Chicago Public Golf

Boy, this Mark Wilson story is just great. Our main man Ed Sherman has not been updating his blog that often but he has vindicated himself with the this piece on Thursday in the Chicago Tribune.

I may just start milling around in the Western ‘burbs just on the off chance that I run into Mark Wilson running some errands so I can say “dude, you kick ass!” Not only is it a great story that this local journeyman finally won on tour, but he did so after assessing himself a two stroke penalty, thereby upholding the integrity of the game and the integrity of all Chicagolanders (even though he is a Packer fan).

If you haven’t heard, on Friday of the tournament he heard his caddie tell another caddie what club he hit. You can’t do that. It doesn’t matter if it’s you or your caddie, neither can give or receive advice in competition to/from another player/caddie, period! He told a rules official and was assessed a two stroke penalty. Then he still goes on to win.

Read Sherman’s article and let’s starting getting into Chicago golf. Also, relish the 50+ degree day we are going to have and get fired up because the season is right around the corner.

Check this out. I’m banging through the Sun Times today at my favorite McDonald’s and Len Ziehm has a great article from the PGA Tour. Mark Wilson, who lives in Elmhurst and plays out of Cog Hill, won the Honda Classic and the accompanying $990,000 in a four man playoff. Keep in mind, Luke Donald, Evanston resident and Northwestern graduate, won this same tournament last year. We [Chicagolanders] rock the golf world and this is further proof that Chicago is the best golf town in the country.

I watched a lot of this tournament this weekend. There were very few big stars down the stretch but the drama was huge. If you’re a fair weather golf fan that watches only when Tiger and Phil play, then you’ve cheated yourself out of some great theatre.

Let me tell you something about Mark Wilson that you may not know unless you were watching on Saturday. He loves to run errands! Yeah, I’m serious. They showed a little taped interview with him about mid way through the Saturday telecast and he says basically that he loves to run errands. Actually, he couched it in these terms, “I love to check things off a list.” He goes on about how he likes it when his wife gives him a list of stuff to do and he figures out the quickest and most efficient way to get it done. Wow, these guys are good…husbands!

I can picture him running around the western suburbs grabbing a gallon of milk, picking up some duct tape from Home Depot, then hitting a bucket of balls at Cog. How cool is that? Congrats Mark.

Wow, you can tell golf season is kicking in because Ed Sherman’s Inside Golf has been appearing in the Trib a lot lately. Today, Ed’s topic is NU golfer Dillon Dougherty’s first few rounds at Augusta. You may know the name Dillon Dougherty because he was runner-up at the US Amateur last summer and therefore gets an exemption to the Masters this year. Dougherty also happens to be a senior at Northwestern, so there’s the local connection.

These rounds were played last December, but it probably took Sherman until now to get this column written because he had to report on all of that important news in the local sports media scene this winter.

Ed talks about the butterflies that Dougherty had when he stepped on the first tee at Augusta. There was nobody else on the course, it was just Dougherty and his dad, yet Dougherty felt “nervous just because it was Augusta National.” Can you imagine? Why be nervous? It’s just your dad watching.

Well, this very same thing happened to me about two years ago at a somewhat accessible course for Chicagoans. In the summer of 2004, my wife and I made the pilgimage to Arcadia Bluffs, in Arcadia, MI, to celebrate her birthday. I think it took about four and a half hours to get there. We had wanted to play this course for a while because some friends had told us of its beauty. They were correct; it is a beautiful, secluded piece of land right on Lake Michigan. The pictures on the website are stunning, but wait until you get there. The confluence of the blue water, green fairways, golden fescue, and setting sun are something to behold. In addition, the layout and conditions are absolutely perfect. And finally, you can get on for about half the price of that other Lake Michigan course, Whistling Straits. Although I warn you, prices at Arcadia have been increasing rapidly as of late.

When I stepped on the first tee at Arcadia, my heart was beating out of my chest. Maybe I just didn’t want to let my wife or myself down. I don’t have a good explanation for it. It had to do with the fact that the day was perfect, the course’s beauty had already exceeded all expectations, it was my wife’s birthday, and I had been fantasizing about playing this course for months. All of these things made this round of golf more important and it weighed on me to the point where it was difficult to execute the shot. I was feeling pressure even more acute than hovering over a six-footer to win the match on the last hole of my buddy’s member guest.

So yes, I know what young Dillon Dougherty was feeling when he got psyched out on the first tee at Augusta. I think most of my bodily functions would shut down if I were ever lucky enough to tee it up at The National. You may think I have completely lost perspective. You may say, “John, golf is not that important you crazy bastard. What’s the big deal? Who the hell takes their wife to play golf on her birthday.” Hey, I don’t know how to respond to those accusations. I know that I have a sickness and I am trying to deal with it.