The inside story of how the venerable Main Line golf club pulled off the biggest sports upset since ’Nova beat Georgetown — landing the 2013 U.S. Open

By Jeff Silverman

ON THE LAST Friday of each September, the members of Merion Golf Club celebrate Bobby Jones’s ascension — on September 27, 1930, to be exact — from mere golfing legend to American cultural icon. Nestled in its leafy Ardmore enclave, Merion has witnessed much golfing glory through the years: No club has hosted more USGA national championships or been more central to the Jones fable. It was here that Jones, armed with immeasurable talent and a putter named Calamity Jane, walked away from the awards presentation — into retirement, myth and divinity — with his fifth, and final, U.S. Amateur title. With it came the Grand Slam sweep of golf’s four major titles all in the same calendar year — something no one has managed to do since.

So members annually convene to mark the moment. After lunch and a round of foursomes, they change into black tie for a traditional march, led by a bagpiper, out to the first fairway, across Ardmore Avenue, past the plaque on the 11th tee commemorating Jones’s triumph, ending at the spot on the hill where Jones hit his final approach. Champagne is hoisted. The president offers a toast.

Merion’s members are understandably proud of their club, its history, its tradition, and its significance; its wicker-basket flag sticks, its shrubby Scotch broom, its 18th fairway, where with a one-iron Ben Hogan launched one of the most famous shots in golf to propel him toward improbable victory in the 1950 U.S. Open. It’s one of only two clubs in the country anointed National Historic Landmarks, and its premiere East Course, perennially ranked among the world’s finest, is revered. “Acre for acre,” Jack Nicklaus, loser of the ’71 Open in a playoff at Merion, once observed, “it may be the best test of golf in the world.”

Read the full story on phillymag.com.

For the Flyers to resuscitate their position in the Conference Finals tonight, they need more than Umberger goals and Marty Magic. In fact, they need some help from above, in the form of upper-deck dancer Shawny Hill, a senior at Rowan University who over the past two years has seen more JumboTron time than the Flyers themselves. — Amy Strauss

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OK, so former Penn Charter soccer coach Mark Franek doesn’t really hate pro soccer. But his Daily News op-ed yesterday about Major League Soccer’s 2010 debut in the Philly area has local fans stewing. We gave him a chance to back down a little and admit he’s secretly into the Beckham, but he held his ground. — Amy Strauss

Why won’t MLS work in Philly?
I’m not saying soccer won’t work — I am just raising three or four legitimate concerns. Is spending $90 million on a soccer-specific stadium in Chester a legitimate use of taxpayers’ money? Who is going to spend money and then stay in the area? The league has not shown a profit in years. Adding up all the games, we’re talking 20-plus games a year. It’s probably not going to have much of an effect on the local community.

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Muddying yesterday’s Super Bowl spectacle was a media push by Sen. Arlen Specter to point a cynical finger at the Patriots and the NFL. The timing seemed well orchestrated to coincide with the biggest weekend in sports, but the motive still doesn’t seem clear. Is Specter really that vindictive over how the NFL supposedly snubbed an inquiring letter of his in November?

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Rich Hoffman’s story in the Daily News today about NHL commissioner Gary Bettman’s 15-year anniversary party is a little misleading. Although Bettman is featured in the headline (and in an odd-looking photo), the bulk of the story is a conversation with Flyers/Sixers chairman and warmonger Ed Snider, whose quotes about the NHL’s relationship with another giant sports media conglomerate seem to have been taken after he chugged a blender full of Ripped Fuel:

“You can’t measure our success whether or not we’re on ESPN,” Snider said. “Screw ESPN. Most of our television is local and we do very well in our local markets.
 
“We could have gone to ESPN. They offered us bupkus. Then they acted like they had us over a barrel, that we had no place else to go. I never liked the way they treated us …”

And then Ed Snider tore off his shirt and began eating Hoffman’s tape recorder.

For the NHL, Bettman has money in the bank [Daily News]

Although Barbaro’s been dead for a year now, his haunting spirit still lives on in the form of an online community so devoted and earnest, they make Clay Aiken’s Spanx-tossing army of middle-aged moms look inert by comparison. (more…)

The Phillies finally signed a third baseman yesterday: former San Francisco Giant Pedro Feliz. When the news hit, the baseball web erupted with the usual best-case/worst-case scenarios. Those clamoring for their own alliterative upper-deck fanbase should act now. “Pedro Persuasion” has a nice, ’80s Latino-keyboard-rock feel to it. That would be my personal choice. (more…)

Coatesville native and should-have-been January cover boy Johnny Weir was ROBBED of a national title last night at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in St. Paul.

Weir beat rival Evan Lysacek in the short program, but Lysacek edged Weir out in the free skate (the one that matters), so although their overall scores were identical — by a hundredth of a point — Lysacek was awarded the title. This is the first tie at nationals under the new scoring system, and fuels the already-amped Weir/Lysacek rivalry. Do these curiously buzzworthy judging results smell not unlike the judging scandal of the Winter 2002 Olympics? I’m not speculating, I’m just putting it out there. I’m not saying, but I’m saying. (more…)

The Phillies have announced their promotional schedule for the upcoming season. Along with the usual batch of bobble-headed madness, windbreakers, etc., there’s the return of “Rooftop Thursdays,” where fans can congregate on the Ashburn Alley rooftop to partake in mechanical bull-riding and dunk-tank activities. (Plus copious amounts of drinking and ogling of flip-flopped women in Chase Utley jerseys.)

More surprising is the continuance of the dreaded “Dollar Dog Nights” — which, as everybody remembers from last year, always seemed to bring out the worst in the Phillies fanbase. Whether it was nitrate overdoses or just general mania brought on by the ingestion of too much cased meat, DDNs seemed guaranteed to end in some sort of free-swinging melee, usually in the 300 level.

So, for those who enjoy drunken brawling and mingling with the Citizens Bank Park security team, mark these dates on your calendar:

Saturday, March 29, 1:05 p.m. (Toronto Blue Jays)
Wednesday, April 2, 7;05 p.m. (Washington Nationals)
Tuesday, April 15, 7:05 p.m. (Houston Astros),
Tuesday, April 29, 7:05 p.m. (San Diego Padres)
Tuesday, May 13, 7:05 p.m. (Atlanta Braves)
Monday, May 26, 7:05 p.m. (Colorado Rockies)
Tuesday, June 3, 7:05 p.m. (Cincinnati Reds)
Tuesday, August 19, 7:05 p.m. (Washington Nationals)
Tuesday, September 9, 7:05 p.m. (Florida Marlins)

The 300 Level [The700Level]

Remember the 94 WYSP promos back in the early ’90s with Herschel Walker where they would play “New Kid In Town” by the Eagles followed by Herschel saying how happy he was to be in Philadelphia? Remember when Walker was the missing piece of a franchise longing for a pure running back — even one who was probably on the downside of his career?

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