First Skins Game Televised in 1975
Skins game at Muirfield Village predates the first Don Ohlmeyer produced Thanksgiving weekend Skins Game by eight years
The Tour Backspin journey through the past takes you back to 1975 and the first televised skins game. This event flew under the radar but the idea would be picked back up eight years later by Don Ohlmeyer and his partner, Barry Frank, for what would become a Thanksgiving weekend tradition. Scroll down to learn more about both events.
The PGA TOUR returns after a week off with an exhibition tournament this week, the Hero World Challenge. Even though the tour was off, we still have some Clips You Might Have Missed from the world of golf. Scroll down to view.
We’ve got a question for you to weigh in on with the Tour Backspin Poll. This week’s Music Clip has Big Country doing “Big Country” live in 1983. Tour Backspin Goes to The Movies, has the 1983 theatrical trailer for “Mr. Mom” starring Michael Keaton and the great Teri Garr who we just recently lost. Scroll down to listen and watch.
The Swing Like a Pro features the powerful swing of Jack Nicklaus in his prime. The WHAT HOLE IS IT? this week should be pretty easy. Submit your answer and you may just win a golf swag prize pack which includes our new 19th Hole Hot Sauce (now available online in the Tour Backspin Golf Shop). We’ve got some links for you in the Check it Out section and an ad from 1983 that touts the PGA TOUR Enterprises in this week’s Vintage Ad. Scroll down to view.
The Tour Backspin Poll
Last week we asked you in the Tour Backspin Poll what you thought about the sample holes that were released by TGL, the new team golf league that will be played on golf simulators. There was an even mix with 50% of respondents who thought the holes were okay and something different, and 50% who hated the holes because they are not realistic. Exactly zero people responded that they loved the holes and that they should be future WHAT HOLE IS IT? holes.
Players in the field this week at the Hero World Championship, a limited field of 20 pros, is awarding Official World Golf Rankings, even though it is an official event on the PGA TOUR. Do you think a limited tournament like this should award OWGR points? Let us know in this week’s Tour Backspin Poll.
We’re playing 1983 PGA TOUR Trivia in this week’s Tour Backspin Quiz. Scroll down to play.
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Okay, we're on the tee, let's get going.
Enjoy!
Larry Baush
There Was a Skins Game in 1975?
It is Friday morning, November 25th, 1983, and Arnold Palmer has arrived in Scottsdale, AZ, at a new Jack Nicklaus designed golf course, Desert Highlands Golf Course. Palmer was spending his Thanksgiving weekend in Scottsdale, along with Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, and Tom Watson for a new exhibition event dreamed up by Don Ohlmeyer, a former executive with NBC Sports. Palmer arrived to play a practice round, but he was forced to wait out a downpour before he could get his first glimpse of the new course, that would be used for a new event.
“I said to Barry the only way to get it on is if we buy the time. I said, ‘are you prepared, if we never sell a minute, to eat one-half of the losses?’ He said, ‘OK’ and we said, ‘let’s go.’
The event was called The Skins Game and would be played under a format known by most golfers because it was a format that most of them played. While most weekend warrior golfers recognized the format, there was one big difference. Weekend players usually ponied up a set buy-in, say $20, and then each player to win a “skin,” meaning the lone lowest score on a hole, would split up the pot. The four legendary star players in the Skins Game would be playing for a predetermined amount for each hole, which increased as the round progresses. Weekend warriors played for their own money while Ohlmeyer raised the $360,000 purse for his event. As is the case in either game, pro or amateur, it is played under a “one tie, all tie” format.
Ohlmeyer, and Barry Frank, the two head honchos at Trans World International, the sporting event production arm of the management company IMG, came up with the idea for The Skins Game as a broadcast television event. They went about shopping it around to all the major networks and found no takers.
“I said to Barry the only way to get it on is if we buy the time,” Ohlmeyer explained to Alan Pergament for his “Sports on the Air” column in The Buffalo News, Buffalo, NY. “I said, ‘are you prepared, if we never sell a minute, to eat one-half of the losses?’ He said, ‘OK’ and we said, ‘let’s go.’”
The pair then recruited the four players, with Nicklaus the first to lend his support. He had an ulterior motive as he wanted to provide some publicity for the new course he designed, Desert Highlands. There was no guaranteed money promised the players so they could leave Scottsdale empty-handed if they did not capture a skin.
Ohlmeyer’s idea was a good one, and the event proved to be very successful, becoming an annual event that ran on NBC until 1991 when coverage moved over to ABC after NBC secured the rights to Notre Dame Football. The event was carried by ABC until 2008 when the last Skins Game was played.
While Ohlmeyer’s idea was a good one, he did not come up with it, and Jack Nicklaus getting publicity for a new course he designed was again a major factor in getting a skins game televised. On Friday, October 17th, 1975, at a new course in Dublin, OH, called Muirfield Village, the foursome of Nicklaus, Lee Trevino, Johnny Miller, and Tom Weiskopf met to play a skins game. The event would be broadcast on Japanese television while a recorded highlight reel would be shown on CBS in early January.
The Japanese television producers not only put on this skins game with its $18,000 purse, but they also put up another $117,500 for a three-day tournament that preceded the main event. This tournament, that would only be aired in Japan, over a 52-week span, featured Jerry Heard, Ben Crenshaw, J.C. Snead, Eddie Pearce, Tom Kite, Forest Fezler, Leonard Thompson, Joe Inman, Mark Hayes and George Burns III, all American players. Filling out the field for the match play event would be David Graham and Bob Stanton from Australia, John O’Leary from Ireland, Scotland’s Bernard Gallacher, and Japan’s Kazunari and Tsutomo Irie of Japan. Both Nicklaus and Weiskopf were exempted into the semifinal matches. All players were guaranteed $2,500 while the winner would take home $25,000.
“Do you realize that I'm going to have on the same sport coat for 52 weeks in Japan?"
When Ed Sneed heard about the format he joked, “Why does Jack want to run the risk of putting himself in the semifinals? He ought to seed himself into four up on the back nine of the finals."
Nicklaus beat Weiskopf in the final match 2 and 1 to take home the $25,000 first prize.
Ken Venturi was the analyst for both competitions and taped an introduction explaining the rules for match play, and for a skins game.
“Do you realize," Ken said, "that I'm going to have on the same sport coat for 52 weeks in Japan?"
In the skins game, each hole was worth $1,000 with carryovers if a hole wasn’t won outright. Each participant was guaranteed $20,000, but that didn’t dampen the competitive urges of the four players and they showcased their talents putting on quite the exhibition. The day was filled with exciting, and exacting golf for the 5,000 spectators allowed on the premises to witness it.
"We might have been out there to have fun, but, man, we hauled off and played jam up and jelly tight," Lee Trevino said about the level of golf that day.
After the first hole was halved with pars, Johnny Miller struck pay dirt first at the 2nd hole with a birdie. Trevino and Miller birdied the 3rd hole for a halve. Trevino and Nicklaus birdied the 4th hole, before Weiskopf took the 5th hole, and the two additional carryovers, with a birdie. Weiskopf went back-to-back with a birdie at the sixth hole.
Nicklaus and Miller birdied the 7th hole, and Nicklaus got paid after he birdied the 9th hole. Miller won the 11th hole with a birdie while Weiskopf took the 12th hole with a birdie. Nicklaus thrilled the crowd with an eagle at the 15th hole and then followed up by winning the 16th hole with a birdie. Weiskopf finished the blazing scoring when he birdied the 17th hole.
The four players were an astonishing 13-under-par combined. This was Muirfield Village after all, and they did this while being wired for sound under their clothing and waiting between shots while cameras were moved. The Japanese production company used about 10 electric carts to transport the cameras around the course.
In addition to the fine golf on display, the players were mic’d up and the banter between the players enhanced the entertainment value. Of course, Lee Trevino provided the most commentary during the six hours of filming, but the others could be counted on to throw a few zingers in as well. When Miller was putting to win $2,000 on the 2nd hole, counting the carryover from the tied first hole, his putt from the fringe was hit too aggressively and looked to be racing past the hole. Instead, it hit the flagstick and dropped down into the hole.
“I’m afraid I’ll have to deduct the cost of a new flagstick, John,” Nicklaus deadpanned. “You cracked that one.”
At the next hole, the fantastic 3rd hole at Muirfield Village, Trevino and Miller hit great iron shots into the green. Lee putted first and curled in his birdie putt. Nicklaus and Weiskopf hurried over behind Miller’s ball and began helping him read and line up his putt.
Trevino called a timeout and addressed the crowd.
“Look at that, folks,” he began. “There’s three of the greatest players in the whole world over there tryin’ to line up one little old putt. If they miss this, they’re gonna look like clowns.”
"This'll be a hell of a show but let's play my game next time, baby. Let's all go down to the bank and draw out our own cash and put it up."
As Nicklaus’ eagle putt was rolling across the 15th green, Weiskopf said, “That’s five feet past.”
“Six inches down is where it’s goin’,” Trevino countered.
The ball dropped into the hole winning Nicklaus $3,000 counting carryovers. The only player who failed to win a skin was Trevino, who had to be content with the $20,000 appearance fee, and he had a suggestion for the next time they got together to do a skins game.
"This'll be a hell of a show but let's play my game next time, baby,” Trevino challenged. “Let's all go down to the bank and draw out our own cash and put it up."
While The Skins Game would enter the Thanksgiving weekend tradition in 1983, Trevino’s idea was never implemented. Gary Player won $170,000 in the first Skins Game, more than he won in any year, except for one, on the PGA TOUR. K.J. Choi won $415,000 the last year The Skins Game was played in 2008. None of that money, though, was put up by the players.
Ironically, it was the rise in PGA TOUR purses that brought on the demise of The Skins Game.
Most golf fans could be excused if they said that the skins game began in 1983. But it was a Japanese and CBS Sports collaboration at Jack Nicklaus’ brand new Muirfield Village that gave us our first taste of the exciting skins format. A format perfectly suited for television.
Next Week: The 1970 PGA TOUR Q-School
BONUS STORY
At the inaugural Skins Game in 1983, Tom Watson had a chance to win his second skin of the day at the 16th hole. He won a skin on the first hole of the day but had been shutout since then giving him a total of $10,000. There were three tied holes before the 16th hole with the prize money carrying over, making the hole worth $120,000.
Arnold Palmer played himself out of the hole after hitting into the desert. Jack Nicklaus barely missed a long birdie putt and settled for a par. Watson’s chip from just in front, and right, of the green looked like it was going into the hole before curling off to the left at the very end, leaving him within tap-in range for his par. Both Nicklaus and Player could not believe that the putt didn’t go in the hole.
Attention turned to Gary Player who had a chip from a similar spot to Watson’s. Player paced up to the pin and looked at his shot from that angle before returning down to his ball and standing behind his ball looking over the shot further. He then stepped into his shot while his caddie walked up to tend the pin.
He struck the chip crisply and the ball rolled up towards the cup, right on line. The ball looked as if it had a chance to go into the hole before it veered off to the right. With the 16th hole tied, the 17th hole was worth $150,000 and Player won the hole after almost holing his third shot on the par-5, and then making the five- or six-foot putt for birdie. He ripped his hat off his head and flung it up in the air in celebration.
The 18th hole was won by Jack Nicklaus despite topping a fairway wood. The players shook hands and then conducted a press conference. Once the press conference was completed a meeting was held between Watson, Player, Nicklaus and Joesph Dey, the official overseeing the exhibition.
“A meeting was held at the close of the match,” Watson said in a prepared statement. “At which time I made my position known about the rule infraction, and I considered the matter closed.”
Watson claimed that he saw Player violate Rule 17-1 by improving his lie when he moved a leaf of a weed that was right behind his ball.
"From a distance of 30 feet away, Watson could be heard saying, ‘I’m accusing you, Gary . . . You can’t do that . . . I’m tired of this.’”
“As I saw it, he was moving a leaf of a weed right behind his ball,” Watson said in a telephone interview the next day with Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post. “I know the leaf was rooted because it popped back up to its original position.”
The whole matter might not have become known if Dave Anderson, a syndicated columnist for the New York Times, had not overheard the meeting between Watson, Player, Nicklaus, and Dey that occurred at a distance on a road behind the 18th green.
Anderson was walking with Watson, Player, and Dey when, “Joe turned to me and said, ‘This is a private conversation.’ I stopped in my tracks right there.”
The group moved on down the road about 30 feet.
Anderson wrote, "From a distance of 30 feet away, Watson could be heard saying, ‘I’m accusing you, Gary . . . You can’t do that . . . I’m tired of this.’”
Player denied moving the leaf and Anderson quoted him as saying, “Tom thought I moved a leaf that I shouldn’t have. But I told him I didn’t, and he accepted that. And that’s the way we left it.”
But apparently it wasn’t left at that as Watson reiterated to Anderson, he thought that Player had cheated.
“What I saw was a violation,” Watson said firmly when contacted by Anderson by phone the next day.
“Unfortunately for all parties involved, what was to be a private meeting inadvertently was overheard and now has become a public matter,” Watson said in his prepared statement. “My greatest regret is that this private matter became a public incident.”
This post was updated on 12/6/2024 to correct the first name of Don Ohlmeyer.
WHAT HOLE IS IT?
Congratulations to Bill Badger for winning the WHAT HOLE IS IT? contest last week by correctly identifying #10 at Wailea Golf Club Gold Course in Maui, HI. Bill beat out three other correct answers in the drawing and we’ve got a prize pack of golf swag on the way to him.
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Tour Backspin Quiz | Skins Game Trivia
How many of The Skins Games did Tiger Woods win?
Scroll down for answer
Swing Like a Pro
Jack Nicklaus tees off the 17th hole at Desert Highlands in the 1983 Skins Game.
Blind Shot
Click for something fun. 👀
Then the PGA TOUR dropped this trailer for a Scottie Scheffler documentary landing 12/23. Merry Christmas from the PGA TOUR.
Gary Player has opinions.
Tour Backspin Music Clip
Big Country plays “Big Country” live in 1983.
Tour Backspin Quiz Answer:
Tiger Woods played in three consecutive years in The Skins Game starting 1n 1996. He never won the event.
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Final Thoughts
That Ryder Cup documentary is worth your time.
I loved the celebration after Jack’s over-the-house ace. Very authentic and the whole family was into it.
Those persimmon drivers they used in 1983 look so small. How’d we hit ‘em?
The PGA Tour needs to remove Jay Monahan and all his minions. Jay plied his disgusting and disgraceful trade under the tutelage of Tim Finchem (a Jimmy Carter WH minion) The tour needs to disband and have former players only in executive positions. Running not only the day to day but the strategic long term plans for their product.
Present management and staff are selfish and untrustworthy.
They are devoid of the charitable foundation of the PGA Tour and have only their compensation concerns upfront. The product is shit right now.
The PGA tour epitomizes crony capitalism and cronyism at the highest levels.