A noted Cards fan, Daly was eager to take part in the ceremony, even wearing a jersey with the number 91.
Little about John Daly’s life has been mundane. When the two-time major winner was chosen to throw out the first pitch at a St. Louis Cardinals game, it follows suit that the experience would be unique.
Daly was on hand as the Cardinals hosted the Los Angeles Dodgers, a move that aligned with the PGA Tour Champions Ascension Charity Classic at Norwood Hills Country Club.
A noted Cards fan, Daly was eager to get the opportunity to take part in the ceremony, even wearing a jersey with the number 91, in homage to his winning the PGA Championship at Crooked Stick in 1991. A portion of each ticket that sold for the contest was donated to the Gateway PGA REACH Foundation, which positively impacts the lives of youth, military, and diverse populations by enabling access to PGA Professionals and the game of golf.
Fans who attended were treated to a Daly bobblehead and then saw the Arkansas product throw this pitch:
Daly, of course, has been entertaining us since Crooked Stick, when as the ninth alternate he won by hitting the ball miles past everyone else. Kind of like what Bryson DeChambeau is doing these days.
But Daly wasn’t a one-hit wonder, as he went on to win the 2005 British Open and three other PGA Tour titles while earning more than $10 million. He’s still known more for his affinity for gambling and drinking, as well as his sartorial choices.
Daly won an interesting wager when buddy Fuzzy Zoeller bet Daly $150,000 he wouldn’t make it to his 50th birthday.
John Daly was a last-minute, late-night drive-in for the PGA Championship at Crooked Stick.
INDIANAPOLIS — He was a 25-year-old blond guy, an unknown rookie golfer from the University of Arkansas. He was a last-minute, late-night drive-in for the next morning’s PGA Championship at Crooked Stick Golf Club in Carmel.
It was a tournament John Daly didn’t think he would be playing in. He was the ninth alternate.
But the golf gods were with him as the other eight alternates dropped out. Daly was a player who came in that first day — not even getting a chance to practice on the infamously tough course designed by Pete Dye, 7,289 yards, the second-longest in PGA history — and he scored a 69.
On the second and third days, he was the pudgy character people started noticing as he smashed the ball, tearing up the course Jack Nicklaus said after three practice rounds was the most difficult he had ever played.
As that PGA Championship at Crooked Stick unfolded in August 1991, a growing legion of supporters awestruck and flabbergasted, lined each hole like a parade route. They roared and gave Daly ovations at every green.
Who was this guy, this guy that looked like he could be a used-car salesman, a bookie, a jovial uncle, that was taking over this competition of elite, seasoned pros.
“He had an Arnold Palmer-type reception out there,” Bruce Lietzke, who was paired with Daly on the third day of the championship, told the Indianapolis Star. “Especially on some of those iron shots that were up there a minute and a half and came down by the hole.”
That was it. Those long shots, the shots that eventually earned Daly the nickname Long John. They mesmerized people who watched.
And on Aug. 11, 1991, that blond bomber from Arkansas mesmerized and shocked the golf world: He won the PGA title.
“This is like a miracle,” Daly said after draining a four-foot par putt on the final hole. “It just doesn’t happen that often.”
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‘A big PGA upset’
Thirty years ago, a photo of a determined Daly in a white polo and pleated khakis, swinging the club, was splashed on the cover of Sports Illustrated. It was Aug. 19, 1991, eight days after his win.
The words over his picture declared: “Long Shot: Big hitter John Daly in a big PGA upset.”
Inside, the article was titled “Over Drive: Belting mammoth tee shots, John Daly won the PGA with an awesome display of power.” The words captured the still stunned golf world.
“You don’t have to believe what happened at Crooked Stick last week,” John Garrity wrote. “You can accept as fiction the news that an unknown Arkansas pro named John Daly bludgeoned a golf course into submission on his way to a three-shot victory in the 1991 PGA Championship.”
People who watched at Crooked Stick were swearing Daly was golf’s next superstar, never mind that he didn’t win a tournament in three years at the University of Arkansas or, as Garrity wrote, “that his 300-plus-yard drives rarely found the fairways until last week.”
It wasn’t usual that a ninth alternate would get to play in a major championship and then topple the world’s most experienced golfers. And do so at the very last minute.
Daly had to drive all night from his home in Memphis to get to Carmel in time for the first round. And it wasn’t until the morning of the first day of the tournament that he knew for sure he was playing. Daly replaced Nick Price, who stayed home for the birth of his first child.
Before the tournament, Daly wasn’t a blip on anyone’s radar. England’s Nick Faldo and the United States’ Payne Stewart were heavy favorites to win the 73rd PGA Championship.
But then, this unlikely fellow, who wasn’t convinced he should even be there, stepped in and magic happened.
But first, tragedy struck.
John Daly reaches out to fans on his way to the 10th tee in the final round of the 1991 PGA Championship.
Day one: A killer storm
Weather warning signs were put up on leaderboards about noon on the first day of the PGA Championship in 1991. Then a violent storm swept Crooked Stick.
A siren suspended play at 2:14 p.m. as players and caddies were transported to the clubhouse.
At 2:40 p.m., Thomas Weaver, 39, of Fishers died after being struck by lightning during the brief, but intense storm.
John Daly reacts while playing in the final round of the 73rd PGA Championship at Crooked Stick.
“It certainly doesn’t seem right that a man came to watch us play golf and now somebody has to tell his family he died,” said golfer Ken Green. “I guess when God wants you he’s going to take you. It’s just unfortunate that it happened.”
Hours after the tragedy, Arnold Palmer spoke to the media.
“I think every golfer out here feels very badly,” he said. “It’s a terrible thing. People say what are you going to do about it but there’s nothing we can do about it. You just hope everybody takes cover when they’re warned.”
The crowd for the first round was estimated at 15,000, a figure then-club president Michael Browning said might have been much higher had thunderstorms not been forecast.
At the end of the first day, Daly had shot a 69 and was in good standing, two shots behind leaders Kenny Knox and Ian Woosnam.
At the end of the first day, Daly had also been shaken.
That Fishers man who died left behind a wife and two girls, Karen, 8 at the time, and Emily, who was 12. “I felt I was almost responsible for him being killed,” Daly later said of that opening round.
After receiving his $230,000 check for the win in Carmel, Daly gave $30,000 of it away — for the education of Weaver’s girls.
John Daly plays a shot during the 73rd PGA Championship in 1991 at Crooked Stick Golf Club in Indianapolis. (Stephen Munday/Getty Images)
‘He hits the ball in places nobody does’
As the second day of the championship dawned, Daly’s rise to “unknown hero” took off.
“He’s treating Pete Dye’s 7,280-yard monster like a pitch and putt course with his booming tee ball,” columnist Robin Miller wrote in the IndyStar.
Daly’s 5-under 67 in the second round shot him to the top of the leaderboard, 8 under par for the tournament. It included one eagle, seven birdies and long-distance drives that left his competitors shaking their heads.
“It’s unbelievable. I’ve never seen anyone hit the ball like that,” said Wayne Grady, the defending PGA champion who was playing ahead of Daly all day. “I mean it’s amazing. He’s hitting 8- and 9-irons into holes where we are hitting 2- and 3-irons.”
Jeff “Squeaky” Medlin, Price’s full-time caddie, had never seen Daly until the first tee the first day of the championship.
“John has shown me a side of golf I don’t normally see,” Medlin said at the time. “He hits the ball in places nobody else does and he was a little hard to club at first.”
25-year-old rookie John Daly knocked in a putt on the final hole to win the PGA Championship at Crooked Stick Golf Club, August 11, 1991.
Daly continued to be in wonder at his own good fortune.
“I haven’t really had a chance to win a tourney before, and I’m thrilled to be playing like this,” said Daly, who had spent the past four years trying to get on the Tour.
By Saturday’s round three, people were abuzz, utterly enamored with Daly. He birdied the 4th hole, 456 yards, with a huge drive, then took an eight iron and dropped the ball a foot from the hole.
On the 609-yard 5th hole, he came within 10 yards of reaching the green in two — even after his drive went right into the rough.
“The first two or three drives he hit, I wasn’t able to see,” said Lietzke of Daly’s play, “because the ball came off the clubface faster than I was used to.”
Yes. This Daly guy seemed to be the real deal.
“His play… ” Sports Illustrated wrote, “should get him into Ripley’s Believe It or Not.”
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‘I’ve done this my way’
The night before the final round, Daly went to the Colts game versus Seattle at the Hoosier Dome “and got a bigger cheer than did the Colts,” IndyStar wrote at the time.
The next morning, Daly ran away with the win, shooting his worst round of the tournament, 71, but still winning by three strokes against Lietzke, five better than third-place finisher Jim Gallagher Jr. and six better than Knox in fourth place.
“It was a vindication of sorts for Daly, who taught himself to play on a nine-hole course in Dardanelle, Ark. (population 3,621), using balls he had fished out of a pond,” Garrity wrote.
A day after the championship had closed in Carmel, IndyStar’s Wayne Fuson called Daly “perhaps the most unlikely winner of a major tournament since World War II.”
Before Sunday’s $230,000 payoff, Daly had made $166,000 on the tour for the entire year. Few had ever heard of him. And then they fell in love, Fuson wrote.
“John Daly is different. He’s the kind of a kid gray-haired groupies want to adopt, the kind of a guy younger gals in the gallery want to take home for their own,” said Fuson. “And, he’s the kind of buddy guys down at the neighborhood watering hole would want to join for a few brewskies.”
After he hoisted the trophy, Daly talked about his unlikely rise to golf’s elite title.
“I can tell you one thing, I’ve done this my way,” said Daly. “I don’t have anybody to blame for this win but me, and I love it.”
Daly made the 1991 PGA something different, something special.
“The world’s greatest players were at Crooked Stick,” Fuson wrote, “but this 73rd PGA will be remembered forever as the one won by the Blond Bomber named John Daly.”
Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow. Reach her via email: dbenbow@indystar.com.
The vehicle he was driving in Iraq hit a 250-pound roadside bomb. Pulido swerved right, saving the lives of those with him.
AKRON, Ohio — John Daly has tried to help those in need throughout his PGA Tour career.
But a gregarious retired U.S. Army major with a Purple Heart and a prosthetic leg helped Daly when he reached a turning point with his 2020 bladder cancer diagnosis. Their partnership has given Daly’s charity work a newfound focus.
Major Ed Pulido teamed with PGA Tour Champions star Daly to launch the John Daly-Major Ed Heart of a Lion Foundation last October. Pulido said their fundraising events brought in $260,000 in the first three months and they’re on track to total $1 million in the inaugural year.
On Tuesday, Pulido stood at the 17th tee at Firestone Country Club’s North Course, greeting participants and posing for pictures during a pro-am put on by the Wentz Family Foundation to benefit Heart of a Lion.
The fundraiser precedes the $3 million Bridgestone Senior Players Championship, which opens Thursday at Firestone South.
First discussed by Bud Wentz, president of Wentz Financial Group in Hudson, and Daly during a pro-am two years ago, Daly’s event was capped by a Jake Owen concert hours later at the Archbishop Hoban High School football field. Most of the proceeds will benefit Daly’s and Pulido’s 501c3 charity that serves children, veterans and first responders.
“We do events all across the country. What we try to do that’s different, we try to keep at least 60 to 70 percent of the dollars local,” Pulido said.
Major Ed Pulido, the founder and CEO of the John Daly-Major Ed Heart of a Lion Foundation, swings on the North Course at Firestone Country Club Tuesday, June 22, 2021 in Akron, Ohio. Photo by Karen Schiely, Akron Beacon Journal/USA Today Network
Pulido, 53, of Edmond, Oklahoma, said he met Daly, 55, about 15 years ago at Whistling Straits Golf Course in Kohler, Wisconsin, and they did some charity work together.
But it wasn’t until last year when Daly began planning the new foundation that they reconnected and became partners.
“A turning point, he had a cancer diagnosis and for him it was like, ‘What’s next? How long can I continue doing what I’m doing?’ and making some changes to not only his philanthropy footprint, but his life,” Pulido said. “I think all of us have a point in life when that comes to be.”
Pulido’s came when he was 37 in 2005, when he was forced to retire from the military after 20 years of service and three tours of duty.
On Aug. 17, 2004, the vehicle he was driving in Baqubah, Iraq, hit a 250-pound roadside bomb. Pulido said he had been trained to swerve right or left in such an instance. He swerved right, saving the lives of those with him.
“The first fragment broke my knee in three places, the fragment is still in the left side of my body,” Pulido said. “A combat medic pulls me out. I spent about 17 hours in surgery after I got back to Bagdad. Then Germany, Walter Reed, and Brooke Army Medical Center [in San Antonio, Texas]. I spent almost 40 days in ICU with e-coli, two staph infections and some kind of chemical infection in my leg. On Oct. 1, there was no other remedy except to amputate.”
With retirement inevitable, Pulido remembered the words of his father Manuel, a chief warrant officer 4 in the Army with whom he served when he enlisted at age 17.
“I’m thinking, ‘What’s next?’ I could have sat down and said, ‘I’m going to take my retirement and hang out at the house,”’ Pulido said. “But it was my father, he said, ‘Be resilient. Never quit. Move forward.’ That’s what John represents.”
Pulido went to work for the United Way, then spent 13 years with Folds of Honor, which aids families of fallen or disabled servicemen and women. Pulido gained valuable experience he’s now using to help Daly.
Manuel Pulido, who lives in Lakeland, Florida, was diagnosed with terminal cancer in June 2020, which Polido said coincided with Daly’s test results. Daly revealed in September that he’d undergone surgery, but the bladder cancer had an 85 percent likelihood of returning. That strengthened Ed Pulido’s bond with Daly.
The Heart of a Lion Foundation soon followed. The lion in the logo represents Daly, the Purple Heart Pulido’s service and the American flag in a heart shape says to Pulido, “America’s heart is with all of us and we should do our part to make a difference.”
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The foundation has worked on a house project for a veteran in Oklahoma. Some battling suicidal thoughts have had help in seeking counseling. Injured first responders have received assistance. The foundation also aids St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and the Boys & Girls Clubs.
“We try to empower veterans to be difference-makers,” Pulido said. “We have veterans who are selling coffee, they’ve started a coffee business, veterans who are doing woodworking. Some are doing long drive and playing golf.
“A lot of it is morale, welfare and recreation, taking care of their families and connections to organizations that can provide support and healing and educational opportunities.”
Pulido said Tuesday’s pro-am and concert would not have happened without Wentz, Heart of a Lion’s first corporate sponsor.
“We talk about unity and we talk about all of these words, but what’s our action?” Pulido said. “Our action is we’re not going to leave anyone behind on the field of battle for our military, but also on the homefront. That’s what’s Bud’s all about. For us to do our part with him and raise a substantial amount of money, tonight (Tuesday night) the concert with Jake Owen is going to be a pretty powerful thing.”
Pulido agreed that his partnership with Daly centered Daly’s charitable efforts that had been well-intentioned but somewhat scattershot before.
“We gave it focus, we gave it horsepower, we gave it connection,” Pulido said. “We reconnected with our network of people that have helped us with other things. Now it’s inventoried and we know what we’re doing.
“We’ve got people coming at us with golf course management, square (toed) shoes. We’ve got a coin coming out soon with John’s logo and name on it. I’m just re-starting this new brand. We’re the heart of a lion, the heart of America, the heartbeat of our nation. That’s the focus that we want to give. We want to change lives.”
Marla Ridenour can be reached at mridenour@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/MRidenourABJ.
The focus on John Daly at the PGA Championship was mostly on his beard and look ahead of Thursday’s first round at Kiawah Island.
But the golfer who shocked the world by winning the event in 1991 went out and actually had a share of the lead for a hot minute, which was quite something. So what if the 55-year-old had it long before much of the field had teed off? It was pretty wild to see and it included a terrific birdie before Daly’s score starting going up.
Let’s look back at his Thursday, which was a roller coaster to say the least:
John Daly, who won the event back in 1991 at Crooked Stick Golf Club, is making his annual appearance at the PGA Championship.
The 2021 PGA Championship kicked off Thursday at the legendary Ocean Course on Kiawah Island, and for a very short time, a previous winner put his name atop the leaderboard.
John Daly, who won the event back in 1991 at Crooked Stick Golf Club, is making his annual appearance at the PGA Championship, wheeling a cart around the grounds. He was given permission to play with a cart before the 2019 tournament due to osteoarthritis in his right knee.
Daly, who is 55 years old and spends most of his time on the PGA Tour Champions, started his day on the range in typical JD style — rocking a McDonald’s diet soda.
John Daly with the McDonald’s cup of Diet Coke on the range at 7am is so on-brand pic.twitter.com/7F6nKdVDev
In his 14th start on the PGA Tour Champions, Weir snapped a winless streak that had stretched to 13 years, six months and two days.
In February, Mike Weir was in position to win for the first time—anywhere—in more 13 years. He led by four shots through eight holes during the final round at the Cologuard Classic in Tucson, Arizona, but Kevin Sutherland tracked him down to snatch away the victory and keep Weir’s winless streak alive.
On Sunday, at the Insperity Invitational at The Woodlands, Texas, Weir didn’t let another one slip away.
In his 14th start on the PGA Tour Champions, Weir snapped a winless streak that had stretched to 13 years, six months and two days.
John Daly briefly held a two-shot lead after he eagled the par-5 13th hole but Weir eagled the same hole a few minutes later, knotting things up at 10 under. Those two dueled from there but after smoking a drive on 18, Daly, playing a hole ahead of Weir, came up short on his approach shot and splashed down in the lake in front of the green. He would close with a double bogey 6 and a final-round 69.
Weir, who stuffed several approach shots on Sunday, did so again when he needed to the most on the final hole. He then two-putted for par to seal the win by two over Daly, Tim Petrovic and David Toms.
Toms was trying to make it an LSU double on Sunday. Just a couple hours earlier, Sam Burns earned his first PGA Tour win at the Valspar Championship. Toms, a mentor and friend to Burns, shot a final-round 71.
The Insperity was reduced from 54 holes to 36 with most of Friday and Saturday impacted by heavy rain. It was the first Champions event to get cut to 36 holes since the 2018 Principial Charity Classic in Des Moines, Iowa. Second-round leader Tom Lehman was declared the champion there after thunderstorms throughout the final day.
Victor Perez had some trouble Saturday during the third round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational on Bay Hill’s sixth hole.
ORLANDO – There was nothing out of the ordinary during the first five holes of Victor Perez’s third round on Saturday in the Arnold Palmer Invitational.
Then things went nutso.
It all started going sideways for Perez on the par-5 6th hole that hugs a large lake. Perez hit his first ball into the ball. Then hit another ball into the water. Finally, after finding land from the tee box with his fifth shot, he hit another ball into the water.
After taking his third penalty drop, he found a greenside bunker with his eighth shot. He needed three more shots – a putt just inside four feet ending the disaster – to make a sextuple-bogey 11.
It wasn’t the worst score ever taken on the hole. Not by a long shot. In 1998, John Daly carded an 18.
To Perez’s credit, he stepped to the tee of the next hole, the 201-yard, par-3 seventh, and hit iron to 18 feet and made birdie.
So that’s 11-2 on the scorecard, folks.
Perez was 6 over for his round after the seventh hole and 5 over for the tournament.
The pgatour.com scorecard showing the 11 that Victor Perez posted on the par-5 sixth hole during the third round of the 2021 Arnold Palmer Invitational.
Sometimes, even the greatest golfers can have a bad hole. See who has had the worst.
You think that snowman that just went on your scorecard looks bad?
There have been far worse scores posted – even from the professionals on the PGA Tour.
This list takes a closer look at the highest numbers ever posted in official events. Some of the names may surprise you, some may be golfers you’ve never heard of and some of these are likely to make you say ‘Oh, yea. I remember that.’
This list is based on data from the PGA Tour. Without further adieu, these are the 20 highest single-hole scores in history and names of the pros who own them.
John Daly holds a lead for just the second time during a tournament since joining the PGA Tour Champions in 2016.
BOCA RATON, Fla. — Sometime Saturday morning, before John Daly arrives at The Old Course at Broken Sound, the enigmatic and eccentric golfer will stand in front one his closets in his RV and decide which one of the 300 or so pants he travels with to wear.
First, Daly said, he will pull out a shirt and then choose a matching pair of slacks.
“What’s great about this stuff is you can dress in the dark because you’re pretty much going to match any shirt,” he said Friday after shooting an 8-under 64 to share the first-round lead with Jim Furyk at the TimberTech Championship.
Daly, who holds a lead for just the second time during a tournament since joining the PGA Tour Champions in 2016, went with a psychedelic pattern of exploding lime greens, purples, yellows and pinks on a black background for Round 1.
Daly, who drives his RV to most tournaments, had no trouble picking out Anna without spectators allowed on the grounds because of the coronavirus pandemic. But if for any reason he could not, he certainly heard her cheering on her man after his eight birdies and an eagle on No. 18 (his ninth hole of the day). Daly also had two bogeys.
The wildly popular Daly would have been basking in the adoration as he conquered 6,807-yard The Old Course.
“It would have been crazy out here if we had a lot of fans,” he said.
Crazier than his outfit? Probably not. But Daly would not have been difficult to find in pants that look like they were lifted from the cover of a Cream album. One thing that is different with him, though, is the shaggy gray beard Daly started growing when he was diagnosed with bladder cancer about two months ago.
John Daly finishes his round on the ninth hole at the PGA Tour Champions TimberTech Championship in Boca Raton, Florida. Photo by Richard Graulich/Palm Beach Post
“If it gets too bad, I might have to trim a little bit, but I’m going to keep it,” he said. “It may be down to the ground before this thing gets over with but that means I’m still living.”
Daly, who uses a cart, said he is constantly tired. He said he is trying to drink the right stuff but “it’s hard to take Diet Coke away from me.” He said Friday he was “proud” of himself for “only” smoking six cigarettes during the round. “Usually I smoke a pack and a half.” He’s trying to cut back, “but hell, who knows. Can’t quit instantly.” He said his next chemotherapy treatment is in about a month.
Daly later got emotional when talking about his cancer. His eyes watered and his voice cracked when he mentioned the support he has received from the players and caddies.
“They’re awesome, they’ve been great,” he said.
And probably surprised to see Daly’s name at the top of the leaderboard. Daly won once on the Champions tour, in 2017, and has just 10 top-10 finishes in 77 starts. And The Old Course does not exactly fit the game of player who likes to boom his driver.
Daly said he used seven 3-woods and seven drivers during the first round. On the 507-yard 18th, he hit a driver and a 7-iron to about 12 feet before sinking the eagle putt. He drove it onto the fringe on the 290-yard par-4 7th hole and made a short birdie putt.
“I just hit it really good,” he said. “The bad drives that I did hit, I could find it. I just putted really, really good.”
Like the old saying goes: “Drive for show, putt for dough.” And Daly is one of golf’s all-time showman, with the threads to match.
