Pro Comes Into Charlotte as a Pauper, Leaves as a Prince
Wins $50,000 with little more than gas money in his pocket
The PGA TOUR event this week visits the TPC Potomac at Avenel Farm in Potomac, MD for the Wells Fargo Championship. This tournament was first played in 2003 as the Wachovia Championship at the Quail Hollow Country Club in Charlotte, NC and we’re going to backspin to the Kemper Open of 1974 which was also played at Quail Hollow. It features a pro who Monday qualifies and then goes on to win the event. It’s a cool story.
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Congratulations to Al Oppenheim, a long time subscriber to this newsletter and the winner in the WHAT HOLE IS IT? contest from last week. The featured hole was #18 at San Francisco Country Club in San Francisco, CA. This week’s photo is a “Guest Post” from Vacek Szymula, a true patron saint of this newsletter. Want your picture featured in a “Guest Post”? Send it to larry@tourbackspin.com. Scroll down for your chance to win this week’s WHAT HOLE IS IT?
We’re playing 1974 PGA TOUR Trivia this week on the Tour Backspin Quiz. Scroll down to play.
Ben Crenshaw is the perfect product spokesman in the 1970s. See why in this week’s 1979 vintage ad. Scroll down to view.
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From Hamburgers in the Motel Room to Filet Mignon
It’s Monday, May 27th, 1974, and Bob Menne just posted a 70 at Carmel Country Club in Charlotte, NC in a Monday qualifier for the Kemper Open that would begin on Thursday at the Quail Hollow Country Club, also in Charlotte. His score was good enough to secure a spot in the tournament which featured one of the richest purses on the PGA TOUR.
Menne needed to get into the field as he needed to make some money. In the three years he had been out on tour, he had a grand total of $19,000 in winnings. In 1974 he had collected $7,200 and his standing on tour required him to Monday qualify to get into events.
To make matters worse, he and his wife experienced car trouble coming into Charlotte and the resulting repair charges left him with only gas money to get to the next stop on tour. His wife was cooking hamburgers in their motel room.
So, how did he do with that coveted spot in the Kemper Open? Let’s backspin to see.
The Kemper Open offered one of the largest purses on the tour schedule. It was also one of three “designated tournaments” by the Tournament Players Division that required all the big-name players to participate.
In the first round, Tom Watson matched the course-record 65 to take a one-stroke lead over Bruce Crampton and a two-stroke lead over Hubert Green and Bob Menne, who both birdied the last three holes in their rounds. Menne started the day by bouncing his approach shot through a bunker and it stopped seven feet from the hole. Watson, despite winning $62,000 so far in 1974, had not yet won on the tour and he was hungry. He had come close in 1974.
“I had a chance to win last week in Memphis,” Watson told reporters after his round. “I had a chance to win in Dallas. I had a chance to win in Los Angeles. And I was in pretty good shape in San Diego. My trouble is that I’ve been inconsistent. I just haven’t finished as fast as I’d like this year. I’ve had some good starts then let it get away. But I’m sure it will come.”
Watson did not miss a green in his round and didn’t record a bogey. He also didn’t birdie any of the par five holes.
The course record that Watson tied on Thursday fell on Friday, a hot and muggy day with little to no wind. Lee Trevino shot a 64 and grabbed the lead. Trevino one-putted nine greens and he identified the round as maybe the best competitive round of his life.
Trevino’s 10-under total for 36 holes was only one stroke in front of a group of a half dozen players that included Watson, Jerry Heard, J.C. Snead, Gibby Gilbert, Chi Chi Rodriguez, and John Jacobs. Crampton shot a 73 and was at 138, four strokes behind Trevino. Bob Menne shot a 69 and was only two strokes off the lead.
Dark threatening clouds hung over Quail Hollow for Saturday’s third round. That didn’t bother Jerry Heard who came out and shot a 65 and grabbed a three-stroke lead. His three-round total of 200 was the best 54-hole score on tour so far in 1974. So was the overall scoring of the field as the whole field was under par.
Heard started the day with two birdies on the front nine and then had consecutive birdies on the 10th through 13th holes.
“I just started making a lot of putts,” said a smiling Heard after his round. “They just started to go in.”
Trevino shot a 69 and was three strokes back as was Bob Menne who shot a 67. Tom Kite equaled Trevino’s course-record of 64 and he shot up the leader board to six strokes off the lead.
In Sunday’s final round, Bob Menne was just looking for a good final round that would result in a high finish and a much-needed large check. However, it began to look like he would be repeating what he viewed as a flaw in his game after he bogeyed the fourth hole. Then he missed a three-foot birdie putt on the fifth hole.
“I always seem to have that one bad round,” he admitted to reporters. “But things started happening on the eighth. I birdied eight and nine to go out in 35, one-under. Then I birdied ten, then 13. But I bogeyed 14 with a three-putt before getting birdies on 15 and 18.”
The birdie on 18 came after he holed a clutch six-foot putt that deadlocked him with Heard at 270. In the sudden death playoff, Menne hit a good drive on the par-5 15th hole and then a “shaky four-wood” second shot. His wedge approach shot ended up 25-feet short of the pin. Heard’s approach finished five feet closer to the pin than Menne’s.
Menne read the double breaking long putt, assumed his stance, and stroked the ball.
“I thought I had missed it,” he admitted after the round. “But when I saw it turning back to the left, I took hope. Then—Draino!”
Holding the $50,000 check along with a new lease on his career, Menne was overjoyed.
"This makes life worthwhile,” he said. “I’ve been dreaming about this moment since I was a little kid. I’m just thrilled to death. It’s unbelievable, unbelievable.”
Jerry Heard was philosophical after the playoff. “I feel everything worked out for the best,” he said. “Bob needed the money and I picked up a good check. It wasn’t like losing to Nicklaus or Trevino, who have more money than they’ll ever spend.” Heard pushed his earning for the year to over $90,000.
Besides the $50,000 check, Menne earned some other perks that would make life on tour easier; he would no longer have to Monday qualify, and he gained invitations to the Masters and the Tournament of Champions. Quite the turnaround to a week that started with his car crapping out leaving him with nothing more than gas money to get to the next stop and his wife cooking up hamburgers in his motel room.
Bob Menne (r) and his wife, Kathy (l) pose with the $50,000 first-place check from the 1974 Kemper Open (photo credit: UPI Telephoto)
Check out the bonus story below about the controversies at the 1974 Kemper Open
This week’s playlist is all about 1974. Listen HERE.
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Larry Baush
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Tour Backspin Quiz | 1974 PGA Tour Trivia
How many first time winners were there on the 1974 PGA TOUR?
Answer below
Bonus Story
At times, the pros were not playing nice in the Kemper Open with two controversies occurring over the weekend. In the first, J.C. Snead was critical of Lee Trevino and Jerry Heard for their deportment during Saturday’s third round. Trevino and Heard were playing in the group behind Snead.
“They were both playing well and when you play well, you can be a little looser,” he explained. “They didn’t bother me as much as they did Chi Chi Rodriguez.”
A reporter asked Heard what the two players did to incur his wrath.
“Oh, telling jokes, getting loud laughter from the galleries . . . fun and games type of things,” Heard said. “It broke our concentration. When we were over putts, we kept wondering if things would break loose back there when we were in our backstroke.”
In the second controversary, John Mahaffey had a bad lie in the rough and didn’t think he could advance the ball very far, so he hit his shot before the green had cleared of the group in front of him. He was amazed when he made great contact and then watched as the ball soared towards the green before bouncing up onto the putting surface.
The group of Dan Sikes, Bob Zender, and Monty Kaser were surprised as well and looked back down the fairway at Mahaffey before resuming putting. Both Sikes and Kaser then missed short putts. Sikes walked over to Mahaffey’s ball and made a show of bending down and looking at it before seemingly contemplating knocking the ball back down the fairway.
Mahaffey later apologized to all three players in the group.
Blind Shot
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Tour Backspin Quiz Answer:
Ten. In chronological order: Leonard Thompson (Jackie Gleason-Inverrary Classic), Lee Elder (Monsanto Open), Rod Curl (Colonial National Invitational), Bob Menne (Kemper Open), Tom Watson (Western Open), Richie Karl (B.C. Open), Victor Regalado (Pleasant Valley Classic), Forrest Fezler (Southern Open), Terry Diehl (San Antonio Texas Open), and Mac McLendon (Walt Disney World National Team Championship).
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