Who's Your Caddy? (Random House Large Print) [Large Print] [Hardcover]

Rick Reilly (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 6, 2003 | Series: Random House Large Print

The funniest and most popular sportswriter in America abandons his desk at Sports Illustrated to caddy for some of the world’s most famous golfers, and some celebrity duffers, recounting it all in this hilarious and revealing look at the world of golf.

Who knows a golfer best? Who’s with them every minute of every round, hears their muttering, knows whether they cheat? Their caddies, of course. So sportswriter Rick Reilly figured that he could learn a lot about the players and their games by caddying, even though he had absolutely no idea how to do it. Amazingly, some of the best golfers in the world—including Jack Nicklaus, David Duval, Tom Lehman, John Daly, Casey
Martin, and Jill McGill—agreed to let Reilly carry their bags at actual PGA and LPGA Tour events. To round out his portrait of the golfing life, Reilly also caddied at the Masters, persuaded Deepak Chopra and Donald Trump to use him as a caddy, accompanied high-rolling golf hustlers in Las Vegas around the course, and carried the bag for a blind golfer.

In Who’s Your Caddy?, Reilly chronicles his experiences in the same inimitable style that makes his back-page column for Sports Illustrated a must-read for more than twenty million people every week. From his laugh-out-loud portrait of Deepak Chopra decomposing on the green, to his portraits of good ol’ boys who bet $100,000 a round, to his hilarious descriptions of his own ineptitude as a caddy, to his insights into what
makes the greats of golf so great, Reilly combines a wicked wit with an expert’s eye in a most original and entertaining look at golf.

Who’s Your Caddy? is the next best thing to a great round of golf. It is sure to delight low-handicappers, high-handicappers, and everyone in between.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

To really know someone, as the saying goes, you must walk a mile in their shoes. But to really understand a golfer, you've got to work as their caddy. Sports Illustrated columnist Rick Reilly managed to get some very intriguing golfers to let him lug their bag and write what he learned both about the game and the folks who play it. Going hole to hole with them let Reilly know a different side of veterans such as John Daly, David Duval, Tom Lehman, and Jack Nicklaus. But Reilly also went beyond the pros to caddy for Deepak Chopra, Donald Trump, professional gambler Dewey Tomko, and Bob Newhart. In some cases, the portraits that emerge fall directly in line with the popular image but at other times it's just the opposite. Daly is sober but has shifted his addiction to massive amounts of Diet Coke, candy, and marriages; Duval is intensely driven during rounds but surprisingly laid back and friendly off the course; Chopra's inner peace is locked in a mortal battle with the inherent frustrations of golf; and Trump manages to be both an egomaniac and a pretty nice fellow. And although he's on assignment to profile his temporary employers, Reilly emerges as an entertaining figure in his own right as he commits numerous faux pas, breaks taboos, infuriates multiple golfers and caddies, accidentally dumps all of Nicklaus's clubs onto the turf in the middle of a round, and discovers that caddying is tougher than it looks. Reilly walks a nice line with the tone of Who's Your Caddy?: it's reverent to the game without becoming a misty-eyed poetic ode, and it's laugh-out-loud funny without being nasty or low brow. And while golf fans will certainly appreciate it, Who's Your Caddy? is an impressive book for fans of biography in general. --John Moe --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Hilarious misadventures, catty gossip and downright embarrassing facts are only part of the appeal of this deftly written journal by Sports Illustrated writer Reilly (Missing Links). Caddying for a golf pro just might be every amateur golfer's dream. Reilly managed to talk 11 players, media personalities and one infamous gambler into letting him follow them inside the ropes, even though he had no experience as a caddy and showed that fact so many times that John Daly nicknamed him "Dumbshit." Consider spilling Jack Nicklaus's clubs out onto the wet ground, just as he asks you for a new ball. Or leaving David Duval's golf clubs in the locker room overnight (the ones he won the British Open with) and not being able to find them the next morning. Self-help guru Deepak Chopra recently took up the game and proved that although he may be able to control the aging process, hitting driver is beyond his mystical powers. Reilly gets serious while carrying Casey Martin's bag, the pro golfer who sued the PGA Tour for the right to ride a golf cart during tournaments (Martin suffers from a rare leg disorder that makes every step excruciatingly painful). Billionaire Donald Trump, comedian Bob Newhart, beautiful LPGA pro Jill McGill, Tom Lehman (there's a "Jimmy Stewart decency about him"), legendary gambler Dewey Tomko and blind golfer Bob Andrews round out the field and provide Reilly ample inspiration for a truly funny, don't-miss read.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Random House Large Print (May 6, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375432108
• ISBN-13: 978-0375432101
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (74 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,635,985 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very Funny Book!, May 28, 2003

By 

Robert Brock (Camden, Ohio USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Who's Your Caddy?: Looping for the Great, Near Great, and Reprobates of Golf (Hardcover)

I found this book to be a quick read (took me a weekend to read 250+ pages) and very enjoyable. I give it four stars on account of the people that Reilly interviewed while he walked the loop with them. My personal favorite was just how much of a redneck John Daly was. I cannot begin to explain some of this man's humor in life unless you read this book. After reading this book, you also realize just how nice Tom Lehman and Casey Martin are, and just how full of themselves Jack Nickalus and Donald Trump are. I found most the humor to be very good, but it just lacked the hook to really pull me in. There were some good moments though, including Reilly's constant problems with the golf bag and how easily he pisses golfers off. I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a quick laugh and one who wants to get an insight on walking with some of the pros on the PGA, but I also found that this book wouldn't win the "Most Humorous Book of the Year" award. A good read for most, especially fans of SI and Reilly's work.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Better Than the Back Page of Sports Illustrated, May 25, 2003

By 

P. O'Rourke "Patrick T. O'Rourke" (Highlands Ranch, CO United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Who's Your Caddy? (Random House Large Print) (Hardcover)

First, a disclaimer. I think Rick Reilly is one of the most creative and entertaining sportswriters out there. I thought it before picking up this book, and my impression has been confirmed.

I've read interviews about dozens of "golfers." Reilly's genius is his ability to turn those "golfers" into "people." In these short vignettes, Reilly not only gives you some insight into what makes people like John Daly and David Duval tick, but he does it an entertaining, mapcap manner.

There are sometimes when Reilly gets a bit over the top, such as when he uses expression like "eat hot titanium," but I can overlook these exaggerations when they serve to move the stories along. I know that I'll pick this book up time and again for light, fun reading.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Majestically unfunny, May 13, 2004

By 

"vandewille" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Who's Your Caddy?: Looping for the Great, Near Great, and Reprobates of Golf (Hardcover)

Reilly is like the kid in high school who tries sooo hard to be funny: some of the jokes he tells might indeed be good, but the sheer, focused effort to "be funny" conveys a sad idiocy to it. Many of his "funny" lines read like they should be accompanied by a vaudeville cymbal-crash, or at very least the canned laughs of 70s sitcoms. His relentless self-deprecating fun-poking at his own caddying inability comes across as contrived in someone who, at other junctures in the book, is revealed to be a solid low-to-no handicap player. The sections on Trump and Jill McGill were decent. The rest was a write-off, and revealed no more abut the inner workings of tour golf that you can glean attending a practice round at any tournament. The snippets of translated "caddy lingo" are pitiful, and by the end of the book I was simply skipping them outright.

This book will appeal to some tastes - after all, even "Blind Date" and "Maury" find audiences... somewhere. If you love watching "Grey Goose 19th Hole" on Golf Channel, or you tape or TiVo episodes of "Peter Jacobsen Unplugged", buy the book with no second thoughts. Otherwise, redeploy your money to another piece of golf literature (Ken Venturi's "Up and Down...", for instance) and you'll be glad you did.