Local golf pro Randy Towner discusses the day he out-drove Michael Jordan by 30 yards
Michael Jordan’s competitiveness on the basketball court has been well-documented the past four Sundays on ESPN’s five-week, 10-part series, “The Last Dance.”
The former Chicago Bulls phenom’s desire to excel — to win “at all costs” — is known in the hoops world and also has trickled to Jordan’s other pastimes, such as golf.
Locally, Firekeeper Golf Course general manager/head pro Randy Towner — who in the past has been crowned player of the year, senior player of the year and golf professional of the year in the Midwest Professional Golf Association — has witnessed Jordan’s intensity on the links.
It was June 1991 when then-Kansas coach Roy Williams, who coached Jordan as a member of Dean Smith’s staff at the University of North Carolina, brought “Sir Michael” to Lawrence to speak at Williams’ youth basketball camp.
Before speaking to the campers, Jordan played a round of golf at (Lawrence’s) Alvamar Golf Club with Towner, who was the course’s golf professional at the time.
“Randy is really playing well. And, and he’s telling Michael where to hit the ball,” Williams said, relating an oft-told story to streaktalkjayhawk.substack.com. “Randy would hit it exactly where he said, and Michael would hit it, but it didn’t end up being quite as good every time.
“So finally, Michael said, ‘Randy, I don’t get this. You hit the ball where you say, and it does well. And I hit the ball there and it doesn’t work as well.’
“Randy Towner had the greatest line, ever,” Willliams added in continuing the story of what happened when Towner whacked a drive 30 yards deeper down the fairway than Jordan “He took his finger and he put it in Michael Jordan’s chest and he said, ‘Michael, just remember this.’ He taps him (Jordan) on the chest and says, ‘NBA.’ And then he tapped his own chest and says, ‘PGA’ We just died laughing.”
Towner provided his own version of the story to The Star about the day in 1991 — yes, that’s 29 years ago — he shot a 72 and Jordan an 81 at Alvamar.
“Roy had Michael Jordan in for camp. Roy sent Michael and his security guy over to play golf. We teed off the back nine at Alvamar,” said Towner, who didn’t tell any of his Alvamar co-workers Jordan would be in Lawrence that day.
“I hit a good one. He (Jordan) hit a good one. We pulled up to the first ball. He was waiting for me to get out (of cart) and hit it. I knew it was his ball and mine was 30 yards ahead of his.
“He noticed it was (actually) his turn to hit. He gave me a look, and I said, ‘Michael, NBA.’ Then I looked at my ball, ‘PGA.’ That is the story. I would never poke somebody in the chest. That’s not something I would do,” Towner added, noting, “I’m a competitive guy, too. But it was just friendly banter on a golf course. I don’t think I trash-talked anybody. I was goofing around,” he added of coming up with his legendary “NBA, PGA” line.
Jordan, Towner and others in the group played for a few dollars in side bets that day as golfers tend to do.
“Not a lot,” Towner said. “I won $20. He (Jordan) had $100s. He looked at me like, ‘I don’t know (what to do with only $100s).’
“I told him that it would be OK if he owed me $20, that it would be fun for me if he was at the line shooting a free throw in a big game I could say, ‘That guy owes me 20 bucks.’ He paid me the 20,” Towner added with a laugh.
Towner — he also played golf with Jordan when Michael spoke at Williams’ camp in 1990 — said, “for an NBA guy he is a good golfer. What I remember is how big his hands were.
“He grabbed one of the clubs … the grips were so big. That’s how muscular he was. He was thin, but muscular. Tall. He was very nice,. He was a good golfer, enjoyed golf and it was a fun day for me, I enjoyed it. I’ve been fortunate enough to play with a lot of celebrities. Celebrities like friendly banter. They are normal people which is the way I like to treat them.”
Robertson story isn’t true
It may be time to clarify another story involving Jordan in Lawrence. It has been rumored that former KU guard Ryan Robertson, who attended Williams’ camp when he was in high school, was pulled out of the stands and played Jordan one-on-one.
“That is not true — fake news,” Robertson, who played at KU from 1996 to ‘99, said with a laugh in a phone interview with The Star. “That never happened.”
Of that rumor, Williams told streaktalkjayhawk.substack.com: “I have no idea where that (rumor) came from, because I know it’s not true. I remember Michael would show kids a jab step and show them how to protect the ball. So he would get one of the little kids up to stand in front of him. But he never played any of the kids one-on-one.”
Jordan likes other sports, too
Jordan, of course, also was proficient in baseball. He hit a respectable .252 in the Arizona Fall League in 1994 after struggling to a .202 batting average in Double A in his only full season in pro baseball.
He also is a standout billiards player.
“One of the best I’ve ever seen,” former Chicago White Sox player/manager Ozzie Guillen told nbcsports.com. “I’m not kidding you. People talk about Michael playing golf and playing basketball and trying to play baseball. Playing pool, he was amazing,” Guillen added.
Jordan also is proficient at table tennis. NBA photographer Nat Butler relayed to SLAM Magazine a story from the 1992 Olympics.
During free time, Christian Laettner beat Jordan in the finals of a ping pong tourney between basketball players on the U.S. Olympic Team.
“These guys are all competitive. They see a ping pong table, the first thing is make the brackets,” Butler told SLAM. “For some reason, Christian Laettner was good at ping pong. So, Laettner and Jordan in the finals, There was some side action (bets) going on. We’ll leave it at that. Michael is playing ping pong, sweating, like fourth-quarter-at-the-free-throw-line kind of sweat. For some reason, Laettner beat him. He (Jordan) threw the paddle. He didn’t talk for two days to anyone. Come to find out, he had a ping-pong table delivered up to his room. No one knew about it. and he was practicing for the rematch. They had a rematch two days later, three days later. It was (something like) 21-4. He destroyed him.”
This story was originally published May 11, 2020 at 9:58 AM with the headline "Local golf pro Randy Towner discusses the day he out-drove Michael Jordan by 30 yards."
