Michael Block kept doing and saying Michael Block things in his PGA Tour Champions debut on Friday.<\/p>\n
Block\u2014the everyman teaching pro who recognizes that he\u2019s been a polarizing figure among golf fans\u2014turned 50 on June 16 and that affords him the opportunity play on the top-level senior circuit. Block doesn\u2019t have a tour card, but he\u2019s available for sponsor\u2019s exemptions, and he figures to be a popular choice after bursting onto the national scene in the 2023 PGA Championship by contending into the weekend and making a hole-in-one at Oak Hill in Rochester, N.Y.<\/p>\n
As it happens, the Dick\u2019s Open is being played this week in Endicott, N.Y., 130 miles southeast of Rochester, and the sporting goods company title sponsor figured En-Joie Golf Course would be the perfect spot for Block\u2019s senior debut.<\/p>\n
Block, a teaching pro in Southern California, happily accepted and admitted earlier this week that he was more nervous playing on the senior tour than in majors, because he grew up idolizing the players who are over 50.<\/p>\n
One thing that wasn\u2019t different: Block\u2019s ability to meet the moment. Block poured in seven birdies to go with just one bogey in shooting six-under-par 66. That was good enough to get him into a tie for fifth, three shots back of solo leader Dicky Pride. Just ahead of Block at seven under are past major champions Padraig Harrington and Darren Clarke. Behind Block are 20 former Ryder Cup players, eight major champions and three World Golf Hall of Famers.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor me to come out here today and shoot what I did my first time out, the pressure I had, everyone’s looking at me, I’ve got all those haters out there which, you know, I love you guys. There you go, I hope you guys like that 66,\u201d Block said.<\/p>\n
Always quotable and often speaking off-the-cuff, Block has been lauded for being down-to-earth while drawing the ire of some who have the perception that he\u2019s an earnest self-promoter.<\/p>\n
That hasn\u2019t changed Block\u2019s approach one bit. In fact, he\u2019s probably only embraced his uniqueness more. And that was again in evidence on Friday when he talked about wanting to get a \u201cBlock party\u201d going for the weekend with his family, friends and the fans who come out to support him.<\/p>\n
He also revealed that he had a dream last year that he was only talking about now. It begins with the fact that earlier this month he emerged from a 3-for-2 playoff to qualify for the U.S. Senior Open that will be played next week at Scioto Country Club in Columbus, Ohio. Block has played in 10 regular majors, including May’s PGA Championship, where he missed the cut.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m just letting you guys know this dream. I’m going to say it out loud for the first time,\u201d Block said. \u201cMy family’s known this for a while. \u2026 I literally, and hate me for it, I don’t care. But I literally had a dream that I was going to win the U.S. Senior Open the first year I turned 50. That’s something I’ve had in my head for a long time. When I got in that playoff last week, it was three guys for two spots to get into the playoff to get in the U.S. Open finals. \u2026 I said, \u2018This is it,\u2019 and I went birdie-birdie. I’m going to do my best. It might not happen, but I had a dream about it so it’s cool.\u201d<\/p>\n
First, Block has this weekend at En-Joie, and he\u2019s feeling very confident about his prospects.<\/p>\n
\u201cHonestly, I think I can get it here, I can go deep,\u201d Block said. \u201cI’m not kidding, I can get after it here. I wasn’t even driving it as good as I normally do today. I putted quite well, got up and down a lot, had a great time. Everyone was great. But I think I can go deeper.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like we said, Blockie doing and saying Blockie things.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael Block kept doing and saying Michael Block things in his PGA Tour Champions debut on Friday. Block\u2014the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28605,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[1443,11534,1485,11535,272,82],"class_list":["post-28604","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bmw-championship","tag-bmw-championship","tag-dicks-open","tag-michael-block","tag-michael-block-scorches-in-his-senior-debut-then-shares-wild-dream-he-had","tag-pga-tour-champions","tag-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28604"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28604\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}