Jeff Sluman - Part 1 (The Early Years)

Intro Music 0:07

Straight down the middle. It went straight down the middle. Then it started to be able to get the biggest.

Mike Gonzalez 0:15

Welcome to another edition of FORE the Good of the Game at Bruce Devlin. A couple of hints for our uh listeners today. Uh, in this guest's honor, I'm wearing a couple of items. One is my CDGA shirt, and the other is a Western Golf Association belt. That's a little bit of a clue of you know where this fella spent a little bit of time. Yeah, he spent a little bit of time on the golf course as well.

Bruce Devlin 0:41

Uh 16 victories around the world. Uh excuse me, 18 victories around the world. Gee, Jeff, I left two off. Uh 88.

Jeff Sluman 0:52

I don't know which ones you left off.

Bruce Devlin 0:55

PGA champion uh Jeff Sluman, it is a pleasure to have you, sir, this morning. We look forward to uh listening to how you grew up and who helped you in the game. And uh great having you with us.

Jeff Sluman 1:11

Yeah, thanks, Bruce and Michael. I'm looking forward to this, and uh, you know, it's uh it's been a hell of a run for me. Um I started when I was four years old in uh in my backyard with uh USAP. My parents were from Canada, yeah, so I'm actually a first-generation American. I immigrated. My father came over from uh Toronto when he was 20 and worked for Eastman Kodak, which was uh big employer in Rochester, New York, where I grew up.

Mike Gonzalez 1:44

Yeah.

Jeff Sluman 1:45

Uh him and 67,000 other employees in Rochester at that time. Isn't that amazing?

Mike Gonzalez 1:51

Amazing. That's incredible.

Jeff Sluman 1:54

So uh he came over and then sent for my mother. It was just, I think, just after the war, just right at the end of the war, World War II. And uh off they started, you know, and then he worked shift work at Kodak. So uh that basically means that machines were running 24-7, so somebody had to be be there all the time. So his work week might start on Friday at midnight and uh go Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday on on that, and then shift to four to twelve, and then eight to four. So it's a crazy work schedule. He he worked hard and you know my hat's off to my late father because uh without his hard work, I'm sure I I probably wouldn't be here.

Mike Gonzalez 2:39

Yeah, yeah. Well, uh we're gonna enjoy getting to know a little bit about uh you, as Bruce said, just growing up learning the game. And uh, as you probably know by now, as we tell these life stories, we always do start at the very beginning. Of course, my uh introduction, I was alluding to the fact that you'd spent a lot of your adult life in the Chicagoland area, right? Uh where I uh had spent about 30 years of my own adult life, and so we've got a lot of things in common. Same vintage, pretty much. Uh, I'm just a couple years older than you, so I'm sure we shared a lot of the same Chicago experiences. But before we get to that, let's get back to growing up up there. You know, I I thought I heard a little Chicago in your accent. Maybe it's a little bit of Canada. I don't know.

Jeff Sluman 3:24

I can kind of go in between there, and I went to school in the south. I can throw some y'alls at you, so I got I got a few accents I can I can't do the Aussie one uh very well, but uh you can um no, not not I can drink the Aussie wine. That's that's uh that's not a bad thing. But uh yeah, I started when I was four years old, as I said uh previously. My I was the youngest of three, two older brothers, and they were five and six and a half years older. And um my parents, they self-taught when they came over to the States. They had never hit a golf ball in their life. So uh we had a kind of a big backyard at the time um in Greece, New York, which is a suburb of Rochester. And uh I started left-handed, Bruce. How about that?

Bruce Devlin 4:16

Yeah, isn't that amazing? A lot you know, you see a lot of people doing it.

Jeff Sluman 4:20

Turn the club upside down and yeah, it was kind of a crazy way to start, I guess. And uh we couldn't afford left-handed clubs, so my older brothers they said you gotta learn how to play right-handed, or you're not gonna be able to play.

Mike Gonzalez 4:38

They weren't as easy to find either. And and of course, uh Bruce knows uh his good buddy from Australia, David Graham started that way. He started as a left-hander, same way.

Jeff Sluman 4:47

Yeah, so not yeah, not that I played much uh uh in many other sports, but baseball I hit left-handed and hockey was left-handed. Um I wrote right-handed, so I did a little bit of I wouldn't say I'm ambidextrious, but I I did do some things left-handed and some things the other way.

Mike Gonzalez 5:07

How about uh bowling?

Jeff Sluman 5:09

Bowling was right-handed, that's for sure. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 5:12

Interesting. Isn't that funny? So uh Yeah, because you were quite a bowler as a kid, too.

Jeff Sluman 5:20

That was probably the sport, if you consider bowling a sport, I don't know, uh, or uh activity, but that was the one I was actually really good at, and probably honestly at 19 years old could have gone on the bowling tour. But I'm pretty sure I made the right decision.

Mike Gonzalez 5:38

Well, my guess is hearing that, uh right-handed, left-handed, you had to have great hand-eye coordination. Um I'm suspecting that you were good at other games like ping pong, darts, lawn jarts, pool, those kind of things, yeah?

Jeff Sluman 5:55

All of all of those things were right up, use the bowling phrase, right up my alley.

Mike Gonzalez 6:03

Yeah. I mean that that that comes as no surprise. So, I mean, in addition to your athletic uh skills, just what comes from that hand-eye coordination and being good at a variety of other things like that, uh the sports of kids.

Jeff Sluman 6:17

Yeah. We had a little pool table in our basement. Um, it was a bar room table, so it learned how to play that, and we had a dart board in there and and all that stuff, and I learned how to uh, you know, it was it was a fun, you know, I look back on it, and it was it was great as I got, you know, eight, ten years old, and and I was down there all the time shooting pool and darts. Uh my brothers were there, they were 15 or 16, and they bring their friends over, and we actually play for money. And if I lost, I had to pay. So, I mean, you you you get a sharp edge early on in life. Yeah. I mean, a dollar back then was a lot of money, and I'm I mean, I was grinding on everything. So I think that, you know, you you really look back on it, and it was probably pretty helpful to stay focused and uh try and remain calm when you know the shot was on the line.

Bruce Devlin 7:11

You did have a job back then though, didn't you?

Jeff Sluman 7:16

Back then, what kind of well, my first job, I think, honestly, was at the bowling alley.

Bruce Devlin 7:22

Yeah. I mean, when you were betting with your brothers.

Jeff Sluman 7:27

Oh, yeah, yeah. They uh and they didn't let me off, you know. I mean, it was kind of one of those things if my father said, if you're gonna gamble, be prepared to lose.

Mike Gonzalez 7:36

So well, the bowling alley thing sounds familiar. I had a uh friend of mine who helped run the family bowling alley in the little town I grew up in in Illinois, and we spent many a Friday and Saturday nights uh with a case of beer uh in the back room sitting behind the, you know, where the pins set, right?

Jeff Sluman 7:53

Yep. I did every job at the bowling alley except uh probably short order cook at uh Dewey Garden Lanes in Greece, New York. There you go. I pin set, I did the front, I did the bartending, I that was did the the cleanup, I oiled the lanes, I did it all. So it was it was uh it was fun.

Mike Gonzalez 8:16

Yeah, I just would have guessed that uh spending the time you spent at the bowling alley, perhaps you hung out at the pool hall, but you really didn't have to because you had one in your basement.

Jeff Sluman 8:24

Exactly.

Mike Gonzalez 8:26

Tell us more about golf uh growing up. You say four years old, you kind of got a club in your hand. When did you really uh kind of really take to the game? Was it at that early age or was it a little later?

Jeff Sluman 8:36

Yeah, for pretty much. Uh right away, uh, you know, we really didn't have any means at the time. And the first golf course we were able to join, or my parents joined, was uh was a long drive, probably close to an hour, and it was I get this fifty dollars for a family membership.

Mike Gonzalez 8:57

Oh boy.

Jeff Sluman 8:58

So we weren't over on the Oak Hill side in the Country Club of Rochester, we were on the other side. Yeah, but you know what? It worked, it didn't matter, and I and they they let me play, and I I became pretty proficient very quickly. Uh I broke broke 80 when I was 10 years old, which wasn't bad back then. That type of equipment and that. And uh uh, you know, well well, you don't know, but um my brothers, as I said, were five and six years older. So my parents said, hey, we're going to it was called Oak Orchard, and it was the first one that we were members at. And um basically, what am I gonna do? I'm five or six years old. I'm I'm going with them, right?

Mike Gonzalez 9:46

You're coming along.

Jeff Sluman 9:47

I'm coming along, and they'd go out and play, and you know, and I'd they'd let me play a few holes at a time at the start when I was five, six years old. And then, like I said, I became you know pretty proficient early. And um I played that we always call it the back three, Bruce, because 16, 17, and 18 were a little loop around the clubhouse. And yeah, my parents would get done, they'd get done and they'd say, All right, Jeffrey, let's let's go play three holes, let's go play the loop. You know, so I was all excited because while they were playing, I was just putting and chipping on the on the little pubbing green. So I mean, I was I was raring to go, but that this was fun for me. I I they didn't force me to go, uh, although obviously I was gonna go. They're not gonna leave a five, six, seven-year-old home alone. But yeah, I mean, I I never turned on the opportunity.

Mike Gonzalez 10:40

You answered one of my questions, nine or eighteen.

Jeff Sluman 10:44

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 10:45

Um it was an 18-hole track, huh?

Jeff Sluman 10:47

It was an 18-hole track, yeah. Um it was it was fun, and it was a golf course that was counterclockwise, Bruce. So you better learn to kind of hit a cut because a little uh little pull hook is Oscar Brown on the left on probably 14 of the holes. Really? So uh if you played there and grew up there, you you learned how to how to have a little fade.

Intro Music 11:13

Yeah.

Jeff Sluman 11:14

Yep. The hookers didn't last too long.

Mike Gonzalez 11:20

Did you guys always walk, or were you carton it back then, or what?

Jeff Sluman 11:24

Um I think I always walked. The occasional time. And you know what? The carts they only had three wheels at the time. Remember those? Right. And they had the the Cushman and he had the the the one uh steering wheel in the front. Exactly. I mean, those were super dangerous, though. They would flip in a second if you weren't if you weren't careful.

Mike Gonzalez 11:48

So speaking of dangerous, our last guest, uh, Jeff, was you may know Dennis Walters.

Jeff Sluman 11:53

I sure do.

Mike Gonzalez 11:54

And we talked about that that very thing. He was in a three-wheel Cushman going downhill, and and uh I rolled one of those as a kid. I know how easy it was. Uh, of course, we didn't understand physics as as well back when we were younger, but uh those are a little treacherous to handle sometimes.

Jeff Sluman 12:11

They sure were. And uh even nowadays you get on wet surfaces or wet grass and the slopes a little much, and you you know, you're aware of it now, but you can get yourself stuck in an interesting situation very quickly if you're not paying attention.

Mike Gonzalez 12:28

So, how old were you when you had your first shag bag?

Jeff Sluman 12:33

Good question. I would say probably my brother had one when he was 15, because he was a really good player and still is, very talented, probably honestly a better player than me, more talent, but um he didn't he didn't want to I shouldn't say he didn't want to, but he didn't want to grind as much as me, and then you know he had other interests in life, and he you know he still shoots his age all the time right now at Oak Hill and uh probably shoots his age two, three times a week. He's 70 well he's 72 now. Yeah. So he's a heck of a player. 71. I don't want to age him too much. He's 71.

Mike Gonzalez 13:19

So uh Shagbag uh had to pick your own balls up as a kid?

Jeff Sluman 13:24

Sure did. You'd hit them, pick them up, and count them, right? You want to know if you lost any or how many you might have lost.

Mike Gonzalez 13:32

I remember that.

Jeff Sluman 13:33

Find them, and uh this was an interesting story. My brother was and the rules of golf is have changed, but this was you know back way back when the 17th hole at this golf course that we we learned on it was a kind of a sharp dog leg over the trees, and you laid it up to the right, and that was where if you had a shag bag, you could hit some balls. And uh my brother lost his ball, and my father said, Well, it's a lost ball. And this real good player at the club, his name was Joey Salvatore. I don't know why I remember certain things in life, you know, Bruce and Michael, it's just crazy. But um my brother sees him and he's got a shag bag and off and away he goes. And my brother says, I I know that he picked my ball up because it was over there. My father said, Hey, it's a lost ball. That's it. And he was so mad because he was underpower, and sure enough, Joey picked up um he picked it up. But the rules of golf now say that you know, if it's I forgot the terminology that the USGA uses it, uh a near certainty, something like that, that somebody picked it up, you can put the ball down. So but that was not the rules of golf back then.

Mike Gonzalez 14:48

Yeah, it used to be rule one-4. I think the equity rule would somehow cover that, maybe, huh? I'm pretty sure.

Bruce Devlin 14:56

So, Jeff, tell tell us about the first golf clubs that you had. Did did dad buy them for you? Or how did it uh how did you get the first set?

Jeff Sluman 15:06

Yeah, they were used, and I'm pretty sure. Now here's another story. Um he bought them at a department store in Rochester called Gem, G-E-M. I don't know what it stood for. It was a kind of a they had a sporting goods section, and um how the world goes around. He bought them from Charlie Hart, Dudley Hart's dad.

Bruce Devlin 15:31

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 15:33

Interesting.

Jeff Sluman 15:34

Chuck was a a salesman at the time there, and he he bought them from Chuck. And unfortunately, I think last week, week and a half ago, Chuck passed away. Dudley's dad, and uh he was my partner for a while when I was involved with the golf course in Rochester that we we Dudley and Chuck and I were third partners, but uh so my dad bought them from Chuck. My brothers used them, and then you know, they kind of handed them down to me. I had I don't know, I had a uh a wooden driver at the time, obviously. Uh metalwoods weren't in vogue yet or or invented, but it was a big red wooden driver head that I would hit, and um, you know, it wasn't anything special. They cut down a I remember, and I still had the putter. It's a Croydon. I don't even know if you ever heard of that.

Mike Gonzalez 16:30

Oh, yeah, I have. It's come up before on the podcast with somebody.

Jeff Sluman 16:33

And it's uh it was just a little like lit mini mallet putter. And they just cut it and put tape around the the uh where the grip was cut and gave it to me, and um that was the putter I used for a long, long time.

Bruce Devlin 16:49

How about the make of the irons?

Jeff Sluman 16:52

Yeah, I'm not one to keep a lot of things, but I've kept that putter throughout the years and all the moves we've made and and that. But uh and you were saying about the irons?

Bruce Devlin 17:04

Yeah. What make were the ideas?

Jeff Sluman 17:06

I have no idea.

Bruce Devlin 17:09

They just were irons.

Jeff Sluman 17:12

They were just they were obviously back then probably forged and and that. Um idea.

Mike Gonzalez 17:22

No idea. You remember getting your first new full set?

Jeff Sluman 17:27

Yeah, I think that was probably somewhere in my mid-teens. I think it was uh Wilson Staffs. My father loved Wilson Staff, and they had a pretty nice golf ball at the time, but really they made a beautiful set of blades.

Mike Gonzalez 17:43

They sure did.

Jeff Sluman 17:44

And uh I had those for for quite some time, and then uh I went on and off of those. And I actually went back, I used there was a great amateur, and he was the pro at the country club of Rochester, Sam Rosetta. He won the U.S. amateur back in the late 40s, early 50s, and then Sam came back and was the, like I said, the pro at um Country Club of Rochester, and he gave me his Wilson staff 71 bullet back irons, and they were awesome. And that's what I actually used to win the PGA in 1988.

Mike Gonzalez 18:20

Is that right? Yeah. So who taught you the finer points of the game early on?

Jeff Sluman 18:27

Um just like every kid, Bruce and and Mike, you kind of mimic who you're around. Um and my brother and father were good players. My brother was, like I said, I mean, he was scratch handicapped and early on, and my father got down to be about a one or a two handicapped. So, you know, you'd you'd watch them and see how they went about and kind of learn really from from them. And you know, you chip and putt all day around the around the greens. So you I I would think most kids are pretty sharp around the greens because they spend a lot of time there. It's uh as as you become older and more grizzled and on the tour for a long time, I think the pitching and chipping around the greens very boring. You know, you get more into hitting the ball on on the range and hitting beautiful shaped shots and how far I can hit it. Uh, but I think as a kid you get it's not boring, and it's a lot of fun to do a lot of chipping and putting and pitching. And I I think generally speaking, you're probably sharper at that age than any age you've you've been. You there's no there's no scar tissue, there's no fear.

Bruce Devlin 19:41

That's right. No fear, I think, is the main thing.

Jeff Sluman 19:44

Yeah.

Bruce Devlin 19:45

I understand uh Jeff, when you were 11, you got to go to the um 68 U.S. Open Championship at Oak Hill.

Jeff Sluman 19:54

Yeah, it was 1968. Uh I hadn't, yeah, I was I hadn't quite turned 11. I'm a September baby, so I was almost 11, and my dad said my dad says, we're going to the US Open. I said, okay. And he loved, I mean, loved Arnold Palmer. As everybody did, right?

Bruce Devlin 20:14

Yeah, absolutely.

Jeff Sluman 20:15

You uh I loved to pick your mind, Bruce, on being around Arnold kind of in his prime. He had to be he had to be, he was so dynamic. And I was really never around him except one time, and I will we'll go into that later on, where I had maybe the greatest experience in my golf was with Arnold Palmer. Uh almost including winning the PGA. It was really cool. But um, that's for a little later on. But we parked on the West Golf Course of Oak Hill, and the there's the East is the championship golf course. The West is in and of itself as good a golf course as the east, but they didn't have room to lengthen T's and all that. So we parked, we parked on on the West course, and I got out, and I my eyeballs were like, Whoa! I said, Dad, these fairways are better than the greens we play on. I mean, it was amazing. I had never seen anything like it in my life. Right? So we get out, and you, you know, my father just, yeah, this is a real golf course, son, and uh this is the way it's meant to be played. And oh, we went out and I followed Di Vincenzo and uh George Archer. He was uh, I think George had the white putter at the time. He maybe painted it white. Um we saw Arnold a little bit, and uh so we followed him in in the practice rounds, and we didn't go to the actual tournament. I don't know, it was it was just a Tuesday or a Wednesday for the practice round, but the atmosphere and the the the stage and the the the aura around it was you know breathtaking for a ten year old, and you really didn't see much golf at that time on on television. Maybe maybe you'd see two or three holes. Was that about all at televised golf at the time?

Bruce Devlin 22:05

Yeah, I think so.

Jeff Sluman 22:08

There was wasn't much more. They certainly didn't go nine holes or anything.

Mike Gonzalez 22:12

So um Yeah, generally they they would show uh Bruce, correct me if I'm wrong, back in the sixties, uh 15 through 18 is generally about all you saw, wasn't it?

Bruce Devlin 22:21

Yeah, I think at Oak Hill they started with the uh short par four and then uh then went uh that would be what 14, 15, 16, 14, up the hill. That Jeff Sluman could carry it on the ground.

Jeff Sluman 22:40

They they they do it now, and it's crazy. But I remember remember Hogan said Hogan said if you don't if you can't drive it here, you don't deserve to win the US Open. You know. But uh it was pretty tight. So I have a question for you guys, uh golf. Um 1968, final uh final day. Bert Yancey's in the lead. Is that I'm pretty sure I'm correct. Yancey was leading uh uh after in second, and I think Jack was either third or fourth, right?

Bruce Devlin 23:17

Yeah, I think you're right.

Jeff Sluman 23:18

Um who played in the last group? Who was the last group off?

Mike Gonzalez 23:24

The last group off probably uh well wait a minute. Which day? Sunday.

Bruce Devlin 23:30

Sunday last day.

Mike Gonzalez 23:32

Sunday. In 1968. Huh? At Oakel. Well, I know it wasn't Bruce Dublin because he finished T9.

Jeff Sluman 23:43

Yeah, you had a nice week.

Mike Gonzalez 23:45

Yeah, he was he was T3 at the halfway mark. What happened, Bruce? Ah, well, yeah. Thanks for having me a lot.

Jeff Sluman 23:53

I didn't know I thought Bruce, I thought Bruce, I thought Bruce might know this, but it was Arnold Palmer. Yeah, I was gonna guess Arnie, but uh they were the USGA was so concerned about ratings, and they Bert Yancey, and there was this unknown guy named Lee Trevino that they asked Arnold if he would go in back of them so that the crowd would stay. Isn't that crazy?

Mike Gonzalez 24:20

Yeah, just well Bruce, uh uh uh back in the day again, back in the 60s, it wasn't necessarily the two leaders went in the last group, and the next two in the last group a little bit, wasn't it?

Bruce Devlin 24:33

Used to be one, three, five, two, four, six.

Mike Gonzalez 24:37

Yeah.

Jeff Sluman 24:38

But Arnold was like in the middle of the pack, but they just wanted him, they wanted him in the in the last slot. I I find that kind of amazing, really.

Mike Gonzalez 24:49

Yeah, and if you know, if people had not heard of Lee Trevino, uh boy, that put him on the map, didn't it?

Jeff Sluman 24:55

His first major there at uh well yeah, and and and interestingly enough, Trevino uh finished, I think, fifth the year before at Baltashral in '67 when Jack won. So you know, uh, I I guess if you look back historically, it it wasn't a complete surprise. Shock.

Bruce Devlin 25:14

Yeah, that's right.

Jeff Sluman 25:15

But his uh his his uh swing and his action was uh much different than anybody I think the golfing purists had ever seen at that time, and they were uh probably a little aghast thinking he's gonna fold, but man, that that swing the way he you know drove his leg and kind of opened up and pushed it down the line was very repeatable.

Mike Gonzalez 25:38

Yeah. Well, I think Trevina will say that it was that 67 open that really gave him his start. He qualified. Uh that was the one at Baltash. Nicholas won that one as well as the one in 80. And I think in 1967 I brought Dennis Walters up earlier, but uh Dennis actually caddied for Johnny Pott in that 1967 U.S. Open at Baltashroll.

Jeff Sluman 26:00

Johnny Pott, what a nice man he was. Got to meet him a few times uh later on when uh I was with the landmark group out in La Quinta.

Bruce Devlin 26:12

Uh.

Jeff Sluman 26:12

And he was with uh Ernie Vossler and Joe Walzer and the guy. So very nice man. Ernie ended up marrying uh Marlene Hagee later on in life. That's right, that's right.

Bruce Devlin 26:27

Let's go back to your um early days as an amateur, uh Jeff, when you started to play in competition.

Jeff Sluman 26:37

I remember my first tournament was I was ten years old, and my I mean it was a sleepless night for me. I was so excited, and I was gonna go out for it was a one-day event at Happy Acres. I don't even know if it still exists in Rochester. And uh uh it was just like I said, a one-day thing. And I think it got rained out, which was devastating for me. I mean, I was so wired, and well, you know, even at 10, I kind of felt like let's see what I got compared to other kids. You you don't really know until you until you tee it up. So then I think we came back a couple weeks later and and played it on a makeup date. And uh so that was the first non-like club tournament I'd ever played as a junior. So that kind of started started me down that road. And uh Rochester was a very booming kind of golf town. Um a lot of golf courses, a lot of Donald Ross courses, a lot of public and semi-private facilities. So um in that Rochester District Golf Association, there was a lot of clubs, so uh really kind of started to play more when I was about 13. And I did end up winning the district sub junior championship when I was 13 years old.

Mike Gonzalez 28:00

Yeah, so uh that was at Durand Eastman. I assume the Eastman name kind of comes from the Eastman family of Kodak.

Jeff Sluman 28:08

Yeah, it was George Eastman, you know, he never married. He was uh in love with a lady named Molly Durand, and it's I think it was Robert Trent Jones' first golf course he ever built. So they were gonna have their like summer home on this, and he had the golf course built, and he had the Eastman house on uh East Avenue, and you know, he was he was big time, he was probably one of the more wealthy guys in the country at that time. And uh he built Molly a house right next to his house on East Avenue, and they had it all planned out, and then uh I don't know what happened, but they never got married. And then he gave all that land to the uh public park. So it was a public golf course. Hilly, uh you could probably do something crazy fun with it, you know, if you could get your hands on it now. And I'm I'm sure it's uh but it would I remember it being a very, very hilly golf course, and it was right on Lake Ontario, although you you only saw it from a few holes. But uh quite a quite a golf course. I was I'll never forget my brother showed up and I was three down with three to go against Jay Lumpkin. Jack Lumpkin, who was the pro at Oakill at the time, uh his son. And then I won 16, 17, and 18, and then won in the first uh playoff hole against Jay, and then um I guess I could say I cruised to the win after that, yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 29:48

Well, as uh probably a senior in high school at uh at Greece Arcadia High School, you you qualified for the U.S. junior.

Jeff Sluman 29:58

I did. I didn't even know these tournaments existed. Somebody I ran across at a um one of the district events, and you know, you got to know some of the kids from other clubs, and they said, Are you gonna try it for the uh you know U.S. Junior? And I I said, What? What is that? You know, oh you gotta put your entry in and you know mail it in. I didn't know that tournament existed. I didn't know the U.S. Amateur existed. So, you know, I sent my entries in, and um from there it was uh, you know, I did qualify, I went to uh Richland, which is not in existence anymore in in Nashville.

Mike Gonzalez 30:40

Nashville, yeah.

Jeff Sluman 30:42

They sold the original Richland and put a shopping center or big something in there, and then Jack came in and built the new Richland uh elsewhere in in Nashville. So I don't know if that's progress, but that's what happened.

Mike Gonzalez 30:57

Well, we've had some interesting uh recollections from a lot of our guests. Uh, you know, as you progress through junior golf, you first match yourself up against the local kids, like when you're 10. Then at some point you expand a little regionally or within the state, and then now here you're on a national platform, getting to really see how your game matches up against uh uh a much broader group of golfers from you know, the kids that grew up playing golf every day, all day, like in Florida and California. Whole different deal, wasn't it?

Jeff Sluman 31:30

It really was. And and uh I got down there and I I met this guy named Bob Tway. And I I looked and I said, I think Bob was about a year, year and a half younger than me, and he hit the ball great, and you know, he was a big, tall, strapping, strapping kid, and as as nice a kid as you'd ever want to meet, and we've become you know very good friends throughout the years now, and of course his son Kevin's out on the tour. Um but um the the people you met and that have become lifelong friends, it's it's really amazing that what this game really can do for you, you know, and and then you go home and just like you know, I make the analogy that you hear, although sometimes the US or a first-time Ryder Cup player didn't fare as well as he thought, he becomes a better player because of that. Yeah, and same with expanding your horizon. Now you play with Bob Tway and I saw David Abel and all these guys, and uh, you know, and and I was always I don't know whether it was intuitive or not, but I always looked at what they did and how they did it, and you know, tried to learn from stuff like that, even in anything I tried to do. And uh so I think it really does pay a lot of dividends to to have that experience. But that was only once a year. Now you look at these young kids, yeah, and they're on they're virtually, Bruce, they're virtually on tour now. They're ready, they're ready. That's why they're so ready to play once they get out there.

Mike Gonzalez 33:08

Thank you for listening to another episode of For the Good of the Game. And please, wherever you listen to your podcast on Apple and Spotify, if you like what you hear, please subscribe, spread the word, and tell your friends until we tee it up again for the good of the game. So long, everybody.

Intro Music 33:32

It went smack down the fairway. When it's mid down the middle five away.