Peyton Manning, Charles Barkley, Dwyane Wade and Grant Hill walk into Augusta National Golf Club. No, it’s not the start of a four guys walk into a bar joke; it’s the start of an epic vacation.
Barkley joined Altitude Sports Radio’s Marc Moser, Vic Lombardi and Brett Kane Wednesday morning to discuss the Denver Nuggets’ decision to fire head coach Michael Malone with just three games left in the NBA regular season. But before the interview ended, Lombardi made sure to mention that he recently played golf at Augusta National, prompting Barkley to detail his own recent trip to the famously private and exclusive course.
“I’m probably going to get in trouble with Peyton Manning, but I gotta tell you this. Peyton Manning called me a few months back,” Barkley began. “He says I want to take you to Augusta for a couple days and we’re gonna stay there I said, ‘Oh I’m in.’ He says well, let me finish I said, ‘no you’re finished there’s nothing you can say to me.’ If he had said, ‘Hey, you got to cut my grass for the next two weeks,’ I’m like I’m gonna cut your damn grass.
“He took me and Dwyane Wade and Grant Hill down there and we stayed,” Barkley continued. “It was two of the best days of my life. It was unbelievable.”
Barkley said he played at Augusta National one other time in his life, but claimed this trip was different because the course was already being prepared for the Masters. And this after the second day of their trip began with hours of heavy rain, but that only left Barkley more impressed by the technology at Augusta National Golf Club.
“We play the first hole, it’s raining like a mother. We play the second hole, it stops raining. Then we hear this noise,” Barkley said while making a humming sound.
Manning informed Barkley, Wade and Hill that the sound was the SubAir system at Augusta National. The initial purpose of the underground ventilation system was to provide fresh air to the root base of plant life at the course. But when operated in reverse, the system is capable of sopping water off the grass.
“It had been raining hard for three hours. I mean, as hard as it can rain,” Barkley recalled. “And Peyton says, within 15 minutes, you ain’t even going to be able to tell it was raining. Guys, it hummed for like 15, 20 minutes. You could not even tell it had rained. It was crazy. I’d never seen anything [like it].”
“It was two of the greatest days of my life,” Barkley said. “But thanks, Peyton Manning, for taking us there.”
