Raymond Floyd was a Madoff victim

[John Blain]

According to the latest issue of Sports Illustrated Ray Floyd had two accounts with Bernie Madoff although no specific dollar amounts were mentioned...
To add insult to injury, in 2006 Floyd was one of 250 investors to lose a total of $213 million in a Ponzi scheme by KL Financial Group in Florida.

Ouch.

[Joe Bausch]

Fool me once, shame on you....

Edit:  D'oh!   

[TEPaul]

Come on Joe, if you're gonna quote the idiotic malaproper, you gotta do it right;

"Fool me once...ah, uhh....fool me...aaaah.....shame on you."


The best that can be said about The Little Shrub is he actually out-malaproped both Yogi and Casey! Or did he malaprob more than he malaproped?

Whatever.

[TEPaul]

Raymond Floyd was a big deal at Indian Creek in the past (but I think he moved on up to PB and Seminole in recent years). It seems like a few people from IC got clipped by Bernie M either directly or indirectly.

[John Burzynski]

I have often wondered why the 'big-name' victims in cases like this have their names bandied about in the media so frequently and prominently.  Is Raymond Floyd any smarter or dumber or more gullible than the rest of us, just because he is famous?  Does it make his loss worse because he is famous?  Or is it a case of the media or many of us saying "gosh, if it can happen to ________ because they are famous then this guy must have been good at fooling people".

Truth is we all want to trust people, and many people, famous or not, should just walk away if the return on investment seems too good to be true.  But to bandy these people's names about just because they were duped and happen to be famous, well, I think it is wrong.

[Joe Bausch]

There was fellow here in Philly that duped a bunch of investors recently too, although not nearly on the scale of Madoff.  But a little school just down the road from Overbrook CC apparently had their entire endowment with the fellow.  Oh my.

[TEPaul]

Joe:

Really? What school was that? Is it the Catholic Girls School basically across the street from Overbrook GC that used to be the estate of Clarence Geist?

[Sam Maryland]

http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/madoffvictimslist.pdf

That's a link to the full list if you want to look through it.   

This article may be of interest as well:  http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_08/b4120022131798.htm

[Joe Bausch]

Joe:

Really? What school was that? Is it the Catholic Girls School basically across the street from Overbrook GC that used to be the estate of Clarence Geist?

No, not the Academy of Notre Dame.  Farther down the road and over a bit:  Hill Top School.

[TEPaul]

Sam:

Thanks for that article on Stanford Financial. What do I know but it does seem to smell a bit fishy, don't you think? 

It generally seems like there's some fire where there's some smoke from former employees a company claims were just disguntled or whatever.   

[Sam Maryland]

you got it.

this was a "Ponzi checklist" was published on the Dealbreaker website regarding the Stanford story :
--------------------
Named after university known more for golf courses than scholarship? Check.

$50 billion in assets? Check.

Substantial overseas AUM? Check.

More than double the rate of return for similar investments? Check.

Limited details on investing strategy? Check.

Small, obscure auditor? Check.

Retribution for questions about investment strategy? Check.
--------------------

I kid you not.  obviously it was a tongue-in-cheek commentary but in all seriousness that simple little list raises some serious red flags.

FYI, Stanford Financial is the sponsor for the PGA Tour event in Memphis...

[John Kirk]

Named after university known more for golf courses than scholarship? Check.

...obviously it was a tongue-in-cheek commentary

Being from Palo Alto, this comment drew my attention.

Stanford GC is a Doak 6.  The university is a Doak 10.  Other universities wish they were Stanford.

Assume emoticon.

[TEPaul]

John Kirk:

I thought Stanford was that university that people from California who should've gone to Harvard go to. 

One time years ago after my dad died I was looking at this alumni book of his from a boarding school in Massachusetts called Groton. I was struck by the fact that every single member of his class went to either Harvard, Yale or Princeton except one guy, the only guy in the class from California who went to Stanford.

[Steve_ Shaffer]

When I visited Stanford many years ago, I saw a tshirt: "Harvard -The Stanford of the East"

[George Pazin]

Named after university known more for golf courses than scholarship? Check.

...obviously it was a tongue-in-cheek commentary

Being from Palo Alto, this comment drew my attention.

Stanford GC is a Doak 6.  The university is a Doak 10.  Other universities wish they were Stanford.

Assume emoticon.

I'm always happy with the opportunity to roll out my favorite Stanford joke, courtesy of The Simpsons:

Lisa: Oh no, with a felony on my record, I'll never get into an Ivy League school!

Bart: You're goin' to Stanford, you're goin' to Stanford.

 

It's always unfortunate to read of anyone being taken in an investment scheme, famous or otherwise. For an interesting take on the situation, I offer the following:

Harry Beats Goliath

[cary lichtenstein]

Named after university known more for golf courses than scholarship? Check.

...obviously it was a tongue-in-cheek commentary

Being from Palo Alto, this comment drew my attention.

Stanford GC is a Doak 6.  The university is a Doak 10.  Other universities wish they were Stanford.

Assume emoticon.

To Ray Floyd, Madoff was a Doak 10, now it's NLE

[Mike_Young]

Joe:

Really? What school was that? Is it the Catholic Girls School basically across the street from Overbrook GC that used to be the estate of Clarence Geist?

Tom,
I just hope it wasn't that famous Philadelphia school of GCA....where is it located?

[TEPaul]

Mike:

Would it make you more comfortable if we just called that old Philly School of architecture back then "That Group of Guys Who Knew Each Other Well Back Then And Practiced Golf Course Architecture."

[Mike_Young]

Tom,
Nope...I like that name Philly School of GCA.....plus I assumed that GCA atlas was an online version of their present school...

[TEPaul]

There is no present Philly School of Architecture to my knowledge Mike. The guys who made it up have all gone to meet their maker many decades ago. Of course some contend they were mostly all a bunch of novices who've been inaccurately idolized by local people and they couldn't have done anything much unless Macdonald/Whigam and HH Barker helped them all out like secretly routing and designing their great golf courses. But the Philly School is long gone and the only thing left today, according to those same people on here, is what is known by them as the "Philadelphia Syndrome." 

How about the Athens School of Architecture? What can you tell me about that?

[john_stiles]

Sam,


No FDIC insurance - check,    you can't make any real interest, real money, if you have to follow the Feds guidelines

[Mike_Young]

There is no present Philly School of Architecture to my knowledge Mike. The guys who made it up have all gone to meet their maker many decades ago. Of course some contend they were mostly all a bunch of novices who've been inaccurately idolized by local people and they couldn't have done anything much unless Macdonald/Whigam and HH Barker helped them all out like secretly routing and designing their great golf courses. But the Philly School is long gone and the only thing left today, according to those same people on here, is what is known by them as the "Philadelphia Syndrome." 

How about the Athens School of Architecture? What can you tell me about that?

Well we were still trying to recover from the War of Northern Agression and had no money for golf when the Philly School was getting started so we were a little behind......but we gained quickly.....of course the USGA did not even want us to know of golf for a while and then ole Bob Jones decides he neds to put us on the map with this golf stuff and he goes north......we start to get a little stuff down here in the 20's and then this Athens School you speak of got started in the 80's.......you need to come back down here and attend a class......we don't use any of those syndromes either

[John Kirk]

So just one degree of separation between Kevin Bacon and Raymond Floyd.

How's that for bad taste?

[Sam Maryland]

I posted this further up in the thread but will mention it again:  http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_08/b4120022131798.htm

That link is to a story from Business Week about a company called Stanford Financial.  They offer a financial propostion that really seems too good to be true...

...and you know that they say if it seems too good to be true.

I mention this again because Stanford appears to be heavily invested in golf.  They are the sponsor of the PGA Tour event in Memphis.  In addition, it appears that they have a contractual relationship with Vijay, Camillo, and Mogan Pressel (among others). 

Possibly it will turn out to be much ado about nothing but I think this is a story worth watching -- could have a big impact on the golf community.
 
 
 
 

[cary lichtenstein]

Sam

another Madoff?

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