If I could give golf flowers and a box of chocolates, I gladly would. Instead, I will continue my habitual Sunday blog posting in preparation for a summer that seems miles away here in Alaska.

Our wild winter has shifted from extreme cold to extreme winds to mellow, warm days. All we can do is allow our mind to wander and dream of what next summer might bring.

Plans change, yet we make them anyway. Mine is to play the Wednesday skins at Palmer next summer, as many of them as I can. I’m leaning toward not playing much of any other type of golf. Life has become comfortably busy. Golfing on the weekends gets more difficult each year.

Last summer, I started using my vacation time for a mid-week escape and it was awesome. Unlike the typical weekend, in which my hours become strained with life’s other tasks, playing on Wednesday allowed me to completely focus on golf and nothing else. I would tee off late enough to create stress-free mornings and early enough to allow a relaxed afternoon and evening.

After a lifetime of fitting golf in hurriedly wherever I could, I am allowing myself to make it more of the leisure activity it deserves to be. I hope some of my golfing friends will be able to join me along the way.

Another wintery Sunday in Alaska is upon us and again, I force myself to sit down and craft to get in the habit.

In this week’s imaginary grudge match, Todd Santangelo challenges Devery Prince to a rematch at Pine Valley in New Jersey. Fuming after his final-hole loss to Prince at St. Andrews, Santangelo pulls some strings to get them a tee time at one of the toughest courses in the world.

Pine Valley is famous for being designed for good golfers, with total disregard for casual swingers who want to sip martinis and have a good time. Santangelo is well aware of this, but hopes Prince is not.

Six holes into the match, Santangelo is 3 up on Prince. The secret is conservative play and deadly hybrid approaches to set up 3-putt bogies. Neither player has made a par, but Prince has four “others” on the scorecard.

As they make the turn and head to the back nine, things aren’t getting any better from a scoring standpoint, as both golfers are on pace for their highest score since they first put pencil to cardboard.

Santangelo’s lead is up to 5, despite Prince making an amazing bogey to win the 11th hole. Prince finally realizes how tough this course is and pulls out his 7-iron he won the Alaskan Masters with years ago. Going to a one-club strategy rights the ship for him and he wins the next three holes.

Prince is on a roll, just two down with four to play, but Santangelo digs deep and bogies 15 and 16 to close out the match 3&2. Mentally and physically exhausted, the friends order two martinis from the cart girl and laugh their way in on the final two holes. Scorecards were quickly thrown in the trash at conclusion of the round after the adding machine indicated Santangelo shot 129 and Prince shot 131.

It is the first Sunday of the second month of 2025, so I’m just sitting down to write something, just to get in the habit. That means there is nothing meaningful to report in the world of Alaska golf or anything else in my world.

Matches were available to play in January, as anyone hankering for competition could have pursued it on a simulator or at some course outside Alaska. The weather outside was frightful as I’ve ever seen in Anchorage. High winds, buckets of rain, roads covered in ice all gave way to bone-chilling days with high temps of about five degrees.

No surprise on my end to not see any matches played, of course, but as I write this I wonder what a match could have been like. Let’s say Todd Santangelo and Devery Prince, for example, had met up at St. Andrews for a match. How would that have gone?

I’ve played a lot of golf with those two in recent years, so I’ll make a fun prediction that will leave one of them bitter and one pleased. I’m thinking Santangelo would jump to an early lead on strength of a couple birdies. The match would level off mid-round and by the back nine, Prince would find his groove and show why I call him Deadeye Devery. As they stepped onto the famous 18th tee all square, which is officially known as tied these days, nerves would be frayed.

Prince and Santangelo would pump nice drives down the massively wide fairway. Both would land approaches on the green no further than 20 feet from the hole and Prince would can his birdie putt to put pressure on Santangelo. After a beautiful stroke sends his ball rolling purely toward the hole, Santangelo would be left disappointed as his putt lips out and loses him the match.

Such drama, such fun.

The new challenge matches and rankings are completely up to the players. I don’t care if nobody plays or a ton of you play. I am providing the opportunity, because many have told me they miss it. I won’t be using any social media. I will post all results here at jjpetes.com.

I will post the latest results on Sundays and Sundays only, so everyone knows when to look and what to expect. The only interference I will provide in the rankings is to either remove someone or gradually sink them in the rankings if it comes to my attention they aren’t actively accepting matches or if they have left town. Beyond that, the rankings are a simple king-of-the mountain format.

If you see someone on the list and you think you can beat them, arrange a match with them and send me the results. If you don’t already know me, you can email results to jjpetes@icloud.com. I will require an official match score, course played, a highlight or two and the parameters of the match.

I don’t care how players conduct their matches as long as both parties think it is fair and as long as only one match is played at a time. If one hits from the reds and the other from the tips, I don’t mind, as long as both think it is fair. Still, I want to know that information for results posting.

You can play any day of the year, indoor on simulators, outdoors in the snow or on an exotic locale in the South Pacific. Have fun and let me know.

If you want to grab your best friend and play a match, go ahead and do so as often as you want. I will insert you both in the rankings after first match results are reported, and will likely insert you much higher than you deserve. The reason for this being, I want everyone to see you have joined the battle. The rankings will always correct themselves in time.

I think that covers it. If not, we’ll figure it out as we go. So, it’s time to get to it, or not. You choose.

Happy New Year!

It is 2025 and what a nice round number. On a personal level it marks the 50th year I will have been living. It marks the 40th year I will have played golf. It marks a full 10 years since I started the Alaska Golf Blog.

I learned a lot from the Alaska Golf Blog, enough to know I won’t be doing it again. That isn’t as negative as it sounds. I simply mean I have changed, my life has changed and my relationship to golf has changed. The changes are dramatic enough that I have decided to start 2025 with a new blog here at jjpetes.com.

It will feature many things about Alaskan golf, including the most popular feature from the Alaska Golf Blog days, challenge matches and rankings.

The challenge matches will be open 365 days per year and can be played indoor, outdoor and in any location in the world. These are not going to be labeled as a list of Alaska’s best golfers. Instead, it will be JJ Petes golf rankings, not limited to just golfers from Alaska. It will likely come to represent more of a collection of golfers I have met in past, present and future.

Golf has provided me with an amazing journey over the last 40 years and it is that journey that inspires my new direction in writing. I look forward to seeing where the next 40 years takes me. If you want to come along for the ride and think you might want to play the occasional challenge match, enter your email below to subscribe.

Details on challenge matches are to come, very soon, before this first day of 2025 is over. Details will be simple and easy to follow. You will not need a golf handicap, just a desire to compete.

Happy New Year to you all. 2025 will be a fun one.