Johnny Miller Graduates—Barely
Makes five foot putt to avoid a playoff in the 1969 PGA TOUR Q School
The PGA Tour was in Los Cabos for the World Wide Technology Championship and congratulations to Erik Van Rooyen who rolled in more than 50 feet of putts in his last three holes. He finished birdie-birdie-eagle to shoot a back nine 28 and a final round of 63, 9-under-par. This was his second tour victory and it was a very emotional victory as he played “every shot out there today” for his friend Jon Trasamar who is battling cancer.
This week the TOUR is in Southampton, Bermuda, for the Butterfield Bermuda Championship at the Port Royal Golf Course. Port Royal was designed by Robert Trent Jones in 1970.
The Butterfield Bermuda Championship began in 2019 so there is not a lot of professional golf history concerning Bermuda. Players in the field are trying to improve their positions on next year’s tour in what the PGA TOUR labelled the FedExCup Fall. We’re going to focus in on the PGA TOUR Qualifying School where players played to secure a spot to play on the TOUR. We’re focusing on 1969 where Johnny Miller earned his playing card. Scroll down to learn more.
Nice finish to a personal best round.
In last week’s Tour Backspin Poll, respondents were equally split on who they put more faith in when choosing a bucket list course to play. There were 50% who relied on friends and 50% who leaned more on the top 100 lists that the magazines produce.
We got another TGL team logo released, the Los Angeles Golf Club. The Jupiter Golf Links Golf Club, Tiger’s team, has been announced and we await that logo.
Are you getting excited about the TGL which will feature shot clocks and a referee? Learn more about the league HERE and then let us know in this week’s Tour Backspin Poll.
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Clip You Might Have Missed
A very emotional win for Erik Van Rooyen.
Billy Davis Monday qualified for the World Wide Technologies Championship. He’s 17 years old.
This week’s Vintage Ad returns to the days when the microwave oven was the cutting edge of technology. Scroll down to view.
We’re returning to our Spotify specially curated playlist this week with a spotlight on songs about school, to honor the PGA TOUR Q School. You can listen HERE.
Johnny Miller shows off his great footwork in this week’s Swing Like a Pro feature. Scroll down to view.
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Johnny Miller Avoids Playoff On Way To Earning PGA TOUR Card
It is the last week of April 1969, and 78 golfers with dreams of playing on the PGA TOUR have assembled at the PGA National Golf Club (now BallenIsles Country Club) in Palm Beach Gardens, FL, to attend the Approved Tournament Players School. Up for grabs were 15 Tour cards that would provide the players who would secure one, playing privileges on the PGA TOUR for the remainder of the 1969 schedule.
The 1965 Q School featured three days of lectures on player conduct, the rules of golf, and other topics.
The Approved Tournament Players School, commonly known as Q School, was instituted in 1965 as an avenue for players to get into the fields of the regular PGA TOUR events. Q School was to help with the overcrowding at Monday qualifying events where aspiring tour players would try to qualify for that week’s event. So many players were trying to Monday qualify that you would often have over 100 players trying to qualify for a half-dozen, or less, spots.
The 1965 Q School featured three days of lectures on player conduct, the rules of golf, and other topics, by established PGA TOUR players including Dave Marr, Jack Burke, Jr. and Chick Harbert. Once the classroom stuff was taken care of, the players then took to the course to play a tournament where 17 would earn the coveted card giving them playing privileges on the PGA TOUR.
Of the players who won their cards that inaugural year John Schlee and Jim Colbert are the best known. But as Billy Booe, PGA Tournament Administrator, said, “It was not an impressive group” of graduates. A year later, only 4 of the 17 had made any money on the tour with only two of them being in the money multiple times.
“I can’t afford to play amateur golf anymore. It’s just too expensive.”
The Spring PGA Q School in 1969 was the first time the tournament was played over 72 holes, a change from the 144-hole tournaments conducted since 1965. There were several Californians entered including Gary Plato of Los Altos, Bruce Summerhays of Boulder Creek, Robert Eastwood of Lodi, Gerry Preuss of Woodland Hills, Charles Montalbano of Van Nuys, John Schroeder from La Jolla, Rod Curl of Redding, and Johnny Miller from San Francisco. The players from Northern California especially, were close.
Upon turning pro, Johnny Miller told Golf Magazine that, “I can’t afford to play amateur golf anymore. It’s just too expensive.”
The weather for the week was mostly pleasant, but on the first hole, Plato witnessed a front coming in. The palm trees began to sway and as his group reached the green, he turned around to look back up the fairway towards the clubhouse. In no time, the clubhouse was obscured by the weather moving in. Contacted recently by Tour Backspin, Plato recalled what he saw.
Pretty soon we couldn’t see the clubhouse as the front advanced down the first fairway. You could literally see a wall of water. One minute you were dry, the next you were under the waterfall.
The wild weather was not the only thing unfamiliar to Plato that week. He could not adjust to the Bermuda greens.
I had never played on Bermuda greens so grain was a real issue and hard for me to adjust to. I wish I had more time prior to the tournament to really get to understand how to deal with Bermuda greens.
Both Plato and Summerhays failed to qualify for their playing cards and after finishing the last round, they headed out to the course to see how Miller would finish. Miller had shot rounds of 74, 78, and 73 in the first three rounds placing him 11 strokes behind the leader, Gerry Preuss, who held a four-shot lead over Robert Eastwood.
Plato and Summerhays knew that Miller was close to the bubble and as Miller played the final hole, a long par 4 over water, he walked over to inquire what it would take to qualify.
‘Don’t worry, just knock it on the green and get your par. You’re gonna be fine.’
“We knew he was right on the bubble; he needed a par on the last hole in order to not go into the playoff,” Plato recalled. “Bruce and I said, ‘don’t worry, just knock it on the green and get your par. You’re gonna be fine.’”
Miller hit his shot onto the green, 20-feet away from the hole, and Plato and Summerhays relaxed, sure that Miller would two-putt to secure the par he needed. Miller knocked his first putt five feet past the hole and Plato and Summerhays were no longer feeling quite so sanguine about Miller making his par. Miller stepped up and made the five-footer to qualify launching his hall of fame career.
Preuss skied to an 80 in the final round, but he qualified easily based on his good first three rounds. Eastwood shot a final round 73 for a total of 291 to be the low qualifier. Eastwood helped his family build the Dry Creek Ranch Golf Club near Sacramento, and he won the 1965 Sacramento City Amateur and Stockton City Championships, the 1966 California State Amateur and defended his title in the Stockton City in 1966, and he won the 1968 West Coast Athletic Conference individual title while playing for San Jose State University. He went on to win three times on the PGA TOUR, including the 1985 Byron Nelson Golf Classic in a playoff against Payne Stewart.
The Q School playoff in 1969 was between the six players, who finished at 300, playing for three spots. The six players were Michael Nugent of Beaumont, TX, Mike Reasor of Seattle, WA, Mahlon Moe of Albuquerque, NM, Charlie Green of Oxford, CA, Dennis Murphy of Long Beach, CA, and Bob Unger of Canoga Park, CA.
“That putt,” he said afterwards, “looked like 60 miles long.”
Murphy went out on the first hole after a bogey, Reasor canned a 12-foot putt for birdie on the second playoff hole securing one of the cards available and leaving four players battling for one spot. On the third playoff hole, a par 3, all the players missed the green. Moe pitched close to the hole leaving himself a six-footer for a par that would earn him his card as the other three players made bogeys.
“That putt,” he said afterwards, “looked like 60 miles long.”
Murphy made the putt and, along with the other 14 qualifiers, celebrated before preparing to join the tour for the remainder of the 1969 season.
For the first time in over a decade, PGA TOUR cards will be available at the PGA TOUR Q-School presented by the Korn Ferry Tour this year. Players who made it through the first stage, held at various courses in October, will compete in the second stage at courses in November. The final stage will be held at TPC Sawgrass (Dye’s Valley Course) and the Sawgrass Country Club (East/West) courses in Ponte Vedra Beach, FL, on December 14th through the 17th. Each competitor will play two rounds on each course.
The medalist at each site of the first stage will be exempt through the Latin America Swing of the 2024 PGA TOUR Americas season. The medalist, and ties, at each site of the second stage will earn limited status on the Korn Ferry Tour and the top five finishers, and ties, at the final stage will earn an instant promotion with cards to the PGA TOUR. The complete qualifying process is detailed by the PGA TOUR HERE.
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Bonus Story
In 1968, players were revolting against the PGA of America and launched their own tour called the APG which held their own Q School. With the spring and fall PGA Q Schools this made three Q Schools for players trying to earn the right to play on a professional tour. When a truce was called just before the start of the 1969 tour between the players and the PGA, the APG graduates were awarded cards onto the PGA tour.
The three Q Schools resulted in the awarding playing privileges to 66 players with Hale Irwin (PGA Spring), Grier Jones, Jerry Heard, Jim Jamieson, Ed Sneed (PGA Fall), Cesar Sanudo and Claude Harman, Jr. (APG), being the most notable names earning their cards.
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Tour Backspin Quiz | PGA TOUR Qualifying School Trivia
Who won the first PGA TOUR Qualifying School in 1965
Scroll down to for answer
Swing Like a Pro
The fabulous footwork of Johnny Miller (photo: Leonard Kamsler | Popperfoto via Getty Images)
Blind Shot
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Uncorked, The Life and Times of Champagne Tony Lema tells the story of one of the tour’s biggest stars in the mid-1960s. A fascinating glimpse into the traveling caravan that was the PGA TOUR during an era where the fields were full of “Mad Men” era personalities. From a hardscrabble youth spent on the “wrong side of the tracks” in the Oakland suburb of San Leandro, to the temptations of Elko, Nevada, to the bright lights of the PGA TOUR, Uncorked tells a story of determination, redemption and, above all else, a love story that documents how Betty, Tony’s new wife, provided the direction and motivation for him to become a top star. Order on Amazon.
What is Hip?
It’s all black and white in 1969.
Tour Backspin Quiz Answer:
John Schlee won the first PGA TOUR Qualifying School in 1965.
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Final Thoughts
The Julius Boros family was huge with seven children. I guess they could only fit four into the above ad.
A milkman could go straight from his job to the course and be as “hip” as the models in this week’s What is Hip? feature.
I would definitely would count that as an ace in this week’s Blind Shot.