The land was snuggled under a thick blanket of snow. The temperatures were headed down. A strange malady came over me. The symptoms were diverse. I kept reading and re-reading the only golf literature I had in the house, a six-month-old issue of Golf Magazine in which I had long ago spilled half a bowl of Honey-Nut Cheerios right on John Feinstein's column. Then I spent a joyful hour or so marking my signature red dot on all of the golf balls in the three new boxes I'd gotten for Christmas. Also, I developed a disturbing case of sleep-putting, sort of a golfer’s variation on sleepwalking. (I would have been even more disturbed had I been better putting in my sleep than I was awake. Luckily I stink in both awake and asleep.)
I asked a friend if he'd ever heard of such an illness. He nodded.
"It's called golf withdrawal. It hits a lot of people, usually in January and February. It's not fatal, but there's no known cure besides playing some golf."
I looked outside at the landscape, which was doing its best to imitate a bad day in the Yukon. "Is there anything else I can do to ease the pain?"
"Besides alcohol? Hmm...why don't you try watching some golf on TV?"
I already had been watching golf every day. Three months ago, my life changed drastically. Cable TV Montgomery added some new channels, including The Golf Channel. Every morning on the way to work, it’s Golf Central, a daily news and scores show, hosted by the beautiful Kelly Tilghman and a bunch of guys whose names I couldn’t remember no matter how many lifelines Regis gave me. I watch The Golf Channel, especially Golf Central, so much I find myself humming the Golf Central theme song during meetings at work. Some say The Golf Channel is also known as the Divorce Channel. I’m pretty sure that this won’t be true in my case, because my fiancée is already aware of, and sympathetic to, my addiction. (Though I was thinking I might have to come up with a special golf pre-nup.)
Watching the Golf Channel didn’t seem to be helping my case of golf withdrawal. I needed more. Luckily for me it was time for the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am, televised on CBS both Saturday and Sunday. Just what the doctor ordered.
One thing concerned me. I wasn’t in the mood to watch the Tiger Woods Show. Don’t get me wrong. I like Tiger Woods. I admire him. I root for him. I am in awe of Tiger Woods. Very rarely, when I stand on the tee and hit the ball just right, a monster straight down the middle of the fairway, I am Tiger Woods. But, when TV shows All Tiger All the Time, it’s sort of boring. I like to see all of the other good golfers that are playing. At Pebble Beach, David Duval, Freddie Couples, Sergio Garcia, and Phil Mickelson were playing. I wanted to see them play too.
On Saturday, I need not have worried. Since he was playing at Spyglass Hill, Tiger was barely shown. The cameras were all at Pebble Beach. Instead, we got to see some bozo named Ray Romano play. The putative star of something called Everybody Loves Raymond, which is a TV show broadcast on--can you guess? You’re right, CBS, which was shamelessly plugging Ray’s show all day long. It was embarrassing. Ray was playing like me out there. The cameramen who cover these golf matches are generally awesome in their ability to follow the flight path of a golf ball when it leaves a club. They were hopeless when faced with Ray’s shots. Some of them just gave up and gave us some pretty pictures of seagulls flying over the Pacific surf.
Speaking of CBS--how cool would it be to have Jim Nantz’s job? Aside from the odious duty of kissing Ray Romano’s butt, that is. Every week, he gets to do golf as his job. And he doesn’t even have to be able to hit a drive 300 yards. I’m a little jealous. (Who am I kidding, I’m a lot jealous.)
I didn’t see much of David Duval playing golf, which is probably just as well, since he did rather poorly. That’s not to say he didn’t score a lot of airtime. He was in ads for Titleist and FootJoy, and a brokerage ad for Charles Schwab. They showed his funny PGA Tour spot, where he knocks over a ball-sweeper on a driving range and says ruefully, "Not again." He also had a bunch of funny commercials with Paul Reiser for AT&T’s new phone plan. Not bad for someone who didn’t make the cut.
Sunday, Tiger played Pebble Beach, and was on TV much more. Unfortunately, so was Ray Romano. It was slightly amusing to see Ray hit his ball down to the actual pebbly beach on the 10th. He spent some time hitting from one part of the beach to another, chasing frolicking dogs away from his ball. Tiger was playing behind him, no doubt angry about having to wait for this buffoon. I kept hoping Tiger would whack Romano upside the head with his driver. That would’ve been some entertaining television!
Woods was the story on Monday with an incredible comeback to extend his amazing winning streak to six tournaments. Kelly Tilghman told me all about it on Golf Central that night. But I had to work on Monday, so I wasn’t able to watch.
On the weekend, Pebble Beach was a fairly exciting event, but to be honest, watching it didn’t cure my golf withdrawal. TV golf just cannot take the place of playing. The second and third day of a tournament isn’t even really riveting television. (Though I’d watch the worst golf tournament ever televised if the only other program choice was Everybody Loves Raymond.)
On Saturday, I found myself doing laundry while golf was on. I washed and dried every single piece of clothing I own, even that ugly striped polo shirt I haven’t worn since the Reagan Administration.
On Sunday, I stretched out on the sofa and took a nap.
Napping is easy to do while watching golf on TV. It’s quiet, relaxing and you rarely miss too much action. (I never actually napped on a golf course, but I came close one Sunday at Poolesville. The group in front of us was so slow, before we played through, we were looking at a six-hour round. It looked like they were apologizing for their ballmarks to each blade of grass on the green.) Sunday’s action at Pebble Beach was a little slow and as I nodded off, I started having this great dream. It was almost as if it were being televised on CBS.
There I was on the par-5 18th tee at Pebble Beach, driver in my hand. My playing partner, some youngster named Tiger Woods. I looked around at the crowd. Behind the ropes David Duval wasn’t playing golf--he was selling beers and telephones from a concession stand. Tiger waited for me to hit.
I took a deep breath of the ocean air and heard the breakers on the beach to my left. Calmly, I took the driver back slowly, then exploded with power. I hush fell over the crowds as they realized what they were seeing. My ball arched into the air then bounced down the center of the fairway. I had outdriven the great Tiger Woods. My ball came to rest four hundred yards away. (Hey, this is my dream!)
As Tiger and I walked down the fairway, spectators marched behind us. "Nice hit," Tiger said. I coolly nodded my thanks. Tiger hit his second, then we proceeded to my ball. Again, I entered a zone of calmness, concentrating on the rhythmic sound of the ocean. At about 150 yards away, the flag looked huge, a chip shot. I swung. The next thing I knew, the people gathered around the green were screaming. The ball had gone in! A double eagle!
I walked up the eighteenth fairway to the green nodding nonchalantly to the crowds, on their feet and cheering me. As I took the ball out of the hole, their cheers turned to a roar. Tiger was leaping up and down and clapping for me. Linda, my fiancée, ran out, jumped on me and wrapped her legs around me like Freddie Couples' first wife did after he won the Kemper. Kelly Tilghman stood at the edge of the green waiting to interview me.
What a great dream!
Did I beat Tiger? What, are you kidding? Not even in my dreams, literally. But I did beat Ray Romano. Not too shabby.
Man, I want to play golf so bad!
(February 14, 2000)