Clay’s Favorite Golf Movie Isn’t Caddyshack?

BUCK: I think I’m gonna be left alone here in the freedom bunker tomorrow, fending off all the commies. But all of you with fixed bayonets with me all across the country ’cause Clay is gonna be out there swinging a golf club around with some big-name folks at the LIV golf tournament, Clay. What should everyone be expecting? And is there a chance we could get you to put your South Side down and call in from the 17th hole?

CLAY: Yes. I will be, during the show Thursday, out at Bedminster playing in the Pro-Am. I know Rush used to play in a lot of Pro-Ams back in the day. I remember talking to Ali about this. So, I am a mediocre golfer at best. But right now, I believe I’m going to be playing with Phil Mickelson 18 holes at Bedminster tomorrow. So, there will be a lot of people playing out there. It should be quite the scene. And I think Phil Mickelson is going to have not a very — a lot of not very favorable things to say about my golf game, by the second or third hole we’re on.

BUCK: We want a live critique from Phil. He and Jack Nicklaus, like, these are some of the greatest of all time, right?

CLAY: Yeah. I think if you were saying to the average golf fan out there right now name two golfers in the last 25 years that you have followed the most, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson would be the answer. And I don’t even think there’s a close third. Last 25 years, not talking about the last 40 or 50 —

BUCK: Jack Nicklaus, I just remember him from the video game.

CLAY: Yeah, Nicklaus, in ’86 at the Masters was his last major, if I remember correctly. So, again, last 25, 30 years it would be Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson. So, I’m pretty excited to get to play with him.

BUCK: I do have to out you here for a second on something, though, because there are just some things where I assume… Clay and I, we do a show together three hours a day, we’re sharing thoughts all the time. And I say to Clay, “Oh, it’s obvious what the best golf movie of all time is,” and I’m thinking of course, “We don’t even have to establish that it’s Caddyshack because everyone knows that it’s Caddyshack.” Clay pulls a curveball on me here and decides to throw Happy Gilmore at the top of his list, like a barbarian?

CLAY: I just… I like Happy Gilmore more than I do Caddyshack.

BUCK: Man, I don’t even know how that is possible. I will say of the canon of Adam Sandler films, I think there is a strong case to be made that Happy Gilmore is the best, probably even better than —

CLAY: Billy Madison.

BUCK: Billy Madison…

CLAY: Billy Madison, I would say. For the Adam Sandler movies, Billy Madison and Happy Gilmore are the two best. And see I’m an Adam Sandler fan; so, you think Happy Gilmore? “The price is wrong, bitch,” which — I know people gonna be like, “Oh, my God.” That’s a quote directly from Adam Sandler.

BUCK: Bob Barker, right?

CLAY: Bob Barker, which is one of the funniest scenes in any movie ever, when you… Bob Barker out of nowhere —

BUCK: Throwing some right hooks. Yeah.

CLAY: Yes.

BUCK: It’s quite a scene, quite a sequence. Always Caddyshack, though, Bill Murray just ad-libbed all those lines. He basically created this character out of nothing, which is pretty amazing. And I always think of this because when the wonderful Mrs. Travis is, Clay’s wife is like, “Oh, yeah. Buck can hang out at the beach house anytime,” and Clay’s like, “Yeah, there’s gonna be like an area down on the beach where the whole pool versus pond discussion.”

CLAY: Yeah, yeah.

BUCK: Yeah, I feel like I’m always being told not the pool for you, the pond; so that’s from Caddyshack, for those of you who don’t know.

CLAY: Yeah. I might be a total… People have trusted me until now and now I went with Happy Gilmore over Caddyshack, but I think it’s the funnier film.

BUCK: What is the best part of your golf? I don’t have a golf game, which I’m ashamed of ’cause my dad is a very solid golfer, but —

CLAY: That is actually a… I don’t know that I have a best part of my golf game.

BUCK: Don’t you just say your short game ’cause, like, who’s really gonna check?

CLAY: But the short game is actually, I think, far more difficult. Like, in the tee box, if you can just hit a decent drive, usually the fairways have a lot of places you can land. If you’re short, it’s certainly not putting, although it probably should be. I’m bad at everything but I’m equally bad at everything. I’m not atrocious necessarily at any of them.

BUCK: I also remember going to… I was brought by family friends to a very fancy golf club out in Long Island when I was like 10 years old. I’ll never forget this ’cause I was like, that sand trap looks like fun. And I just decided to run through a sand trap on a golf course. I had never been screamed at by old men that loud in my life. I never forgot that. You mess with their sand trap —

CLAY: They’re not happy.

BUCK: — they’re very unhappy with you.

CLAY: I had never golfed until I was like 22. So, I was in law school when I actually started to play. I played a little bit, got somewhat decent, then I had kids, and I have not been out on the course a lot since. So, Phil Mickelson, if we can get him to call in with us, I think you guys are going to love his destruction of my golf game. Should be fun.