How Craig Way helped Chi Chi Rodriguez win a PGA Tour Event

World Golf Hall of Famer Chi Chi Rodriguez passed away at the age of 88. Craig Way remembers the charismatic golfer by telling the story of Chi Chi's win at the 1972 Greater Greensboro Open and how him and his brother played a role. 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Glad to have you with us here on a fire
me Up Friday. Uh, fire me up or fired up?
What do you like? Fire me up? That's what I thought. Okay,
fire me up Friday here on Sports Radio AM thirteen
under the Zone, because throughout the show we're getting fired up.
So you up, Yeah, you're getting fired up for the weekend.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Yeah, what are you going to do this weekend? Oh
that's a great question, I think. Actually, I'm going to
a nineties party.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
Okay, why don't you just make me feel a little
bit older, like like like, I'm going back in the nineties.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
I was getting coffee with my uncle this morning. He
said the same exact thing. He said, Wow, I'm old.
Actually it's a nineties slash ats party, which is insane.

Speaker 1 (00:43):
The thing. I mean, how vastly different did we dress
back then?

Speaker 2 (00:51):
I mean, honestly, the styles are kind of coming back around.
Uh and honestly, I'm kind of mailing it in for
the for the dress for this party. The last costume
party went to I went, I went to uh is
mister Clean? So I got fake gold earrings? Did that?

Speaker 1 (01:07):
Well? White eye broached this one.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
I just bought some like Jazzy Jeff type pants and
I have at George Costanza's sweatshirt that being aware, and
maybe some ridiculous glasses.

Speaker 1 (01:19):
But okay, all right, I can see that. See this
again reveals my age. I remember in the nineties. In
the nineties, my wife at the time, my late wife, Laurie,
and I went to a sixties party and we went

(01:40):
to a costume shop and I had like an afghan
and bell bottom slacks and John Lennon granny glasses, the
whole bed, I mean it, and uh, and I even shaved.
I had a beard at the time, and I had
shaved it to a goatee. I mean, it was the

(02:00):
very sixties looking there. But you know, you really just
made me feel old.

Speaker 2 (02:06):
Hey, I'm feeling old too because I was born in
the nineties.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
And keep it going, all right, I'm approaching thirty here, Okay,
stop it, okay, let me tell you he's approaching a
different number. The first round of the Windham Championship is
going on in Greensboro, North Carolina. This was the gov
tournament that I grew up around, and it was known
as the GGO the Greater Greensboro Open for decades, and

(02:30):
then it was the Greater Greensborough Chrysler Classic, I think
for a while now it's just it's called the Windham Championship.
It's one of the oldest events on the PGA Tour.
It started in nineteen thirty eight. Sam Snead won the
first one. Sam Snead won at seven other times too.
He won the event eight times, including the last time

(02:53):
he won it was in nineteen sixty five when he
was fifty two years of age. And it has been
known over the years as a golf tournament that helped
kind of boost careers of young golfers trying to make
it and that sort of thing. And for years, I
mean years, it was played the week before the Masters
in April and so, and now of course it's in August.

(03:15):
It's but it does have its significance because what this
is the last event, isn't it before the X Cup playoffs.
It's kind of like what the Richmond Race is the
last one before the NASCAR of playoffs as well, So
it still has quite a bit of meaning to it. Well,
the number I was going to mention is bo Hostler,

(03:35):
a lifetime long worn has the lead. Now. They had
to start the first round today because they had so
much rain there and they couldn't They couldn't play yesterday.
In fact, they had clear skuys most of them. But
it's starting to drizzle again there. And Jonathan Vegas, who
is a lifetime long worn and who won a couple
of weeks agoing Tour, is one under part, but the

(03:58):
lead right now belongs to Bohs Hostler, the lifetime long worn,
is playing the par for eighteen. Bo Hostler is ten
under par for his round through seventy two holes. I mean,
excuse me, through seventeen holes. Through seventeen, he's ten under.
It's a par seventy pretty good, so what that means?

(04:19):
And the Hostler's in the fairway right now on number eighteen.
If bo Hostler makes birdie at eighteen, he will shoot
fifty nine now, so now the first time fifty nine
has been shot there. Bran Snedeker did it a few
years ago, I think twenty fifteen. And it's not like
an easy, easy golf course. It doesn't look like there's

(04:40):
gonna be a birdie. His hostler just pulled it into
a bunker, a greenside bunker, and the pins cut to
that side, so it's going to be a very difficult
third shot for him coming out. But it is a
but it is a golf course. It's a Donald Ross
design that will reward good iron play because the greens
hold really well, in part because of what they're dealing

(05:00):
with now, a lot of rain, and the greens are
pretty soft, and you can really fire darts at it,
and if you can pot, you have a chance to
really post a good number. Well, Hostler has done that
right now. He is ten under par and right now
that's good enough for a four shot lead. Matt Kocher
is four under on that and in fact there's several
guys at four under and several others at five hundred.

(05:21):
Jordan Sped I think is at three hundred part right now, yep,
in that first round, but Bo Hostlers at ten under part.
He just barely missed a birdie at seventeen. It stopped
like two inches short of the cup if he had
made that, and all he would have needed to do
was make par to shoot fifty nine today. But he's
almost certain to have the lead after that. The reason
why I also bring this up, other than the fact

(05:42):
that you've got Bo Hostler leading, is the golf world
yesterday lost a legend and he was not only a
very good golfer he and as a Hall of Famer,

(06:03):
but also a real friend of the game. And that
is Chi Chi Rodriguez. A lot of people know familiar
with the name is reel named one but win by
Chichi Chi Chi Rodriguez. He passed away yesterday at the
age of eighty eight. He was one of the most
popular players on tour every year. He was from Puerto Rico.

(06:23):
He won eight times on the PGA Tour, and he
grew up in Puerto Rico, served in the US Army
and no one from Puerto Rico ever made it to
the PGA Tour before him. He served in the US
Army from nineteen fifty five to nineteen fifty seven. He
joined the PGA Tour in nineteen sixty. He won eight
times in a twenty one year career, and he played

(06:45):
on one Ryder Cup team as well. The first of
his eight tour victories came in nineteen sixty three he
won the Denver Open. He followed up with two the
next year and it went on through. His last win
was in Tallahassee in nineteen seventy nine. He also had
twenty two victories on the Champions Tour from nineteen eighty
five to two thousand and two, and he had total
combined career earning some more than seven million dollars. Inducted

(07:08):
in the PGA World Golf Hall of Fame in nineteen
ninety two. Great guy, great ambassador for the game. There's
a couple of stories that I can share with you
about Chichi Rodriguez, because what a nice guy he was.
Funny guy. One was in nineteen seventy three, so it

(07:30):
was fifty one years ago. He was playing the Greater
Greensboro Open, the GGO, and that year which they played
the tournament in April, it was the week before the Masters.
That year, the tournament was, as it is this year,
delayed by rain. In fact, they hadn't finished it on Monday,

(07:51):
which is a real possibility for this tournament. They say
they could finish it up if they could get enough
played today and tomorrow. They could cut after tomorrow and
play thirty six holes on Sunday. That's a possibility, but
they could also extend as far as Monday. Well, they
had to play it on Monday. The final round back
in nineteen seventy three, and in those days, you didn't

(08:11):
have as many sponsor events that a lot of the
touring pros had to be at on Monday, so you
had more options to be able to finish up a
regular PGA tour stop on a Monday. So it was
with a nineteen seventy three GGO, the Greater Greensboro Open,
because it had gotten rained out and extended to Monday.

(08:33):
It was a weekday. Obviously, my mom had two extra
tickets or badges for it. They were like stickers that
we would actually wear, and we got out of school early,
like at noon to go. She got us out of
school early at nuone so my younger brother Chris and
I could go with her to the GGO, and we

(08:55):
stationed ourselves with these badges, got us seats in the
bleachers on eighteen near the green, just just right to
the right front edge of the green to the side,
and it was coming down the stretch and here was
Chichie Rodriguez who had a one shot lead going to
number eighteen, and number eighteen is a dog leg to

(09:18):
the right up hill and by the way, Bo Hostler
has just come out of the bunker. He did not
make birdie, so he's not going to shoot fifty nine,
but he did a nice effort, rolled it back to
the all gives himself a chance to make part. And
so my brother and my mom and I are sitting
there in these bleachers on the eighteenth green and we
can't see the tea box. It's back up the hill,

(09:39):
back of the dog leg up the fairway. But we
heard a word whispered around the guy that chie Chee
had driven the ball in the rough and was going
to have kind of a difficult second shot. And my
younger brother, Chris said to me, I want to be
something of chi chie Rodriguez hit his ball right over here.
It wasn't ten seconds after he said that, and we

(10:02):
see a ball soaring toward us and other you know,
differ from most people who then, you know, duck coward,
get out of the way. You know, we're dumb, twelve
and eleven year old kids, right, We tried to grab
the ball. It hit the ground right in front of us.
I won't swear to the fact that neither of us

(10:25):
didn't touch it. I won't say that we didn't touch it.
I'm not that to this day, I'm not one hundred
percent sure. But it did get stopped. It bounced I
think off of us. I think it's skipped on the ground,
hit one of us, hit the bleachers, and pop back out.
In other words, I think we kept it from going

(10:46):
under the bleachers. Inadvertently. Here comes the marshals and they're
in a huddle and they're pointing to us. You think
those guys touching a bit. And they decided to let
it go. And here comes Cheechi Rodriguez. It was him,
He says hi to people, comes up, he chips to
within three feet, makes the pup wins by one shot.

(11:07):
So I will always remember that about Chiechi Rodriguez. And
then there's one other story, and this is really best
told by the guy who witnessed it in person. That's
Bill Shooning. Bill tells this great story, and I think
he even told it on his Facebook page. But the
way Bill tells it, it was at the old Legends
of Golf that they had at I guess at Barton

(11:29):
Creek and Bill's out there with a press credential and
he was following Chichi Rodriguez for a while, and it
was out on the course and Chi Chee is on
a par five and he hits a ball that looks
like it's headed for a bunker. It's going to be

(11:50):
buried in the bunker, but it hits a rake. It
ricochets out to within two feet of the hole, and
he taps in for an eagle, or maybe it was
a third shot. He taps him for Bertie, taps him
for Bertie. Round goes, he finishes the round, and you
know how it is in the pressed him where they
go through the round and they go through the holes,

(12:10):
you know, on number seven and I had a four
iron with an eight feet just missed the birdie, had
a chance tap him part and they go hole by hole. Well,
Chi che just kind of ran through his round and
he said, on number fourteen, I hit the I hit
the driver to the left, I hit it, I hit
him in and then knocked it in and it got

(12:31):
close enough on the third shot I was able to
tap in for the birdie. And that's all he said.
And he went on the rest of the round. So
they get to the Q and a portion of it
and Bill Schoning raises his hand and they get the
mic to him and he says, Chi Chee, I was
I was there at whatever it was, number eleven, and
I saw your ball come sailing through on that third shot,

(12:54):
and I saw it hit a rake and then and
then ricochet back over. Is that what you saw? Did
you know that? That's what happened. And Cheechee looked at
Bill and had his name on the badge, it said Bill,
and he goes, wait, let me tell you something. Peel.
He saw him. He said, I hit the thirty out
of and out of, hit it so good, and it
came in and when it came in, it hit a

(13:16):
rake and it ricocheted back over. So you know what
I did. I went up and I moved that rate
because I would never want that to happen to anyone else.
He was a great guy. He was a great guy.
And he had had the whole Matador thing with the
putter and you know, putting the pudder like his saber
back in his scabbard and all that stuff. Bo Hostler

(13:38):
did tap in for par, not tapp it. He made
the par putt. He wound up shooting a twenty eight
on the front nine of thirty two. On the back nine,
he shot sixty six to oh and U is in
the lead at ten under par in the clubhouse. So
the Longhorn Bo hostler at ten under round of sixty
day at Sedgefield Country Club there in Greensboro, North Carolina.

(14:00):
But I always think about Cheechee about that whenever that
golf tournament happens. And of course, like I said, we
lost Chee Chee yesterday at the age of Ada, great guy,
outstanding golfer as well. It was a lot of fun.
All right. We're gonna hear some more from Longhorns coming
up next when we continue on Sports Radio AM thirteen
under the zone of the iHeart Radio app.