The serial golf cheat in the White House

Some of his tactics are blatant: not counting foul shots, dropping balls closer to the hole, and improving his lies. At Winged Foot, a storied New York course where Trump is a member, Reilly tells us, “the caddies got so used to seeing him kick his ball back onto the fairway they came up with a nickname for him: ‘Pele.’ ” (For those who don’t know soccer, the Brazilian Pelé was one of the best kickers of a ball in history.)

And Trump doesn’t only give himself unfair advantages: he’s also been known to hobble his opponents. On another occasion recounted by Reilly, Trump was playing with Mike Tirico, the sportscaster, who hit a long, soaring second shot into a par five, high-fived his caddy, and headed for the green. When he got there, there was no sign of his ball; it had somehow ended up in a sand trap some fifty feet left of the pin. “Lousy break,” Trump said. Tirico was so befuddled that he took a seven. Afterward, Trump’s caddy told Tirico that his approach shot had actually finished up about ten feet from the hole. “Trump threw it into the bunker,” the caddy said. “I watched him do it.”