The biggest name in golf right now is Zach Holland. Holland is not a PGA Tour pro. He’s not tearing up the Korn Ferry tour. He’s not even a competitive mid-am. He’s an ordinary stiff just like you and me … or at least he was before he faked a hole-in-one at a member-member this weekend and got caught with his hand in the cookie jar (or rather, cup).
The incident went viral thanks to TikTok user @rjisntfunny, who shared the wild story—including a nighttime mission to the course, a fake phone call from a sick grandmother and smoking-gun security camera footage from a nearby maintenance shed—on Sunday. After the story spread across golf like a wildfire, Holland fessed up and resigned from WingHaven Country Club … but as sandbagger detective, Yip Stricker, reports, his “hole-in-one” was merely the culmination of a summer-long score manipulation campaign.
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According to Stricker, who dove headlong into Holland’s GHIN scores following the incident, the hole-in-one hoaxer posted eight scores in July that he backdated to June, suspiciously just after a remarkable 65. That 65, which Holland shot from the gold tees at WingHaven as a +0.7 handicap, was hit with a whopping -8 differential that became a -9 after an Exceptional Score Reduction.
Was Holland really trying to massage the ESR on his June 65 in anticipation of August’s member-member? Only he can say, but during a radio appearance on 101 ESPN – St. Louis, Holland was asked why he cheated as elaborately as he did. “To answer your question,” he said. “We were giving two shots back to the field.”
Intentional or not, clearly his team’s handicap was at the forefront on his mind leading up to this weekend’s scandal. We’ll likely never know for sure if Holland was actually manipulating differentials or just a little forgetful in June, but if it looks like a sandbagger, talks like a sandbagger and fakes hole-in-ones using his sick grandmother as a patsy, well, you can figure out the rest.
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This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
