For those of you who tuned into the made-for-TV, golf extravaganza known as “The Match 3”, the big winner was…Tucson. Even the revamped, less tortured swing of Charles Barkley could not distract the viewer from the amazing drone shots of Stone Canyon Country Club and the panoramic views of the Santa Catalina Mountains. While PGA legend Phil Mickelson, who is one of the owners of Stone Canyon, was giving pointers to Barkley, NBA superstar Steph Curry was not at his best and Payton Manning was equally unspectacular, when it came to shotmaking. The event was pretty much a low key walk after a Thanksgiving feast
But from a public relations standpoint…it couldn’t have worked out any better. The producers knew they could always fall back on the amazing Tucson desert landscape, if the golf couldn’t carry the show, and that they did. Brent DeRaad, the President of Visit Tucson, was a guest on The Golf Arizona Show (8-9 am, Saturdays on ESPN/Tucson) and he said “you couldn’t put a price tag on the amount of exposure we received from the coverage…definitely into the millions of dollars.”
If you had to come up with a star, from a golf point of view…it would have to be Barkley. The ex-NBA star, also known as “The Round Mound of Rebound”, was at one time a pretty good golfer. I got to play with him at The Phoenician Resort in Phoenix about 20 years ago and he came in with an 80. He had a pretty good game. But then, it was like he was taken over by some sinister life force. He developed a swing that resembled a flamingo having a seizure…arms and elbows stopping and restarting with the club rarely making solid contact on the ball. His trials and tribulations on the golf course were chronicled in a handful of reality shows with various pro’s trying to fix his swing. He struggled for a decade, until just recently. During The Match 3, Barkley’s swing looked pretty darn normal, and he hit a few nice tee shots down the middle of the fairway…albeit from a tee box 80 yards forward from the one the others had to play from. After all, he’s still a 25 handicap and needed a little help.
Even though travel and tourism numbers are down for many of the attractions in Southern Arizona…Tucson golf courses are thriving and thanks to events like The Match 3…for us local diehards, it may get tougher and tougher to get a good tee time.
By Mike Boyd
