Charles Barkley visits Arvada golf course for commercial shoot

Barkley for years, Wodark said he was as authentic as he appears on television.

BY JOHN RENFROW JRENFROW@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Golfers might see the occasional pro at the West Woods Golf Club in Arvada, but they’re not usually of the basketball variety. But Thaddeus Wodark, a staff manager at the club, recently got a chance to meet one, and it happened to be his favorite athlete ever.

“I actually developed a friendship with my childhood idol,” Wodark said. “It’s still surreal to even talk about.”

That idol was, and is, former NBA star Charles Barkley, who on the course exchanged phone numbers with Wodark and, weeks later, even texted him congratulations when he got married. Barkley is simply “Chuck” to many of his fans, but Wodark can really claim a firstname basis now.

“Chuck was in his prime when I was young, and he was my favorite basketball player,” Wodark said.

“So much so, to the effect that I had a guinea pig named Barkley. I mean, he was everything to me.”

It all happened last month when Barkley was in town to shoot a commercial for Microsoft Bing. Afterwards, Barkley took to the Cottonwood and Sleeping Indian courses at the club for 18 holes, with Wodark as a sort of course chauffeur.

The 1993 MVP and television personality also took time to meet with fans, signing autographs and stopping for photos throughout the day.

Wodark, 38, wasn’t just with Barkley. Also in the group was former NBA player Grant Hill and former football player and sportscaster Ahmad Rashad for the round at West Woods. Growing up idolizing

“He couldn’t have been any better of a person. He couldn’t have been more real or more gracious. He was thanking me for my admiration towards him,” Wodark said. “It was an experience I will cherish for the rest of my life. It’s like I hit the lottery.”

The commercial shows Barkley in his usual self-deprecating and humorous way tapping into artificial intelligence for help with his golf game. To view the full commercial, search “Charles Barkley Uses AIPowered Search to Improve Golf Game” on Youtube.

Wodark and I sat down for a deeper Q&A about his experience that day.

Q. You said Charles was your favorite player growing up?

When he got traded to the Phoenix Suns, my parents bought me all the decor for my whole room. I had one of those fake, plastic, Phoenix Suns lockers in the corner of my room, and it had Barkley’s name on it.

Q. Was meeting him everything you hoped it would be?

To get to meet him and share the better part of a day with him, was honestly one of the top three experiences of my life. I can’t even explain to you how profound it was. It was an experience for me that I will cherish for the rest of my life.

Q. What was your role in the event that day?

I essentially kind of chauffeured them around our 18-hole course because you can kind of get lost on our course. It’s not very selfexplanatory getting to the next hole, if you will. So I was there as kind of a liaison just to make sure they were getting around and getting their golf in and having a good time. They were pretty much using me as a caddie, and it just couldn’t have been any better.

Q. How was Charles with the crowd and the community?

People were flocking out of their backyards and yelling, ‘Chuck! Charles! Hey!’ And he would say, ‘Okay, hang on a second.’ He did his shot, and then he would take his golf cart over to them, greet them, take a picture, or whatever, and then carry on his way. He did bonus!

It was just such an added bonus. Grant couldn’t have been any better either. When I was in elementary school, I’m not joking you, I wore an NBA basketball player’s jersey to school every day. I had Grant Hill’s Detroit Pistons jersey that was reversible, back when they had the teal green with the Piston on it. I told him about it, and he was like, ‘That’s awesome.’ Halfway through the round, Grant was like, ‘I have tickets to Game 2 (of