Golf's celebrity major is all about entertainment
The annual American Century Championship draws big names from the sports and entertainment worlds for big stakes and delivers a fair amount of drama.
Celebrity golf isn’t for everyone. Especially for people who like fun.
It is simply entertainment and a surprising number of fans like to watch their favorite celebrity or athlete struggle with golf just like the rest of us.
That’s why the American Century Championship works, that’s why NBC Sports televises it — this year being July 12-14 — and why it is celebrity golf’s unofficial major championship of the year.
If the event needed validation, Steph Curry provided it last year. Curry, who has led the Golden State Warriors to four National Basketball Association titles, took the opening-round lead in the Stableford format. He aced the seventh hole in Saturday’s second round and led after 36 holes.
Tennis star Mardy Fish rallied and grabbed the lead on the back nine of Sunday’s final round until Curry eagled the par-5 18th hole for a walk-off win.
Sometimes, celebrity golf is also pretty good golf.
The ACC, founded in 1990, is about to be played again at Edgewood Golf Course in scenic Lake Tahoe, Nevada.
The bad news is that Curry will not be back to defend his title. He is playing for Team USA in the Paris Olympics, also being televised by NBC.
“Well, we've discovered that the only thing Stephen Curry can't do is be in two places at once,” said NBC Sports president Jon Miller.
The event has no shortage of other celebrities.
From football: Tony Romo, Jason and Travis Kelce, Josh Allen, Jerry Rice, Steve Young, Aaron Rodgers, John Elway, Baker Mayfield, Charles Woodson, Larry Fitzgerald, Tim Brown and Joe Theismann.
From basketball: Charles Barkley, Vinny Del Negro, Blake Griffin, Ray Allen.
From baseball: Alex Rodriguez, Albert Pujols, John Smoltz.
From stand-up comedy: Nate Bargatze, Ray Romano, Larry the Cable Guy, Rob Riggle.
From entertainment: Carson Daly, Jake Owen, Don Cheadle, Miles Teller, Colin Jost.
Curry was the first active athlete to win the tournament since 2000, when NFL placekicker Al Del Greco did it. The all-time king of ACC is former baseball pitcher Rick Rhoden, who won the tournament eight times.
Theismann, a former Washington Redskins quarterback and TV analyst, is a regular ACC participant, but at 75, he admits, he’s not a contender.
“I’m just trying to finish in the middle of the pack,” he told me on The Golf Show 2.0 podcast. Theismann had time to chat about his own career while helping promote the tournament. Some highlights:
Why he began his career in the Canadian Football League: “I was drafted the fourth round by the Miami Dolphins and I ran into a contract issue. The Toronto team flew me up there and made me an offer. My head coach at Notre Dame, Ara Parseghian, whom I never consulted, calls me at six in the morning and says, ‘What have you done?’ I say, I signed with the Argonauts. He said, ‘I know. Don Shula is coming here on a plane from Miami right now.’ Don read me the riot act, but I wouldn’t trade the three years I spent in Toronto. I loved it.”
How he made it to the NFL: “George Allen (Redskins coach) traded a number one pick to Miami for me. I wound up backing up Billy Kilmer and Sonny Jurgensen for four years. Then in 1978, I had the chance to play.”
On returning punts: “I returned punts in high school and I started my first seven games as a sophomore at Notre Dame returning punts. In 1974 against the Giants, we lost both of our punt returners, so I sneaked up behind George Allen and said Kenny (Houston) was hurt, do you want me to go in? He waved me in without looking and then when we lined up, he asked our special teams coach, ‘What’s he doing out there?’ If you showed George you could do it, he’d let you do it. So for the next two seasons, I returned punts for the Redskins.”
On his punting record: “It was in 1985 against the Chicago Bears, our third game of the season. Our punter got hurt. I walked up to coach Joe Gibbs and said, I can punt. He looked at me and said, “You can?” Danny White had punted for the Dallas Cowboys and was their quarterback, so I figured if he could do it, I could. The ball is on our 15, I’m standing on our goal line and we’ve got a 10-7 lead. It didn’t turn out very well. The ball actually went 16 yards, but the net was one yard. So I believe I am the worst punter in the history of football.” (In 1997, Rick Tuten of the Seattle Seahawks set the official NFL mark of minus-6 net yards for the worst net punting average in a single game.)
On being recognized: “I appreciate it very much. I was fortunate enough to do a couple of Hallmark movies and to broadcast for a few years. Players wear helmets so a lot of former players walk the streets and nobody knows them. I have people come up and say, ‘I know that voice.” Or also, ‘There’s Joe Montana.’ They don’t know which Joe I am. It’s funny but my voice gets recognized more than my face. It’s nice. Everybody likes to be remembered.”
On his golf game: “I started playing when I went to Canada, around the age of 21 or 22. I’ve been playing the game for a long time and it’s a continuing work in progress. As you get older, there’s this fight to preserve youth, thinking you can hit clubs the same distance as when you were younger. I just got some new clubs. I had 65-gram shafts in my irons for a long time and I just knocked it down to 50. I shot 74 the other day, one of my lower rounds this year. What a difference the lighter shafts made. I was losing distance. My 7-iron shots went from 155 yards to 135. I changed the shaft and all of a sudden I’m back up to 150 yards.”
On the American Century Championship: “The tournament has donated close to $8 million to charities over the years. There’s a $750,000 purse, so it’s a lot of fun. For those of us who are not professional golfers, it’s the invitation event of the year. American Century Investments gives away over 40 percent of their net profits to charity. When you think about the amount of money the company is giving to charity, it is spectacular.”
On the state of college sports: “We no longer have amateur athletes or amateur sports. This genie is out of the bottle and let me tell you, they’re not putting it back. With the transfer portal, we’re teaching young athletes how to quit and go someplace else instead of competing for a job. I think some things have to be walked back. Something needs to be done because college sports are spiraling out of control.”
On his golf highlights: “I’ve had three holes-in-one. My first was down at Loxahatchee Country Club in Florida. My wife at the time was riding along in the cart, she didn’t care for golf. I hit the shot, it goes in, I say, ‘I made a hole-in-one.’ She said, ‘That’s nice.’ I also made an eagle at 18 in the American Century tournament years ago and I thought of Hale Irwin, and that show he made in the U.S. Open and went running around giving everyone high-fives. That’s exactly what I did. You live for those moments in golf and they keep bringing you back.”
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Big difference in this REAL Celebrity Tournament with actual Celebrity's and the 8AM Championship with folks that pretend to be stars - sure they have a couple. But the real gamer is the YouTube Influencer Crowd that just keeps on getting traction and eyeballs on them because they are promoted by each influencer team who plays. Good Good, Bob Does Sports, Grant Horvat, Gabby Golf Girl, Barstool, Rick Sheils and others are the one driving golf and views in golf right now.