Chip Shots

A long, hard winter finally ends for local golfers

You can smell it in the air.

Golf season has finally arrived in York County.

It became official over the weekend when Briarwood Golf Club became the first local facility to open up.

Not surprisingly, the place was packed.

After all, it’s been a long, hard winter for local hackers. They were overdue to get their golf fix. There’s been a snow cover in York County nearly all winter, meaning even the most hardy winter golfers were kept off the links.

But that changed this past weekend at Briarwood. And by this coming weekend, all the local courses should be nearly snow free. Unfortunately, the weekend forecast doesn’t look real promising right now. The weathermen are calling for rain. But forecasts can change.

But even if this coming weekend is a washout, local golfers can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

The white stuff is nearly gone. Now it’s time to hit the little white ball.

Snow _ the winter golfer’s worst enemy

I hate the snow.

I hate driving in it.

I hate shoveling it. (OK, I snow blow it, but it’s still a massive pain.)

I hate looking at it, especially when it turns into a gray, disgusting mess after it’s pushed to the side of the road by the snow plows.

But I hate it most of all because its covers the beautiful landscape of our local golf courses.

Yes, I’m one of the lunatics who plays golf all winter _ provided the temperatures stay above 30 and the snow doesn’t cover the courses.

Now, no matter what the temperatures, winter golf is out of the question, at least for the foreseeable future.

Saturday’s 15-to-20-inch snow storm made sure of that.

Now, I’ll almost certainly have to wait until our annual late January jaunt to Myrtle Beach to get the sticks out again.

That’s way too long for this golf addict.

Winter golf, with its cheap prices and tiny crowds, can often provide some of the most enjoyable rounds of the year.

But it’s something I won’t get to experience for at least several weeks, probably longer. 

And it’s all because of those miserable white flakes.

God, I do hate the snow so.

Moral outrage all the rage in Woods case

It’s easy to pile on Tiger Woods right now.

Moral outrage is all the rage.

But my take is simple _ let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

I have no idea what it’s like to be Tiger Woods. Almost none of us do.

To be young, famous, good looking and rich beyond imagination. And to have women of enormous beauty constantly throwing themselves at you.

It would take a man of great integrity and serious restraint to turn them all down.

This is not a defense of Woods. If the rumors are true, what he did was wrong. No excuses.

But we all have failings. We all come up short at times.

Now Woods is paying a serious price for his mistakes.

An intensely private man is having his dirty laundry aired out 24 hours a day. His marriage may be in trouble. His financial empire may suffer. And his children may have to pay a terrible price.

It must be causing him great distress.

Many are saying he’s getting what he deserves. That may be true.

But that doesn’t mean we have to enjoy it so.

Silence is the worst policy for Tiger

Tiger Woods is an intensely private person who loves to be in control.

Unfortunately for him, he’s embroiled in an extremely public story over which he has little or no control.

No one _ except Tiger and his wife Elin _ knows exactly what happened on early Friday morning outside his gorgeous house inside a gated Florida community.

But the rumors are swirling in cyberspace.

And Woods can’t do anything to stop them. In fact, he’s making the whole situation worse by saying nothing _ both to the media and authorities.

The vacuum created by his silence is being filled by all kinds of nasty innuendo.

Woods’ best option now is to come out and explain what really happened _ like David Letterman. Do that, and the story may go away, like the Letterman story.

But Woods seems determined to remain in hiding. And that’s a mistake. This has gone beyond a sports story. The cable news networks and blog sites such as TMZ are involved now. And since they’ve gotten their hooks in the story, it’s evolved and grown exponentially.

Tiger can remain silent if he wants, but the noise surrounding this story is getting deafening.

Phils fans could get used to this winning thing

Yankees fans are used to “this.”

In fact _ in their own arrogant, overbearing way _ they expect “this.”

But for long-suffering Phillies fans, “this” is completely new territory.

What is “this?”

It’s the expectation that somehow, someway, your team will find a way to win.

After more than a century of near-constant disappointment, Phillies’ fans had become accustomed to expecting the worst. And they usually weren’t disappointed. The 1964 implosion left scars that still haven’t healed for many Phils’ fans.

But this is a new generation of Phillies team. For them, winning has become a way of life.

The unbelievable September comeback to beat the hated Mets and win the NL East in 2007 started the new era. The 2008 World Series title cemented the new era. And Monday night’s dramatic, ninth-inning comeback to eliminate the Rockies, 5-4, added another chapter to the new era.

Now it’s on to an NLCS rematch with the Dodgers. And one thing is certain. The Phils fully expect to return to the World Series.

Their fans may still have their doubts. After all, it’s hard to shake decade after decade of frustration. But the players have no such baggage.

And if the Phils keep winning, their fans may finally come to expect ”this,” too.

After all, it’s kind of easy to get used to “this” winning thing.

Cream rises to top in match play event

The first-ever York County Amateur Golf Association Match Play Championships are getting down to the wire.

And, not surprisingly, the names that are still left are very familiar to local golf fans.

In the overall championship bracket, three of the four semifinalists are Bob Ruby, John Lowder Jr. and Dan Wolfe. The other semifinalist will come from the winner of the match between Matt Henry and T.J. Ostrom.

All five of those players are having outstanding golf seasons. In the 2009 YCAGA War of the Roses point standings (through Aug. 13), Henry is No. 1, Ostrom is No. 2, Wolfe is No. 4, Ruby is No. 5 and Lowder is No. 12. Henry was first and Wolfe was second in the York County Amateur. And Lowder recently set a new course record at Cool Creek with a 60.

In the Senior Bracket, the finalists are Jeff Poet and Scott Knouse. The third-place match will pit Bill Brenner vs. Bob Kuhn. In the YCAGA Senior Player of the Year standings (through Aug. 22), Brenner is No. 1, Poet is No. 2, Knouse is No. 3 and Kuhn is No. 6. The senior championship and consolation matches are set for 10:30 a.m. Saturday at Out Door Country Club.

The cream has really risen to the top for this first-ever event.

Surprise! Tiger says something controversial

This just in ….. Tiger Woods said something controversial.

Wow!

Woods, who typically speaks in bland cliches off the course, has questioned Ernie Els’ work ethic during his comeback from knee surgery.

Woods, meanwhile, praised his own diligence in rehabbing from a similar knee surgery.

My guess is that Tiger will claim he was misquoted or misrepresented somehow. But I hope he doesn’t. If that’s what he said, and what he truly believes, bravo.

I’d like to see Woods speak his mind more often.

It would be a refreshing change of pace.

Whitetail offers serious golf challenge

Are you feeling pretty good about your golf game?

Are you looking for a challenge?

Are you up for a road trip?

If you answer yes to all three of those questions, I have the course for you.

It’s Whitetail Golf Resort in Mercersburg, Pa.

I’m not going to lie _ it’s a haul from York. It’s about 100 miles west and at least a 1-hour, 45-minute drive from Continental Square.

But in my opinion, it’s worth it.

The group I play with normally goes there about once a year. We call it our annual “beating” _ for good reason.

The course is always in nice shape, the rates aren’t outrageous (you can play there on a weekend after 11 a.m. for just $36.25 with this coupon) and it’s an absolutely brutal test of golf.

From the white tees, the slope rating is 134 and the course rating is 71. And, if anything, this course is even harder than those numbers indicate.

From the first hole on, there’s just no let up. One difficult hole is followed by an even harder hole. There’s numerous forced carries, plenty of high native grass that constantly comes into play, lots of water hazards and a forest of trees.

It will test all of your golf skills.

Sure, your score will probably soar, but it’s still fun to take on monstrous challenge every once in a while.

And when you get back home, it will make Briarwood, Honey Run or Cool Creek seem like a walk in the park.

A remarkable day on the links for York Catholic

Mountainview Golf Course near Fairfield, for those of you who have never played there, is a very nice public course layout.

But it’s not exceedingly hard. The front nine, especially, can be scored on. The back nine, however, is a solid test of golf.

Overall, the par-71 course has a 125 slope rating and a 69.4 course rating from the white tees, which stretch 6,092 yards long. Those are all respectable numbers. It’s not exactly a pushover course.

That makes what the York Catholic golf team did on Thursday quite remarkable.

They had five players shoot 78 or lower for a team total of 381 at Mountainview in a York-Adams League Division III match. Let me tell you, that’s nearly unheard of in this area. Normally, any team total under 400 is way, way above average.

Delone Catholic had three players shoot 78 or lower at Mountainview, including a pair of 74s, for an excellent team total of 397 _ and lost by a whopping 16 shots.

For comparison, the winning total for the York-Adams Division I match on Wednesday at South Hills was 412 by Dallastown. And the winning total for the Division II match on Monday at Pleasant Valley was a 418 by Kennard-Dale.

And those two divisions feature much larger schools than York Catholic, which is the smallest school in York County.

For a school the size of York Catholic to put together a golf team this strong is truly noteworthy.

They should be applauded.

Vick deal proves winning trumps all else in NFL

Editor’s note: This column originally appeared as a column in Wednesday’s York Dispatch:

Just win, baby.”

It’s the slogan that Al Davis made famous while coaching and owning a band of misfits and miscreants known as the Oakland Raiders.

But that mantra also perfectly describes the NFL as a whole.

It’s all about winning. Coaches and owners can preach character, leadership and family values until they sound like Billy Graham, but that’s just so much window dressing.

Legendary Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi had it right when he said repeatedly: “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.”

Want proof?

You need look no further than the Philadelphia Eagles’ signing of Michael Vick. The Eagles, of course, are framing this as a “second chance” for Vick. That’s laughable. There would be no “second chance” for Vick if he didn’t run like the wind and have a rocket launcher for an arm.

The Eagles signed Vick for just one reason — they believe he can help them win the Super Bowl title that has forever eluded them.

The Vick bargain comes with a price, however. It’s a public relations nightmare that will bring protests, boycotts and tons of bad press. But none of that will matter if the Eagles are holding the Lombardi Trophy on Feb. 7, 2010, in Miami.

Former Raiders coach and longtime NFL broadcaster John Madden once said “winning is the best deodorant.” He was right on. If the Eagles win the Super Bowl with Vick playing a key role, the pungent stench of his ugly crime will be conveniently hidden under the sweet perfume of a championship.

Does the name Ray Lewis ring a bell? His obstruction of justice conviction in connection with the murder of two men in Atlanta was soon forgotten after he was named MVP the following year in the Baltimore Ravens’ Super Bowl win.

Of course, the Eagles and Ravens aren’t alone in hiring players who’ve had legal woes. Nearly every NFL roster has at least one or two — sometimes many more. But none of the NFL teams could get away with such sketchy behavior if they didn’t have millions of co-conspirators — namely the NFL fans. We continue to pack the stadiums and we continue to be glued to the TV sets every Sunday.

If the Vick signing really bothered us, we wouldn’t converge on “The Linc” like moths to a flame and we wouldn’t watch the TV games by the millions. But my guess is the Eagles will continue to sell out every game and the TV ratings for Vick’s first Philly appearance will be astronomical.

Sure, a few will follow through with threats of a boycott. But for every one of those fans, there will likely be five more waiting to buy their tickets.

And it’s all because we love a winner above all else.

Steve Heiser is sports editor of The York Dis patch. He can be reached at sheiser@yorkdispatch.com or at 854-1575, ext. 455.