Millers enjoying time on latest reunion tour
QUINCY - To get to the happenings that are going on at the Granite Links Golf Club this weekend, you must first start with the 1971 Maine Open.
Actually, you needn't begin there, but Allen Miller must, at least if he's to explain the route he and his wife, Cindy, have taken to arrive at this BJ's Charity Classic, the $500,000 Legends Tour stop for 45-and-over LPGA Tour members that begins today. It is a story of a partnership built around golf and if along the way they've been able to have some good laughs and share some fun with great friends, well, they always figured that was the point of it all.
"She's funnier than hell," said Allen, and almost on cue, Cindy says something on the practice range that cracks up a few of the young girls who are taking part in a junior clinic. Miller is providing instruction, as are a half-dozen of her fellow Legends Tour members. If it appears to be a throwback to a time when pro golfers truly had to help promote their event and spread the virtues of golf, well, that's OK, too, because that remains at the heart of their love for the game.
"It's fun helping people, especially people who want to be helped," said Allen, eight days shy of his 60th birthday, but 37 years into a rewarding professional golf career. Good enough in 1969-70 to be ranked by Golf Digest as the No. 2 amateur in the world, he had a 3-1 singles record for two US Walker Cup teams, 1969 and 1971, and counts the 1970 Northeast Amateur at Wannamoisett CC in Rumford, R.I., among his six prominent amateur wins. Yet it was his first tournament as a professional that set in motion his relationship with Cindy - in a roundabout manner, that is.
"I played it right after I turned pro, right after the Porter Cup [in Niagara Falls, N.Y.]," said Miller. "I met a guy up there who was wild, a crazy guy named Tom Stanley."
Wild and crazy in a fun way, of course, which is why Miller hit it off with Stanley, who hailed from Manchester, N.H., but escaped to a winter sun at the University of Miami. They joined up a few winters later, Stanley working as Miller's caddie at the Doral stop. It gave the student something to talk about when he met a member of the Miami golf team at a campus bar.
"He told me he was a caddie and that he was one of the financial backers of Pat Bradley. I said, 'Sure, right,' " said Cindy Miller, who figured she'd show up at the Doral tournament to see for herself. "Darned if he wasn't telling the truth."
That's how Allen Miller met Cindy Kessler. They were golfers with a common interest - the life of a tour pro. The only thing is, Allen's pursuit went one way, Cindy's concerns took her another. Allen, who had joined the PGA Tour in 1972 and won his only tournament at the 1974 Tallahassee Open, was already eight years into his career when Cindy joined the LPGA Tour and they did their best to juggle things. They married in 1981, the same year Cindy put an end to her LPGA career, and when in 1986 Allen called it quits on the PGA, it was time for them to go into business together.
"He's the brains, I'm the mouth," said Cindy, and it prompts a chuckle from Allen, who offers a different explanation about their collaboration in an indoor-outdoor, year-round teaching facility just outside of Buffalo. Said Allen: "I'm the theorist, she's the put-it-acrosser. That's her talent."
For years, Allen and Cindy were content building their business and raising their three children - Kelly, Jamie, and Matt - but when The Golf Channel unveiled its "Big Break" reality golf show several years ago, the series earmarked "for ladies only" caught their interest.
"She loves to play and she's a better player now than she ever was," said Allen.
Cindy, who had won the LPGA Teaching & Class Professionals Championship the year before, jumped at the chance to appear in the 2005 series. It rejuvenated her competitive fires and that season she finished second on the Legends Tour money list. Just like that, after a hiatus of more than 20 years, the Millers were back in the golf-touring business - this time with Allen serving as caddie for Cindy.
That season meant a trip to Granite Links for the debut of the BJ's Charity Classic and as they headed for the Boston area, Allen and Cindy got a call from out of the blue. It was Stanley, rekindling friendships some 20 years after they had last met, and they have made this Granite Links stop an annual reunion. For her part, Cindy - who will be paired with Jenny Lidback in the 28-team competition - cherishes the whole scene.
"It's a mulligan for me," said Cindy, who describes her three seasons on the LPGA Tour more than 25 years ago with her biting wit. "I was the worst of the best, so this is a second chance."
Just last week, Allen walked alongside his longtime friend, Lanny Wadkins, and followed the action at the Porter Cup at Niagara Falls CC. Their sons, Jamie Miller and Travis Wadkins, were participants in the prestigious amateur tournament. Cindy caddied for Jamie, who has pro aspirations and enough talent for his parents to tell him to give it a shot. "He's got a finance degree, so I told him, 'You go figure it out,' " said Cindy.
Thirty-seven summers earlier, Allen Miller and Lanny Wadkins had probably been given similar advice before they made the Maine Open one of their first stops in the pro world. Wadkins was a runner-up at Riverside CC, but Miller may have earned the bigger prize.
In a way, he won a wife.
Jim McCabe can be reached at jmccabe@globe.com.
