As ‘The Tailgater of Golf,’ Sanders makes it also about entertainment, and charity

Broadcaster Steve Sands (left) calls Albertsons Boise Open tournament director “the best-dressed man in all of golf” (courtesy Jerry Smart)

BOISE — Media Day for the Albertsons Boise Open is always an event. Jeff Sanders makes sure that it is so.

Since the tournament’s inception in 1990, Sanders has been one of the constants as tournament director, along with the title sponsor and Hillcrest Country Club as its site.

That’s right. The 37th Albertsons Boise Open, scheduled for Aug. 13-16, will feature the same director, sponsor and site as it did when the developmental PGA Tour got its start in what was then called the Ben Hogan Tour. That kind of thing just doesn’t happen in pro golf, much less in pro sports.

But it has happened in Boise, and the result has been by far the most successful tournament on what is now known as the Korn Ferry Tour.

Sanders values media coverage for the event on secondary circuit, in which players ranked between 121 and 250 in the world compete. So the Sunset High and University of Oregon grad invites the media to enjoy a buffet breakfast, listen to a celebrity speaker and participate in a free 18-hole scramble event. Kudos to Sanders’ marketing director, Ryan Fowler, who took care of all the arrangements for a first-class outing at Hillcrest.

The result was a day worth reporting on this website, and not just because Sanders’ company, Jeff Sanders Entertainment, is a sponsor of kerryeggers.com. On Tuesday, the dapper dude of sports promotion brought in very interesting choices for this year’s two sponsors’ exemptions — John Daly II and Tyler Aldridge. More on them later.

This year’s speaker was Steve Sands, veteran broadcaster for The Golf Channel and NBC, who adroitly covered many of the PGA Tour’s main topics as a crowd of more than 100 journalists and tournament sponsors looked on.

I conducted interviews with Sands, Aldridge and Daly — along with the latter’s famous father — that I will get to. But first a primer on the tournament itself.

For several years, Sanders’ company operated a pair of tournaments on the PGA Tour — the Safeway Open in Napa, Calif., and the American Express in La Quinta, Calif. — while pioneering the “Golfchella” approach of combining golf, spirits and musical entertainment that has been both unique and successful.

The theme — “Golf by day, music by night” — has struck a chord in the Northwest, which has embraced the Albertsons Boise Open and made it the biggest happening on the Idaho summer entertainment calendar.

Actually, there are “four pillars” that make Sanders’ event go — golf, music, food and beer/wine.

The four-day, 72-hole event features mostly young players and the stars of tomorrow. Among those who have participated in the Boise event: Scottie Scheffler, Wyndham Clark, Viktor Hovland, Aaron Rai, Rickie Fowler, Justin Thomas, J.J. Spaun, Sam Burns, Xander Schauffele and Keegan Bradley

“Every year, about 75 percent of the winners on the PGA Tour have played in our event,” Fowler says.

Adds Sanders: “Bottom line: Most of the guys out there on the (PGA) Tour have come through Boise. They come through, and we don’t know who they are necessarily. The next thing you know, they win the U.S. Open.”

But great golf is only part of the deal.

Local restaurants and food outlets provide excellent culinary items for purchase during the week, and craft beer and regional wine vendors offer a variety of choices to whet the palate.

After the golf ends, the music begins. This year’s concerts feature rap artist Nelly on Thursday, rock band Counting Crows (“Mr. Jones”) on Friday and country favorite Hardy on Saturday. (The latter two shows are sold out; Nelly was close at press time.)

All of that — the golf and the show — comes with the price of a $35 daily ticket.

Says Sanders: “And 100 percent of that $35 goes to the charity you choose as a ticket-buyer.”

The first thing Sands noticed about Sanders were his long locks and flamboyant attire.

“Jeff is far and away the best-dressed man in all of golf, and for us who are follically-challenged, he has the best hair in all of golf,” Sands kids. “It’s not even close.”

Then he gets serious with compliments about the way Jeff Sanders Entertainment operates. Sands became acquainted with Sanders when he was running the two PGA Tour events.

“The thing that makes Jeff different from anybody else (running a pro golf tournament) — besides the hair and the way he dresses — is his understanding that sports is entertainment,” says Sands, a staple on the Golf Channel for the past 25 years. “When you give (the fans) four days of excellent golf, that’s one thing. But if you give them music, food, wine and a good time. …

“There is no tailgating in golf; Jeff is the tailgater of golf. He brings people together. With music and food and wine and golf all mixed together, it’s a great week. Sports at the highest level should be fun. People have come to Jeff’s events all through the years in Napa and the Desert as well as Boise and loved the experience. He gets it. Not everybody in his business does what he does.”

Sands has never been to an Albertsons Boise Open, nor had he ever been to Idaho before “Media Day.”

“All the players I know through the years, guys like Scottie and Justin Thomas, have told me about this place,” he says. “I was talking with Jim Furyk at the U.S. Open and I was telling him I was coming out here. He says that it is the premier event on the Korn Ferry Tour. He said, ’It’s the best-run event, it has the best fans, the best atmosphere.’ ”

Then there is the charity angle, the most important part for both Sanders and the executives running the shop at Albertsons.

“If we weren’t giving money to charity, they would have dropped off awhile ago,” Sanders says.

It’s a whale of a lot of money, too. For the sixth straight year in 2026, the tournament will contribute more than $3 million to various charities in the Boise area. None of the other 24 events on the Korn Ferry circuit come close. The others average between $100,000 and $150,000 in giving. The Albertsons Boise Open gives more than all the other events combined. Over 37 years, it has raised more than $42 million.

“We want to be No. 1,” Sanders says. “We want to give more to charity than any tournament. We want to be watched by the most people. We want to have people walk away with a smile on their face and say, ‘That was the greatest golf event I’ve been to.’ ”

Jeff Sanders Entertainment is contracted with Albertsons for at least two more years, with the probability of extending the agreement through at least 2029.

“I would like to reach $50 million before I hang ‘em up,” says Sanders, 70, who over 37 years has worked with 11 CEOs of Albertsons.

“Every one of them has been awesome to work with,” he says.

Sanders is at an age where most of his contemporaries are retired. Why does he keep going?

“Because it’s fun, it’s rewarding, and we are always innovating, always improving things, trying to figure out what can we do to be more valuable to the customer,” he says, adding that without a team of more than 1,000 volunteers working under the radar, “we wouldn’t be doing this like we are doing this. That is really cool for me to see.”

John Daly II (right) recalls kicking field goals on the blue turf at Boise State as an eight-year-old (courtesy Jerry Smart)

One of the players who will compete via sponsor’s exemption has a name that any golf fan will recognize. John Daly II is the youngest of three children, and the only son, of John Daly, the big-hitting, swashbuckling, sometimes controversial figure of PGA golf in the 1990s, a five-time tournament winner including two majors (’91 PGA Championships, ’95 British Open).

The junior Daly, who turns 23 on July 23, is a recent graduate (recreation/sports management) of the University of Arkansas and, like his father, a former Razorback golfer. The youngster once known as “little John” turned pro in June and tied for 55th in his first Korn Ferry event, the OccuNet Classic in Amarillo, Texas. Daly II shot even-par 288, winning $4,190.

“He led the field with 22 birdies and an eagle and shot even par,” Daly Sr. tells me via phone. “Conditions were rough. The wind blew every day. He said it was brutal.”

“Too many double-bogeys to be up among the leaders,” Daly II says. “A little bit of inconsistency off the tee. But it was a great week. I was happy to make the cut and I made a lot of birdies, which was nice.”

Daly Sr. has played three times in Boise, beginning with the inaugural Albertsons Boise Open in 1990 at age 24. He tied for 10th and made $1,720. In 2003, Daly and Michelle Wie were paired against Hank Kuehne and Nancy Lopez in a televised “Skins” game that took place the week of the ABO.

John Daly, shown here playing in the 2011 Albertsons Boise Open, says son John Daly II will be a crowd-pleaser in this year’s tournament (courtesy Jeff Sanders Entertainment)

In 2011, Daly brought his son along when he participated in the ABO. John Sr. participated in the Michelob Ultra Shoot-out charity event to start the week, and won the majority of the $25,000 prize on behalf of the Boise State golf teams. He recalls playing with Jamie Sadlowski, a former World Long Drive champion.

“He drove the green with a 3-iron on the first hole (a 360-yard par four),” Dalys says with a chuckle. “(The drive) was so long. I ended up playing in the tournament with him. He just bombed it. But his short game wasn’t too good.”

Hampered by a sciatic nerve injury, Daly shot 71-71 and failed to make the cut. The trip from Arkansas, however, was memorable.

“Little John was eight, and I had just gotten custody of him,” Daly says. “He traveled with me in the bus. We just had a blast.”

Daly II remembers kicking field goals on the blue turf at Boise State’s football Stadium.

“He made one from 20 yards as I recall,” his father says.

Daly began watching Boise State football when former Razorback player and coach Houston Nutt coached there.

“I have been a big fan of the Broncos for a long time,” Daly says.

Daly II began his golf career at age two.

“He didn’t want any short clubs,” Daly Sr. says. “He used my clubs. He held a club up under his arm until he was about five to hit the ball. I finally got him to do the interlocking grip. He smashed one and said, ‘Dad, why didn’t you tell me a long time ago?’

“Most of what I practiced was the short game. He fell in love with the short game. He loves to chip and putt. He went to some golf schools and got a great education and found coaches along the way.”

Daly pauses, then muses, “It’s funny. Charlie Woods would listen to me, and little John would listen to Tiger, but neither was going to listen to his father.”

Daly II followed his father and played golf for five seasons, including a redshirt campaign, for the Razorbacks. Did he go there because of his dad?

“Yeah, that and it was the rage when I was growing up (in Arkansas), whether it was watching football, basketball or baseball games,” he says. “We even went to some bowl games. I was too big a Hogs fan to wear another logo.”

The junior Daly says he naturally became interested in golf.

“I was one of those kids who looked up to a father who is a famous athlete,” he says. “I grew up around it. But he never pushed me. He has never laid anything on me. It has been about having fun and doing what I want to do. I chose golf.”

Is there more pressure, being the son of John Daly?

“Not really,” the junior Daly says. “I have been around the spotlight for awhile. I got used to it at a young age.”

The Dalys have played together several times in the PNC Championship, an annual two-day two-person scramble in which a former major or Players champion teams with his son. The Dalys won in 2021 and have placed second three times.

“That is by far the best week of the year, being able to play with all the greats,” Daly II says. “Tiger. Jack (Nicklaus). Lee Trevino especially. You draw inspiration from those legends. Yeah, I have a famous last name, but being around that is so awesome.”

The lure of the tour is there, but it’s the competition that Daly II likes most.

“I like how humbling the game is,” he says. “I see what Scottie (Scheffler) is doing these days, but besides that, there is no superstar of the tour. No powerhouse. Anyone can win. I like how every now and then there is a Cinderella story or hometown hero or stuff like that.

“Everybody in this wants to be the best today. But mainly, it’s about enjoying what I’m doing no matter what. Good day or bad day, always having that same urge to play like I did when I was a kid.”

Daly, now 60, is gratified to see his son entered in the Boise event.

“Jeff Sanders is such a good man,” he says. “We have been friends for a long time, for business and golf. I am so happy he gave little John a spot at Boise. I think the fans are going to love him. He is a good kid, and he can play.”

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Tyler Aldridge (right) gained a sponsor’s exemption after pledging to donate 100 percent of his earnings to charity (courtesy Jerry Smart)

So can Tyler Aldridge, the other “wild-card” entry in the ABO. The Nampa, Idaho, resident and ex-Boise State golfer is a former PGA Tour player who won the 2019 Greater Dallas Open on the Korn Ferry Tour and has competed five times in the ABO through the years.

But Aldridge, 41, hasn’t played much tournament golf in some time. He gained his entry by making a unique appeal through email to Sanders.

“He said, ‘If you give me a spot, I will give 100 percent of my earnings to charity,’ ” Sanders says. “I have been in this business for 40 years and I have never seen or heard of any player make that kind of offer.

“Tyler has had some good results in the past. We like to give local players opportunities when we can. He said, ‘I am playing the best golf of my career.’ So we are giving him a chance to be a hell of a story.”

For the past few years, Aldridge has focused on a career in real estate.

“But this is something I felt like I needed to do,” says Aldridge, who has his children’s charities already selected. “I am running out of time. I didn’t have a super career. It has been something in the back of my mind, giving back to the community. It takes money to play golf. There are kids out there who have talent but never get the chance to prove it.

“If I can do something special the week of the Open, it would go a long way to helping    some of these kids.”

How high can he finish? Aldridge is shooting for the $180,000 first prize.

“I can win,” he says. “It is all about mindset. I will be ready for tournament week. I have won at this level before. It is just getting back to that mindset.”

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Steve Sands says he is concerned about proposed changes to the PGA Tour expected to go into effect in 2028 (courtesy Jerry Smart)

Steve Sands is a strong interviewer, but he is a good interview, too. The man Tiger Woods nicknamed “Sandsie” has a lot of stories to tell, and it serves him well.

The Washington D.C. native majored in journalism and initially wanted to be a sportswriter before finally coming to his senses, joining the sportscasting world in the 1990s. He joined the Golf Channel in 2001.

Sands, 51, and his wife now divide their time between homes in Florida and Delaware. He covers between 27 and 31 PGA Tour events a year, and has an annual studio show during Masters week.

Do you think he likes his job?

“Traveling around the country talking sports for a living?” he says with a smile. “It is a dream come true.”

Observations from Sands on a variety of topics:

• The quality of play on the Korn Ferry Tour: “People don’t have an appreciation for how great the players are out there. Those players just need that door to open up. If the Korn Ferry (regulars) got the opportunity to play on the PGA Tour, to step up in class, they are so good, they usually take advantage of it.

“That’s what makes this event so cool. Not all Korn Ferry Tour events are well-attended because the people don’t recognize the names. Here they understand that, with Jeff and his team and all the things they provide — the golf and the food and the wine and the atmosphere and the music — it will be a good show. The fans get it, and the players understand it and appreciate it, and they like to perform here.”

• Wyndham Clark, the former Oregon Duck who won the U.S. Open, handling the catcalls from fans during the tournament: “He handled it with grace. He knows he had his troubles in the past, but he hung in there when all the fans were rooting for Scottie. Wyndham was a villain on that Sunday for a lot of reasons. One is it was Scottie’s 30th birthday, and he was trying to win the career Grand Slam on Father’s Day; he is a brand-new father for the second time. He is the No. 1 player in the world, and everybody loves the guy. “Wyndham admitted he has been wrong. He has apologized. He stood up and has been great about it. He is an American and a previous U.S. Open winner, and he still got roughed up. He works with a sports psychologist named Julie Elion. From the collars on up, for him to deal with what he was dealing with, the F-bombs and all kinds of personal attacks … you can’t believe what was going on. The work with Julie really helped him. He is now a two-time U.S. Open winner and is playing as well as anybody right now.”

• Tiger Woods’ personal life, and his golf future: “Tiger wanted to play in the U.S. Senior Open. He is trying to do something that has never been done in history — win the U.S. Junior Amateur, the U.S. Amateur, the U.S. Open and the U.S. Senior Open. It is the one thing that Jack (Nicklaus) has never done. Tiger was really working hard to try get himself to be able to play this week in Jack’s hometown of Columbus. To do it there after just turning 50 would have been extra special.

“He is not just the best player of his generation. He also is someone who has a lot of responsibility not just inside the ropes. He has a huge PGA Tour event at Riviera, the Genesis Invitational, and an event in December, the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas. Both of those events give him a different perspective from being just a player. He understands what it’s like to run an event and to try to get players to come there and all the things that encompass a PGA Tour event. With his expertise, on the course and administratively, and his stature in the game … the young kids have learned a lot from him. He has been nothing but great for the PGA Tour throughout this entire crazy process since LIV came about. He has been a huge boon to the Tour. He has been very influential. He is not just a bystander. He cares about the PGA Tour.”

• Same question on Phil Mickelson and his personal strife: “It’s delicate. We need to pump the brakes and see how it all plays out with however many sides of the story there are. What I think mostly about Phil, since he won the PGA Championship in 2021, becoming the oldest player to win a major, is this: He was the second-best player of his generation behind Tiger, an absolute star in the game. For him to not be around the sport is sad to me. He is Phil Mickelson. If Tiger didn’t have those two events and just retired and went away, that wouldn’t be great for the game.

“Phil has a lot going on (personally) that I do not know much about. As far as the sports part of it goes, it’s a shame he’s not around the PGA Tour and around golf as often as he used to be. It’s unlike other sports. Jack Nicklaus retired and had the Memorial. Arnold Palmer retired and hosted an event at Bay Hill. Tiger is 50 and can’t play forever, but he has his events. He is around the game a lot. That’s the way the sport is. It’s unlike the team sports where sometimes (former players) are in broadcasting and sometimes in a front office, but they are not around the game like in golf. I don’t know what is taking place in Phil’s world, but it is a shame he has not been around the PGA Tour and golf in the last five years.”

• On where Scheffler ranks among the greatest in golf history: “We have only a small sample size. I don’t love to rub the anointed oil all over him just yet. But what he has done in a four-year span is spectacular. If it continues for another couple of years — even just one more year — now we are putting him in a different category.

“Every great player on the PGA Tour has his run. Scottie is having his run right now. He has won three of the four majors; if he wins the US Open he has the career grand slam. He has done things no one has ever done. He has already won a Players Championship back-to-back (2023-24). He already has a Fed-Ex Cup title (2024). He has 20-plus wins, and it has been only four-plus years since he won his first. But I need to see a larger sample size if we’re comparing him to the all-time greats. He is a fabulous player and, the most important thing to me, he is a wonderful guy. A perfect face for the game. The guys have a lot of respect for him. He plays the game the right way. But to put him in a category with Tiger or this guy or that guy? We need to see it a little bit longer, though it’s getting close, because he has done so many amazing things.”

• On the future of the LIV Tour: “They have certainly been a disrupter. They have forced the PGA Tour to make a lot of changes, and they are continuing to make a lot of changes because of what has taken place in the last four years. Now all of a sudden, LIV looks like it is on the ropes and doesn’t seem like it is going to be a viable option for years to come.

“If this is the end of LIV, man, was it a disrupting force to the sport. The PGA Tour staggered a little bit; they made a lot of economic and personnel changes. That was all because LIV came about. Some of it was good; a lot of it not good.”

• On whether it bothered Sands that money from Saudi Arabia, one of the biggest human rights-violating countries on the planet, was funding LIV: “It bothered me in the sense that in golf, because it is an individual sport like tennis, greatness is not measured by money but by titles. When you win the titles, the money comes with it. So when you are playing just for money and not the titles, that seems to me like you’re selling yourself out.

“If I had been a PGA Tour player and had the option, as difficult it might be to turn down that money, I would have stuck with the Tour. There are plenty of team-sport athletes who have never won championships — Dan Marino, Charles Barkley, some all-time greats. But in this sport, to be considered an all-time great, you have to win big events. The true measure of greatness is in the titles you win. If you’re on LIV and playing for money and not for titles and history … that’s not the route I would have taken.”

• On how the PGA Tour will receive LIV players: “They offered five LIV players to come back early this year. Only one took it — Brooks Koepka. He gave $5 million to charity and couldn’t play in signature events, and he has done all the right things. In one event, I watched Brooks — who will moonwalk into the Hall of Fame if he never hits another golf ball — as an alternate all day until somebody dropped out and he stepped in. Players of that stature never do that. He played an opposite-field event in Myrtle Beach. Players of that stature never do that.

“There are guys —    Bryson Dechambeau, Jon Rahm, Dustin Johnson, Cam Smith, Joaquim Niemann — they would welcome back. But the penalties will be more severe, as they should be, because those players had the opportunity to come back and they chose not to. The players who stayed (with the PGA Tour) were offered a lot of money (by LIV), and there is some honor in that.”

• What will happen when the PGA Tour makes sweeping changes beginning in 2028: “There will be two tiers to the PGA Tour schedule. The top 120 players will be in the Championship Series, the next 120 in the Challenge Series. There will be no sponsor exemptions, no more Monday qualifying. It will be the best players vs. the best players 16 to 20 weeks a year. It all sounds great, and it is for TV. But what does it mean for the rest of the schedule? Supposedly, a (Championship Series) player can’t drop down to the next level. If Scottie Scheffler, who is from Dallas, wants to play in a hometown event and it’s not a Championship Series event, he’s not allowed to play in it.

“This is all a work in progress. The announcement last week was a framework. The players are not under contract with the PGA Tour. They have never been told when and where they have to play. All of a sudden you’re not being told how many you have to play, but how many you can’t play. (Members of the PGA Tour Future Competitions Committee) feel like a closed shop is better than a complete free-for all. But when you take away sponsor’s exemptions, Monday qualifying, the David vs. Goliath opportunities are gone. That’s not healthy for sports. I don’t like that. If you close that door, it’s a mistake. I don’t think that’s what fans want. It’s all about money, unfortunately.”

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