Valentino Dixon - Golf With Jay Delsing

Jay Delsing spent 25 years on the PGA Tour and is a lifetime member of the PGA Tour and PGA of America. Now he provides his unique perspective as a golfer and network broadcaster. It's time to go On The Range with Jay Delsing.

On The Range is brought to you by Pro-Am Golf. Good morning. This is Golf with Jay Delsing. I'm your host, Jay.

Perley, what's going on over there? Good morning, Jay. Just ready to rock and roll on the Golf with Jay Delsing show. Of course I'm feeling good.

I'm ready. We've got Mead over there taking good care of us and we have formulated the show like around the golf. The first segment is called the On The Range segment. It's brought to you by Pro-Am Golf. Dan Kirchhoffer, my good buddy, is now the new president over at Pro-Am Golf. If you need lessons, fittings, you need gear, call them at 314-781-7775. Ask for Craig.

He is just terrific. You can check us out on our social media outlets and just Google something, add Jay Delsing, whatever that is. I don't know.

Twitter and Facebook. It'll get you somewhere near there. Yes, it will. It will. We're not totally in love with social media. And we want to thank Bob and Kathy Donahue for Donahue painting and refinishing 314-805-2132.

You need anything done for your house inside, outside. They do it safely. They have professional guys that come in and do a phenomenal job. So give them a call. And Bob and Kathy, thanks for supporting the show. All right, probably this is not show number 100.

We already do show number 100. I'm just checking this. Make sure you're there. I'm ready.

You're there. Okay, so I've had the, I don't want to sound like a whatever. I've had an opportunity to meet a lot of people in my life.

I really have way more than I should. The guy that we have an interview with is special. Not that all our guests aren't special.

They're special to Cupcake over there. I see that. Wow. He's on a roll already. Let me tell you, Valentino Dixon is a kid that grew up in downtown Buffalo, got wrongly accused of murdering someone and spent 27 years in prison and got out of prison through the help of golf and through the golf golfing communities. We're going to talk a little bit about that, but he's our guest today and I can't wait.

Great interview. He's a lot of fun. You've done some other work with him as far as the art show in town and some things like that too.

So you've kind of been around him and get to know him a little bit. Yeah, I really, really did. So we'll talk a little bit about that. So, all right, so let's go to the match three.

All right, Phil Mickelson, Chuckie Barkley, Peyton Manning, and Steph Curry. What did you think? What did you think? Okay. First of all, I'm just going to say it's like the elephant in the room. I miss Tiger. I miss the presence of having Tiger involved in that thing. John takes it all to a different level.

However, you can't make the Tiger comparison. You'll be disappointed for many, many years to come. Don't you think? I am. But you asked me what I thought. That's what I thought. I thought Phil and Charles just kicked their ass.

Just kicked their ass. Steph, who's a really good player for amateur standings, did not have a good day. And Peyton is a competitor. So Peyton's got two shots. He plays like our father's friend. He's from the Jim Thorpe school. He's got a duck hook and a double duck hook. But he knows how to get his ball around the course.

And it just didn't happen. They were also playing just outside of Tucson at a place called Stone Canyon that, oh, by the way, Phil Mickelson purchased. Is that an unfair advantage? Not according to Phil. Charles was written down, Pearl, as a 25 handicap. And he played some tees. He was so far up, he didn't look fat.

He was so far up, you couldn't see him. And he was hitting 6s and 7s off of tees. And Phil, is it possible to overcoach? Phil was working it. He was telling Charles, we're going to clear our mind. Has anybody been more overcoached in the history of the golf game than Charles Barkley?

I don't think so. But Charles delivered. He's either forgot or left the hitch at home. Even all three of the hitches.

There was no hitches. He could fall apart at any given time, which is fine. But, you know, Phil's hitting driver off every hole, you know, trying to drive greens and everything. It was fun. But let me give you some of the numbers that came out of here.

So the whole idea, this was called the Match 3 Champions for Change. So they were specifically raising money for historically all black colleges and universities to get some sort of push in their golf programs and for their golf in those universities and those communities, which I thought was fantastic. $5,455,000 was raised. Wow.

That's amazing what those guys can pull off. And 3.7 million meals were donated because of this. One of the things, it's, you know, we're not political. And I don't want to be political. But there's a few things that we are talking, and we're over our 100th show because we love this game. It has been phenomenal to us. It hasn't been perfect, though. It hasn't been perfect. No one said it is.

We never pretended it has been. But there were, you know, as you look back at some of the history of the game and things like that, it was, shoot, you grew up a little differently than I did. But to me, it seemed kind of exclusive or exclusionary because we didn't have enough money to join a club. So from that standpoint, I felt like I was kind of on the outside looking in. But it wasn't the case because I was able to, the game brought me in.

Oh, yeah, you did. I mean, my first time being on a golf course was caddying. I mean, I caddied for my father, then I went up to the public course and caddied. And if I went to the public course and caddied, then I could make a couple bucks and I could play the golf course.

I get the exclusionary from the membership thing and that kind of stuff. But, I mean, you're always pointing out, and I think, I know when we were growing up, if you want to go play golf, there's places to go play golf. But also, part of it was, it wasn't that big of a deal. It was not.

I wanted to play ball with the neighborhood kids, football during football season, baseball, basketball across the board. Golf was like, if we take one of our dad's clubs and go into the backyard and whack some balls into the woods, that's what we knew about golf at the time and didn't really care. Right. But the point is, this sort of thing is a phenomenal step forward from wherever the hell you want to say we are.

I happen to think, I want to think, you know, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm on the sunny side of the fence over there. I want to think that we're, you know, maybe a little bit further than some others. But the point is, we've got people interested. We've got people raising money and creating some awareness.

It's only going to get better. Yeah. Well, you got the first T program, which you've obviously been involved in. You've got things like this. I just contend, and I think, of course, I want the capability to be there for everybody.

I just, I'm just not sure how many people's radar it's on. Plus, Jay, you know, you can go out and play catch and play baseball. And after a couple minutes, normally you can kind of catch it and throw it.

Basketball, if you have some level of strength as a little kid, if you can throw it high enough, you're going to make one of them once in a while. You go out there and golf. You got to go out about 25 times before you can do anything that you feel like you can do anything.

Right. Nothing good is going to really, really happen to you those first couple times out. When you're a younger person, do you really want to go do something? I guess that'd be like, which I never got past the second lesson, playing a guitar or playing a piano or something. You know, you didn't want to do that because I don't get it after the first lesson.

So why am I doing this? Right. I think that's one of the other hard parts of the game.

And then you, then you get behind and then, you know, how many people have you run into a business? They want to go play now that they're in business, but they can't play. And the other guys are shooting, even if they're shooting below 90 anything or right around 90, the person that's going to go out there and shoot 140, you know, like Meat, you know, they don't really want to go out there. And I said, well, Meat does want to go out there though. Wow. I thought he was sleeping. I thought he was sleeping.

Well, we're going to hear from Meat as soon as he gets that mic turned on. Did you say he was sleeping alone? Did you say 140? Is that what you said? No, I said 140.

I was giving you a compliment, but you only caught part of it because you weren't paying attention. Well, the other thing that's cool is Jay Monahan, our commissioner, has committed $100 million over the next 10 years for racial and social justice causes. So we're rallying. We're rallying. We're going to get better. Let's put it that way.

We're going to get better. And the other thing, Pearl, we've said this way too many times. I'm going to say it way too many times again. Look what the game does. Yeah. Look what the, I mean, charitable engine like nobody's business. This is the Friday after Thanksgiving and these guys are playing in front of no people and Capital One and some of these other companies that stepped up to the plate right on. They're making it happen. It's a good thing.

Right on. Well, that's going to do it for the On the Range segment, but don't go anywhere. We've got the front nine and we've got an interview with Valentino Dixon. Hi, this is Bob Costas and you're listening to Golf with Jay Delce. Let your local farmers insurance agent Ed Foglebach put his experience to work for you. Ed Foglebach proudly serves the St. Louis City, County and Metropolitan area and any of their families and businesses and is ready to review your existing policies or provide a no obligation quote today. Call the Foglebach agency at 314-398-0101 to get smarter about your insurance. Again, that's the Foglebach agency at 314-398-0101.

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Hey, welcome back. This is Golf with Jay Delcey. Jay and John are here and we are going to the front nine brought to you by the Ascension Charity Classic.

Pearl, in terms of the Ascension Charity Classic, it's going to be played in September at Norwood 2021, the inaugural year. Has there been a better rookie class on the Champions Tour than what? Do you have the list?

Yeah, you've got some. I don't think so. I don't think so. Can you remember? We remember because when you were going on the regular tour 450 years ago, that was a monster class. This is an awesome looking class. Is it going to bring more attention, more interest?

I hope it does. I don't know. That's a good question. Tiger, Phil, Ernie. Good names. There's just, as you know, in the media world, there's only a couple of names that move the needle. Tiger and Phil are just about it.

That's why it's almost an unfair question. But man, those guys can still really, there's so many guys out there that can really play. I remember going through tour school, counting for you through tour school, just kind of wondering what we're going to see.

It was amazing how deep, and I can remember the one time I wish I would have written the number down. I think of one tour school that you're going through, maybe it was down in Houston, I think I counted like 18 previous tour winners. Winners. That's right.

Just going through tour school, not playing in an event. That wasn't the year that my ball hit the bulkhead, was it on that one par 5? Hit the wood? I'm pretty sure it was. Yeah, I thought it was too. Not that I'm remembering much of it. Not that you didn't let that go.

No, I didn't. Good yardage. Anyway, I got to thank my friends at Whitmore Country Club for sponsoring the show.

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So visit them at whitmoregolf.com. All right. So, Valentino Dixon. This is a guy who grew up in Buffalo. Got caught up in a really bad situation and got convicted of a murder he didn't commit.

Spent 27 years in prison. Let's go listen to what Valentino Dixon has to say. Is it his time? There it is.

Can you believe it? Valentino Dixon is brought to you by Golden Tee. Two years ago, we met. We were doing a little gig with Mike Doster and Jerry Peterson with Art Unleashed. And we brought you in because your story caught my eye.

And I haven't been able to put it down since. So, Valentino, you were wrongly in prison for 27 years, man. Can you take us back to 1991 when this whole thing kind of went down? Yeah. Well, I was hanging out with some friends at a popular hangout. It was about 90 people out there. And a shooting took place. I took off, ran in my car, drove away. And shortly thereafter, I was pulled over and taken into custody. OK, and told that I had shot and killed the man, which I thought was insane.

But I always felt like, OK, this thing is going to clear itself up. OK, eight people came forward and actually the person responsible for the crime stepped up and told detectives what happened. All of those people were disregarded. I believe because of embarrassment, public embarrassment, I had been plastered all over the news.

And I don't believe that detectives or whoever was in charge wanted to just make it right and say, hey, we made a mistake here. You know, I was poor, you know, I hate to use a race card. I hate to use race card, you know, but I was poor. I was from the inner city and I couldn't afford an attorney. I find myself going to trial. Ten months later, my appointed attorney did not call any of those witnesses who were available. He did not introduce the confession of the shooter, which was available to him.

And he didn't even give an opening statement. And I complained about the judge to the judge about his conduct and just told me to sit down that I had a fine attorney. And all this is on the record. So the jury came back and found me guilty. They gave me thirty nine years.

I found myself in an adequate prison, which is, you know, one of the worst prisons in America. And, you know, for the first seven years, I didn't draw at all, you know. And so my uncle sent me some art supplies and he says, if you can reclaim your talent, you can reclaim your life. And so I just started drawing. And he said, hey, man, you may have to draw yourself out of prison.

The evidence is there, but authorities is not acknowledging it. So you may have to draw yourself out of prison. I didn't know what he was talking about. I started drawing every day. My my spirit started getting stronger. Then the whole time God was with me, I didn't understand it or know God, but he was with me and I was always sort of educated. So I would help guys learn their GED. You know, I went to college in prison. You know, I was, you know, just basically a counselor in there for other people. And, you know, I want to perform in our high school for artwork.

So I already had the skill, but I hadn't used it in nearly eight or nine years. And so I started drawing every day, every day, every day. And this was invigorating my spirit, making me feel better.

And in comes one, in comes the board in one day. So they, Valentino, could you draw my favorite golf hole? You know, because I had by then I had become known as the artist and addict.

I had 20 years in prison. And I said, sure. Even though I never golfed before, I'm a black kid from the inner city. What do I know about golf? You kidding me? Like, how is the, you know, we're not introduced to anything like this.

Basketball, football, that's it. So I drew it, the picture for him, the 12th hole of Augusta. He loved it.

He was elated. And my neighbor, another guy that used to golf, a white guy, he said, hey, Valentino, you need to draw some more golf holes. I said, Adam, you must be kidding me. I'm not drawing any more golf holes.

Get out of here. And he tossed some old golf dice, just magazines on my bed. So, all right, eventually I started going through them because I did enjoy drawing the 12th hole.

I mean, that bridge is iconic. The flower scene, it was different. It was more than the golf hole. And so I started going through the magazine. So I started pulling out the different, because he gave me a bunch of old issues.

He said, you don't want to toss them out. So I started pulling out all the nice golf courses that I thought was nice, you know, because some of them, you know, are shabby. But so, yeah. I know all about those shabby ones, bro. I grew up on a Muni, for sure. Dusty, yeah.

Dusty, a lot of dirt, a little bit of grass, whatever. So I remember loving the Pebble Beach. And I did a bunch of Pebble beaches, you know, just the water, the fence on the end of it, and the sunlight hitting it.

So I just did it from different perspectives. So after about six months, I had about 40 golf drawings, because whenever I do something, Jay, I just put my whole heart and soul into it. So I was just golf crazy then.

I was just going in just like all day, every day up to 10 hours, drawing golf courses. So I started reading the articles inside the magazine. All right, I don't know nothing about this sport. Let me read about this world. Valentino, let me stop you just for a minute. Seriously, you grew up in the inner city in Buffalo, New York.

There's not a golf course around. I mean, golf and you and how I just it's just amazing. But let me just back up just a little bit. But you had to have some really dark days in prison. How, how did you get through?

Let me say this right. I did have some dark days. I had some tough days. I cried a lot.

I buried my face in the pillow. But let me just say this. I always knew that I was blessed and I always knew that God had a plan for me.

Okay. And when you're tested in life, you don't get it. You don't get to decide what test God is going to throw at you. You know, you got to roll with it, you know, and we're all going to be tested. It could be death. It could be a death in the family. It could be a divorce.

It could be a car accident. I don't know what it is. Everybody's going to have a test. You know, my chest was 27 years of wrongful imprisonment. You know, so I just wanted to, you know, eventually as I understood this, I want to be able to show people that you can overcome anything. You know, and my gosh, God willing that, you know, that's what I did. Yeah, you have. Yeah, you have. Okay, so I'm sitting here in my office looking at that beautiful painting of the 12.

I've got it sitting right here. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Hold on now. It's a drawing. Oh, it's a drawing. Yeah, it's right.

That's right. Color pencil drawing. Color pencil. You're right.

I blew that. I put myself on that because, because I have to, there's so many layers for it to look like a painting. So I have to put all these different greens on there and take that drawing look out of it to give it a paint look. And that's what, you know, that's what separates my drawings from other people's. Yeah.

Oh my gosh. How long would it take? Did it take you to probably draw this gorgeous picture? Depending on what size that I could work up to 10 hours a day. So I'm in every day 365 a year.

I never took days off. And so a drawing could take me three or four days if it's a smaller one. If it's a bigger one, it might take me two weeks.

If it's a huge one, it may take me three months. Yeah. Okay. This was probably the medium size.

It looks like an 18 by 24 or something. It is gorgeous though. Oh, okay.

It is absolutely spectacular. So, so go back. So you said you drew, you had 40 paintings. I'm sorry to interrupt. I mean, 40 drawings. I'm sorry to interrupt you. Right. That's all right. So I have 40 drawings and now I'm starting to read the articles.

Okay. So I come across a column by Max Adler. Golf saved my life. Golf saved my life. What are they talking about? So one of the articles, a guy was an Iraqi war.

He lost his arm during the Iraqi war. But the only time he felt better is when he golfed. You know, so it gave me big scenarios on how golf was actually keeping people's spirit alive and giving them a reason to want to live.

You know, so I said, you know what? I correlated that with what I was doing. I see I'm in here drawing golf courses. I never golfed. This is peaceful. It's serene. Wow.

Golf is saving my life. So I ended up writing a four page letter to the golf digest magazine, Max, and I sent him one of the drawings. They were only smaller than tiny with seven by nine. Okay. And I actually did about 150 of those. Right.

I think I have about 40 left. Wow. Oh, yeah. So I wrote him, and Max immediately wrote back. And he says, I'm interested in covering this story. Of course, he didn't believe I was innocent. He just thought, this is my story.

This guy is black here in the city. He draws golf courses, and he says he's innocent. Okay, whatever. So, but I, Jay, the whole time I could prove my innocence. I had all the statements, I had the police reports, I had everything I needed to clear me. I had a confession from the guy that did the crime, you know, and it was a no brainer.

You can't get around it. I just had nobody looking at it. Nobody cared to look at it and really, you know, look into my case.

Valentino, I got to concur with you because since I've known you, when I met you two years ago, I've dug up all this stuff. There's video of all those guys saying, you know, I did, you know, he didn't do it, and I'm the one that did it. It doesn't matter, Jay, when our system makes a mistake, it's hard for them to admit to it. I mean, people are human, you know, and people are human, and sometimes you don't want to cover it for each other.

This is what happens, unfortunately. So you got good judges, you have bad judges, you have good prosecutors, bad prosecutors. I'm not about to say all of them are bad. You have some very fair ones out there.

I just happened to get, you know, some people that were involved in this case that was not fair. And I'm going to leave it like that because I'm not a basher. You know, I don't condemn people. I don't hate people. A lot of people say, how are you laughing?

How do you smile? How do you not hate these people? You know, my mom says, you know, I'm not getting over this no time soon, and, you know, maybe you can't, you know. But, you know, at the end of the day, man, I feel very blessed, you know, and when I look out in the world, and I see the suffering that people are going through, you know, I see a 10-year-old kid, you know, sitting in the hospital, going through cancer treatment, and, you know, chemotherapy, and it's not going to make it. You know, I look at that and I say, you know what, I ought to count my blessings, you know. And it wasn't easy, but this is a part of life. Man, I'm more pissed off about this than you are. Gosh, I'm with your mom.

I couldn't get over this any time soon. I just think that God took me through that so that I can, you know, maybe, you know, shine on somebody else's life, maybe some happiness to them, where if they're going through something, they say, wow, Valentino, he got through that. I'm going to get through this when I'm going through, you know.

And I think that's my purpose. Man, when I was in there, I used to counsel guys. They had issues. I had friends that committed suicide that I couldn't save, you know. And I was like the black doctor feeling here. Wow. Oh, my gosh. That's, I just can't imagine, I can't imagine that experience in Attica.

I've heard horror stories about a Valentino. Well, right now I'm writing my book, The Soul of an Unfreed Man. And it takes you on my journey from beginning to end on how I survived Attica. You know, I share a lot of horrific stories in there, things that actually happen.

Nothing is fictional. And that's, you know, and it's coming out on Amazon December 1st, the book is. Well, I'm getting one. I'm going to get one.

I can't wait to read it. That's fantastic. So, yeah. So, yeah. So let's talk about these Georgetown's law students that helped you.

Ellie, Julian. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So this is how that came about. So when the God died, this issue came out, I asked Max, I said, Hey, Max, I need 50 magazines.

They said 50. I said, Yeah, Max, I've got to send these magazines out to all the top law firms in the country and ask them for support. I had been taking it, making the journal of a lot of the top lawyers. So I already knew who they were and who I wanted to focus on.

So I take this magazine, sends it out and. One of the lawyers out of New York City, I'm not going to say his name because he he took the case, but he sat on the case. It didn't help. However, he had a peer legal working there. Mary Tame Cliffs, who ended up leaving and going off to law school and becoming an adjunct professor at Georgetown.

He's the one that introduced my case to the students. Man, the term it takes a village has never been more appropriate here, has it? Yeah, man. Never, never take the village.

It took a village to convict me and take the village. So tell me about your relationship with these women. Well, I was just texting Julie yesterday and she's out of France. OK, I can't wait to pandemic is over so I can fly over there and visit her and possibly have some speaking engagements and stuff like that. Now, Ellie. She's in England and already been to England and met up with her and we hung out and stuff like that because I was I was did a show with Piers Morgan. Oh, sure. You know, yeah, I did two shows with Piers Morgan and I they actually flew me over there before the pandemic. So me and Ellie is right, really close. And then now he's he's from Japan and he wasn't as involved as the other two, even though he was there a lot.

He had other other obligations, so I haven't seen him since I've been out. Well, that's going to wrap up the front nine. Hey, I need to give a shout out to Kevin and Angela at E&B Granite. I recently redid my bathroom and these guys were rock stars. It took them no time to come out, measure my countertops, plop those things in. And my bathroom looks good. It looks good enough for almost two per for Pearly to use, but not quite next time. I love it.

Granite rock stars. Yeah. Did you get did you get this guy? This guy's getting good.

He's just really taking all these jabs and just keep firing. Is my mic on? But you've got to call Kevin and Angela at E&B Granite. And their number is three one four six four five ninety three hundred at E&B Granite. And that's going to wrap up the front nine and the first half of the Valentino Dixon interview.

But don't go anywhere. We have the back nine coming up and the second and remainder part of the Valentino Dixon interview. This is golf with Jay Delsing. Are you in the market for some new clubs, maybe a bag and the latest style of sweet new shoes? Is this a year you decide to stop listening to your buddy's advice and go get some real golf instruction? If any of these appeal to you, then go to Pro-Am Golf today.

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Visit ascensioncharityclassic.com. We're halfway there. It's time for the back nine on golf with Jay Delsing. The back nine is brought to you by Fogle Bock Agency with Farmers Insurance.

Welcome back. This is Golf with Jay Delsing. Pearly is sitting right here with me in the ESPN studios, and we're headed to the back nine that are brought to you by the Fogle Bock Agency with Farmers. Ed Fogle Bock is a great guy. I talked to him today. He has got some of his children working for him.

If you need anything insurance wise, any sort of insurance product, your company, your family, call the Fogle Bock's and they will take care of you. All right. We're going to go back to the remainder of that Valentino Dixon interview.

I hope you enjoy it. Well, here it comes. Oh my goodness. Oh wow.

In your life have you seen anything like that? Valentino Dixon is brought to you by Golden Tee. Valentino, did you have some appeals prior to that that got turned down? All my appeals got turned down. How? How? With all of that evidence. The appellate courts, you know, when you appeal your case, it goes to the appellate court. You know, within two weeks, they rubber stamped it.

They sit out and have a claim. And that was that. You know, I don't believe they looked at the motion.

You know, the 60 page motion. It highlighted the eight witnesses that cleared me and had their statements in there. You know, the physical evidence that cleared me that didn't connect me to the crime and the confession.

They overlooked it all. Why? Because who wants to overturn a murder conviction? You know, and that's that's the best way I can put it. It's a sad reality about our judicial system. But this is what happens. OK, so the case goes to the federal court. It gets all the way up to the federal court and they tell me that I'm time barred, meaning that I filed it two months too late. So they wasn't even going to entertain it.

Oh, man. And then and then we pay 30 grand or lower to try to take it to the to the to the Supreme Court. And the Supreme Court said, we're not even going to look at it. We can't do anything here. Or the Court of Appeals, both boards, you know. So guess what?

What do I do? I have to go back to the drawing board. I actually have to come up with new evidence. Believe it or not, the eight witnesses in the confession was not enough to come up with new evidence. So I got to sit for some years until the evidence comes around. And that's exactly what happened, Jay. Let me just say this.

Let me just say to say, why do you think you would be a newspaper's man, woman exonerated after 20 years, 30 years, 25? Why does it take that long? It takes that long because people are too busy burying in and covering for each other.

Yeah. OK. Until until somebody comes along and pushes the envelope and says, hey, you know, you got to do something here. You know, so at that point, when it when, you know, when the laws come caving in. The system has to do something about it. You know, I started getting too much publicity with my case. So then they had to do something. Well, man.

So, Valentino, so this thing starts getting some positive momentum after all of these years. And yes, you get exonerated in 2018, 27 years behind bars. I just can't imagine it. What what did it feel like?

I mean, I can't even imagine. Well, let me just say this. I'm different. I was a different type of prisoner. So meaning that I stayed out here with you guys. What kept me strong was that I was not never really there inside the prison. I was on the outside thinking about all the things you guys were doing, fantasizing, looking at it in magazines, reading about it in books. You know, checking it out on the TV in the yard and just like I'm out there living life, even though I was in prison, you know. So when I walked out, it wasn't no culture shock because I was already updated on everything. I was not stuck in 1991. I picked the guard's brains whenever we talked.

I picked the inmates' brains that had just came from the outside. I needed to know everything that was going on in the world because I'm not going to be behind. What kind of phone do I want?

Do I want a galaxy or do I want an iPhone? I knew these things before I walked out of there. Oh, my gosh.

Just that mental exercise had to be so helpful. And your daughter, Tina, she was six months old when you went to prison. Man, you lost all that time. But I can remember you. Yeah, Jay. Let me say, you can remember what, Jay?

I was just remembering. You told me the story about how much fun it was when you got out and you were messing with the phone with her. And she was teaching you stuff like, Dad, no, this is the iPhone. Yeah, because I didn't want the iPhone.

I wanted to get a galaxy because I knew that was easier to navigate. Yeah. Okay. And she was like, nope, you're going to be a part of the iPhone family.

I don't care what you say. And she gave me no choice. I'm glad, though. Yeah, daughters are like that, man.

I got four of them. Yeah, man. I'm glad I became part of the iPhone family, you know. And you know what? You just gave me an idea. You know what? We need to reach out to iPhone. We need to share this story with them. Yeah.

Let's do. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Maybe they can donate to my foundation, The Art of Freedom, to help me fight these wrongful convictions.

Because I get a lot of requests that come all the time and I can't help these people without a lawyer. No, no, I'm sure. Yeah. You know, I got a bunch of guys that call me on my phone from prison. I write letters and stuff like that.

So maybe, yeah, maybe iPhone might want to help with the prison reform thing if they heard this story right here. Yeah, absolutely. So let's talk a little bit about your art. I know you had a sold out art gallery in New York years ago, didn't you, after you first got out? Yeah, that was in SoHo.

It was at the Andrew Edelman Art Gallery in Manhattan. And I haven't had these shows since, okay? But people do reach out to try to buy an original or something that I drew in prison. So originals are still available if anybody's interested. I have 7x9s, 16x20s, 20x30s, I have 40x60s, you know. So I've still got something left if anybody's interested. Yeah, we need to let everybody know before the end of this interview how they can get in touch with you, how they can follow you, how they can buy your art.

I've got two pieces in my home. It's just spectacular. But I sit here, Valentino, and I'm like, wait a second.

Here's an inner city African American guy who gets thrown in prison for something he didn't do. And he's now, you use golf and art, so he's hanging out at golf courses and art galleries. What, you know, did it get any crazier? Let me tell you something, Jay. Don't forget, I went to the Masters, I met Tiger Woods. I know, we got to tell that story.

It's fantastic. And let me tell you something, I met Tiger Woods, I go over and introduce myself, and I tell Tiger, you're going to win the Masters. He says, I'm going to try my best. I says, no, Tiger, you're going to win the Masters. And he won the Masters.

That was last year. I got it on my phone, Jay. I got the whole conversation on my phone. You also met the other greats, Nicholas and Watson, all those guys. Hold on, then the next day, I meet Jack Nicholas. We're conversating, and he said, you remind me of somebody.

I said, who? He says, you remind me of Nelson Mandela. He spent 27 years also, and you guys have the same spirit. Oh my God. That was such a great moment and an honor just to hear that. And then, later on that day, Tom Watson gives me golf lessons.

Come on, you can't make this stuff up. Man, if someone had told you when you were 10 years old, you'd be at Augusta, you'd be hanging out with Tiger and Jack and Tom, come on. And then, a few months later, I went to the Emmys. My story for the Golf Channel was nominated for an Emmy Award. Man. And I meet Michael Strahan.

Imagine that. Well, it's just the tip of the iceberg, but the story you have is just absolutely fantastic. This is Valentino Dixon, my friend, who was wrongly accused for 27 years of a murder he didn't commit, and this story is fantastic. Valentino, tell everybody how they can reach out to you. I mean, they can follow you. They can look at your art, anything. They can go to Valentinodixon.com to look at my prints that I have available on my website.

If you want to buy an original, you just send me a message to my email at artistvalentino, A-R-T-I-S-T, Valentino, V-A-L-E-N-T-I-N-O, at icloud.com, artistvalentino at icloud.com. Well, man, I got to tell you what, and they can pull this stuff up on the internet, and it is just absolutely beautiful. And I'll respond directly. Yeah, I know you well, and they'll soon know about you as well. Man, Valentino, I can't thank you enough for all of this time. First of all, thank you for being my friend. I'm a better person after knowing you, knowing your story, and knowing what you've overcome. It's so inspirational.

Let me say this, Jay. I mean, for me, it's a privilege and an honor just to know you. I mean, I really appreciate it, you know, everything, all the love that you showed me in St. Louis bringing me out there. It was just a wonderful experience. I've never been to St. Louis before, you know, so I'm very grateful, you know, and I really, really mean it, man, and I do consider you a friend. I'm glad that you, you know, referred to me as your friend. Oh, I absolutely do. And I just thank you for hanging out with me, and we'll keep up with the story and keep telling it. And one more thing, Jay. Yeah. When you took me out to dinner, oh my God, I'm still thinking about that meal.

We ate a lot, didn't we? You kidding me? What? Listen, Jay, these things I don't forget because I dreamed about this stuff when I was in the prison cell. You know what I'm saying? Oh, hell yeah.

Some people it's no big deal, but for me it's a big deal. Wow, how about that interview, Pearl? You come up with the most unbelievable guys, stories, interest, energy. I look forward to talking about it. Golf art saved his life?

I mean, come on. Well, don't go anywhere because we'll pick this story up on the Michelob Ultra 1912. That's going to wrap up our back nine. This is Golf with Jay Delsing. The management team at Marcon would like to give a shout out to our 500 plus employees and their families. Their diligence and commitment to each other, our process and our company are so good that we are obligated to state it publicly. We are so grateful for each and every one of you. You have all contributed to our success and your dedication is imperative to the continued growth of our company.

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Joe Sieser has closed over $500 million in loans in nearly 30 years in the business and over $2 million alone to Delsings. Are you in the market for some new clubs? Maybe a bag and the latest style of sweet new shoes? Is this a year you decide to stop listening to your buddy's advice and go get some real golf instruction? If any of these appeal to you then go to Pro-Am Golf today.

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So you take that knowledge along with their state of the art cameras and equipments and boom, your game is going to get a whole lot better. Visit them at ProAmGolfUSA.com PGA Tour Golf is back in the loo. The Ascension Charity Classic. A couple months ago I received some really good news. My friend Henry Miller from the law firm Grant Miller Smith had represented me in yet another round of legal wrangling from my divorce of almost 15 years ago. I felt as if I was being unfairly burdened by the maintenance I was paying. Not only did they think so, but so did the judge. I cannot tell you how good this feels to be relieved of all that pressure. If you find yourself in any type of situation regarding your marriage or your children, do yourself a favor and call 314-788-3030 and set up a complimentary appointment.

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Grab your friends, a cold one, and pull up a chair. We're on to the 19th hole on golf with Jay Delsing. The 19th hole is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. Welcome back to Golf with Jay Delsing. I'm your host, Jay. Perle is with me here, and meat is taking care of us in ESPN Studios, and we're headed to the 19th hole, brought to you by our buddies at Mic Ultra.

I think they got something with that Mic Ultra. Perle, what do you think that's here to stay? Yeah, it's here to stay. I have to say I like it. It's really good. I don't change my patterns much, and I'm changing. I like that a lot. Yeah, really good.

Okay, so Valentino Dixon. First of all, I meet this guy. I shake hands with him.

This was when we could still shake hands. And I'm like, what am I feeling from this man? Like, what is this? There's just this calmness.

There's just this, I don't know what. And I'm like, wow, that's so cool. And I don't even know him. So we go have lunch.

We're walking around showing the hotel, showing them what we're going to do for the night, what our program looks like. He doesn't know me from Adam. I got him his name from Paul Tesori, who caddies for Webb Simpson. And we kind of circled the wagons that way through our network. And he came in, brought some of his paintings, and I was on the board at Art Unleashed at the time.

My buddies, Mike Doster, Jerry Peterson, we put this together and had a little fundraiser and raised a bunch of money for the charity. But I still scratch my head. I'm more pissed off about what happened to him than he is. First of all, I thought it was one of your better interviews of the first hundred that you've done. And obviously, the subject matter was very interesting. I obviously have a different perspective. I wasn't there. You did the interviews.

I haven't met the gentleman. But what's interesting to me is I think he kind of kept trying to say in different ways, hey, I had to get this mindset or I wasn't going to survive this thing, let alone prosper. And so I don't want to say just survived.

He's far more than survived, prospered with it. So however you get that, however you get to that point, I hope we find out. But once you're there, it seems like a pretty sweet place to be because he seems pretty good with where he's at. Oh, man.

Well, here's a couple of stories. So Augusta National, you know, all the networks in the golf networks were all behind the scenes, pulling strings and trying to make this thing work for this guy. And he gets exonerated and released. Augusta names him one of their designated artists for... I didn't know that.

This happened last year, 2019. Now that I'm putting the whole thing together, I was there, you know, at the tournament. I wish I'd have known because I would have loved to just said hi to him. But anyway, so he's mulling around inside the Champions locker room and he meets Jack Nicklaus. He meets Tom Watson. They're giving him lessons. He's never mulled around inside the Champions locker room.

Me neither. OK, I was going to say, I think there's an exclusive party that gets in there. Well, and, Pearl, he walks into the clubhouse. What's the first thing he does? He pulls out his cell. He's taking vids. He's like, I'll never forget.

What am I going to be? And they're like, Mr. Dixon, you can't do that. And he's like, oh, OK, sorry.

No problem. You know, it was completely innocent. But he runs into Jack Nicklaus, and Jack Nicklaus says something to the effect that I've only met one other person that gives me the same vibe and feel as you do, and that's Nelson Mandela. Yeah, that's quite the compliment.

How about that? Yeah, so, but here's a cool story. So he meets Tiger, and, you know, Tiger's, he's competing, you know, that week. So it's still, it's on, OK? And he says, Tiger's like, hey, yeah, man, I know who you are.

You know, tough story, but glad you're out, glad you're here, you know. And Valentino pulls from behind his back a picture that he's drawn of the 12th. And he said, look, this is for you. And Tiger's like, oh, no, you don't have to do this.

He said, no, this is for you. You are going to win this tournament this year. And this hole's, or whatever, Valentino doesn't know which end of the golf club to hold, right?

This hole's going to be very important. And Tiger's like, hey, thanks, man. And, you know, off he goes. Because, you know, Tiger's got responsibilities.

He's playing and everything. Really? The 12th hole? You had Koepke hit it in the water.

It was important for everyone else. He hit it in the water. He had Finau hit it in the water.

You had, it was, Oh, the English guy. Poulter hit it in the water. Yep. Tiger hits that little trappy draw into the set of the green. Right where he said he wanted to hit it. Yep. Right where Jack says he wants to hit it all the time. Yeah, so anyway, cool story.

Valentino Dixon, if you don't know him, look him up, Valentinodixon.com, and look at some of his hard work. He somehow, I want to say a roommate, might have been a roommate, but a fellow inmate gave him an old golf digest and said, can you draw some of this? I kind of like golf. And he's like, do you know anything about golf? He's like, dude, I grew up in the city.

There's no golf courses in downtown Buffalo. Yeah, it was actually one of the guards, I believe. Yeah, just encouraging. But that's absolutely awesome.

It's just, it's just fun. You know, we're never going to find, never going to know when we're going to find our passion, find that interest, find that thing that clicks with us. That's one hell of a story on how he found his, but it's out there for all of us. So I think that's pretty sweet. When do you think you run up again around him again? We text all the time.

He just texted me every Thanksgiving the other day. So he's out speaking and stuff? He does some speaking things. He's doing some stuff over in Europe.

He actually had a sold-out gallery showing in New York City not long after he was released. And so I bought a couple of his work. It's, I don't know, he's just one of those people that you meet. Sure, got to follow this guy, see where he goes.

Yeah, it's pretty cool. You know what? That is going to wrap up another show. Well, thanks for being with me, probably me. Thanks for taking care of us. And we will be back next week, and we're bringing back some Whack-N-Chase. So don't miss out next week's Whack-N-Chase. This is his golf with Jay Delsing.

Hit them straight, St. Louis. That was Golf with Jay Delsing, brought to you by Whitmore Country Club. Tune in next Sunday for more from Jay John and the other pros and experts from the golf world. In the meantime, you can find all of Jay's shows at 101espn.com, as well as at jaydelsinggolf.com.