The Official Site of Hunter Mahan

Mon, Jan 4th 2010, 12:08

Caddie's Corner: Happy New Year

Hey All…

First of all, my utmost apologies for completely flaming out on updating Hunter’s Caddie Corner. After the Ryder Cup of ’08, I just kind of fell out of touch with it and never reconnected. So, one of my New Year’s resolutions is to be more consistent with the updates…starting with a recap of the 2009 President’s Cup in San Francisco.

I have to be honest, and I don’t think Hunter would mind me saying this: Nearly all of my best caddie memories and experiences have all come from team events. There is something so compelling and exciting about being a part of a team that energizes me in a way that nothing else does. I grew up playing baseball, so maybe that’s part of the reason….you get 12 players, 12 caddies, a captain and a few assistant captains, all the wives and family members, all pulling in the same direction for one goal. It’s
just so unique.

So, as the 2009 President’s Cup approached, only 90 miles from my home in Sacramento, I can’t lie, I was panicking a little as we found ourselves right outside the top ten on the points list. I thought we had a good shot to be a Captain’s Pick, but you never want to leave it up to that. It was a little frustrating, because Hunter ran off a string on unbelievable golf heading up to the matches, and each week I’d check to see where we moved to on the points list, and each week it seemed we couldn’t crack the list! Top tens in the first two majors of the year, and thrilling final round 62 at Congressional to get nipped by Tiger by a shot, another fantastic week in Hartford, a top 5 in Akron….but all we could do was do our best, and hope in the end we would make the team.
Thanks to Fred Couples, we did.

The matches themselves were just an unbelievable week. I can’t tell you what it’s like to be in the team room at these things…watching the greats of the game and how they go about their jobs. Hanging out with friends, playing Ping Pong, watching playoff baseball, talking strategy, picking the great Michael Jordan’s brain on his thoughts on competition, and just chilling with Fred all week…you can’t
ask for more.

I won’t go into great details about the golf itself, except to say that the U.S. as a team has figured some things out in the last few years, it seems. And any time you have our top three guys, Tiger, Phil, and Steve Stricker, play like they did, I find it hard to believe anyone could beat us.

After an opening match which we lost, Hunter played extremely well, going 2-1-1 on the week. We paired with Stewart Cink in alternate shot to score a half against Vijay and Robert Allenby (birdieing the last two holes to gain a huge half moments before Tiger hit his ridiculous 3 iron), paired with Zach Johnson in best ball to defeat Allenby and Villegas, and defeated Villegas in singles to contribute
to the effort.

I’m sure most of you watched the golf, which of course was a thrill. But the following two pictures were couple of my favorite moments
for the week. All the caddies wore San Francisco Giants jerseys on Wednesday in tribute to the hometown club, and because I kind
of spearheaded the effort, I assigned the numbers to the players. Which meant I got to wear my favorite Giant’s # for the day, Will Clark. Thanks for the loan of #22 for the day, Will…Hunter got a big kick out of it… And below that is a picture of a conversation I had in the team room with The Great Willie Mays. An experience I will never forget. “Bob Gibson, boy he was just mean.” Wow…

Thanks for the trust in picking Hunter, Fred. We had a blast.

- John