Another tough blow to local golf.

Teeing off to start the final round of the AAGA Open at Norton Country Club.

I still read the newspaper for which I toiled for some 42 years or so, although digitally rather than ink-and-paper -- hey, it's the 2020s -- and I got a huge shock when I reached Monday morning's lead editorial on the Opinion page.

The big news of the day, beyond saving Capron Park Zoo in Attleboro and the local "No Kings" protests that will surely be mocked by the irritating cadre of right-wing zealots in this corner of southeastern Massachusetts, was that the Attleboro Area Golf Association's annual "City Open" tournament -- which hasn't been conducted within the city limits for several years now because many local courses have disappeared -- was welcoming Ledgemont Country Club of Seekonk into its fold. But the reason was even more newsworthy.

It was partially because Norton Country Club, which has had a six-decade association with the AAGA and been host to many of the most memorable moments of the annual tournament as one of its founding sites, had severed its partnership with the local association.

The story actually broke Friday on the front sports page of The Sun Chronicle, a story I completely scanned past and missed when I viewed the online edition. At the time, writer Mike Kirby tried to get a comment from Norton Country Club management, but could not reach anyone before deadline. So the question remained unanswered: Why would Norton CC, one of the area's most revered patches of property to local golfers, bail out of a decades-long association with a group whose sole mission is to promote the growth of local golf?

After reading the editorial, I immediately reached out to someone I know that might have the answers. But since I'm no longer a "professional" journalist and not working for an accredited news-gathering operation, I told this individual that any information that was shared would remain just between us. So while I may know a little more as I write this than I did a couple of hours ago, it's my fervent hope that The Sun Chronicle will continue to strive to get on-the-record answers.

OK, I understand that some of you that read this may feel that this issue doesn't really amount to more than a hill of beans compared to the many other issues facing the world today -- war in Iran, rising gasoline prices, corruption at the highest levels of government to start, let alone how bad the traffic will be in Foxboro when 60,000 soccer fans with no knowledge of the area converge upon Gillette Stadium (screw this "Boston Stadium" nonsense) about 30 minutes before each World Cup game is supposed to start.

Besides, more people get upset when Sydney Sweeney's bra size is misreported in the national media than anything else that's happening. Fake news!

But for someone that tried to be a golfer at one time in his life, and enjoyed covering it for the local newspaper for decades, the erosion of the Attleboro Area Golf Association's championship tournament to just three different sites in four days is worrisome. The demise of several golf courses in the area is already a trend that may be irreversible, and Norton Country Club's decision to turn its back on the AAGA may be a blow from which the association won't be able to recover.

Great personal moments. There weren't many.

I tried to learn how to play golf in the 1980s and maintained a playing relationship with the sport into the 2000s, before both the cost of playing and the pain in my knees started spiraling out of control. I was totally self-taught, managed to break 100 legitimately a few times (without Donald Trump's foot wedge tactics or his taking "gimme" putts from 20 feet out), and even popped in an eagle at Hillside Country Club in Rehoboth from about 110 yards out, choking up on a 7-iron from an elevated fairway lie and making a perfect swing to send the ball on a direct line from there to the pin.

I should have stopped playing then and there. Best stroke of my life, and I knew right then I wasn't ever going to top it. 

While I knew I would never challenge for a berth in the City Open, I did want to get to know the game better. So for a couple of summers, I instituted a feature that appeared in the Sunday editions of The Sun Chronicle called "The Local Links." I'd approach the management of golf courses throughout the region and ask them if I could play a full round with a photographer in tow, and I'd describe the course and its unique challenges while our photog captured the natural beauty of the surroundings. I even offered to pay for the round, but most of the time, they let me play for free. 

It turned out to be one of our most popular recurring features, and it gave me the opportunity to play on a lot of courses on which I'd really have no business being otherwise. I played all sorts of different courses -- from the lush fairways of Highland Country Club in Attleboro, to the twisting turns of the compact layout at Wentworth Hills in Plainville, to the hacker's delights like Locust Valley in Attleboro and Sun Valley in Rehoboth. From those, and so many others, I learned that while golf may be tedious to watch on television to some individuals, playing it and playing it well was even more of a mental challenge than it was a physical one.

During that time, I did have a few favorite courses to play -- mostly the ones where I could get on quickly and play by myself. One was Easton Country Club (now owned by Stonehill College), which had a great pro shop and long and wide fairways whose toughest hazards were the mounds of goose poop that often couldn't be avoided. Another was Rehoboth Country Club, kind of a hidden gem that was relatively easy to play but had some very challenging holes among its 18. And it was always easy to get on the course there.

But my favorite was Norton Country Club -- even back when it was just a wet and wild nine-holer that loved to swallow my errantly-struck Titleist balls that disappeared into the swampy muck bordering the narrow fairways. Some of those balls, which weren't cheap, are probably still buried there.

Once Norton was expanded to 18 holes, it truly became the gem of our local golfing world -- at least until just a few forested feet away to the east, the spectacular TPC Boston layout was carved out of another patch of the disappearing Great Woods.

Golfers knew we were coming with this display.

For a while, local golf was booming. TPC Boston hosted the annual Deutsche Bank Championship, bringing the best names in the game to our little corner of the world. Meanwhile, Peter Gobis and I covered the absolute shit out of the AAGA Tournament every year, approaching it as if it was the U.S. Open. Four days, four different courses, and we'd try to get every single angle and story we could out of the local championship. 

For the most part, the reader response was excellent -- because, after all, we were writing about hometown heroes. Gobis and I could be seen prominently while executing our duties, riding our free golf cart with Sun Chronicle logos plastered on it (although I did buy several polo shirts at every course as compensation).

Oh, yeah, we had a few critics. One was Ed Duckworth, a former Patriots beat writer for the Providence Journal that lived in our area, who used to needle me about how the paper would kick almost all other sports news from its pages over four days in August for a local golf tournament. He was probably just bustin' my chops, but I'm sure there were others that had no investment in the game and thus no interest.

But Gobis and I made the commitment. We often saw Marc Forbes. a gentleman's gentleman, make the triumphant march to the final hole at Highland to put the finishing touches on another of his 16 victories. We stood amid the fairways of Locust Valley, freezing our asses off because we chose to wear shorts on a day in which the temperature unexpectedly dropped into the 40s, watching John "Buck" Renner practically reach the green on a par 4 with his powerful drives. 

We watched Buck's son, Jim, totally dominate the Hillside course in 2002 on his way to a final-round 69 and his second tournament victory. And we saw Davis Chatfield, a diminutive lad from Bishop Feehan High School, stroll confidently down the 18th fairway at Foxborough Country Club to finish a 16-stroke victory in 2015, hitting in the 60s for three of the four rounds.

Jim Renner dominated the AAGA Open.

Jim Renner briefly reached the PGA Tour, and now Chatfield is there and showing great promise. Not bad for a couple of alumni of a local tournament that is approaching its 66th playing this August.

Alas, the times are not favoring local golf. 

Two of the original locations of the tournament. Highland and Locust Valley, are golf courses no more. Highland is a "nature preserve" whose immaculately manicured fairways have overgrown with weeds and scrub, with a few walking paths open to the public. Locust Valley is also as overgrown as it can get, although not much grew there in the summertime anyway. There are barely a few reminders of its past life as a popular golf course -- especially popular to legions of young golfers that used to sneak on and get in their licks just before sundown. Both are ticketed for future housing development.

Ditto for Heather Hill Country Club in Plainville. For years a popular place for wedding receptions, Heather Hill benefitted from the golf boom and expanded to 27 holes before the boom turned to bust. Again, housing development is the culprit -- a planned 384-unit development for residents 55 years of age and older.

Some courses continue to hang on, but it's far more expensive to have memberships because costs have risen to maintain the facilities. It's simple economics, and the lure of big bucks from developers is always nagging the owners to cash in their chips and get out of the golf business while the getting is good.

As a result, the Attleboro Open is no longer played within a five-mile radius of Attleboro.

Don't get me wrong, Ledgemont is a fine facility that will be a welcome addition to the AAGA rotation of Foxborough and Wentworth Hills. I don't think I played it during my "The Local Links" tour, but I an pretty sure it was on my list before we discontinued the series. An aerial view of the course is very appealing.

Ledgemont may even give the final threesomes a bit of a break. As it will be the only course played after the two-round cut at Wentworth Hills, the final competitors will be able to iron out their third-round mistakes and approach the final day with confidence borne from their previous experience.

Davis Chatfield is on the rise.

But it's clearly a reflection of changing times that the AAGA Open is fighting for its life. It does irk me when I hear stories about how members at some of the courses are pissed off at the AAGA for taking charge of their precious patches of turf for maybe 12 hours on a summer weekend day. One friggin' day at the clubhouse bar once a year apparently can't be set aside for an organization that promotes local golf, conducts several different tournaments for local golfers of all ages and genders, and awards scholarships to young competitors who might be interested in pursuing further development of the game in college. In fact, many youthful participants in the AAGA Open have gone on to play in college. I know. I've interviewed them. 

Davis Chatfield is an excellent example of the kind of golfer that the AAGA helped send to the rest of the golf world, whether it was to Notre Dame or the PGA Tour, where he has proven himself to be an on-the-rise talent. I'm sure he would have found a way to this level of accomplishment if the AAGA Open didn't exist, but I have to believe that exposure to a tournament environment at a young age, regardless of the competition level, is helpful toward the education of a player learning the ropes.

I cherish this award.

I just get the feeling that this is now all at risk. Local golf needs an advocate, and the AAGA has been just that. Bob Gay and Bobby Beach, the co-presidents of the association, have worked tirelessly to promote the game. So have all the members of the AAGA committee. And I don't mind telling you, I'm proud as hell that a hacker like me could be inducted into the AAGA Hall of Fame, as I was in 2010 along with Gobis and North TV executive director Peter Gay, for our assistance in promoting the game locally.

I'd really love to hear the explanation from those in charge of Norton Country Club why they feel their course is now too important, or can't be bothered, to take one day out of their so-precious schedule to host a popular local tournament that has been a centerpiece of its very existence for more than 60 years. They'd probably tell me it was none of my business, so I'll leave that task to the professional sportswriters -- but I assure you, it's a question I eventually want to hear answered.

MARK FARINELLA still has a bag filled with expensive Titleist irons in a closet, but they need re-gripping and there's some rust on the shafts -- just like their owner. Make him an offer at theownersbox2020@gmail.com.

The Owner's Box, Ep. 61.

Rob Gronkowski is likely to be a shoo-in for the Patriots Hall of Fame this year.

It's been a long time since I last put a podcast on the interwebz, but here it is. It's Episode 61, and the first of our so-called "fifth season" of The Owner's Box.

During this 55-minute return to the airwaves, I talk about my upcoming knee replacement, my return to high school sports broadcasting next month, and a few other topics. But perhaps the most interesting topic of all is the coming conundrum that I'll face on Wednesday of this week, when I head to Gillette Stadium to participate in the meeting of the Patriots' Hall of Fame Nominating Committee.

I've been a member of that august panel since it was founded in 2007 (I had forgotten how long I've been participating), missing only one of the meetings because I was up to my ears in editing at The Sun Chronicle for one of our special sections featuring the winter all-stars. Otherwise, I've played a role in every Hall of Fame member selected since then.

Adam Vinatieri has all the credentials.

Last year, as one of the eldest committee members, I had the privilege of being the first speaker, and I nominated placekicker Adam Vinatieri to be one of the three finalists for the annual fan vote. But it was another nominee, wide receiver Julian Edelman, that won the fans' vote. Edelman was honored in September along with former coach Bill Parcells, who was inducted into the Hall as a contributor by team owner Robert Kraft.

It's not unusual for a worthy nominee to miss out on induction on his first try. Current Patriots' coach Mike Vrabel was on the three-person ballot seven times, finally earning induction in 2023. So my plan is to probably nominate Vinatieri again -- especially since he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame this past summer.

However ...

There's a fly in the ointment here, and he wore No. 87. Rob Gronkowski, now having been out of pro football for four years, is in his first year of eligibility for the Patriots' shrine. I'm sure someone will be quick to nominate him on Wednesday, and I can't see how the wildly popular Gronk won't make it on his first try.

Hell, I'd vote for him. All Travis Kelce discussion aside, Gronk is probably the best tight end ever to play in the NFL. But I still believe that Vinatieri belongs -- not only for all the clutch kicks he made over the span of his tenure with the Patriots (I can forgive his many years with the Colts), but doubly so for those two "Snow Bowl" kicks against the Raiders and his game-winner against the Rams in Super Bowl 36. 

So, I'll make my speech in full knowledge that the timing won't be right again this year. I expect Vinatieri to be on the ballot again, and I expect fans will vote for the guy they know the best ... after all, it's hard to believe but true that Vinatieri's best moments for the Patriots came before the latest generation of Patriots fans was even born.

It's too bad there can't be two inductees, but as they said in those "Highlander" movies, "There can be only one!" Unless there's a tie in the fan vote, I suppose. But since PR czar Stacey James won't let us see those tallies, how would we know? 

Anyway, I talk about that in Episode 61. And if you're wondering why there was no Episode 60, well, let's just say I will have an explanation for that ... but you'll have to wait a week or so before you hear that. 

Here's the link to Episode 61. Enjoy.

Finally, this 'fraidycat makes a commitment.

Both of my knees have managed to destroy the meniscus over 70-plus upright years.

I like to think that I have a certain about of courage in my soul. After all, you don't get to be 72 without some.

But to be fully honest, I'm really a wuss. I have never run into any burning buildings to save a dog or a cat, let alone another human. I've never faced enemy fire in the service of my country. And while I've generally tried to use intelligence and rhetoric to get myself out of most personal conflicts, I have probably lost every single physical fight I've been in. I might get in a good lick to start, but then I stand there admiring my work until my adversary gets up, brushes himself off and then proceeds to whale the tar out of me. I just have never had that burning anger within my soul to sustain a conflict.

Another aspect of my self-preservational tendencies is a pathological fear of invasive surgery. I've had a few such instances -- removal of my stone-filled gallbladder in 2001 and my damaged left testicle in 2010, not to mention enough dental records to fill a short novel. But if it's something I could avoid, I made a point of doing my level best to do so.

I've finally reached the point, however, where I can no longer avoid some very important repair work.

Later this week, I will have my first consultation with an orthopedic surgeon regarding the replacement of one of my damaged knees. It's something I've been putting off for a long time because of the impact it would have on my work schedule as a local high school TV sports announcer. But I can't put it off any longer.

It's not the pain as much as it is the uncertainly of my mobility.

My first knee injury came in high school.

I can handle pain. My left knee has bothered me since I was in high school, and I finally tried to address that in August 2020 with arthroscopic surgery on my left knee to remove what remained of my damaged meniscus. It helped for a while, but the meniscus is the cushion between the two major bones of your leg, and when it's gone, you've got bone rubbing against bone. As they say in medical terms, "that ain't good."

For many years, I forced my right knee to do extra work to compensate for the weakness of its partner on the left side. But gradually, that knee started to break down as well. Now both click and pop all the time, they give out at the most unexpected times and they pose a serious threat to my health if it happens at the worst time.

There were two such incidents in recent months that pushed me over the edge.

The first was when I drove up to Oakmont Regional High School to watch the Foxboro girls play in a non-league basketball game at mid-season. I got there just as the junior varsity game was wrapping up, and when it was over, I walked toward the center of the bleachers to find a place from which I could chart the game. 

When I got to the steps, I noticed that there was not an extended step to floor level that would make it easier to get to the first actual step. And the handrail in the middle of the aisle was pointed away from the floor, and not toward it, which made it impossible to reach and thus provide an assist to start the steps up.

This knee brace was a pain in the ass.

I looked at it and thought to myself, "Don't be such a wuss. It's one friggin' step. You can make that." So with briefcase and seat cushion in hand, I raised my right leg to get leverage on the first step, hopefully to be able to reach that handrail and pull myself up.

Didn't make it.

Once I put pressure on the right knee, it sent a wave of pain throughout my lower body and lost all strength. The result was a spectacular, ass-over-tea-kettle tumble to the gym floor that brought an audible gasp from the fans in the stands.

I wasn't hurt, just embarrassed beyond all redemption. People immediately came out of the stands and helped me to my feet, and I repeatedly thanked them and assured them that I was uninjured. Even Foxboro coach Lisa Downs came running over from the opposite sideline to make sure I was still in one piece.

The other incident of note took place on the day before we got our second huge snowstorm of the winter about a month ago. We had a little slush storm just before that, and I was at the base of my driveway trying to clear away what the town plows had pushed there, when I stepped on a flat, loose chunk of ice that was hidden from sight because of the slush covering it. It went out from under me, and for what seemed like an eternity, I thought I was on the verge of regaining my balance -- before my right knee just gave out and I started falling to the pavement.

I was able to turn just enough in mid-fall so my right shoulder would take the brunt of the impact and not my head. It hurt like a son of a bitch, and I initially thought I had broken my arm or dislocated my shoulder. But as I was lying flat on the street, I wiggled my fingers and then lifted my lower arm, so I assumed all was well. I turned over, crawled to my nearby fence and pulled myself up with my left arm.

For about a week, I couldn't lift the full right arm above shoulder level. Gradually, my range of motion improved. I still have some pain and a loss of strength in about a 20-percent area of rotation, much like when I tore my rotator cuff in high school. But for the most part, it's practically back to normal. 

Arthroscopic surgery wasn't invasive.
Whatever comes next will certainly be.

I'm just fed up with not knowing what my knees are going to do at any given moment. I have steps to climb and much more walking to do before my days on two feet are done. I'm not ready to surrender to infirmity. 

Most of the people I know who've had the procedure have encouraged me for some time to pursue it. One of those is Kristen McDonnell, the extremely successful basketball coach of the Braintree girls, Norwood boys and Norwood girls, who recently resigned from the latter job to spend more time with her family. As a player at Boston Latin and Stonehill College, McDonnell injured both of her knees more times than anyone would want to count. By the time she was in her late 30s, both of her knees had been replaced. And she has been the most enthusiastic supporter of my plans to follow through.

Now, keep in mind, as a young, athletic and fully motivated woman, McDonnell was able to recover her mobility fairly quickly. I'm 40 years older, and while I have shed some poundage from the days when I used to run up and down the sidelines covering football games, I certainly don't have the physique of Adonis. I have to remember that I need to heal and heed the advice of the medical professionals, no matter how frustrating that might be. And it may still interfere with a schedule I have from North TV that includes at least eight games in various sports -- but there's not much I can do about that. I'd rather have it interfere now than in the fall, when the schedule gets really busy again.

I will cross all of those bridges when I get to them. The whole point of all this is to be able to cross those bridges without falling down in mid-crossing.

Wish me luck, folks!

MARK FARINELLA is not known as the most patient person in the world where it comes to rehabilitation programs. After all, he walked 11,000 steps a day for nine days in Phoenix during the week leading up to Super Bowl 49 in 2015, about four weeks after suffering a mild stroke. Tell him to chill out and heal by emailing him at theownersbox2020@gmail.com.