Dr. Smith asks: Greatest golf comeback story -- Hogan or Tiger?

     So the kind, elderly gentleman -- a prominent preacher here in Fort Worth -- who is an around-the-corner neighbor on our floor asked me:
     Which is greater: Tiger Woods' comeback story or Ben Hogan's comeback story?
     Dr. Lamar Smith, 91, then said I should investigate the question. So I am posing it to my reading audience.
     Here is my answer: Ben Hogan, no doubt.
     Simple premise: Hogan darned near died in the 1949 accident when his car ran head-on into a Greyhound bus.
      Tiger, as you well know and has been written 108,245 times in the past, is back in a Masters green jacket after eight back and knee surgeries, a sex scandal and rehab, a DUI-related rehab, divorce, too many girlfriends to count, etc.
       But he wasn't close to death, as far as we know.
       So, for Dr. Smith and everyone else, here is the Hogan portion of a September 2018 Golf Digest story headlined "Tiger Woods and 9 other remarkable career comebacks in sports":
     "While this list isn't limited to golf, we'd be remiss to not start it off with Ben Hogan, who suffered a number of gruesome injuries in a head-on car collision ... Despite those injuries being career-threatening, Hogan improbably returned to the PGA Tour in 1950 and won the U.S. Open that season at Merion Golf Club. His schedule was limited throughout the rest of his career, but he still managed to win five more majors between 1951 and 1953."
     From a pga.com story in 2018, on the 50th anniversary of Hogan's return to golf after the accident, here are details of the man's injuries:
    "... In a successful attempt to save his wife's life by throwing himself in front of her, Hogan likely also saved his own life since the steering column punctured the driver's seat.

Ben Hogan and the crashed car.

    "Hogan, 36 at the time, suffered a double fracture of the pelvis, a fractured collar bone, a left ankle fracture, a chipped rib, and near-fatal blood clots; he would suffer lifelong circulation problems and other physical limitations.
    "Fifty-nine days after the accident, Hogan was out of the hospital and by November of that year, he resumed golf activities."
     And, yes, we are partial because he was Fort Worth's finest golfer and longtime resident.
      If you want the whole list of comebacks in this particular story, here is the link:
 https://www.golfdigest.com/story/tiger-woods-and-9-other-remarkable-career-comebacks-in-sports-history 
     If you are really diligent and want all the links on this subject -- greatest comebacks from injury in sports -- try Google. There are plenty of choices. A few more links ... 
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/845881-the-20-biggest-injury-comebacks-in-sports#slide20
https://www.mensjournal.com/sports/13-athletes-who-made-amazing-comebacks-after-career-threatening-injuries/
https://www.insidehook.com/article/sports/these-athletes-made-amazing-comebacks-from-horrific-injuries-illnesses
---
     As for the man asking the question, a little about Dr. Smith:
     He was the longtime associate pastor of evangelism at First United Methodist Church of Fort Worth. He "retired" in 1997, but most days -- when he is feeling good -- he drives the few blocks to the church and still works, meeting the people with his good words.
      He is a legend at his alma mater, Texas Wesleyan University, where he has ties dating 70 years. He was first president of the alumni association in the early 1950s, was interim president in 2010-11, and honored with the naming of the Rev. Dr. Lamar Edward Smith Center for Evangelism and Church Growth, part of the Central Texas Conference building.
      And he recently was honored with the Law Sone Medal, named for the longtime Texas Wesleyan president. It is on a lanyard, so he can wear it for display, and I think he has taken it off one or twice the past couple of months. 
     Not bad for a young man who moved slightly west after growing up in Mineola, Texas, and who served in the U.S. Navy during World War II.
     His career in the ministry began at Fort Worth's First Methodist in 1955 and in 13 years as associate minister he welcomed more than 5,000 new members.
     He also is a humorous, story-telling man -- aw, heck, he is downright funny -- who, when reading the daily papers downstairs in one of our breakfast rooms, makes the sports section his first choice.
     His pastoral days took him from Fort Worth in '68 to a couple of other Texas stops and at one point to the Methodist church on the LSU campus in Baton Rouge.
     Which leads to one of Dr. Smith's favorite little stories, his move from the Methodist church in Wichita Falls, Texas, to Baton Rouge ...
     "When I left Wichita Falls, the last bumper sticker I saw said, 'Honk If You Love Jesus.' When I got to Baton Rouge, the first bumper sticker I saw said, 'Go to Hell, Ole Miss.' "
---
    Back to Tiger and Hogan ...
    Mr. Ben -- "Bantam Ben" was one of his nicknames -- won 11 more PGA Tour titles after his return from the accident. That is fourth-best all-time.
     Tiger Woods, after this Masters, has 81 PGA Tour titles -- one behind all-time leader Sam Snead. So Tiger very likely soon will be the greatest winner of all, and his comeback is off-the-charts tremendous.
     But greatest comeback story? Dr. Smith and I will stick with Hogan.   

Toughest story assignment -- it was Love (and death)

     The most difficult, most challenging, assignment of a 45-year sportswriting career? Some stories/columns to choose from, but one stands out.
      It dates 30 years this November, and relates to Jacksonville, Florida, and the Florida Times-Union. And it was about golf, but not specifically.
      It was more about the aftermath of the deaths of four men in a small-plane crash. And the assignment was totally unexpected.
      Reading a book on golf recently brought a reminder. The main character of the latest of John Feinstein's long string of sports-related books, The First Major, (subtitle) The Inside Story of the 2016 Ryder Cup, is Davis Love III.
      If you know golf, you know the name.
      He was captain of the winning U.S. Ryder Cup team in 2016, having been chosen for the captain's position for a second time (because his work as captain in 2012, even in a U.S. loss to Europe, had impressed the U.S. Ryder Cup people).
      These days people might not remember Davis Love Jr., father of the son. When I see Davis III, I always think of his Dad. 
      It was his death and three others that made Nov. 14, 1988, a memorable day for me.
      On that Monday morning, I received a phone call from Mike Richey the then-Times-Union sports editor and my longtime friend from our Louisiana days.
      He wanted me to drive to St. Simons Island -- off the coast off southeast Georgia, some 75 miles from Jacksonville -- to do a story on the scene at Sea Island Golf Club.
      That was home base for Davis Love Jr., 53, the nationally known Golf Digest teaching pro/instructor, and two others who went down in the plane -- head golf pro John Popa, 37, and teaching pro Jimmy Hodges, 35, Mr. Love's protégé.
      Also killed: nearby resident Frank "Chip" Worthington, 39, the pilot.
      Obviously, this was a tragedy, a shock to the golf world and to that community on the most prominent, most affluent of the "barrier" islands just east of Brunswick, Ga.
      I was new to the Florida Times-Union, maybe three weeks into the job -- a job I needed after my departure from Shreveport. With the family, we had settled in Orange Park, a suburb just south of Jacksonville.
      Here, other than what was going to be a trip into a sad, stunned scene, was what made it difficult. I knew little about the golf world, I had never been anywhere close to Brunswick, had never heard of Sea Island Golf Club or St. Simons Island.
      I was a stranger in strange territory, about to meet and interview people who were complete strangers to me.
      And I was only vaguely familiar with Davis Love III, then an extremely promising, long-hitting, 24-year-old, fourth-year PGA Tour player with one tour victory, his father's prize pupil and -- with younger brother Mark -- his greatest achievement.   
      Now, expecting a routine work day (my main task was to guide the high school/community athletics coverage), here I was faced with uncertainty.
      Why me?
      We are not sure, can't recall. We think, though, that Mike Richey that morning could not reach our talented main Times-Union golf writer, Chris Smith, who had a good relationship with the Love family. (It was before cellphones, folks.)
      Maybe because -- laugh here -- I was a savvy sports writing veteran (it was my 19th fulltime year, but at 41, I was still kind of young, OK) and had experience, Mike called on me. We had plenty of other really good writers on that staff.
---
      This was at least 10 a.m., so I rushed to get ready to go. Mike gave me some travel directions and the first place to find -- the Times-Union bureau in Brunswick and the name of that bureau person -- Beth Reese.
      Thank goodness for Beth, who soon added Cravey to her name and moved to Jacksonville, where she remains on the newspaper's news staff. She made my work that day a bit smoother.
      As I recall, when I found the bureau, she showed me how to use the machine to get my story back to the office a few hours later, and because she had to attend a meeting, left me the key to the office. And gave me directions to St. Simons Island.
      It was a 7-mile drive east on a causeway -- marshland all around -- with the Atlantic Ocean close by the resort and residential community.
      It was with plenty of trepidation that I drove to that golf club. Actually, I was not sure of all the details of the plane crash. 
      A link to the full details is below (from a Golf Digest story 20 years later).
      What happened: Davis Love Jr. and his two companions were going to attend the annual meeting of Golf Digest teaching pros at Innisbrook, a golf resort near Tampa. Because they wanted to spend most of that Sunday with their families, instead of driving to Jacksonville to catch a flight south, they chose to have Worthington fly them there -- in early evening -- from the air strip next to the golf course and connect on a Piedmont Airlines flight at 9:30 p.m.
      But the short hop met disaster -- a dense fog and, as it turned out, mixed-up signals from air controllers. Worthington's sight lines were impossible; the plane, a quarter-mile left and 500 feet past the runway's starting point, hit trees 40 feet above the ground. The estimated time: 8:53.27 p.m.
      The plane went "off the radar," but the fog was so bad, the wreckage was not found until daylight the next morning.
      Damn.
      What a loss. What a sad story to write.
 ---    
      Unfortunately, we -- any of us who write and get paid for it -- do some of our best work when it involves deaths, or tragedy. Many of the strongest reactions to pieces I've written fit this category.
      And it can be a tough task. Thinking about writing this blog, I remembered that one of the toughest assignments I made -- with the suggestion from editor Stan Tiner at the Shreveport Journal in summer 1983 -- was sending young sportswriter John James Marshall to visit/interview Joe Delaney's family after the sensational running back's drowning as he tried to save some drowning young people in Monroe, La.
      John James said it was his toughest assignment, and credited then-Haughton head coach Bobby Ray McHalffey for accompanying him and sitting through the interview. That made it easier, but "easy" is not the right word in these situations.
      For me, the people at Sea Island that awful November day in 1988 could not have been more cooperative and available. 
      Davis Love III and wife Robin were not there; they were on the way back home from Hawaii (and then San Francisco) where he was to play in the Kapalua Open and also make a vacation of it. They had just arrived in Hawaii when they got word the plane was missing.
      Three weeks later Chris Smith went to Sea Island to interview Davis III, and Chris' in-depth story was one of his best.   
      Davis III, who will be 54 next month, continues as one of the PGA Tour's biggest names, a 21-time winner on Tour, one major (1997 PGA Championship), a World Golf Hall of Fame inductee last year.
      Two of his victories came near Jacksonville in The Players Championship (1992 and 2003). We were there in '92 when, three shots out of first going into the final round, he shot a 67 on Sunday and won by four shots.
      Because of what had happened -- with its Jacksonville ties -- four years earlier, I thought that was an especially poignant victory.
      Chris Smith, who now works for the PGA Tour (senior director, business public relations), made Davis Love III and his "team" the focus of the cover story for the Times-Union's Players Championship preview the next year. Another nice story.
       It wasn't that my story for the Times-Union -- published Nov. 15, 1988 -- was that difficult to write. It was mixing the quotes from the interviews and the facts into a readable piece (our sports desk in Jacksonville helped with that).
       It was not an award-winning effort, but it was rewarding just to meet the challenge and get it done, and in plenty of time before deadline. 
       It was one to remember, for sure.
---      
https://www.golfdigest.com/story/gw20081107fields
---
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aGl2Xctj1o

My day with Arnie, the King

       He was my favorite golfer always, as he was for millions. And I spent one day -- at a distance -- with Arnie.
    I write this with apologies to Hal Sutton and David Toms, the best two golfers of recent vintage from Shreveport and my favorites from the late 1970s through today.

Arnie, his health obviously declining, at his final Masters
opening ceremony appearance in April 2016 (from www.masters.com)

    Like so many of the thousand PGA Tour stars who followed, I think they will tell you they are indebted to Arnie.
   On a Sunday that began with sadness with the news of the death of 24-year-old Jose Fernandez of the Miami Marlins in a boating accident and the not-totally-unexpected firing of Les Miles as head football coach at LSU, the news that evening was most difficult for me came in  a text message from a friend:
    "Tragically sad day. Arnold is gone."
    Oh, Arnie. We loved you so.
    This has been a year of more deaths of sports and sports media icons, nationally and on a personal level, than I can ever remember. For those of us who relish the late 1950s and the 1960s, Arnie was one of the greatest memories.
    He was the golfer I rooted for -- not for his greatest rival and great friend, Jack Nicklaus; not Lee Trevino; not Gary Player or Raymond Floyd or Billy Casper or any of the others.
    If Arnie was playing, I was in the television Army.
    And one day, in June 1989, I was in the on-course Arnie's Army in a round at Sawgrass' then-new The Valley Course in North Florida. It was the only time I followed him live.
    It was the Senior Players Championship; it was on a day I wasn't working at the Florida Times-Union (Jacksonville) and so I took the long drive (45 minutes or so) from Orange Park,  where we lived to Ponte Vedra Beach, home of PGA Tour office and the adjoining course, the more famous Stadium Course.   
    Not having grown up as a golfer, rarely having covered the sport until the mid-1980s and still not knowing much about the intricacies, I was grateful -- despite my lack of knowledge -- to be on the Times-Union coverage team for five The Players Championship tournaments.
   Arnie never played in those, his best PGA Tour days long behind him. If he had been there, I would have followed him. Still, following my other favorites -- Sutton and Greg Norman (this was before Toms made the Tour) -- was exciting.
   But the one day, at the Senior Players, was memorable.
   Arnie was no longer a contender but still competitive, and he did not play well that day. He struggled for, I want to say, a 74. And in the news conference afterward, which I sat in on, he was un-Arnie-like.
   In the hundreds of interviews I've seen and the hundreds of stories I read, Arnie was almost always gracious, courteous, with a story/memory or two, his humor wry, his comments diplomatic even in controversy. 
   That day at Sawgrass, he was a bit peeved. His answers about his game were curt, not expansive. He wasn't rude, but he obviously was not happy with his play.
   He was, as we were reminded last night watching a 2011 interview with Charlie Rose, his own toughest critic. He told Charlie that his Latrobe, Pa., club pro father, Deke, who had brought him up in and taught him the game, always told him: "Don't tell people how great you are; show them."
     Obviously, he showed them so much over the years. For me, he was golf for many years.
     I have seen many beautiful stories/columns written on Arnie the past few days, including those by my golf writer friends -- Jeff Rude, Garry Smits, Jeff Babineau -- and by the great Dan Jenkins (of Fort Worth). (Links are below.) 
     My favorite Arnie golf memory: His last of his 62 PGA Tour victories, at the 1973 Bob Hope Desert Classic. He won it in typical Arnie fashion, with flair: A last-hole birdie putt, and a pump-fisting celebration. We were watching on TV at The Shreveport Times.
      Biggest Arnie disappointment: What else? The 1966 U.S. Open when he blew a seven-shot lead in the final nine of the fourth round, while Billy Casper blazed to a 32 and tied him. Then Casper won an 18-hole playoff the next day.
      Arnie finished second in the Open again the next year (he was second four times in a six-year period), but he never won another major.
      Watching that Sunday round from San Francisco was, unbelievably, an even greater collapse than Norman's blowing a six-shot lead in the first nine holes at the 1996 Masters, finishing with a painful 78 and losing by five shots to Faldo. Loved watching Norman, exciting and flawed, almost as much as Arnie.
      My fondest Arnie memory: He was guest host of The Tonight Show, the first athlete I'd ever seen do that. Looked this up -- it was July 17, 1970, one of those rare nights (there's a laugh here) that Johnny Carson was away on vacation or appearing in Las Vegas. I loved Carson and The Tonight Show, so I watched often.
       I was so proud Arnie was the host. Don't remember much, except he was not exactly adept at the monologue, not quite as at home as on a golf course, and I know he wore a bright red blazer. Arnie always was a colorful dresser.
       He was a colorful character, period, and one of the sports greats of our time. He was golf's ace ambassador.
---
https://www.facebook.com/jeff.rude.58/posts/916331305139100

http://golfweek.com/2016/09/25/arnold-palmer-golf-boss-piled-up-the-hits-year-after-year/

http://jacksonville.com/sports/golf/2016-09-26/story/arnold-palmer-1929-2016-king-drew-masses-his-game?

http://www.golfdigest.com/story/dan-jenkins-savors-his-moments-with-arnold             

Welcome to the neighborhood: It's Colonial week

      Each May, our neighborhood turns into a fortress. Fences are put up, tents are pitched, roads are closed, and we are practically in lockdown mode.
      It's not as bad as you might think. In fact, it's quite good.
      The PGA Tour is back at Colonial Country Club, which is just across the Trinity River from where we live. Fort Worth has much going for it, and the tournament at Colonial -- note how I am avoiding the corporate name -- is one of the city's biggest assets.
      It is one of the PGA Tour's biggest assets, in my opinion. Other than the Masters at Augusta National, no tournament on tour has been played on the same course annually as long as Colonial. When you see it describes as "historic" Colonial, it's true.
       It is a beautiful old course, a beautiful setting, built into the TCU-area neighborhood, next to the river, a course designed with lots of dogleg fairways and challenging carries over water, and shorter by today's standards (only two par-5s). So the long-drive bombers have to compromise and don't always prevail.
      And we are right here. The fourth green at Colonial -- the dastardly tough 247-yard par-3 hole which has never been aced in tournament history -- is about 100 yards (if that much) from the apartments where we live.
      Only a river, and a bridge, is between us and the golf tournament. Oh, and a ticket to get in the place. I usually manage to find one.
      We have lived in the Colonial neighborhood for nine years, and tournament week is exciting ... and it can be a traffic mess. But starting last year, the PGA Tour and Colonial officials -- with security in mind -- rearranged access to the course.
      The main entrance to the course, which used to be at either the front of Colonial or on Colonial Drive near the second-hole tee box and first green, now is just down the street from us.
      The open field across the street from the fourth fairway/green now is the site of Frost Park, and a huge stage-like base on which is built the "entry" pavilion. I knew tournament time was nearing when they began construction about five weeks ago.
      This week, they close off the street here at the bridge. Fans cross the street from the pavilion to enter the course midway down the No. 4 fairway.
      So, from there, it is quite a walk to either the No. 1 or No. 10 tee boxes, where players begin their Thursday-Friday rounds. But for me, it's a shortcut for walking all the around the fence to the previous entry spot.
      Besides, I don't mind the walk. I walk for exercise just about every day and go past No. 4 several times a week, and I have walked the Colonial course regularly during most of the nine tournaments since we've lived here. (Had to miss a year or two because of conflicts, family matters.)
      Love walking the course. Watching golf isn't easy, but it is easier if you prefer to sit at one hole -- or two, if it's within range of vision -- and watch all the groups come through.     

David Toms' children celebrate with him after his
2011 victory at Colonial (Getty Images photo)

      I'd rather follow a group all the way around, and enjoy all the course. It gets harder as we get older, but I can find the shortcuts, such as not walking the length of the 611-yard, par 5 No. 11 ... unless my guy is in contention and I need to take a closer look.
      The people who know me know that my guy -- years ago -- was Hal Sutton. Followed him in many a round here, in Memphis, in Shreveport (obviously not as part of the PGA Tour), even in Honolulu, and at The Players Championship in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.
       My guy now is David Toms, like Hal a resident of Shreveport. I don't know David personally, although we've met and I've written about him. I do have long-ago connections with his father and stepmother, and I know several of his friends.  
       I have followed David's rounds here every year I've been, and my favorite Colonial was four years ago when he finally (finally) won this tournament.
       He had been close several times, and he often has said it is one of his favorite courses and tournaments. One reason is the course suits his game; he's not among the long drivers on Tour but one of the best iron players.
       Another reason: He always has a strong following here, LSU fans and people from North Louisiana who make the drive over or the Metroplex residents with Louisiana/LSU ties who like to see him play.
       I'm in that group, and one of the reasons I so enjoy the Colonial crowds is there are always longtime friends I see there.
       We can only hope it will be as much fun as it was in 2011 when David posted his 13th career PGA Tour victory -- and a thrilling one, considering his wife and children were there and that he had met with disaster the week before, losing The Players Championship in playoff with K.J. Choi after leading most of the day. That had been his sixth runner-up finish since his previous victory (in 2006).
       In the first two rounds in 2011, David was on target -- 8-under 62 both days. I had to miss Saturday's round (out-of-town trip) and David faltered to a 4-over 74.
       On Sunday, as we were all nervous all day, he came through beautifully with a 3-under 67 and a one-shot victory. So he was 19 under for the three days I was there. Dang right, I was his good-luck charm (don't tell me otherwise).
       It was almost as much fun last year. After a 72 on Thursday, he shot 66-65 and we had that nervous feeling again Sunday. He had the lead at 9 under when he went to No. 10, but faltered and finished two shots behind Adam Scott (playoff winner) and Jason Dufner.
        Undaunted, I plan to follow David to another victory this week.
        I am not a golfer, never have been, never covered a golf tournament until I was in college, rarely had been to a golf course. But I always liked watching the big tournaments on TV, watching Arnie and Jack and the other greats and non-greats.
        My appreciation for the game -- and its difficulty -- has grown over the years. This observation will be no surprise to the millions who have played (or tried to play). I've seen some of my friends hack their way around the course. I've seen some who can really play.
        Still, what I know about the game -- technically -- would not fill the cup on the No. 4 green at Colonial. I do know some tournament history and know some of the players, and I have been on coverage teams for the Colonial and The Players Championship.
        Because we lived in the Jacksonville area and I worked for The Florida Times-Union for a half decade, I got to see some great golf on what I think is an outstanding and challenging course, the Stadium Course at PGA Tour headquarters. 
        Loved seeing the players up close, interviewing some of them and writing what little I could contribute. Even Greg Norman -- Bea and I were such fans, and he let us down quite a few times -- dominated The Players one year.

Three symbols of victory at Colonial: The Marvin Leonard
trophy, the plaid jacket ... and David Toms. (PGA.com photo)

        I usually try to watch The Players on TV, and it was great theater two weeks ago when the "overrated" Rickie Fowler won in a playoff (and birdied No. 17 three times on Sunday ... wow).
        Love that course, although I don't especially love the island hole, No. 17.
        If you made me choose between the Stadium Course and Colonial as my favorite, I'd have to split the vote. How's that for being decisive? I do think that getting around Colonial might be a bit easier than the hills and contours of TPC; both are easier than walking Augusta National.
        What I love most, though, is being near the golfers, and the caddies, and the media ... and the crowds. It's a fine place for people watching, and seeing old friends. 
         At Colonial, I particularly enjoy watching players take on the "Horrible Horseshoe," Nos. 3-4-5, as tough a three-hole stretch as any on Tour (similar to Nos. 16-17-18 at the TPC Stadium Course). I also enjoy all the par-3s here -- the long No. 4, then 8, 13 and 16 (the last two with carries over water, just as on Nos. 9 and 18). 
         I also know to stay away from No. 13 -- The Party Hole -- on Saturday and Sunday when crowds are large and especially rowdy there (it's bad enough on Thursday and Friday).
         That was the scene of the "caddy races," when bets were placed on which caddy will step on the green first. It was silly and wild, and the PGA Tour finally put a ban on them.
         Still, I want no part of No. 13. I'll watch from a distance, thank you. But if David Toms is playing well, and in contention, I might pay closer attention. Let's hope that's the case.
         The neighborhood is rocking, and I'm starting my walk toward to Colonial. I expect it will be a fun week.