The Aftermath…

Broken Joe
Mar 19, 2021
6 min read

EJ and I traveled the 45 minutes and arrived early to set up, somewhere around 10:45, you know…early.

We drove around a little, reconning the area. From the street, you cannot really tell just how big the Lake House property is. At first, I was a little concerned about having people come to our outdoor meeting.

As it turned out, it was a very large, multiple-level property right on the water. It was a very nice location, Thank You to Bryan and his parents. for sharing their lake house property for our meeting. I am looking forward to Bryan and his parents inviting us back when the temperature is much warmer.

The day was cold and windy, especially coming off the water. But I told people it would be chilly outside and that they should dress for the weather but I never expected snow flurries.

Once Bryan arrived, EJ & I started setting up but soon we realized the PowerPoint slide show was not going to work. There was too much light and not enough extension cord. That’s ok, we will make due.

I wanted to start the meeting promptly at noon but Bryan went to pick up food at 11:45 and did not get back until about 12:10. Plus we were still missing Dan, Dave, Joe T, Rock, and Jon. I already knew that Adam, Tim, and Harry could not come.

Finally, the meeting started... late

We begin the meeting by identifying the 2020 winners and I had hoped to collect their trophies but Rey was the only one to “remember” to bring his trophy. Is anyone surprised?

Next, I passed out the 2020 Rider Cup metals to members of Team MATT.

Next, Juan was given his “prizes” that he had won by answering the BJG blog post trivia questions. Adam, I still have your swing bag.

Next, I gave Rey his 2020 Winter Classic Champion Shirt, and Juan accepted Harry’s 2020 Fed Up Cup Champion shirt.

Next up, The Schedule:

Originally, I did not notice (and neither did the Scheduling Committee) that we were scheduled to play on Memorial Day weekend.

After I fixed that, I noticed that we had to play back-to-back weekend, 4/25/21 – Chubby Classic (Chubb Classic) and 5/2/21 – The Pretenders (The Players). We also had back-to-back weekends OFF, 6/13/21 – Off, and 6/20/21 – Fathers Day.

Then, as I was creating my PowerPoint, I found ANOTHER back to back weekend OFF, 5/9/21 – Mothers Day and 5/16/21 – Off. Did anyone even glance at the draft schedule?

At this point, it is what it is. Here is the 2021 BJG Schedule along with the Points, Closest to the Pin and Longest Drive holes. Print it and give a copy to your S/O.

Dan will be handling the “Longest Drive” and “Closest to the Hole” cash duties in 2021. There is also talk of maybe doing some kind of skins game but I will leave that up to someone else.

Next up, The Rules:

Well, since I didn’t have access to my PowerPoint, I figured I would just go to the “21 Rules of BJG” word document on my laptop. Unfortunately, because of the outside brightness, I could not see that either. When my webcam came on and I could not turn it off, I figured it was time to put the laptop away. Good thing it was cold outside or you might have seen me sweat.

I called Dave up to help with the rules. We talked about “marking your balls”, we talked about lost balls off the tee box and lost balls after the tee box. We talked about penalty areas (water) and we talked about counting your scores. And of course, I covered “Rule 19” in great detail.

What we failed to talk about was “if you find your ball, you MUST ball that ball. If you search the deep woods for 2 minutes and find your ball, then you MUST play that ball…

Dave will need to have a quick conversation with Adam, Tim, and Harry about these rules before we start playing golf on the morning of 3/28/21 at St Annes. Hopefully, Dave will be earlier then he was for the meeting.

Next up, The Fees:

There should not be any surprises. New Members fees are $80 (same as all new members) and are due at the first event on 3/28/21.

Current membership fees are $65.00. $33.00 is due on 3/28/21 at our first event and the second payment must be paid before the BJG Championship. This will cover the TWO Green Jackets that I had to buy and the “2021 End of Season Awards” dinner as well as the rest of the BJG usual costs.

All payments go to Dan and yes, you can pay early. For those of you that miss the payment schedule, there a $20 late fee from 3/29/21 until 4/10/21. There will be another $20.00 late fee from 4/11/21 to 4/24/21. If you have not paid your fees by 4/24/21, you are not eligible to win any trophies or score any points.

2021 BJG Handicaps…

I was hoping to avoid the conversation about the “2021 Handicaps” because I could tell that the natives were restless and they were just waiting for a spark to start the revolt.

After 3 months of "committee work”, I was ready to re-establish my position as Commissioner and invoke “Rule 19” if need be.

Joe T was the person to start the conversation towards handicaps but, I quickly turned him away. He wanted to talk about handicaps using the average winning scores to determine handicaps blah, blah, blah.... Sorry Joe T, I just could not do it anymore.

The truth about handicaps is that there is a scoring difference of 44 between Cody (1st) and Jon (Last). Now you can slice that any way you want but the difference will always be 44. Cody could be a plus 7, Jon would be -37. Cody could be a plus 12, Jon would be a -32. Jon was a -12 handicap last year, is anyone surprised he finished in last place?

After reviewing some more data points, I did make a tiny adjustment to Adam, Matt, and Jon’s handicaps. These handicaps, hopefully, will allow everyone to compete and have an opportunity win. I cannot do any more than that.

Here are the 2021 BJG Handicaps. I had the hardest time with Chris, Rey, and Rock. At the end of the day, I decided Rock should be a -1. Once that decision was made, I felt like Rey needed to be a -1. Last but not least, if I could give Joe T a -1 last year, Chris was going to be a -1 in 2021. Who knows, maybe with new clubs and a new handicap....

While your handicap may feel high, so is your place in the BJG hierarchy. I can remember when Joe T, Chris, and I were battling each week for 3rd, 4th, and 5th place. Be proud of where you are and the rest of us should be working to move up a spot. Jake used to be the 3rd best golfer in BJG.

Now, in theory, this should get everyone to a handicap score of 95 or 96, IF you play well. If you have a bad game, no handicap will help you. Dave (98) and Chris (101) were the exceptions but they did not play good golf in 2020. Even using the 2020 average score, for the most part, there is only a stroke or two difference between us.

If you have a complaint because of a stroke or two then you are in the wrong group. "Play Better Golf" has always been Broken Joe Golf motto. Believe me, I have heard the phrase more then enough times.

To re-cap:

While preparing for the meeting, I found another back to back off weekend.
Showed up early to a place I’d never been before to set up for the meeting without bring the the extra extension cords or being prepared for the light conditions.
It was cold, windy and it even snowed a little.
Tried to set up the projector but it was too light outside.
Wanted to start at noon but Bryan went to pick up food at 11:45.
Finally started the meeting around 12:10 still missing some people.
No one brought their trophies except Rey.
I could not see the laptop screen because it was too light out. Finally abandoned the laptop when I could not turn off the webcam.
Dan, Dave, Joe T, Rock, and Jon finally show up.
Had Dave come up to help with rules but he didn’t have to add.
Talked about Fees but afterward, Dan was only taking “full” payments.
I was hoping to skip “handicaps” but Joe T called me out. Fortunately, this group is easily distracted and we moved on.
Brought all of this gear (for no reason) only to tear it down and re-load the car.
Started to talk about the Pan AM event being a scramble and everyone wanted to “vote” for Teams (like that is going to happen).