Jim Nantz is warming up for the NFL season opener with some golf the next few days, and he’s doing so with a good friend of some renown at the Tepetonka member-member.
Nantz, 67, is set to make a seamless transition from being the voice of the PGA Tour on CBS Sports to handling its lead NFL play-by-play duties when the Minnesota Vikings host the Green Bay Packers on Sunday.
That made it perfect timing for Nantz to host the inaugural Storytellers Member-Member at Tepetonka Club in the western part of the Land of 10,000 Lakes.
Golfweek has chronicledNantz’s involvement in the construction of the new golf course by OCM, which includes a short course that Nantz helped design, and Nantz penned his own piece recently on partnering up with his old University
of Houston pal, Mark Haugejorde, who is the visionary behind Tepetonka. The course opened all 18 holes for early member play last month ahead of next year's official grand opening. But the member-member refuses to wait.
When Nantz asked if he could lead the first member-member, Hoggie, as friends have called him for years, asked his old college teammate, whom he planned to play with?
“I knew he was going to say me,” Haugejorde said.
Not so fast, my friend.
“But he says, Eric Church,” Haugejorde recalls. That would be the country music star and if you haven’t seen his college commencement speech that went viral this year, stop everything and thank us later (unless your a Duke or N.C. State fan). Anyway, Haugejorde quickly pointed out there was one problem with Nantz’s choice: Church wasn’t a member.
“He said, ‘No, but he will be,’ ” Haugejorde recalled.
So, it’s Church and Nantz playing alongside Jerry Johnson, the chief financial backer behind Tepetonka, and Hoggie beginning today, and the trash talk started long ago. Haugejourde's partner ran into Church at one of his concerts and said, "We’re looking forward to playing with you guys." Church fired back, "You know, we’ve never been beaten."
"So, we’ve got some action," Haugejourde said.
The story of how Nantz and Church became undefeated as golf partners is a story in itself. Five years ago, when Nantz moved his family to Nashville, he received a text from Church welcoming him to town and inviting him over to his house for dinner.
“Very generous!” Nantz recalled.
Ben Weprin, the founder of AJ Capital, which owns the portfolio of Marine & Lawn Hotels, including Rusacks in St. Andrews, Scotland and Pine Needles in Pinehurst, North Carolina, is friends with both Church and Nantz and told Church that Nantz was moving to the Music City and gave him Nantz’s number.
“Two weeks later, I was having dinner with the two of them at Eric’s lake house,” Nantz wrote in a text.
It was the start of a beautiful friendship that has continued to the golf course, most notably during a golf trip around the 2022 British Open, which inspired a song from Church, "Ain’t the Only Ghost in Town."
Perhaps the Storytellers Member-Member will inspire its own ballad of birdies and bogeys.
Adam Schupak is a senior writer for Golfweek, covering the PGA Tour.
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Jim Nantz and Eric Church are an undefeated duo — heading into this member-member
