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A look at 2019 at Area 313 of the Detroit Golf Club, holes 14, 15 and 16, for the Rocket Mortgage Classic.

Detroit Free Press

There is a chance to spot Mark Douglas during the final round of the Rocket Mortgage Classic.

You could spy on the president of the Detroit Golf Club by relaxing in the back yard of his house, which is located along the ninth hole.

“So I’ll be nearby,” he said. “Even though I may not be directly on the field, I will be nearby.”

[ Live leaderboard: Here’s where things stand entering Sunday’s final round ]

Imagine that. The president of the club hosting a PGA Tour cannot even get on his course due to the severe limitation of people who can participate in the event.

Welcome to golf at the time of the coronavirus pandemic.

And it’s a shame because Douglas has a great story and a message to spread about inclusion, diversity and overcoming the challenge of organizing a great sporting event as the world continues to face COVID-19.

Detroit Golf Club was founded in 1899. And Douglas, the president of the Avis Ford dealership in Southfield, is the 113th president of the club. But he is only the third African American club president.

During a normal year, the club and its leadership would have received a lot of media attention in the pre-tournament period. But social distancing guidelines have sunk plans to promote the club and tournament with stories like Douglas’ showing diversified membership.

“It obviously sends a good message in today’s environment with what we are dealing with on many fronts: racial equality and things like that,” said Douglas of his presidency. “It’s a positive story in an era where you don’t necessarily have many positive stories to tell. So there was hope that we could maybe take a short tour of a club that didn’t have African American members until (1986). “

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Former Detroit Mayor Coleman Young was the club’s first African American member, although he was an honorary social partner. In the same year, longtime vice president of the National Bank of Detroit (now Chase) Walter Watkins joined as the first member of African American golf.

Douglas’ father, Walter, became the club’s sixth African American member in 1987. Douglas, 53, was elected president of the club in October after being encouraged to seek the position by his friend Lane Coleman, who had been the second African American president. of the club in 2015. Coleman challenged Douglas to serve on the board as more than just a figurehead.

“Not just as an African American but as a leader in general, he talks about what we hope to do every day in work and other affiliations,” said Douglas. “You don’t want to be, I call them board members of the bobblehead type, where in a way you shake your head yes or no to whatever the leadership dictates”

‘We got a little nervous’

Douglas had no idea how much his active and involved leadership would serve him as the club undertook a major $ 4.5 million internal and external restructuring in September in preparation to host the Rocket Mortgage Classic for the second year.

The club started preparing for this year’s tournament within a couple of months of last year’s June tournament. When the PGA Tour stopped playing in March and suspended its schedule, the club faced some uncertainties.

“Initially we were a little nervous,” said Douglas, “because obviously we have devoted a lot of work to things up to that point.”

The key players and decision makers involved in maintaining the tournament in the PGA Tour schedule were the Tour itself and the sponsor, Rocket Mortgage. But the club did its part through its willingness to move the tournament from May 28th to 31st to other dates.

“The thing to our advantage was that we were flexible,” said Douglas. “We have always maintained good lines of communication with the PGA and based on this we have been optimistic. And the other thing is that they never said no to us. “

The pandemic and the suspension of the Tour did not affect the club’s preparations much because much of the work, such as the organization of volunteers, had started well since December. And the club’s main contribution to the tournament – the field – was not affected because Superintendent Jake Mendoza was able to continue his work.

“Jake really did a great job of keeping the field in condition,” Douglas said, adding that the initial rule of the state’s travel ban has reduced the amount of play the course has achieved and has helped keep the field in top shape. .

People want little birds or a train crash

Last year’s wire-to-wire champion Nate Lashley won last year’s tournament with six shots at 25 at par. Douglas said the club saw that score as an anomaly attributed to a player who has just become hot. Do you think that the winner this year will probably end up with a lot less strokes due to some course improvements.

“Teenagers” said of the final winning score in relation to par. “We think it’s more realistic where things will be. Because, once again, we made some changes to the course especially for this event: added tee boxes, stretched some holes.

“I mean, you still have (7,300) more yards. And these kids don’t really like trees. “

The narrow, tree-lined fairways are certainly a challenge. But the notoriously difficult and subtle Donald Ross greens, which have crowned areas and false fronts, are the main defense of the field.

“In fact, last year (the Tour) also wanted us to slow down the greens sometimes,” he said. “They would roll us in certain areas over others so that they didn’t get super fast, because we could make our greens much faster than what the pros sometimes see.”

Douglas said that the greens could run like a 13 or 14 on the Stimpmeter, a device that measures the speed of the greens.

“But they asked us to keep our greens around 12,” he said, “when we could actually have made them much faster, which would have made the course much harder.”

The reason for slower greens, Douglas said, is simple.

“The reality is that people either want to see a lot of birds or want to see a train crash: they want to see the winner at 3 below, on the right, for the whole weekend,” he said. “So based on that, I think we satisfied what we thought the public would like to see and the PGA, we always have to respect what they ask for.”

Douglas has no problem with slower greens and lower scores – and will be ready to catch his share of birdies from his patio.

“So I’ll be home,” he said, “and definitely on Sunday to watch and cheer on the boys.”

Contact Carlos Monarrez at [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @cmonarrez.