SOMETIMES I WISH I’d been able to cover the PGA Championship in the quaint days of match play, which ended in 1957. It would have been fun to try to make sense of lurkers like Frank Walsh, Henry Williams, and Felice Torza making it to the finals, or trying to comprehend lurkers like Tom Creavy and Bob Hamilton actually winning it in the finals over Denny Shute and Byron Nelson. Did I say fun? I meant inconvenient.
But I’ve managed to make it to a total of fifty-three PGAs contested at stroke play, and that’s more than enough to stock a man with a collection of agonies and ecstasies.
Assessing the Evidence
Auburn University conducted its own in-house investigation and found no evidence of any wrongdoing with Jason Dufner winning the 2013 PGA at Medinah.
If Only Twitter and Instagram Had Been Around Then
During Larry Nelson’s winning of the 1987 PGA, his third major, at the PGA National in West Palm Beach, Florida, he was upstaged by a killer blond in a lime-green bikini who commandeered a boat to get to the floating scoreboard at the 18th hole.
Only Roman Numeral to Win a Major So Far
Davis Love III, 1997 PGA at Winged Foot
Hard to Fool a Wife
When Jack Nicklaus shot a 79 in the first round of the 1978 PGA at Oakmont, Barbara said, “He even walked sloppy.”
Deep Trivia
Name the only four players who won the NCAA and the PGA. Answer: Jack Nicklaus (Ohio State), John Mahaffey (Houston), Tiger Woods (Stanford), Phil Mickelson (Arizona State).
Giving Up Smoking Could Be Hazardous to Your Golf Game
While trying to quit smoking, Arnold Palmer shot an 82 in the 1969 PGA on the NCR course in Dayton, which moved Dave Marr to tell him, “Arnold, you gave up smoking and golf the same week.”
Nine Is a Crowd
That PGA in Dayton was the one where nine guys tied for the first-round lead with 69s. They were the eventual winner, Raymond Floyd, and Charles Coody, Larry Ziegler, Tom Shaw, Bunky Henry, Larry Mowry, Johnny Pott, Bob Lunn, Al Geiberger. World record, far as I know.
How to WD
It was drizzling during the second round at Tanglewood in 1974 when Tom Weiskopf arrived at the 16th green. By one count, Weiskopf managed to nine-putt, occasionally gripping the putter upside down. “I’m injured and I quit,” Tom announced to an official. When the official asked what his injury was, Tom said, “I’m 25 over.”
It’s a Whole New World
In 1996 at Valhalla, caddies rebelled and wore shorts for the first time, to combat the insufferable Louisville heat. They were told to wear pants or leave. Now it’s shorts everywhere. Caddies, sportswriters—everywhere but on me.
The Shirt from Hell
It was the blue-and-white polka dot that Steve Elkington wore at Baltusrol in 2005. I take back what I wrote. It didn’t look as much like a frock that Joan Crawford sold on eBay as it did Ron Turcotte’s silks when he was up on Secretariat.
Fame Is Fleeting
Ed Dougherty was asked at Firestone in 1975 when he came in only two off the lead after a first-round 69 if he had ever been on a leaderboard before. He said, “Yeah, at Westchester I made four birdies in a row. But then I started going bad, so while one guy was putting up the Y, another guy was taking down the D.”
Criticisms That Make a Writer’s Day
Lee Trevino at Oakmont in 1978: “The only way to stop a ball around here is call a policeman.”
Jack Nicklaus in 1982 at hot, humid Southern Hills, one of the few courses where he never won a major: “I’m not sure I could play well at Southern Hills if it was air-conditioned.”
Paul Goydos reviewing the renovation of Oakland Hills for the 2008 PGA: “If you had Rees Jones redo Scrabble, he would leave out all the vowels.”
Tom Weiskopf commenting on George and Tom Fazio renovating Oak Hill before the 1980 PGA: “I’m going to organize a Classic Golf Course Preservation Society. Members get to carry loaded guns in case they see anybody touching a Donald Ross course.”
Explanation for a Quad
André Romero explaining a 78 at Oakland Hills in 2008 that featured a quadruple 8 at number 16: “I was disconcentrated the rest of the round.”
The Non-Charge
Vijay Singh won a three-hole playoff over Justin Leonard and Chris DiMarco in 2004 at Whistling Straits after a final-round 76, which was the highest last round for a winner in any major since Reg Whitcombe won the British Open in 1938 at Sandwich with a 78 in a storm that blew down the exhibition tent.
Low Perm
Fuzzy Zoeller showed off a new hairdo while finishing second to Larry Nelson at Atlantic Athletic Club in 1981. In the locker room, Jerry Pate said to Fuzzy, “I’ve only seen hair like that on the back of a dog.” Fuzzy’s comeback: “Oh, yeah. How about you? Ever seen a bald-headed dog?”
He Used to Be a Bank Teller?
Woody Austin, after Tiger Woods’s second-round 63 at Southern Hills in 2007: “I outplayed him all day, but he beat me by seven strokes … I don’t get it.”
Best Putting Exhibition
Has to be forty-five-year-old Jerry Barber at Olympia Fields in 1961. He holed three monsters on the last three holes of regulation—20 feet for birdie, 40 feet for par, and 60 feet for birdie—to tie Don January, who had been rehearsing his victory speech. Barber did it again to win the playoff, 67 to 68.
Somewhere along the way that week I was in the locker room chatting with January and a few other pros sitting around. Cary Middlecoff, Doug Sanders, Doug Ford, others. I asked what any of them thought about the phenomenal amateur Jack Nicklaus. I think it was Middlecoff who said, “If he thinks he can play, let him come out here.”
Well, he did. And …
When Rory McIlroy, the boy king, won the 2012 PGA at Kiawah by eight strokes over David Lynn with a last-round 66, it topped Jack Nicklaus winning by seven over Andy Bean at Oak Hill in 1980. Biggest runaway in a match play final belongs to Paul Runyan. He gave Sam Snead a lesson in chipping and putting at Shawnee-on-Delaware in 1938, beating him 8 and 7.
Speaking of Runaways
Jimmy Demaret used to dine out on his 10-and-9 loss to Ben Hogan in the semifinals of the 1946 PGA at Portland Golf Club. Jimmy loved for people to ask him what Hogan said during the match.
Jimmy would report, “Most of the time he’d say, ‘You’re away.’ ”
Riviera’s Prank
During the ’95 PGA at Riviera, a rumor floated that O. J. Simpson’s handicap at the club had been mysteriously lowered in the past year of his incarceration. Pranksters apparently had been punching in low scores for him on the golf shop computer. He was now a four instead of a 16. Surely that was punishment enough.
“Save Yourself”
Gary Player was accidentally pushed into a lake in a rush of autograph seekers at Congressional in 1976. “Why didn’t you jump in and save me?” Gary asked his caddie, Rabbit Dyer. Rabbit replied, “I can’t swim.”
Paul Azinger, after winning at Inverness in 1993: “Twelve years ago I’d never broken 70, and I couldn’t break 80 two days in a row.”
Best or Worst Prediction
John Daly after winning in ’91 at Crooked Stick: “I’m not gonna become a jerk. If I become a jerk, I’ll quit golf.”
The Always Quotable Mr. Daly
John Daly on the subject of sports psychologists during the 2007 PGA at Southern Hills: “You gotta be insane to listen to all our s—t.”
Best Rant
Tommy Bolt gets the award for his performance in the 1961 PGA at Olympia Fields near Chicago after he was suspended indefinitely—it lasted two weeks—for using “vulgar and abusive language.” Part of the rant: “Man, everybody cusses. I cuss, sure, but I cuss myself, don’t you see? If they suspend everybody out here who cusses, they ain’t gonna have nobody left on the tour but the folks who do the suspendin’.”
Don’t Touch These Greens
By tournament time in ’87 at the PGA National in West Palm Beach, Florida, the greens were 80 percent dirt, 10 percent wire, and 10 percent herpes.
The 1977 PGA at Pebble Beach served up the first sudden-death playoff in majors history. It was sad to see forty-seven-year-old Gene Littler stumble to a closing 76 and allow Lanny Wadkins to tie him. But in the locker room before the playoff, Lanny took the cocktail out of my hand, saying, “Gimme some of that,” took a swig, said, “That ought to do it,” and went out to win on the third hole.
The record book doesn’t show it, but I claimed an assist.
Big Finish
The last day of the 2014 PGA at Valhalla was filled with so much drama, I’ve ordered a drone to drop Oscars on Rory McIlroy, Phil Mickelson, and Rickie Fowler, plus the grounds crew, which somehow managed to turn rivers and fishing holes left by a violent midday rainstorm into a golf course. Then Rory, the three-day leader and master of all golf shots, lost the lead and had to reclaim it on the last nine with an eagle and two birdies, and win it over the heroic Mickelson and the gritty Fowler with two putts practically in the dark. Best PGA ever, and one of the best majors ever. In the end, golf introduced a new sheriff in town, a twenty-five-year-old power-hitting, sweet-swinging Northern Irishman whose name wasn’t Tiger.