Notebook: Faith In A Caddie

By Ken Klavon, USGA

Fort Worth, Texas – A caddie's job on the golf course is much like the old proverb that says kids should be seen but not heard.

Excuse 17-year-old Tiffany Joh if she doesn't agree with it. En route to carding a 1-under-par 70 Monday, Joh directed most of the credit for her round toward the one carrying her bag.

Even if she didn't know her name.

Going into such championships, it's normal for players to request a club-supplied caddie. That's what Joh did, hoping that she'd be assigned someone with a vast knowledge of the Mira Vista course. After all, it worked for 2002 U.S. Women's Amateur champion Becky Lucidi at Sleepy Hollow Country Club (Scarborough, N.Y.) when local looper Ed Conners got her bag. She relied on Conners' astuteness in reading greens to the very end.

That's not to say Joh is on a similar path to a national title, but nonetheless, she was pleased to find out that Ginny Potthoff could guide her around the course.

Potthoff, a member of Mira Vista, is a senior on the Texas A&M golf team.

After Monday's round, Joh acknowledged that she felt “lucky” to walk away at 1 under. That's because she was erratic with her driving and fairway woods, spraying the ball every which way. There was no better evidence than on the par-5 17 th hole, a hole that she miraculously scrambled to earn a birdie.

Upon slicing her drive, Joh hooked her second shot far left while using a 3-wood. But somehow she kept it together, chipping close to the hole to set up the birdie.

“Putting kept me alive,” said Joh. “I was really consistent. I made everything I should make.”

As for Potthoff? Joh couldn't say enough, intimating that Potthoff's knowledge of the greens and overall guidance relaxed her.

“We're learning the distances of ‘our' clubs,” said Potthoff jokingly. “She doesn't know distances that well. But it's been all her. She's the one making it happen out there.”

No Caddie

Then there are those of the mind-set that believe caddies are more of a luxury than a necessity. Thirteen-year-old Jessica Wallace of British Columbia, Canada, walked off the ninth green, her final hole Monday, drenched in perspiration with bag in tow.

It was no wonder, with the searing Texas heat making the course feel like an oven. Wallace shot 14-over 85 in her first Girls' Junior.

“I figured that I'm not going to be in full contention for the week,” therefore there was no need to hire a caddie, said Wallace.

Wallace had other reasons as well. Someone unfamiliar with her game might prove to be a deterrent rather than a benefit. Also, to snare a club caddie for two practice rounds through stroke play, the expense would have been $160.

She didn't have much to complain about, other than wishing she had “four hands” at times to manage better.

“It's pretty tough to catch everyone moving on when they have a caddie,” she said.

Defense, What Defense?

Sounds like last year's winner, 17-year-old Sukjin-Lee Wuesthoff, would like to have a case of amnesia. Normally title defenders are proud to wear the badge of champion, daring others to take it away. Not Wuesthoff.

Or to clarify, it's not that she doesn't want to win again, it's just that she doesn't want to get drawn into the psychological warfare that past champions engage themselves in from placing added pressure on themselves. Sometimes they try to do too much and it backfires.

“I didn't think about defending,” said Wuesthoff.

“I never thought about defending, because then I get nervous.”

Or maybe it's something as simple as that.

More Her Style

To say 16-year-old Amanda Wilson wasn't intimidated playing in this year's U.S. Women's Open would be like saying someone with acrophobia could live atop the Empire State Building carefree for a week.

“Oh yes, I was kind of scared,” said Wilson after posting a 1-over 72 Monday.

Wilson, making her fourth Girls' Junior start, didn't survive the cut at the Orchards Golf Club. Seeing all the people involved, especially those in the gallery, made her antsier than she would normally feel.

One of seven competitors in this week's field who played in this year's Women's Open, Wilson felt more like a grizzled Girls' Junior veteran when she arrived at Mira Vista recently.

“Actually, I like it better this way,” she said of the sparse crowds and slower pace.

Open Contestants

Nine players in the field this week have played in a Women's Open? Can you name them?

The seven to appear this year were Paula Creamer, Megan Grehan, Jennie Lee, Taylor Leon, In-Bee Park, Jane Park and Wilson. Only Creamer and Lee made the cut, with Creamer tying Michelle Wie for low-amateur honors.

And the other two players? Fourteen-year old Sydney Burlison, who played in the 2003 championship, and 16-year-old Morgan Pressel, who played in the 2001 and 2003 Women's Opens.

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“I almost started crying because it was my first one and it was kind of emotional. But I think if I had just made a birdie I think it would have helped my round a lot more than making a hole in one. With so many more holes to play it was almost a mistake. 

“The feeling of writing ‘one' down on your scorecard is a feeling that you normally don't have.  I kept telling myself, ok, you have to play the next hole and the next shot.”

Creamer on her first career hole-in-one, carded on the par-3 seventh hole.

Ken Klavon is the Web Editor for the USGA. E-mail him with questions or comments at kklavon@usga.org .

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