Jeff Sluman - Part 3 (1988 PGA Championship)

Intro Music 0:07

Straight down the middle. It went straight down the middle.

Mike Gonzalez 0:13

Then it started to come out of the box in 1988. First PGA tour win just happens to be a major championship. This is the PGA Championship at Oak Tree Golf Club, where you won by three over Mr. Zinger with ground 6970, 68, and then you throw a little 65 at him on Sunday.

Jeff Sluman 0:40

Yes, I did. And I've never really said this, but honest to goodness, had I putted good on Sunday, I might have shot 60. I hit it so close. I didn't miss a shot. I I hit two or three shots within two feet. I hold a sand wedge on six for Eagle. I mean, it was honestly, it was a stripe show, just nonstop. Right at it. Boom, boom, boom. Right at it. And I've been playing well for a long time at that point. And to me, my mindset was it's only a matter of time before I win. And I liked Pete Dye golf courses. You know, they kind of trick you with his eye and was very target-oriented and kind of was right up my alley, you know, drive it really good. I had played well the year before at the players and lost in a playoff there, you know, at the uh in Jacksonville, which is obviously another Pete Dye uh golf course. So I felt very comfortable on the golf course. And just, man, I went out and from what I understand um and I've done it two or three times. I think I led the week in fairways and greens hit. So if you're on a difficult golf course, a US or Open or a PGA venue, and you do that, you should have a chance with nine holes to go to win. Unless you've just made a mess of the few holes that you, you know, drove poorly on or did something very, you know, strange, made a big number, but um that's that's a pretty good key if you want to play good golf and and you know big time tournaments that are set up difficult-wise. Uh lead and fairways and greens hit.

Mike Gonzalez 2:39

So do you think Sunday would have been different had you been sleeping on the lead that Saturday night?

Jeff Sluman 2:45

Probably. I I was I was really, really mad. There were two things that kind of frustrated me. I had thought I had played well enough in losing the players on a in a stack field and uh in a playoff the year prior in in 87, and all of a sudden here I am again, and I've been playing well all year. I I kicked it away at the Byron Nelson earlier in the year in '88. So I get it up and down on 18 on Saturday to play in the second-last group with Faldo, which was great for me. Yeah. Because there's going to be no talking. You know, he's all business, I'm all business. Um, you're you're you're not gonna be playing with a buddy or a guy that's you know, one of those guys. You just this is it. So I'm watching the uh local news, and they said, well, this is Aisinger's to win or lose. He's playing with Dave Rummels, and Faldo's in fourth, and somebody else is in fifth, and they entirely skipped over me in third place. I was like, really? This is this is what they're you know. I mean, I was just I was pissed off. They get no respect. I don't know whether, you know, I was like, God, I hope I get a chance to show these, show them, right? Yeah. So, anyways, that's I don't know whether that was the impetus to get me over the top, but yeah, yeah. Sure, nice. I got up on you know, and and to me, I was always kind of told, you know, really take that first t-shot and then and go up there, don't rush that, be ready. But you know, this is an important way to to start your day. And I ripped it down the middle and hit it in there about eight feet and missed it, and then the next hole I smashed it down the middle, I hit it in there six inches, tap in, you know, next hole down the middle, close. So, I mean, it wasn't it was it was like, wow, I am spot on again today.

Bruce Devlin 5:01

This is you know, total total focus. So, yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 5:07

Yeah, well, as as the round progresses, uh, are you are you playing with Aisinger? You're playing with Faldo. I'm playing with Faldo. So you're you know, uh I think you I think you're four back of Azinger, maybe, uh, or three back probably. Three back. Three back. And and uh uh uh I don't know, does Azinger come out and and bogey the first hole? No, you sorry, birdied the first hole, so now you're four back. Um and then the next thing you know, you get to five, you throw a little eagle at them, and uh now it's all tied up after five. Is that when you thought about yeah, maybe this is not really uh honestly, I didn't.

Jeff Sluman 5:49

I mean, you intuitively know that you're in the game. I mean, there's only two guys ahead of you. I think I'm three under after five, and then make another birdie somewhere hit a close, and well, of course I gotta be you know near the lead because you're not hearing any roars in back of you. So um, but um until I think the 12th hole, I kind of was compartmentalizing it and not looking at any leaderboards. But you're going, I I hit it in there uh again, I think on 12 I hit it in there for a tap-in. And I'm walking to the 13th T and I hear, well, he's got the lead. You know, I mean, well, he of course he's got the lead by two or something like that. I, you know, so I knew I was obviously right there. And uh from there you just try and keep keep the pedal to the metal and do what you're doing that you got to that point. Um and I would ask Bruce this question, and it's always it's always been uh and I don't know if there's really an answer, when when you do it and you win a tournament and perform under the biggest pressure, and you say it wasn't that hard. And then when you kick a few away and hit some errant shots or make a mental mistake, you wonder how you ever did it to win. And I I think that's the yin and the yang, right? And and I don't know if there's a right answer or not, but it it sure seems easy when you do it, and then other times it's it's like impossible to think that you'll ever gonna win again.

Bruce Devlin 7:42

I don't know if there's a I think you're right. I don't think there's a real answer to it, to be honest with you.

Jeff Sluman 7:50

Yeah, is it is it comfort? Is it is there one key shot that gets you over that hurdle? I I don't know. But uh, you know, I just I stayed focused mentally, I stayed, I didn't try and get ahead of myself. Like, what am I gonna say? Is my acceptance speech? I've done that a few times, and then you look up the board and you're you're sitting in fourth. You know, the acceptance speech is you know you get me to the airport quick.

Mike Gonzalez 8:18

Yeah. Well, you you tied David, we mentioned David Graham before, you tied David Graham's record for lowest final round score by a winner of a PGA championship with that 65. I would have loved to have seen a 60, by the way. That would have been pretty cool. Um invariably, these leaderboards back in this day featured a lot of great, great golfers. And in this case, that leaderboard featured uh in the top 10 six World Golf Hall of Famers or to be World Golf Hall of Famers. Um, I understand you had a nice note of congratulations from Jack Nicholas that somehow I lost.

Jeff Sluman 8:55

Somehow you lost. Yeah. So Jack wrote a he was doing uh television for ABC. And on a side note, this is funny stuff. Um, Jerry Pate followed our group.

Mike Gonzalez 9:11

Oh my.

Jeff Sluman 9:11

And he was doing the hole by hole, and I did watch, and I've only watched it once or twice, the the replay of me winning the tournament. And Jerry got every club I was hitting in wrong. Every one of them. It was unbelievable. So I came up to him, I came up to Jerry a few weeks later, and I said, Jerry, I watched that, and you know, you got every club wrong. As a matter of fact, when I was I was going for the green with a three-iron on 16, you said I was laying up. I said, What gives? He said, Ah, nobody cares about that. So, you know, later on, later on, as I uh as I got out on tour and I knew Chuck Will and Frank from Trikanium from CBS, Chuck was adamant. You don't say the club unless you know it. He said, the last thing we at CBS want to do, this was their one of their golden rules, is we don't want to say seven iron to the public, and the guy's hitting an eight because you're guessing, and he makes it and he goes into the press room and says, I hit an eight iron when the world thinks we reported a seven. He says, 'You have to be on the ball. Now Jerry's like, who cares?' I mean, it's kind of funny.

Mike Gonzalez 10:31

Yeah.

Jeff Sluman 10:31

Maybe that's why Jerry didn't work for CBS.

Mike Gonzalez 10:34

That sounds like Jerry. I thought you were going to tell me that uh your caddy was missing a finger or something.

Jeff Sluman 10:40

No. So getting back to the Jack thing, you know, it's kind of overwhelming, and um, and everything. I read the note and put it in my locker, and somehow I lost the note. So this was pretty important to me. This is the greatest player of all time writing a a note on the quality of my play, yeah, and and everything. So I saw him a week later, though, the next week at uh International, because he designed it, the golf course for Jack Vickers and that, and uh Jack's out there. And I said, uh, uh, Mr. Nicholas, is there a chance? I said, I really appreciate the note. Would you write me another? Is there a chance? Is there a chance you could rewrite it? And he kind of looked at me and okay, you know, and he wrote another note, and I've got it in I've got it in my archives, and Arnold wrote wrote a nice, beautiful note to me. And uh I'm not a guy that keeps a lot of things, but I kept those. I kept notes from Byron Nelson and Arnold and Jack. Um just again, I always go back to who'd have thought that could happen to a kid from Greece, New York.

Mike Gonzalez 11:54

Yeah. Well, uh, so you win the you you you you your breakthrough, you win the 1988 PG Championship. Um, you're walking off that green, and the last thing you were thinking about was I was gonna have to wait another nine years to do this again. Uh so how did it change your life, first of all? And then let's talk about those intervening nine years before you then got you kind of got on the winning track for a while at a fairly uh uh old age, you know, and uh by today's standards.

Jeff Sluman 12:28

I don't think it really changed my life. It it gave some order to it. Winning a major at that time was a ten year exemption on a PGA tour. Yeah, I mean that was the big thing. I had I could plan my life uh for the future what I was gonna do. Um besides that, golf ball doesn't know you're a major champion. Correct. You know, every week we start out even. So, you know, to me, uh, and I've talked to other guys that that's happened to winning a major, uh, there's a time you can kind of beat yourself up to if you don't win immediately. Like, how did I do this? Oh my gosh, you know, people are thinking I'm lucky. I mean, the the mind is a beautiful thing to waste at the thing. And uh I was wasting my thoughts on things that I could only imagine people were saying that obviously they weren't. Um, but at the on the other hand, uh it wasn't like I was hitting ground balls at the time. I I lost four or five tournaments in playoffs. Um I was still playing good golf uh for the most part. Uh and I just tried to stay patient. Now I was not my best friend. I I did beat myself up at times, and uh that was that was not a good thing for me. Um, but I was hard on myself. I was my biggest critic. Um, and that's probably part of the personality that got me there, and that's part of the personality that uh made me kind of uh suffer a little bit during those years of not winning. You know, I wasn't, like I said, I wasn't my uh I wasn't my best critic to myself. There was one thing I forgot to to kind of mention. The interesting thing about how life takes you on different paths than that. So in 1985, I came up to play the Western Open, and it was a golf course renowned for being very difficult, Butler National. And I had played 12 or 13 weeks, Bruce, and I did a two-day pro-am, and I mean I was exhausted, never played Butler, wasn't in the pro-am, got in late Tuesday night, and exhausted. My swing, all of a sudden, I just went in the tank and I shot 85. So I always remember it. I shot 85 in 1985. And I said, you know what? I've had enough. I'm not gonna play any. I'm I gotta go home. I gotta see Craig Harmon, and and you know, this is this is bad. So 86, 87 goes by, and now 1988. I said, you know, I think I'm a better player, and this is a golf course I should be able to play. After saying I'm never gonna play, and I don't know, how many times did you say that? I'm never coming back. Well, there might have only been two or three places you've got a long enough career that you're ever gonna be allowed to play. So I go back there and met my wife. Met my future wife. Yeah. So it was uh, you know, if had I stuck to my guns, I never would have met her and wouldn't have had my beautiful daughter, Katie, and all that. But it's just uh kind of one of those things. So Butler's always uh always gonna remain uh near and dear in my heart. Right.

Mike Gonzalez 16:05

I'm just glad you didn't tell us you came back in 1988 and you shot an 88.

Jeff Sluman 16:10

It would have been bad. I played on the weekend. I made I made that cut too.

Mike Gonzalez 16:15

I know I played on the weekend, so it was you talk about coming off a golf course with that kind of feeling coming off of an 85. Uh Bruce Devlin, you came off that golf course having played with Billy Casper one day.

Bruce Devlin 16:28

I don't remember. Oh, oh no, yes, I do. Yeah, you not Butler National, though. It wasn't Butler National.

Mike Gonzalez 16:37

Oh, you I well the first time you told me it was Butler National. So well then we won't we won't we won't be able to include this, but you can tell Jeff for his edification.

Bruce Devlin 16:46

Uh it was another golf course, I think it was Beverly. And uh I was Oh yeah, Beverly.

Mike Gonzalez 16:53

I was still still the Western Open then, I guess, is what I was thinking of.

Bruce Devlin 16:56

Yeah, yeah. Anyhow, I played the Western Open at Beverly. In our day, Jeff, we used to play 36 holes on Saturday, right? And I got uh I got through playing 36 holes with Casper, who won the Western Open. And I went back to the hotel to see my wife that night, and I said, What the hell am I doing playing golf for a living when you gotta beat a guy that can play like Casper? He he put on a clinic for 36 holes. But you've probably seen some of that yourself.

Jeff Sluman 17:34

Yeah, probably I'd say Billy Castro's probably the most underrated player of all time. I think so. No, no question about it. What he's done, the majors he's won, and and just phenomenal record.

Mike Gonzalez 17:52

That exact statement came up. Uh a recent guest, and I can't remember who it was. Bruce said the exact same thing. Yeah. They thought he was the most underrated golfer, maybe ever lived.

Jeff Sluman 18:03

Yeah, I think most players don't even don't even have they have no idea what he accomplished and the amount of tournaments that he won. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 18:12

I would have liked to have seen him play. Could have easily been added to the big three back in the 60s.

Jeff Sluman 18:17

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 18:20

So you you mentioned earlier, Jeff, uh, you wanted to tell us a little bit of a story about uh what you thought could have been your life's greatest golf experience, and that was with Arnold Palmer.

Jeff Sluman 18:31

Yeah, I I mean most people would obviously first say, well, you you won the PGA, that's gotta be you know, only major, that's gotta be your greatest experience. And I I guess to a point that is, but in 1989, as the defending champion of the PGA, uh the pairings everybody has their own kind of pairings, but I get to Kemper Lakes in Chicago and I get paired with Arnold Palmer. Now, as we all know, Arnold needed the PGA to complete the Grand Slam, and you know, he came close many times. Um, I remember watching him with a sad, sad uh my father looking sad when Julius Boros beat him, right? At uh down in Texas, I think, Bruce.

Mike Gonzalez 19:24

Yes, okay.

Jeff Sluman 19:25

San Antonio or whatever. Yeah. But anyways, so I get paired with Arnold, and I I believe Larry Nelson is a past PGA champ. And we get out there, and what's Arnold at the time? I'm gonna guess mid-50s, 55, 56, somewhere around there. And I'm pretty sure this is how it goes. He parsed one, two, and three, and I'm like, you know, pretty good. Birdie's four, birdie's five, birdie's six, birdie's seven, birdie's eight. I mean, it's like people are going to manners. Oh, I can imagine.

Mike Gonzalez 20:01

In Chicago?

Jeff Sluman 20:02

I think he parsed nine, and you can look this up because I was so caught up in this, I didn't even care about how I was playing. Only time we've ever seen it, the entire press corps at the time came out and followed us on the back nine. And Arnold makes another birdie somewhere on 12, and then he makes a bogey somewhere, but then he stiffs it on this long par four to about eight feet to take the lead alone. Mists the pot. I think he bogeys, he might have bogeyed 17 and 18. But he shoots 68, and it was magnificent. And to this day, I said, I actually saw Arnold Palmer, if you know what I mean. I saw the man, the way he played, for years and years as a young man. He was like Jack said, he he was young in the last nine holes at Augusta National in 1986. Arnold was that guy. I I couldn't believe it. I wanted a caddy for him. I just wanted to be, you know, and I'm inside the ropes. Yeah. It was maybe the greatest experience, like I said, of my golf career. Just to be there for that.

Mike Gonzalez 21:14

Yeah. And Bruce, you got a chance to see him at his prime quite a bit, didn't you?

Bruce Devlin 21:18

I sure did. He was uh I got a I got a a very special week one week with him. I flew up to Latrobe, Pennsylvania, stayed with Ian when he in. We did five exhibitions during the week. And that was uh, I mean, to be around to be around him for that amount of time and see how wonderful the people, you know. I mean, just him being there was enough for the people, you know, aside from his golf. Yeah, he he captivated people.

Jeff Sluman 21:51

And he was so good with the people and signed and signed. I mean, he's just a a role model for any golf. For coming up. If you could, if if you were lucky enough to witness how he was with the people, it was it's so important.

Mike Gonzalez 22:07

I'll always remember what Jack Nicholas shared with us when we visited with him. We talked about Arnie, and he said, you know, he says, Arnold Palmer loved being Arnold Palmer.

Jeff Sluman 22:19

Yes, he did. Yeah, he did. And like I said, and I saw, I saw the Arnold Palmer. Yeah. That was so cool.

Mike Gonzalez 22:29

Well, before we get to the the 97 win, which I alluded to coming nine years after that PGA championship, uh, I I do want to mention uh that you and Bruce are sort of a unique company at Augusta National. You uh having what perhaps is still the only hole-in-one on number four?

Jeff Sluman 22:46

Is it still current? It it's still the only hole-in-one on number four. And interestingly enough, I've been doing the streaming for CBS and Masters uh the last five years with Scott Verplank and Dave Fleming on holes four, five, and six. Ah and and you know, I I think they mention it at least hourly. I think that's the proper thing to tell our viewers that I'm the only one that's ever got it. Um but we had a real uh close one this year. I forgot somebody kind of jingled it in the hole for a second. I was like, oh, you know, but another year was Dodge, so I'm I'm still the only one.

Mike Gonzalez 23:28

That may be safe for a while, but what a tough hole. And it's got a little longer since uh you played it regularly, right?

Jeff Sluman 23:34

It's gotten longer, and you know, the way the hole's designed, you really rarely shoot at the pin. You're just trying to get it on the right level and uh and miss it in the right spot where you can make where you can make three. It's a it's an incredibly difficult hole. But still, you you must say it's surprising that I'm that there's only been one hole and one there in in the history.

Mike Gonzalez 23:57

Yeah. Uh well, as a as a golf announcer to Gustave then you must know Bruce's distinction from the matchup.

Jeff Sluman 24:04

Mr. Double Eagle. Mr. Double Eagle. 57 years forward from what 240? Yeah. Yeah. 246 yards on the number eight?

Bruce Devlin 24:14

Yeah, forward.

Jeff Sluman 24:15

Something like that.

Bruce Devlin 24:16

Yeah. 15 yards. Not bad. Hook with a forward. Oh, you know. My dad got to see it too, Jeff.

Jeff Sluman 24:24

My daddy got to see it. That's awesome. I my my mother and father, and everybody saw my hole in one as well. That was very cool. That's great. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 24:34

That's neat. Well, Bruce, let's go to that next victory in '97.

Bruce Devlin 24:37

Tucson Chrysler Classic at uh Omni and Tucson, where you beat an open champion by the name of Steve Jones by a shot. That was nice to come back after that time and win.

Jeff Sluman 24:53

Yes, it was. And uh I went through a lot as I kind of met, you know, touched on before that. A lot of near misses, a lot of playoff losses. And then frankly, I lost my game in uh late 93 and into 94. I was I was a terrible golfer at that point. I don't know what happened, um, but I knew right then that my golf career was over. I was I played so bad. Uh I I I just couldn't believe it. It was pathetic off the T. I mean the strength of my game went to be the worst part of my game, driving the ball. Um and and I and I honest to god, I tell you this, and I it brings shivers up my my spine and and hair standing on the back of my neck. We started the year and I had a new caddy in '94, and I practiced for a couple weeks in Palm Springs. And the first tournament of the year back then was what's now the Sony Open in uh uh Hawaii. I went out in the pro am. And if I broke 50 on the front nine, it wasn't by much. I was hitting it all over the lot. That's how bad I was driving. I mean, I hit it down the Hilo Highway. I hit it everywhere. And I said, Oh my god, I I I'd like to be able to drive it as good as this 12 handicap I'm playing. It was it was that bad. And um it had been bad for a while, but now here's the gun going off, and it's Wednesday afternoon, and I got just a few hours to try and fix this. And uh I hit it, I think I sniped it out of bounds, left on nine, then hit it over in the canal to the right. And I told my playing partners, I said, I'm gonna go to the range, hit a few balls, you know, like that's gonna help, but I just had to, you know, do something. So we went over there and I hit a few and met them on 10. And it wasn't like the the bell went off, but we got to the first T on Thursday, and when I tell you I had a sleepless night, I'm like, oh my god, I'm this this is this is the all-time nightmare right in front of me, and here we go. And my caddy looked at me and he said, No drivers this week. Because I could hit the three wood okay. And I always had a strong three wood in my bag, and I made the cut. It was I mean, the all-time grind. I got to the ninth hole, which was this reachable par five, out of bounds left, kind of out of bounds right, and the wind was in, and I said, Bruce, I said, All I gotta do is make a bogey to make the cut. And the first t-shot was out of bounds so quick.

Bruce Devlin 28:12

Really?

Jeff Sluman 28:13

Now I gotta make four, and I just said to my candy, give me another ball. And I teed this thing up, and I hit a bullet down the middle, and then I hit the three-wood off the deck, out of the green, 20 feet, two putted, made the cut. Made the cut. So, you know, I didn't, I wasn't beating anybody, but I made the cut. So that was a that was a big deal because you couldn't have been in worse shape 24 hours before. We get to 13th hole on Sunday, and you know, if if there's 70 guys that made the cut, I'm 65th or whatever. So, you know, you you want to try and build on the next week. And let's so I said to my candy, I said, What do you think? I mean, I've got 200 yards to the right and left. So you there's no trouble. I said, Well, you what do you think of hitting the driver here? And he looks at me and said, You're not ready. That's a good caddy, that's a strong caddy. Yep, yep. And I looked at him and I said, Yeah, I guess you're right. So, anyways, three wooded it in and uh, you know, went on. And it took a while. And uh I finally kind of got out of it by the Western Open that year in July. But it took a long time for me to get over it. It was it was awful. But I think I think it makes you a better player.

Mike Gonzalez 29:36

Yeah, Bruce, do you ever remember a stretch going through like that like that?

Bruce Devlin 29:40

I do, I do remember. I came over here and I used to have a rather strong left-hand grip, and I saw all the American players who had sort of neutral to slide over with the left hand, and I tried to change, and I couldn't hit a three-wood off the ground for about four months, I would say. It was that was a terrible, terrible time. It's uh and I think part of it's uh certainly part of it's physical, but a lot of it I think is metal as well.

Jeff Sluman 30:22

Yeah. It's physical, then it goes physical and mental, and then it's kind of really all mental, because you don't want to go out and practice. You've you know, I felt embarrassed to some degree. I mean, how bad I was playing. So that in and of itself, I think I got some advice from Bob Tway, and he said, you know what? Not if you get out of it, when you get out of it, you're gonna be a much better player because of this. You'll be tougher. Uh and he was right. And you were. But I'll tell you what, it's not fun to go through.

Mike Gonzalez 31:02

Yeah. Well, he sure was right because uh uh at some point when you figure it out, you did you did go on a bit of a stretch. Uh as I said, at an age when today you don't see as many guys winning at age 39, 40, 43, you know, whatever, uh, with all these great young kids out there. But uh starring in 80 in 97 at the Tucson Classic, you had a pretty good run. Uh uh, as Bruce mentioned, that was uh over Steve Jones by one. And then in 1998, you come to the GMO, the Greater Milwaukee Open at Brown Deer, and uh pick up another win over uh the the hometown favorite.

Jeff Sluman 31:41

Yeah, yeah. I'm glad I had a four-shot leave with four to go over Strick. Um but uh yeah, I I played some really good golf for a long time in my late 30s, really until almost 50 years old. I mean, I I uh Jeff Ogilvie won the US Open over, you know, that was Phil's debacle. I finished fourth that year, I believe. And I could have that was another week of leading that week in Fairways and Greenset. Now I I messed up that the start of that tournament, but I played so good that week. And if I I think if I shoot even power on the back nine, I'm I either win or I play off with Ogilby. I think I shot three over, something like that. But I thought that was pretty pretty darn good at 49 years old to go out there and do that under those conditions. I I really really hit the ball great that week.

Mike Gonzalez 32:46

Yeah. Well, you must have liked Brown Deere. You won there a couple of times, didn't you?

Jeff Sluman 32:49

Won there a couple of times. I had another uh very close call, I think the year Corey won, Paven. Um we played a we moved from forgot the name of it. Not Milwaukee Country Club, certainly. I stayed there. Tuckaway. Tuckaway. Yeah, yeah. Moved from there to Brown Deer and Andy North before uh it was announced. Andy said, come on up and play this. We're doing a little outing. And uh I fell in love with the place from from day one. It just it's it suited my eye. Everything about the the shot making and uh different clubs off the tee, strategy. Um just fell in love with the place. So it's it doesn't mean you're gonna play well, but it sure helps when you show up at a place and you like the golf course.

Mike Gonzalez 33:41

I actually I only played it once. I used to live in Milwaukee, only played it once, and it was with Corey Paven. He was our pro and partner the year he was the Writer Cup captain. Oh, nice. Yeah, two times. Had a wonderful time. Uh and uh uh you're you you may be aware of this history, but uh you know you won for the first time there in 1998. Uh the event debuted in 1968. Uh we talked about Trevino's win in the U.S. Open that year. He decided to play the first GMO instead of going to the British Open, a tournament he was going to win twice in a row starting in 1971. But he elected to play in 1968 the GMO. And the reason for our listeners is uh the GMO announced a purse of$40,000 to the winner, and the British Open was paying the winner$0,000.

Bruce Devlin 34:39

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 34:41

So another fellow that made that same decision, and he's a guy that didn't play the British Open much, and that was Dave Stockton. Of course, Dave won that first uh GMO and pocketed the 40 grand when uh whoever won the Open Championship that year cashed that small, that small check. Check.

Jeff Sluman 35:00

That's pretty interesting. But yeah, I mean, the when I first came out on tour in 1983, I couldn't believe I was gonna play in a tournament with a$400,000 purse.

unknown 35:13

Yeah.

Jeff Sluman 35:13

I said, oh my goodness, this is, you know, and the purse structure has always been 18%. So that's$72,000 for the winner. I mean, I had won the biggest tournament in 1982 of the JC Goosey, the Space Coast, and that was a$15,000 check. And then I won two other one-day events. I I made like$18,000 that that one week. And I said, I can retire. This is crazy. You know, I mean, never had that much money in my life. But um my goodness, how the times have changed and the purses, and um, you know, some people, I I don't know how everybody feels differently. But if you really look at it, um and look at other sports, it's not that out of whack. No, yeah. If you look at the if you look at the stock market, now I'm gonna throw one out at you, in 1990, the entire stock market of America, if you took the uh value of all the companies was three trillion dollars. That's a lot of money. Today there's five or six companies alone, their market their market cap value is over three trillion. Pretty much so I mean if you if you think of that, yeah, going from you know, playing for a winner's purse. I remember the players' championship was a million dollar purse in 1987. That was 180,000. I mean, if you if you do that math, you know, maybe the guys are underpaid. You know, they're certainly not, but you know what I'm saying? If you can make you can make any any kind of case in point that they're probably uh not that old they're not overpaid.

Mike Gonzalez 37:15

Yeah, yeah, we've talked a lot about how the purses have evolved over the years. I can remember uh back when Westchester Classic first played the winner a hundred thousand dollars.

Jeff Sluman 37:26

And I thought, man, that's that's the nanny handy, I think. Wasn't it, Bruce? The man manufacturer's handover, the manny handy.

Bruce Devlin 37:33

Yes, it was. Yes, it was. Yeah, that was the biggest piss.

Mike Gonzalez 37:38

Yeah. We talk about pensions too, uh, Jeff, and and uh this is a sore point with Bruce. I mean, here's a here's a guy, Bruce Devlin, you know, plays on the tour for 20 some years, whatever, and and is quite successful. Uh, and then he gets his lump sum, he chooses to take a lump sum payment from the PGA tour, right? And and of course, you'd think he needs an armored car and a couple of banks to put it in. What was it, Bruce?

Bruce Devlin 38:07

4,600.

Jeff Sluman 38:13

Well, it's not that anymore.

Bruce Devlin 38:15

No, it's not that anymore, is it?

Mike Gonzalez 38:18

It's amazing. It's amazing. Times have changed. 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.