Code Breaker Contest 12

plaintext doesn't have any double letters

Not intentionally. There is nothing to NY being the 11th state, or there being 11 letters between N and Y

A nickel ain't worth a dime anymore. - Yogi Berra

Take the encrypted text, reverse it (ZCPLJ...) and SUBTRACT the ordinal value of the keyword (YOGI).

Z - Y = A (Ordinal value of Z [26] minus ordinal value of Y [25] equals [1] which represents A)
C - O = N (You have to add 26 to C since its ordinal value is less than O's)
P - G = I
L - I = C
J - Y = K (again, add 26)
and so on.

I'm sure jg86 LOVED it when the first two letters (after being reversed) were NY for this St. Louis born Yankees legend, whos first name is really Lawrence!

I'd like to hear jg86 say that, and then I will tell you what the deal is about the golf ball (if jg86 doesn't tell you first).

OK, here's the deal on the golf ball. When I play a new golf course, I try to get a souvenir golf ball with the course logo. I have played less than two dozen courses in my life, so getting a new souvenir is a big deal for me. When jg86 won one of my previous code breakers, I found out he was not far from a golf course in Canada that was out of souvenir golf balls when I was there a few years ago. He was gracious enough to agree to send me one next time he was in Strathroy, but now he has to put that little chore at the top of his to-do list. I get my golf ball faster, and jg86 still has a prize burning a hole in his pocket so we may all have the pleasure of being tormented by him again.

Oh, joy!

I do have a new code ready to go if no one else is ready...

Lars,
I am very impressed!
How on earth did you do that?!
Can you tell us how you approached the problem?