Greetings,
What a weird and sad day in the golf world. I had written a bunch of other silly and ridiculous things that then were obviously usurped by the news of Dan Hicks’ death.
I feel … rattled.
I didn’t know Dan, was not around him in any of my jobs in golf. But he was such a part of the fabric of my (our) golf existence (watching golf on TV and writing about it) that the news makes me feel like I did know him.
This probably means that he was good at his job.
I am sad for his family, both actual and professional. Nothing sobers us up more quickly to the fact that none of all this stupid LIV, strokes gained, Ryder Cup or green jacket stuff matters than the death of someone meaningful to the world that we are in.
Name drops today: Dan Hicks.
Today’s newsletter is presented by Turtlebox.
Their Cub speaker has been my go-to of late, mostly because my kids have taken all the Rangers and the Original (Gen 3) usually stays in the car for baseball practice.
Also, the Cub is just easier to move around but without losing much (any?) of the oomph of the Original. I have no idea if that’s in their copy, but that’s what I think whenever I use it or take it places.
One of my favorite things about Turtlebox is how patient they are with their rollouts. They don’t get out over their skis [raises hand] and release 500 different types and styles of speakers.
They do what they do, perfect it and then move on to the next one. The Cub is the latest iteration in this journey and it’s worth a look going into the holiday season. One of those purchases that you look back on and think, Why didn’t I do that a year ago?
And now, onto the news.
1. I always loved Dan Hicks’ voice and thought he was quite underrated as a lead play-by-play guy. Any sport. Track, golf, swimming, all of it.
You’ll see the Tiger 2008 call all over the internet today, but the one I’ll remember him for was actually a few months later at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
I’ll never forget where I was when this race happened. I’ll never forget watching it. I’ve watched it 500 times since August 2008. I may watch it 500 more times today.
Here’s the ending.
It’s the crack in his voice at 0:37 that does it for me. On the “right now.” The rest of the call is the stuff of legend and is expertly capped with, “UNBELIEVABLE AT THE END!”
Man, I get chills watching it every single time. It was perfect.
I told someone today that the best thing about Hicks is that it always felt like he was talking across to you rather than down at you. There seems to be a consensus both behind the scenes and in front of them: Dan will be missed by everyone in golf.
[Jason here] Hearing the sad news about Dan Hicks made me think back to one of my favorite broadcast moments, the bat in the booth at the 2025 Open. As I’m rewatching that clip now (and you should too) of Hicks and Kisner bobbing and weaving, with the feeling that Dan Hicks just passed away, all I can think is “have fun.”
Have as much stupid, laughable fun as possible.
2. Remember six months ago when one of the primary talking points was the lack of young American stars. And since then, we’ve gotten the twirl of a lifetime at the Presidents Cup.
And in addition to that, Ben James, who …
And Blades Brown (!), who last week became the youngest PGA Tour winner since the Great Depression was barely a year old.
Throw in Michael Brennan winning in Japan, and you have four of the five highest-ranked players in the world under the age of 25 (also just one European in that group 👀). Those four Americans are all also ranked inside the top 50 in the world.
Now all of a sudden, is it crazy to think that this could be your team at Adare Manor?
Scottie
Burns
Morikawa
Xander
Gotterup
Blades
James*
Koivun
Cam Young
Cantlay
Wyndham
Henley
Or something in that realm. And doesn’t that excite you more than what the U.S. has been trotting out there of late? Things change quickly in golf, and now we go into 2027 with some real juice around young potential American stars and superstars. Not all of them will pan out in terms of the current trajectory they’re on, but it’s likely that at least one of them will, which is extremely thrilling to think about.
*[Jason here] It cracks to list James as a one name guy. Even after seeing that graphic above, I read James and thought, “Who?! LeBron?!”
3. Amazing (and true) tweet.
Me reading this three times in a row …
Only half?!
4. Do you agree with this ranking?
I haven’t tried all of them or even most of them probably, so I’m ignoring things like Xbox ultimate and ChatGPT Go. But here are my biggest qualms …
• Put Spotify in the top tier.* Same for Prime.
• Move Apple TV down a tier.
• Switch Claude pro and Claude max.
• I would actually move Netflix down a tier, too. It’s kind of low-key stinky.
• Twitter premium is top line for me (not for everyone though).
• YouTube TV in burning money?! That’s tier 1 or 2 for me!
• Unfortunately agree on ESPN, though I would move it to “only if you use it” because I do use it a lot for golf.
Send thoughts!
*[Jason here with thoughts] Spotify can only be top tier if they fairly pay their artists.
This post will continue below for Normal Club members (all 1,050 of them) and includes the Carnoustie announcement, Bryson thoughts and one characteristic that I think is most important in adulthood …
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