Jerry Barber

Jerry Barber, nearing 77 and a professional golfer for more than half a century, is beginning to think nobody likes him. The Senior PGA Tour doesn't have room for him, and many regular tour members resent his presence. Barber, who didn't earn enough money to qualify for the tour for players 50 and older, didn't come close to making the cut in the Nissan L.A. Open at Riviera Country Club when he shot an 83 Saturday to go with a first-round 80.

The baseball diamond in Davenport, Iowa, is under water from the Mississippi River flood, but that hasn't kept the Quad Cities River Bandits from playing their home games. The Bandits borrowed North Scott High School's field in Eldridge, 10 miles west--on dry land. A soybean field runs along the left-field side, like a scene out of "Field of Dreams."

How did you and your significant other spend Valentine's Day? A romantic dinner? A twilight stroll on the beach? A sip of wine by the fireplace? Wimps. A certain Camarillo couple did Valentine's Day the right way--in Malibu Creek State Park, walking on planks and swinging from trees. Now that's togetherness. Laurel Hunter and Alan Sailer joined four other couples in a seven-hour-plus "Adventure Ropes Course" run by the Wilderness Institute of Agoura Hills.

Let's see, there was the Adams Tight Lies. Cha-ching. "And there were some other three- and five-woods," Chuck Magnuson says. Cha-ching. "And some fairway irons, or one for the tee and one for the fairway." Cha-ching. And the Killer Bee. Cha-ching. "And the Big Bertha Callaway," Magnuson says. "And a real whippy driver, because I hit every wood 200 yards and I wanted to hit it farther." Cha-ching. "And three putters." Cha-ching.

Long before professional sports moved into the area, the unique Cravens Cup golf tournament was a major event each May in Southern California. Club golf tournaments were big around here. The Cravens, involving most of the top amateurs, was something special. It commanded widespread interest and the attention of the media. With the arrival of horse racing, the Rams, Dodgers, Lakers and Angels, amateur golf was shunted to the back--or ignored completely.

Mike Buroza arrives at Los Verdes Golf Club each day about 5:30 a.m. It's one of the busiest public golf courses in the country, so, like everyone else going there, Buroza must get there early. The difference is, Buroza arrives without clubs. He is the head professional at Los Verdes, and that means he won't have time to play golf.

It has been 32 years since the PGA Tour held an event at Olympia Fields Country Club and 75 years since a U.S. Open has been staged at the suburban Chicago course, so local knowledge is going to be hard to come by until practice rounds this week at the layout where the 103rd U.S. Open championship will be decided. Tiger Woods, who won his second Open title last year at Bethpage Black in New York, played a practice round at Olympia Fields two weeks ago and concluded a strong start is possible.