I honestly don't play too much when I'm actually home. We were talking the way down to it. I was like the one night golf trip where you fly, you play around, have some pubs, hang out with your buddies, play early in the morning and you're back by the time, like, I have a five year old and a three year old by the time, like, it's, you know, three or four o'clock and they're ready to go after naps and stuff, like, your home. That's, like, my favorite thing in the world to do.

So you're not looking to just take big, long week, week plus long buddy trips. Yeah, like, between work and, yeah, my wife is amazing. She understands that, like, this is my vice. She's phenomenal with it, but like, no, I, I, it's not what you want to be doing. I really like my kids. I really like them, you know, so, you know, two nights feels like long to me,

but you know, the one night golf trip is like, I'd rather sacrifice four rounds at home to go kind of travel somewhere awesome and do a one night. What's the highlight place that you've played? Pline Val is my favorite. Yeah, what was it your favorite? It's just because when you play well there, there's a lot of space to hit.

If you know what your ball flight's gonna be, right? If you know you have a cut and you can hit it all day, you can score. If you have a two way miss, you are dead to rights. It's the most, but it's unlike some places where it's like you hit a good shot and it's just unfair. If you hit a two-way miss, you are dead to rights. It's the most, but it's unlike some places where it's like, you hit a good shot and it's just unfair. If you hit a good shot there, it's never unfair, ever. And then if you don't, you are screwed, like absolutely screwed.

And I completely respect that. It's such a grind when you're not playing well. And it's like, it makes so much sense to architecturally when you're playing well. I guess it's just like, you see it, you feed it, you know the shot, you have to hit. It's my favorite. Another like best place I've seen in a long time is as far as new chords, Ohoopi, is phenomenal. I haven't been there yet. It's fun.

I'm blaring Obe Mission in my golf res. It's awesome. And so with- It's comparable to Swings in some ways, right? It's kind of, not in terms of the golf, but like it is a different concept for golf. Yeah, but they kind of thread the needle between a proper round, you walk, you get your yardages, you do it, but they also play Willie Nelson on the driving range. Yeah.

There's not a lot of, like most plays that play music on the range, you know you're just going to go like speed derby with your carts and you're gonna roll up and it's gonna have the number and there's not gonna be a lot of like conversation, there's not gonna be, so they thread the needle between like an old school golf experience with like a modern day club as good as I've seen. What at Pine Valley, did you play it all the way back

or did you play the next? I played all the way back once. I've only played it all the way back, so difficult. I don't need to, it's so hard. I mean, it's just, it's, it's, uh, it's just like, it looks like some of these tee boxes, you know, you can almost barely even see the fairway way you're trying to hit it.

Yeah, the reason, the reason I wanted to play it back was just so when you see these scores come across and crump and the other events where, like, I'm going, how does someone say that? I don't understand that. Someone goes 64, 65. It doesn't make sense. So you just wanted to kind of feel,

and it's all you can handle. I don't need to play there. Any interest in competitive golf, or have you done it? No, none. And I don't return to minutes, nothing. Like if you're just like, hey, we can go hit balls in the range,

and we're really, this is probably why I'm stagnant with my handicap. Or we can go out and like mix it up in play six holes. I'm like play six holes every time. Like I grinded on that minutiae of one sport for so long and it was a stress point. I never ever ever want golf to become a stress point. Ever.

Any skills in tennis do they translate to golf at all? I mean baseball, I feel like works against people in a golf swing, but I'm wondering, like hockey players seem to transition very well because the way they generate speed with a hockey stick helps. But you were known for your serve in tennis Is that help you at all for engulf? I don't know I don't think it would I don't know I mean it seems to like I don't know what it is, but it seems to translate and I don't know why I mean you you most

tennis players who play golf pretty aggressively like they they get the rounds in end up being low single handicaps And then you have like fish, he's like a plus, he's amazing. Courier is really good, Samperus hits it a mile, he's really good. I mean, Conner's is really good. So you, but there's something to be in a professional athlete and learn,

you learned how to be competitive in this sport and you learned, you know, how to get better at it. That has to translate, so. I think you learn feels a little bit like. I haven't taken a lesson, I don't, yeah. Ever take a lesson, but it's like, okay, it. I think you learn how to translate stuff. I think you learn feels a little bit like. I haven't taken a lesson. I don't ever take a lesson, but it's like, okay, well, I think of this thing like, this simplified, like swing left.

I don't think about arm angles and all this stuff, but like, you kind of learn how to self-analys a little bit coming from other sports. Maybe that's it, but I don't know what the special sauce is with tennis to golf, but it seems to translate. You know, most people will end up becoming pretty good golfers. What's your bucket list place you've never played

that you're dying to get to? A lot of the places in Australia. I've played Kingston Heath. I've played that twice when we were down there, but Royal Mayor Melburn even going to New Zealand and Tara Edy and going to Tasmania and Barbe. That whole run where you could actually settle in, I've never been to Ireland, never been to Scotland, never,

so all of the places where you travel and experience a different type of golf, I would wanna see, like I said, my kids are still young. Those aren't exactly convenient for the one night golf trip that I like right now in my life. You need to get them playing and then you take the trip over to Scotland. What a dream that would be.

Old courses where I'd say, your first big trip is set up right there. There's so much good golf in there. I can say I will see all of them at some point. It's just I got to take some time. I also want to create some space where you don't want to go over there and like not see everything. Sure.

I think I'm a years away from that. But who's the best player you've ever played with? You play with Torporos often or kind of any crazy awesome experiences with groups you've had? I play with Sergio a lot because he's an Austin now. You get Sergio when he's just free-wheeling or like relaxed and I mean he just doesn't miss shots. It's so good.

The way he views a course is just, it's so different. Like we'll be a, we're playing it in Spanish oaks in Austin. He doesn't know the line and I'm like well you know I'm trying to explain it like if we went out and you hadn't seen a place I don't know what you play off of it But I'm like, oh yeah, you kind of lay back here and you know, I be easy shot. There's no trouble Like I'm saying like hit it here because there's no trouble. There's OB left I'm like it goes it goes half fairway. He goes how far is the hole? Like I don't know. It's like four hundred and what's the last?

What does it do the last like 70 yards? I'm like, oh, it's like downhill kind of towards a pin He goes, I'm just gonna hit it there. Oh yeah, just do that. That's how you go. But it's hard to get really good players advice. So I'll tell you this, this is good for a podcast. So the week before he won the Masters, we played, we would play tennis every morning

and we'd go out and play golf every afternoon. And we're walking down 17 at Spanish Oaks. And I said, how do you feel about next week? And he's like, he goes, man, he goes, I've never, like, the golf course stresses me out. Like, I just, there's always a day where it's hard, it's windy, the greens, I miss a chip. Like, the guys who win the Masters grind through

and they end up at par on days where it's just hard and he goes, I just can't, I've never been able to grind it. It was like completely self-aware by the way, which I wish more of the golf world knew about him. Like they see his worst moments in his petulant moments. He would admit to those, but he's kind of self-aware. You know, when no one's watching, and he goes, he goes, but he goes, I've never had more control over my golf ball. He goes, I can move it three yards either way right now. That's like haunting.

And so he says it, and he goes, I just have to get through that tough round. He goes, I can score there. He goes, I need to just save the bad day. And so it was like day two, I think. It was blowing like 30, 35 miles an hour, something like that. And he made 17 parts.

And I'm going, oh my God. And I didn't text him, I'm like, don't say anything. Like this, what he's talking about. This is what he was just saying. He got through and he got like some tough up and downs, made some, you know, six footers, some tough six footers, which obviously has been as a kill his heal over the year, the years.

And like it was almost foreshadowing. It was crazy. And so I'm like, watching on Sunday, I'm like, oh my God, this is unbelievable. And then he burned the edge on the one putt to win it. I'm like, oh no, come on, come on, come on. And he did it. And it was like, he knew it was so clear to him what had to happen. And it was, so he comes back the next day.

I go, how do you like the golf course now? I guess. I've had a difference of opinion. Well, you're going to be playing the rest of your life, but I have complete control over my golf ball. I can move either way, high, low, whatever I need to right now. What a feeling that must be. Yeah.

All right, man, let's get back, get you back up to hitting some golf shots up there and we may sprinkle in some bourbon along the way as well. But thanks a lot for coming on the pod. And we'll have to get a sweet and strip planned. Or next time you go, you got to go stay at the house. Appreciate it. Thank you. All right, thanks, Amy.

It's gonna be the right club. Be the right club today. Yes. That is better than most. How about it? That is better than most. Better than most. How about in? That is better than most. Better than most.