Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains Trump

By Rick Reilly

Book Overview

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

An outrageous indictment of Donald Trump's appalling behavior when it comes to golf--on and off the green--and what it reveals about his character.

"Reilly pokes more holes in Trump's claims than there are sand traps on all of his courses combined. It is by turns amusing and alarming." --The New Yorker

Donald Trump loves golf. He loves to play it, buy it, build it, and operate it. He owns 14 courses around the world and runs another five, all of which he insists are the best on the planet. He also claims he's a 3 handicap, almost never loses, and has won an astonishing 18 club championships.

How much of all that is true? Almost none of it, acclaimed sportswriter Rick Reilly reveals in this unsparing look at Trump in the world of golf.

Based on Reilly's own experiences with Trump as well as interviews with over 100 golf pros, amateurs, developers, and caddies, Commander in Cheat is a startling and at times hilarious indictment of Trump and his golf game. You'll learn how Trump cheats (sometimes with the help of his caddies and Secret Service agents), lies about his scores (the "Trump Bump"), tells whoppers about the rank of his courses and their worth (declaring that every one of them is worth $50 million), and tramples the etiquette of the game (driving on greens doesn't help). Trump doesn't brag so much, though, about the golf contractors he stiffs, the course neighbors he intimidates, or the way his golf decisions wind up infecting his political ones.

For Trump, it's always about winning. To do it, he uses the tricks he picked up from the hustlers at the public course where he learned the game as a college kid, and then polished as one of the most bombastic businessmen of our time. As Reilly writes, "Golf is like bicycle shorts. It reveals a lot about a man." Commander in Cheat "paints a side-splitting portrait of a congenital cheater" (Esquire), revealing all kinds of unsightly truths Trump has been hiding.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316528080
• ISBN13: 9780316528085
• Release Date: April 2019
• Publisher: Hachette Books
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 1.01 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.1" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

Highly recommend the book.

Loved the book. Fortunately because my husband had been a golfer, I already knew the terms and heard of several golfers mentioned. However I wanted another insight to the Commander in Cheat. The book was humorous and insightful. It confirmed much of what we already knew about him and this was in 2019, before he became even worse. I highly recommend the book.

Commander in Cheat is a great read!

Before I picked up this book, I hadn't heard of Rick Reilly and I knew very little about golf. Now that I've read Commander in Cheat, I've expanded my knowledge of golf way beyond the driving range and mini-golf. The author shares inside information in an uplifting and humorous manner. I highly recommend this engaging book. Check it out!