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We Saw You: SMOKE’s Tent Was Smokin’ at MIM Contest

Of all the tents, booths, and lean-tos I’ve been inside during the Memphis in May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest, SMOKE wins first prize in my book as the most over-the-top barbecue location.

And I was at the very first Memphis in May barbecue contest back in the day. Behind the Orpheum Theatre, as I recall.

The SMOKE tent’s furnishings included a 12-foot S-shaped couch that could seat 18 people, two crystal chandeliers, and four electric fireplaces, which had the flames flickering in the 80-or-something-degree weather. 

Part of the SMOKE tent decor during Memphis in May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest. (Credit: Michael Donahue)

A large photo of pro golfer John Daly hung on the wall.

John Daly?

“It used to sit over our bar,” says SMOKE team member Andy Lamanna. “He was our homage. That’s why the bar lights up with rows of stacked Titos going all the way up. The bottles change colors. We have lights in them.”

Drew Harrison and Mike Thannum at the 2021 Memphis in May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest. (Credit: Shelly Thannum)

The team has a connection to Daly, says Drew Harrison, the team’s head cook. He purchased equipment for their team’s tent “from a restaurant auction of John Daly’s old restaurant in Conway, Arkansas.”

Their tent included five refrigerators, a beer cooler with “50-case-plus capacity,” a cold table food server, hot table food server, a 125 gallon water tank with 1.5 horsepower water pump, three-compartment kitchen sink, a dishwasher, and a “military grade smoke machine.” They also had 100 amp electrical service.

Harrison, who is with Harrison Energy Partners in Little Rock, says,  “I’m a nerd engineer.”

He bought the outer furnishings on Facebook Marketplace, among other places. It was an “anywhere-I-could-buy-something-I-bought-something kind of deal.”

In addition to the sofa and the fireplaces, Harrison also brought an armoire that was converted into bar shelves with custom LED under lighting. “The bar shelves, liquor shelves, two chandeliers, and two back-lit LED signs are all controlled by a single DMX controller so they change colors in unison to the beat of music.”

Another look at the bar inside the SMOKE tent. (Credit: Michael Donahue)

Daly’s photo that was over the bar was moved to another spot this year, Lamanna says, “We replaced it with our team photo when we won. We got 10th in shoulder last year.”

Their tent, by the way, was “30 by 30,” Harrison says. “The front porch was 20 by 30. And the kitchen was 20 by 30.”

Mike Thannum was this year’s team captain. Team members come from “all different places. We come from different states,” Harrison says.

But what brought them all together is “barbecue and Memphis.”

SMOKE didn’t win anything this year, but the team still celebrated the experience by indulging in their annual Saturday-of-the-event tradition, Harrison says. “Watching Top Gun on our 65-inch television.”

Around and About MIM World Championship Barbecue Co0king Contest

Memphis in May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest is a family event. (Credit: Michael Donahue)
Memphis Grizzlies weren’t forgotten by the People’s Republic of Swina team during the Memphis in May World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest. (Credit: Michael Donahue)
Grilled chicken anyone? (Credit: Michael Donahue)
You could also BUY barbecue at MIM World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest. (Credit: Michael Donahue)
Memphis in May president/CEO James L. Holt visits Ghana’s barbecue team at the MIM World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest. Ghana was this year’s MIM honored country. (Credit: Michael Donahue)
Michael McCaffrey and Ben Prudhomme bring in the reinforcements for the Cadillac Grillz team at MIM World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest. (Credit: Michael Donahue)
We Saw You

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Body Double: Trump’s Other Memphis Connection

Of course, we all remember the time Donald Trump cost 2,500 Memphians their jobs. Don’t we? You know, that time when the POTUS of today totally went after Holiday Inn like it was NATO? No? Well, it happened, and here’s a link. That inglorious moment isn’t Trump’s only Memphis connection either. It’s certainly not the weirdest. That distinction may belong to this little gem right here. It’s not new information, but it’s new to us and exactly the kind of thing we here at Fly on the Wall like to pass along.

There’s no giving this devil his due here. The Donald in Chief says “fake news,” when he means, “news I don’t like.” But way out there on the fringes of this textbook B.S. there is — as there always is with presidents and other public figures — plenty of grotesque caricature, propaganda, and general misrepresentation; all magnified in a politically polarized, social media environment.The modern myth-busters at Snopes.com have compiled a list of photo-manipulations that have been widely shared on the W.W. web. Some of them impossibly flattering, some not so flattering. In the latter category, among the most recognizable is an image that’s been used to make the golf and fast food-loving POTUS appear even more bloated and slovenly than he is in real life. Turns out, in this instance, Trump’s nearly crimson face has been pasted onto the body of Memphis’ infamous bad-boy pro golfer, John Daly. And yeah, in the original Big John’s teeing off while puffing on a cigarette. Like you do. If you’re John Fucking Daly.

John Fucking Daly

This isn’t the first time internet artists have recognized Daly’s viral potential. It all began when somebody unearthed this photo, which is basically a Renaissance painting.

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

Pour! The Links Between Alcohol and Golf

When it comes to golf, I’m on the sidelines — with a drink. For better or for worse, booze and golf go hand in hand, from drinking your way around the course to dozens of professional golfers falling prey to alcoholism. It’s even classic joke material: “A recent study found that the average golfer walks about 900 miles a year. Another study found that golfers drink, on average, 22 gallons of alcohol a year. This means that, on average, golfers get about 41 miles to the gallon!”

I had a cousin, Jack Finlay, who my grandmother’s sister, Margaret Maclin, met and married in India during WWII. He was a Scotsman, who, as family lore has it, was the son of a greenskeeper at St. Andrew’s Fairway. Jack Finlay came with Margaret to Shreveport, Louisiana, after the war ended, and wound his way up and down the Mississippi River Delta. He worked at dozens of golf courses and country clubs in towns like Belzoni, Bunkie, Monroe, Tallulah, and all points in between. He was also a big drinker who, for the most part, seemed unfazed by the dozen
or so beers he’d pound every day.

Drinks and golf links

His propensity for alcohol — and his talent for golf — surprised no one. After all, according to Scottish folklore, golf evolved as an 18-hole game because a bottle of Scotch contained 18 shots. When the bottle was drunk, the game was over.

Jack drank it all, and so there’s no revered family recipe to share here. He died when I was young, so I have no idea whether he’d prefer to throw back a Scottish Links, made with Glenmorangie Original whisky and sherry, or a Birdie, a blend of gin and St. Germain. Odds are, he’d like them both.

I lean toward the doctored-up Arnold Palmer, a variation on the virgin ice tea and lemonade concoction made famous by the late, great golfer that includes bourbon. Memphis golfer John Daly has his own cocktail, another Arnold Palmer variation that includes vodka. There’s also the Azalea, a cocktail salute to the Masters in Augusta, hallowed ground for every golfer. The sweet drink is a combination of one part each lime juice and pineapple juice and three parts gin, with enough grenadine added to turn your drink bright pink.

Last month, Golf Digest conducted an informal study of the effects drinking has on your golf game. Their conclusion: A few beers can serve as “swing oil,” but too many, and your senses are dulled, which affects coordination.

Too many for my cousin Jack meant that he would lose his job — a regular occurrence — and he and Margaret would have to pack their bags and head to another golf club on one or the other side of the Mississippi River.

I’m curious to see how Daly plays at the FedEx St. Jude Classic, which starts June 4th at TPC Southwind. I felt a little hungover myself as I watched the professional golfer recount how many times he suffered from the after-effects of over-drinking on the course in his epic ESPN 30 for 30 episode, titled “Hit It Hard,” which first aired in 2016. Who knows what shape he’ll be in this time around?

Then again, when I feel hungover, there’s no better cure than golf: I turn on the TV to whichever tournament is being broadcast, set the volume on low, and watch the tiny ball float over a sea of beautiful green grass. The hushed tones, the polite applause, the way the white ball eventually sinks into a cup just as the caddie removes the flag: Somehow, it all makes me feel like I’m ready for another drink.

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Book Features Books

John Daly, Literary Giant

Finally, some sweet relief for those of us still reeling from the death of Norman Mailer.

Golfer John Daly is back with his second book, Golf My Own Damn Way: A Real Guy’s Guide to Chopping 10 Strokes Off Your Score. In this masterpiece, Daly not only gives helpful golfing tips (“let your belly lead your hands, keep your head out of the game”), he also ponders what a better world it would be if the PGA would just lighten up by letting him “wear his hair down to his butt if he wants to” and “quit disqualifying him for having a bottle of Jack Daniels in his bag.”

Grab a copy of Daly’s book here just in time for the naughty duffer on your Christmas list.

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News The Fly-By

Fly on the Wall

Smokey Mirrors

Tennessee’s new cigarette tax will put pack-a-day smokers back about $3 a week. For most smokers the additional cost isn’t prohibitive. Besides, the kids don’t really need milk with their breakfast cereal, do they?

The Daly Show

Although he’s well off, blond, likes his booze, and most likely has a sex tape floating around somewhere, it’s probably not accurate to describe Memphis’ John Daly as the Paris Hilton of Golf. But like the vapid hotel heiress, the links’ most colorful character knows how to “overshadow” other newsmakers to steal national headlines. Here are some examples from across the country:

“Daly Overshadows Leaders in Memphis” — Newton Kansan

“Daly’s Domestic Woes Overshadow Leaders in Memphis” —

PR-Inside.com

“Daly Overshadows Leaders” — WSTP-TV, Tampa Bay

“Scott’s Lead in Memphis Overshadowed by storms, Daly” — USA Today

And finally …

“John Daly, Golf’s Chris Farley” — Knoxville News Sentinel

Chris Farley? Sure, there may be a passing physical resemblance between Daly and the dead comedian, but we were thinking more along the lines of the bastard love child of Adam Sandler and Lindsay Lohan.

Drug Dealers

Julien’s Summer Sale at the Beverly Hilton is offering a number of Elvis-related items, including an undated bottle of prescription medication that contains pills that may or may not be antihistamine Naldecon.

“The pills are very old,” Julien’s president Darren Julien told Bloomberg reporter Daniel Taub. “They’re heavily discolored,” Julien added, estimating that the artifact would sell for between $2,000 and $4,000. “You can take them to a lab, obviously, and figure out what they are.”

So it’s legal to sell unidentified prescription drugs? Who knew?