OAKMONT, PA – They’re called “half-par holes” be cause they play either much easier or much harder than the par on the scorecard states, and they are often the key to winning a golf tournament. Be it stroke play or match play, the ability to negotiate the razor thin edge between a birdie (or even eagle) or a triple bogey is the difference...
—Friends to Jay: “Who’s going to win the U.S. Open this year?” Jay to Friends: “Oakmont, that’s who.”— Of all the major championship venues I’ve seen in my career as a sports writer – and I’ve see everything from Augusta to Pebble and back – Oakmont is my favorite. Cresting the hill of the second...
MAMARONECK, NY – Brian Williams pitched in from perdition to open the day’s play with lightning, while college stars Chris Troy and James Nicholas closed the day with thunder, using gargantuan length and unyielding pressure to pummel their opponents by a combined score of 8&7. Winged Foot members all, along with Williams’s partner Hans...
MAMARONECK, NY – With all the merciless ferocity of the Headless Horseman himself, Sleepy Hollow Country Club’s Cameron Young and Michael Quagliano fired a blistering 8-under 62 on Winged Foot’s formidable West course Friday for a 2-day total of 4-under to claim medalist honors in the 80th Anderson Memorial Tournament at Winged Foot. Meanwhile...
Ernesto the Prediction Iguana is coming out of hibernation early this year in honor of Euro 2016. Those of you that follow this column know that we divide our futbol picks between the round robin phase and the knockout phase. We’ll see you again once the brackets are finalized. Remember also that this year the top three third-place wild-card teams will make the...
SCOTCH PLAINS, NJ – Raise a glass to 100 years of rousing cheers. Shackamaxon Country club in northwest New Jersey celebrates their centennial this year. It’s another runaway success for the tandem of owner/developer/magnate Chris Schiavone and golf architect Stephen Kay. Finger pressed firmly on the zeitgeist of modern golf architecture, they’ve...
Great job by Ryan Ballengee and the folks at Golf News Net running my review of my new Callaway Apex Forged Irons.
UPDATE! I’m still hitting the irons great, thank you for asking!
We had Ryan Ballengee and Gary Van Sickle on the Jay’s Plays show on the Golf News Net Radio Network. We talked about the Masters, Jordan Spieth, the Players, Fowler, McIlroy, the USGA Fourball and the Anderson Memorial, both at Winged Foot, and the best moments of Tropic Thunder! sadly, no one has gotten the JB’s Best Hot Sauce Trivia Question right in a...
MAMARONECK, NY – One’s called “Sandman,” because he puts opponents in a sleeper hold until they succumb. The other, “Phatty” to his friends, is one of a fourball tandem known as “The Silent Assassins,” that used to go undefeated through state championship caliber fields. Yet this week these former rivals teamed up in...
I’m swinging new irons for the first time in 37 years, and it feels like I just got out of prison. As for my last set: Fred Flintstone, here’s your freaking golf clubs back. “Are those original Ping Eyes?” people would ask me, staring slack-jawed at my golf bag as if they were meeting a Dodo bird. “Yes, they are. Do you still point at...
MAMARONECK, NY – Set your TiVo for Fox Sports 1 this weekend, because you’ll get a rare and wonderful opportunity: Winged Foot’s East Course, in all its majesty and splendor, will finally get the close-up it so richly deserves as the USGA and the television cameras descend on the venerable club – the Yankee Stadium of golf – for the...
Starting with this week’s coverage the the Players Championship, GNN will be doing video. Look for my piece on Sawgrass shortly!
Great job by the wonderful folks at GolfCourseTrades.com for running my article on Old Town Club, the last great course of Perry Maxwell. It’s a wonderful course in Winstom-Salem, NC, the home course of mighty Wake Forest! From the article: “It is impossible to understate how important Old Town is to both Maxwell’s legacy and the study of golf...
MONROE TOWNSHIP, NJ – The wind was cold as Spanish steel. A golf ball-gray sky stretched end to end across the horizon, clouds moving forlornly before the breeze. To the west a dark thunderhead roiled, black as a witch’s cauldron. Yet to the buoyant hearts of northeast golfers it might have well been a sunny 4th of July. “What a perfect day for golf...
Some sad news today – Barstow the Cat has died. Attacked by a dog while playing in his backyard, he was rushed to the vet as soon as possible, but, sadly, succumbed to his injuries. We here at AWITP and GNN extend our deepest condolences to Barstow’s owners Ian and Ali. Barstow was an Internet sensation, thought by many to be the smartest cat they knew...