"It Was Murder"
Players react to the windy conditions at Sawgrass Country Club for the 1979 Tournament Players Championship
Another designated event and another fantastic finish. What a back nine at the Arnold Palmer Invitational Presented by Mastercard. After hitting a shot out-of-bounds, for the second time on the weekend, on the 9th hole in the final round, Kurt Kitayama played a back nine for the ages. His birdie on the 17th hole and then a 191-yard 8-iron, from rough so thick you could not see the ball, onto the final green where he 2-putted from 47 feet left him atop a star-studded leader board. Great fun to watch.
The announcement of the Designated Event Model by the PGA TOUR had everyone talking. Part of the model includes eight events that will feature smaller fields and no cut. So it was the perfect week for the story of how Greg Koch, the head of instruction at the Ritz Carlton Grande Lakes in Orlando, affected the cut line.
Greg, who won entry into the API by winning the PGA of America section title, needed a par at the last hole to make the cut. He elected to wait to hit his second shot from the rough at 18 until the next day as the daylight was fading. He came back in the morning and made a gutsy par. Seven other players were quite interested in how Koch finished the hole on Saturday morning. If Hoch would’ve birdied the hole, those seven players would have missed the cut. Read more about it HERE and then let us know how you feel about the “no cut” aspect of next year’s designated events in this week’s poll.
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We’re headed to The Players, what the PGA TOUR would like to be known as the fifth major. What contributes to the status of this tournament is the strength of field. How much will that mean next year with the new Designated Event Model?
This tournament started in 1974 with Jack Nicklaus winning the inaugural event when it was known at the Tournament Players Championship. In 1988 it became the Players Championship and it is now known simply as THE PLAYERS.
We’re going back to 1979 when Mother Nature was calling the shots and Lanny Wadkins didn’t care what Mother Nature had to say. Scroll down to learn more.
The last year of the 1970s featured a little bit of everything. Explore the variety of musical styles on this week’s playlist. Listen HERE.
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Wadkins Handles Windy Conditions With “One of the Best Rounds of My Life”
It is sometime during the third week of March, and the commissioner of the Tournament Players Division of the PGA, Deane Beman, is leading a group of reporters, and other dignitaries on a field trip. They were all heading across the street from Sawgrass Country Club where the Tournament Players Championship was currently being played.
Beeman was going to show off the property where the new TPC Sawgrass course was under construction. The new course, which he purchased for $1, would host the Tournament Players Championship starting in 1982. As part of the project, the Tournament Players Division was also constructing its headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach near the site of the new course. Pete Dye was hired as the architect of the course and he promised that the effects of the legendary wind at Sawgrass Country Club would be mitigated at the new Stadium Course.
“For starters, 10 of the holes are protected by deep woods, and the rest are exposed to the south and the southwest so we can get the prevailing breezes during the summer,” Dye explained.
Mitigating the wind was a priority, especially during the playing of the 1979 Tournament Players Championship.
“The most significant championship we play all year.”
The week opened with Jack Nicklaus calling the tournament “the most significant championship we play all year.” He held this opinion because the TPC was a “designated” event, one in which all leading players were required to compete in and featured the strongest field of the year.
Designated event. What’s old is new again, huh?
Nicklaus had gotten off to a slow start in 1979 having played in just four tournaments prior to the TPC and his best finish was a tie for eleventh in the Bob Hope Desert Classic. Still, he was considered a favorite as he was the defending champion and had won the event three times (1974, 1976, and 1978).
The first round commenced under benign conditions on Thursday, a lovely calm day bereft of the famous winds that usually plagued Sawgrass. The small, oddly shaped greens benefited from watering and held iron approach shots. The players took advantage of the conditions shooting low scores, and Kermit Zarley led the pack with a record-tying 66. Nicklaus, Lanny Wadkins, and Andy North were one-stroke back while another 49 players broke par.
This was not your usual first round at Sawgrass, but not to worry, the winds would make their presence known beginning with a stir during Friday’s second round. While not howling with its usual ferocity, the Friday winds were a harbinger of things to come.
Wadkins ignored the wind and continued his fine play in the second round shooting a 68 that resulted in a three-stroke lead over George Burns. Wadkins went bogey-free for the round and Burns made eight birdies to equal the course record with a 66. Zarley shot a 79 while Nicklaus shot a 73 and Lee Trevino shot a 69 to his opening round of 70 to jump into the mix.
“It was murder. Basically, you just tried to survive.”
But conditions were changing, and it would be a weekend filled with doom. Jack Renner shot a 71, the low round of Saturday’s third round and he passed a slew of players to climb from a tie for 18th into a tie for second with Trevino (75), Burns (76) and Bill Kratzert (75).
“It was murder,” Renner admitted after his round. “Basically, you just tried to survive.”
Renner finished birdie-par-birdie to card his 71.
“Let’s just say I did not have the ability to handle the conditions.”
Wadkins shot a 4-over-par 76 yet retained his three-shot lead in the howling, shifting winds that reached 35 miles per hour. It was a horror show. Nicklaus struggled to an 82 and simply shook his head when a reporter asked, “Was this golf?”
“Let’s just say I did not have the ability to handle the conditions,” the Golden Bear admitted. “Do you know that I only put the ball on the putting surface in regulation four times? And I actually hit the ball fairly well.”
After having made only one bogey in the first two rounds, Wadkins recorded seven bogeys in the third round. Not losing any of his lead after shooting a 76 brought about some comedic comments.
“What’s unusual about it?” asked Hubert Green, grinning. “Isn’t 76 one under here?”
And the fun was only beginning.
Sunday morning dawned with no relief from the wind—in fact, it was getting stronger. Sustained winds of 25 miles per hour with gusts of 45 to 50 miles per hour caused chaos to many of the players. But Wadkins kept his head down and watched as his challengers fell by the wayside.
Playing in the last threesome, Wadkins watched as his playing partners, Trevino and Burns, shot themselves out of the tournament on the front nine. Trevino made the turn shooting a 41 while Burns skied to a 46. Wadkins shot a one-under 35 and took a five-stroke lead into the back nine.
Kratzert made an early move with birdies on the 2nd and 4th holes but disappeared after a triple-bogey on the 7th hole where the wind moved his drive into the woods and he was unable to recover.
“They were two of the best rounds of golf I’ve ever played in my life.”
Wadkins, who had a reputation for playing his best golf on the toughest courses, negotiated the wind and was never really challenged on the back nine. He came home shooting an even-par 72. Wadkins believed that his final round 72, combined with his opening round 68, were some of the finest golf he’d ever played.
“They were two of the best rounds of golf I’ve ever played in my life,” he said.
The wind and the course, one that was designed like an inland course with bunkers fronting rock-hard greens, but was traditionally subjected to links type wind conditions, embarrassed many of the pros. Nicklaus followed up Saturday’s 82 with a Sunday 78 and Bob Murphy posted a 92 in the final round.
Even with all that, Wadkins became the first player to win the Tournament Players Championship with a score under par on the Sawgrass Country Club course.
All of the players looked forward to the calmer conditions that Pete Dye promised for the new TPC Sawgrass course. The use of that course was delayed, due to heavy rains, from its planned opening in 1981 to hosting the TPC in 1982. How the players reacted to the new course is another story, for another time.
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Bonus Story
The new TPC Stadium Course at Sawgrass was not the only announcement that Dean Beman made the week of the 1979 Tournament Players Championship. He also announced that the PGA was exploring the development of a tour for players aged 50 and over.
“We feel that there is a great deal of interest in the possibility,” he told reporters on the Wednesday before the tournament began and indicated that the tour could be in operation within a year.
A motivating factor for establishing such a tour was the fact that Arnold Palmer would turn 50 in September.
“We are not unaware that Arnold will be 50 this year,” he admitted. “In fact, we are not unaware of the date, September 10.”
Beman went on to say that the senior tour would not be built around a single individual, including Palmer. The Senior PGA Tour was established in 1980 and the name was changed to the Champions Tour in November of 2002 and then became known as the PGA Tour Champions, and is known by that name today.
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Tour Backspin Quiz |Tournament Players Championship Trivia
The Players has never had a defending champion win the year following their victory. What is the best finish by a defending champion? Hint: it has happened three times.
Answer below
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Geoff Shakelford continues to amp up the excitement for this years U.S. Open at the North Course of the Los Angeles Country Club in his Substack newsletter The Quadrilateral. He describes the changes made in renovations as well as the Hollywood setting for the host course of the U.S.G.A.’s marquee tournament. Check it out HERE (subscription paywall).
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Tour Backspin Quiz Answer:
The best finish by a defending champion is a tie for fifth place. It happened three times (1977, 1990 and 2001)
Comments | Feedback
Hale was a real character - I caddied for Dave Stockton in the 1972 Greater Jacksonville Open and Hale was in our group first two days - during second round we had a rain delay and were caught way out on the course in a rain shed - everyone else fled the course but our group, caddies, and several young girls holed up in the shed hoping for a break in the weather - after a while Hale looked over at a vacated drink-hotdog stand and told his caddy to climb into it and bring us all drinks and hotdogs back which he did - Hale also gave his rain jacket to one girl and his rain pants to another (it was cold as well) and he had a bunch of candy in his bag which he passed around - I remember everyone laughing and having a great time and Hale was the hero of the rain delay - great memories.
Dave H. The Society of Golf Historians group on Facebook
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Final Thoughts
How many balls did Tyrell Hatton throw into the water in the 4th round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational?
Has a player ever contended for a title after hitting two balls out-of-bounds on the weekend in a tournament before Kitayama?
In Sunday’s NBC broadcast of the final round, after the winner’s red cardigan sweater was shown for the first time, analyst Paul Azinger commented on how cool the sweater was. He suggested that former champions, who won before this tradition started, should get a sweater. Tour Backspin Nation—we must make this happen!