Rachel Stuhlmann Is In Spain & She's BACK To Dominating Tennis Influencing, ESPN Is A Mess & Al Drains One

You deserve a medal if you sat through ESPN's NBA Draft coverage

I'm BACK. I survived. Nobody went to the hospital. Nobody got arrested. One guy got a hole-in-one. And some are saying this might have been the best golf trip yet.

Guys, I know you probably sent me a bunch of emails and asked where I'm at because you didn't read last Friday's edition of Screencaps. I'm not opening emails after yet another off-the-charts guys' golf trip to northern Michigan. 

My voice is shot. My body is turning up new bug bites by the minute. My hands are cut up. I'm still a little wobbly. But I promised I'd be here to give a full recap and here I am. 

Where do I even start with this one that included 36 guys? 

It's not hyperbole to state that this might have been the best golf trip I've ever been on. It's not recency bias either. It's not that a Screencaps reader is the GM of where we played (Garland Golf Resort). I'm not trying to blow smoke up his ass because he had drink tickets waiting for me at check-in. 

From the food, to the staffing level, to the golf conditions, to one of the best cart girl teams on the planet, to the 19th hole smiles on faces of men who just needed to let loose and leave their normal lives behind for a few days, this one delivered the goods. 

After getting ripped off by Treetops resort in Gaylord two of the last three years by what turned out to be one of the biggest scumbag scammers in golf resort history, trip organizers needed a redemption trip. They needed to come up with a resort that could deliver the full package without us being ripped off again. 

Garland delivered. 

Again, I'm NOT blowing smoke up the Garland GM's ass because I know he's reading this right now and has been reading this OutKick for a long time. 

Remember, three years ago, in this very column, I RIPPED Garland for bunkers that were unplayable and for its goose problem that was so bad in fairways that you couldn't take a step without walking into a goose bomb.

I was promised things were different this year. It turned out the Garland GM wasn't blowing smoke up my ass either. 

The Golf: 

  • Chainsmoker, beer-slamming Al, who has to be pushing 65 years old, pulled 6i from 162 out in a two-man scramble Ryder Cup format and drained his first-ever hole-in-one to close out his team's match. Not just a hole-in-one on his resume. It was a game-winner. Nothing but net. Game. Over. 

I'm told it was the first hole-in-one in trip history that dates back to 2011. Like Joe Exotic in Tiger King, I'm not sure if Al will ever financially recover from this one. Al slapped down a $400 credit on his bill at the 19th hole tiki bar and told us to go nuts. 

So, we did. 

Al's performance all but guaranteed him a spot in the trip hall of fame, but that will be up to trip organizers to figure out. Was it enough for an instant HOF induction or will Al have to wait five years? It's a storyline worth watching. 

  • Garland's Fountains course, the resort's showpiece course, was in amazing shape. The greens looked like they hadn't been played on. Immaculate. 
  • The resort's brand-new reversible Par 3 short course, Sawyer, literally just opened 10 days ago and looked like something out of a video game. It looked fake, but it was 100% real. We never had time to play it, but we'll be back. Honestly, it looked so nice that some of the degenerates on this trip didn't need to be on it.
  • Over on Swampfire, where the goose shit was so bad three years ago when I played it with Millennial Chris B., things were much, much different this year. I'm not sure we even saw a goose or a turd. I love the geese and the Up North® feel of having them swimming around being geese, but wiping wet dumps off golf balls gets old. 
  • Out of four 18-hole courses at the resort, just one hole had a goose issue and that was just in the fairway where they should know by now that they could die at any moment. 
  • As for my golf game, I played pretty well on this trip. I went 88 on Friday on The Loop at Forest Dunes, one of the wildest golf courses I'll ever play with carnival greens where you can putt from 100 yards out. It's Forest Dunes' reversible course. At Garland, I went 96 on Fountains, which, for me, is playing pretty good golf on a hard course. I won both of my Ryder Cup matches. In our 2-man match up, Matty J and I were down 4 through 11 and came back to win it on 18. Some are saying it might be one of the greatest achievements in golf trip history. In my head-to-head, I took Double Barrel Don to the woodshed and closed him out after 12 holes. I was definitely in the low 40s through the first 9 on that round and even drained a birdie on a par 4.

The food:

  • We ate like kings on this trip which never happened at Treetops because they couldn't get golfers a pizza in under an hour. Seriously, Treetops' food service has been absolutely pitiful for years. Leave it to Georgia-native Millennial Chris B. in Bowling Green to notice hush puppies on the Garland 19th hole restaurant menu. He called them the best hush puppies he's ever had, which is a high honor. I don't know how many orders of hush puppies went out from Sunday-Tuesday, but it was numerous. I'm sure the GM will notice. The other big highlight had to be the Beastloaf, a blend of bison, wild boar, wagyu, elk, fresh herbs, and vegetables topped with mushroom bordelaise sauce and served with whipped potatoes. It was wonderful. All the food was wonderful. Even the guy on the trip who will only eat chicken tenders said they had the best tenders he's had in a long time. I had the tenders and hush puppies Tuesday night and I have to agree. 

The staff:

  • I'll say it one more time, I'm not blowing smoke up the ass of Dave, the GM, but he has put together a Dream Team. 



From cart girl Michelle, a retired Brazilian jiu jitsu fighter, to Kristin (who wanted to be called Karen) in the 19th hole bar who is one of the biggest maniacs (in a good way, don't fire her, PLEASE…she's a treasure), to Andrew running the tiki bar at lunch, to Kylie (it might be Kaylie; I'm still fuzzy), to Jaylynn, to the ladies running the breakfast buffet full of hungover golfers, to the cart barn guys who always seemed to have the phone we were looking for, thank you for your service. 

Thank you to Garland. 



We needed that badly. Something tells me we'll be back for more in the near future. 

And to Dave the GM, you delivered.

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Written by
Joe Kinsey is the Senior Director of Content of OutKick and the editor of the Morning Screencaps column that examines a variety of stories taking place in real America. Kinsey is also the founder of OutKick’s Thursday Night Mowing League, America’s largest virtual mowing league. Kinsey graduated from University of Toledo.