The Pro Shop List... That Wasn't Meant to Be Found!

🔹 The CCC Masters Pool is LIVE! Didn’t get your entry in on time? GREAT NEWS! Our pool allows entries until Saturday night so it’s not too late! Enter the pool here for just $25! New odds will post tonight after the rounds conclude!

🔹 New CCC Contests - We are going to take a break from our Comment Contests (but please, keep them coming - we love reading them) and begin some easy Social Media contests starting next week! A $100 Gift Card to Good Boy Golf will be given away, so stay tuned!

🔹 Winner Alert! Congrats to Art G. for last week’s Comment Contest. See his witty reply below!

Dear readers, every private club has its unspoken hierarchies. There are those whose names command instant respect, whose tee time requests are never questioned, and whose cocktail preferences are memorized by every bartender. Then there are those who, despite paying identical dues, somehow always find themselves waiting an extra beat for service. Most members believe these subtle distinctions arise naturally from tenure or tournament victories. At Evergreen Oaks Country Club, however, the truth proved far more deliberate - and far more explosive when revealed.

The Discovery

The discovery began, as so many club scandals do, with a misplaced document. On a blustery April morning, Melanie Harwick, club secretary and wife of mid-handicapper Brad Harwick, was searching for the Ladies' Invitational planning folder in the rarely used tournament committee cabinet when she discovered a weathered leather binder simply labeled "Member Services."

Assuming it contained outdated club protocols, Melanie flipped it open, expecting dusty instructions for towel folding or perhaps discontinued cocktail recipes.

Instead, she found herself staring at the membership roster - not the official one distributed at annual meetings, but a far more candid version, meticulously annotated in multiple handwritings spanning years.

The Coded Hierarchy

Next to each member's name was a series of codes and symbols that would make military intelligence blush. "$$$+" meant "exceptional tipper"; "PA" indicated "passive-aggressive"; "MPC" labeled "Multiple Personality Consumer" (those who routinely purchased and returned merchandise under questionable circumstances).

The list went far beyond basic service notes. "FT" identified "Fairway Therapists" who converted every round into an 18-hole counseling session about their divorce. "EB" - flagged "Excuse Bankers" who were known to collect, deposit and withdrawal excuses both on the course and off. Most alarming was "PTSD" - "Post-Tournament Stress Drinker" - with helpful notes on which staff should handle them after a particularly disappointing round.

Most revealing was the comprehensive five-star rating system covering everything from pace of play to personal hygiene, all culminating in what was simply called the "Total Value Score."

For fifteen minutes, Melanie sat transfixed in the empty committee room, flipping through page after page of brutally honest assessments.

Some comments were practical ("Always check Mr. Donaldson's math when he pays his tab"), others bordered on cruel ("Mrs. Peterson requires 'high-contrast lighting' to see her ball - aka needs sobriety check by 3pm"), but all revealed the unfiltered perspective of the staff who served the membership daily.

When she reached her husband's entry, she paused. Brad Harwick: "$$-" (poor tipper), "GL" (gear lover, never buys), "CS" (club slammer), "SDM" (slow decision-maker), "GPS" (can't find ball without search party), and most damningly, a Total Value Score of 2.1 stars with the note: "Nice enough but exhausting; avoid if busy."

The real revelation came when she saw her own entry: "Melanie Harwick: 'QB' (question bombarder), 'GQ‘ (gossip queen), 'VP' (volume problem)." Her Total Value Score: a dismal 1.8.

The Exposure

What happened next reverberates through Evergreen Oaks to this day.

Rather than discretely return the binder to its hiding place - a decision that would have preserved countless dignities - Melanie did what any self-respecting club secretary with a newly discovered 1.8 rating would do: she photographed all 87 pages.

By noon, the images had reached the phones of the Ladies' Nine-Hole Committee. By cocktail hour, the club's text channels erupted with outrage, denials, and the occasional smug response from those who fared well in the underground assessment.

Member Reactions

Bernard Crawley (five stars, "Ultimate Member") initially attempted to downplay his top rating as "staff exaggeration." This humility evaporated by evening when he casually mentioned his rating to the foursome ahead of him, suggesting they might "pick up the pace out of respect for a five-star player." By Tuesday, he had added five gold stars to his signature on the sign-in sheet and was inquiring whether the pro shop could embroider them onto his golf gloves.

Meanwhile, in the men's locker room, Winston Garrett (two stars, "NOR" - never orders ready) confronted assistant pro Tyler Jenkins. "What gives you the right to judge me?" he demanded, while simultaneously rearranging the towels on the counter. "I've been paying dues here longer than you've been alive!"

Jenkins, a college golf standout with a psychology degree and diplomatic instincts, responded with remarkable candor: "Mr. Garrett, when you order at the turn, you change your mind three times, hold up the entire line, then complain the hot dog is cold. We're not judging your character - we're just trying to calculate how many staff hours to budget for your weekly appearance. Your indecision costs us approximately 1.7 employee lunches per month."

In the staff break room, spirits were mixed. "I've been updating that list for seven years," confessed Rodrigo, the longtime caddie master. "It started as a training tool for new hires. How else would they know that Mr. Whitman needs exactly six ice cubes in his Arnold Palmer or he'll send it back three times?"

The Factions Form

By Tuesday, three distinct factions had formed at Evergreen Oaks:

The "Reformers," led by medium-rated members who saw an opportunity for improvement, advocated for staff sensitivity training and official service standards. They suggested a formalized feedback system where members could rate staff while staff rated members - "a balanced ecosystem of judgment," as their hastily printed brochures proclaimed.

The "Abolitionists," populated primarily by low-rated members, demanded the termination of any staff involved in the list's creation. "This is worse than a data breach," declared Harold Winters (1.7 stars, "CM" - club mistreater, "LP" - line pusher). "It's character assassination!" he added, while unknowingly standing on someone else's towel.

The "Preservationists," comprised almost exclusively of four and five-star members, suggested the list simply be made official - "for transparency." Charles Pemberton (4.8 stars) proposed adding the ratings to member profiles on the club website. "It would help with pairing compatible foursomes," he reasoned, while ordering a drink that wasn't on the menu but that the bartender had memorized anyway.

A fourth unofficial faction, "The Statisticians," emerged briefly to debate whether ratings should be adjusted for inflation and whether there should be separate ratings for weekday versus weekend behavior.

The Reckoning

The emergency board meeting on Wednesday lasted six hours. In attendance were club president Richard Whittaker (four stars, "ODG" - overall decent guy), head professional Cameron Williams (initiator of the list fifteen years prior), and club manager Diane Fulton, who brought with her a revelation that silenced the room.

"Before anyone else speaks," Fulton began, placing a stack of binders on the table, "you should know that we in management have discovered that the staff aren't the only ones keeping lists."

She proceeded to distribute photocopies of documents discovered in various committee folders, member lockers, and caddie storage areas.

There was the unofficial caddie list ranking members by how fairly they assessed their swings ("Claims to have shot 78 but needed more pencil than club to do it" was written next to board member James Arlington's name).

The beverage cart rankings detailed members who tried to flirt versus those who treated servers with respect ("Calls me 'sweetheart' but can't remember his own wife's birthday" appeared multiple times).

Most damning was a list maintained by senior members evaluating newer members on their "club worthiness" and "adherence to unwritten traditions." President Whittaker himself discovered he had been labeled "NST" - "New School Thinking" - apparently a grave insult among the club's founding members.

A stunned silence fell over the boardroom as members confronted their own participation in the very behavior they had gathered to condemn.

The Resolution

President Whittaker, after a lengthy pause, finally spoke. "It seems," he said, studying his own mediocre ratings on the caddie assessment, "that we have created a culture of evaluation without communication. Perhaps instead of destroying these lists, we should learn from them."

"What if," suggested new member and management consultant Veronica Hayes, "we created a rating system for the rating systems? We could evaluate them on accuracy, helpfulness, and emotional impact."

The laughter that followed broke the tension, and the resolution that emerged was not what anyone expected.

Rather than punishments or apologies, Evergreen Oaks instituted what became known as "Feedback Friday" - a monthly forum where members and staff could address service concerns directly. The infamous star system was retired, but its spirit of honest assessment remained, now channeled into constructive dialogue.

The staff's secret rankings were formally destroyed in a ceremonial burning at the summer barbecue - but the digital photos remain in the phones of numerous members - an artifact of club history that still occassionally gets shared with new members and guests to this day.

As for Melanie Harwick? Her whistle-blowing earned her a curious form of respect. While her membership experience didn't noticeably improve, she received a revised unofficial staff rating that recognized her most valuable quality: "T" - for transparency. She has, however, worked diligently to lower her voice on the course, and staff have noticed.

And so, dear readers, we leave you with this final word of advice: In golf as in life, how you treat those who serve you reveals more about your character than any tournament victory. The next time you interact with club staff, remember that while they may not keep written records anymore, their mental scorecard of your behavior is always up to date - and unlike your handicap, this is one rating system you can't manipulate with creative accounting.

Poll Question

Last Week's Poll Result

🏌️‍♂️ Handicap Hustlers: Who’s the Biggest Cheat? 🏌️‍♂️

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 1️⃣ The Rehab Ruse - Faked injury, tanked scores, “miraculously” recovered for the big tourney.

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 2️⃣ The Phantom Index - Posted fake scores from a nonexistent club, won big.

🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 3️⃣ The Inside Job - Handicap Chair who rigged the system... for himself.

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 4️⃣ All of the above - legends until they get caught.

Well, once again we agree with the masses. They are all pretty big cheaters and it’s hard to pick just one so “all of the above” was a popular choice! You know what else is a popular choice? Scottie Scheffler to win outright in our Masters Pool! Sign up now if you haven’t yet! It’s not too late - new odds will be up tonight!

A big congrats again to Art G. for his winning comment last week - “I was once the victim of a handicap hustler. Guy claimed he was a 12 and shot a 73—with a hangover, two borrowed clubs, and a bag Goodwill would reject. I bought lunch. He bought a Rolex.” That’s rough Art, but at least you have the story! Next time tell us his name so we can be on the lookout! 👀