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DEL.ICIO.USAndrade third after quick turnaround
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
Medinah, Ill. — Once in awhile, an alternate will win a tournament on the golf tour. But rarely. An alternate is a player who makes the field only when one of the other players develops a crick in his back or there’s a baby on the way. And when one does, all thoughts flash back to John Daly, who arose from the ashes of ninth alternate and won the PGA Championship at Crooked Stick in 1991.
(Get this, though. Since then, Daly has made only three cuts in the PGA Championship and never come close again.)
So Billy Andrade’s week started like this: Monday, the kids started school. (He was seventh alternate for the PGA Championship at Medinah.) Tuesday, he and his wife Jody went to a matinee. (When they went in to watch “You, Me and Dupree” he was third alternate.)
“When I came out, I had a call. I was in the tournament. Go see [‘You, Me and Dupree’], something good may happen to you.”
He drove over to Capital City Club, played 18 holes by himself and shot a 61, best round of his life at the Brookhaven course.
“I’m ready,” he said.
Caught a plane to Chicago at 8 o’clock Wednesday, got here at 11, went out to Medinah, had lunch and played a leisurely nine holes, by himself. “Then I went to dinner at Maggiano’s, by myself. Got up at 4:30 a.m., came out to the course, warmed up and took the shuttle out to the 10th hole and teed off at 7:30.”
He was paired with two former PGA champions, Rich Beem and David Toms, filling the hole left by another, Steve Elkington, who has a habit of making sudden withdrawals. This is not a forgiving golf course, Medinah No. 3, where Cary Middlecoff won the U.S. Open in 1949, Lou Graham won it in 1975 and Hale Irwin in 1990, and Tiger Woods won the PGA in 1999, but this a different golf course now. It was originally laid out, which is basically what they did in those days, by Tom Bendelow, who did the same at East Lake. But four years ago, Rees Jones, sometimes known as the “Great Course Rejuvenator,” was commissioned to apply his magic to No. 3.
“I played here in 1999, but it was a quick two [rounds] and out,” Andrade said. “I played horrible, so I don’t remember much about the course. So I kept asking marshals and officials, ‘Gee, isn’t this different?’ I’d say, ‘I don’t remember this,’ ” and came to find out it was all different, but they did a wonderful job. Hey, if they called me in the morning and say you want to play, I’d be there in the afternoon. It’s very exciting when you get in. It’s a bonus. But if it doesn’t happen, I’m going to have a wonderful week at home with my family.”
Billy birdied the second and third holes, the fifth, the 13th and 14th and parred in for a soothing 67, leader at the time, later surpassed by another onslaught of the South by Lucas Glover. All of this taking some of the electrical charge out of the pairing of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson, who, in case you weren’t caught up by it all, slipped home with equalling 69s.
There’s hardly anything in life to which the Andrades can’t find a way to contribute, Jody as a community participant, and Billy, with his friend Brad Faxon, in the Rhode Island CVS Charity Classic, for which they have been cited by the Golf Writers Association. Friends of the tour come to play, and over the years this event has raised over $5 million for their children’s fund.
I can hardly let this day go by without referring to something has hung heavily over the heads of us in this huge communications center and in the players’ headquarters. This morning, Heather Clarke, wife of Darren Clarke, was laid to rest at Portrush in Northern Ireland. She died of cancer, leaving Darren with two sons, 8 and 5. It was the crushing conclusion to a long period of anguish, one that left a pall of gloom over not just our European friends, but all of us here.
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