This Story Has Three Sides to It

DUBLIN, Ohio — Well, just as a lot of us suspected, God is a golfer. Probably a two handicap.

Otherwise, why would He have let Tiger Woods and John Daly make the cut in the Memorial golf tournament here by a hair’s breadth the other day? And why would He make Fuzzy Zoeller His instrument to ensure that they do?

The situation was this: Zoeller, lying two on the 18th hole of the second round with a 12-foot putt for a birdie, could put the cut at 146 if he makes it. He would have disenfranchised half a dozen players by holing it--among them Woods and Daly.

The irony is that Tiger is the player about whom Fuzzy shanked a quote a couple of weeks ago and found himself in the deep politically incorrect rough with no shot.

So, Zoeller misses the putt. It’s a pretty easy straight-in putt, slightly uphill. The kind Zoeller makes nine of 10 times. This time, he yanks.

You have to think somewhere God is laughing. This not only lets Woods and Daly back in the tournament, but, by the luck of the draw, it pairs them together in one of history’s great matchups. It spares them and pairs them.

Let’s hear it for Fuzz! Remember how you did it? Or was there another hand on the putter?

While we’re on the subject of mortality, we have to tell you reports of Woods’ otherworldliness are grossly exaggerated. He (come closer, I wouldn’t want this to get out) can’t hit a downhill lie any better than you or I. And when he gets one hanging over a creek, he does what the rest of us do. He hits it in the creek.

We’ve got that shot, right?

It’s nice to note Eldrick does too. The guys in his threesomes now don’t have to look at him sternly on the first tee and say, “No miracles, now, y’hear!? We’re just playing golf.”

It’s reassuring that when he gets in the deep rough on the fringe of the green, he can chili-dip with the best of us.

“I hit it fat,” he admitted of that shot. Music to our ears. Just when we were about to frisk him for wings or see if he could light cigarettes just by snapping his fingers, or check to see if he sleeps in a coffin, all of a sudden he’s all too human. On a couple of holes, Daly can turn to him and say, “I believe it’s you.” I even saw him in a sand trap once.

He’s not yet Hogan.

Meanwhile, back at the front of the race here, Scott Hoch was leading the parade.

I guess he was. He doesn’t talk to us peons of the press. Now, ordinarily, this is no great loss--I wouldn’t want to be stranded on a desert island with him--but he’s leading here and, the way things are going, he could be the winner of a rain-shortened tournament.

It’s well-known the good Lord evens up. He makes your face fair, he makes your feet flat. Or your stomach not.

So, He gave us Daly-Woods. Then, sent the rain.

Look! If you’re ever in this part of the world this time of the year, bring two umbrellas. And lots of cough drops. Palm Springs, it ain’t.

They keep trying to fit this thing in between raindrops but by 4 o’clock Saturday, the fairways were rivers, the sand traps at periscope depth, and on the greens, the putts floated. Jack Nicklaus’ Muirfield was a giant water hazard navigable only by canoe.

I don’t know who’s going to win or how many holes they’ll get to play but, if Tommy Tolles does, it will be every educator’s worst nightmare.

Tommy is a pretty good golfer--he’s been second on tour before and could have won last year’s PGA Championship--but he was, to put a nice face on it, an indifferent scholar.

He tried to pass his classes from a fairway at the U. of Georgia. The only book he opened had nothing to do with the Napoleonic wars but told him where to put his thumbs at address.

Tommy’s more than a dropout, he’s a flunk-out. The only time he saw a teacher was on the driving range. Other guys were learning calculus, Tommy was learning the right-to-left draw.

When they flunked him out, most of the guys on the faculty didn’t even know he was there. He put no strain at all on the school library. When we asked him which marketing education courses he flunked, he said “How about all six of them?”

Now, the president of Harvard or Columbia might consider he blew it. You know, “Stay In school!” is the catchword of our TV commercials and advice from athletes--most of whom ignored the advice themselves.

So, Tolles majored in nine-iron. He decided to go to putting for a living instead of going to an office or a lathe.

Now, a plot like this calls for the dropout to become an object lesson: living in a carton, panhandling on the freeway, shining shoes, selling brushes.

But Tolles made $871,589 last year. Try not to let the kids find out about that when they decide they don’t really need algebra.

Can he win the Memorial? Well, the good news is, Hoch lost two shots of his lead before the rain came. And, Woods started with a birdie. The battle of the century found Daly outdriving Woods but Woods outscoring him. Daly opened par-bogey-bogey-bogey before the rain. The battle of the century is looking more like Louis-Paychek than Dempsey-Firpo.

Jupiter Pluvius is the leader in the clubhouse anyway. “You swing a five-iron shot in that wet and you find yourself hitting knuckleballs,” Tolles notes.

If he hits enough knuckleballs to finish far down the money list, every student counselor can breathe a sigh of relief and say to the kids “See!”

But, if he wins here ($324,000), they may have to revise their advice to the young to “Stay in school. Unless you can get a starting time.”

As to the Memorial tournament, I leave you with two words--Ah-choo!