The Downhill Lie
“I sank a golf cart the other day,” I confessed, “in a lake.”
“Oh, I’ve done that,” McCord said matter-of-factly.
“You have?”
“Yeah. We were chasing a roadrunner.”
This was music to my ears.
The next afternoon, armed with network credentials and a cumbersome portable monitor that displayed the live network feed, I followed Feherty to the practice range, where Woods and his caddy were stationed distantly at one end, by themselves. We did not approach. Nobody did.
Feherty prowled the tee area, muttering to himself and greeting the other pros with “Hey, asshole” and other graphic endearments that unfailingly caused the players to grin or crack up. Despite giving the impression of being authentically miserable—he recently quit drinking—Feherty is one of the wittiest, most likable companions you could find. He’s also uncommonly wise about golf and, although he claims to despise the sport, can be heard to say in unguarded moments, “I love to watch these guys hit the ball.”
During his playing days Feherty won ten tournaments worldwide, and was a member of the 1991 European Ryder Cup team that dueled the Americans in the so-called War by the Shore at Kiawah Island, South Carolina. When asked why he retired from professional competition, Feherty said he saw a young rookie named Eldrick Woods hit a tee shot in Milwaukee and thought: “I’ve got to find another line of work.”
He took a broadcasting job with CBS, penned a hilarious golf novel called A Nasty Bit of Rough, and now writes a column for Golf Magazine that is refreshingly blunt and occasionally raunchy.
After pacing the Firestone practice area, Feherty alighted near Ernie Els, who’d pulled a driver out of his bag. “Watch,” Feherty whispered to me.
Els owns the Perry Como of golf swings, smooth and oh-so-easy, but the impact off the composite clubface sounded like a high-caliber rifle shot. The ball vanished on the fly over the back fence of the driving range.
I turned to Feherty and said, “Okay, I’m quitting golf again. This time for good.”
Practicing next to Els was one of the tour’s top young players, Adam Scott, who was rocketing one 3-iron after another downrange. All these guys are staggeringly good, and television doesn’t do justice to their talents. Watching them swing, I was simultaneously awestruck and discouraged. My ball flight in no way resembled theirs, and I didn’t need Stephen Hawking to tell me why.
Woods and Davis Love III teed off at 2 p.m. sharp, with Feherty and me in brisk pursuit. The Firestone South course is famously long and lushly maintained, and the stroll would have been lovely if it weren’t for the gummy, sweltering weather. Feherty sullenly reported that he was in gastric distress; still, he traveled the fairway like it was carpeted with hot coals, and keeping up was a challenge. Behind Tiger and Phil Mickelson, he is arguably the third-biggest celebrity at PGA tournaments. Fans hollered his name constantly, and tugged at him for autographs.
“My constituency—drunken white guys,” Feherty grumbled in mock annoyance. “I’m a magnet for morons.”
Wielding the monitor, which the CBS crew had affectionately dubbed “the Turdhurdler,” I tried to appear useful when in reality my only interest was scoping out Woods. Having never seen him play in person, I didn’t want to miss a trick.
And there were no shortage of those. On one hole he choked down on a 7-iron and cozied it 145 yards, a low draw to an uphill green. On the very next hole he took the same club and knocked it 215 yards, a high fade over the treetops.
“He’s a freak of nature,” Feherty said admiringly. “The hundred-year flood. Maybe even the five-hundred-year flood.”
Woods had finished first in his last three tournaments, including the British Open and PGA Championship, and was earning approximately $2,500 per stroke. At age thirty he’d already won fifty-two times on the tour, including twelve majors, and banked $63 million in prize winnings.
Some fans gripe that Tiger’s dominance has made professional golf boring, but excellence isn’t boring. Nobody ever turned off the television when Hank Aaron was at the plate, or when Dan Marino was dropping back in the pocket. Woods is the rarest of media phenomena, an athlete who lives up to the hype and surpasses it. He’s done for golf what Muhammad Ali did for boxing and Michael Jordan did for basketball—attracted millions of new fans to a sport that desperately needed a spark.
Every player on the tour should drop to his knees and thank God for Tiger. Since he turned pro in 1996—in truth, because he turned pro—the amount of PGA prize money has tripled. The golfer who finished dead last on the Sunday scoreboard at Bridgestone would pocket $30,750, a nice paycheck for four days’ work.
As it happened, a dubious blip of history occurred on the front nine: Tiger carded four straight bogeys, something that hadn’t happened to him during a tournament in ten years.
“This is my fault,” I told Feherty after Woods’ second bogey. “All my bad putting mojo—it’s probably wearing off on him. Maybe I’m standing too close.”
“You fucking Norwegians,” Feherty groaned.
But after the fourth bogey, his skepticism evaporated. “Jesus, Hiaasen, I think you’re right!” he exclaimed after Tiger missed another short putt.
“We call it the Nordic pall of gloom,” I said.
Once leading the field by two strokes, Woods was suddenly five down. Feherty was itching to ask him what was wrong, but Tiger’s stare would have made a suicide bomber wet himself.
After Woods birdied the 10th, Feherty sensed an opening. As we hurried along the 11th fairway, the Irishman sidled over to the world’s greatest player and said, “What was goin’ on back there, mate? All of a sudden you turned into a 12-handicapper.”
Woods smiled ruefully. “I wish I was a 12-handicapper. I suck.”
Feherty and Woods have a cordial relationship, partly because Feherty makes him laugh. In the heat of a tournament Tiger seldom speaks to anyone except Steve Williams, his caddy, yet he doesn’t seem to mind the occasional profane zinger that Feherty fires his way.
Before the day was done, the other leaders faltered and Woods rallied to stay in the hunt. He made another birdie and finished only one shot behind Stewart Cink.
Rain was predicted for the next day, so the starting times were moved two hours earlier. That meant CBS would pre-tape the final round and broadcast it later, in the usual afternoon time slot. Feherty foresaw chaos, and blamed me for the oncoming monsoon. Nevertheless, he took mercy and decided I wouldn’t be required to lug the Turdhurdler around all day. Instead I was issued a live headset as a prop, and ordered not to utter so much as a syllable into the microphone, under penalty of castration.
Woods, who was playing with Cink and Paul Casey, got off to a sluggish start. The booth announcers, Jim Nance and Lanny Wadkins, speculated that Tiger was getting tired after battling to three consecutive victories.
Listening on his headset, Feherty rolled his eyes. He didn’t believe that Woods was fading. “He’ll find a way to win if you give him a hockey stick and an orange,” he said.
Sure enough, the birdies began to fall, and soon Tiger’s name was on top of the leader board. He was shaping golf shots as gorgeously as Eric Clapton bends the notes on a Stratocaster. On one monster par-5, Woods pushed his drive into some thick rough in the maples, a gnarly lie from which most pros would have humbly chipped back toward the fairway.
Tiger never considered it. He shredded the heavy grass with a supercharged 3-iron, cutting the shot first around the outreaching limbs, then high over a distant stand of oaks and then finally across a pond before dropping it five feet from the flag, where it trickled to the fringe.
Feherty lowered his microphone and shook his head. This was golf as art.
Yet Cink lurked stubbornly, dropping clutch putts as storm clouds gathered to the west. Tiger missed a four-footer for par on the 16th, Cink birdied the 17th and they both finished at minus 10.
A tie meant a sudden-death playoff, and Feherty was roiling. The sky was tur
ning purple, and he was booked on an early-evening nonstop to Dallas. “It’s all your fault,” he hissed at me. “The Norwegian curse.”
The first three holes were a survival contest, Woods and Cink scrambling to match bogeys and pars. As soon as the players teed off on the fourth, the heavens of northern Ohio unloaded.
With rain pelting his face, Tiger calmly pulled out an 8-iron and through the squall fired the ball eight feet from the pin. Cink dumped his shot in a bunker, Woods rolled in his birdie and the soggy marathon was over.
“Finally,” sighed Feherty.
He hopped into a waiting cart and, with me clinging like a gibbon to the rear bumper, the driver sped toward the CBS sound trailer. There Feherty hastily shed his microphone and harness, and bid farewell to the crew members, whom he would not see again until the new broadcast season in January.
Before bolting for the airport, Feherty asked if I needed any more clubs from Cobra.
What I needed, after watching Tiger play, was a bowling league.
Day 385
Halfway through the front nine, I run for cover as the thundering remains of Tropical Storm Ernesto shut down Quail Valley. I’ve made exactly one good shot—a full wedge that stopped five inches from the cup on No. 3. Everything else was Hack City.
I also seem to have misplaced my Mind Drive concentration capsules, a clue that they’re not working as advertised.
Day 386
In the disarray of my office I find the blister pack of Mind Drives, and gulp two caps before driving to the course. Soon I start feeling jumpy and flushed. Sweat is dripping off my visor and landing squarely on the blade of my putter—I might be sick, but at least I’m properly centered over the ball.
Another lightning storm chases me off, but not before I execute some spectacularly wretched golf. The lowlight is losing two balls on No. 5 before smacking a large 4-iron to the green and sinking a twenty-five-footer to “save” double-bogey. On the par-3 eighth, I push two tee shots into the lake before hitting a 6-iron fifteen feet from the flag. Coolly I miss the putt and take a 7.
New theory: Whomping those rats has screwed up my swing.
Day 388
The Cobra 9.0 and I have reconciled, so Big Bertha is being exiled to my locker at the club.
“They have ways of getting out, you know,” Lupica says darkly.
The neon Ping putter seems to be bailing on me, as well. To add to my aggravation, the apparatus has so many peculiar curves and sharp angles that it’s impossible to get it clean with a golf towel. I need to take the blasted thing to a car wash and have it detailed.
Day 390
“This game is fluid. It’s always changing. It’s always evolving. I could always hit the ball better, chip better, putt better, think better. You can get better tomorrow than you are today.”
This is Tiger Woods, speaking to reporters after firing a 63 to win the Deutsche Bank Championship, his fifth tournament victory in a row. He’s played his last twenty rounds at a stupefying 86 under par, yet all he talks about is improving his golf game.
If that doesn’t motivate me, nothing will. Over my last twenty rounds, I’m approximately 438 over.
Day 391
A new personal worst—I accrue five 7s on my way to a drag-ass 96. So much for the miracle Mind Drive pills. My stepson says he wants to try them while he’s doing his homework.
Go nuts, I tell him.
Day 392
Scotty Cameron and I are pals again—no three-putts today! As Lupica would say, this is epic.
However, I still shoot 91, thanks to a waterlogged quadruple bogey on No. 8 and a sandy triple on No. 12. Maybe one of these days I’ll put it all together for one good, steady round.
Dream on, schmucko. Where does this lunacy end?
Six months from now, Quail Valley holds its annual Member-Guest Invitational, which I’ve been talked into entering by Peter Gethers, my book editor and a fellow hacker. Conveniently, Peter will remain far from the scene of the crime.
Why I succumbed to such an ill-starred proposition is hard to explain. The idea of mingling with ninety-five other golfers, much less competing against them, conjures cold-sweat nightmares. I still get cramps on the practice range, for God’s sake.
But, like many writers, I function better on a deadline. Unless I set a firm date and a goal, my exhumed struggle with golf might drag on until the onset of senility, and with it this journal. Twenty-four weeks seems a fair span of time in which to elevate my game to a semi-respectable level, or declare defeat. The Member-Guest will be either my Normandy or my Waterloo, but pivotal it will be.
Leibo has agreed to play in the tournament as my partner, but he has one demand: “Promise me you’ll have fun.”
Fun isn’t such an abstract concept when your handicap index is 5.2, as is Mike’s.
The club tournament will be set up as five nine-hole matches over two days, undoubtedly with wagering. I’m already twitching like Mel Gibson at a Kinky Friedman rally.
Day 394
Quinn Hiaasen, age six, is hauling his golf bag to the range. He carries only a driver, an 8-iron and a pitching wedge, all of which he deploys with enviable gusto and glee.
For me it’s a new type of paternal experience, because I never got to golf with my older son, Scott. During my long hiatus from the game, he played for a few years and then quit. He says that I bought him a set of sticks in college, which is possible.
Now he’s married, with three young children and a busy newspaper job in Miami. We’re lucky if we get to fish together a couple times a year. He’s a fine fly-caster, so I’ll bet he had a pretty smooth golf swing.
As for young Quinn, sometimes he whiffs and sometimes he whales on it, but the sparkle never leaves his eyes. He’s been hitting balls since he was three years old, well before his father foolishly embarked upon this quixotic return to the game.
When the little squirt smacks one up on the practice green, his old man exclaims, “Great shot!”
“Dad, I love golf,” the kid says.
Oh dear.
Day 398
Item in the club newsletter: Groundskeepers are planting 225 new pine trees around the golf course to enhance “playability.”
For whom—squirrels?
Day 400
This morning I hit only two of seven fairways, but I return home to cheerier headlines: Ohio congressman Bob Ney, that thieving suckfish, is pleading guilty to corruption charges in hopes that a judge will show mercy.
One of Ney’s many crimes was accepting a free golf trip to Scotland. He and a half-dozen other Republicans played seven courses in five days, including the hallowed Old Course at St. Andrews. The man who picked up the tab—from the chartered Gulfstream to the green fees—was lowlife lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who is also packing for prison.
Abramoff specialized in ripping off Indian tribes that had competing gambling interests, while paying off GOP lawmakers with campaign donations, gourmet meals, skybox tickets, vacations and other goodies. In exchange, the senators and congressmen gave special attention to bills benefiting Abramoff’s clients.
Lots of politicians love golf, a weakness that special-interest groups avidly exploit. In 1999, Abramoff accompanied six Republican senators and fifty fellow lobbyists to St. Andrews. A year later he returned with another golf nut named Tom DeLay, the future House majority leader and currently a criminal defendant in Texas.
Greedy Bob Ney got his invitation from Abramoff in the summer of 2002. Other notables on the flight manifest included Ralph Reed, the former head of the Christian Coalition, and David Safavian, then a hotshot in the second Bush administration.
Golf Digest published a terrific column by Dave Kindred lambasting this gang for sullying the historic Old Course with their loathsome presence. The article featured a photo of Abramoff, Ney and the other jerkoffs, posing on the tarmac in front of their jet. If the judge goes easy on Ney, he might be out of the hoosegow in time for the 2009 Pebble Beach Pro-Am.
It?
??s sobering to contemplate how many bribes have been negotiated in this country during casual rounds of golf. There ought to be a law that anytime a politician and a lobbyist tee off together, the foursome must be rounded out by two FBI agents.
Day 401
Facing a sinister easterly wind, I decide to play Quail Valley’s back nine first and get the worst behind me. Unaccountably, I shoot 40, probably the best string I’ve ever put together.
A wiser person would have called it a day, but vaingloriously I set out to conquer the front side. The script unfolds as expected—three 7s, each more clownish than the last. I finish the round with 88, a numerical barrier that I cannot seem to break.
On balance, I shouldn’t bitch. I made several decent golf shots—more, in fact, than I probably deserved.
Although the course was buzzard-free today, I did encounter a red-shouldered hawk feasting on an unrecognizable mammal in the 11th fairway. To avoid disturbing the regal predator, I politely snap-hooked my drive into a nest of distant bunkers.
Day 409
After a week of fishing, I’m back at Quail, expecting the worst. Amazingly, I shoot 40 on the front nine, and that includes a couple of idiotic three-putts.
On the difficult par-3 eighth, where I usually dump at least one tee shot into the lake, I stick a 6-iron thirty feet from the flag. What the hell did I eat for breakfast?
On the back side I open with consecutive pars, so now I’m obliged to keep playing. Although I’m not striking the ball well, I’m scrambling like a true grinder. Looming ahead are the two holes I most fear, the uphill 17th and bunker-pocked 18th, which as usual are playing against the wind. I double-bogey both of them, another clutch finale.
Nonetheless, the scorecard reads 85, topping my previous best-ever by three strokes. Just to make sure, I re-do the addition: Eight pars, seven bogeys and three doubles. It occurs to me that I didn’t knock a single ball in the water, an aberrancy that’s had a salutary effect on my stroke count.
It really is impossible to complain about shooting 85, only thirteen months after returning to golf. I could quit all over again and be happy. In fact, I should quit again, before the scabrous claw of doom drags my score back up to the mid-90s and beyond.