I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
And when I find my ball in a fried.
Egg Friday egg, the dreaded Frida egg, Frida egg, Frida egg egg, fridagg bride egg Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the hump course.
Welcome back to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast. I am your host, Andy Johnson, and today I am joined by the Patterson Clubs Director of Grounds, Jason Meersman. I've known Jason for a number of years now and I've always wanted to have him on the podcast. I don't know why it's taken so long. He is quite the person and I think this was a super fun conversation. It's very much about life, golf courses, golf course maintenance, and a little bit about the Patterson Club which is
about to undergo a renovation in due time. We'll see how quickly it goes. But thank you to Jason for coming on. Before we get to Jason, just one thing that we're doing for the company. We launched a T shirt for to support Hurricane Helene relief efforts in western North Carolina. Obviously crazy thing that happened there and a disaster. It's unbelievable to look at, and we.
Want to do our part.
So this T shirt is our Donald Ross and North Carolina T shirt. I think it's an awesome T shirt. I'm wearing it actually right now. It's under a sweatshirt, so if you're watching this on YouTube, you can't see it. But the T shirt is a really neat T shirt and all the proceeds will go to the relief fund. Big thanks for everybody who's bought this already has been up less than twenty four hours. It's exceeded our expectations.
At this point, we just want to deliver as big of a check as we can and to that extent, all listeners from Floridaite, I'm praying for you. I hope, I hope that Milton is not a catastrophic event as many are are predicting.
So awesome.
Prayers to both North Carolinas and Floridians who are having to evacuate.
Be safe.
And if you're interested in buying the shirt in supporting the relief efforts, go to proshop dot Thefrida egg dot com. All right, let's talk about Toro. Toro is the only brand with a full line of equipment and irrigation products to keep your golf course in top condition. Toro is serious about R and D and they're always out there listening to superintendents so they can develop products that can help you solve your biggest challenges.
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Local service and support, their distributor network is second to none. See how Toro is always solving and always evolving at Toro dot com. Jason, what's it like growing up in a turf family, A superintendent family.
Great question. I almost don't remember. No, so growing up, Yeah, third generation golf course superintendent. It was great. You know. I think I was fired multiple times by my father, but next day it was brought back onto the team with a nice cold water saying you're late for work, get up and to work. No, it was it was great. How are you?
How are you late to work?
When you when you were in the house, like I assume you were getting a ride.
Oh yeah, oh yeah, No. My dad used to sit at the bottom of my steps and y'all, I can't see you, and you'd be dragging yourself to the top of the stairs and uh. And some days, it would just be a little ice cold glass of water. And then and then my brother got keen into doing that a couple of times, as if he was playing Dad's role, but no, it was early mornings. It was amazing, amazing people, you know, growing up on a golf course. You can't grow up on a golf course and then try to
go to a different career path. It's it's next to impossible because of the people at the club, from the starters to the snackshack people, to the members, to the daily feed, depending where you are. It's just it's littered with great people who share that passion that we all do for this beautiful game of golf, you know. But yeah, the uh, it was a it was an active, active childhood.
It was basically me the golf course is basically my brother and I babysitter and we'd go early in the morning and I remember, like twelve years old, picking up trash and and helping cut cups and and and then the rest of the day Dan and I would go play golf, hit range balls, maybe build a fort in the woods, always something to do.
That's using the golf course effectively as your playground. From yeah, like, what if you remember back when you were a kid, was it like when you were ten or nine, were you like chopping at the bit to go work? There was that the kind of the dynamic I remember like with me and golf, Like my dad would go play golf with my grandpa and uncle, or he'd go play early in the morning, and especially when we were on vacations, like I just was like, why can't I.
Come absolutely absolutely well, and especially with like the equipment for us. You know, you get there and you'd be seeing these guys run this big equipment. You're like, oh, I want to try that. You know. Dan was a little more methodical than I was when it comes to that, you know, but I could, uh yeah, at a young age, I could operate almost every piece of equipment we had
and and really got into that aspect of it. I think at one point I was my father's mechanic slash bartender after he became the uh the general manager and things of that nature. But yeah, exactly that. You know, you would see everybody working having fun, and you're like, I want to get in there, and yeah, I didn't really have a choice.
But your your family tree kind of you're you know, people talk about like superintendent trees, your family tree, you know, is the lust. So where where your grandfather got into turf? Where did he work and could you just explain kind of the family in golf golf Baynut.
Yeah, So the Meersman family kind of got into the golf world through a small part three golf course that was originally like a playland type place. It was called Playland and it was in South ben India. Yeah yeah, and it had go carts and my grandfather was like the mechanic for the go carts and was the handy everything man at Playland and spectacular place I remember playing
as a kid. However, when the owner decided to create a part three golf course and change Playland into more of a golf centric arcade slash driving range lit up at night par three golf course. So nothing better than waiting seven people deep on each tea box and you put your little ball, You put your little ball, and then the thing that goes down to the bottom and your ball shows up, it's time for you to play.
But so my grandfather started running that did a great job there, did a great job to the point where you know South Bank Country Club, which I believe at that time was ranked like second in the state of Indiana. Uh, Dave MC that is a cool golf course, very cool golf course. Thank you for saying that.
I but Nick Nate, uh, superintendent of South Bend, has been on this podcast.
Oh really, I did not. I'll have to go back. Sorry for my uh yeah, ignorance on that one.
You guys got to meet, you would get along. He's a great guy. Uh, you know, diehard golfer, just complete golf nut.
Like yeah, yeah, that's great, that's great. Yeah. No, we actually stopped by looking for him the last time I was in South Bend. My father and I were God rest my mother's soul, but she uh we were touring our old homes, our own stopping grounds and and uh doing a little a little tour, and we stopped South Bank Country Club and my dad and I toured the
maintenance facility and unfortunately he was on property. But we got to see some of his staff and and just shake our heads at like wow, wow, how time just changes and how it just keeps going. But yeah, special piece of property there, and a lot of great memories, a lot of great stories. Not so many of my memories as much as stories I know from there, and uh, anyway, yeah, but so that was kind of my grandfather's start of his like a career. You know, he was considered one
of the gurus at that time in the area. If if he's telling the story properly, Steve Glossenger the gentleman. I did my apprenticeship for work worked in that area and had a great deal of respect for him in the product he always put out and his passion for what we do.
And before we get your to your dad, what's your favorite story from from the South Bend? You know, you said, you know that they're not your stories, but lots of stories. What's what's the story from that period of your family kind of tree.
That that you you particularly enjoy.
Yeah, and this is a no brainer. So my very favorite story about my grandfather, and uh, there's many of them. However, I've heard it from a couple of different people, and I think Steve Glocester told the best about how he was known as being the superintendent, the only superintendent ever to knock a member out cold on the range too and keep his job. I don't know what the complaint was, but I know my grandfather had a short fuse, and unfortunately he took his swing knocked the guy out cold.
Next day, air Parses walks up to him and slaps him on their shoulder and says that a boy, Jimmy, nobody liked that, you know, maybe so ob or anyway, so the old Polish band had had or Belgian Polish whatever we are, had a short fuse. Anyways, our era par Sia should give him the pass, you know, I.
I don't think that would fly today.
I don't think so every member is my favorite member, all right, that's how we play it these days.
That's right, That's right. You have everyone's a favorite. That's a good, good political stance to have.
Yeah, yeah, and it has its truth to be, to be quite honest with you there, you know, you gotta love everything, you know. It's easier to do that than the opposite.
So anyways, your your grandpa's at South bed that I imagine your dad starts working there for him.
Yeah, yeah, so I think you know, all of his siblings at one point worked for him. My father, my uncle became golf course superintendents. From there, they took over municipal golf courses in South Bend. Everheart and Erskine. I believe is my my uncle Pat's first job from there, I think was anyway, I might I might be missing that a little bit, but I remember very well growing
up there. My uncle lived on the golf course and and you know, maybe my cousins and my brother would would terrorize the uh the maintenance dump or you know, building fort, start running around on the property late at night. And yeah, it was the greatest playground ever. So yeah, the uh and then Everheart, where my father grew up, or we grew up right down the street. You know,
we'd walk there, ride our bikes there. It's another really great golf course that the San Cho River cuts through some really beautiful bridges, and you know, going back there with him. If it's not there, it's it's South Pineview golf Club where we also grew up, like from about twelve on. We it was thirty six hole golf course there. But I like going back to with my father and pointing out his terrible tree plantings. Wow, is this fairway gotten narrow? Anyway? It's easy?
Are they sil silver maples? Or that's a that's a that's a tree to tree?
Did Joure of.
The Midwest Midwest unis is the silver maple. You know, my favorite thing about having one of them in my backyard was that, you know, the thing about silver maples is they hold on their trees really long, you know Midwest. Yeah, they're leaves, so you know, they routinely would hold onto their leaves almost into December. And you know, you're you're
looking at this tree. Every other leaf in your in your yard is gone, You've you've disposed of them, and you're looking at this tree like that that asshole won't get rid of its leaves. And then sure enough cleanup when it was with snow, knock all the leaves down, and you're looking into your backyard. It's like a perfect we got snow and leaves, and I'm going to go out there. And just so you know, for golf course, uh, golf course super tense. I could only imagine that feeling magnified by having.
Hundreds of them.
Oh absolutely, property, absolutely yeah yeah. And you know you just that that's exactly right, because like there's a fall clean up, you're sitting there waiting waiting for I always tell my guys get the tree shaker out, you know, as if we're actually gonna get the tree shaker out. Let's speed up this process. You know, one year we when my one of my first years here at Patterson, Hurricane Sandy came through, and you know, we lost a lot of trees, but more than but one of the
silver linings. I hate to say there's ever a silver line with a hurricane. However, one of the silver linings. We woke up that next day, came out here and I don't know where leaves went. I mean, they're they're in Ireland, you know. A couple of weeks later, I don't know what was going on, but I was like, well, that's just nice. Just chop up all these trees and make some firewood, and uh yeah, that's it.
There's nothing better.
There's nothing better that I imagine again this is multiplied by x when you're a superintendent, but there's nothing better when you look out on your yard.
And this is the perfect time of year to have this discussion.
When you look out of your yard you see just leaves everywhere, and then there's just a really windy day and you look out later that day and there's no leaves.
Yeah, you know, the neighbors yard not my problem.
Al Yeah, yeah, yeah, you just keep them over there. Yeah. No, that's a great that's that's that's so true. Yeah, oh yeah. I have a tree dot right out right in front of my neighbor's tree actually comes over to my yard. I got a nice little white picket fence though that that that plays defense. And then I got out the big blower and just kind of shove them back halfway.
Do you ever bring maintenance equipment from the shop to never?
Never?
No, come on, Like, have you ever done like an air ration? Have you brought like the air raidor over to do it on your own yard? Like? Like, do you do you do that?
I don't think.
Really no.
I have actually asked grounds chairs like, hey, you know, I owe my wife, you know. I think it was like one of our early anniversary presents. She's like, day, our yard is awful, and we've been living there for about three years. But it hadn't struck me exactly what
I wanted to do yet. And I was like, look, I shot your lotor back hole over there, you know, And I drove it all the way there with the flashers out, and you know, I got the thumbs up, and you know, yeah, I don't know and if I'm if I'm unemployed after this come, no, no, but they were, Yeah, I did get to borrow at that time. But you try, now, you know, you try obviously not to do or mix any of that stuff. But at the same time, yeah, it's it's right there. You're like, oh, baby, I could
use a good verification. Give mean, that's six forty eight over to my house would be lovely. But yeah, it's.
Got to be a conflicted feeling after the yard, your yard, because, like I imagine you do this all day, the last thing you want to do is come home and look at it from You have to almost detach yourself.
Right, Oh, the shoemaker thing is so true. Like you come home, the last thing you want to do is go out and scar up your yard and start seeding because it's been an awful year and you know, my yard typically looks a lot worse than the golf course. So that's good, it's good news. But yeah, no, it is. It is you don't want to come home and do that stuff. You know. I actually have by synthetic putting green in my backyard and a little tea box. I call it. I call it Pooh National because of the
dog poop. But Uh, it's just as nice as firing up the blower. I'll fire up a blower any day of the week, you know. But uh, but yeah, going out there push mowing.
Is it embarrassing at all to have a synthetic synthetic in the backyard.
It's not. There's no I'm not top dressing.
I'm not going home after doing it all day to do that all over again. No chance. No.
Ill know, you know, in your back of your head, you could have as good of a greed as you want back there, but you've gone to the synthetic.
You know, nothing wrong with cheating a little bit.
What I will say, one of my favorite, you know, superintendent ground staff crossovers is that you know, justin to Pippo, the superintendent at bel Air.
You know, obviously some of the biggest, some.
Of the most expensive homes in the world litter, you know, surround his golf course and one of his one of his perks of his job is he gives an extra day off for his staff so that they can take landscaping jobs on the surrounding homes. And he's like, it's like, you know, all the homeowners apparently come to him.
How should I take care of this yard.
And he he sets him up with his guys and they probably you know, it's a substantial boom in their salary.
Yeah, to may take these you know, eighty.
Million dollar homes and uh and you know he gives them an extra day off, and it's just like a symbiotic relationship. But I imagine also, you know, it keeps the it keeps the relationship of a of a homeowner as we've seen. As we've seen in the Northeast, there have been some contentious homeowner golf course relationships. Some actually yeah, yeah, Quaker, the Quaker rich one, to me is the most ridiculous carry.
On top right, Yeah, yeah, that is that is cream of the crop, that one. You know, you're hundred percent right, Like, you have to have great relationships with your neighbors out here, and and that is an act. I've taken pieces of equipment from the club to other neighbors homes on property more frequently than my home because it's easier to it's easier and more important, I would say to to take
care of them. So those mornings when you kick on a blower too early, you know, you got a new guy out there, and he's he's not following or rules or you know, forgot the rule or whatever the case may be. You know, but we've definitely gone over and chipped up fallen trees or or scarified a yard or or just you know, just trying anything and everything to keep them on your good side. However, golf courses tend to be the best neighbors you can have and other
than the early mornings. But you know, it's it is a very important relationship for sure, especially right now we're getting ready to do some renovation work and uh and you know, I'm actually getting ready to go out and do a couple of walk arounds and knocking on doors and you know politician, Oh baby, yeah, absolutely, it's it's that's That's the one thing Michigan State taught me. Well, this is you're not going to school to just grow grass, you actually also to be a politician.
Jay, What do they do in that regard?
Like I you know, I think like going to school to be a superintendent is a very science like technical heavy education.
What is what is the schools?
How do they kind of prepare you for navigating the political landscape of a club or a course.
Yeah, So when I was there, we started, uh, doctor Rogers started a like an etiquette class, like an etiquette training as if like like, so, look, this is how get fitted for a suit. This is uh the silver war you should use, you know, if there's multiple forks, this is what this one is, and work your way outside. So you know, we would, we would, uh we we created a little class like that. I'm sure it's an existence because I thought it was kind of a story
of genius for a lot of our guys. But you know, he's also you know, they're also very good, like especially like a doctor Rogers or mister Crumb or you know a lot of these great professors we have in our industry. You know, they understand the the world we're getting ready to dive into, and they have a number of stories that they tell you. You know that kind of you know, it gets the point across to be all right, you've
got to be buttoned up and polished. But at the same time, you know, you're still your passion for growing grass is still the key that gets you. It gets you home safe every day, you know. But yeah, there's a fine line between breaking bread and and managing somebody's piece of property. You know, you've got to be able to do both a little bit.
I you know, we're going to get back to the family tree in a second. I've heard, I've heard from multiple people that you are extraordinary dealing with with members, you know, interacting with them, raising money for projects, getting buy in on on on different things, you know, working with various committees. What what are the you know, what are kind of if you were going to synthathize, size it down into a couple of keys with how you
do this? And I think this like applies to all aspects of life, like right, this applies to somebody who's a consultant. It applies to somebody, you know, anybody that works with people. Really what what are some of your keys to to navigating the complexity of al of life at a club? As you know, I think like this
is like one of the trickiest things. You are the person in the room that knows the most about about the subject matter most likely, but you know you're in a room with a bunch of people that think they, you know, know the most.
Yeah, you know some simple stuff, you know. I always say, what does it keep it simple? Stupid? Right? I think that's a great line for this. The reality is is my father taught me a young age, treat people the way you want to be treated, right, and if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. Those are two keys, right. So I've also learned a great deal of patience from a number of my members
watching them navigate these waters. So I would think that first of all, the treating people the way you want to be treated is. My brother told me a line one time before I started interviewing, and and Dan, sorry for giving this one up, but it's people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. And I think that's to a golf course superintendent, that's reality. You know, these greens out here, these are my kids.
You know, I have two beautiful daughters, but then I have these nineteen greens out here that are at my absolute babies, and you think about them all the time, and you need constant coverage and babysitting. And so if you treat your greens, you treat your members like you treat your greens, you know what I mean, You're gonna be doing well. So my job right is to educate everybody to make sure they're as educated as possible. And I do that simply by getting people much smarter than myself.
Steve McDonald, for instance, he's been on this podcast Smartest Man in Golf, Jaeger Kovich or a former architect at the at the Patterson Club and with a faz Yeo group. Here was Tom mars Off, extremely intelligent man. You know, I would use the people that we have hired to basically sign off on what we're trying to accomplish here, as in, you know, Steve, what are your thoughts on the aconomic side of what we're trying to do here? What's the design factor? Okay, those two were got sign
off on those two. You can even throw a guy like Herb Stevens in our weather guy. You know, people people have there's a lot of chatter about Steve, Herb Stevens. But it's nice to not have to be the guy that cancels the outing. You know. It's nice that Herb's saying, you, guys, you're gonna get out there and you can be soopping white the whole day. Not Jason Meersman. What's that?
Is he a member?
No, he's not a member, but we we we subscribe to his his his weather forecasting it's long runed weather forecasting.
And I was gonna say, Larry David warned us of meteorologists weather man.
I don't know if you're oh, yeah, one of my favorites ever getting started. You know, I was there.
It's perfectly sunny.
He's the only one on the golf course after he told everybody it was going to.
Rain all day.
One of my favorites, by the way, that one, or when he stole the tip, then stole the tip from the bench and then went out and hit the guy and uh forge Danielle four because the guy was deaf. Anyway, Larry David, I almost went down to you know, when I was graduated in Michigan State, I was one hundred percent ready to go with Steve Gloucester CAP's Valley, and I'm so glad I did. But there was a part of me that so desperately wanted to go out to like Riviera, just to just to try to get to
know Larry David. Yeah, my single favorite, maybe of all time.
I think the.
Like by Dream Foursome, he's he's gotta be gotta be at itad like absolutely the commentary. He's just so himself, Like you could tell that's exactly who he is.
Yeah, you know, yeah, it would be awkward and funny the whole time. It would be great, Like, yeah, I misspeak all the time, so it'd be perfect. You know, he'd be he'd be tear me apart and then anyway, it'd be great. It'd be great. But yeah, so you know, I don't know if I ever buttoned up that beautiful question you asked me. But at the same time, like you know, I kill him with kindness, be yourself, you know, love them. They're gonna love you back. And I mean
that wholeheartedly. You know, I'm not I'm not here to sell a project or or raise money for this thing. You know. My reality is is I have to, uh, I have to keep people understanding where we stand, you know, and and and keep them educated on that. And then and then as a team, we have to make you know, the decisions for what's best for the club period, you know.
And you know, and I think with these intelligent people around yourselves, with and and calling my brother for a little advice, or calling Steve Revenue for some advice, or you know, just Mike de Husky down at Shelter Harbor, Like we got a great group of support out here in the in the Northeast, and and you know, there's a number of people that come to your back and aid to make sure you have the the answers and and the knowledge to be you know, to to help
lead these these these people through what is very tough decisions for them, you know.
And I think, like one of the things that you said that resonates to me is be yourself. I think, like so often you see, like it's like, as someone who grew up working at a club, you you feel like you have to put up this facade of like polite, always politeness, and that can sometimes mask your personality. But when I think back to like as as young Andy coming of age, you know, in college, like who became My best.
Relationships were as who are members were.
Often people that caddied for regularly where I would spend a lot of time, and you like you lose that veil of of of how you felt like you had to act because of how much time you spent with someone, you know, And this was me in my twenties, right when I was young, and like, when I think back to it now, is like those people actually got to
got to know me. You know, and if you just let people in sooner and and kind of you know, be polite, be you know, be a you know, understand like you know, the politeness, but like also show them who you are. Speak like, speak to them the way you would speak to your friends, you know, and they are more likely going to develop like a real relationship with you and respect you, because like you know that. I think that's something as you get older, you like
kind of realize. But it's like, you know, there's no sense putting up this like false facade, right because you're ever then going to have a relationship of significance, and especially in your position where you're trying to get things done, you need to have that deeper relationship with with people in order to push things through.
Yeah. Yeah, you got to build that trust, right, Like you know, I always tell people that come up to me and they're like, hey, Jay, there's something over here, there's something over there, and you know you want to get to it. I always say, you know, if you're seeing it, I'm losing sleep over it. You know I've already I've already seen it, I promise you, And if
I haven't, I'll jump right on it. You know, sometimes people will give me what I call layups, right, you know, Hey, Jay, is there any chance we could get an extra flower pot over here? Done? Jay, the trash can over here? And sometimes I might explain to them why we tried that it doesn't work out. But other times I'm like, well, that's a layup. Cut a path to the forward tea box on two from one, so you don't have to walk through the tall grass or walk around. Yeah, I'll
cut you a little path. Let's do that. That's a layup. Let's get that one done. Check the box.
What's what's your least favorite? You know, if someone tells you something like is it is it? Like there's there's some Doug grass somewhere? Is that re least favorite?
Like? What what we the least favors?
When you don't know, you know, it's communication with your staff, you know, forgot to mention, Oh, I forgot to mention that my bad No no, no, no, no no. I
need to know everything. There's there's a stone that's been turned, I need to know it, right Like, uh, yeah, you can't not and uh you know, this year we've done so much work with communication and really trying to communicate to the membership about all the either work that's coming at us here and and uh, you know, you're you're you know, it's hard to it's hard to be everywhere at once, and and you're really line on your people
for this communication. And so when you get caught and you you don't know what they're talking about, that's when it's the worst. Other than that, it's like, you know, I'm either going to ride the complaint wave with you and try to do better, or else I'm gonna or else I'm gonna go fix it right away. But yeah, you know, here's a good one for you. A lot of people are asking me about this project we're doing. They're like, we're gonna ask about the project, j J,
what's what's what's your favorite part? They all think I'm gonna be like, you know, like you, I'm an architect nerk right, Like oh I love number four or number five, or oh this is gonna be a great mound here, it's going to get the ball rick ische and moving all over the place, or we're gonna open up the bunkers. No, No, the most exciting part to me is not wasting money on bunkers that are seven years past their last their life expectancy or an irrigation system that's been you know,
leaking like a sieve for five six years. You know, I'm just really excited to not be wasting that money because we're gonna be able to do so much more for you, you know. I mean, we're gonna have divots feel quicker, We're gonna be plugging davids, We're going to be you know, what else can we do? Let's get more done? You know, That's that's the reality of it. I mean, but so anyway, it's exciting.
Your your golf course.
I you every time I talk to you, you remind me that it's I think I big the numbers the ninth rtj.
Oh number eleven eleven, it.
Was between I knew the two numbers that were coming into my had were nine and thirteen. And it ends up being right in the middle ourtj golf course. You're you're gonna do a major project on this golf course.
Uh.
Jaeger Kovich is going to to uh you know, you know, figures crossed.
I think the best we're in the.
Middle of the boat right now. I don't know what it looks like. I know there's been great participation by the members and uh and I know the team that has done the communications for it is there's there's a there's a love fest there. We just we've been working so many hours together. It's it's it's been fun. They've done an amazing job. And uh, yeah, fingers are crossed that this is going to go through. The reality is the master planning is done and so what we're going
to do it has already been planned out. It's just how we're going to execute that is is not one hundred percent set in stone yet, but pretty close.
With with just the history r d J Robert Trent Jones one of the you know, most revered golf architects in the in the history of golf. You're an early golf course of his, which I think for the most part the early work was was the most celebrated of RTJ. What has been you know, the kind of process for maybe pushing slightly away from his original work and what has been the kind of how have you guys gone about, you know, getting the membership to the point you're at now.
Yeah, So, yeah, great question. I I I one second though on that. I do want to remember remind you the first time we ever met. Do you remember this National Golf Link?
I was yeah, oh yeah, National Golf Link.
Yeah yeah, I was touring National Golf Links with mister Sell and Eddie, the amazing superintendent there. It was my first time on property and I'm like a Kidney Candy store, just just looking around, and I see you out there and you're playing. I'm like, I ran up check and Jason Meersman uh golf course superintendent of the Patterson Club, Robert Trent Jones eleventh and you started laughing like you were like, yeah, that's exactly anyway. That was how we met.
And then yeah, the perfect perfect way to.
Intro right to a golf historian, right number eleven. Anyway, it's so funny.
Yeah, so god, that was my twenties.
Twenty eighteen, yeah, yeah, right right, yeah, twenty seventeen maybe no.
He was yeah right? When then when was she? When did Chinnacok host the US Open? I had a picture? I was twenty eighteen, so that was eighteen? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Is the second second major championship that I covered in person?
Oh awesome?
Maybe third.
You're just hot, You're just getting hot, that hot you're playing National two.
I didn't stay the whole week. I couldn't afford to stay the whole week. We didn't have enough money in the business account. So I was only there from like Monday or Tuesday to Friday.
Yeah.
Yeah, those are early early, early years.
That's great. Yeah, yeah, I was volunteering for mister Jennings me to work. Great stuff, great week. So yeah, so back to the So, first of all, our history, you know, there's some there's some fun stuff that I like to talk about when it comes to Patters Club's history. And you know number one is yeah, first of all, we were eleventh golf course. But if you look at his archives, you'll you'll see that Augustin National hired Robert Trent Jones Senior at the same year that we that we employed
him to build our golf course. Excuse me, the Patterson Club was originally a ge established club. So the president CEO, who most likely were members at Augusta Nashville and pretty tied in with the boys there just doing some of the world's best work. I always say that I can only imagine the the interview process and one of these guys from g saying, hey, let's hire this young guy, and then by the way, why don't you stop up in Fairfield and whip us up a golf course real quick,
you know. And so long story short here number eleven. He comes up here and and it's just an amazing piece of property, just a beautiful piece of property. And he put out some you know, some some beautiful golf holes. And you know, there's some interesting facts, like our eighteenth hole was never finished. They were they were working on some tree work through the driving which is currently our driving range. And you know, one hundred thousand dollars, shy
finished the tree work. We'll just do it next year. Never happens.
Wait, wait, so it wasn't finished.
Oh no, this is walked to the top of the hill and put the te's instead of going through the woods and playing the golf hole. They had finished the green so the green green. Yeah, well no, this is yeah. So they basically fifteen would have been our current fifteen would have been seventeen originally, and it would have been a great final stretch of holes. And and you know they were getting ready to finish eighteen and you know,
we're not gonna get those trees clear in time. Let's put the teas at the top of the hill, played down the hill, and like I said, they probably were like, we'll just do it next year.
It just never happens.
Never, never happen. You know, things happened. That's how that's how it works. And you know, and in the late sixties, I think nineteen sixty I've looked at all the old overheads. You know, I think like nineteen sixty eight they started using as a driving range and you know, piped off a stream that would have been strategic in the final hole. And and long story short, what's a cut to your
club without a driving range? Now? So this actually, you know, it's kind of funny how this works, but it almost kind of helps us in a way that like what we're trying to accomplish now is to really improve our shortcame practice driving range. And we can do that with a slight re route to our golf course, which you know was highlighted by a number of architects in the past.
But we really cast Yagurkovich with during this how do we create you know, these better shortcame practice area driving range, but at the same time improve our golf course. And he's created a great opportunity for us. He saw this after many days of walking around in the cold and our car hearts and anyway, the uh, you know, that's going to be the kind of that was kind of the biggest hurdle is trying to get everybody to understand that. But then the rest of that renovation, we're looking at
about you know, seventy percent restoration thirty percent renovation. You know, so really kind of paying a lot of homage to Robert Trenchones Senior and bringing some of his earlier work back, some of the things he had planned earlier, bringing those
things back and really kind of highlighting those. For instance, our fourth hole, you know, we're going to kind of do what you would see like eight at Augusta National, the big mounds around the greens and let the ball just bounce and run around and it's a really neat, narrow, banana shaped green and just kind of improving the interest of that golf hole. Also making a little bit more playable for the higher handicap golfer and more strategic for
the lower handicap golfer. You know, so we're really focused on doing a number of those types of things while you know, really paying homage to him. You know, on number six. He had a really great hit it high and hope volcano hole short part three. It was really the only short part three in property. And you know, now we're we're looking at kind of bringing something back, not one hundred percent back to what he had because it was a little diabolical. People stopped playing it for
a reason. So let's do let's pay a little image too, Let's cut it into the side of the hill, make a little postage stamp out of it, and you know it's going to be the sixth try on our sixth green. It's been done multiple times, so you know, let's just start turned to try to get it right.
It's an interesting you know, I think like one of the things when I think about golf history and I know you're in golf history, is like the Great Depression in World War Two created like this like just stop and almost like like very abrupt restart almost twenty years from the last time new golf was being built. There
were a few, okay, a few golf courses. But what happened was, you know, like all of the ties to the old style, like the this of rapidly evolving new practice of golf architecture, all the ties were pretty much broken. There were a few that had ties to that that era of golf design, RTJ Dick Wilson being two of the two of them. And it's like the early stuff with RTJ has a flare to it. You know, if you looked at and and you think about like Dick Wilson.
You know, if you look at some old pictures of Dick Wilson's designs, you know, actually early in his career there was a you know, a real late Golden Age look in style to it. But then when you when you know, it almost was like they became part of
the next era. And a lot of it had to do with, like I think, societal trends, Like it was kind of what was going on in the world, this like manufactured this like peak manufacturing era, this like simplicity, Like yeah, subdivision you knows are are huge in housing in the fifties and sixties, and it's like, you know, it's just like a very you know, like I think like RTJ built so many golf courses over so many years and had his thumb his fingerprints on so many
of the great Golden Age golf courses that sometimes like the he built a lot of golf courses, and a lot of golf courses might not be the greatest golf courses, but he did build some that were fascinatingly unique, particularly early in his career.
Yeah, I mean I could only imagine, right, you're you're you're over five hundred golf courses. Correct me if I'm wrong. Yeah, you've got to be getting to a point where that's my favorite. Here's my list of thirty two grades. I'm gonna give you a seven, a twelve, fourteen, let's have a you know, I mean, I don't know that's not Also in another way, it.
Gets to the point where you're not even visiting, right, Like it's like I show up on on for the for the sales.
Meeting, opening day and opening day.
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, Now you're one hundred percent right, it's uh yeah. He became a he became like the first kind of you know, I mean, he was the big name golf course architect, right, he was the he was the first guy that was like, this is my career, this is the only thing I'm going to do, and and this is who I am. And so five hundred golf courses, you know, I wonder how many heat didn't
show up to right, he's never been to. But at the same time, he's got a number of people in this career he started off there there, you know, their careers in golf, building, golf courses for him, junior architects, you know. So just amazing footprint or dumb print in the in the business itself. H kind of uh sparking all these jobs and all these professions. And you know, I always like even my little role in the golf right as the golf course superintown, the director of grounds and greens and.
Don't call me a superintendent.
Yeah director, I have my golf ball director of grounds.
Don't call me a super intendent.
Yeah yeah, so I yeah, well, you know.
I like I personally like across the pond when they get master greenskeeper, Like if you could get master in.
Your in your in your title, I think that's just like a huge you know.
I remember my grandfather back to back to him, he was very against the greens keeper title. He wanted it to be the golf course superintendent, you know, and.
Now it's like disrespectful to say superintendent.
I know, no, that's the that's the best role there is. My superintendent Steve Kobiki is a wild man. And then I have a superintendent facilities Mike or chef. Amazing guys. They're killing it on a daily basis. But at the same time, like like that's the fun stuff. I get to go, what's that.
I heard a recent story of a friend of mine meeting a new superintendent and uh and them correcting them saying, I am the director of agronomy, not the superintendent.
And I thought, I don't do any corrections. Back to that, I think the first or second question. Yeah, I don't correct people very often.
It's you know, it's interesting my you know, personal opinion. Hey, you've been you've been.
A part of this. This might be like a great question for you, it might be a terrible question. You grew up in Turf, you've lived your life has been this, Yeah, with young young people in Turf. Now, like how do you think that the role in the people have changed? Like how how is the profession industry and the young people coming into the industry, how how's it evolved?
Yeah, good question, good question. You know when I started out, when I was an assistant, it was sixty to eighty hours a week. You know, it was go go, go go, go, go go. Nowadays, it's very different and your employees are very different, and and you know, how has it changed the the professionals themselves. I mean, deep down we're all
the same, right. But at the same time, you know, you have your what I call tinker bells, right, the guys who were to try everything, you know, the guys who who just can't help but to keep trying new things, love it, and then I'm very much on their shoulder, going, how's that working out for you? But then you have the uh, you know, you have the guys.
I love that.
That's the that's an entrepreneur right thereial spirit, like they want to just they wanted to test boundaries.
They're testing boundaries twenty four to seven. I mean I could name a list of them, and they're they're spectacular what they do. And then there's the uh you know, so you always have your same people, right, like like the guys that we're all kind of let's figure it out and get it done, you know, present a superintendent, director of grounds, whatever you want to call them, with the task, and they're going to figure out a way
to do it, right. They're always going to come up with fifteen different ways and then you know, it might not be the might not be the best time, but they're they're never going to stop thinking about it until they figure out the single best way to accomplish what they're being asked to do. Which that's kind of the nature of our business, right and love that the people that are constantly, you know, coming up with new ways. But uh, you know, the world has changed so much.
And what I mean by that is like people aren't signing up to work sixty to eighty hours, and oh the increase in wages. We can't pay the overtime that like, like like that anymore. And and so you have to get creative and think out of the box. We we do a lot of evening maintenance, you know, and in a lot of evening maintenance, a lot of part time, a lot of just finding really good people in the community come out and help you out. You know. Just yesterday I was talking to somebody and and this this
woman was like, oh, my my husband's retiring. He's going to be a retired firefighter. And I'm like, oh, oh, I'm licking at my chops. I'm like, oh, get him in here, let's get him all and rough, let's just get him own fairways, you know, like anything to take a little bit of stress off the core team. So you know, you're always kind of you have to evolve.
You have to be willing to change, you know, or you'res to cowboy and you're sticking to your guns and you're saying, I'm gonna work these guys eighty hours a week and you better be able to pull all the best college students if you're that guy.
You know.
So you know it's changed a lot. The people hands are still callous though, you know, the hands are still callous, and the hours are still real. So I don't think that much has changed when it comes to that.
All right, let's take a quick break to talk about Toro. This episode is sponsored by Toro. Did you know Toro has a full line of work vehicles. Whether you're hauling materials, towing equipment, or shuttling VIPs, Toro has a vehicle for just about any need. Workman series is your go to for power and payload capacity, and the Vista series is perfect for guest transportation with a comfortable ride.
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Torres tons of options to customize your work vehicle, including all electric models, so check them out on Toro dot Com. All right, let's get back to Jason Meersman, how.
Do you with with two daughters?
How do you go try and have work life balance in your own life?
Yeah, so that's a that's a great.
Question, maybe one that you haven't solved.
I I definitely have not solved that. I'll be quite honest with you. And when I saw that, yeah, I'll let you know. No. But you know, for me, it's been basketball coaching their basketball teams. So wintertime slows down a little bit and I get to go be coach j instead of coach K.
What kind of.
Uh are you on the forefront of girls basketball analytics? Are you?
Are you? Are you? Are you here out of the ball to teach them how to pass before they dribble? You know, but get the ball they want to dribble. No, No, we're gonna play with a flat basketball. And I want you to think it past first. You know we started. Oh gosh, I've had so much fun coaching girls basketball. Unfortunately is the first year I'm not doing it a lot going on this I'm really bummed, but I'm I'm still actively at their practices, cheering them on.
You're not even going to move into assistant role, special assistance.
You know, we'll see, We'll see. I'm not nearly as good of an assistant coach as i'm a head coach. I'd like to be leading the conversations at those practices and then and then uh behaving myself during the games, you know. But uh no, I've loved it. I've loved it to death. That's that's It's been a great one. I'm also just like you know, date days, right, I just got to have those date days. I just had a day day with my daughter Luella. The other day. We went to a Patriots game and I was wearing
my Bears T shirt. Yeah, I was wearing my Chicago Bears T shirt. And I almost dressed up as Dica. I like to put on the fake mustache and some aviators and my cool sweater. But you know, she talked me out of it. Oh my gosh, you have to give you. Yeah, we'll off to trade for something nice that's spectacular.
By the way, I'll send that out. That was a headcover free ad here in this toropod.
Yeah. That thing's yeah. Yeah. I hope that one finds its way at Fairfield, that's for sure. I will I.
Ope PJ wh who's producing this. I owe him a package of champions to her gear. So I need to go to the UPS UPS facility near me and I'll send I'll send that as well.
Well. I'll be happy to send a bluebird back. All right. The best logo in golf, I don't know how we get Oh, we don't get the nod there from time to time.
My brother, you know what, The whole ranking logos thing is such bullshit because because they're they, every nobody can take a part that like can remove the the.
Logo from the place.
Like you look at them, and I want to be clear, Yeah, this is as someone who did the first ever logo madness Be exacted it like eight years ago.
Now now everybody does it, and you know it's we thought.
About making an annual thing, but we're like, it's just gonna be the same logos.
And guess what happens every time somebody does it.
Next year will be the same, The same logos make it And and if they're all great golf courses, like I would respect the logo contest. If some golf of course I'd never heard of, that has an awesome logo, maybe it's the far on there, but it's Marion uh wingfoot Maidstone's gonna make it far, Sleepy Hollow is gonna make it far.
It is like gets in there. They always in the light, like top twenty. I'm like, what bluebird on the hickory stick? Come on, that's I'm.
A burder so.
So anyways, there's my rant on the logo contest is if you if you could somehow remove the names and remove if you could do.
The men in black, you know light thing.
PJ probably never even saw men in black, but you could do them the memory thing where you just wipes away everybody's memory.
Yeah, the logos that win wouldn't win.
Yeah, because because screen speed shouldn't be in the conversation when you're picking logos, right, Like I.
Want to talk about green speed. No, you probably like, honestly, I don't know where we're going.
We've been all over the place. Let's keep going.
We still have to get back to the family tree. I'm not I'm not gonna you know, but the family tree it's gonna be the jumping off point. It's the through line of the whole episode. But the uh Greens, I honestly find myself sometimes and people are probably gonna think I'm a snob or I'm some like golf hipster. I don't know, you either get described as a hippie
or like, oh that golf course stop. Like I find myself like actively hating Northeast golf golf in the Northeast like active, I actively dislike it because of how fast the greens are, because it's.
It's honestly like ruined some of the golf courses.
Yeah yeah, yeah, well, I mean if they haven't softened, you know, why.
Are we softened the slopes? You know, So, as as a superintendent at your club around green speeds, how does that work?
Well, I mean I try to my golf pro is adamant with me about Jay don't make him too fast, and I completely agree with them. You know, we first of all don't have many whole locations on our greens right now anyways, So you know I have three to five, I mean eleven and a half the green's played perfect and twelve's like a member guest invitational something like that. You know, you get over that here and there's nowhere
to put a whole location. And by the way, you're just turning six is into sevens and sevens into eight right,
and yeah, what fun is that? And you know, we're very much a family club here and we try to make you know, we try to it's very important to know who your customer is, you know, so you know, one of the greatest compliments ever got was from Dave the Donus during our we were hosting a MET event here for the MET superintendents and and he said, Jay, your green speeds were perfect for your greens, you know,
for the slopes. They were actually perfect. And I thanked him kindly for that, because that's truly what we're trying to do. I want to see puts go in. I don't want to see people embarrassed, and I don't want to make the game unplayable. You know, it's too easy to do that. It's too easy to do that on accident,
let alone on purpose. I had a member one time, a board member, who we were talking about modifying greens because the green Speeds technology is that, you know, greens were growing so fast that back in nineteen forty six when we were created, you know, it just didn't match, right, it doesn't match. And one of our board members is their handkxhious. Why don't we just slow down the Greens.
I was going to vote vote.
It's the most logical thing that like it rarely is even discussed as an option.
Right right, right, right right? Yeah, I hear you, I hear you. You know it's a balance that I isn't it.
The thing that I find amazing about the whole discourse is Scottie Shuffler. I you know, in terms of like if he came to your club, he'd be the best putter on the grounds that day.
Like people people.
Are always suck to putting, such a puttings when compared like he's not great at putting when compared to like the greatest putters in the world.
Andy, I never miss. I don't know if you've known that about me on the golf course. I've yet to miss.
Okay, So anyways, like I think about his all time bad putting performances, and I think that nothing was worse than his putting this year at the at the Open at Troon.
It was like unwashable. You know why because the Greens were slow nine nine and a half.
Yeah, yeah, you gotta take a real stroke at the ball when the greens are rolling.
Like that, you know, you have to be like so aggressive.
It's not like I have to just wiggle this onto the line and then I got it on the line. It's going in and because of how fast they are, there's not a lot of slope, so it it. You know, I probably just have to get this on the edge. It's not going to break that much. When the greens are slow and your stroke doesn't feel good, it is like a horrifying, horrifying proposition, Like you are terrified of
three footers, you're terrified of five footers everything. You know, when you're fifteen feet away, you have no shot of hitting a ball online. But then like conversely, when you're like feel great about your stroke, it's like I can't miss.
Yeah, yeah, I just like don't understand.
Like I was a couple of years ago at like a very historic golf course.
And they were telling me about how they're going to change the screen. It's like it's one of the most revered holes in the world. It's like, what, you're going to soften the green?
Like, yeah, the greens are four feet too fast, and you're going to soften the.
Green right right, You're gonna.
Eat Like this is famous green and you're gonna change the green rather than just slow the greens down.
Yeah, I mean that's a tough one. You know, obviously the greens are always evolving, but you're one hundred percent right, like you know, between bunker splash and mo lions and things like that. But at the same time you're you know, yeah, it's almost like we've confused ourselves and made it very challenging to come up with a proper answer there. You know, people want fast greens just for peacock feathers, you know.
And that's the thing.
It's like they go down the street to club and the greens are fast and they put one off the green and they're like, oh, that was freaking awesome.
You know, can we do that here? Why can't we have that here?
Yeah?
I think I think the other thing that gets misunderstood and is like the trueness. People I think associate trueness.
With speed, sure, and.
And don't think you could have a reasonably paid screen with with.
That same trueness. Is that is that harder? Is it? Is that something that like you.
Oh no, yeah, smoothness is everything. Yeah, Like so like you think about it, like during our invitationals, right, we run out there and roll greens or reroll them with it, even with the squeegees. From time to time, if they're too fast, we'll just get them with a squeegee. It just get them smooth again. And that's just for footprints. That's just for ball marks, you know, things of that nature, well fo foot scuffing and things you know like that.
But the reality is, yeah, I always try to you know, you always try.
To keep them.
They got to just fit where you are, you know, those speeds have to fit where you are. But like the smoothness and trueness is everything to me. Like if I see a line and once you hone in your speed and you see that line, yeah you wanted to stay online, period, but yeah you didn't have to ramp up the speed just to get that trueness.
Is it easier to have true greens if greens are let's just say a ten or a thirteen.
No, true is just on smoothness, and a lot of times it's early out, you know, early out on or frequency of roles. So yeah, you can have them ten and a half eleven and it can be true as can be, and just like they would be at a twelve thirteen. You know, don't get me wrong, twelve or thirteen.
It's just going further past the hole, you know. Yeah, the same scuff marks, the same ballmarks, the same you know, somebody walk in your line is going to create the unevenness, the lack of true true ball roll.
Wouldn't those scuff marks and stuff be amplified. The tighter the grasses.
Now, the longer it is, typically you would have more the scuff show longer. So and then in the summer months, when you know you're August and it's puffy and and maybe you've backed off heights of hair. Yeah, when people start scuffing their feet, it shows a little bit more. But again you're out there checking moisture and hitting it with the hose and blowing bunker splash and you know, tapped on spike marks. You know, they don't have to be cruising it thirteen fourteens.
But what what evolution in agronomy are you most excited for? Like what type of new Like what's the new thing that you would most like to see?
Well, I mean I've been we're talking to agronomy, you know, I've been big this year. We brought in fourteen new robot robotic mowers. We have the little the Little Husk of ar I don't know IF's supposed to do plugs here, the Little Husky of Varn and the robot mowers spectacular.
They're cute little guys.
Cute well guy, yeah, oh yeah, we're talking. We got to name them here at the club. All my members want to name them. So we're gonna auction off naming them. Maybe find a good charity to promote and and and anyway. But they you know, it's just about consistency, about noise, about safety and and you know, minimizing the amount of times we still mo with the regular mower that rough from time to time. We also do our range tea and I'm hoping that you know, we demoed a fairway
unit this year and loved it. Just helps with you keeping up on the consistency of the the you know, the playability and uh, you know those big moors, those big motors are loud and uh, you know you're training somebody, you're filling with fuel and all this, you know, and you know you still have to do it, but just not nearly as much. If we could go from having the more our fairways four times a week to two times a week with the big units through these robots,
I think it's a no brainer. Gives us more time to to do some of that that detail work that our members know more than anything.
The fairways are the big fairways are the big one left to like really solve.
Right.
Yeah, so again you know a number of people will mow. Yeah, it depends what your fairway heights are. The one that we had, we have our fairways just under you know, right around three tenths of an inch. So this robot was definitely cutting grass. And and if we, like I said, I think we went to mowing it twice a week versus like three to four times a week. And these robots, they just keep you looking good looking, right, give it
a nice clean cut and then that's way. Also when you go back out to cut, you're not taking so much grass off the plant, right, that will stress it a little bit more. But also the uh also just the grass that's building up in the reels and things of that nature. It just gets a little mess here. So again it's more about just consistency, you know, are rough. This year has been spectacular with a first time I've ever heard our rough is too easy. So I was like,
never thought i'd hear that. I heard from a twenty two handicapper. But you know, I like our golf course is a lot of fun, and the greens are are are pinched off by bunkers from our last renovation, and so it's very challenging to hold our greens. So you know, I really try to just keep the rough maintained a you know, inch and a half inch and three quarters and let you get on the back of the ball. You know, I wanted to be a quarter shop penalty,
not an entire shot penalty. So you know, these robots have allowed us to do that and execute our rough exactly how we want to, you know. So that's been great.
Let's get back to the family tree.
Okay, okay, we're at We're.
At your your father and uncle maintaining South Bend Municipal Golf Course is yeah, this is this is where your.
Brother and you come into the into the equation.
Yeah. Yeah. So he started working for my dad a year before I did, and that's when I was like, you were saying, that's when I was jealous. That's when I was like, oh, I remember, like yesterday, you know what I mean like, oh, he's getting the gout there at work. I can't wait. I can't wait. And yeah, he started working. I think I I started when we moved up to Michigan. So we were in South Bend and I would just I just got to hang out at that property and and uh and watch them work
and kind of see it all unfold. But when we went up to Michigan, that's when I got to start working. And that's where so Dan and I would be there in the morning and we'd either be raking all thirty six holes of bunkers or we're in Michigan three Rivers, Michigan place called pine View, it's a thirty six hole. It was a single owner, semi private. Still is spectacular golf course. My brother got married there. It's just our home away from home. We go back and it's like
a time capsule, you know, like nothing's changed. People are still amazing, so friendly. Like I said, the only the only problem with the place is my dad's tree plantings. No, not true. It's still a great place anyway. But we had a lot of fun in our last couple of visits there. But yeah, you know, Dan and I got there in the morning, first thing in the morning, we'd work our tails off for about four or five hours
and then we'd go out and start golfing. You know, he would be starting he would be out there with towels on the driving range. Remember this, Well, I was always trying to clear the tree line in the back of the range, while he was, you know, very methodically had towels laid out every five to ten yards and he was chipping and working on a short game. And yeah, what does.
That tell you about the two of you and how you are as superintendents. That sounds like drastically different personalities.
Different personalities. Yeah, he's the single greatest consultant I could possibly have because he balances me so well. You know, that's amazing, it is, it is. It's very fortunate for that that consultant slash brother.
Yeah.
Uh so.
Then so then you guys got into the industry and and any any cousins that have gotten into it too.
No, our cousin was smart enough to get out of the industry. No, no, they didn't. Yeah, no, I think we you know, we caught the book early, and uh, you know, we both kind of looked at going to leave an industry at one point and we were like, now it just pulls you right back in. Like I said earlier to the the people surrounding this game are just so good and it's hard to get away from.
And uh, you know, so basically what happened is, you know, we both went to the Kalamazoo Valley Communit College to play golf and to figure out if this is exactly what we want to do. And then we ended up going to Michigan State. You know, it's party on grass program there. Doctor Rogers, doctor Crump, two of my favorite people. We lost, uh mister Bargus, our doctor Argus recently, but just some some great people there that that again passionate about growing grass and and and there are a bunch
of bunch of tinker bells. You know, we're all just trying to figure out the best way to skin the cat.
You know, what's the what's the best from you know, it could be your brother, it could be one of your classmates, it could be superintendent down the street. What's an example of a of a tinker bell uh trying something in a becoming standard practice?
Well, I also Steve Glossinger made this little snout that Pat Sisk perfected. It was a little snout on the end of a pushblower. We call it a little wonder. I forget what we what's actually called. We call it a little wonder because that was the name of the pushblower. But it's a little attachment that grabs the the wind and forces it straight down, so after you put top tresting on top of holes, it helps it blow it
in the holes. That was one that worked out well until we realized buffalo blower is probably just as good, if not better. You know, it's a long list. So my father and I always called it fence climbing. Right we would go, we'd be traveling, you know, we would always travel in our and our old celebrity to the family vacations and they were usually wrapped around to the
golf conference or something of that nature. And we would camp on the way out and camp on the way back, and and oh, every time we saw a golf course, it was like squirrel, squirrel. You know.
I love driving on the road, and yes, even the ones on the highway that are never good.
There's a maintenance facility. Let's go in there. We bop in there and see, oh wow, creates on the back of a bunker rake so we could hold our tools in there. All that makes too much sense. You know, you're always grabbing great ideas from people. We talked about bell Air Country Club earlier. I was out there and stole their trash cans. This year, they have these trash cans that look like stumps. They've been a huge hit
at the Patterson Club, you know. And all we did was line the old ones with with with wood and then cut out the TI. It was genius. I mean, you know, you're always taking these ideas from other people, and and you know it's celebrating them. I never pretend like they're mine, you know. I mean, heck, Steve Raven who let us borrow some cores from his eration on his greens, and we have greens expansions that are gonna
be done during our project with wing football up. Basically, so you're always you're always trying to.
If you listen to any professional golfer though poet stinks, you know, they're all holding on to I feel like all the all the old golfers that are on TV hold on to like nineteen ninety six pebble beat screens, you know, like that is why they just they hold this resentment towards the service.
Yeah. No, First of all, that Northeast Poet is some of the best poe you've ever seen, Right, It's right up there with that Pittsburgh Poe. So those guys obviously have never played wing foot, all right, none of them except for that d Shamblefill I think did pretty well there. But uh, yeah, no, I you know, I've played some of the some of the best greens in the world, I think, and and and uh, I've seen them both bent and poeist. So a lot of it's just like
you said earlier, it's kind of just a hi. Your rolling it that day plays an important role in your true view on on on the type of grass. So if it's going in, it's going in, you love it. If it's not, you don't love it, it's.
Uh, we're we're gonna get you out of here. Now.
You know this has been a fun conversation. Well they do part two someday. Last question, how how are you feeling about the beloved Bears?
Oh Chicago Bears, Oh buddy, I hate. I originally wanted him to get a king's ransom for that first pick, but after watching hard knocks it kind of like Caleb. He seems like a good guy that that's going to figure it out. Love that last game he looked he looked pretty good. But uh, you know, like any team, you gotta you gotta get a little further into the season before you got it all figured out. That offensive line needs to keep solidifying their purpose for us, right, stop laying down on plays.
To have it seems like they need to have a purpose.
Yeah, last two they looked better, all right.
So you know, as a.
True Chicago Bear fan, I don't you know, I do all my trash talk in the off season and then I just, uh you know, I go to the games and support and and and talk as if I have no clue about anything. Right. Bears one thousand, Uh yeah, negative sixteen for the Patriots, that's.
Uh yeah, the Patriots resemble a lot of our Bears teams in a couple of decades right now. So Jason, big, thanks for coming on. I mean this should cover boxed up our friends. We're gonna tell our friends this swag that it's it's uh, it's fine in a home, it's really going.
To appreciate it, and uh just appreciated at my home.
It just I think I've found somebody that might appreciate it even more.
So.
Yeah, hey, thank you for coming on. People can find you. You're you're on Twitter, right, I'm.
All over the place, so yeah, I'm all over the place. I'm easy to find.
The conversation was all over the place, you know.
Yeah, we knew that was coming.
Big thanks, and uh look forward to seeing you maybe at the show. This the Swimmer San Diego. That's an easy one for me. It's a home it's a home game for me.
Yeah, let's try to get around of golf in.
Yeah, we should. We should love to. I'd like the idea of that, you know.
Yeah, yeah, it would be just like this conversation. We'll be all over the place, all right. Thanks, all right, Hey, thanks so much.
Thank you for listening to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast. Hey, big, thanks to Jason for coming on. Big thanks to PJ. Clark for editing and producing this podcast. As a reminder, as I said at the top, we have the Donald Ross North Carolina shirt in the Pro Shop. All proceeds from that are going to support Hurricane Helene relief in North Carolina. Thank you to everybody whose bottom is way exceeded what.
We thought when we were going to launch this. We hope to keep it going.
We would love to really give them a sizeable check, so you can check those out at at proshop dot the fried egg dot com.
It's right there at the homepage.