Biography of Hogie as authored by Black Bear

Matt was born April 3, 1990 in Basking Ridge, New Jersey with a full beard he wears handsomely to this very day. But, this town in the Garden State couldn’t hold him, no, no for the West was calling his name. It started as a whisper, “Go west young Butler. West Texas. West Texas.” He spent his formative years bouncing between Rochester, Pittsburg, Chicago, Harrisburg, and Cincinnati. Baseball became his passion, his obsession, his Daisy Buchannan. In the summer between 6th and 7th grade Hogie took up the game of golf, began showing symptoms of OCD, and started shaving twice a day. It was a pretty big summer. Several years later, the call of the West convinced him, grabbed him by the wrist (actually fracturing his sphenoid bone) and dragged him to Dallas, Texas. The wrist injury and consequential surgery robbed the once powerful player of his prodigious length. Unable to pipe it 300 down the middle, Hogie was forced to hone his short game. Mmmm yeah, that’s what gets the ladies excited -a good lag putt. Oh yeah. Seriously, though, he is one hell of a putter. There is a saying that you drive for show, and putt for dough. Listen up Hogie, since you are an NCAA athlete, you can’t accept cash prizes, but you can show off. Using Bangworthy’s phrase if I may good sir, when the big stick is functioning well, you put on a show, you entertain, you inspire, and you realize that you are a champion.

~Black Bear