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Vandyland
- 2005 McKinleyville Open -
"The Nine Hole Open"
- Prologue - Odds - Final Scores - Epilogue - Full Scorecard - Pictures -
The
McKinleyville Open trophy was in new hands...again...after the 2004 open; The trophy's sole owner is Carl Van Der Kamp thanks to his solid showing last year. For a full recap,
click here. What
will 2005 bring? What will the format be? Will all of the contestants be playing? We'll see.
The Open this year will be early again; sometime between 4th and 8th of July. Early word is that Greg will not be making the trip due to the forthcoming birth of his son, Marky-Mark, but Carl, Micah, and Josh have all but confirmed. This means that there won't be a team format for the second straight year, but there may again be a handicapped format as we saw in 2004. The Board of Directors still need to meet to finalize the details.
- May 17, 2005 - The early, "opening-gate" odds are as follows: Carl-103; Josh-100; Micah-99
- June 20th, 2005 - Rumor has it that Greg may appear in his first open since 2003, but we shall see. Greg and Josh played golf in Roseville and both shot well. If memory serves, Josh was in the low-to-mid 90s and Greg was in the high 90's, or at least they would have been if they had finished their round.
- June 23, 2005 - Odds are that Greg now will not play in the open...but we shall see. Wouldnt it be great if Mr. Werner could make up his mind so that the Board could finalize their decisions.
- June 25, 2005 - Carl and Micah play their warm up round at Wildhawk. Carl plays very solid golf and chipped like he wss someone else and Micah played well considering he hasn't played much this year. If Carl chips as well as he did at Wildhawk then he may again take home the trophy while Micah will need his good driving to continue nut will live and die with his short game.
- June 26, 2005 - The McKinleyville Open will be played either on the 4th, 5th, or 6th of July
- June 27, 2005 - The board has toiled over the decision, and it hasnt helped that all information is not yet known, but the format will be one of the following:
- If Gregs plays, it will be team play with Josh and Greg facing off against Carl and Micah
- If Greg does not play, then the format will be the same as in 2004, stroke play with McKinleyville Open handicaps. It was intensely debated if the handicap should be based upon the McKinleyville Open averages or the estimated score for each played, but in the end it was decided that it was better to base the scoring off of something measurable and not just the scores projected by the Board of Directors. The projections have been very close over the years, but measurable is best so that the integrity of the tournament remains. In that case, Micah has to give up one stroke to Josh and seven to Carl.
- The projected scores, however, are different that the handicaps. Josh played a very good round recently and has played a couple of rounds in the past few months so he should play better than last year. Josh will shoot a 99. Carl amazed the spectators with his short game in his most recent round. He only had 1 bad chip all day and only one sore greater than double-bogey. He had a couple of three putts, but the greens at Wildhawk are more difficult than Beau Pre. Carl will shoot a 100. Micah showed he can still play and his driver worked well most times, but his approach shots of 50-100 yards were terrible and his chipping was awful. He will need to make good second shots to win. Micah will shoot a 98.Greg hasnt played much but his most recent round was promising. If he plays, Greg will shoot a 102.The players seem to be much more equal this year so the open may not be close, but the only thing you can expect at the McKinleyville Open is the unexpected.
- Rules: The Board of Directors has decided that it is time to lay down some rules for the McKinleyville Open. For the time being, this will be the location of the rules, however sometime before the 2006 open the rules will be given their own page.
- Players are not allowed mulligans, unless they are more than 10 strokes off the lead in which case are allowed 1 mulligan per round
- Players cannot score more than a quadrouple bogey; that is, no more than a 7 on a par 3, 8 on a par 4, and 9 on a par 5.
- Players will all tee off from the white tees.
- As it is usually wet when the tournament tees off in the morning, Winter rules will apply during play; that is, a player may pick up and move his ball no closer to the hole to improve a poor lie that exists because of the condition of the course. For example, if the ground is so wet that the ball has plugged into the ground, the player may reposition said ball. For example, if the course is so wet and the ball at rest is covered with mowed grass, the player can pick up said ball and reposition it. For example, if water exists on the course that would not normally be there if it was a sunny day in San Diego, the player can reposition said ball. Interpretation is left to the player and it is requested that the player respect the game of golf, and more importantly, the McKinleyville Open.
- The starting order of the players for the first hole is determined on the first tee by the grand marshal of the McKinleyville Open, that is, Carl. He will determine the starting order by tossing a tee in the air until the order is determined. If the grand marshal is not playing in the tournament then a replacement must be named.
- The starting order for the rest of the holes is determined by the scores on the previous hole, lowest score tees off first. If there was a tie on the previous hole, the starting order is determined by the hole prior to that
- The player with honors may choose to give up his place if he wishes.
- It will be another great Open, so good luck to everyone. -The McKinleyville Open Board of Directors
- Carl: 56/54/110 - Greg: __/__/__ - Josh: 47/46/93 - Micah: 54/46/100 -
Epilogue
Strange is is the norm for the McKinleyville Open, and the 2005 tournament was no different. Again, the tournament was only played between three players and again handicaps were used to determine the winner, or, were planned on being used to determine the winner. Prior to the first tee shot, Josh was already complaining about the stroke that Micah had to give up to him, but this year it was Josh who really should have given up some strokes to Micah, and some, and some, and some more to Carl. The 2005 McKinleyville Open will go down as the second most lopsided in Open history, second only to Josh's 13 stroke shalacking of the field in 2001.
Josh lead by 7 over Micah and 9 over Carl after the front nine, but it was nothing that was incredibly obvious, it was just a stroke here, a stroke there and the front nine and the tournament was over. On the fron nine, the only pars recorded were by Josh, three of them, and he picked up 4 strokes on Micah and 7 strokes on Carl on those holes alone. It really wasnt anything special, just solid golf from Josh and not-so solid golf from Carl and Micah.
There was some very poor gold played on the par 5 7th however. Carl lost his ball on his tee shot the the left (way left), Josh on his tee shot to the right, and Micah on his tee shot to the left. The players could have salvaged decent scores, but they didn't. Carl and Micah finished with the maximum of 9 and Josh posted an 8. Ugly!
The tournament was basically over by the time the players made the turn, and Josh's name was engraved on the trophy by the 12th after he picked up 4 more strokes on Micah and 6 strokes on Carl on the first three holes on the back. It was then, after Josh's lead was 11, that he told Micah to not try to get pissed, but instead just try to post a good number; a lesson Josh learned in the 2004 Open. Micah took the advice and made par on the next hole before doubling the par 3 15th and playing for a possible birdie on the par 5 15th but instead making double. Carl also had a chance to post a good number on the 15th after a good drive, but instead finished the hole with a double. Josh collapsed on the hole and posted the max.
The players all par'd the 17th and Micah par'd the 18th to finish with a respectable 46 on the back, which Josh matched, and Carl came in with a 54, a slight improvement from his 56 on the front.
All in all, the 2005 Open was won by the player who played bogey golf, was not won by the player whose recent chipping made him the favorite, and was not won by the low-scorer in the past 3 McKinleyville Opens.
What was learned from this Open? Don't take yourself out of contention in the front nine (we knew that), play bogey-golf and you will win (we knew that), the player with the most par's will win (we knew that) and the player with the trophy gets bragging rights for a whole year (we knew that too). Hopefully the Open will be back in the team format in 2006, but perhaps not. Regardless, two players will again lose next year.