Tag: Clint Eastwood

Sources: AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am to become designated event, celebs/amateurs out for the weekend

Golfweek has learned Bill Murray may have made his final weekend appearance at Pebble Beach.

Bill Murray may have made his final appearance on the weekend at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

Golfweek has learned that the PGA Tour is expected to make the annual stop at Pebble Beach Golf Links in Pebble Beach, California, one of the eight designated events, beginning in 2024. As a result, the Tour is considering shortening the amateur portion to 36 holes played on Thursday and Friday only over two courses, rather than all 72 holes over three courses with a 54-hole cut to the top 30 teams. So long, celebrity Saturday.

Jack Nicklaus spilled the beans about Pebble’s elevated status during an interview at the Honda Classic last week.

“I heard that,” said AT&T ambassador Jordan Spieth, who won the Pebble Beach Pro-Am in 2017, and has been campaigning for the tournament to receive a better spot on the schedule. “That was maybe a bit premature.”

On Wednesday, PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan sent a memo informing the membership that the board approved a plan beginning in 2024 to reduce the size of fields and eliminate the cut at several of its designated events. The eight affected designated events for next year have not been finalized.

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Including Pebble Beach in that elite group would mark yet another drastic change for the Tour – reducing the field from 156 to between 70-80 players and bumping the purse from $9 million to $20 million – at a tournament that dates to 1937 and started out in Rancho Sante Fe, California, when Bing Crosby invited some friends to play golf, enjoy a clambake and a raise a little money for charity.

“I voiced that I feel that we have this opportunity where the top guys are committing to play in the same events then we should look at the most iconic venues and make sure that we’re doing it there because that feels like the coolest scenario for ratings, for sponsors,” Spieth said. “Let’s figure out what can be done. I don’t know what that looks like. I don’t even know if they do. For AT&T to be open to it would be really cool because I love that golf tournament and it had been an unfortunate part of the schedule ever since the Saudi stuff and even before that.”

Justin Rose won the most recent edition in February, which featured just three of the top 20 and 21 of the top 100 players in the world.

Crosby’s Clambake, as it was affectionately called, shifted to Pebble when Monterey Peninsula Herald Sports Editor Ted Durein and a group of sports-minded persons on the Peninsula suggested to the famed crooner, who had become a member of Cypress Point Club, that he move his golf tournament to help fill hotel rooms and restaurants in Monterey during January’s off-season. And beginning in 1947, fill them they did, as Pebble Beach Golf Links, Spyglass Hill Golf Course (1967-76, 1978-), Cypress Point (1947-1990), Poppy Hills Golf Course (1991-2009) and Monterey Peninsula Country Club. Frank Sinatra, Steve Young, Johnny Bench, Clint Eastwood, Jack Lemmon and Murray are among the stars of screen and field who became regulars. Crosby invited the country – many of them snowed in and dreaming of when they too could hit the fairways again – to a tournament that became world-renowned through a top-rated television show.

Spectators focused as pro Ken Venturi, center, drove from the tee on the 450-yard par 4 ninth hole at Pebble Beach in second round in the 19th annual Bing Crosby National Pro-Amateur Golf Championship, January 23, 1960, Pebble Beach, Calif.

Crosby wrote in the prologue to “The Crosby: Greatest Show in Golf,” that when asked what he considered his highest and most gratifying achievement in life, “the answer is immediate. This golf tournament … When I think I’ve had a hand in this, my cup runneth over.”

“It has a great history, so I think that’s the only challenge there. How do you change a little bit of the Bing Crosby and still maintain the history, probably the most historic regular event,” Spieth said. “Maybe one course, maybe two courses. There are a lot of options. That will all come down to balancing what the players are willing to go there and do and what the sponsor wants.”

Steve John, Monterey Peninsula Foundation’s CEO and tournament director, said he had nothing to add to this story as “conversations with key partners are ongoing.”

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Former Miss America Kira Dixon’s week at Pebble Beach includes compliment from Clint Eastwood

Former Miss America Kira Dixon teamed with legendary actor-director Clint Eastwood in a charity competition at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

For Kira Dixon, the legendary squint of Clint Eastwood made her day.

The former Kira Kazantsev, and 2015 Miss America – sorry, fellas, she’s off the market now – played five holes on Wednesday in a charity shootout with Clint Eastwood, the 89-year-old actor and director, as part of Team Eastwood.

“I think it was the most legendary thing I’ve ever done,” she said. “He was so sweet. He said, ‘C’mon, gorgeous, let’s see it.’ It was amazing. He looked at one shot and said, ‘That was very respectable.’ I said, ‘Thank you, Clint.’ ”

Dixon can bring it, according to her pro-am partner this week, Zac Blair.

“Like all partners in these kind of things, she was a little nervous early, but she can play. She can smoke it,” Blair said of Dixon, a 15 handicap.

Dixon, 28, was introduced to the game at age 3 by her father. The Bay Area resident grew up working at a golf course and even made the varsity golf team as a freshman in high school. But she moved on to “cooler” pursuits such as cheerleading and didn’t get back into golf until after her crowning achievements first as Miss New York and then Miss America.

Her celebrity status drew several invitations to charity golf events, and she caught the golf bug all over again.

“I’m weirdly obsessed with golf,” she told NCGA Golf Magazine in a 2019 profile.

She’s become a regular on the pro-am circuit, including at the American Century Celebrity Golf Championship. She even impressed Tiger Woods enough with her short game to earn an invite to the inaugural Celebrity Cup at Riviera Country Club last year ahead of the Genesis Open and has co-hosted the live auction at his annual fundraiser, Tiger Jam.

Dixon also is pursuing a career in the golf space as a TV personality, and has served as an on-camera digital reporter for the USGA at the past two U.S. Opens, at Shinnecock Hills and Pebble Beach, and regularly appearing on the organization’s social-media platforms. That led to a gig with Golf Channel, for whom Dixon hosts Golf Advisor Living, a program on golf lifestyles, and she recently did live hits from the floor at the PGA Merchandise Show for “Morning Drive.”

Dixon made the cut in her inaugural appearance in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am last year, but couldn’t duplicate her success today. She and Blair finished 10 under for three rounds after a 1-over 73 at Pebble Beach on Saturday. But as one of the few female participants in the competition, she took pride in having an eight-year-old girl named Caroline follow her around on Friday, claiming to be her biggest fan. And there was that 6-hybrid that she boasted she hit “perfectly” to set up a net birdie.

“We don’t need to talk about my other shots,” she said with a smile.