2020 Beat Down | cidercup

2020 Beat Down.

The 8th Annual Cider Cup was held on October 24th/25th at the Cynthiana Country Club in gloomy, misty, cold conditions. While we’ve had some colder temps in previous “Cups”, there’s always been at least one of the days or afternoons where the weather cooperated. Not in 2020. It was consistently dismal from start to finish. But, no matter what “Mother Nature” threw at us, the players spirits remained high.

For the 3rd consecutive year, there were 40 golfers participating including six rookies. Sparks’ Team had Eric Sanders, Weston Jenkins and Steve Slade playing in their first ever Cider Cup and compiling 5 wins, 5 losses and 2 ties to contribute a very respectable 6 points. McCauley’s Team countered with three 1st timers as well. They were Bart Lenox, Terry Jolly and Taylor Hill. The trio contributed 5.5 points by winning 5 matches, losing 6 and halving 1.

As usual, both coaches had some obstacles to overcome fielding teams of 20 players, but once set, the issues were minimal.

Team Sparks

Chris Anderson and Monty Moore both had to deal with excruciating “Cuticle Trauma” on Sunday but somehow gutted it out.
Mike Aldridge spent Saturday night with “explosive” diarrhea (a malady all too familiar with Sparks’ Team) and was replaced in the Singles matches by Charlie Biancke.

Team McCauley

JD Ashbrook had a previous appointment to coach his daughter’s soccer team and was replaced by some guy we just called “YMCA Guy”. I don’t think I ever actually saw him.

It was shaping up to be the closest competition in Cider Cup History based on the Team HDCPS, but oh how that would prove otherwise.

The 9 Hole Scramble session was first up. Looking at the matches as they went off (1st Match on 1 and 5, etc), you will see that the “Olds” were down 7-1 until Bolin/Stephens and Case/Aldridge got it to 7-3. I realize that the matches didn’t end exactly in this order, but an interesting look nonetheless.

The afternoon matches were 18 Holes of Alternate Shot. It is the only format that Sparks’ Team leads in the overall series as McCauley’s Team tied up the Singles and Chapman this year.

Once again, Sparks’ Team was able to hold serve and pull to within 1 point as Saturday’s action came to an end with the score 10.5 to 9.5. Even-though I was well on my way to my first 0-4-0 performance, I felt good about my Team going into Sunday. Little did I know about the “Beat Down” that was coming on Sunday.

Thanks to some fast work by my Tiffani Sparks/Madison Case along with some help from spectator Fred Denniston, we were back in the Cart Barn for the annual GALA, which should probably be renamed if it’s going to be held in a Cart Barn. We enjoyed great food from Porterhouse BBQ and the musical stylings of John Daniel Herrington. We also raised right at $2000 during our silent and live auction. (By the way, if you haven’t paid for your item yet, please Venmo me). I think it’s safe to say that the Cart Barn is the permanent home of the Cider Cup Saturday Night Festivities. Everyone seemed to have a great time.

As we arose on Sunday to even colder weather than Saturday, we gathered outside for a short devotional from Larry Bishop. It was here that I should’ve known the “Beat Down” was inevitable. It started out so innocently with “Bish” reminding us that we need not fear. I’m thinking he’s going to say that we need not fear death if we have Jesus as our Savior, or that we need not fear the uncertainty in this world because God is in control which are both absolutely true….but it went a different direction. Maybe it was the fact that he was wearing short pants in such cold weather?

Who knows, but what we witnessed next, was the anointment of St. Hank.

Now look, there is nobody that loves Hank any more than me. I think he is awesome, but St. Hank?? Nope.

But the blessing had been bestowed and there was nothing anyone could do to change it. Interestingly, St. Hank went 0-2-0 on Sunday. Maybe it was too overwhelming for him, but the rest of the team seemed buoyed by the fact that they had a Saint on their team. What happened to my team after that was similar to the Egyptian Army marching thru the Red Sea on dry land only to be swallowed up by the water just when the other side was in sight. My Team was off to a great start winning the first 2 matches and actually held the lead……but then St. Hank held out his staff and here came the flood. His team won 7 of the next 8 matches and held a 17.5 to 12.5 Point lead going into Singles.

I still felt Ok as we’ve had very good success in the past with Singles. I’ll admit that I was concerned, but liked my matchups and since we’re on this Biblical theme, I was looking forward to the “David vs Goliath” match.

Well, this time Goliath won. Oh did he ever, as the Team went 11-5-4 in the Singles to crush their opponent.

At one point during my Singles match against “Buzzsaw”, my teammate Kelvin Winkle looked at the scoreboard and saw that the prediction was 26-24 and I’m thinking that we could flip some matches and make this thing tight. I’m fired up. Then about a hole later, Kelvin utters those prophetic words while looking at the app….. “Uh oh, something’s happened and it isn’t good.”

The final tally was the most lopsided points-wise of any Cider Cup thus far with a deficit of 11 points. Oddly enough though it ranks as the 3rd most lopsided event percentage of points deficit as 30.5 out of a possible 50 = 61.0%. In 2015, Sparks’ team won by scoring 61.4% of the points and in 2016, McCauley’s Team returned the favor by scoring 61.3% of the points.

Some stats from the event:

14 of the 50 matches went to the last hole vs 22 last year.9 or the 20 Singles matches went to the final hole. Sparks’ Team lost 4 and halved 4, only winning one of those. Had we flipped the losses and halves to wins, that would've given us exactly 25.5 points and the Cup. I know, I know, if “If’s and Buts were candy and nuts”, but this one’s going to sting for a bit and I need something.

Bob Ammerman, Bill Meeks and Scott Bolin each had perfect records of 4-0-0 for the event.

The Cider Cup now stands at 5 wins for McCauley’s Team and 3 Wins for Team Sparks.

I still refer to it as McCauley/Sparks although Stephen turned the reigns over to Austin midway thru the pairings event so we will certainly be coming up with more permanent team names for next year.

Congratulations to the winners. You guys played great and our hats are off to you.

To my team, I’d go to battle with you guys any day. You played your butts off.

Special thanks to:

Grant Howard and Mike Lenox for their work getting the course in shape.

Joe and Emily Ammerman for opening their front porch to us on Thursday night for the “Pairings Party”.

Amanda, Jimmy and Beth – unbelievable job by them.

Brian Kinsey for his work on the Golf Gamebook App.

Larry Bishop for the devotional.

Our wives, friends and families for their support in allowing us to act like kids for a few days.

Tiffani Sparks, Emily Ammerman and the untold others that provided an incredible Saturday morning breakfast event.

To the Cider Cup Rookies. Thanks for playing. I hope the experience was all you hoped it would be and you’re looking forward to next year as much as the rest of us.

Your generosity. I don’t have the final totals yet, but believe we raised a little over $4300 which will put this over $30K! Unbelievable!!!Finally, I want to thank all you for playing. It is without question my favorite golf event of the year. It’s invigorating and so intense. We grind over every tee shot, pitch, chip and putt. When the last putt drops I am always mentally and physically exhausted, totally spent in bed by 9:00 PM …..and I can’t wait to do it again next year.

www.cidercup.com as I will be adding stats, info and pics in the coming days.

I’ll leave you with this closing thought, which is the same thing I said last year.

In the book of Revelation, Jesus tells the church of Laodicea…”15 I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! 16 So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”

One of the many things that I love about the Cider Cup is that there is no “lukewarm or cold” attitudes. You guys have a passion that shows up in this event like no other I’m a part of. How else can you explain the fact that you just played 54 holes of golf in inclement weather and had a ball. That’s passion and dedication, nothing lukewarm in my book. Just think if we (I) approached everything in life like the Cider Cup? Giving it our (my) all. My hope is that I would come home every day as exhausted as I am after the Cider Cup because I lived and loved the way God intended me to, leaving everything out there. What a difference that would make.

God Bless all of you and again, thanks for being a part of this.

I can’t wait for the 2021 Cider Cup!!!!

Ray Sparks