by Daniel Dullum

Bill Murray who shows up at almost every AT&T Tour this year being no different as he lead the cavalcade of stars at Pebble Beach on Wednesday. Here’s a look at the top celebrity golfers appearing at this year’s event: Kenny G, Kelly Slater, Peyton Manning, Chris O’Donnell, and Wayne Gretzky. Is Murray a great golfer? We’ll if you were that good you’d be on the tour and Murray has a lot of fun with it. He’ll put on a show by himself for the folks who show up.

He brings an act to every tournament that he shows up at he has a way with connecting with the crowd they want to see a little bit of a show and he knows he’s not a great golfer so he disguises that with having fun with the crowd. With some of the celebrities that show up fans might be mildly surprised how these folks are at golf.

There’s former 49er quarterback John Brodie he actually played on the seniors tour for a little while and that was back in his playing day with the 49ers. He was very close to being a scratched golfer, he was good quite good back then does that surprise anyone that some celebrities can play the game? Not really, they have athletes like former 49ers quarterback and current Chief quarterback Alex Smith out there and he’s working on his game between seasons. Golf for these guys are a way for these guys to unwind in between season going to mini camp and working out.

A lot of these guys are a lot of fun to watch in scenario like this because I’ve got to cover a few celebrity golf tournaments through the years an just to watch these guys in the T box just swing away it’s just amazing how far they can hit. What usually does their game in is the short game or the approach shots when it comes to driving a lot of these guys former ball players have the strength to do it. It’s really fun watching them swing away and see how far they could hit it.

There is a lot of former pro hockey players that play quite well on the links, it does not surprise me if Gretzky has a little bit better game than the average celebrity. With the celebrities having their game on Wednesday before the pros get in there on Thursday it says a lot about the early days of the tournament it’s always been a highlight to bring in the celebrities whether it’s from sports or the entertainment field.

It’s a chance for those guys to rub elbows with the touring pros. The course at Pebble Beach is challenging and it’s one of the few like it in the world so and everybody enjoys getting out on a course like Pebble Beach to see how good they are. It’s probably the best American equivalent to the type of courses that are played on when the guys play in the British Open.

Daniel Dullum does commentary on the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro Am listen to his podcast on the AT&T below on http://www.sportsradioservice.com