The Greatest Golfer Who Ever Claimed to Live. Donald Trump says it is called talent, and that he has it. He also claims a mountain of club championships, which would make him either the finest amateur of his generation or simply the man who owns most of the clubs involved. Both theories fit the evidence. Only one requires witnesses.
The genuinely irritating part is that he can play. He hits it a long way for a man his age, and his registered handicap would embarrass most weekend hackers into silence. Which is precisely what makes everything else so unnecessary.
Sportswriter Rick Reilly filled an entire book with testimony from caddies, playing partners and touring pros. Balls that vanish into desert scrub and reappear on the fairway, sitting up like they are posing for a portrait. Scores that shrink between the green and the clubhouse. The caddies reportedly nicknamed him after a footballer, on account of all the kicking.
Oscar De La Hoya has described watching a ball get relocated. Samuel L. Jackson said he cheated, which prompted Trump to announce he had never played with the man at all.
Suzann Pettersen, who has actually won things, cheerfully told a Norwegian newspaper that he cheats like hell, then added that nobody ever says anything because he is the one paying for lunch.
One senior club title was apparently secured by declaring victory over a round nobody else attended.