Lee Trevino - Part 1 (The Early Years)

Mike Gonzalez 0:15

Welcome to another edition of FORE the Good of the Game and Bruce Devlin. I was going to do this opener in Spanish and I realized two things. One, I don't speak it that well. And two, I'm not sure our guests would understand me anyway, but uh he was supposed to be one of our first guests over a year ago when we first got started. And I'll tell you this with all due respect to your ball striking, Bruce, this guy could make his ball talk in different languages.

Bruce Devlin 0:42

Well, isn't that the truth? Not only that, but he is the only professional golfer that has ever put me to bed.

Lee Trevino 0:53

Many times.

Bruce Devlin 1:01

One of the truly great and look, people talk about the great ball strikers that have ever played this game, and uh two names come up all the time, Ben Hogan and Lee Trevino. And uh I can assure you I've played with both of them, and those two evaluations are correct. Lee, thanks for being with us, buddy.

Lee Trevino 1:21

Thank you. Thanks for today. Hey, Mike, how are you? Good to see you guys. Yeah, we've been trying to do this thing for quite a while. Uh great compliment telling me that I was a ball striker, and so was Hogan. Uh, you know, they asked me that question all the time, and uh I I I I never call myself a great ball striker. I was a kind of a scrambler. Uh I I could do what I wanted to do with a golf ball. But you can't leave Sam Sneed out of there, you know. This Sam Sneed was pretty good. I mean, this guy was fantastic when he came that. But you know, you you're going back talking about putting you to bed and stuff. We had some great times. I think one of the first times I've uh I I ever saw you, I and you I don't know if you remember this or not, uh, but I I went to Sydney and we were having a tournament at Yerriera in Melbourne. And I went and stopped and seen Sandy, and he was making those irons. Uh, you remember the Australian blades?

Bruce Devlin 2:16

Slazenges. Yeah. Sasenges.

Lee Trevino 2:18

Yes, and he made me this set of irons, and he delivered them on Wednesday when we played the Pro Am uh at Yerriera. And uh you and I, if I'm not mistaken, tied and you beat me in the playoff, or you beat me by one shot in the tournament. I remember that. Yeah, I remember it. I've I used those clubs.

Bruce Devlin 2:36

Playoff. Beat you in the playoff at the 17th.

Lee Trevino 2:39

That's what it was, yes. I thought it was a playoff. And you know, and I used those clubs. Uh I used those clubs for so many years. Uh, I won the uh I won the major, I won some major championships with those clubs. Yeah. That was one of the greatest irons I had ever seen. And he was one fabulous club maker, this guy. Yeah.

Bruce Devlin 2:59

Yes, he was. He was.

Lee Trevino 3:01

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 3:02

So while we're on the subject, let's hear about this incident because Lee Gloria was the one that told me this story about at some point you putting him to bed.

Lee Trevino 3:11

Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 3:11

I don't remember all the details.

Lee Trevino 3:13

Well, I'll tell you one thing. I was sober enough where I didn't get in there with him. So we we absolutely enjoyed life. It was different back then. Uh not a lot of the wives traveled, uh, as you well know uh when we played. Uh we had families, and the wives stayed home with the kids uh going to school and what have you. Uh but um yeah, we we like to pint here and there. Uh we we had a few uh here and there, and sometimes we had a few too many, and this is what happened to us, yeah.

Bruce Devlin 3:47

Well, that was a victory evening, if you remember. That's when I won the uh one what would be now called the World Golf Championship at uh at uh uh I believe it was Burkdale.

Lee Trevino 3:58

Yeah. Anyhow, it was it it was Burkdale. It was Burkdale, yeah.

Bruce Devlin 4:03

Yeah.

Lee Trevino 4:03

And we stayed at the at the Prince of Wales, you remember, and we used to go to Kingsway Casino across the street. That's where we got smashed over there in that casino.

Mike Gonzalez 4:17

Well, you talk about the wives traveling, and uh reminds me of a story Bruce told me. I think it involved you two guys, and it was back uh when he might have invited you to to come over and play the open at uh Royal Sydney. And uh I think your wife was with you at the time, and uh they wouldn't let you guys in the clubhouse to access the bathrooms.

Lee Trevino 4:37

Well, a lot of people don't really realize how golf evolved uh back in the old days. If you went to Britain uh uh and back back in the 30s, they wouldn't let you in the clubhouse then. The golf professional uh was not a member of the club, so he stayed, he could, he was not allowed in the clubhouse, even the golf professional that was there. So when you had a tournament and you brought the PGA in, they actually put a tent up outside. 1972, we went to Royal Sydney and and played, and the accommodations were great. I mean, they had a tent out there, uh, great food, great drink, everything else, but we were not allowed in the club. I remember when I I remember when they started back in the in the 30s, and one of the pros, you remember uh Walter Hagan hired a a limo and hired a cook and and a couple of bus boys, and they brought a table and put it in front of the clubhouse, and he had dinner in front of the clubhouse. And then I think that's when they said, you know, we need to let these pros in the clubhouse. But uh, oh yeah, Deepdale was like that in Long Island up until uh, you know, what 15 years ago. Um, but that's the way it was. If you go, for instance, here's how you can tell if you go to the National Long Island, if you notice the clubhouse is away from the pro shop. You see, the pros when you go there, you're not allowed in the clubhouse. Uh and and uh it's it's the same thing with Cyprus. If you'll notice the pro shop is away from the clubhouse. That's old school. And the great thing about it is uh we've we've gotten past that. Yeah, we've gotten past that. Everything is good now. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 6:17

Yeah. Let me mention one other thing that involves you two that I've heard Bruce talk about, and I'll let Bruce uh maybe start it out and ask you, Lee, what you recall about it. But uh I seem to remember that Bruce had a lot of luck in final rounds in contention playing with Lee Trevino. And and and Bruce, um Bruce, you can give us the detail. The bum hope.

Bruce Devlin 6:39

I don't have to give him any detail. He knows.

Lee Trevino 6:43

I got a great memory unless I don't want to remember it.

Bruce Devlin 6:47

There you go. There you go.

Lee Trevino 6:49

Uh, we were coming down the stretch uh at at uh uh and I and and Bruce had enough cotton in his mouth to knit a sweater. And uh I knew it because because we all we all choke a little bit, we have pressure, we handle it differently. But you know, uh we had three holes to go, and and he's been leading, uh so he's playing good. I mean, there's no question that he's playing well. Uh so uh I'm I I'm I'm looking at him and the whole thing. Now you have to understand that golf courses are built in a way to where you never want to go past 180. You got the 360 green, you want to go 180. If you get ever get past 180, you got troubles. You you can chip the ball up and down from front, right, left. But once you start going past that line, and now you got to chip back this way and that way, it slopes too much, it's downhill. Uh generally the green in the back is built up, so it falls down more at the back, and and you got to be more creative. So uh I remember him. I remember the club. Uh I think it was 16, and he pulled out a seven bar, and I put my hand over my mouth and said it's an eight, it's an eight. And Bruce said, Well, it's an egg. So Bruce says the eight hits it on the green two pots, ends up winning. But that wasn't the best one. The best one of all was the British Open at Living St. Anne's. We're playing and we're playing like a dog. Both of us are playing like a dog. And I've got this old McGregor driver that's got this nickel insert in it. And I mean, this thing goes about four miles, and I can hit it so straight. But I was just I was just spending too much time in the casino. That was my problem. And so we we were like dead last. And every time you play in the open championship, you always have an official with you, and he goes along with us to give rulings or whatever. So we're on the driving range, and Bruce is he's missing the driving range. The driving range is 300 yards wide, and he can't hit the range. I mean, it's awful. I mean, I'm watching him hit this driver, and I said, hell, I figure I'm gonna look for balls all day. You know, I'm gonna be looking for balls all day. So I said, Here, hit my driver. See what you can do with mine. And man, he killed it. He absolutely killed this driver right down the middle of the fairway. And I said, Well, man, he said, Yeah, he said, that's great. He said, What the hell is that gonna do for me? I said, No problem. I said, Listen, Bruce, we're gonna go out there. I said, Let's use the same driver. He said, Well, how are you gonna do that? I said, Well, if I got the honor, I will drive, and the official will be looking down the fairway to see where the ball's going, and you walk right up and take my driver and hand me yours. And we did this for the whole round. Yeah, we only won like $50 anyway. What the hell? We were having a ball. Yeah, but he drove it good. He drove it well.

Bruce Devlin 9:54

You've got to add the story about talking to the RA secretary at a dinner, though, when he would not believe what you just said.

Lee Trevino 10:03

Yeah, yeah, I wouldn't believe it. I said, Well, what so what? I said, Don't pay me. Well, what it was you you couldn't buy a steak for what you and I won that day. Uh, we had a ball.

Bruce Devlin 10:17

We had a ball, that's right.

Mike Gonzalez 10:19

As you can imagine, having already talked to 41 of your your old uh running mates, uh, we've had some great stories about life on the road back in the day, the things you guys had to endure, uh, because it was certainly different than the days of today.

Lee Trevino 10:36

Oh, I I mean it was it was unbelievable. I remember playing the Ryder Cup uh in uh I think with Walton Heath. And uh we we were playing extremely well. And uh Dave Maher was the captain at the time, and I was gonna be first on Sunday out, and I was playing Sam uh I I I I had no clue who I actually was playing. So I came down in the hotel lobby to catch a ride, and nobody was there to pick me up to take me to the club so I could eat breakfast. I teed off at 7:30. And uh it was a pretty good drive. We were staying, you know, downtown, and Sam Torrance comes down the stairs and he says, uh they all call me Max. He said, Max, he said, uh what time are you playing? I said, 7:30. He said, Um, who you playing? He said, um uh I and and and I I said I have no clue. He said, well you want to ride? I said love a ride. So he gets in the car and he's taking the rights and the lefts and the rights and the lefts. And I said, Sam, I gotta get to the club. I gotta tee off at 7.30. He said, Don't worry about it. He said, We're going to London. He said, I'm gonna get a half a point today. You're playing me. So we don't if we don't show up, we get we each get a half a point. So, anyway, so we went out there and played, and I beat him seven and six. They hadn't even cleaned up the breakfast dishes by the time we got back. You know, we were only out there about an hour. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 12:08

And that was your last Ryder Cup in 1981, as a matter of fact, at Walton Heath, wasn't it?

Lee Trevino 12:13

We had a we had a team there. I'm gonna tell you something. Sandy Lyle shot 62 and lost. Oh yeah. We we we had a team that or Tom Kite shot 61. Yeah. Walton Heath. Yeah. We we had a team there. We had a team there. That was the year that um that Larry Nelson beat uh, if I'm not mistaken, beat Sevy every round. Uh Sevy never uh he couldn't beat Larry Nelson. We beat him in the team. Yeah. Nelson made it like a 40-footer on the last hole to win one up. Yeah, Nelson could really play. He was a cool customer, yeah. He was.

Mike Gonzalez 12:46

Yeah, I think his first two Ryder Cups, he was either 7-0 or 9-0 or something like that in his first two rider cups.

Lee Trevino 12:53

Yeah, I could never figure out, I I I've never questioned it, but I I I I've never figured out why he was never a a uh Ryder Cup captain. Yeah. No, I I never could understand that. And and I didn't, you know, I didn't say anything to the PJ or anything, but I was wondering, I don't know how they pick him. Yeah. I know neither.

Mike Gonzalez 13:14

That's that's come up a lot from our our guests and also from our listeners who've have wandered that over the years. So yeah, as we always do, Lee, in telling your story, we we might as well start at the beginning. And uh, while a lot of this is well known, it's in your book, uh just take us through those early years growing up uh growing up in Texas.

Lee Trevino 13:34

Well, I mean it it was uh it was a farm, uh cotton farm out in Rallett, Texas, which is uh about 40 miles outside of Dallas. And um, and then I I moved with my granddad uh uh in Dallas. My dad, my granddad was I didn't know my dad didn't and my uh my uh uh my granddad raised me. My granddad was a gray digger, to tell you the truth, that's what he was. And I never pursued the game, I didn't know anything about it, but I lived next door to a golf course. I lived next door to VAC, which became Glen Lakes. They played a lot of ladies' golf tournaments there. And I used to caddy a little bit at a younger age, which most of us did back in those days. Uh that's how we picked picked it up. Uh today it's not that that doesn't happen anymore. But anyway and I didn't I didn't pursue the game. I I didn't do anything. I was a kind of on my own raising myself. Uh I've kind of been on my own since I was eight years old. Uh uh and so uh and and I'm amazed and so is everybody else that I got to where I'm at from where I came from and how I was uh I was raised. And then I dropped out at the age of fourteen and and um uh just kind of did odd jobs here and there and everywhere. Still not playing any golf or doing anything. And then I got in um a little trouble, I guess you could say, um uh with another kid. Uh we were messing around taking things that would didn't belong to us and and uh Dallas's finest got a hold of me and said, uh how old are you? I said, seventeen and he says, uh I'm gonna be seventeen. I said in a month and he said, I need you to talk to someone and so he took me to the Marine Corps recruiter and uh I ended up in I ended up going in the Marine Corps, which is the best thing that I ever did. It it absolutely settled me down. It gave me some vision. Uh I decided to do what uh the right thing and uh I spent four years in there, uh in the Marine Corps. And I I I still hadn't played much golf, you know, I was here and there as a caddy and out in the parking lots and what have you. And I got out of the Marine Corps uh in 1960. I went to work on a construction crew building a golf course here in Dallas at the Columbian Club, New Dine Holt. And I started playing a little bit, and I was getting better and better, and I was beating everybody out of their dollars every day. And a guy noticed me at a driving range in a par three course, and he says, uh, You need to go to work for me. He said, I think that uh you've got some potential. So I went to work for him and naturally he had a driving range for this is where I've told him the driver. And then he had a par three course, and this is where the wedge came from. We didn't have a putting green. I was never a great putter. I you the Bruce will tell you that when I was on a hot putting streak like I was on 71, I was very difficult to beat because I didn't hit the ball crooked. I didn't hit it crooked. So I hit the greens, I hit a lot of greens. And uh if I putted, yeah, I was I was tough to beat. But you know, I know it's a hard I I know it's hard to believe, but I really, really didn't start playing golf and got serious about it until I was almost 23.

Bruce Devlin 16:58

Yeah.

Lee Trevino 16:58

Twenty-three years old. Larry Nelson started when he was twenty-two, got out of the army.

Bruce Devlin 17:02

Yeah.

Lee Trevino 17:03

And the first tournament that I entered after I had practiced four years and I had never played in a tournament, you know, pro ams, local pro ams and stuff, but a tournament I never played. And the first one I ever played was at Houston, uh in Houston was the Texas State Open, and it was at Sharpstown. And all the Houston team was there. Homero Blancas, uh Homero Blancas was there, uh Fred Marty was there, uh all the guys that that were Toscano uh was there. Yeah, and I ended up winning the tournament in the playoff over a kid from Dallas, Frank Wharton was his name.

Bruce Devlin 17:44

Remember him.

Lee Trevino 17:45

And what you coach Williams comes up to me after I won and he says, Who the hell are you? He said, Who the hell are you? I said, I'm nobody. He said, Where did you come from? I said, I'm I'm from a little small town outside of Dallas, and I learned to play on a driving range and stuff. The reason that I and and Bruce will tell you this. The reason that I was such a good maneuver of the golf ball, you know what I was good at? I was good at flight. Flighting the ball. In other words, if I wanted to go 30 feet up, I could go 30 feet up. I could hit it, I could hit five balls the same height, or I could go higher. I could flight my ball. See, people that can't flight a golf ball, I mean, they're control the length. They can't control the length. That's exactly right. So I could flight it, and the reason for it is because I was a range rat. In other words, in the summertime when it was hot, nobody's coming out to that driving range to hit balls. So what did I do? I took one club and I'd walk around the driving range, and I'd hit all the balls to the middle of the range so they'd be close together where I could pick them up. All different distances. I had to work it around trees, over trees, you know, through fences and the whole thing. And that's and I did it every day. The part three course I used to play with only one club. I didn't use a putter. Uh I couldn't get then. That's when I went to the bottle. You know, I couldn't get a game because I was shooting so low all the time on this part three. So that I I came up with the Dr. Pepper bottle where it was a and I take the neck and I'd hit the bottle, I'd hit the ball with a bottle. And I shot 29, two over par with that bottle one time. I'd take a half a stroke of hole. Any if you wanted to gamble with me and play against me with the bottle, all I needed was a tie. I said, I'll play you with that bottle and I'll take the tie. And I'd throw the ball up like a baseball bat, and I'd hit the thing like this. I'd throw it up and I'd hit it, and I could hit it a hundred yards. I could roll it a hundred yards. And the longest hole was 120, and the shortest hole was 55 yards. Well, you know, I made some birdies with it. And then I'd put the bottle down and putt with the butter uh, you know, uh between my legs. I'd putt with it. I could put pretty no yips there, baby. One hand. One hand. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 20:12

Well, you know, I've I've heard you say and of course read a lot about uh the fact that you really didn't have instructors or a bunch of lessons, but you had to be influenced by someone somehow. Where did you pick up the various things you needed to do to develop a full game?

Lee Trevino 20:32

Let me tell you something. Up until 1963, when they had the PGA, when they had the PGA at north at uh at uh DAC, I had never heard of Jack Nicholas or Arnold Palmer. This is 1963. Uh I had never heard of any of those guys. I did meet Dutch Harrison. He came over to the to the driving range because he knew the the owner. Uh I had no clue about professional golf. Nothing. My my whole goal was to go out to Tennyson Park and win five or six, seven dollars a day playing golf. I mean, it was a lot of money back then. And I and no one could beat me out there. I had I had a I had a plus six handicap at uh at Tennyson Park. Plus six. Now I I I I every 65 around there every day. And when we when we teamed up and I'd go out there and strangers wanted to play, they'd say, I'd say, what's your handicap? And they'd say, Oh, I'm an eight. You know there are four, but they say there's an eight. But then I'd say, I'm a scratch. Well, I was actually a plus six. So I got them by two before we tee off. Yeah. Yeah. I I don't I can never remember losing at Tennyson Park. I can just can't remember doing it. Yeah. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 21:43

Well, Jack Jack won that PGA back at DAC in 67. I watched him. Did you get to see him play?

Lee Trevino 21:49

I did. I watched him on the last round because Dave Reagan, that was before they had line of sight. And uh 17 was a small dog leg left par four. And uh They had a television tower right on the corner, and Reagan got behind it, and he and they changed the rule. Uh for some reason he didn't get line of sight. And he bogeied the whole, and Nicholas took a I think a one-shot lead in part 18 and won the tournament. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 22:18

So what did you take away from that experience of seeing Nicholas for the first time?

Lee Trevino 22:22

Well, I I didn't I didn't really watch Jack. I was kind of walking around uh, you know, watching different people uh hit shots. Um you know to tell you the truth, I I I will tell you this. I didn't even think about um that's just what I want to do. You know what I'm saying? I I didn't even think about it. I uh I fell into that after I had won that tournament uh in in 65. Uh then you know people were saying, you know, you can you could probably you know get um get on tour. And how I got on there is when I finished fifth at Baldestraw in 67. I qualified. And when I finished fifth at Baldestra, I got some invitations to play in the tournament, uh, which I didn't know. The first invitation actually was the Canal, was the Western Open. I think it was at Beverly at the time. And then the next one they get yeah, and then they sent me one to play um the um Carling, I think it was in Canada.

Bruce Devlin 23:26

World Open? Yeah, right.

Lee Trevino 23:27

Yeah, the World Open that I got there and then they invited me to play in Westchester. So all of a sudden I got three invitations. So I went to this is a funny story. I went so I I I took my wife and my daughter and I put them in the 65 Plymouth station wagon, and we decided to drive to Minnesota to qualify on Monday to be a rabbit to see if I could get a little little tune-up before I went to the Western Open. So we drove all the way playing Hazel team. And we were we were qualifying on Monday, and I shot 77 or 78. You can look it up if I'm not mistaken. And all the cars were parked right in front of the clubhouse in the field there. And Wade Cagle, uh, I was packing all my car up because I shot 78, I think it was. I figured there's no way that I'm gonna make this tournament. I did not know that they had 62 spots, and I'm packing my car, and back in those days you could call anybody whatever you wanted to. There, my nickname was Pinto Bean. Hey, Pinto Bean, everybody call me Pinto Bean. So Wade Tagel comes by. He says, Hey, Pinto Bean. He says, Where are you going? I said, wait, I shot 78. I said, Hell, I'm going, I'm going to Chicago. He said, What are you talking about? He said, We got 62 spots here. I said, I shot 78. He said, Hell, you're leading. That's how hard, that's how hard. Hazel. Well, it was hard. We had never seen anything like that, Bruce. We'd never seen a course like that. We've been playing these Donald Ross courses and and Tillingheads courses and stuff, which are short and open and facing you and bunkers to the right, you know, and to the left, no fairway bunkers. All of a sudden, we show up at this course where the the rough was a foot high. Dave Hill, what did Dave Hill tell him? They ruined a great farm. He said they said they ruined a great farm here. But um I I I I I mean that course was really difficult, really difficult. And we had never seen anything like it. And I've never seen anything like it since, except PJ West. PJ West, in my opinion, if you get on that back T at PJ West, it's all you want. It's really a difficult, really a difficult course. So I ended up going to these all these tournaments. I was the PJ member, class A. If you were a PJ member, you could you could uh if you were a PJ member, uh you you you could participate or qualify for these tournaments. And if you made the cut on Friday, you were automatically in the next tournament. So I went up and and uh I I I started going and I I wasn't missing any cuts, so I just kept going. And ended up playing thirteen tournaments. And to qualify for rookie of the year you have to play sixteen. But since I made thirteen cuts in a row and and and and played thirteen tournaments, I won thirty-three thousand dollars for the year. And Hawaii was the last one. And I ended up getting rookie of the year with thirteen tournaments. They gave it to me because no one was even close to me in scoring and everything. So but uh you know, I uh but that's what one of the things that I'm proud of more than anything. I know I won the majors and do all this stuff, but the scoring average is is got a lot to do with uh that that that's that's where you're you're at. That's how you get in the Hall of Fame and stuff. You gotta win majors, but you gotta look at a guy's scoring average, and I I won that thing five times. Yeah, I won it five times. But I wouldn't have won it all five times if Nicholas would have played enough rounds. A couple of times Nicholas actually was lower than I, but I think you had to play 18 tournaments, maybe, to qualify for the uh uh for the Boydon trophy, which is low scoring. Yes. Yeah, yeah. I I I think you had to qualify for that. You had to play 18 tournaments. Nicholas only played 16. But he his score is actually lower than mine, yeah. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 27:34

Well, I you know, I could spend uh Bruce probably the next 30 minutes just recounting Lee's record and accomplishments on tour. But uh just uh some of the highlights for our listeners. 92 professional wins, including 29 PGA tour victories. That ties in for 17th on the all-time list. And oh, by the way, 13 of those guys are older than Lee, so they played many in a different area. And also to get a match set uh 29 victories also on the senior tour. And he is third there behind Hale Irwin, who we've talked to with 45 wins, or who we just talked to with 43 wins. So quite a record six majors as we've alluded to uh Jack being uh the recipient of uh being second in four of those. And I'm sure at some point we'll get to talk about each of those F major championship winners as a five times. Trophy winner, the F the PJ player of the year in 71, which was an outstanding year. Fon a lot of other things moneyless, Byron Nelson. Uh he won he won a tournament every year from 68 to 81, which is an incredible stretch of consistent golf. Um a whole lot of stuff to talk about, Lee. But if we get back to the U.S. Open, because I think those first three for you were quite important. I mean, they're just different milestones. You qualified for your first one at Olympic Club in 66, uh, you know, Desta, Texas, and uh made 600 bucks making the cut, didn't you? Yeah.

Lee Trevino 29:04

Yeah. Um I made the cut. I finished 54th, I think, in that tournament or something like that. Uh and I'd never seen rough like that. You know, I'm I'm used to playing a public golf course where they mow the golf course with one more. You know, I mean, they don't have they don't have six more to mow at different different uh heights, you know. Oh, this is the first cut, oh, this is the second cut, and this is this is no, no, no, no. No, you play tennis in Park East, they got one more. It's probably five gangs, they're going around trees, they mow it once a week, and that's it. Well, I got to Olympic and and man, I I I looked at that fescue or whatever they had there, man, and I couldn't get out of it because I flat. I stood away from the ball a long way, as Bruce can tell you. I didn't stand away from it. I'm 5'7, and I'm I'm a I'm a flat swinger, and I, man, I said I was laying the sod right over it. But but what carried me there was the driver, and actually I was uh the only hole I had a difficult time hitting was 17. That hole that went up the hill and dog led the left because it sloped so much from left to right that I'd hit a cut up there and it would run down in the rough every time. Run down. But 18, no problem. I'd drive it down the bottom, you know, put it on the green. Um, but I was there. I felt so bad for Arnold Palmer. You know, that's that's when Arnold Palmer had a seven-shot lead with nine holes to go and he lost. He and he he met Cash for time. But uh I I didn't play, you know, it was my first one. I didn't know if I wanted to go back and play a U.S. Open because uh because of the difficulty. And and my my uh my ex-wife says to me, she says, You gotta try it one more time. She said it was 20 bucks. And I mean, uh so we sent the 20 bucks to go back, and that's when I qualified for a DAC, I think it was, Dow South L Club. I made Eagle on 13 or something to you know to make it. I think I had the fourth spot there. We had four spots. I think I got the fourth spot, and then we went to Baldurstraw. Yeah, that's the first time I had seen Jack Nicholas was at Baldurstra. And if you've ever been to Baldurstra, the Pro Shop's up high, and there's a suspension bridge that goes from the pro shop to the parking lot, and the putting green is down below, maybe 20 feet down below you. It's kind of in this little dungeon down there. And as I'm walking, I had a uh the Cadillac uh agency guy there uh wanted me to have a beer with him, so I went up and sat at the patio, and he says, Uh, would you like a beer? I said, I love beer. So I drank the beer, and you know, me, you know, being from Texas, it doesn't take long to drink a beer. And uh so I put it down. He said, Would you like another one? So the next thing you know, I drink. He says, Well, you you I buy them, you just drink them. I said, Okay, so after about eight, he said, Damn, I never see anybody drink this much beer. I said, I this is nothing. I said, We we we do the this is it's hot down there, we don't drink water. I said, We just drink this stuff. So, anyway, so I'm leaving, it's already dark. So I'm leaving to go out to get the the car and uh to go to the hotel. And I'm walking over the suspension bridge and I see this little white object moving in the dark back and forth, and I can't tell who it is. And I said, uh somebody came along and I said, Who is that? He said, That's Nicholas. I said, Mr. Nicholas? He said, Yeah, he said he's practicing his putting straw. I said, You gotta be joking. He said, Yeah. Come to find out, it was a white bullseye that Dean Beaman had given him that week there. Because Jack wasn't putting good with his Wizard 600. So Jack says, so Beaman says, You need to try this bullseye. And Beaman gave him that uh gave him that white bullseye. He had painted it white, and that's remember that's the one Nicholas won that tournament with. Yeah. Yeah. Uh-huh. Yes, sir. I I I I could have done better there. Uh I got nervous. I finished fifth, and I'll tell you why I got nervous is I didn't know the rules that well. And do you remember they had continuous putting? And a couple of and a couple of times I got scared about marking my ball, so I reached over to try to make a couple of two-footers and I missed them both. Yeah. Yeah. I was playing with January. I'd never seen anybody get out of the rough like January because he stands so tall over the ball. He's not flat. And um uh I I played with Dave Hill, I think it was, in uh in January. I put it with a I put it with a bullseye heavy blade uh offset. And I broke it, and you're not gonna believe this, and I broke it trying to bend it, because you could those bullseyes would break easy. And for fifty years I've been looking for another one, and I've never found one.

Bruce Devlin 34:03

I'll be dying.

Lee Trevino 34:04

I never found one. I tell you, I look in the eBay, I look everywhere. I asked people, and I've never found another one. Yeah. They tried to make me one, they tried to make me one, but it didn't, yeah, it wasn't the same. It was an offset. It's called an offset heavy blade.

Bruce Devlin 34:22

I don't think I've ever seen one.

Lee Trevino 34:24

Yeah, it's a bullseye. I know a guy that had one, but uh he won a tournament with he won't. Gabby Gilbert has one.

Bruce Devlin 34:30

Does he really?

Lee Trevino 34:32

Yeah, I wouldn't putt with it anyway. I mean, these things they're making today are self-shooters anyway, you know. If your nerves good, you know. I mean, case in point. Look at the scores on the PJ tour. You know, everybody says, oh, but they drive it so far. Baloney, look what they look how they putt.

Bruce Devlin 34:49

Yeah.

Lee Trevino 34:49

And that's a lot to do with the equipment, the balance of the putter, the shafts, you know, the way they they've they've figured it out. Science is is is real. I mean, it's real. I mean, there's a lot of lot a lot of good stuff out there today. A lot of good stuff.

Mike Gonzalez 35:04

Of course, the green conditions are a little bit better than what you guys played on, too.

Lee Trevino 35:08

Well, we used to we used to putt on the tees. In other words, if you go and play a golf course and tee the ball up on the T, that's what Bruce and I putted on. Yeah. And that's why that heavy blade, we had to have a heavy putter. Yeah. We couldn't put with a with with a uh, you know, with a light putter. It had to be heavy. Yeah. A lot of a lot of mallets back then. Heavy mallets. Yeah.

Mike Gonzalez 35:29

Heavy mallets.

Lee Trevino 35:29

That's what I use, a heavy mallet. Yeah. Had to be.

Mike Gonzalez 35:32

That's why two footers weren't gimme's, were they?

Lee Trevino 35:35

Oh no. I missed a nine-incher on core in Japan one time and I lined up. I marked it, put it down, and and I didn't touch the hole. And I think I was like nine inches. I said, holy moly. You know, that core right, that thing. That thing, you had to be careful when you teed your ball up, it'd cut your finger. I'm telling you, that grass was. That grass was tough.

Mike Gonzalez 35:58

Maybe that's why Captain Sam Sneed thought Tony Jacqueline should have putted that putt in the writer cup that Nicholas gave him. Yeah.

Lee Trevino 36:06

Oh, I I I thought that was a pretty good gesture. I I that'll go down in I think that'll go down in history, you know. You know, um uh is is uh sportsmanship. This game's about, you know, this is when we get along so well. I mean, come on. I mean, I don't know about Bruce, but I I've I played out there what 20 years and stuff. I never I broke up. Uh a couple of guys were gonna get into it in the locker room one time, and I got in between them and told him, I said, listen, guy, where are you going with it? Are you gonna kill each other or what? Because if you're not gonna kill this guy, then why the hell hit him? You know, because he might get mad and kill you. You better leave it alone. And uh, we never had any problems.

Mike Gonzalez 36:50

It was at this moment in the interview that uh Bruce's wife Gloria Devlin entered Bruce's studio to say hello to good friend Lee Trevino. Well, look who we got here.

Lee Trevino 37:02

Hey! How are you, honey? You look fabulous. How are you? Good to I tell you what, you're taking good care of that old dog right there. I can tell that.

Mike Gonzalez 37:15

Bruce, you gotta relay what least uh staying to her because she can't hear you. Oh, yeah.

Bruce Devlin 37:22

I'll I'll tell her. I'll tell her. She wanted to come in and say hi to you.

Lee Trevino 37:28

That's great. Thank you. Thank you.

Bruce Devlin 37:30

She she always tells the story about flying from Australia to Los Angeles with Lee Trevino when she had our youngest boy, Kurt, who was I don't know, he was three or four years old or something, and and he slept all away, and Lee kept saying to Gloria, hey Gloria, I think that boy's dead. I mean, how can he he's not even moving? What's going on with him?

Lee Trevino 37:57

He never moved. I mean, it was about 15-hour flight. Oh my God. How about Gary? Gary Flair would get on a plane and then and then he'd he'd go to the front and and sleep on the floor.

Bruce Devlin 38:10

Yeah.

Lee Trevino 38:10

And then and then he would, and then when they stopped, we stopped in the Canary Islands one time to to uh refuel. And he got off the plane and ran up. He was running up and down the uh landing strip. Yeah, he was getting extra. He was running up and down the I'll tell you what, it m he he he did it right though, because I I just saw him last week and he looks fabulous. He's 86.

Bruce Devlin 38:36

He does look great. Yeah, he looks great.

Lee Trevino 38:38

He can hit it too. He can still move that ball out there at 86.

Bruce Devlin 38:42

Yeah, yeah, that's great. He loves to play. He loves to play.

Lee Trevino 38:46

He plays every day.

Bruce Devlin 38:47

Yeah.

Lee Trevino 38:48

He plays I like it too, but um, you know, I I I don't play much anymore. It doesn't do a lot for me. If some friends come in town or something, I'll go out and play nine holes or something. I play with the dog, the dog, and I played dog all the time.

Bruce Devlin 39:03

You played with the dog. You played with the dog yesterday. I know that because he sent me a little text. Sent me a little text last night, and he said, Oh, I see where Lee's gonna do the podcast with you tomorrow. So you must I saw Yeah, you must have filled him in.

Lee Trevino 39:22

Yeah, I filled him in. I actually were playing with uh I was actually playing with Lee Michael and Cameron Don, the pro out there, and Ishabrenner, my sponsor, came in from uh El Paso and we played uh a quick 18. Yeah, yeah. But I see the dog every day. He looks good. Yeah, he does.

Bruce Devlin 39:40

Yeah, yeah, so do you know how he got his name, dog?

Lee Trevino 39:46

No, I have the putter. I still have a putter with dog on it. But I I don't I I thought that was his initials, but it's not because his middle name is not Anthony. Uh Anthony, that's a D-A-G.

Mike Gonzalez 40:00

Yeah, it's Anthony David Graham, I think.

Bruce Devlin 40:03

So when we were we were on a flight going from Sydney to Adelaide uh with a guy by the name of Alan Murray, who you may have met, who came over here and played on the tour a little bit. And David arrived with a beautiful, you know, typical David Graham, you know, dressed to the hilt, nothing out of place, had this new leather uh duffel bag with him, right? And he gets up during the flight and goes to the bathroom, and Alan Murray pulls that bag out and it's got D A G on it. So he takes a big marking pen and he went right over the A and turned it into an O. To an O. To an O. He said, that's what your name is. You're a dog. And it's stuck. It's stuck. It's stuck forever.

Lee Trevino 40:57

You know, I he gave me a putter that I guess Scotty Cameron made for him. He's got more golf clubs than Arnold Palmer. I don't know where the hell he puts them. Um he he he he he pull hooks everything because naturally he can't uh turn as like he used to. So I play with him, I play with him a lot. We play nine holes. We hit practice balls almost every time I go out, we get together. And but he's got drivers. I mean, uh he keeps thinking it's the driver. I told him, I said, you know, it's the Indian, you know, it's not the arrow, you know.

Bruce Devlin 41:40

Uh the tinker, the tinkerer of all tinkerers with golf clubs, David Gray.

Lee Trevino 41:46

He knows his clubs, he knows his clubs. He can he can really do some stuff with them, you know. Um and um very meticulate about uh what he does, you know. Uh uh, I'm like Arnold Palmer when it comes to clubs, you know. I grind them, I don't think about polishing them. As long as the grooves are not messed with, I don't care what the back looks like. He's not like that. You know.

Mike Gonzalez 42:09

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 see it again.