John Mahaffey - Part 3 (The 1978 PGA Championship)

Bruce Devlin 0:15

Yeah, we mentioned uh we mentioned at the top of the show about you winning the PGA championship in 1978. Uh you you have actually uh handled two pretty good players in the playoffs there. One Jerry Pate and Tom Watson. Tell us a little about that.

John Mahaffey 0:34

Well, I think uh it was it was a strange week to begin with. I shot 75 the first day. And uh, you know, as I as I said earlier in the show, I I'd only made about 10,000 at that point, and I wasn't really really going too well. And I but I thought I figured something out the last three or four holes. So I played in the morning, I skipped lunch, I went to the practice team, I didn't leave till dark. And really figured I thought, okay, now I've found something. You know, you you never really want to say you got it, because that's the kiss of death, because it's gone. It'll never be there again. But I think I think this will I think this might work, kind of deal. So the next three rounds, I played as good a golf as I've ever played in my life and putted like a dream. And uh shot in the 60s every round. I think I shot 68 or 67, 66, 68, 67, 66.

Bruce Devlin 1:28

That's right.

John Mahaffey 1:29

And uh 66 with a bogey. I had a three-putted at uh what uh 16, yeah. Anyway, uh I get to uh we get to the 18th, and we're uh we're all tied. Jerry Pate, Watson and myself, Watson and I were standing in the fairway. He's outdriven me as he always did. Uh I hit a three or four iron just past the hole about 15 feet. He hit one a little bit further past. Uh we were watching from the fairway before we hit those shots, watched Jerry Pate, and we didn't know for sure what it was for, but uh he had kind of horseshoe to putt. And uh, you know, knowing Jerry, I thought that might have been for Bertie because he's he's known for going for the the flag on the last hole. You know, yeah. He was never afraid he did that at Atlanta at me at uh at the uh for the U.S. Open in 76. Anyway, um he misses, and Tom and I end up making par. And uh Watson, I knocked it past the hole trying to make it and made it coming back. Watson left it short, and he walks by me and says, Well, at least you gave it a chance. You know, kind of think you know, really mad him short right in the heart. Anyway, we go to the first hole, and Jerry Pate likes to talk a little bit. You guys had him on the show, you know. Yeah, or well, you've known anyway.

Bruce Devlin 2:51

Channel. Got a little channel in it.

John Mahaffey 2:53

So you know how they they cut just a little swath through the rough after after you walk off the off the T's in these majors, yeah, and that's where everybody walked. Well, all three of us start out there, and then Jerry's walking between us, and you see Watson peel off to the right, and I peel off to the left. I don't want to listen to this guy as we're walking down the fairway. You know, I've lost a U.S. Open and a and uh our back-to-back U.S. opens in 75 and 76. Now I've got a chance to to kind of write the ship a little bit here. And then I'm you know, I want to focus. I don't want to listen to some story going down the fairway. So anyway, we all par the first hole uh in different man in different ways. I I got it up and down from short of the green, and I think Jerry and Tom too put it anyway. I had the honor on the second, as I did on the on the first with the draw. So uh most guys hit an iron off the second hole. And at uh it's a it's a really kind of tight fairway and uphill green, short hole, R4. And uh I thought, you know what? This is the time for me to do something special. Uh I'm hitting the ball very well. So I took out a three wood and I started there's a little creek that goes down the left side. I started the creek and turned it off the creek, put it right in the middle of the fairway, up there parallel to the or right across from the bunker. And uh Watson and and Pate both hit irons. Uh I think Pate might have hit it in the rough. And uh anyway, Pate ends up short of the green, pitches up, uh, not very well. Watson hits it on the front of the green. Now I've got a nine-iron in my hand, and that pin is on the over on the left side of the green. And you've played Og Bond, Bruce, you know.

Bruce Devlin 4:32

Yeah, sure.

John Mahaffey 4:32

That green may be the fastest green, maybe in the world. Okay. Even even from Australia. You know, some of those how fast they get. Anyway, so I hit it left of the hole about 12 feet. And uh Watson misses. Tate misses his park butt. He's done. So now I I get over this putt, and I mean, I have just got to touch it. It's one of these deals where I think, okay, I pick a spot right ahead. If I can just make this ball roll right over that little spot, and I just I touch this thing and it rolls right over that spot, and I'm I'm looking at it, and about this far from the hole, I'm in the air because I know that sucker's dead center, and it did, and it changed my whole life. Yeah, you know, I'll say, you know, just retribution, you know, whatever. And uh sort of a little payback to Jerry Pate for the open, but you know, I kind of gave him that one, unfortunately, but still uh little payback. And uh Watson said some of the nicest, I didn't don't remember Jaring coming to the playoff, I mean to the uh presentation, but I know Watson said, you know, JD, you've been close a lot of times. He says you deserve this one. Well done. And for him to say that, because that would have given him the grand slam. Yeah, that would have you know he'd never won the PGA.

Bruce Devlin 5:49

Yep.

John Mahaffey 5:50

And as a as close a friend as I am to him, still uh I'm glad I did.

Bruce Devlin 5:57

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 5:58

You know, you look back on that final round, uh John, you were still seven back of Watson with 14 holes left. And uh you were playing in the same group with Tom, right, the last day?

John Mahaffey 6:09

Yes, yeah. Yeah. The big turnaround was a tenth hole. Tell us about that putt. The putt, yeah. Well, Watson was Watson was kind of hacking it around on that hole a little bit, it ended up making a double. And I had a a putt from about, oh gosh, 60 feet or something by the time it went up and around the green and back down and stuff like that. I'm just trying to lag it up there, and I make it from the front of the green. And uh that kind of and then I bur I think I buried the next hole, and then there's uh it's kind of kind of come becomes a blur until the the second hole in the playoff. But uh I'll never forget making that putt. And uh the look on his face, it was kind of like, oh boy, a three-shot swing. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 6:53

Yeah, you talk about uh getting back at Jerry Pate, not only uh uh back at him for the for the uh US Open 76 down Atlanta Athletic Club, but didn't he beat your college roommate in the uh USM final?

John Mahaffey 7:09

Oh John Grace. Yeah. Yeah. Johnny Grace was uh Johnny Grace would have been a great player if Coach Williams would have let him play. Uh a great collegiate player, if Coach Williams. He played played on a c on five or six of the of the championship teams we had, but never got to play in the NCAA. You know, they say Dean Beaman was the best four-way player in the world. Uh-uh. No way. Johnny Grace was the best I've ever seen in my life. And a marvelous putter, great short game, never missed a fair way, good iron player, uh funny, great sense of humor. Uh from up in Michigan. Uh uh, I thought he and I had so many good times together and qualified a lot together and played on uh enough teams to to get close. And uh yeah, Jerry Pate, he beat him too, so we got that in common, John Grays and I do.

Mike Gonzalez 8:01

Yeah, so uh uh you make that final putt at Oakmont. I don't know if they measured your vertical leap, but you jumped into your caddy's arms. Uh tell us about that caddy.

John Mahaffey 8:13

Well, I did play basketball in high school, so yeah, and I and I could touch the rim, okay? Believe it or not. So uh I had reptile, we call him. Uh Dave Lemon, Reptile, was my caddy. And uh reptile could get a little bit uh excited too, and I thought his eyes were wide, his saucers too. He jumped up and down, and I went and jumped into his arms. Uh you know, you don't know what you're gonna do when you win like that. The emotions are just they're flying all over the place. And uh to actually finally get over that hump, you know, it's uh it's a hard thing to do. There's a lot of really, really great players that did win majors.

Bruce Devlin 8:59

Yeah.

John Mahaffey 9:00

And uh, you know, it's it's fortuitous things that happen. The 60-footer, uh, to make a putt on the on on Oakmine on the second hold of win on probably one of the most difficult, fastest screens in the world. I mean, those things are they don't happen every day. And uh they just happen to to me at the right time.

Mike Gonzalez 9:18

So you mentioned this victory being life-changing for you, uh, probably much like we didn't really ask you about it, uh how your life changed after that first win on the PGA tour. But tell us a little bit about how your life changed as a result of winning this major.

John Mahaffey 9:33

Well, I think everybody uh, well, even after winning the first tournament, uh, when I won in Las Vegas, I remember playing in San Antonio a little bit later in the year. And uh with Tom Watson, we were we were uh waiting on an airplane. We're sitting in a bar in uh San Antonio, and you know, he's sitting there and he's almost crying. And he says, you know, and he's been close a lot of times. I mean, he was known early on that he threw a lot of tournaments away as a choker or whatever, you know, to so he's almost in tears. And uh, you know, and I'm what the heck's going on, man? He says, Well, you won a tournament, you will never be forgotten in the game of golf. He says, I just hope someday people will remember me. That's Tom Watson. I think they do. I think they do too. Oh, what a career! And and the other thing is, you know, you reach that level when you when you win a golf tournament and you become part of the fraternity. And then and then and then the goal is always to be in to to win a major after that, right?

Bruce Devlin 10:38

Yeah.

John Mahaffey 10:39

And with the belief that people like Demerit, like Hogan, like uh Trevino, and and and different people, that uh to gain the respect you feel like you really have to. You know, and to and and as as uh uh to show them that that their faith was was real in you, that you really had enough to do it. And uh to take that last step to get there was was just a feeling that I don't know that I'll ever have again. It's uh in sports for sure. I mean it was just unbelievable. And uh having the opportunity to to represent my country after that, which I'd never done before. I didn't make the the obviously turned pro too so too soon. I would have made the the Walker Cup team, I find out after the fact, but uh that didn't happen. So now I'm you know an opportunity to to represent the United States. That was terrific.

Mike Gonzalez 11:35

Tell us a little bit about that Ryder Cup experience you're alluding to, which was a victory in 1979 at the Greenbrier with Billy Casper and John Jacobs as the captains for the teams.

John Mahaffey 11:48

Yeah, Billy Casper, and I uh I really wasn't playing that well at the time, and I don't uh he knew that, and I wasn't upset that uh that I didn't play as much as some of the guys. I played three uh three matches. I played with Hale Irwin uh in uh in a better ball one day we got beat, and uh mostly my fault. I didn't play very well, and I played Lee Elder and I played an alternate shot, and I was I was horrible and and Lee couldn't Lee couldn't help me there either. Uh fortunately uh in the singles I I beat John Jacobs. Uh no, uh Brian Barnes. Brian Barnes. Brian Barnes, uh who had yeah, who had uh beaten arm uh Jack Nicholas a couple of times several years ago in in Ryder Cup. So uh and that that it was early on, and and that was probably the point that uh clinched it for us, but we were gonna clinch it anyway with the guys playing behind me. So uh but at least I got one point. But I enjoyed it so much. I've never been that nervous in my life. In fact, I don't think Lee Elder could either, because we we were standing on the first T and we had decided that he was gonna hit the first T shot, right? My caddy was already down the fairway, down the on standing in the rough, you know, a couple of hundred yards down. And they play the Star Spangled Banner and all that stuff, and you're shaking in your boots, you're scared to death. And hardly breathe, I mean, you know, your mouth is dry. And uh, so you know, I said, good luck, partner. He says, I can't hit this. I said, What? I can't hit this. I said, Well, okay, so now we're changed right now, midstream. I've got to hit the first tee shot. I'm not even thinking about this thing. I'm thinking of, you know, he's a good driver, the golf bomb. I have it down here, and he can put me at a game, he can draw it off the tee, good angle at the flag, all this. So, you know, I blade my caddy back up, and now I figure, okay, the only thing I can do here is close my eyes and hit this as hard as I can, see what happens. And I smash it down the middle of the fairway. And I told him before we played, I said, Look, uh, I've got a little issue with my short game. I I'm not really that good from 30 yards in. I got I'm a little, it's a little iffy, okay? The little fat sometimes, a little skinny sometimes, you know. And occasionally I'll get it close. I said, but if you can leave me, like on the par fives, with a full wedge, we're good. All right. So he's he's only got an eight or nine iron, and he hits it fat and rolls it 30 yards short of the green. All right, and the hole's tucked up over this bunker. And so I'm going, all right, time to suck it up a little bit and see what we can do. I open his sand wedge and hit this most beautiful flop shot right behind the hole about three feet, and the poor guy misses it. And that was only the beginning of our troubles. I I let him down from there on. I mean, it was uh it was not a pretty sight. I don't know if I think we lost five and four, something like that. But uh a little the the final uh the round, the the the singles, I got it back a little bit, but uh I was disappointed. I would have liked to have a better record in the Ryder Cup, but it was it was great to represent our country in in a winning fashion as our team did. Yeah, first time the Europeans played, actually.

Mike Gonzalez 15:04

Yes, I was gonna I was gonna ask you about that, John, because uh of course you know the subsequent history of the Ryder Cup, what happened uh after the decision to bring the Europeans in, but that was really uh sort of changed the tide a bit for that competition, didn't it?

John Mahaffey 15:22

It certainly did. And uh I don't know if there's any more excited exciting competition in today's world uh than that. I mean, people really look forward to it. It's uh it's almost like a war, isn't it?

Mike Gonzalez 15:37

Well, as a matter of fact, they did nickname one, the war by the shore, in 1991, the year that uh Dave Stockton uh took his crew and beat uh Tony Jacklin in the group, or rather, uh sorry, probably Bernhard Gallagher in the group, yeah. Let's talk a little bit about the World Cup because uh you had an opportunity to play in the World Cup first in in 1978, where uh the American team won by 10, and you were the individual winner by two strokes with uh teaming up with Andy North at Mackay Golf Club in uh Kauai.

John Mahaffey 16:09

Right, that's it, Princeville. And uh Andy actually finished second, so we finished first and second. You're pretty much gonna lock it up.

Bruce Devlin 16:17

I think so.

John Mahaffey 16:19

Uh and Bruce, you won uh you and David Graham. How many you won a couple World Cups, didn't you?

Bruce Devlin 16:24

No, no, we just won one. We won one in uh in Argentina in 1970, a few years before you guys won. And then uh then you guys you also won again the next year with a different partner.

John Mahaffey 16:36

Yeah, Hale Irwin. And uh I think he finished first, I finished third, so we kind of took that one too. Played at this place called Lafata golf course, and it was about a foot from the airport, all right. So you could wave at the pilots when they landed. It's the loudest place I've ever played in my life. And uh it was uh playing with Hale, it it was great to be able to win with Hale since I felt like I let him down in the Ryder Cup, you know, in 78. So uh we had a good time in Greece, it was great. Uh and uh Hale, I think Hale's a very misunderstood guy. People think he's very stoic and stuff. Hale is one of the funniest guys in the world, he's got a great sense of humor, very competitive. Very uh, and uh that's what you expect with his record, you know. Uh he's a tough guy and he plays he plays hard and never gives up. I mean, that's the kind of partner you want. And uh we did good. We uh we had a a great team over there, and uh we're lucky enough to win by a few.

Mike Gonzalez 17:35

Yeah, this the team from Scotland, uh uh Ken Brown and Sandy Ly were on that team. They finished second. The the thing I found interesting uh looking at the history of that event, uh the South African team was invited to play that year. They took part in the practice rounds, the Pro Am, and then they weren't allowed to compete. Do you remember anything about that?

John Mahaffey 17:55

Uh I think it wasn't in an apartheid issue, I think.

Mike Gonzalez 17:58

It absolutely was, sure. Yeah.

John Mahaffey 18:00

Uh and uh, you know, I think we were given the opportunity to leave. Uh Hale and I, they talked to us about it and stuff, and we we wanted to play. We uh we decided we were there, we wanted to play, so we did. And uh not not trying to go against anything, just uh, you know, it was a it's a competition, it's not politics.

Bruce Devlin 18:21

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 18:23

So you joined the PGA senior tour beginning uh in 1998 when you turned age 50. You had a win in the Southwestern Bell Dominion in a playoff with Jose uh Jose Maria Canazaras and Bruce Fleischer. This was in 1990.

John Mahaffey 18:41

Yeah, it was in San Antonio again, uh this time at Dominion. And uh I birdied the last hole to tie those two guys, and we went out and uh birdied Jose and I birdied the 18th, and Flasher didn't uh the first playoff hole. Then we go back to 17. I think we played 17 three times. And uh the third time it was really getting dark. And uh Jose hit it about 15 feet, I hit it 30 feet, and I could barely see the hole, and you know, just kind of one of these you pick a line and hit it, and I knocked it right in the middle. He missed his putt, and we couldn't have gone another hole, we'd had to come back the next day. But uh it was another uh another win for me that that that meant a lot. It was very special being in San Antonio, so close to where I grew up and uh the place where I saw my first golf tournament.

Bruce Devlin 19:34

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 19:36

I probably misspoke. I think I said the the 19 it was in 1990, it was probably what 1999, year after you came on the senior tour.

John Mahaffey 19:45

Yeah, 1999.

Mike Gonzalez 19:46

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So how long did you play on the senior tour?

John Mahaffey 19:52

I played till 2004, and uh then uh we talked about earlier how I I was uh I came a little bit early as far as being born. I was a premature baby. Because of that, my hips never fully developed, and I never realized this, that uh I was playing on borrowed time anyway. Uh my hips uh began deteriorating uh later on uh in my PGA tour uh career. Uh and then when I finally got to the point where uh I couldn't I couldn't hardly take a stance and I couldn't hardly play, uh I decided uh it was time to kind of hang it up. I went and got my hips replaced. Uh Dr. Mark Bertram down in Naples did it for me. Johnny Bench and Peter Jacobson actually talked to me at the Legends one year and said, Look, you're walking like a 90-year-old man. You can't hit it 200 yards. And if you want to play, or even if you want to have a quality of life, you better think about this, or you're gonna be in a wheelchair. So I go meet with with Mark Bertram down there, and uh this guy played at the University of Kentucky when uh Russ Cochrane there, and Mark was the number one player. Didn't realize this this guy can play some golf. And uh so he took me in, we did x-rays, CAT scans, all this kind of stuff. And uh I went through a whole bunch of tests, and uh he said he came back to me and he says, Look, if you don't have this operation, I promise you in two years you'll be in a wheelchair. He said, Both your hips have deteriorated. He says, I don't even know how do you stand the pain. You got chips of bone falling off and you know, slicing into things. And I'm going, well, you know, it's not it's uncomfortable, you know, to say the least. So, and uh so he said, uh, and he he had a whole battery of people, it was a great place to go down there to get an operation because it was all in one deal. You had a whole bunch, you had a la a female doctor that oversaw all your tests and everything else, the CAT scans, the x-rays, and all that, and then you had Dr. Bertram that actually did the surgery and stuff. And uh everything came out quickly, you didn't have to wait for too much stuff. And uh anyway, uh Dr. Bertram he uh he calls me into his office, he says, I want to tell you something. He says, uh You sm you smoke, you know. And I said, Yeah, I did. And I smoked a lot at that time. He says, Well, I want you to I want you to talk to your doctor. She's sitting right over there. I want you to I want you to hear what she has to say. She says, Well he said, First of all, you you're gonna have to either slow down or stop, or I'm not gonna operate on you because you're gonna be in the in uh in the on the operating table for three to four hours because I've got to replace both of your hips at the same time. And he said, and your doctor has a little something to say. She says, Yeah, she says, I'm a little worried about your heart and I think you have lung cancer. I'm gonna have to send you for another CAT scan this afternoon. So, scared to death, you know, I go get this stuff done. She calls me the next day and uh and tells me that I that I'm a lucky man. What am I gonna do? I don't have cancer and my heart's fine. I put down cigarettes that day. She said, How much do you think you smoke? I said, uh a pack maybe. She says, How about four? She's the number of nicot amount of nicotine you have in your system. So that was another blessing in disguise, yeah, being able to stop smoking right on on the spot. And this was like in 2010. So uh quality of life for me has changed quite a bit uh with the changes in my life and also the ability to be upright and to be pain-free as far as my hips. I thank Dr. Bertram for that because it's been marvelous. But my golf game suffered. I didn't I didn't have a chance to really learn how to how to play with the hips.

Bruce Devlin 23:41

So, John, now that uh now that you couldn't play on the senior tour, what what is John Mahaffey up to nowadays?

John Mahaffey 23:49

Well, I had 15 years that I worked on the on the uh golf channel. Right, and uh worked with Lanny a bunch of those years and stuff, and I really didn't want to do it. Uh I it was toward the end of my of my playing time on the on the senior tour and my wife kept uh Keith Herschelin. I think you probably know Keith.

unknown 24:07

Yes.

John Mahaffey 24:08

Heard of Keith, a producer for the golf channel.

Mike Gonzalez 24:10

Yep.

John Mahaffey 24:10

He kept calling my wife and saying, I would like John to try out as a walker for me on the golf channel. He says he can't play dead right now, and it's terrible to watch him try to play. And we'd love to give him a shot. So she talked to me about it, and I said, I don't want to do that. I think I can still play. And she got it right in my face, you can't play anymore. And and and she said, Why don't you just realize that you're not gonna make a living, you're never gonna win again out there. It's we're spinning our wheels, we're spending more money than we're making. You know, and I said, Okay, so why do you think I can do this? She said, Oh, well, let me see. You know all the golf courses, you know all the players, you know how to you know how to play the game of golf, you know what they're thinking, and you're smart and you can and you think quickly, all right? Articulate. What do you think? I said, okay, I'll give it a try. So with her, uh Keith hires me. I go try out after playing a uh a pro am up in uh Michigan or somewhere, and and uh we try I try it out for him. He says, Okay, you're gonna be fine. And uh he ended up teaching me a lot about about television. And one of the things he taught me is I don't know if when you first got into it uh or not, Bruce, but did you have a go-to phrase?

Bruce Devlin 25:23

No, I didn't have a go-to phrase, but I but I I was I was told one thing when I first started, which stuck with me throughout my entire career in the television industry. I may remember a guy by the name of Don Olemeyer? Oh, yeah. So when I first started to work for NBC, he just moved over from ABC to take care of the golf thing, and he said to me, I'm gonna give you one piece of advice. Remember that what you see on your screen, the same people that you're talking to see it on their screen too. So don't talk about what you see, talk about the people that are playing, the conditions of the golf course, just like your wife said to you. You know, you know all about that, so talk about that and not about what's on the screen.

John Mahaffey 26:14

Exactly. It's not radio, it's television, right?

Bruce Devlin 26:16

That's right.

John Mahaffey 26:17

Yeah. Well, um, Keith was telling me, he says, okay, look, there's two things. One is you're only one word away from being fired. All right. So think about it before you speak. All right. Your first thought may not be the best thing to say, all right. And the and the second thing is you've got a go-to phrase and we've got a break you of it. It's I tell you what, guys. I tell you what, every time they come, I tell you what, guys, they go, I tell you what, guys. So, you know, I'm doing two or three two or three tournaments, and I get uh, we might have been why I don't remember exactly where it was, but he goes, I they go to me and I go, I tell you what, guys, and all and in my ear, as loud as you can imagine, and you know, you're talking while they're talking, right? In my ear, he say, if you say that one more time, and drop that clipboard, take off that headset, leave them right there, we'll come pick it up, get your ass out of here. So I I learned very quickly, not that I didn't do it for a long time. And and Keith uh left the golf channel shortly thereafter, and uh, but came back to do a couple of tournaments later. And uh, so the first time, the first one he's doing with us, the first time they came to me, I went, I tell you what, guys, he goes, uh-uh, I've been listening to you. You don't do that. That's for me, right? I said, That's for you. I had a lot of fun doing television, I really did. I met a lot of great people, a lot of uh it was it's a it's a a road family, all right, is is what it is. People that you you learn to live with and care about on the road, and uh your camera guys, your technicians and all that become your best friends. They help you in the I mean they're there for you. And uh I couldn't, I I enjoyed it. Uh uh 15 years was uh probably the best 15 years I had not playing golf, really. Uh but you know, after that I decided uh I wrote a book during that period of time called Hogan's Boy. And I wrote it because uh I thought I can I played golf at a at a very interesting time in the game, kind of spanning three eras between Hogan Nelson and Sneed, all the way up to Tiger Phil and the like. All right. And all the friends that I had in between. So I kind of wanted to give a little bit of my history, but also a lot of the interaction I had with these guys and a lot of the stuff we talked about today, how helpful they were to you if you know they knew that you were gonna put out the effort. So I wrote that, I wrote that book and uh it was fine. I didn't lose money with it, okay? Uh but I wrote it basically to see if I could write. Uh, but it's autobiographical, so you write that in passive voice. So then I decided, all right, now that I'm gonna take some time off, I need to figure out what I want to do to get excited to get up every morning. Something to look forward to. I don't want to just retire and sit around eating bonbons and watching Perry Mason. You know?

Bruce Devlin 29:16

Bad idea. Bad idea.

Mike Gonzalez 29:19

That sounds familiar, by the way. That sounds very familiar to me and probably badly. Yeah. That's right.

John Mahaffey 29:25

So anyway, so anyway, I decided that I would like to, I've always wanted to write mystery books. And the reason I'd wanted to do that, mystery thrillers, is you know, traveling so much in airplanes and alone on the road and in hotel rooms, you get tired of watching television. I started reading these mystery novels and stuff, you know, and I really enjoyed them. So I thought, you know, with all uh 50 years of the tour, living in a fishbowl, all right. Now I've had a lot of experiences and stuff, but I've seen a lot of experiences too. I've seen what a lot of people have had to deal with. And it gives you a lot of material. I mean, the guys that uh and I and I finished my first book, it's out now called Shafted. And uh it's it's a series that call I call it the Nemesis series, and it's uh it's somewhat golf related. In fact, if you read the whole series, there's a whole bunch of tips in there from Hogan and some of the greats of the game if you just kind of pay attention that uh are kind of hidden in the in the text. And uh but I I've I've really enjoyed doing it because it it's I'm now on the fifth book, uh third of the way through. Yeah. And uh I've got a I've got a great uh great lady that's that's helping me with this up in Denver, uh, a wonderful uh editor and a book, a lady that knows how to lay out a book as good as anybody I've ever seen. And uh, you know, we just I I'm having a blast. And I've it's it's something I'm having fun with. If I make money on it, that's great. Uh and I hope I do, but it's uh it's about a family. Uh uh and really I think the the protagonist in the whole thing might be the family and the and the nemesis thing. Now there's not one particular character early on there is, but it becomes a family thing. It's the McCall family and how the this kind of progresses through the years. They uh they all take part in this nemesis organization. So that's what I'm doing.

Mike Gonzalez 31:25

If our listeners would like to find uh this latest series of books, or your first book that uh you mentioned was entitled Hogan's Boy, A Journey in Golf, where do they go to find those?

John Mahaffey 31:36

Amazon.com.

Mike Gonzalez 31:38

There we go.

John Mahaffey 31:39

How about that?

Bruce Devlin 31:40

They've got everything. Just type in John Mahaffey and it'll bring it up.

John Mahaffey 31:44

Type in John Mahaffey, and if you have an issue with it, just go to filters. That drops you down to books.

Mike Gonzalez 31:51

There you go. So uh I don't think you mentioned to us, or for our listeners, Hogan's boy. Tell us a little bit about how you got that nickname.

John Mahaffey 32:00

Well, uh actually the the guy that helped me write that book, and uh actually I wrote all the text in the book mostly. Uh John Caden, who I think you know, Bruce.

Bruce Devlin 32:10

I I I remember meeting him.

John Mahaffey 32:13

Yeah, once or twice.

Bruce Devlin 32:14

Yeah, right.

John Mahaffey 32:15

Anyway, he he was back, he was back in Houston back in the in the day. Anyway, uh he was responsible for doing a lot of the statistics and stuff like that and getting the chronology right, things like that. Uh but he said we were trying to figure out, you know, back in the day, what are we going to call this book? Uh you know, what kind of title. Uh and he says, well, what did the first uh what did uh what happened when you first met Sam Sneed? And when I first met Sam Sneed, it was at Sedgefield, a tournament that he'd won like ten times. I was a rookie. And I walk up, and this is the final round, we're tied, tenth place. I walk up to him, and again, like when I met first met Hogan, my hands are shaking like this, and Mr. Sneed, I'm John Mahathi says, No, you're not, you're Hogan's boy. You know, and he he and Hogan were not the best of friends. They were okay, you know, but they weren't always the best of friends. They, you know, that rivalry was pretty strong. So all the way through the round, he he'd hit a shot and say, Hogan would never try that. Hogan could never do this, you know, that whatever. And then years later, and we ended up tying for 10th. We both shot the same thing the last round. So uh years later, JC and I, uh JC Sneed, his nephew and I became very good friends. I was up at his farm in Virginia, and Sam was getting, was nearing uh the end. And uh JC said, Hey, you want to go see Unk? And I said, Yeah, I'd love to. He says, Well, he's just right around the mountain. So we go around the mountain, and uh JC opens the screen door, knocks on the door, and goes in, and Sam's kind of laying on the couch with with a throw over his legs and stuff, watching TV. And he says, Hey, Unk, he says, I think I got somebody here you might know. And I walk in, he says, Oh, hell, that's Hogan's boy.

Bruce Devlin 34:02

So never forgot.

John Mahaffey 34:04

No, he never forgot. Uh so you know, we had a nice visit and he showed me his basement, which very few people got to see with all his trophies that he brought back from Africa and every golf club he'd ever had, and every Wilson bag. And that and that old uh mallet and the lead that they used to go off to lie their clubs with, yeah, all that was down there in that basement and uh had a marvelous visit with him. Sadly, we lost him very soon thereafter, but uh that's how we got the name Hogan's Boy.

Mike Gonzalez 34:31

Yeah, I'll be done. So, Bruce, uh, there's a couple of questions we like to always ask our guest. Maybe you can ask him the first one, huh?

Bruce Devlin 34:38

That's true. Yeah, so John, if you knew what you know now when you first started playing this game, what would you have done differently?

John Mahaffey 34:52

Well, there's two things. Obviously, I'd changed my lifestyle. No doubt about that.

Bruce Devlin 34:57

That's the first one, right?

John Mahaffey 34:58

That's the first one. I would have definitely done that because the other was going nowhere fast. And uh the other would be I'd work harder from 50 yards in. There you go on my golf game. You know. Uh I hit way too many drivers and two irons, and I was good at both of those, but not as good from 50 yards in as I should have been, and not as good a putter as I could have been.

Mike Gonzalez 35:20

You know, normally when we get to this point in our talk with these guys, Bruce, I I uh we generally have a good idea of what the answer is to this next question, but I don't. And so I will ask it.

Bruce Devlin 35:31

I don't either.

Mike Gonzalez 35:32

We'll give you one career mulligan, where would you take it?

John Mahaffey 35:44

Wow. I don't know. You know what? I mean, every shot I hit was planned out, so I don't know that I would uh I don't have an answer. I really don't. I mean, I can say well, there's actually two, all right? But neither one of them was my fault. Uh at when I lost the U.S. Open to Jerry Payton in Atlanta in 86. Uh on 16, a little uphill par four. I drove it down the right side of the fairway, and it drove the fairway usually slopes right to left. It kicked right in the first six inches of the rough. Well, you and I both know in U.S. opens that's the worst rough to play in. That's the strongest, the the thickest. And I made bogey there. Um the the second one would be the T-shot at 18, where I try to hit it down the left side, and I hit it down the left side, it kicks hard left. Again, six inches in the first cut of rough. And then I try to hit a four wood out of there because I got I have to try this shot. I've already been second in the open before.

Bruce Devlin 36:50

Yeah.

John Mahaffey 36:50

All right. Uh that's like kissing your sister. That ain't that good. Okay. You know? So uh those would be my two I'd like to have back if the kick was proper. You know, uh wow. That's a good question.

Mike Gonzalez 37:03

Yeah. Well, it's a good answer too, because it's two shots you you hit fine, just just get bad breaks. You know, we've you can imagine the the variety of answers we've had from from other guys. Some guys, same thing, said, you know, I I don't want to do over. Uh Jack Nicholas didn't even talk about mulligans for himself. He talked about three other guys' shots. Yeah.

John Mahaffey 37:24

Yeah. Yeah.

Bruce Devlin 37:26

Interesting.

John Mahaffey 37:26

Another great guy to play with that that you think would be intimidating. First time first time I played with him, I walked up to him. It was at the tournament, we're at at uh World Series of Golf at Akron. And uh I walked up to him and you know, shook hands with him. I said, I bet you're scared to death playing with me today. And the look on his face, because he knew he knew I was petrified. And it's and I thought it worked because he hit like three wood off that first T and pulled it in that left bunker, right?

Bruce Devlin 37:55

Yeah, not good.

John Mahaffey 37:56

And I drove it right down the middle. I said, Well, I got it, boy, I got him. And he takes this whatever he hit, eight iron out of the hits it a foot from the hole. You know, I hit it behind the old three putt. He makes three, I make five. I said, Yeah, I got it. I got it.

Mike Gonzalez 38:08

Right where I wanted. So, John, uh try to imagine now we've got uh avid golfers who are interested in golf history, and they're sitting down listening 50 years from now to this podcast. What else would you want them to know about John Mahaffey?

John Mahaffey 38:28

That I was probably the luckiest guy that ever lived for what's happened to me, the grace that I've been given, uh for the the second chances, the third and fourth chances that I've been allowed for being able to be at the right place at the right time with the right people and to make some of the greatest friends that anybody could ever have in the game and outside.

Mike Gonzalez 38:50

Well, Bruce, that's a great place to leave it.

Bruce Devlin 38:54

Yeah, it is a great place, and I was just gonna say it's uh it's been our real pleasure to have you today, John. We uh we hope that uh the people folks in the future will get a chance to listen to the John Mahaffey story because it is a very interesting story. You've been a great friend for a long time, and I thank you. Thanks for being with us today. It's been a pleasure, our pleasure.

John Mahaffey 39:19

Well, thank you, Bruce and Mike. Thanks so much. You guys were great. Uh I'd do this again in a heartbeat. You guys are that good.

Mike Gonzalez 39:27

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. But until we tee it up again for the good of the game, so long, everybody. It went smack down the fairways. When it's hard at this place just snitched off line. It heard it for two, but it bounced off.