Story by Hailey Wist
Photographs by Joel Caldwell

Meet the Kiawah Island Club Caddies who make a round of golf so memorable.

Stefan Kwasny
The Strategist
Kiawah Island Club Caddie Since 2011

What’s your Favorite course on the Island?
Cassique gets a lot of love but River Course is my favorite. It’s very hard, especially when you play it from the back tee. 

What’s your favorite hole?
Number fourteen at River Course.

What is your favorite golf course in the world?
My favorite place in the world is the Charleston Municipal Golf Course. I’ve been to some really cool places like Shinnecock [Hills], National, and Oakmont, but every time I’m out of town, I just wish I was back home at the Muni. That’s where I take my kids. It’s like backyard golf. 

What’s the most memorable round you’ve caddied?
I got to watch Bernd Wiesberger play Cassique one day, and he was nine under through fourteen. His caddie asked us what the course record was on fourteen, and we told him it was ten under sixty-two, and that one of the cart service guys at River Course actually held it. As soon as we told him that, he quit trying. His caddie told us that he won’t take course records from local guys. I thought that was the coolest thing ever. 

What’s the most common mistake golfers make?
It drives me crazy when people blindly lay up to a number that they’re terrible at. Say, you’re on a par five, and I’ll tell them, You’re 253 yards away. They laugh and they’re like, I can’t hit it that far, and they just grab their three wood and hit it as far as they can, but they hit it down to forty-five yards. Nobody’s good at forty-five yards to a tight hole location. It’s totally avoidable. Hit it to a number you’re good at! 

Who’s your favorite pro?
Payne Stewart was my favorite. He dressed cool and he was a really good person off the golf course. We named our son Payne after him. 

What’s your greatest strength as a caddie?
I’m good at course management—plotting your way around the golf course and hitting the right shots. I’m supposed to keep you out of trouble and not let your brain take over and make bad decisions. When I first started, I didn’t know how to read putts for other people. I was a good putter myself, but some Members actually taught me how to caddie, how to read putts, and how to communicate well. The best thing a caddie can do is be four or five steps ahead of their player at all times. 

 

Tommy Metherell
The Square
Kiawah Island Club Caddie Since 2005

What’s your Favorite course on the Island?
River Course. It’s a proper golf course.

Favorite hole?
Number twelve at River Course. 

What is your favorite part of your job?
I just love being outside. It’s like the beginning of Caddyshack when the sprinklers are going, the sun is coming up, the grass is green. I get to be in this beautiful place every day. I’m in paradise, right? It’s just unreal. 

What’s the most common mistake golfers make?
I think it’s all about tempo and balance. Everyone is kind of swinging too hard and too fast. So I would say to just slow down a little, keep a steady head. 

Any crazy wildlife sightings?
I swear this really happened but sometimes I think I dreamt it. I think I’ve talked myself out of it. About fourteen years ago, I was on fourteen at River. There is a pond there with a little island. And lo and behold, a cougar walks onto the bank. It was not a bobcat. I’m a big cat guy, and this was twice the size of a bobcat. He came strutting out and didn’t even look at me. My jaw dropped. I was the last one on the hole, and when I caught up to my guys, no one believed me. They told me it was a bobcat. 

What’s your favorite course in the world?
Nicklaus [Club] Beijing. I had the opportunity to go to China twice to train caddies. It is an eighteen-hole course on one hundred and two acres, which is small. But the way they engineered it, six, twelve, and eighteen went back to the clubhouse. There wasn’t a piece of grass out of place. It was perfect. 

Who’s your favorite professional to watch?
Freddie Couples. He’s in the groove. 

 

Lee Sneed
The Good-time Guy
Kiawah Island Club Caddie Since 2008

What’s your Favorite course on the Island?
Definitely Cassique. If golf is a religion, I tithe Cassique. I love that place. It’s my church. 

Favorite hole?
Cassique’s hole number fifteen. 

What’s your favorite course in the world?
The back nine of the Muni in Asheville, North Carolina.

What’s your favorite part of your job?
I’ve never loathed this job. I’ve had a bunch of other jobs, and I’ve loathed them on Monday mornings. I basically wake up happy every day and can’t wait to go to work. It’s a beautiful existence, honestly. 

What is your strength as a caddie?
Golf has “hang around” people. There are always people who hang around and make the group. Nobody wants to play by themselves, so I guess I’m just a good hang-around guy. I try to make it smooth, keep things positive. I caddie for high handicap and low handicap, and they both seem to like me. I’m the old pair of boots. 

What’s the most common mistake golfers make?
Moving your head and swinging too hard. Everybody thinks you need to swing really hard. You don’t! 

What’s the most memorable round you’ve caddied?
I was on a group with Lindsey Graham, the senator. Something happened with Benghazi, and they wanted Susan Rice to be the Secretary of State. He called Greta Van Susteren, and then the next call he made was to John Kerry. And Kerry ended up being the Secretary of State. I know it’s conjecture, but I’m pretty sure I saw that happen.

What’s your craziest wildlife experience?
I watched a bald eagle harass an osprey. The osprey gave up his fish, and the eagle caught it in midair. The whole thing took two and a half seconds. It happened right above our heads. It was amazing. 

 

Jeff Heikkinen
The Grouch
Kiawah Island Club Caddie Since 2005

What’s your Favorite course on the Island?
Cassique. 

And what’s your Favorite hole?
Number fifteen at Cassique. It’s a par five that looks like it was put there by nature—almost as if a high tide brought it in and left the hole there for us. 

Tell me what you love about your job.
It is so much more than golf now for me. I take a lot of pride in making someone’s day better. When people find out that I’m a caddie, they want to know what celebrity or professional I’ve caddied for but honestly, it’s the Club Members I enjoy the most. I’ve gone to the graduations of kids I caddied for when they were eleven. I’m part of something out here and that’s extremely rewarding. 

What’s the most common advice you give during a round?
The main thing is confidence. It’s not necessarily getting a lesson or a new putter, it’s believing that it’s going to go in the hole. So my blanket advice is just to believe in yourself. 

What do you think is your greatest strength as a caddie?
I’m not everyone’s cup of tea. I’ve been here for twenty years. I started when I was twenty-two. I say it how it is and don’t sugarcoat things. But I’m going to try as hard as I can to make you have the best day. 

What’s your craziest wildlife run-in?
Everybody thinks that I’m lying but I’ve definitely seen “the Cougar.” It was fifteen years ago, and I was on the ninth hole at River Course. I looked to my right out at the marsh and thought, that’s a thick deer. Then the tail popped up. It was a cat, a very large cat. 

What is your favorite course in the world?
I have had the opportunity to play golf all over the country. I’ve played Cypress Point and Pebble Beach. But one of my regulars asked me what my number one bucket list golf course was, and I said, Fishers Island. She just laughed. I mean Fishers Island has like one hundred members. It is one of the top ten golf courses in the world. It’s impossible to play there. But her godmother is a member. So another caddie and I stayed with this woman on Fishers Island and played the course. Her dad was the original professional there and was there the day it opened in 1926. The whole experience was unreal.

Who is your favorite Pro?
It’s always been Phil Mickelson. When he won the PGA Championship here in 2021, I was at three of the four rounds and followed him exclusively. That was obviously one of my top golf experiences in life—just to be there. 

 

David Palefsky
The Dad
Kiawah Island Club Caddie Since 2015

What’s your Favorite course on the Island? My favorite course is Cassique. It’s like Africa meets Ireland.

What’s your favorite hole?
Number five on Cassique, Pulpit routing. 

What’s your favorite part of your job?
The relationships. Some of these ladies I caddie for have followed my engagement and then marriage and then the birth of my daughter and son. These are long-term relationships. I also like intimately knowing the courses and learning everyone’s favorite spots. 

What’s the most common mistake golfers make?
A lot of people get hung up on finding the one thing they’re doing wrong. But it’s usually not as simple as that. I might tinker with their setup, but I won’t dive too deep into swing mechanics. That usually just doesn’t go too well. The best thing you can do is confidently choose a target and go after that. 

What’s your strength as a caddie?
I’ve been called Mr. Mellow. I’ve been called the psychiatrist. But the other caddies call me Dad. I over-prepare and take a bunch of extra things on the course with me in a fanny pack.

Like what?
I bring an extra towel, sand bottle, Band-Aids, Advil, Tylenol, ChapStick, matches, batteries, a Koozie, a yard book, a pencil, prescription sunglasses, tissues, breath mints, and business cards. 

When did you start golfing?
I’ve been golfing since I was nine years old. We moved to Charlotte, North Carolina and the movers left somebody else’s nine iron at our new house. I put vegetable cans in the ground and taught myself how to play. 

What’s your favorite course in the world?
TimberStone in Iron Mountain, Michigan. And the other River Course at Blackwolf Run in the Sheboygan [River Valley]. In early October, two- and three-foot long salmon come up the Sheboygan River from Lake Michigan and swim alongside the course. They’re too fat for the river so they stick out of the top of the water. It’s incredible. 

Who is your favorite professional?
I grew up with Tiger [Woods]. I saw him finish tight with Payne Stewart at Pinehurst in 1999. And I was at the Masters on Sunday when he won in 2019. I also like Bryson DeChambeau. I appreciate his self-confidence and creativity. He’s not afraid to think outside the box.