Eddie Doc a Philly PGA Hall of Famer

   An overdue visit to the Philadelphia Section PGA website this week revealed an item that I missed and it’s an oversight worth addressing.

   Last fall, the section inducted Linwood native, St. James graduate, Vietnam War hero, PGA Tour and Champions Tour winner -- and probably one of the nicest guys you’ll ever want to meet – Ed Dougherty to its Hall of Fame.

   As a golf fan, I was aware of Dougherty in the 1970s, mostly from when he contended at the 1975 PGA Championship at Firestone Country Club.

   I first crossed paths with him at a Section Championship -- I want to say it had to be 1978 or thereabouts -- that I was covering for the long defunct five-day-a-week daily Montgomery Publishing put out of Fort Washington called Today’s Post.

  Regardless of the year, the tournament was held at the Philadelphia Cricket Club’s classic old course (the Milita Hill Course didn’t exist yet) and Dougherty dominated the first couple of days.

   On his way to what looked like an easy victory, an old wrist injury suddenly flared up and Eddie the Docs started hitting it sideways. He did not win the tournament. It ended up in a four-way playoff at dusk and I believe Mike Nilon ended up winning.

   But Doc never complained and, while he had to be frustrated, he just dealt with it and moved on.

   Fast forward 20 years when I staffed the Bell Atlantic Classic Senior Tour event for the Daily Times the first time it was played at Hartefeld National in Chester County.

   Doc had turned 50 the previous fall and was anxious to get out on the senior circuit because he knew he could still play and there was money to be made. Of course, Doc being Doc, a back injury – related to treatment he was receiving for another chronic injury – cropped up, preventing him from making it to the Senior Q-School.

  As a local guy it wasn’t too hard for Doc to scare up a sponsor’s exemption to the Bell Atlantic, but it was just his second start and he needed to start making some money to avoid going to Q-School the following fall.

   In what I am quite certain he has to consider a career highlight, Doc rolled in an eight-foot birdie putt on the 18^th green at Hartefeld to complete a brilliant 8-under 64 in the final round. It gave him a tie for third and a $66,000 check and one of Delco’s favorite sons was off and running as a senior golfer.

   On a day when another local favorite, Berwyn’s and Aronimink Golf Club’s Jay Sigel, won the event and the greatest player in the whole darn history of the game, Jack Nicklaus, was in the field, there were few roars louder than the racket Eddie’s Delco fans made when that birdie putt disappeared into the cup at the 18^th.

   He got the most out the “second-chance” tour as he could, winning two times and banking nearly $6 million. He thrilled his many Delco fans, particularly the membership at the course he always called home, Edgmont Country Club, when he battled to the end before settling for a second-place finish at the 1999 U.S. Senior Open in West Des Moines, Iowa.

   His only PGA Tour win came at the 1995 Deposit Guaranty in Mississippi when he was 48. He was off and on the tour for much of his pre-senior days and whe he wasn’t touring he was winning the Philadelphia Open in 1983, the National Club Pro in 1985 on his way to being named the PGA Club Professional of the Year and the Section Championship in 1986.

   “It’s a humbling experience and I’m honored to go in with such a great professional and friend in George (McNamara),” Dougherty told the Philadelphia Section PGA website in October. “I played a round of golf in 1969 at Edgmont Country Club after returning from the war and ended up with a career.”

   A career that has done Delaware County, golfers and non-golfers alike, proud.

Pine Valley No. 1, Merion No. 6 in Golf Digest rankings

   With 153 days until the 2013 U.S. Open tees off at Merion Golf Club’s historic East Course in the Ardmore section of Haverford Township, it is the perfect time to review the Golf Digest biennial rankings of America’s top courses.

  The Golf Digest rankings are the original and probably still the best and the publication has gone to great lengths to create a numerical value with which to measure the country’s top layouts. Still, when one of the criteria is ambience, we’re not exactly talking wins-above-replacement, or whatever that stat is the sabermaticians have dreamed up to measure a player’s worth to his team.

   When the statistical dust cleared at the Golf Digest offices, Pine Valley was declared the best course in America. However, even Ron Whitten, the author of the piece, had to admit that Pine Valley’s edge over Augusta National was so small that it amounted to a statistical dead heat.

   Regardless, Pine Valley, the gem in the pine barrens halfway to the South Jersey shore from Philadelphia, has always been at or near the top of the rankings. That’s why so many top pros and amateurs in the area were so anxious to tee it up in qualifiers for the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s Open Championship when it was held at Pine Valley last summer.

   It’s why Episcopal Academy senior Sean Fahey can be pretty darn proud of himself for getting around 36 holes at the greatest golf course in America in 78 and 79 at the Philly Open in the summer before his senior year in high school.

   Merion’s East Course has consistently been among the top 10 in the Golf Digest rankings, although it may have fallen out a couple of times during some lean years between the 1989 U.S. Amateur and the 2005 U.S. Amateur. But the East in a lean year is better than most golf courses can ever hope to be.

   With the Open returning to a rejuvenated and muscled-up Grand Dame of the Main Line on the heels of the 2005 U.S. Amateur and the 2009 Walker Cup Match, Hugh Wilson’s East Course sits at No. 6 on the 2013 Golf Digest rankings, just behind Pittsburgh’s Oakmont Country Club and just ahead of Pebble Beach.

  The only other Delaware County course in the top 100 is Aronimink Golf Club, which is ranked 80^th. I thought maybe the Donald Ross classic might move higher as a result of two really nice stagings of the AT&T National in 2010 and 2011. I’m pretty sure Aronimink’s been ranked higher over the years, but the membership in Newtown Square knows what a high-quality layout they have.

   In the state-by-state breakdown, obviously it’s Oakmont, Merion East and Aronimink at 1-2-3, respectively, in Pennsylvania. Three western Pennsylvania layouts, Laurel Valley, Huntsville and Fox Chapel occupy the next three spots. The Lehigh Valley is represented at 7 and 8, respectively, by Lehigh Valley Country Club and Saucon Valley’s Old Course, which the USGA has gone to for two Senior Opens and a Women’s Open in the last 20 years or so.

  The Philadelphia area is represented at Nos. 9 and 11, respectively, by two classics, Huntingdon Valley Country Club and Philadelphia Country Club. At No. 10 is Lancaster Country Club. Saucon Valley’s Weyhill Course is ranked 12^th.

   At 13 is the only other Delco course on the list, Rolling Green Golf Club, site of the 1976 U.S. Women’s Open. The USGA will return to Springfield Township, it was announced late last year, for the 2016 U.S. Women’s Amateur.

   The Mystic Rock Course at the Nemacolin Woodlands Resort in western Pennsylvania is 14^th on the list followed at 15 by Applebrook Golf Club, a really neat course you can see from Paoli Pike In East Goshen Township, Chester County.

   Stonewall’s Old Course in the far reaches of Chester County is ranked 20^th in Pennsylvania. It was the site of a memorable Delco battle royal for the 2009 Philadelphia Amateur Championship with former Strath Haven standout Conrad Von Borsig defeating former Haverford School star James Kania in the title match. And Philadelphia Cricket Club’s relatively new Militia Hill Course, where I’ve seen The Haverford School’s Michael Kania and Cole Berman win Inter-Ac League individual titles in recent years, is ranked 22^nd in the Keystone State.