Thread by @EnswellJones

So one time, GOLF magazine asked me to play a round with Arturo Gatti and Micky Ward and write about it. If you don’t know those names, they were two tough-as-nails boxers who fought three hellacious fights against each other and somehow became golf buddies.

The night before, we all went out for dinner at an Italian restaurant. Arturo and Micky spent the meal laughing about the permanent damage they’d done to each other. Arturo started, lifting up his shirt to show off a lump in his midsection that Micky had somehow made in him.

Micky—he was played by Mark Wahlberg in The Fighter and has a terrific Boston accent—went next, talking about how Arturo had basically knocked his eye out and he couldn’t see anymore. Their friendship had literally started in the hospital. I was like, these two guys are insane.

Anyway, the next day, we met at the golf course. We started with a photo shoot. I have always hated doing a story the same day as the photo shoot, because some (not all) photographers are selfish, precious dickheads who burn up all the time and leave the subjects spent.

This guy was ESPECIALLY like that. He took hours putting the fellas in gloves and boxing robes, holding clubs and driving carts. I kept saying, Buddy, we have a round of golf to play. If we don’t play, there’s no story, and your photos won’t run. “Just one more.” I was dying.

Finally, we got free and made for the first tee. We were met by an entourage. Somehow, six of us were supposed to golf, and there were at least a dozen other heavies straight out of The Sopranos spinning around us in carts. “I’m not sure the course will like this,” I said.

Arturo looked at me and said, “What the fuck are they going to do about it?” I looked at the collection of low foreheads and smashed noses around me. Leather coats and fistfuls of gold rings at a golf course. “Right,” I said. Nothing. They’re going to do absolutely nothing.

I need to add here: I am a bad golfer, and I am especially terrible when I play with strangers and/or an audience. To make matters worse, the first shot was over water. And I was stressed from the photo shoot. Friends, my bunghole was puckered up like I’d fed it a lemon.

As casually as I could, I toss up the tee to decide who hits first. Arturo. Then Micky. Then me. Arturo has a professional set of clubs with an embroidered bag and I’m like, Oh shit, here we go. He sets up with his driver and swings like he’s trying to knock someone’s teeth out.

He makes it over the water but hooks it well off the fairway. Micky’s turn. Micky hits a power duff and shoots the ball high enough to start rain. “Where’d my fahking ball go?” he says. He really can’t see. Like, a minute later it lands with a thud two yards in front of him.

Now it’s my turn. I am sweating. I had one club that I could hit pretty well—my 4-iron, weirdly. For some reason it just fit me. I tee up, and I shit you not, my legs were shaking so bad, my knees clacked together. I take 1,000 deep breaths and start my trademark baseball swing.

Friends, I have never hit a purer golf shot in my life. Felt nothing. Ball travels on a rope, as straight as an arrow, more than 200 yards down the fairway. A huge wave of relief washes over me. And I turn to Arturo Gatti and Micky Ward and say: “TAKE THAT, BITCHES.”

Years later, I can’t explain why the hell I said that. It just came out of my mouth. And two of the hardest men on Earth, along with their army of professional legbreakers, just stare holes into me, in my little polo shirt and cargo shorts and with my 4-iron trembling in my hand.

It was one of the longest, quietest moments of my life. Finally, everyone wordlessly heads to their carts. We haul down the fairway like the marauders in Mad Max: Fury Road, hit our next shots, pummel that first green to death, and head to the second tee. Total silence.

Maybe ten minutes later, Arturo turns to Micky: “I don’t want to play anymore.” And that was it. They all vanish. I finish my round alone, waiting to get dropped by a bullet from the trees. “Take that, bitches.” Jiminy Christmas. At least we had lots of photos to fill the space.