GODFATHER OF APPAREL’ HANGS IT UP By Bill Huffman

BY BILL HUFFMAN

For the last four decades, Ron McPherson has been the driving force behind the Antigua Group, a global apparel company that is headquartered in Peoria. It has been an amazing ride right up until … now.

In an open letter to friends, colleagues and business associates, McPherson recently announced his pending retirement. Eloquent as always, the well-spoken president and CEO of Antigua allowed a few select words to do his talking.

“It’s been an honor and a privilege to lead Antigua for the past 40 years,” penned McPherson, who looks way too young to be celebrating his 70th birthday in May.

“We have grown our brand and company from a local Arizona supplier to a brand with an international footprint. With that said, I will be turning over the reins of the company to our great management team and retire from duties as president and CEO effective June 1, 2020. I thank you for your friendship, guidance and business over these many years!”

To say that Ron McPherson is both a class act and a humble gentleman would be an understatement. That would also be only half of the story when it comes

to Arizona’s “Godfather of Apparel.” McPherson also is a devoted family man, a seasoned mentor to his employees and friends, a respected business leader and one of the most highly decorated guys in Arizona golf history. Among his many accolades, McPherson is a member of both the Arizona Golf Hall of Fame and the Southwest Section of the PGA Hall of Fame; the Anser Award, named after PING founder Karsten Solheim and considered the highest honor bestowed by the SWPGA; and a recipient of the PGA of America’s prestigious Ernie Sabayrac Award for lifetime contributions to the golf industry.

Asked which of his honors he was most proud of, McPherson stayed completely in character.

“All of them,” he said. “I’m also quite proud of a golf tournament that was named after me called the McPherson Cup, a Ryder Cup-styled event that they play every other year at the Glacier Club in Durango.

“(The McPherson Cup matches) are between the Colorado, Sun Country (New Mexico) and Southwest sections, and that’s really been fun to go back to Durango, one of the places where I played on the minitours as a young man.”

For McPherson, who came within a couple of strokes of earning his card on the PGA Tour in 1979, it all began in the high country of Kalispell, Mont., where he was born to parents who loved to play the game. When his dad, a newspaperman, moved the family to Cheyenne, Wyo., Ron knew right where to go.

“I started out in the game at the Airport Club in Cheyenne, picking up range balls and cleaning golf clubs when I was 10 or 11 (years old),” he recalled. “I played a lot of junior and high school golf, and apparently was good enough to get a scholarship to the University of Wyoming.”

It was during his days at Central High School in Cheyenne that McPherson met Del Cochran, an upperclassman who also played on the golf team. McPherson and Cochran, the longtime captain of the club at Grayhawk in Scottsdale, became lifelong friends.

“We played high school golf, college golf, and even kicked it around on the minitours together; lots of fun and laughs together,” Cochran said of the relationship. “We became dear friends, and I couldn’t be prouder of the way it all turned out for Ron.”

It was during those days as a Cowboy that McPherson fell in love with the Arizona desert. It also was about that time that he captured the Wyoming Amateur Championship — twice (1968, ’70).

“I remember going down to Arizona when we were playing in college and getting our butts beat by Arizona and Arizona State,” he said. “Those were the days that really got me entrenched in golf and Arizona – the weather was always so great — and after graduating, I moved there in 1973.”

COURTESY ANTIGUA

McPherson took a job as an assistant pro at a little course called Apache Wells Country Club in Mesa, working with Cochran and a guy named Tom Dooley. As it turned out, Dooley and McPherson were a few of the first pros to ever hold “demo days,” hooking up with HillerichBradsby, a baseball bat manufacturer, to sell a newfangled club called Power-Bilt.

“Tom and I sold a lot of them, and eventually Tom came up with an idea in 1979 to start a small apparel company called Eagle Golf,” McPherson noted. “I was the first employee, Tom bought an embroidering machine, and eventually Eagle Golf became Eagle Golf of Scottsdale and then Antigua.”

Dooley sold the company to an English group in 2003, but McPherson knew too much about how to run Antigua, and so the new owners, Fraiser’s Group/Sports Direct, made him the boss.

“Tom and Ron grew Antigua into a big business, but Ron was the guy who made it go,” Cochran noted. “The reason he’s been in charge (for the past 17 years) is because he genuinely cares about his customers and employees, and understands golf and how to run a big company.”

What was McPherson’s finest hour with Antigua?

“Probably in the early days, when we put together the NFL-Payne Stewart (plus-fours) deal in 1987,” he said. “With that we got into the licensing business, which not only helped us in golf but all of our licensing going forward. That was the tipping point of the company.” From the NFL, Antigua landed the

NBA, Major League Baseball, the NHL, colleges and universities, the Major Indoor Soccer League, the WNBA, NASCAR, the PGA of America, the LPGA and, yes, the PGA Tour. “I like to say we have all the licenses that really count,” McPherson said with obvious pride. “It’s the full array of the sporting world, including a few U.S. Opens, Ryder Cups, Solheim Cups, Super Bowls and Stanley Cups.” So what’s next for McPherson as he heads to greener pastures with his golf game intact? That’s right, Ron still hits them straight down the middle and on a good day can go low. “I’m going to play a little golf and hang out with Marti and the grandkids,” he said of his wife and grandsons, Wesley and Hudson. “It’s why I decided to hang it up — QTR, or ‘quality time remaining.’ “ Yes, quality time for a quality person, and McPherson will do that routine quite nicely from his summer home in Pinetop. “I’m really proud of the fact that I’m leaving Antigua in such good hands, as our management team is awesome,” he said. “The company is in good shape, no debt on the balance sheet, and we’re still winning a few of the battles against the big boys like Under Armour and Nike.” Asked what he’ll miss most, McPherson replied: “That’s easy. “I’ll miss the people of Antigua. We have such a great family culture that you don’t find just anywhere. I’ll also miss the friends we’ve come to know in the business.” It’s a “gimme” they’ll miss Ron McPherson, too. n

BY JOE PASSOV

Don’t let the town name fool you. Carefree, Arizona, may ring of sweetness and charm, but the course that put the town on the golf map in 1962 possesses the tortured howl of a coyote and the fanged bite of a rattlesnake. Competitors in the 96 th Arizona Amateur Championship (July 27-Aug. 1) at Desert Forest Golf Club will face a rigorous examination. Ed Gowan, executive director of the Arizona Golf Association and a member of the club since 1988, concurs.

“Desert Forest is the most difficult tournament course in Arizona for stroke play,” says Gowan. “You have narrow landing areas. You have to play the proper angles into the greens. The greens have a lot of movement to them, so if you miss a green, it’s very difficult to get the ball up and down and the greens are very fast. Most desert courses in Arizona are very generous, either in the landing areas or in the greens. Desert Forest is neither.”

What Desert Forest does possess is beauty and character — and authenticity. It is a true original, a pioneer that blazed a trail for all of the desert/target-style courses that followed 20 years later.

Conceived from a vision of Carefree town founders K.T. Palmer and Tom Darlington, Desert Forest was to serve as the centerpiece of a burgeoning community. Yet, success seemed improbable. Carefree’s nearest population center was Scottsdale, more

than 20 miles away. Whatever golf course that would emerge from such inhospitable terrain would have to be world-class to attract and retain golfers.

Palmer and Darlington granted the design commission to Robert “Red” Lawrence, an architect who had recently relocated to Tucson after more than 30 years in Florida. Lawrence wasn’t a household name, but he had served as president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects in 1956 and had apprenticed under one of the profession’s greatest practitioners, William Flynn, designer of Shinnecock Hills and Cherry Hills, among others.

Prior to the construction of Desert Forest in the early 1960s, Phoenix

area golf courses typically resembled Midwestern parkland layouts, carpeted in wall-to-wall turf, with fairways framed by imported trees. Desert Forest changed all that. “Leave the desert unmarked” was Red’s mandate to his crew. With a minimalist approach that preceded Coore-Crenshaw by 30 years, Red Lawrence created an influential, enduring, low-profile masterpiece that melded seamlessly with its desert surrounds. It also led to his catchy nickname, “the Desert Fox.”

In his 2004 club history, architecture scholar Brad Klein summed up the brilliance and challenge inherent in Desert Forest. “The genius of Desert Forest’s design is in the shapes of the fairways and the contours of the putting surfaces. Few golf courses built in the modern era of bulldozer construction respect the native ground contours like Desert Forest.”

One prominent player enthralled with those magical undulations was Tom Weiskopf. Weiskopf first tackled the course in early February 1965, when he was a rookie on the PGA Tour. He posted a 4-under 68. Weiskopf plunked down his own cash to join the club in 1979 and, in later years, served as a capable design consultant on multiple occasions.

Perhaps the most significant reworking to Desert Forest concluded in December 2013. Undertaken by architect Dave Zinkand, a longtime associate of the Bill Coore/Ben Crenshaw design firm, the alterations resulted in improved sightlines from the tee,

COURTESY OF DESERT FOREST GC

reshaped greenside bunkers to better interact with the greens, increased distance from the tips (to 7,203 yards), recaptured green sizes and some new contouring to the putting surfaces.

What didn’t change was the remarkable routing, nor any of the individual hole corridors. Indeed, Desert Forest remains full of memorable tests. Both Gowan and head professional Brandon Rogers cite the par-5 16 th as a great risk/reward hole. Rogers explains that at 535 yards, distance isn’t the issue.

“The challenge will be attacking the narrow and sloping fairway with a driver if the player is trying to force a birdie or eagle,” Rogers said. “Those that lay up will have to have to pick the correct distance off the tee and then the correct

line and distance on their second shot to avoid a large mesquite tree in the fairway about 150 yards from the green.”

Adds Gowan, “You can make a 3 or a 7 at the drop of a hat.”

The par-4 13 th also earns votes for Best in Show. Even at 466 yards, it’s less demanding than it was a generation ago thanks to a widened fairway. At the 280-yard mark from the tee, however, it narrows and slopes left to right, leaving an approach from an uneven lie to an elevated green with a false front. A scary-deep bunker front-right and some wild undulation in the middle portion of the green further complicate matters.

The sporty, dual-fairway par-5 seventh that heads towards Black Mountain is another favorite, as is the 329-yard, par-4 14 th , now driveable by the gambling bomber after the Zinkand renovations. Gowan tips his cap to the difficult par-4 closer.

“You stand on the tee,” says Gowan “and you must hit a great drive and a great second shot. And to do that at the end of the round when your swing is starting to fall apart, that makes the 18 th a truly pivotal hole.”

Low scores at Desert Forest are rare, but not impossible. Club member

—Ed Gowan

Aaron Baddeley, a former Phoenix Open champ, holds the course record at 61. Rogers relays one of his favorite stories about a round that “could have been.”

“In the early 1990s, Phil Mickelson was in a match with Dave Cunningham against Rob Magnini and a rising star at ASU, Todd Demsey,” Rogers recalled. “Todd made eight birdies and an eagle through 15 holes.

“As the story goes, Phil was getting fed up with Todd’s barrage, and when Todd stepped up to the 16 th tee, the famous risk/reward par-5 with a 2-iron in hand, Phil gave Todd some pretty good lip service on his cautious club selection. Rob tried to convince his partner to ‘stay the course’ with his club selection, but Todd eventually fell prey to Phil’s

needling. Todd went back to the bag, hit driver with all he had, and pulled it left into the desert. Todd made 8, Rob made par, while Phil and Dave posted birdie/ eagle, respectively. Todd went on to shoot 66 that day and beat all others in the group, but that story lives on as a prime reminder of what every player will face on the 16 th tee during the State Am.”

Actually, potential disaster lurks on every tee at Desert Forest. He who confronts that fear factor — and conquers it — will thrive at this summer’s Arizona Amateur. n

“Travelin’ Joe” Passov is an awardwinning golf writer who resides in Cave Creek. He was the recipient of the 2019 Donald Ross Award, which is given to “a person who has made a significant contribution to the game of golf and the profession of golf course architecture.” Passov is the co-host of Backspin The Golf Show, which is heard throughout Arizona on Fox Sports 910 Phoenix and 1290 Wildcats Radio in Tucson.

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