2014 – Week 14

We are down to the final four weeks of the 2014 GCCGL season. Once again the weather gods spared us and gave us mid-September weather in late July! Couple that with some heavy rains in the Independence area the night before which softened up the course and led to some ridiculously low scores. We had another great turnout this week but it wasn’t perfect. We had 23 of 24 golfers show up with the lone no-show being Wildcard. A big thanks to Reinersman, Schott, Smith and Brooks. Sounds like the name of a legal firm. “Give the legal firm of Reinersman, Schott, Smith and Brooks a call today! WE don’t get paid unless YOU get paid!”

First thing’s first, I apologize for not posting a blog update last week. I usually have small window on the weekend to create the blog post but was out of town most of the weekend. No excuse, I know, but at least you got a fresh Kreyling Korner update last week. Hopefully that satisfied your blog cravings.

This is usually the time of year we like to recognize the top GCCGL members who are having standout seasons. A lot has been whispered about the play of Big Donkey this season and for good reason. Harris has his team in first place. He has posted an 8 – 3 win/loss record up to this point with two of those loses coming at the hands of Snoodles. He’s 5^th in the money standings and 3^rd in the point standings and currently averaging 6.1 points per match. This is what you come to expect year in and year out from BD. J.J. and Gobstopper are also quietly putting together fantastic years. Eiser is the only member with perfect attendance this season. He’s among the leaders in points (68) and wins (8). He’s averaging a healthy 5.6 points per match and also sits 7^th in the money standings. Meanwhile Troy, although he’s missed a few weeks, is making it count when he is here. Bachmann has put together an 8-1 win/loss record which is good enough for the best winning percentage (.889%) with just 3 matches left. He is just behind J.J in the money and averaging 6.1 points per match. Finally, he also leads in the destroyed greens department because of his leaving massive indentations from those huge Sasquatchian, big bird, bozo the clown boats of his. Seriously, he can rent out his old footwear to a small Guatemalan family if he wanted to. But the person who no one is talking about is co-commissioner Cupcake. No one wants to play him (he’s faced the card 2- 3 times) and it’s not because of his gastrointestinal disorder. Yes, I know there might be some underlying health concerns there but that isn’t the reason folks don’t want to play against him, it’s because of his stellar play this season. He’s tied for the point lead with J.J with 68 points but he’s played one less round. He is leading the league in point average (6.2) and wins (9). All this hasn’t translated to a whole lot of money winnings but that’s mostly because we have folks scoring in the net 20’s! He is single handily keeping the Putt Pirates in the thick of things (along with LG). Great season so far guys!

Have you noticed that this season’s blog has been pretty much free of Cletus material? I think it’s been a quiet season all around, other than the substitution scandal perpetrated by co-commissioner Cupcake and Lip Gloss earlier this season. But Cletus and Syndrome usually are good for 50% of the material on this blog each season. Usually, this eclectic group of individuals provide enough shenanigans that the blog writes itself. But this season, I’ve had to struggle to fill each week with a lot of fluff, hence the quicksand piece two weeks ago. I think the reason for this is that along with the rest of us, Cletus is just getting older. We also think he’s starting to lose his hearing. Case in point, as the gallery waited off the 9^th green, Prince Albert asked Cletus how he thought Adam Schott was doing in his match against Silent H (Adam and Cletus apparently had a bet together). Cletus responded with, “I don’t know what happened, I think it’s a love triangle”. Huh? Was he having a stroke? I know there are times it may be a little hard to understand Cletus, especially after a few cold ones. It’s kind of like sitting around the kitchen table and conversing with Dennis Miller. I could never understand anything that guy says! Anyway, this caught several of the gallery members by surprise and his response was met with a roar of laughter. He was also showing his age as he segued from Mitch Smith’s nickname of Prince Albert to an old phony phone call joke where one would call the drug store or the corner grocery store (remember those?) and ask them if they had Prince Albert in a can. When the store clerk would respond with a yes, you’d yell back “you better let him out!” I confess, we used that joke many times while killing time as little kids. Apparently this old joke was new to the younger crop of GCCGL members since no one ever heard it before and thought it was hilarious. These are the things we did as kids BEFORE the Internet. Cletus, you know I jest.

The team matches were extremely close this week so there was hardly any movement in the standings. The big winners, if you can call it that, were Das Boots are Made for Golfing who defeated the first place team Morning Wood (22 – 18) for the second victory in a row. They were led by J.J. who squeaked out 6.5 points. They were followed by Putt Pirates who narrowly beat Carrier to the Hole and Duer (21 – 19) thanks to a big week from co-commissioner Kreyling who grabbed 8.5 points and shot 2 under par gross (33). Nice freakin’ round. Schmuck Dynasty barely got by Balls and Dolls (20.5 – 19.5). They were led by Chris Meyer (#2) who took 7.5 points. The low net winners this week were Kurt Kreyling (A/B) with a low net of 27 and Troy Bachmann (C/D) with a low net of 28. Carrier was so pissed that he didn’t get low net that he stormed off after recording a low net 29 and not winning the money. This is a tough league when you shoot 6 under your HC (against me of course) and NOT win the $$.

This coming week is the Battle Golf event. Please make sure to adhere to the rules. You can only carry 14 clubs in your bag, no foot wedges and definitely no magic wands (this means you Potter). This event went off very well in its inaugural season last year. It should be fun once again. We leave you this week with “the hug”. Apparently last week, Bleeker’s strategy against Big Donkey was to not speak to him all night. He didn’t mutter a word to him not even when directly addressed by BD. He did speak to the others in the foursome however. The strategy backfired and BD laid a beating on Bleeker. So this week, Big Donkey was still feeling unappreciated. So as the libations were flowing and the razzing grew more spirted, Remington walked over to Harris and just hugged him. None of us who witnessed the awkward incident were sure what to make out of it but from a particularly specific angle, it kind of looked like Ahab getting swallowed by a trimmer, stealthier Moby Dick (don’t want BD mad at me). For once, this was caught on video by J.J. and we also have a picture taken by Lickert. We hope to see you on the course this week and as always, hit ’em straight!

George Almeida – GCCGL founder and co-commissioner