Former UA punter Mohr set to host Kevin Turner Golf tourney

Former Crimson Tide punter Chris Mohr will be this year’s guest host for the 27th annual Kevin Turner Golf Tournament on May 13 at the RTJ Golf Trail at Capitol Hill.

By TIM GAYLE

PRATTVILLE – Former University of Alabama and NFL punter Chris Mohr will be the guest host for the 27th annual Kevin Turner Golf Tournament on May 13 at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail at Capitol Hill, Prattville YMCA officials announced.

“It’s an honor,” Mohr said. “K.T. was a great guy, a great friend, a great teammate. I really hated to see him go through what he went through, but he was tough as nails, tough as they come.”

Turner went through a five-year battle with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), which was triggered by CTE (chronic traumatic encephalopathy), a disease that hits home with many Crimson Tide players from that era who witnessed it first with Turner and more recently with former Tide running back Kerry Goode. Mohr was a teammate of both players.

“Kevin was a great locker room guy,” Mohr said. “He came across as quiet, but when he got involved in a conversation, he was always witty about everything. As far as a football player, he was a great player -- he was a blocking fullback, he was a receiver, he could play tailback, it didn’t matter. He had that size and speed that he could do it either way and always played bigger than he was.”

Mohr and Turner would later cross paths in the National Football League, where Turner was a fullback for the Patriots (1992-94) and Eagles (1995-99) and Mohr was a punter for the Bills (1991-2000) and Falcons (2001-04), appearing in Super Bowls XXVI, XXVII and XXVIII.

“We’re excited to have Chris as our guest host,” said Prattville YMCA Assistant General Director Keith Cantrell, who initiated the tournament in 1998. “Of all the guest hosts, and we’ve had some really good guest hosts, Chris has been the most positive in keeping up with the tournament and trying to help the tournament.”

Also planning to appear with Mohr is Crimson Tide Sports Marketing announcer Chris Stewart, the play-by-play announcer of the Crimson Tide radio network.

Mohr hailed from Ray Guy’s hometown of Thomson, Ga., and was recruited by Alabama coach Ray Perkins from Briarwood Academy, where he played quarterback and punter as well as basketball, baseball and golf.

He was redshirted in 1984, then punted for four years (1985-88), finishing as one of the Southeastern Conference’s top punters his last two seasons. In his senior season, the four-year starter broke the school record formerly held by Frank Mann (1968-70) for career punts (203) and career yardage (8,636), an average of 42.5 yards per punt. His senior year, he averaged 42.67 yards per punt as the Tide compiled an 8-3 record, including a Sun Bowl win over Army.

Turner, a Prattville native who starred at Alabama in 1988-91 and in the NFL for eight years, loaned his name to the tournament after participating in sports at the YMCA in his early years and attended the event before his battle with chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, led to his untimely passing in March, 2016. He made a brief appearance at the 2015 tournament with guest host Gary Hollingsworth, a former Alabama quarterback and teammate of Turner. After Turner’s death, the Turner family was honored as the second guest host.

Since then, the tournament has had former Turner teammates as guest hosts, including Siran Stacy (2017), Antonio Langham (along with Andrew Zow in 2018), Sherman Williams (2019), Martin Houston (2020), Roger Shultz 2021) and Preston Gothard (2022). Former Auburn running back and coach Carnell Williams was the guest host in 2023.

Proceeds from the tournament help fund the Coach A Child campaign which provides financial aid to make YMCA services available to all persons regardless of their inability to pay. The Prattville YMCA has provided financial aid to more than 3,300 individuals, many of them children, at a cost of more than $377,000. This year, the goal is to raise $265,000 for the Coach A Child Fund Campaign, part of which is funded with proceeds from the golf tournament.

“Kevin loved the Prattville YMCA and he loved all the things that the Y was able to do,” Cantrell said. “And he wanted to make sure that nobody was turned away due to their inability to pay so we started this tournament to raise money for the YMCA Coach A Child Scholarship Fund.

“The Prattville YMCA was a big part of Kevin’s life. He wanted others to have the same enjoyment he had, growing up and coming to the Y. This tournament is one of the things that makes the YMCA possible for everyone.” 

The golf tournament is in its ninth year at RTJ Capitol Hill after spending the first 18 years at the Prattville Country Club. The tournament will change its format this year, switching to a morning flight and afternoon flight on both the Legislator and Senator courses. Eighteen teams will play on each course in the morning and again in the afternoon.  

Several sponsorship levels remain available. All teams will be provided lunch, beginning at 11 a.m., with the morning teams also receiving a light breakfast and the afternoon teams receiving snacks at the conclusion of the tournament. For more information or to sign up your team to participate in the tournament, contact Cantrell at (334) 358-9622 or e-mail him at kcantrell@prattvilleymca.org