The Challenge opens; Watson wins again

    The Monday Nine for April 14, 2014

    Juniors: The IG Challenge at Glenwoodie is June 24

    We’re back with the news that the other tradition unlike any other, the Illinois Golfer Challenge Junior Golf Championship at Glenwoodie Golf Course in Glenwood, returns for its 26th playing on Tuesday, June 24.
    You can find the entry blank here. The best news of all is that the entry fee remains the same – $35, lower than any comparable junior tournament – with all entrants getting lunch, a bag tag, a towel, and a shot at a trophy.
    There are four divisions, two for boys and two for girls. In each case, the age groups are 13-to-15 and 16-to-18.
    The Challenge, which began as the Pulitzer Challenge in 1989 and for most years carried the banner of the Daily Southtown, has attracted anywhere from 60 (in its inaugural year) to 160 competitors. The entry limit is 156, and we’d like to reach it. The more players, the more fun!
    Entries are open now, and close on June 13. So you’ve got two months to get that entry in. Don’t delay, enter today!

    Now, to the usual nine:
    1. In the end, five strokes, two of them barely lacking, decided the 78th Masters.
    The first two were the answering birdie putts by Bubba Watson, matching Jordan Spieth on the fourth and sixth holes. Birds on those two demonic par 3s are hard enough to come by, but answering a deuce with one of your own? Stout, and vital, as they kept Watson two (at No. 4) and one stroke behind Spieth, who played the first seven holes in 3-under and appeared, even with a bogey at the fifth, to be pulling away. Watson prevented that.
    The next two strokes were by Spieth, and were those that lacked a little something. Just a couple of yards. He came up just short on the par-4 ninth, his ball rolling down the false front of the green and down the hill to the flattish area about 10 yards in front of the putting surface. A half-club more there would have helped. And a half-club more on the par-3 12th was absolutely necessary, for Spieth plunked his shot at the heart of Amen Corner into Rae’s Creek, a two-hopper that came off the green and drowned.
    Spieth was fortunate to get away with a bogey on the 12th to match the one on the ninth, but pars on both holes and he’s still in the toonamint, as the say on Washington Road. He’s not two strokes back and reeling. He’s tied with Watson after Bubba’s bogey on the 10th, and still there after the 12th.
    Had he been in that position, what happened next, the final critical stroke – Watson’s booming blast off the tee on the par-3 13th that curved around the bend like a cruise missile and landed 366 yards from the tee, even after clipping a tree – might have been less a body blow.
    Instead, it was like Joe Frazier had shown up and thrown a punch – connecting right on the chin. Spieth had nothing left to answer, parring in for an even-par 72. And he had company.
    Nobody else in the last 11 groups broke 70, while he scored 3-under 69 to finish at 8-under-par 280, three ahead of Spieth and Jonas Blixt. It was similar to the 1991 PGA at Crooked Stick, where another big hitter, John Daly, started the day in the lead and stayed there when he had the best round of the last 16-odd players.
    2. Kudos to Blixt, the unknown golfer. He’s played in three majors and finished in the top four twice. Keep an eye on him at Pinehurst.
    3. The picky in Twitterville and surrounding Internet communities have been complaining since about 4 p.m. Sunday that Watson’s big finish meant a lack of drama, depriving them of the dramatic back nine that The Masters automatically provides. Actually, The Masters doesn’t automatically provide it. Back nines like Jack Nicklaus’ charge of 1986 or Charl Schwartzel’s four-birdie finish of 2011 are rare, and that’s why they’re remembered. In 20 of the last 24 years, the winner at Augusta National has come from the last pairing. That doesn’t exactly shout upset city. It hints at two-horse races.
    What makes Masters Sunday so special, aside from gawking at the beauty of the course, is the potential for a topsy-turvy leader board. There’s usually more movement than there was on Sunday’s back nine, but the front nine provided plenty of excitement. Eliminate the aforementioned two so-so strokes by Spieth, and it would have been a two-man race in the last pairing to the wire. This one happened to end after Watson’s tee shot on the 16th landed dry.
    4. For decades, Augusta National’s various bosses were criticized for failing to televise more than a few hours. We remember when Sunday’s coverage started on the 15th fairway and was in black-and-white, and you were lucky to get an hour on Saturday.
    The need for expanded coverage still rings true on weekdays, where leaders with hot morning rounds can finish before or just as television coverage begins, but the lords of Augusta, along with keeping commercials to a minimum – the four-minute average per-hour has been in effect since around 1965 – are ahead of the game when it comes to online coverage. Between covering two feature groups each day, plus channels dedicated to Amen Corner and the 15-16 combination, and other features, Augusta’s live online offerings pale in comparison to the other majors, regular PGA Tour stops, and other sports.
    If there’s one beef to be had there, it’s that the coverage doesn’t start early enough. But the pictures are amazing, and, via Masters.com, there are no commercials – CBSSports.com adds them in.
    5. If you’re wondering how good Spieth is, this good: He led the field in greens in regulation, he was under par the first three days, and he was so calculating, calm and composed for the first 63 holes, showing emotion – as in burying a club in Stadleresque fashion after a shot on the back nine, and flipping his putter in the air after a miss on the 15th – was suddenly considered immature by some.
    Not really. At 20, chasing a major, 3-under on the day through seven holes, wondering where in the closet the green jacket will so, and so forth, emotions sometimes weave their way into the psyche.
    He’s already mature. Wait until he’s seasoned as well.
    6. Quote of the day came from Spieth: “I’ve worked my whole life to lead at Augusta on Sunday.”
    Yes, all 20 years.
    7. When watching the pre-Masters specials on the Big Three and Nick Faldo, we couldn’t help but be struck with the realization that CBS has all this old Masters coverage sitting around, generally unseen except for the occasional highlight or “Jim Nantz Remembers” version. CBS also has the CBS Sports Network, which fills hours with simulcasts of radio talk shows and rodeos.
    Why not arrange with the lords of Augusta an annual marathon of old Masters broadcasts the week before the big doings in Augusta? How cool would it be to watch Arnold Palmer’s four wins at Augusta as they originally played out?
    8. The big week started a week ago Sunday with the Drive, Chip and Putt competition, an all-junior affair that crowned eight champions, four boys and four girls from a quartet of age groups. That can only get bigger. What kid getting into the game could resist trying to get to Augusta National? What parent wouldn’t like to get inside the gates and watch their lad or lassie on the range or putting on the 18th green with a title on the line?
    Kudos to Augusta, the USGA and the PGA of America for dreaming up golf’s answer to the NFL’s Punt, Pass and Kick competition. (And as far as we know, new Augusta member Roger Goodell, the NFL commissioner, had nothing to do with it.)
    9. The local scene had one big development recently. Chris Flick is the new superintendent at Cog Hill Golf & Country Club in Lemont. Flick succeeds Scott Pavalko, who took a similar post at Bob O Link, the private club in Highland Park. Pavalko was among those who recommended Flick. They worked together at Muirfield Village Golf Club, site of the Memorial Tournament. The 30-year-old Clemson grad was most recently at National Trail in Springfield, Ohio, a three-course operation, so he knew what he was in for at Cog Hill, where he started last Monday.
    Pavalko, who succeeded Ken Lapp, goes from a four-course circus of activity to an outpost where there is only one course and not nearly the amount of play in a month that Cog Hill gets on any of its courses in a week.

    – Tim Cronin

Doral and the Chicago connection

    The Morning Nine for Monday, March 10, 2014

    If the weatherman is correct – and he has been all too often this winter – spring will waft in today with 50 degree temperatures. That’s a start. Of course, he also says it will snow on Wednesday, never get above 26, and plunge to 16 going into Thursday morning. So think golf dome if you’re thinking about practice at all.
    Having said that, on to the Morning Nine, which, thanks to the weather, is Florida-oriented, albeit with Chicago connections:

    1. The complaints, oddly not so much by players as observers, over the remodeled Doral Blue Monster turning into just that on a windy Friday seem unfounded when the long view is taken.
    The renovation by Gil Hanse included 18 new greens. Very new greens, less than eight months old. A new green has little thatch in it, so shots are going to bounce harder than they would on an established green. Add in rough that’s as new as the green on slopes that lead to ponds, and wind gusting to 33 mph, and shots that aren’t as well struck as they should be are going to die a watery death. That’s why 113 balls found the water during the second round. (There were only four rounds in the 80s among 68 players, so it wasn’t a torture chamber.)
    The course will mature. Players will also learn to play it – as winner Patrick Reed did, playing the 18th hole by laying up off the tee and on his second shot, settling for a bogey 5 to take home the trophy by a stroke over Bubba Watson and Jamie Donaldson.

    2. Here’s how Rory McIlroy – after finishing at 5-over-par 293 – put it into words: “It's a frustrating golf course because you feel like you should be doing so much better, and it just doesn't allow you to. You have to be so precise and just to get the ball close on some of these greens and these pin positions. I don't know if it's because you've got memories of the course before, like going low, and the way it is now it just doesn't allow you to do that.”

    3. Doral was designed by Dick Wilson and Joe Lee in the early 1960s. It earned the Monster appellation soon after, but Wilson didn’t implement all his design strategies, which called for players playing over angles – especially of water – completely.
    That’s likely in part because Doral developer Al Kaskel threw Wilson off the property when the architect, a notorious boozer, turned up hammered once too often. Wilson turned the job over to Lee and underling Robert Von Hagge, going back to Boynton Beach to complete Pine Tree, considered by many Wilson fans his best work.
    But the original plans remained, and Hanse consulted them when planning the renovation. The result is a 21st century version of what Wilson originally envisioned, as interpreted by Hanse. The Wilson-trademark jigsaw-puzzle bunkering and elevated greens remain. The hunch here is that Wilson would be proud of Hanse’s redo.

    4. Wilson’s Chicago connection is Cog Hill. He and Lee were hired by Joe Jemsek in the early 1960s to create 18 holes that became the No. 3 course, then kept on to build Jemsek’s championship layout, No. 4, which he named Dubsdread after an Orlando layout he fancied.
    Dubsdread’s original look, once the land for the current 13th hole was bought, was updated by Rees Jones several years ago, and proved as controversial as Doral has been. The only difference: It was the players in the BMW Championship / Western Open who were complaining about slopes on greens and conditioning at a time the WGA was looking to maximize the annual return, based on the big boost in revenue that came about from the renovation-timed trip to Bellerive near St. Louis.
    Aside from McIlroy, the players at Doral bit their collective tongue with Donald Trump prancing about his property. Cog Hill might have lost the tournament anyway, since it’s easier to make money in the fall from corporate clients on the north shore than in Lemont, but the complaints didn’t give Cog Hill a fighting chance to retain it.
    Phil Mickelson was one of the complainers. But for Doral, he said. “I think it’s really close to being great.” So go figure.
    Meanwhile, for the public without access to Butler National, Medinah No. 3 or Olympia Fields North, Dubsdread remains the toughest place to play in the area – and a fair test from the proper set of tees.

    5. It’s always amazing when players on the PGA Tour complain. They’re playing for millions, they get a free car for the week, they get free food in the clubhouse, people grovel for their autograph, and someone else is carrying their clubs. What’s the beef?
    Those on the lower levels are almost uniformly appreciative when the smallest kindness is shown. Players at last year’s Chicago Open marveled at the free buffet, for instance. On the big tour, someone would probably complain about the wrong kind of salad dressing.

    6. The other chatter post-Doral is about Patrick Reed pronouncing himself one of the top five players in the world. He said so Saturday night on an interview NBC played an excerpt of during Sunday’s round, and repeated himself after winning.
    Three wins since late last year and a climb into the top 20 in the slow-to-react world rankings is mighty impressive, especially since Reed hasn’t played in one of the four pro majors.
    Top five? Of the players who’ve done anything in the last couple of months, yes. Overall?  Win a couple of more and we’ll talk. But the lad’s pluck is admired. Better to have someone crow than “aw, shucks” his way though an interview.

    7. For the second year in a row, there’s no U.S. Open sectional qualifying anywhere near Chicago. The closest site is the so-called Tour qualifier in Columbus, Ohio, at Brookside and Scioto country clubs. The local qualifiers this year are at Dunne National in Oak Forest on May 5, and at the Knollwood Club in Lake Forest on May 12. U.S. Women’s Open qualifying is at Indian Hill Club in Winnetka on May 12.

    8. It’s one thing not to host a U.S. Open since 2003. But no sectional qualifier, which sends players to the Open? It’s not as if the CDGA hasn’t lined up great courses for the 36-hole test in the past. Sometimes, the thinking of the USGA is unfathomable.

    9. Finally, it has nothing to do with golf – yet – but if you have a minute, check out the Paraylmpics on NBCSN. The skiing was absolutely amazing early on Monday, though two skiers had to be helicoptered off the mountain after taking nasty falls. By the way, don’t look for golf in the 2016 Paralympics in Rio, unfortunately. It didn’t make the cut when new sports were added for that carnival.

    – Tim Cronin

Expect a slow start to the season

    The Morning Nine for Monday, March 3, 2014

    As the deep freeze continues here in Chiberia, some warming thoughts.

    1. Don’t expect your favorite local golf course to open immediately after the last flake of snow melts. (It will melt, won’t it?) A superintendent at a local private club says there’s no way his course will open before April 1, and that’s a stretch.
    The problem won’t be muddy turf after a few people walk or ride over it, it will be the need for the turf, especially greens, to recover from the ravages of winter. Ice is the biggest culprit, killing grass because it effectively smothers it. As the guru explained it, there’s no way for gases to escape, and that causes winterkill. That can mean reseeding or returfing the dead areas, which will look blighted until that happens. And no amount of warm weather will bring back dead grass. Good grass will come back from the natural dormancy of winter and regular snow cover. Dead grass is dead.
    Some courses will open instantly, of course, but don’t expect those fee factories to be in anything near good shape until May or June. Waiting a week or 10 days will pay off in better conditions down the line.

    2. To steal the old line from Ken Venturi, Paula Creamer could have dropped a small bucket on the green and not made that 75-foot swinging putt for eagle to win in Singapore a second time. But she only had to make it once, and she did. Left turns in NASCAR aren’t that severe. Great stuff, and the leading candidate for putt of the year.

    3. It’s hard to believe that Creamer hadn’t won since the 2010 U.S. Women’s Open. It’s also hard to believe she’ll go another four years without winning more. This could be her year.

    4. Meanwhile, the final round of the Honda Classic turned into a demolition derby. Rory McIlroy crashed on the back after taking a three-stroke lead early in the round, and after a four-man playoff in which ol’ Rors was fortunate to be a part of, Russell Henley emerged the winner with a 54-foot two-putt birdie on the first extra hole, the 18th at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. All right, not exactly Creameresque, but it got the job done, which McIlroy, Russell Knox and Ryan Palmer did not.

    5. McIlroy, whose birdie on the 18th at least made the playoff a foursome, might be talking to himself still, though he put a good face on his failure to hold the lead after the round. Hey, who hasn’t hit into the water from a bunker? And Knox and Palmer had their chances as well, especially Knox, who dunked a tee shot into the water on the 14th hole.

    6. By winning, Henley gets into this week’s WGC cash cow tournament at the redone Doral Resort near Miami, and also returns to the Masters and PGA Championship. Some regarded him a one-shot wonder when he won in Hawaii last year at the “Big W,” but no more.

    7. There was one other casualty on Sunday. Tiger Woods, who flirted with missing the cut and then threatened to become a contender on the previous two days, withdrew with a bad back after 13 holes. Yes, he was 5-over on the day, but his erratic tee shots were the hint that something was wrong. And back spasms are killer for a golfer walking five miles or more, much less under tournament pressure. Will he back at Doral? Or Bay Hill? Or Augusta? We hope so.

    8. Doral will be interesting if only because the Blue Monster been completely revamped by Gil Hanse since last year. (Ah, the wonder of year-round warmth in which to work.) Most of the Dick Wilson-Joe Lee routing was retained, and the 18th still is a liquid torture chamber, but the Wilson-styled bunkering is deeper, and some holes are completely new. In other words, Hanse did at Doral what Rees Jones did with Wilson’s Dubsdread layout at Cog Hill, only more so.
    All of this bulldozing and shaping and whatnot was underwritten by Donald Trump, who bought the place and is pouring $250 million into the five-course complex and hotel. The name – Trump National Doral Golf Club – is a handful. Then again, so is the mop on the head of The Donald.
    But someone will shoot 65 this week. Notwithstanding the Keystone Kops finish at PGA National, these guys are good.

    9. Finally, are the Oscars over yet? We lost faith in them when “Caddyshack” didn’t win best picture for 1980. (But a tip o’ the Hogan lid to Bill Murray for remembering Harold Ramis, whose death came after the memorial tribute was made.)

    – Tim Cronin

Golf needs more players and players playing more

    The Morning Nine for Tuesday, February 25, 2014

    How cold is it? Cold enough for a day’s delay in the Morning Nine. This comes straight from the Deep Freeze, still fresh on a Tuesday afternoon.

    1. Walking the aisles of the Chicago Golf Show last Friday, two things were evident.
    First, people who play golf still love golf. Maybe not as many as 10 years ago, but there was a crowd for the first day, with some inspecting clubs for sale in the bargain racks, some taking practice swings on the indoor range, others listing to pros pontificate about the finer points of the game, and some just scooping up brochures from courses near and far.
    Second, that those in the business are worried about the business because of those people who have disappeared from the links in the last decade. They wonder if players will play more after a wicked winter, if improvements at courses will pay for themselves, if rock bottom has been reached, and if it has, will a real rebound commence soon?
    The problem, of course, is that there aren’t enough golfers playing enough rounds to cover each course with players at every hour every day in season. Or even some of the hours on some of the days. At public courses, outside of the weekend morning hours that have been locked up on subscription for years, there are time slots available all summer.
    How do those get filled in? With new golfers. Where will those new golfers come from? And how can players who do play find the time to play more? Those are the billion-dollar questions. From the First Tee to Play Golf America to Play It Forward, a gaggle of new golfers has yet to materialize. If we had an easy answer – or a complicated one, you would read it here.
    2. The CBS golf bigwigs have to be scratching their heads. They get the early network run of the PGA Tour, and end up with winners like Scott Stallings and Jimmy Walker, plus talented-but-unknown Jason Day knocking off Victor Dubuisson in the World Match Play final. NBC starts this weekend after its Olympics run, and has everybody but Walter Hagen in the Honda Classic field. Woods, Mickelson, McIlroy, Scott, Fowler, you name a name and he’s playing.
    3. Next CBS tournament? The Masters. The field should be decent there, no?
    4. A bit of a tournament shuffle in the Midwest finds the Big Ten men’s and women’s championships leaving the French Lick Resort after this spring for parts unknown, with the Senior PGA Championship takes its place there next year.
    5. Len Ziehm notes on his website that there’s a local golf centennial that some (including your obedient servant) have missed: Wilson Sporting Goods, founded in 1914 as Thomas E. Wilson and Co. Wilson’s gone through tough times but has persevered, and still stands tall in River Grove.
    6. Every best wish to Scott Stricker, brother of Steve, on a continued recovery from his recent liver transplant.
    7. Good news from far-off Furman University. The Paladins men’s golf program will live on. The school has canceled canceling the program. Must have been the ghost of Richard Boone haunting the administration that made the difference.
    8. A moment of silence, please, for Harold Ramis, director of “Caddyshack,” still the ultimate golf movie, and one of the most quotable movies of all time. The flag at Bushwood is at half staff.
    9. Finally, this would have appeared yesterday, save for the inability to spell Dubuisson.

    – Tim Cronin

RIP The Eisenhower Tree

The Morning Nine for Monday, February 17, 2014

    A dispatch from the arboreal world leads off this edition of the Morning Nine for an eventually snowy Monday:

    1. The news came suddenly, but it probably shouldn’t have been so unexpected.
    Augusta National Golf Club’s Eisenhower Tree is dead. It was believed to be about 150 years old.
    The killer was last week’s ice storm that roared through the south. The old loblolly pine tree on the left edge of the 17th fairway – from afar, as the adjoining photo from 2013 illustrates, it looked more like an oak – lost too many branches under the weight of the ice, and was taken down over the weekend after arborists said it couldn’t be saved.
    The word came Sunday, when Augusta Chronicle reporter Scott Michaux wrote about it, including a photo, on his web site.
    It looked like a carcass torn apart by a ravenous beast. Lightning couldn’t have done a better job of taking apart the tree named after the president and Augusta National member who hit it on a regular basis and whose request to remove it was denied by Cliff Roberts in 1956.
    It was no longer a factor for most drives in The Masters – players hit over it, not into it – but it stood there like an old uncle visiting at Christmas, as much a part of the lore of Augusta as the wild MacKenzie bunker on the 10th fairway, the little corner of heaven called Amen Corner, Magnolia Lane and the pimento cheese sandwich.
    Now? No more.
    For a while on Sunday, Twitter was alive with the news of the tree’s fate, much as it was filled with pictures of the damage to the magnolias on the world’s most famous driveway on the morning after the storm. Even the sign in front of the club was cockeyed, hit by a falling branch.
    Ike’s tree was held up by a series of cables – the same is true of the Big Tree, which stands majestically behind the clubhouse and where everyone who is anyone in golf uses as a meeting point during The Masters – but the club was concerned enough that a similar pine was planted about 20 years up the hill and closer to the 17th green some years back.
    It was wiped out as well. (No word on the Big Tree.)
    Augusta boss Billy Payne called the tree’s demise “difficult to accept.” In a statement, he said, “We have begun deliberations of the best way to address the future of the 17th hole and to pay tribute to his iconic symbol of our history. Rest assured, we will do both appropriately."
    The hunch here: On Masters week, if not before, a new pine will be standing in just about the same spot as Ike’s Tree, ready to accept a low liner hugging the left side of the fairway. Augusta has rebuilt the 11th and 12th greens after Rae’s Creek turned into a whitewater canoe run. A little ice storm isn’t going to get in the way of a tradition unlike any other.

    2. Last year’s go-to spot for Masters week visitors to Augusta was the spot off the 10th fairway from which Bubba Watson hit his impossible shot to set up his winning playoff putt in 2012. This year, it’ll be the 17th fairway, to see what the answer the Lords of Augusta have for Mother Nature.

    3. If this had happened Masters week, the tree might have been replaced overnight. Buildings have been repaired that quickly. In 2012, a severe thunderstorm tore through central Georgia late on Tuesday night. At Augusta, it felled a tree that smashed through the roof of a new restroom building – a big one near the rear entrance behind the fifth green and sixth tee.
    At most golf courses, the plan would have been to bring in portajohns as a temporary replacement.
    Augusta National does not do portajohns. Augusta National rebuilds buildings overnight.
    By about 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, when the course opened to spectators a half-hour late for the day’s practice rounds and the Par 3 Tournament, the tree had been removed and the restroom had been rebuilt. Completely, with a new roof, new fixtures, the works. Those who had been in the day before say you couldn’t tell the difference.
    At Augusta National, they can do anything, and apparently don’t need no stinkin’ building permits.

    4. Closer to home, the Chicago Golf Show begins a three-day run on Friday at Rosemont’s Stephens Convention Center. Bigger by a factor of about four than the Tinley Park Golf Show, admission is $5 on Friday, $10 on Saturday and Sunday, with children under 12 free and those from 12 to 15 in for just $4. Of course, parking in Rosemont is maddeningly expensive, but if you car pool with a golf buddy, that’s a help.
    There are 186 exhibitors listed on the show’s web site, with a mix of Chicago area courses and those from afar, all the way out to Florida and, of all places, Atlantic City, N.J. NBC’s Mark Rolfing, a Chicago native, will host special lesson sessions with Jeff Sluman and Bears kicker and golf nut Robbie Gould on Saturday.

    5. Bubba Watson shed a tear or two after winning Sunday at Riviera with a second straight 64. He’s often moved to tears. Wait until he hears about Ike’s Tree. Or is interviewed by NBC skiing analyst Cristin Cooper. He could solve California’s drought singlehandedly.

    6. Wednesday brings the start of the year’s most unpredictable tournament, Tucson’s WGC World Match Play. This was the Tuscon Open in the old days, and might disappear from Tuscon completely after this year. Tiger Woods, Phil Mickleson and Adam Scott sent their regrets, meaning there’s that much less star power to get knocked out in the early rounds, and the picky pro players generally regard Dove Mountain as a dog track. Even when it doesn’t snow.

    7. KemperSports is now running Cantigny Golf in Wheaton for the McCormick Foundation, except all the same people at Cantigny are still going to be running Cantigny. So what’s the deal? One advantage may be to take advantage of volume pricing. Kemper has so many courses in its portfolio, it can probably buy golf course chemicals and other things in bulk for its entire group.
    All the familiar faces, including head pro Patrick Lynch, will be back this year, and Cantigny brass indicate that there would not have been a deal with Kemper if that was not the case. KemperSports knows the business of golf and delivers value, and has increasingly worked the high end of the market, from Bandon Dunes in Oregon to, more recently, Harborside International on the southeast side of Chicago. This should work out fine.

    8. The Dallas Morning News reports Dallas Country Club has welcomed its first black member into its ranks. Private equity tycoon Kneeland Youngblood was recently admitted – after a 13-year wait to join the ultra-exclusive club. The story indicates there was some dissension in the ranks because Youngblood has connections with the Rainbow/PUSH coalition headed by Rev. Jesse Jackson.
    Youngblood said he plays neither golf nor tennis. But making one deal over lunch would make the $137,000 entrance fee seem like chicken feed. Happily, where people of his color might have only been waiters or busboys to the members before, now he has the chance to make that deal.

    9. Finally, a look out the window and a reading of the forecast indicates the groundhog should not have been consulted on Feb. 2. This could be a muddy wet spring. The best investment this year might not be new clubs, but new DryJoys.

    – Tim Cronin