CULLMAN, Ala. – Cross Creek Golf Course hosted a Veterans Golfer Appreciation event Monday, and the course was packed with players enjoying a perfect day for golf and contributing to a great cause. Local veteran Brad Davis led the charge in organizing the event and wanted to thank everyone who contributed to putting it together on short notice.
“JG’s Campen Life RV Campground helped get money donated to cover a lot of the expenses and they covered the biggest majority of the food that we got so they’re responsible for a lot of making this happen,” Davis said. “Someone else I want to thank is Your Golf Super Store over in Huntsville. That’s my home away from home. Anything I need they take care of me, so they give me stuff to raffle and give away at amazing prices.”
Veterans had discounted green fee and holes 3, 10 and 13 featured closest to the pin competitions. Veteran winners received a Seminole Golf Course pin flag autographed by the legendary golf professional Bob Ford. Nonveteran players won a PING red, white, and blue hat. Hole 16 was a very special wager hole. Players could wager $20-$100 and if you birdie the hole, you double your money. As an added incentive to wager, everyone who participated was entered into a raffle for an Odyssey DFX 2-Ball putter.
Raffle tickets were available for $10 each and all proceeds went to the PGA HOPE organization.
Some of the prizes included:
Mizuno S23 60° Wedge
Mizuno S23 56° Wedge
Tour Edge Hot Launch C524 driver
Callaway Shield Umbrella
Yeti Tumblr
$50 gift cards for Top Golf
1 hour golf lessons at Steven DeBoer Golf Academy
Mizuno Camo BR-D4C Cart bag
Guided Kayak Fishing Trip from Chad Hoover Fishing ($500 value)
Deep Home Cleaning from Fraziers Cleaning ($350 value)
Free rounds of golf from Cross Creek
As a disabled veteran, Davis had trouble finding relief from many of his struggles until he began playing golf three years ago and eventually became involved with PGA HOPE.
“I’m 100% disabled with PTSD, depression, anxiety and daily suicidal ideations and I found gold about three years ago now. Nothing has ever really stuck with me, and I’ve never been able to concentrate to do anything for very long, so I started playing for about a month and then I started looking for military organizations that do stuff with veterans and found PGA HOPE (Helping Our Patriots Everywhere),” Davis said. “They teach veterans, disabled or not, how to play the game over the course of eight lessons. The lessons are all done by certified PGA pros that have gone through adaptive golf training, so they know how to work with single amputees, double amputees, the blind and others and I’ve actually attended the training just to see what it was like.”
PGA HOPE has been a great resource for Davis, and he wants to help the organization reach more people here in Alabama.
“Recently I’ve actually been in the process of becoming an ambassador. I’ve done three speaking engagements so far. There’s one PGA HOPE chapter so far in the state of Alabama and it’s the one I started here at the (Steven DeBoer) Golf Academy and just this past week all the PGA pros from all the Robert Trent Jones courses got certified as PGA HOPE instructors,” Davis said. “So, we’re really excited about that. I love sharing the game and sharing the change that PGA HOPE has put into my life. I’m a pretty open book. I feel like maybe God has given me an ability to talk about a lot of the things that have happened to me so I can help others.”
Cross Creek’s Head Golf Pro Ches Harris was glad they were able to get the event organized in time for Veterans Day and was happy to see the community show its support for a great cause.
“Being a PGA member, it really means a lot to see the proceeds going to an organization like PGA HOPE is awesome and Brad is a prime example of what it can do,” Harris said. “We’ve had close to 11 people play so far today and it got shared a lot on social media, so I think people were excited about it. Then the people who didn’t know about it that have come in today and saw that they were getting free hot dogs and door prizes and things like that have been excited about it too.”
Reflecting on how golf has changed his life, Davis reflected on one of his darkest days and shared that it was the game of golf and more importantly, the people he has met since he began playing, that saved him. Now, Davis wants to use the game of golf to help save people himself.
“A few months ago, I was supposed to go down to Dothan to speak and had probably one of my worst days ever. I went by the store and got half a case of beer and had all my prescription pain medicine with me. I went to my dad’s grave and drank all 12 of them to give myself the courage to go through with it and I had reached out to a few people to tell them I appreciated everything they’d done for me and one of the people was Ches (Harris) here. He told me ‘No, it’s not time yet. You’ve got your stories to tell, and you’ve got people to help.’ So, I tell everyone man if I can save one person through the game of golf, I’m a happy man,” Davis said. “You see that I’m covered in comic book tattoos and that’s why I tell people that everybody has the ability to be a superhero in someone’s life. Whether it’s making them smile when they’re having a bad day, helping them on the side of the road when they’re broken down or in a car accident sitting there bleeding, everybody has the ability to be a superhero. And maybe this is my calling to go save some lives.”
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