New York Jets cornerback Sauce Gardner has spent a great part of the last two seasons doing what he could to learn golf. Better yet, Sauce has documented some of his progress throughout it all.
Thursday showed Gardner’s work was proven to be well worth the wait.
Sauce Gardner wins the NFLPA Classic
Gardner and his fellow Cincinnati Bearcats teammates competed in the NFL Players Association’s annual NFLPA Golf Classic in Mexico this week. Incredibly (or perhaps not so incredibly, had you tracked Gardner’s golfing progress), Sauce’s team won the entire event.
Gardner and former teammates Desmond Ridder, Josh Whyle, and Alec Pierce all participated in the foursome.
The Bearcats team defeated 17 other teams to win the tournament at El Camaleón Golf Course at Mayakoba in Riviera Maya, Mexico. For Gardner, it was a culmination of work over the last few years during the offseason.
“It’s got to be one of those things where it’s like, that play’s over with, just like with golf: That shot’s over with,” Gardner said last training camp. “It just helped with my mental a lot. Just being able to go out there and, in golf, you just hear nature, and it’s quiet, you know? So, it really helped me like slow my mental down.
“And I try to make that apply to the football field, especially if I have a bad play or something like that, just come back down, tone it back down.”
Hopefully, the added hardware will keep Gardner motivated to play even better for the Jets next season. New York Jets’ all-time great cornerback and current head coach Aaron Glenn certainly hopes so.
