On the back roads of golf, tales from the tour

You’ve seen the sign at the baggage claim to check your luggage because some bags may look alike. That goes for golf travel bags, too.

Nick Watney and Angel Cabrera arrived in San Francisco for the U.S. Open about the same time, on different flights. Cabrera kept waiting at oversized luggage for his bag to come out, and he began to think the airlines had lost it. There was only one golf bag there, and it belonged to Watney.

That’s when the light came on.

Cabrera’s agent called the person in charge of U.S. Open courtesy cars and asked them to stop Watney on his way out.

Sure enough, Cabrera’s golf bag was in his trunk.

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The relationship three-time major champion Padraig Harrington has with reporters is unlike that of any other player, especially the Irish media.

He was giving an interview to Greg Allen of Irish radio station RTE, and after they finished, Harrington began making small talk. He asked Allen, “I heard you lost your sunglasses?” Allen’s shoulders slumped as he told Harrington he had misplaced his glasses and didn’t know where to look for them.

Harrington didn’t commiserate. He smiled.

“They’re in my locker,” he said. “You left them behind the other day.”

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Sung Kang received elite training in South Korea’s national program that is producing more and more top players, but he worked equally hard on his English and speaks beautifully for someone who has played the PGA Tour only the last few years.

Turns out he has been coming to America twice a year since 2002 to work on his golf, and he devoted just as much effort to the language.

In Florida? California?

“Dallas,” Kang said. “I went to the Hank Haney schools, so I would work with Haney and learned English there in Texas.”

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