INAMORI CLASSIC NOTEBOOK : Buskey as Caddie Is Like Money in Bank

Why waste time hitting balls on the practice tee?

Hire Bill Buskey as caddie and cash a check as one of the top 10 finishers in the LPGA Inamori Classic.

It happens every year.

1992: Judy Dickinson finishes first with Buskey toting her bag.

1991: Patti Rizzo finishes sixth with “Beautiful Bill,” as his fellow caddies refer to him, doing the heavy work.

1990: Rizzo finishes fifth with you know who.

1989: Rizzo wins.

1988: Dot Germain places seventh with Buskey--the last time she’s landed in the top 10 in an LPGA event.

“I don’t understand it, but it’s like I have to finish in the top 10 in this town,” Buskey said. “I mean in 1985, I also won in San Diego with Beth Daniel.”

Buskey worked three-year stretches each with Janet Anderson, Daniel and Rizzo before making connections with Dickinson at the end of last season. In his first four assignments for Dickinson, she twice placed in the top 10.

And now she has her first win on the tour since 1986.

“We’re getting along pretty good,” he said. “I guess what this means, at least, is I’ll be working with her for another week.”

Some caddies are just “mules,” who pack clubs and keep their mouths shut. Buskey, however, has been on the LPGA Tour since 1977, and many of his decisions have led to better golf.

“I think we used the driver about six times a day,” Buskey said. “ We kept it in the fairway.”

It pays to listen. Buskey’s employers have combined to win $166,250 in six trips to this tournament. Dickinson collected $63,750 Sunday.

And Beautiful Bill’s take?

“That’s personal,” he said.

Several caddies said they have been told that the Inamori Classic will not return to the StoneRidge Country Club next year and will move to Aviara.

Brad Lillmars, the tournament’s chairman, however, said that Kyocera and the StoneRidge Country Club have one year remaining on their contract. He said unless both parties mutually agree to part ways that the tournament will return here.

StoneRidge leased the course for the Inamori Classic in 1988 for $60,000. The fee for the course has gone up 5% each year.

“We have talked about Aviara and finding a flatter course and place with more facilities for our Kyocera parties,” Lillmars said. “But the tournament will be here next year, and then we will explore different sites for a possible move to meet our needs.”

Ramona’s Meg Mallon.

Although she lived in Ramona for only three years, it’s as if Ramona has become part of Mallon’s name every time she returns to the San Diego area.

Helen Alfredsson spent four years at U.S. International University and is engaged to a former Sockers’ player, and they can’t even get her introduction right on the first tee here.

“They got it all wrong,” Alfredsson said. “They announced that I was a graduate from International Business College. What’s that?

“I went to USIU on a full golf scholarship and graduated in 1988. I met the USIU soccer coach, Leonard Cuellar, who played for the Sockers (1980-1981), and we’ve been engaged for four years.”

Alfredsson makes her home in Los Angeles now, but she was raised in Sweden. She won five times overseas last year, and in her first five appearances on the LPGA Tour, she has earned $40,283 to place 13th on the money list.

“Didn’t see anybody out here I knew,” she said. “They don’t have athletics at USIU anymore and I really don’t know those people. And nobody seemed to know me here.”

USIU’s Alfredsson, however, shot a closing 69 for a three-under 285, and finished in sixth place.

What a difference a year makes: Last year Laura Davies beat runner-up Dickinson by four strokes to win the Inamori Classic and $60,000.

This year she finished 18 strokes behind Dickinson, tied for 47th place and earned $1,459.

It could have been worse: Lynn Connelly placed last--25 strokes behind Dickinson--and won $520 for her week’s work.