Now’s your chance to own one of the most famous trophies in sports. Just be prepared to pay a hefty price.
John Daly’s Claret Jug from his 1995 Open Championship victory at St. Andrews is up for auction at Golden Age Auctions. The starting bid was $500, and with a little more than three days to go until bidding closes, the price to own a rare piece of golf history is up to $152,463 (as of Thursday morning).
The jug is being sold by a consignor, who originally purchased the trophy directly from John Daly in 2015. The Claret Jug comes with a signed letter of authenticity and provenance from Daly, too.
Daly beat Costantino Rocca in a four-hole playoff to win his first Open Championship and second major title.
Earlier this year, Golden Age Golf Auctions sold Gary Player’s Claret Jug from 1974 for $481,068. That Claret Jug was a 90 percent scale of the real Claret Jug that every Champion Golfer of the Year gets to parade around for a year.
Per the listing, Daly’s Claret Jug is “sterling silver (hallmarked), and measures 12 ¼” tall (50 percent scale of permanent traveling Claret Jug). The magnificent case measures 14 ¼” x 8 ½” and is embossed with the R&A logo on its silk-lined interior.”
As of Thursday morning, there have been 66 bids for Daly’s Claret Jug.
“Neither of the 1974 Masters Trophy nor the 1974 Open Trophy were sold by me or by one of my companies.”
The sale of Gary Player’s Claret Jug from winning the 1974 British Open is being contested by… Gary Player.
As reported on Monday, Golden Age Auctions sold a replica Claret Jug, which had been purchased by Player’s company, Black Knight International, and had been on display at its office – first in Palm Beach, Florida, and later at The Cliffs in South Carolina. It has been auctioned for the sum of $481,068. The auction attracted 39 bids in all, with the high bidder exceeding the previous bid by $80,000.
Player earned the trophy for his wire-to-wire win at Royal Lytham & St. Annes Golf Club, his third triumph at the British Open in a Hall of Fame career that included nine major titles.
Player read several of the stories noting the sale of the jug, a 90 percent-sized replica version of the original given to the champion for permanent keeping. It had been in the custody of Player’s design company until a previous sale during COVID-19 and controlled by his son, Marc, his ex-manager. The two had a falling out several years ago that ended up in the courts with Gary Player awarded $5 million in a legal dispute over unpaid royalties. In 2022, he filed a separate lawsuit against son, Marc, and grandson, Damian, alleging they had sold or tried to sell memorabilia despite an agreement requiring the items be returned.
“I feel that it is necessary for me to correct inaccuracies contained in those articles,” Player wrote in a post on X, the former Twitter. “Neither of the 1974 Masters Trophy nor the 1974 Open Trophy were sold by me or by one of my companies. Each of these trophies was granted to me for my sole use and enjoyment as winner of the respective majors. The person entrusted with ensuring the safekeeping of these items on my behalf and who was tasked with using them to enshrine my golfing achievements has done the opposite by offering them for sale without my consent and against my wishes. My legal team is taking appropriate steps to resolve this unlawful situation.”
Player issued a similar statement when the trophy was originally sold during a public auction in November 2020 for $143,020. The value of collectibles has exploded in recent years, and Player’s Claret Jug has turned a tidy profit for its owners.
“Unfortunately Mr. Player’s statements about the sale of replica trophies are not accurate. Shortly after the COVID pandemic began, Gary Player’s company had serious cash flow issues and reached out to a number of auction houses to sell its collection of replica trophies in order to meet payroll,” Ryan Carey, President of Golden Age Auctions said in a statement provided to Golfweek. “Golden Age then facilitated a private transaction between Gary Player’s Black Knight International company and a private buyer. The net proceeds of this sale were paid directly to Gary Player’s Black Knight International. The private buyer then sold some of the trophies, including this exact same replica 1974 Claret Jug at public auction in November 2020. Mr. Player was well aware of those sales back in 2020, and he was aware of them when he made these contradictory statements today.
“While Golden Age has the utmost respect for what Mr. Player accomplished as a golfer, his inaccurate statements are simply not acceptable under any circumstances.”
The sale this week marks the fourth time the replica trophy has been sold – twice publicly and twice privately. The latest owner of Player’s trophy has not been revealed.
Marc Player wrote in a direct message that the latest sale “has absolutely nothing to do with me” and while stating he had no “official” comment, he noted, “I find it rather strange that my father would contest it as he already sold his original Grand Slam trophy collection to Johann Rupert in South Africa [and on display there at Leopard Creek]. Perhaps best to reach out to whomever sold it for proper provenance.”
The year 1974 was a great one for Gary Player in the major championships.
The year 1974 was a great one for Gary Player in the major championships.
He won the Masters and Open Championship at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. He also placed seventh at the PGA Championship and tied for eighth at the U.S. Open. It was the only time the nine-time major champion career won two majors in the same year.
And 50 years after his victory in the United Kingdom, his replica Claret Jug has sold for nearly half a million dollars.
Golden Age Golf Auctions posted the trophy on July 18 with a starting bid of $5,000. Twenty-nine bids and 11 days later, it has sold for $481,068.
The website stated the Claret Jug is a 90 percent scale of the real Claret Jug that every Champion Golfer of the Year gets to parade around for a year. It is the first time one has been sold by the website, which has also a Tiger Woods backup putter and other golf memorabilia.
Player’s victory in the’74 Open was memorable because he led wire-to-wire and won by four shots. It was his third Open title and eighth major victory.
The lid is off now and Schauffele is going to try to keep stacking majors.
TROON, Scotland – After Xander Schauffele won his first major championship at the PGA Championship in May and finished all of his media obligations, he and his caddie and wife and some close friends retired to their rental house to celebrate. Nothing was open at that hour so they found two bottles of whiskey and nearly polished them off between the six of them.
“It was a rough next morning,” Schauffele’s caddie Austin Kaiser said. “But we’re having drinks afterwards and one of our buddies is like, ‘You feel lighter?’ And he smiled. He was like, ‘Yeah, I do,’ ” Kaiser recalled Schauffele saying.
Victory at Valhalla removed the proverbial monkey from his back. No longer stuck with the label of being the best golfer never to win a major, Schauffele said he felt relief. At the 152nd British Open, Schauffele doubled his pleasure and validated his major moment, shooting 6-under 65 in the final round at Royal Troon Golf Club on Sunday to win the Claret Jug by two strokes over Justin Rose and Billy Horschel.
“I mean, it’s a dream come true to win two majors in one year. It took me forever just to win one, and to have two now is something else,” Schauffele said.
In doing so, he became the first player since Brooks Koepka in 2018 to win two majors in a season. Schauffele carded four birdies on the final nine to turn a taut competition in which any of seven golfers seemed capable of hoisting the trophy to sucking all the drama out of the closing stretch and claiming his ninth career PGA Tour title with a 72-hole total of 9-under 275.
“Best round I’ve ever played,” said Schauffele, whose score was the best round of the day by two strokes and one of only two bogey-free rounds on the day.
“Now that he’s won two, it’s all up from here,” Kaiser said. “I told him, we got the lid off. Let’s just stack’em.”
Kaiser and Schauffele, 30, both transferred to San Diego State at the same time in 2012 and Kaiser has been on his bag since he turned pro in 2015. Kaiser remembers their humble beginnings when they were playing mini-tour events on the Golden State Golf Tour and traveling together in Kaiser’s Honda Accord, staying in Candlewood Suites and cooking sausage and eggs on a hot plate.
Schauffele quickly proved to be a player of great promise but as he piled up 12 top-10 finishes and six top-5s in his first 27 major starts without a victory, questions emerged whether he was a closer. In 2018, Schauffele was tied for the lead heading into the final round of the 2018 British Open at Carnoustie Golf Links in Scotland but carded a 2-over 72 in the final round and lost to Italy’s Francesco Molinari by 2.
“There’s calmness and super-stressful moments when you’re trying to win a major championship. I felt them in the past, the ones I didn’t win, and I let them get to me,” Schauffele said. “Today I felt like I did a pretty good job of weathering the storm when I needed to.”
Xander Schauffele celebrates with his caddie Austin Kaiser on the 18th green at the 152nd Open Championship at Royal Troon. (Warren Little/Getty Images)
In tricky conditions all week that turned Troon into a survival of the fittest, Schauffele was a model of plodding consistency, shooting rounds of 67-72-69 before his final-round brilliance. Conditions turned nastiest on Saturday afternoon with wind whipping and rain falling, but Schauffele managed to card four birdies in his first 10 holes before giving back shots at Nos. 11 and 18 to join a six-way logjam in second place, one stroke back.
On Sunday, with a brisk southwesterly wind blowing off the Firth of Clyde and gray skies, Schauffele showed great patience, starting with five pars before he went on the attack.
With nine holes to go, South Africa’s Thriston Lawrence held the lead, which was all the more remarkable given that he started the weekend 10 strokes back before shooting 65 on Saturday, tying for the low round of the week. He played his way into the final group and surged into the lead at 7 under with four more birdies on the front nine. But the 27-year-old cooled off on the back nine, losing the lead with a bogey at No. 12. The four-time winner on the DP World Tour settled for his best career finish in a major, a solo fourth that earned him a spot in next year’s Masters.
The 43-year-old Rose was attempting to win his second major more than a decade after winning the 2013 U.S. Open. He had to go through final qualifying just to make the field and put up a valiant fight until he made bogey at No. 12. He closed with a birdie at the last and posted 4-under 67.
“I left it all out there,” Rose said. “I’m super proud of how I competed.”
Horschel, the 54-hole leader, pictured himself hoisting the Claret Jug before he went to bed but hit into a pot bunker off the tee at the third, found the sand at the famed Postage Par-3 eighth and short-sided himself at No. 10, leading to bogey each time.
“Ah, Billy, Billy, Billy, you’ve made three mistakes today,” he said to himself aloud as he headed to the 11th tee. “Let’s clean it up.”
He did, signing for 68, but birdies on the final three holes came too late. Still, his T-2 finish is his best result in 43 majors.
Callum Scott won the Silver Medal for the low amateur at the Open, the first Scot to win the award since 2018.
But it was Schauffele who outshined the field, picking apart Troon’s vaunted back nine with birdies at the 11th, 13th, 14th and 16th to seal the deal. Kaiser labeled the birdie at No. 11, the second-hardest hole of the day, as the turning point. That’s where Schauffele uncorked a drive that veered left and had Kaiser praying for a good break.
“Please cut, please cut or get a good ground kick,” he recalled thinking. “Luckily it did a little bit, I guess.”
Schauffele took advantage, planting a wedge inside 3 feet and knocking in the birdie putt — he was the only player in the field to make birdie there on Sunday — to climb to 6 under. He jarred a 16-foot birdie putt at 13 to reach 7 under and never relinquished the lead once Lawrence made bogey.
“Winning the first one helped me a lot today on the back nine,” Schauffele said. “I had some feeling of calmness come through. It was very helpful on what has been one of the hardest back nines I’ve ever played in a tournament.”
Xander Schauffele celebrates on the 18th green in celebration of victory at the 152nd Open Championship at Royal Troon. (Jack Gruber-USA TODAY Sports)
Until this season, Schauffele’s most notable title had been capturing a gold medal at the Olympics held in 2021 in Toyko. In May, he canned a 5-foot birdie putt on the 72nd hole to outlast Bryson DeChambeau and win the PGA Championship at Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Kentucky. With Scottie Scheffler, who finished T-7 after shooting 72, winning the Masters in April and DeChambeau the U.S. Open last month, this marks the first time since 1982 that all four majors were won by Americans and the first time since Tiger Woods won consecutive Opens in 2006-07 that Americans went back-to-back in the Open Championship. (Brian Harman won in 2023.) Schauffele said he watched the highlights of the last time the Open was played here in 2016 as motivation and it proved effective.
“He’s obviously now learning that the winning is easy,” said Rose, who played alongside Schauffele on Sunday. “He’s got a lot of weapons out there. I think probably one of his most unappreciated ones is his mentality. He’s such a calm guy out there. I don’t know what he’s feeling, but he certainly makes it look very easy. He plays with a freedom, which kind of tells you as a competitor that he’s probably not feeling a ton of the bad stuff. He’s got a lot of runway ahead and a lot of exciting stuff ahead, I’m sure.”
Added Rose’s caddie Mark Fulcher: “When you see a round that good you take your hat off. He didn’t put a foot wrong. It was nice to be able to watch it and not have to buy a ticket because it was fantastic…You’d almost like him to be a bit of a wanker but he really couldn’t be nicer.”
In just a matter of nine weeks, Schauffele has flipped the narrative from being the nearly man who can’t close to being a serious contender for PGA Tour Player of the Year and bona fide Hall of Fame candidate. He possesses both the Wanamaker Trophy and the Claret Jug and earned the distinction of Champion Golfer of the Year. The lid is off and now Schauffele and Kaiser are going to try to keep stacking majors.
The Champion Golfer of the Year earns a big paycheck and of course the Claret Jug.
The Champion Golfer of the Year, aka the winner of the British Open, earns a large sum of money, many accolades and the historic Claret Jug. OK, not the Claret Jug. We can explain.
Harman is winless since becoming the Champion Golfer of the Year.
TROON, Scotland — His wife’s “Brian the Butcher” party, drinking fine wine and “unusually exceptional” bourbon out of the Claret Jug at Augusta National with Kevin Kisner and bringing the famed silver trophy on the field during halftime of a University of Georgia game are behind Brian Harman, and on Monday, he had to return custody of the Claret Jug to the R&A’s CEO Martin Slumbers.
“It’s been a great year,” he said during his pre-championship press conference on Monday ahead of the 2024 British Open, joking that he practiced getting out of his car one time for the ceremonial trophy return captured for posterity on video. “Yeah, a little sad to give it back, but I’ll remember everywhere it’s been forever… In my opinion, it’s the coolest trophy in all of sports. So I think it’s deserving of all of the pageantry that is involved with it.”
Harman won the title on the back of a blistering first 36 holes at Royal Liverpool in England, building a five-stroke edge and coasting to victory. He did so despite playing in a hostile environment that was rooting quite vociferously either for the home favorite, England’s Tommy Fleetwood, or the ever-popular Rory McIlroy.
“You know, I’d be lying if I didn’t hear some things that weren’t super nice today toward me,” Harman said at the time, adding, “If they wanted me to not play well they should have been really nice to me.”
Harman played it smart on Monday, saying there are no hard feelings and he praised the British Open fans.
“It doesn’t bother me. I’m ready to take whatever in stride. I’m here to play the best golf that I possibly can. That’s my main focus,” he said. “I’ve always loved the fans over here. I’ve spoken a bunch of times about how I find them the most knowledgeable fans of any that we play in front of. I kind of chalk last year up as more of an anomaly than anything else.”
A special tradition continued, The Claret Jug has returned.
Winning the Claret Jug remains the crowning achievement of the three-time PGA Tour-winning 37-year-old lefthanders career. The magnitude of what his victory meant sunk in one winter day at his farm in Georgia while he was riding on his four-wheeler.
“I just kind of like had a moment where it’s just me. It’s cold, and it was just like I was so happy that I was there,” he said. “It’s like, this is just really nice. It’s nice to be the Open champion and still be doing the same thing that I would have been doing otherwise.”
Harman is winless since becoming the Champion Golfer of the Year. He has made 16 cuts in his 18 starts this season, with a season-best T-2 at the Players Championship. But he missed the cut at the Masters after opening with 81 and has just one top-10 since April, a T-9 at the Travelers Championship last month.
“My stats this year have been really good. My ball striking has been as good as it’s ever been,” he said when asked to rate his current form. “The only thing I haven’t done well this year is I haven’t putted especially well. So I’m just kind of waiting for it all to line up correctly.”
Harman, who enters the week at No. 13 in the Official World Golf Ranking, will attempt to become the first player to defend his Open title since Padraig Harrington turned the trick in 2007-08. The pressure to defend is there but Harman also said there are benefits to knowing he’s been there, done that and it could come in handy next time he gets in the trophy hunt for another major title.
“I think it would probably add a little bit of pressure, but I don’t think you ever really know what you’re capable of until something like that happens,” Harman said. “At least now I know that if things go my way, I’m well prepared. I’m a tough guy to beat, and if I just prepare the proper way, then take care of what I can do, then I’ll give myself the best opportunity to have another chance.”
As the Champion Golfer of the Year and with possession of the Claret Jug for one year, Brian Harman has been checking off some potential firsts with the famed silver trophy awarded annually to the winner of the British Open.
Harman took the Claret Jug to Augusta National Golf Club in late October during the weekend of the annual Florida/Georgia football game. Fellow Bulldog Kevin Kisner and a couple other friends joined him on the trip.
“Just bro-ing out up there,” Harman said.
Kisner told Golfweek that the Augusta National staff told them it is believed to be the first time that a winner has ever brought the Claret Jug to the home of the Masters.
The Jug has been plonked on Brian Harman’s mantelpiece in Georgia for the last year. The American lefty has enjoyed having it.
“It holds a bottle of wine to perfection,” he said on a conference call as he mulled over the various libations that have been slurped from it. “Lots of wine, lots of Guinness, maybe even a little bit of Kentucky’s finest bourbon in there.”
Harman, a calm, composed, clinical winner at Hoylake last July, has certainly savored the giddy highs that come with Open success. His first taste of links golf at nearby Prestwick, though, was a sobering experience.
“I hated links golf, it ate me to pieces,” he winced as he reflected on his appearance in the 2007 Palmer Cup at the birthplace of The Open. “I kept trying to hit lob wedge around the greens. I got killed and lost all my matches.”
Here in 2024, Harman will return to this parish as an Open champion. It’s a funny old game.
Kisner told Golfweek that the Augusta National staff notified them this is believed to be a first.
As the Champion Golfer of the Year and with possession of the Claret Jug for one year, Brian Harman has been checking off some potential firsts with the famed silver trophy awarded annually to the winner of the British Open.
Harman took the Claret Jug to Augusta National Golf Club in late October during the weekend of the annual Florida/Georgia football game. Fellow Bulldog Kevin Kisner and a couple other friends joined him on the trip.
“Just bro-ing out up there,” Harman said.
Kisner told Golfweek that the Augusta National staff told them it is believed to be the first time that a winner has ever brought the Claret Jug to the home of the Masters.
“I can’t verify if it’s the only time it’s been there and so I feel bad saying that,” Harman tells Golfweek. “If they want to say that, that’s great.”
But he was more confident of another potential first with the Jug.
“It’s been inside my tractor,” Harman tells Golfweek. “I don’t know if it’s ever been inside a tractor. We took it down there and rode around for a minute just so we could say we did it.”
Brian Harman looks on on the 18th hole on Day Two of The 151st Open at Royal Liverpool Golf Club on July 21, 2023 in Hoylake, England. (Photo by Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)
Harman may need to check with Louis Oosthuizen, the 2010 Open champ and avid farmer, about being first.
But the highlight of hanging with the Jug so far for Harman, he said, was being honored on the field during Georgia’s home game against Ole Miss in early November, a night game at Sanford Field.
“That was cool because my wife and kid were with me,” he said to Golfweek.
“That was probably the highlight of the partying with it so far,” he said Thursday after his opening round at The Sentry. “It’s quite the party trick. It’s been a lot of fun to possess for a year.”
And enjoy it, he has.
“It’s an antique, it’s a relic,” Harman said Thursday. “It’s like a golfing past.”
British Open champion Brian Harman was back at his old stomping grounds in Athens Monday ahead of playing in the Tour Championship starting Thursday in Atlanta.
“I got to take a picture with the jug,” Georgia football coach Kirby Smart said on 960 The Ref. “I got to see that. Pretty cool. I didn’t drink anything out of it.”
That would be the Claret Jug that Harman won at the Royal Liverpool in Hoylake, England, joining two-time Masters champion Bubba Watson as former Georgia golfers to win a major championship.
Harman had a chance to sit in a football team meeting, but Smart didn’t make a big deal about it.
“I wanted to introduce him to the team, but I was afraid nobody would know who he was,” Smart said.
After Harman won the trophy at Hoylake, the 36-year-old Savannah native said he was inspired by words Georgia football coach Kirby Smart said prior to last season.
“I was a wreck,” Harman said, according to the Golf Channel. “I mean, I’ve been a wreck the whole week. But … I kept thinking about something Kirby Smart said, ‘I’m not gonna be hunted; I’m gonna hunt.'”
Harman, 36, never let up after holding the lead after the second and third rounds. He entered Sunday with a five-stroke cushion at Royal Liverpool in Hoylake, England and lifted the Claret Jug after winning by six.
“Dawgs on top! Congrats @harmanbrian,” Smart tweeted after the victory “Let’s celebrate this fall!”
Harman told reporters after his win that he’s impressed with how Smart has handled success.
“I’ve always kind of — I just always pay attention when really successful people talk,” he said. “There’s always clues there as to how they feel. I’ve always admired the fact that even with all the success that he’s had, it’s all about the next play, the next game, the next week of practice. He knows that the results come because of what you do in the trenches.”
After showing off the trophy to Smart and others on the Georgia campus on Monday, Harman added another big moment on Tuesday night when he threw out the first pitch at the Atlanta Braves game against the New York Mets.
Former Georgia bulldogs and current British Open champion Brian Harman, throwing out the first pitch here at the Braves game tonight
“It’s so cool. It warms my heart seeing everyone here.”
Brian Harman received a hero’s welcome when he arrived home to McKinnon St. Simons Island Airport in Georgia on Friday.
Fellow major winner Davis Love III, PGA Tour pro and fellow Georgia alum Harris English and Harman’s swing coach, Justin Parsons, were among more than 50 friends and fans that surprised The Champion Golfer of the Year upon his arrival.
“It’s so cool. It warms my heart seeing everyone here,” Harman told PGA Tour.com. “My wife played it off pretty good. I was thinking we would just scoot home and not see anybody, so I’m thrilled everyone came out. It’s really touching.”
Harman, who won for the first time in more than six years on Sunday and collected his first major championship, stepped off the plane holding his youngest of three children in his left arm and the Claret Jug, the famed trophy that the winner of the British Open is awarded custody for one year, in his right.
Harman hung around and posed for pictures, signed autographs and drank a Coors Light from the Claret Jug.
“There’s booze in there, sorry,” Harman said with a grin in a video posted to social media by the PGA Tour.
Young fans settled to touch the trophy.
The Champion Golfer of the Year has returned ❤️@HarmanBrian was welcomed by friends and fans when he arrived home in Sea Island. pic.twitter.com/MmpMSY2q0d
Harman flew back to the U.S. early Monday morning following a celebration the night before at Hickory’s Smokehouse, not far from where he won the British Open at Royal Liverpool in Hoylake, England. Harman met up with his wife and three kids, who watched his victory from her family’s home in the Syracuse, New York, area.
“The last three or four days have been really nice,” he said. “We’ve been secluded up there by the lake. But it’s nice to get back and see a bunch of familiar faces and get to celebrate with them.”
Harman has called St. Simons Island, part of a chain of barrier islands nicknamed the Golden Isles, for most of his career. Based on his arrival home, the party is just beginning for Harman’s career-defining moment in this picturesque corner of southern Georgia – halfway between Savannah and Jacksonville, Florida.
