About 10 years into his retirement, Ron Blackmon’s wife told him it was time he found something to do. “To be honest, I wish she told me sooner,” he says, his eyes lighting up. “Because I love what I do. I tell folks all the time, ‘I love my new offices.’ ”
He gestures to the stunning backdrop of City Park Golf Course on a crisp spring morning. “There’s downtown, the mountains,” he says. “And all I have to do be nice to people who are out here to have a good time.”
Ron and his ever-present smile represent the new breed of golf’s kumbaya, namaste on-course patrol. Traditionally, and still at many facilities, they’re known as rangers or marshals. The trendier titles are Player Assistant, as at the CGA’s CommonGround and other upscale courses, or, at City Park and Denver’s other overflowing munis, Player Ambassador.
These positions are filled today by paid hires, not retirees trading their time for free rounds. (At Beaver Creek, two years’ experience is required and housing might be available.) The help-wanted ads qualifications include words like “outgoing,” “courteous,” “friendly.” He or she is a people’s person who enjoys interacting with players and has, as the Aurora job description articulated, “a servant oriented attitude.”
“We changed from Ranger to Player Ambassador five or six years ago, because we wanted it to be more collaborative, more friendly, rather than antagonistic,” says Scott Rethlake, Denver’s Director of Golf. “It’s a fun job for a people person. I liken it to good service at a restaurant, where you’re asked, ‘How was your meal?’ It’s a relationship building position, not an enforcer.”
“You can’t be shy and be sitting underneath a tree trying not to interact,” agrees CommonGround Director of Golf Operations Ben Pennymon, who counts flight attendants, educators and a pilot among the on-course assistants. “You have to be willing to engage, and be comfortable with difficult conversations, because every conversation around pace of play starts the same way: ‘Hey, I see you’re out of position, da da da.’ ‘Oh, well, we were waiting on these guys the past two holes, da da da.’ ”
Ah yes, pace of play. The busy South Suburban golf courses abandoned their volunteer marshal program because, says district Director of Golf Bill Ramsey, “When we evaluated the situation, we did not feel course marshals had any impact on the speed on play and we were incurring costs. We periodically have the staff make a tour of the golf course or respond to complaints.”
But at other Colorado courses, keeping players moving around the course remains the objective of a professional player assistant. At City Park, Ron shows me his clipboard, which lists every tee time from open to close and what time that group should be finishing each hole based on an 18-hole goal of four and a half hours. “Even if there are gaps, as long as a group is on time, we don’t harass them,” he says. If he sees a group waiting at a tee, he’ll stop and say hello, see if they’re doing OK and let them know what’s ahead.
The tee sheets are full, too, at CommonGround, but Pennymon has no intention of letting the course get a reputation for long rounds. “I don’t want to go there,” he says. “There are a couple golf courses that I personally won’t go play just because I know when I go there it’s a five-and-a-half-hour round.”
CommonGround uses a GPS-based system called Tagmarshal, golf’s version of Big Brother because it knows when you drove the cart where you shouldn’t or whether your group is off pace. It keeps CG’s player assistants informed on backups and identifies what it calls “delayers” in need of what Ben calls “a gentle nudge.”
“The first thing we have our player assistants do is introduce themselves and ask how the round is going, how’s the pace of play, have an interaction,” he says. “Then if there needs to be a conversation around pace of play, they can say, ‘Hey guys, you’ve got a little space in front of you. If you can pick up your pace and just try to catch the group in front of you and stay in that position then you’ll be in good shape.’ So it’s kind of a tiered approach.”
The next interaction might be: “Hey guys, gimme one hole, one fast hole. Play a scramble if you want, whatever you need to do to catch up again.” Finally, there might follow the “nuclear option:” Pick up, skip this hole, move forward.
“That hardly ever happens,” says Pennymon.
That’s probably a function of the collaborative spirit fostered by the new breed of on-course personnel. At one course, the approach of the marshal means a new joke is coming or that wedge you left at the last hole is arriving. At another, if the ranger’s coming there’s bound to be a compensatory golf ball tossed, or fresh ice water offered on a hot day.
Making the rounds with Ron at City Park, he starts at Hole 9 and works backward, so players see him coming. They wave and trade pleasantries, Ron asking, “How’s it going?” He hops out at a green and smooths over a bunker, something he likes to help with if a group is behind. He checks in with a threesome waiting on the tee of a par-three. At the range, he picks up buckets and trash.
“I want to make sure folks have a good experience here at my country club,” he says with a wink.
We stop and chat with Doc Fishman, who taught Ron the ropes two years ago. “People are a little nervous when they see you,” Doc says, “So the idea is just to be nice to people.”
“Some people think we’re out to get them,” Ron says. “We’re not out to get them, we’re trying to keep the pace of play moving so everybody has a good time.”
In fact, these friendly people persons would like the public to look forward to seeing them. Says Pennymon: “We’re operating within a shared space. If we don’t take care of it, the golf course, the facility, collectively together, no one can enjoy it. Use the player assistants as a resource, knowing that they are employed for the whole entire purpose of helping the golf course to be better, to run better, and for everyone collectively to have a positive experience while they’re out playing golf.”