THE PLAYERS Championship’s greatest comeback

Gardner Minshew, the Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback, was, like many, intent on having a good time Thursday. He had invited a friend, and his dad had driven from Mississippi, also with a friend. They made their way to the Jaguars’ box on 17 to watch the first round.

“There were whispers, are we going to be able to go,” Minshew says. “We were probably going to go all four days; we were pretty fired up for it. It was my first time ever going; everybody had talked about what a blast it is. I play golf on the weekends or whatever. Everybody drove in from Mississippi, my dad and his friend and one of my buddies, they all got in late the night before.

“About halfway through the day we found out that was going to be it,” Minshew continues. “So, we had to try and fit four days into one afternoon. We made it worth it, though; that one day was pretty good. We pretty much just informed the Jags that they were not stocked well enough; they didn’t anticipate our needs, especially in the Tito’s department, so we’re hoping that gets fixed.

“We didn’t want to see it end; we were having too good a time.”

They weren’t the only ones. Tacos on Twelve was slammed, as were other on-course vendors.

Meanwhile, the scores rolled in. Harris English, Christian Bezuidenhout and Si Woo Kim shot 65 to trail Matsuyama by two. Patrick Cantlay and Marc Leishman shot 67.

Ponte Vedra Beach resident Tommy Roy, who produces NBC’s golf coverage, was now tasked with covering the tournament while also covering an emerging global health emergency.

“Fortunately, we had Mike Tirico on the crew, our host, who is very connected with the sports world,” Roy says. “He was getting messages about all the different leagues and colleges getting ready to shut down, and one by one they all started doing so, and we were having to report that.”

Major League Baseball canceled spring training, the NCAA canceled all remaining winter and spring championships, including March Madness, and Disney World closed.

“It felt like this avalanche of bad news coming down in the middle of my favorite tournament,” Roy says. “But if you’re on air with live coverage and news is breaking you have to deal with it.”

Everyone had an opinion on whether THE PLAYERS should continue. Golf seemed like the perfect social-distancing sport, being played outside on hundreds of acres. Rory McIlroy was among the first to say that if all the players and caddies could be tested, then play on.

But was that even possible?

Crisis communications 101

TOUR execs huddled in a conference room in the clubhouse from 7 a.m. until almost 10 p.m. Thursday. Almost no other sports leagues remained standing, save for Ultimate Fighting, and the closure of Disney World seemed especially dire.

The official announcement of no on-site fans for the rest of the week came at 6:15 p.m. But was that enough? Neal had taken a crisis-communications class the previous summer, and the big takeaway was this: What would reasonable people expect a responsible organization to do in a crisis? With Monahan temporarily out of the room, she wrote it on the board.

Upon stepping back into the room, having immersed himself in talks with local, state and federal officials, Monahan eyed the board, and his team. Travel restrictions were going up seemingly everywhere. Almost no sport was left standing. The parks had closed. After taking precautions from extra sanitation to the agonizing call to keep fans away, there was nothing left to do.

The text went out at 10 p.m.    

“We were going to bed, I had already turned my phone on Do Not Disturb,” says Rickie Fowler, who was staying at a friend’s house with Justin Thomas and their significant others. “JT is on my favorites list, I’m getting a Facetime call from him from 20 yards away. He goes, ‘Did you get the text? Did you get the news?’ I was like, ‘No, what?’

“He’s like, ‘Everything’s cancelled. It’s done,’” Fowler continues. “So I was like, ‘Hold on a second.’ Went downstairs, grabbed a couple drinks because all we’re gonna do the next day is drive home. We had two drinks and then, ‘All right, well, see ya later!’ Go back to bed.”

Most other players reported similar stories.

NBC’s Roy was sitting in his car at the Jacksonville Airport.

“We thought we were going to be broadcasting Friday without fans,” he says. “Well, how do you do that? If we weren’t going to get crowd noise, then I would play music more often. We were preparing for that, and we were fully prepared when we left the compound. I went to pick up my daughter, who was flying in from New York, and that’s when I got the word.

“I’m actually sitting in the cell phone lot waiting for her to land when I got the news that they were going to cancel,” he continues. “The primary thought is, OK, what are we going to do on the air tomorrow? And the safety of everybody. Everything was so unknown; it was a scary time. And on a personal level I was glad that my daughter was getting out of New York.”

Entering uncharted territory