Everyone knows President Trump loves golf, and some people might be forgiven for believing he's also quite good at it — as Trump will tell you himself, he's won 18 club championships (a claim so preposterous that it makes real golfers spit out their coffee). Despite Trump looking like an elite-level player on paper, his tricks for winning the game are exposed in a hilarious new book by sportswriter Rick Reilly, Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains President Trump, out this week.
In Commander in Cheat, Reilly interviews caddies at Trump-branded clubs, as well as at Winged Foot, a New York golf club where Trump is a member. At Winged Foot, Reilly discovers that the caddies have a nickname they use for Trump behind his back, due to how accustomed they've become to seeing him kick his ball back onto the fairway: Pelé. Yes, as in the Brazilian soccer legend.
Of course, that's a big no-no in golf. You're supposed to play the ball where it lands "without any change to the overall situation," GolfLink explains. Kicking the ball back onto the fairway definitely qualifies as an illegal "change to the overall situation."
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Reilly is so confident that Trump cheats his way through the game that USA Today reports he has challenged the president to 18 holes with a stake of $100,000 — so long as Trump doesn't use his "cheating caddies." Read more about Trump's alleged cheating in Commander in Cheat, available to order here.
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