After logging more than 1,300 miles on my car in less than eight days, the
Skinny is back. And I’m more amped up than a kid hooked on Jolt.

Why shouldn’t I be?

The CGT boys have been making some serious noise up and down the eastern seaboard.

Jeff Martin qualified for the PGA Championship at the Club Professional Championship in South Carolina. Todd Westfall won the Greater Portland (ME) Open. Bill Link qualified for a Nationwide Tour event in West Virginia.

Everyone is joining in the action, including 1980 Olympic Hockey goalie Jim Craig, who has traded in his goalie pads and skates for a set of clubs and is in the Pro-Am field at LeBaron.

Things are looking up. But don’t ask me to glance towards the heavens. I’m afraid to after incorrectly predicting rain wouldn’t interfere with the Atlantic City Hilton Classic. Monday’s first round had more delays, stops and starts than the New Jersey Turnpike during rush hour. (Trust me; I drove home in it, along with probably half of the Tour.)

Yup. I’m leaving screwing up the weather forecast to the experts. I’m going to stick with what I know best. Golf, baby.

For those of you looking to pad your lead in the CGT rotisserie leagues (hey, they might exist), let’s take a quick inventory of who’s feeling it heading into the LeBaron Hills Open.

Right out of the gates, I have three players log-jammed at my #1 position. Each has won an event in the last month. And each has shown Brillo pad type toughness in final rounds.

Call me Mr. Bandwagon (See: my tendency for picking recent winners as favorites), but Andy Bare’s come from behind victory in the Atlantic City Hilton Classic was nothing short of phenomenal.

The transplanted North Carolinian, now living in Vermont, began the final round six shots behind Noah Zelnik, a proven front runner who had converted his only other 36 hole lead into a win in the ’03 Atkinson Open.

In need of a hot streak that would make Phoenix’s summers blush, Bare, a CGT rookie, proceeded to blitz the 7,300-yard Twisted Dune Golf Club for nine birdies, including six red dippers during a back nine 30 that leapfrogged him over several seasoned professionals faster than you can say, “Rookie
schmookie.”

Not impressed? Well, that closing 64 wasn’t even close to a flash in the pan. (Check his player bio for supplementary information then read on.) Through six rounds on Tour, Bare has tallied the most birdies with 29. He
ranks third in scoring average. Statistics aside, off the tee he’s longer than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s career, which should serve him well on each of LeBaron Hills four reachable par 5s.

Rob Oppenheim, who stumbled down the stretch with two back nine bogeys in Atlantic City, isn’t exactly looking to reinvent the wheel. Keep in mind; he has five top 11 finishes in his last six CGT events. Throw in a second in
the Greater Portland Open two weeks ago for good measure. Robby’s nickname should be Land O’ Lakes because he’s on a roll.

My final recipient of this week’s top billing is Todd Westfall, who only happens to be the LeBaron Hills defending champion and who happened to win the Greater Portland Open with a gutsy closing round of 68. Yes. His
confidence is up. Obviously. But his affinity for LeBaron Hills strikes me as more important. There are horses for courses. And then there’s Todd Westfall and LeBaron Hills, whose 2nd and 6th holes ranked as the two most
difficult on Tour in ‘04.

After each round of last year’s event, Westfall couldn’t rave enough about LeBaron’s layout. The contour of the greens. The links-style feel of the course while transplanted Scottish clouds hung overhead. The plush
fairways. You name it. Everything fit his eye. Westfall appreciated LeBaron Hills more than Dick Vitale appreciates players from the ACC.

It was almost no big surprise, then, that he hung tough down the stretch to defeat Billy Downes and current PGA Tour rookie Sean O’Hair en route to earning his first CGT win.

I’m not saying he’s going to pull a Daily Double, but, hey, Mark O’Meara won at Pebble Beach four times. Maybe Todd Westfall will be best friends with Tiger Woods soon.

These three names have caught the Skinny’s eye, but there are dozens of other challengers who could emerge from the pack and leave LeBaron victorious.

Egloff. Sisk (Ahem, the three-time player of the year). Salinetti. Lamberti. Zelnik. Donovan. Downes. Carbone. The possibilities are endless. Just like making your selections for your Rotisserie league.

See you at LeBaron Hills.