Editor's note: The following is a column by Golfweek editor Jeff Babineau on senior writer Ron Balicki, who spent more than 30 years covering college golf for our sister publication before his passing on March 25.
Debbie Balicki won't ever forget the first time she met her future husband. She was at a party thrown by a pro football player in the Florida Panhandle in the early 1980s, and she decided to approach a tall, handsome man with a mustache standing next to the bar.
"Are you the bartender?" she asked. "No," he answered.
"Well, think you could fix me a drink anyway?" she asked with a smile.
Later that evening, after she had departed early, retreating to a quieter beach spot down the road, the two would meet up again. They talked. They laughed. They played some backgammon. And when she got home that night, she remembers thinking to herself, "That's the nicest man I've ever met."
Lots of people would say those very same words about her husband of 32-plus years, Golfweek senior writer Ron Balicki. He simply was the nicest, kindest man one ever could meet. At his home in the woods in Mount Ida, Ark., on Tuesday morning, Balicki passed away after a valiant eight-month battle with cancer. He would have turned 66 on April 6.