Masters Update

We're dropping down to 3 groups, so we're officially full.

Tee time is still 9am on Sunday.

Jamaican Open - Summer 2015 Recap

It felt like Jamaica yesterday... which might explain why two "brown" guys played well in the heat, humidity and soggy fairways. Yes, Chandler (hey, thats me!) won his second consecutive event by shooting his age on the front nine. In a display of lights out putting (only 12 putts on the front), literally everything was dropping leaving his playing partners shaking their heads. Standing on the short par-3 15th, Chandler was still -2 (gross!). But a topped shot into the marsh derailed what would have been an unbelievable round. Despite the triple bogey and two following bogeys, the 75 is now the lowest league score in history (if you don't count Countryway or Faz's 74 on a par-68 Babe Zaharias).

But just as impressive was tournament host Reid, who started his day: 6-6-6-6-8. He was +7 (net) after those five holes, completely on tilt and headed toward the double-pitcher zone. But he went +3 (gross) on the next twelve holes to finish as the only other player under par (net). It's proof that you can still put the wheels on after a horrendous start to the round.

Taking out Chandler and Reid, the scores were really quite terrible. Yeah, Waterlefe is a tough course and the heat was unbearable. But it's funny that more guys showed up drunk/hungover to this event than the JW Hangover tournament. And most of you people could benefit from hitting a few balls before the round.

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We're playing Lake Jovita (South) this Sunday at 9am. I was able to talk them down to the member/guest rate of $50 (range balls included). Jovita has two of the best courses in the area, but both are long and punishing.

Only four people have a shot at winning the cup (Chan, Dave, Reid, Guest). Everyone else with at least 4 tournaments played this season can join the field in hopes of taking home a decent payout. We have a couple of guys who don't meet that requirement, but they're still welcome to play for side bets.

See you all out there.

Jamaican Open - Venue Change

Pebble Creek, as expected, is still flooded. They're open but it's cartpath only... which honestly isn't a huge deal at a flat course like PC. But their drainage is one of the worst in Tampa. I've seen multiple lost balls in the middle of the fairway.

Reid's out there now and at least has confirmed there's no way it's going to dry up by this weekend. So I'm making the executive decision to move the event down south where there hasn't been constant monsoons.

The Jamaican Open will return to Waterlefe for the 3rd time in it's history, at 9:00 AM!

I realize that's early in the morning, but we need to get out before the rain and have time to wait out a few isolated showers (if needed). The good news is they're charging us $40... and I found a $10 off coupon. Print that shit here!

So do yourself a favor and don't stay up until 4:30am the night before with your wife. And don't get so drunk that you lose your car keys on Saturday. And don't wake up in the morning, look at the radar, and start begging the league to stay inside.

Wake up early. Put on your big boy pants. And get down to the course in time to warm-up if you need it. And make sure your shirt is one of the colors below. It's a $2 penalty paid to Reid (money offsets cost of his trophies) if you're "reppin" the wrong attire.

Does your shirt look like one of those colors above? No? You owe $2 to Reid.

Oh... and if you talk to or see one of the guys who constantly doesn't "read the blog"... you might want to tell them about the venue change.

JW Hangover - Summer 2015 Recap

Tampa got drunk on rain this weekend, washing out the motivation for most of our league to hang out and golf. The competition to find the best excuse to stay at home was fierce... with Gorecki ultimately winning by sending a screen shot of a weather radar, while at the same time suggesting we go to TopGolf which would require him to drive 25 miles in the very storm he was afraid of.

But the golf gods rewarded those of us who knew how to use technology. Countryside was miraculously open for play, but Bradenton had almost no rain all weekend and the storm system looked like it would somehow avoid the area on Sunday. Faced with sitting inside and not doing anything all day, six brave and dedicated golfers rolled the dice and drove down to Esplanade.

Sure enough, other than a few soggy spots on the front nine, most of the course was dry and not even cart-path only. The sun actually peeked out of the clouds for a bit on the back nine. And two champions emerged despite having real hangovers, because you know... they went to the bar the night before.

Dave and Chandler, with identical handicaps, both shot gross 80s to split the money. But each of them choked away a solo victory at various parts of their round. Dave made two atrocious double bogeys on the back nine, both short par 4s (342 & 300 yards). While Chandler had six three-putts during the round, an insane stat considering he only made eight bogeys.

Yesterday was the smallest field since the JW Hangover a year ago (Summer 2014), causing only the top 3 to earn points. Darren took 3rd place points thanks to his usual chipping and putting clinic. Ironically, he probably would have won the event if not for a missed 2-footer and a bladed short chip. Maybe that was the golf gods punishing him for losing his Man Card on Saturday night.

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Two people (Gorecki & Gary) are officially eliminated from winning the DPT Cup this season. A bunch more will be eliminated after next week. Reid is going to book us 3 groups at Pebble Creek... but we'll have to check in with them throughout the week since that course notoriously doesn't drain well. More info on that after he makes the tee times.

There are 4 guys I haven't heard from regarding this Sunday, and only 3 spots available.  

Hey Reid... don't forget to book 3 tee times...

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A couple of people asked about the World Woods check-in situation. We're staying up there Friday and Saturday night. I'm taking Friday off and going up in the afternoon, so I'll have the keys and everything all set. All you have to do is go to the villa (I'll post the address later) whenever you want that day/night. After I check in I'll probably head to the course to practice a bit. So when we get closer to the event, I'll be asking everyone their arrival plans to make sure nobody is locked out.

Weather Update

Countryside got very light rain compared to South Tampa today. But more rain might be on the way.

I'll call them around 7am to see what their condition is. We also have the option of heading down to Bradenton depending on tomorrow's storms. They basically had no rain today, so Waterlefe, RiverStrand, Eslpanade are all options (Stoneybrook has no tee times until 2pm).

Esplanade would be a 12:15pm round... but again... all this depends on what the storms look like tomorrow. Check back here for more details, but I'll try to text everyone.

**UPDATE**
Esplanade has us booked at 12:15pm. Check back here around 9:30am, since we still need to monitor the weather a bit just in case. 

Bradenton is still missing the rain. I'm sure that won't last all day... but we should be good to go. See you down there.

JW Hangover Invitational - Summer 2015

Alright, kids. THIS Saturday at 9pm, you need to be at PJ Dolan's Irish Pub.

It's located at: 2836 E Bearss Ave, Tampa FL, 33559.  Basically the north corner of Bearss and Bruce B. Downs.

I have never been to this bar, so I apologize if it's terrible. New Tampa isn't really my area of expertise. That being said... it's a bar and a Saturday night. We're not really aiming for the most amazing night of your life.

Nine league members are signed up for Sunday. Every 15 minutes late, you'll be buying your own penalty shot. I've got a car leaving DI around 8:30pm (assuming I'm taking Gary and JW... with Racahel driving us). Dave, Guest and Gorecki might want to discuss Westchase transportation. Feel free to bring people.

See you all up there.

Jamaican Open

Next Sunday, August 9th. Reid is going to make us play Pebble Creek... which is currently flooded.

Anyway, who's in? Who's out? Let us know before this Sunday so we can book tee times.

Member Locations - A Study of Maps

JW requested an analysis of our league member's locations in order to find a central bar. It's a fun exercise, especially when it gives you actual perspective on where everyone lives. However, this will NOT change the Hangover bar location for this weekend.

First we need to set some parameters:

• I'm only going to use the 13 members ranked in the Official Golf Rankings.
• This gives us only those who have played in at least 8 of the last 18 events, thus eliminating the guys who rarely show up.
• Even though they're eliminated by the above parameter, Dan and Darryl would vastly skew this data. Reid is already somewhat skewing it... but he's been in the league since its inception, which is another reason we're heading up toward him this weekend.
• We need to actually calculate the mid-points. There's a great website I found which does this called the Geographic Midpoint Calculator. It allows me to load up exact addresses and then calculate a couple of points:
• Geometric Midpoint - Basically the true center of all the data points "as the crow flies."
• Average Minimized Distance - A complex algorithm finding the exact point that minimizes the total distance between each location. Obviously, it doesn't account for traffic or actual driving time.
• I had to "guess" for Brendan and Tall Mike since I couldn't snoop their exact locations. I'm told Mike lives under a bridge near International Mall, and Brendan lives at Sally O'Neal's Pizza.

For any of the maps below, you can click on them to get a much larger version.

First up is the true geometric midpoint:

True Geo-midpoint: 6003 North Hale Avenue Tampa, FL 33614

This is a neighborhood called "Pinecrest," which is basically at the corner of Dale Mabry and Hillsborough. It has a ton of car dealerships, and everything bar related is pretty terrible. If you live in Pinecrest, you do not have many options. I guess the Hooters on Hillsborough is the best bet.

Next let's look at the minimized distance point:

Average Minimized Distance: 3409 West Aileen Street Tampa, FL 33607

You'll see this location is skewed south, due to the 7 league members who actually live in the City of Tampa. You read that correctly... only 7 of us live in the Tampa city limits. The rest of you are posers who love to talk about how your mail says "Tampa" on it. But don't be fooled... your taxes do not fix my roads.

Anyway, this location is a few blocks south of Raymond James Stadium. It's a pretty bad location as well, but I guess you can cheat to the west slightly and hit bars near International Mall. However, most of those are restaurants and we wouldn't be drinking cheap. Best drinking spot: Chili's for all day 2-for-1 drinks?

As you can see, most of us are clustered in two areas. Which is why we've bounced between them every season: 1) Retreat (UT) 2) Taps (downtown) 3) Dubliner North (Carrollwood) 4) Islands Club (DI) 5) O'Briens (Carrollwood) 6) Maloney's (Westchase). Three down south, and three up north. Almost as if it were planned perfectly by a god of scheduling, organization and fairness.

That leaves us with our one outlier, Reid. Poor guy drives a million miles to not only golf with us, but to also drink with us. If you look at one of the maps above, we'll be hanging out this weekend at a location near the 2nd lowercase i in "University." It honestly isn't even as close to Reid as it should be. So with that being said... suck it up... get a sober driver... and let's go enjoy another JW Hangover event.

JW Hangover Bar

While we're all set for golf this Sunday, we aren't set on the bar the night before. In fairness with tradition, we're trying to hop around to each player's neighborhood so we don't have a situation where certain people are ALWAYS traveling a long distance.

This season... we're supposed to visit Reid up in New Tampa.

I was going to drag us to Copper Top, which is a dive bar with pool tables and darts... but more importantly they had all you can drink beer for $8. Emphasis on "had," as they no longer run this promotion.

Peabody's is a popular spot for the kids. But Gary, Darren and Reid are far too old for that place.

That leaves like 10 different Applebees locations, a handful of Golden Corrals, and probably a bunch of bars I don't really know about. The internet tells of places like "PJ Dolan's Irish Pub" or a new Paddywagon's that just opened up somewhere in the dark continent where Reid lives.

If you're one of the NINE people registered to play this weekend, feel free to weigh in on a bar for Saturday. We don't have nearly enough people to get any deals. So let us know where you've been that's decent, and make sure it's at least half-assed near Reid. If I don't hear any good suggestions, I'm going to randomly pick something.

2015 Ryder Cup Draft Results

Last night we held the 2015 Ryder Cup draft... and all the "experts" predictions were immediately washed away with the 50 inches of rain we've gotten this weekend. While Gary as the #1 overall pick isn't a huge surprise... Buchert went with consistency and perhaps an elevated handicap taking Chandler and Reid with his first selections. Darren immediately snatched up two more bombers, while Buchert stocked up on even more high cappers.


Darren in blue. Buchert in red.

1 - Gary
2 - Chandler
3 - Reid
4 - Dave
5 - Faz
6 - Tall Mike
7 - JW
8 - Brendan
9 - Guest
10 - Gorecki

Be sure to bring golf attire that matches your team's colors.

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After much discussion, both fist time captains set their pairings and order. Technically we could (and probably should) have set the singles matches as well. But we'll do that either the first or second night up at World Woods.

You can view the pairings here.

Season Update

Ryder Cup draft is tomorrow night (Friday), 9pm at Irish 31 in Westchase. Attending is Buchert, Darren, Chan, Faz and Gorecki. Let me know if anyone is going so we can save a spot. Or just show up and surprise us.

Saddlebrook on Sunday is: John, Buchert, Chan, Reid, Gorecki, Darren.

Hangover bar on Saturday, August 1st is going to be in Temple Terrace / New Tampa. Still looking into that. 9pm mandatory attendance. You can go home at 1am. Make sure to carpool or Uber it there.

The actual golf tournament is going to be at Countryside in Clearwater. It's a private course with great greens and three nines. Basically a MUCH better Northdale (and has a range). I met the pro today and he's going to give us a discounted rate off the "member guest" fee. Details on that to come once we're on the tee sheet.

Registration Updates

People that said they're IN for John's outing this Sunday at Saddlebrook:

John
Chan
Darren
Reid
Gorecki
(I might have one more)

Tall Mike... while looking up who said "yes" I noticed your comment from last week. John's friend scheduled the Saddlebrook deal. So while we aren't playing a league event because Brendan is getting old... not all of us are going to the FSU thing.

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The Hangover is next Sunday (August 2nd), which means if you're playing you need to attend the bar next Saturday night. We'll be headed towards Reid's area... details on that later. Here's who I got playing:

IN
Chan, JW, Gary, Brendan, Reid, Darren, Dave, Guest, Gorecki

OUT
Faz, John, Buchert, Tall Mike, Dan

No Idea
Darryl (assuming no bar), Geoff

That's 9 people in... 5 people out... and 2 people I haven't heard anything from. If it stays like this, I might actually win an event!

Ryder Cup Draft

The Ryder Cup Draft will be held at Irish 31 in Westchase, 9pm on Friday, July 24th. It's a location and date that worked for the two captains.

I know there's some other stuff going on that weekend, and obviously attendance isn't mandatory. But if you want to come hang out make a comment so we can save a seat for you.

The draft itself doesn't take long. The captains will also set their rosters for the first two events (Four-Ball & Alternate Shot). The rest of the night we'll drink beer and talk crap about those who didn't show up.

Site Issues

Google has been slowly converting all their Sheets (their shitty version of Excel) to a newer, allegedly better, version.

Last night they finally converted the main sheet that runs most of our data. Of course, that broke a ton of things embedded on this site.

It'll take me a bit to figure out what all is broken and how to fix it. Assuming there is a fix.

So... Dave's in 1st place. The rest of you aren't.

DPT Championship - Summer 2015 Recap

On the range, Big John mentioned to me he thought I was over-hyping the difficulty of Fox Hollow. He proceeded to shoot 55 on our first nine and looked to be hanging out in the double-pitcher zone.

The course was a beast, as expected. And the weather made it a disaster. Luckily we teed off early enough to get most of the front nine in, only playing the final few holes in a monsoon and lightning death trap. After a break in the clubhouse to let the storm pass, we were able to move along pretty quickly on the soaked front nine.

Also as expected, the top three guys were either long hitters or a high handicapper who kept the wheels on. Dan played an excellent round to win his first career Major, only blowing up on two holes (one probably due to lightning). Dave recovered from an opening 49 (gross) to shoot +2 on the second nine and finish 2nd. Also tied for 2nd was Tall Mike who played consistent throughout the day. Both those guys were shocked to be in contention.

At the other end of the spectrum, Big John had a crazy finish shooting EVEN on his final 4 holes to escape the previously mentioned double-pitcher zone. And Faz struggled all day, making the mistake of buying a hotdog during our rain delay and not washing it down with beer.

The rest of us were terrible in various spots. The back nine scorecard is littered with double pars.

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The standings continue to be a jumbled mess, as we now have 6 different winners in as many events.  Anyone in the top 12 can potentially take the lead by winning JW's Hangover Invitational. Granted, we don't play it until next month. And it requires a mandatory bar attendance the night before (Saturday, August 1st) in order to enter the tournament.

Currently OUT of the next event is Faz and Tall Mike. If anyone else isn't playing, let me know. I imagine Darryl is out of the actual event since he's not going to make the bar... but he's still welcome to play with us regardless. I'm thinking of booking us at Esplanade (near Bradenton).

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All qualified players paid for the Ryder Cup before the deadline. So the field is set. All we need to do now is draft some teams. I'll talk to Darren and Buchert to work out a date. You don't have to attend but if you're free... come drink some beers and find out what team you're on. It'll be held in either Westchase or Carrollwood.