Category: Recent freelance

Ryder Cup site Bethpage Black has an unusual way of doing things

Lots of golf facilities have hosted the biggest PGA events, but Bethpage Black – site of the Ryder Cup has an unusual way of doing things.

The head golf professional, Justin Koff, is also the director of junior instruction at the massive five-course facility. The director of golf is Kelley Brooke whose company heads Bethpage Golf Group.

“I own the company that runs the entire operation,’’ said Brooke. “It’s the equivalent of being the head pro at a golf course.’’

It’s a big job, to be sure. Koff, as a PGA member, holds the title of head professional but Brooke oversees the pro shop operation, the driving range, sending out the carts and the instruction programs.

“And I pay rent to the State of New York in return,’’ she said.

Brooke won the contract for the Bethpage job in 2018 and is operating on a 20-year contract. She didn’t know the Ryder Cup was coming when she landed the job.

“It was a pretty good secret,’’ she said, “and it changed my life financially.  Now (leading into the Ryder Cup) we’re doing $35,000 a day in merchandise sales.  The Ryder Cup has put me and Bethpage on the map.’’

She was prepared for it, though.

After attending the University of Iowa on a scholarship in the 1980s she broke into golf as a driving range instructor on Staten Island in the early 1990s.

“I worked at a range that was between a dump – a landfill – and a prison,’’ she said.  “Finally, in 1993, I couldn’t take it any longer and started to build my resume.’’

She developed a variety of programs at other locations and – after 10 years – she got her first contract at Brooklyn Golf Center. Now, in addition to Bethpage, she has negotiated long-term deals at three other Long Island facilities—Montauk Downs, Merrick and Harbor Links. Merrick and Harbor Links are for 25 years and Montauk for 10. She’s hoping to add Lido to that list. It’d be a 30-year project.

“The pro shop and instruction will be huge there — $13-15 million,’’ she said.  “If I win Lido, that’ll be my last one.  I’ll ride into the sunset. I’ll be in my eighties by the time I’m done.’’

In addition to her management business Brooke has been competing on the LPGA Legends Tour but, understandably, her playing career has been put on hold for this year with the demands of the Ryder Cup taking precedence.

Koff has also been dedicated to his duties on the teaching end. His father got him started in golf when he was seven or eight years old and bought him a set of clubs for Christmas.

“On my first shot he told me to hit it at a flag, and I hit it to two feet,’’ said Koff.

That was a good start and – playing frequently at the Bethpage courses and nearby Eisenhower — he eventually got his handicap down to a plus-1, but he didn’t play college golf as a student at Clemson. He was more interested in another side of the sport that started when he volunteered to work in the First Tee program as a 14-year old.

After college he was hired as a program director at the First Tee of Nassau County and took it to new levels.

“When I started we had about 500 kids and 30-40 volunteers,’’ he said.  “In my time there it grew to 5,000 kids and 150 volunteers.’’

“We made pretty extensive growth,’’ he said.  “We made efforts to create different programs that would attract all kinds of participants. We focused on the under privileged to help them get into the game of golf.  I was more interested in watching others grow in the game rather than enjoy playing it myself.  Students are my priority.’’

At Bethpage his junior program offers something for youngsters between the ages of 5 and 17.  It has a PGA Junior League and a summer camp program.  Koff doesn’t teach only juniors, however.

“I teach everybody,’’ he said.  “My youngest student is 4, my oldest is 98. The 98-year old man can still play 18 holes and shoot under 100.  His wife plays, too, and is a little better than he is.’’

Koff’s lesson count is staggering.  He estimates that he has averaged 1,000 lessons per year for his 15 years in the business.

“My unique story is that I grew up as a public golf guy on Long Island, and now I’m teaching it at Bethpage and Eisenhower.  Those are courses I grew up on,’’ he said. “It’s like a dream come true. I like to serve the public and give them quality lessons that are as good as they would be getting at a private club.’’

The excitement of having a Ryder Cup is not lost on Brooke or Koff.

“The impact on the local economy will be phenomenal,’’ said Koff. “I know how excited New York fans are.  It’ll be an absolutely amazing event. The businesses, restaurants and hotels will all benefit from this.’’

And so will his youth players.

Twelve members of the PGA Junior League teams will be standard bearers at the Junior Ryder Cup matches and have access to the practice rounds on Thursday of competition week.

“They’re saying there’ll be 50,000 (fans) there each day,’’ said Brooke.  “The stands they’ve built on the first tee will hold thousands and thousands. For me my goal is for the Ryder Cup to help grow our instructional programs.  I think that’s why I got the contract here. I like to see junior and women’s golf growing the game.’’

 

 

 

Haven’t heard of Curly Lambeau? Maybe you should

I’m an avid reader, and always have a book going on some topic or another. That got me to writing book reviews on some of them, and my last three reads have taken me in new directions.

The first two led to my taking on books that went well over 1,000 pages for the first time – one being a look back at Frank Delano Roosevelt’s life and times during World War II and the other a biographical look at Samuel Clements, an author better known as Mark Twain.

I couldn’t put the first one down – it was that historically captivating — and the second took me into previously uncharted territory. I had no inkling about the life of this famous author. While those books were most worthwhile reading I – for some reason – didn’t write my own reviews on either one.

When it comes to “Lambeau,’’ however, I couldn’t resist.  Herb Gould, my long time sports-writing colleague at the Chicago Sun-Times, wrote this one.  Kudos to Herb.  While Herb didn’t hit the 1,000-page mark, he created a book that provided captivating reading from the first page to the last and his extensive research uncovered the complex life of a most worthy sports figure of the past.

BOOK REVIEW TIME: Check out this one on a key sports figure from the past.

Lambeau was “The Man Who Created the Green Bay Packers.’’ That team plays its home games in Lambeau Field, one of the most popular stadiums in the National Football League. The book might seem like a biography of Lambeau, and he was certainly a most interesting topic for that kind of writing.  Herb has gone far beyond that, however.

He has given us a candid glimpse into what life was like in the early days of professional football – and those were interesting times, to be sure. Names like Vince Lombardi, George Halas, Johnny Blood and Don Hudson are prominent.

Their particulars are thoroughly covered in “Lambeau.’’ He was a successful player and coach before being forced out of his job leading the Packers. Then, though a series of lifestyle changes, he found Green Bay a happy place again.

Most interesting was the politics involved in getting Lambeau’s name on the city’s football stadium.  Seems like his name should have been an obvious choice – but it wasn’t. You’ll have to read “Lambeau’’ to the end to find out how it happened.

 

 

 

 

 

Welcoming PGA players is nothing new for Quail Hollow’s Davenport

In any business this is a rarity.

Quail Hollow Club, the PGA Championship venue for the second time, opened its  course in 1960 and has had only two golf professionals.  The current one, Scott Davenport, has held the job since 1999.

“It’s a good place to work,’’ said Davenport. “Johnny Harris and his family have been very pro-golf professional.  They’ve been great supporters of me and the entire staff at the club. I’ve been incredibly lucky.  My vocation and avocation are one in the same. Nobody deserves it so good.’’

Make no mistake, though.  Being the head professional at Quail Hollow is no small task.  Davenport — now 69, married and the father of two daughters – has a big job

James Harris, Johnny’s father, owned the property and gathered some friends in Charlotte to start the club in 1959.  The course opened in 1960 and hosted the Kemper Open from 1969-79 and the World Series Invitational from 1980-89 before Davenport got there.

He arrived 40 years after the club opened and succeeded Jim Hood as its head professional. Davenport  still calls Quail Hollow “a small private club, ‘’  but since his arrival it  has  hosted two PGA Championships after being revived as  a PGA Tour site in 2003.

The PGA returned first with the Wachovia Championship, then in 2009 it became the Wells Fargo Championship.  That ended last year and Truist, a Charlotte bank, will start a six-year run as title sponsor in 2026.

“We’ve been in professional golf a long time,’’ said Davenport.  “Our members have been in favor of doing that.  Back in 2003 Quail Hollow was a very nice place, but now it’s on the national stage.  I don’t see that changing.  Charlotte, and the Carolinas, have been very supportive, just as our members have.’’

Hosting big-time golf events isn’t just a one-week deal each year. Each requires lengthy planning time,   and the host professional is always in the thick of it.

“The preparation is as much fun as anything,’’ said Davenport.  “We want to make it a memorable event for all involved, from players to spectators. It’s an ongoing deal to make things better.’’

Though the goals are the same, Davenport’s  role is different when the tournament shifts from being a regular tour event to a major championship.

“For me, we’re much more involved with the tournament during the week of the tour event than we are with the PGA,’’ he said.  “Our tour events are well-attended, but a major is a whole different level. The PGA is so enormous. In the PGA Tour events we do the merchandising, and our tent is 5,000 square feet. The one for this PGA is maybe 100,000.  The whole event is that way.’’

Quail Hollow’s first PGA was in 2017.  The club also hosted the President’s Cup in 2022.

We’re almost like competitors in the regular tour events.  We want a great event for the spectators,’’ said Davenport, “and our course is so unbelievably spectator friendly. It’s so close to the clubhouse.  It’s almost impossible to get more than one hole away from the clubhouse. There’s a lot of trees.  It’s an easy walk.  There’s elevation change, but not that much.’’

Davenport never qualified for the PGA Championship as a player. He grew up in Alabama and the Pittsburgh suburbs and played a year of college golf at Houston, then transferred to Furman.  After graduation he went directly into the club pro ranks in 1978 as an assistant to Hank Johnson at North River Yacht Club in Tuscaloosa, Ala. — the home to Golf Digest’s VIP schools.

While there he spent time with some of golf’s great teaching names – Bob Toski, Sam Snead, Davis Love Jr., Peter Kostis and Jim Flick.

Stints at clubs in Arizona and Florida followed before Davenport moved to Sea Island Club in Georgia.  He arrived in the aftermath of the deaths of professionals Love, Jimmy Hodges and John Popa in a1988 plane crash and stayed there for a decade.

“The circumstances were incredibly unfortunate, but Jack Lumpkin and I tried to follow through on the learning center Davis  ( Davis Love Jr., son of PGA tour veteran Davis Love III) envisioned before he was killed,’’ said Davenport.

Then it was on to Quail Hollow where Davenport  thrived under the leadership of its president, Johnny Harris.  Davenport still enjoys playing, and does most of it with Quail Hollow members. They include Jim Nantz, the renowned golf TV broadcaster, and one of the PGA Tour mainstays, Webb Simpson, has had a residence near the seventh tee.

Davenport has seen Quail Hollow’s course, originally designed by George Cobb, changed several times during his years as head professional through modifications made by architect Tom Fazio.

With Harris leading the way there’s always been an ongoing effort to keep up with Augusta National, the annual site of the Masters tournament. Harris is an Augusta National member.

“They set the standard.  We can’t compare with those guys,’’ said Davenport.  “They’re so unbelievably good, and they have more disposable income than we’ve got, but every year we’re trying to make it better.’’

Since 2003 Quail Hollow has seen some great champions perform well.  Justin Thomas won the 2017 PGA Championship and Rory McIlroy won four Wells Fargo  events there.  Among others who earned titles at Quail Hollow include Vijay Singh, Jim Furyk, Tiger Woods, Rickie Fowler, Brian Harman, Max Homa and Wyndham Clark.

As for his best personal memories Davenport doesn’t single out any of the tournaments played at Quail Hollow.  Instead he cites a dinner.

“There have been a lot of highlights, but they used to do a Champions dinner like Augusta National does (the week of each Masters tournament),’’ said Davenport.  “The PGA used to host the players and others from the club.  It was really neat to be a part of that dinner.’’