When PGA Tour player John Daly walks into a room, people notice.
On this particular night, Daly didn't so much walk into a room as on to the patio at the Celebration Town Tavern. A guest on "The Leaderboard," a golf radio show that airs locally on ESPN 1080 AM and streams live at www.leaderboardradio.com, "Big John" turned out to be a big draw, indeed.
"We're fortunate to have a good crowd on the patio every Monday night when we do the show live," said J.P. Marks, one of the four on-air personalities on the show. "But the night that J.D. was here, the normal crowd increased by about a thousand percent. We kept seeing people who were walking down Market Street just stop and stare, like, 'Is that John Daly?' And then they would take out their cell phones and call their friends. The next thing we knew, there were a hundred people on the patio, and a hundred more standing three-deep on the sidewalk."
Marks, a graduate of Clemson University and Pace University School of Law, has been a sports journalist for 20 years, including a five-year stint as an on-air reporter for News 12 New Jersey. His television work has been recognized by The Associated Press and his writing was honored with Florida Press Association awards in 2003, 2004 and 2005. He is joined on "The Leaderboard" every Monday from 6-8 PM by Bill Bona, Ian Davies and Kenny Nairn. Both Bona and Nairn have strong ties to Celebration; Nairn is the Golf Director at Celebration Golf Club and Bona is one of the principal owners and operators of the Tavern. Davies, a former Canadian Football League player, handles the guest arrangements.
Celebration's resident PGA Tour professional Robert Gamez has been a regular guest on the show, and he's been joined by a long list of some of the game's big names.
PGA Tour legend Calvin Peete was a guest on the patio during the 2008 season, as was 2002 PGA Champion Rich Beem. The list of call-in guests is impressive as well; among the notable callers are PGA of America President Jim Remy, LPGA Commissioner Carolyn Bivens, PGA Tour winners Pat Perez and Charley Hoffman, and LPGA stars Paula Creamer, Christina Kim and Nicole Castrale.
Every Monday at 6 o'clock, the show starts with "The Leaderboard Superfecta," an offer of free beer, free golf, free golf lessons and free food. Bona, Davies, Marks and Nairn insist that all of the above are readily available and not that hard to attain. But, they say, you'll have to listen to the show to find out just how you can come by the freebies.
"It's easy, and it really is free," Bona said. "In fact, Kenny answers five or six e-mails a week from people who may or may not be listening to the show, but maybe they heard from a friend that he was willing to give free golf lessons. You might find free beer, free golf and free food somewhere else, but I've never heard of a Master Teaching Professional so willing to help people simply because they called or e-mailed."
"I'm in the industry," Nairn said. "And 'The Leaderboard' allows me to give back to the industry and help people enjoy the game I've made my life out of.
"We love to know people are listening whether they play golf or not, and because we stream live on the internet, we get e-mails from all over the world. Some may want a tip to help their game, but others just want to let us know that they like the show. So the way we see it, anything that we can do for our listeners is well worth the satisfaction of knowing that what we're doing on the air is reaching so many people."
"The Leaderboard" crew says that they always have room on the patio for new listeners each Monday night, and are open to having any interested parties join their team through sponsorship or advertising opportunities on ESPN 1080 "The Team." You can contact J.P., Bill, Ian or Kenny via their e-mail addresses at www.leaderboardradio.com.
Leaderboard Celebrates Golf Lifestyle
By William F. Forbes
