By Michael Ashcraft --
Rob Scribner. Remember that name. You may see him as an emerging sports star sometime soon.
No, not "Grandpa" Rob, the former LA Rams special teams player who never needed uppers in the pre-drug testing days to amp up before hurtling downfield full speed and smashing mercilessly into barbarians.
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Grandpa Rob Scribner was a name in sports.
But he's not playing football anymore. He's walking around leisurely on golf courses these days. He's taking his grandson, "Little" Rob Scribner around the links and improving the kid's shot.
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Despite not having his best day, Rob Scribner, a sophomore at local Lighthouse Christian Academy, still won the golf tournament against SCVI and Westmark Friday at Balboa Golf Course in Encino. (Apparently, SCVI thought it was only a 9-hole tournament and left for home before it was over.)
Little Rob plays golf like he does Spanish homework: impeccably. (I should know. I'm his Spanish teacher. He does better than kids who grew up speaking Spanish.)
Little Rob -- who's not little because he measures 5'11" -- launched into the woods of Tiger Woods when he was 3.
Yup, three.
That's when he got a plastic golf club and plastic golf ball to whack around inside his house during winter to perfect learn his shot. Just like Bubba Watson did.
He was five when his dad took him on the course and encouraged him to try to hit real balls.
He also tried football but pretty much left that up to his older brother, Marcus, who will feature on Santa Monica College's team next year.
He tried baseball but pretty much gave that up too.
Golf has been his main love. He does it with patience and perseverance.
"I started golf ever since I was a little kid. I always did it as a hobby. I got good just because I was playing with my grandpa a lot, and he helped me get better, and my dad and my Uncle Zach (Scribner, LCA's golf coach)," Rob says. "I started to practice hard and practice a lot. Even though I didn't feel like I was getting good, I could look on the scores and see they were getting lower."
Everybody agrees Rob is a putter.
"If I were to just gain a few more pounds, the long ball would be insane," he adds.
What did Pastor Rob, senior pastor of the Lighthouse Church which is the parent organization of the LCA, teach him about golf?
"He taught me to never give up because even if you think you're playing bad all throughout the whole course, you never know until the end," he says.