Tag: Mike Visacki

The unforgettable story of Big Mike and Big Mike and the making of a viral-video sensation

This is the story of Big Mike and Big Mike and how 11 words and 12 seconds of heart-tugging video changed a life.

“Do you mind if I throw a camera in your face?”

With those 11 words, videographer Mike Wolfe changed the course of golfer Mike Visacki’s life. This is the story of Big Mike and Big Mike.

Less than 24 hours earlier, Wolfe, who works for PGA Tour Entertainment and cut his teeth at Golfweek many years ago, had captured the victory celebration of Aussies Marc Leishman and Cameron Smith at the Zurich Classic of New Orleans. He photographed Smith’s mullet in all its glory (see below) and didn’t leave TPC Louisiana until 10 p.m. He logged three hours of sleep before heading to the airport to catch a 5:30 am flight to Tampa and straight to Southern Hills Plantation Club to shoot his first PGA Tour Monday Qualifier. Life on the fringes of the circus that is the PGA Tour, as essentially one of the carnies, can be anything but glamorous.

“I had no interest in being there at all,” Wolfe said.

But Wolfe projects a positive spirit in the workplace and once he got in the field, the juices began flowing. He helped two different players find their balls in the bushes near the sixth hole and as the storyline of a playoff emerged for the final spot in the field, Wolfe’s woes were forgotten.

Wolfe could be forgiven for having never heard of Mike Visacki, a 27-year-old mini-tour pro, until he canned a 20-foot birdie putt on the second playoff hole to earn his first start on the PGA Tour. Wolfe rushed in to film Visacki stick his face into his caddie’s left shoulder as hot tears rushed from his eyes as he realized a lifelong dream to play at the highest level. When he pulled away, Visacki blinked back tears. But it was too late. Here was this bearded mountain of a man – Big Mike to his friends – shedding tears of joy and they wouldn’t be the last ones.

Wolfe was behind the camera when a PGA Tour producer conducted a short interview. They had everything they needed to produce the type of feel-good story that would fill space between ad units early in the week before the tournament got underway. That’s when Wolfe asked those 11 fateful words that changed Visacki’s life.

Cameron Smith (left) and Marc Leishman, sporting a mullet wig he bought online, are photographed after their victory at the Zurich Classic in the TPC Louisiana locker room by Mike Wolfe.

Given a green light to stick a camera in his face, Wolfe zoomed in as Big Mike dialed his father, an immigrant from Yugoslavia who grew up in a home of mud and hay and sacrificed so his son could chase his dream, and instructed him to click speakerphone. The 12 seconds of raw emotion of Big Mike telling his father, “We did it,” would melt the heart of even the most ardent cynic. Even Wolfe admitted he got choked up.

“I’m not one to be emotional when I’m working, but if it had gone on another second my eyes would’ve been watering,” he said.

He likely would have lost it had Visacki’s next call to his mother gone through, but it went straight to voicemail. With the shoot over, Wolfe put down his video camera and said, “If it wasn’t for COVID, I’d give you a hug.” Both men smiled and went their separate ways.

As soon as Wolfe played back the tape on his camera, he realized what he had captured made the effort to be there worthwhile. Wolfe also had been behind the lens for the Tour’s previous biggest viral video of Amy Bockerstette, a Special Olympian with Down Syndrome, making a par at the 16th hole at TPC Scottsdale as she repeatedly proclaimed, “I’ve got this.”

Visacki’s viral video resonated for the same reasons in that it wasn’t forced; it happened naturally, and it was a beautiful moment that tugged at the heartstrings. It was the best possible outcome for covering a Monday Qualifier, something that traditionally had been an afterthought. Still, who could have predicted that ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt would choose the video to close his show that night, or The Today Show, Fox News and others would make Big Mike so big that strangers recognized him at a local restaurant and told him they were touched by his story and to keep plugging away.

“I never imagined it would take off the way it did,” Wolfe said.

More than 12 million people viewed the video of Big Mike. Suddenly, his story made him an overnight sensation that warranted his own press conference the following day. When he walked in the room, Big Mike’s eyes lit up when he saw Wolfe.

“I smiled at him and said, ‘Sorry for making you famous,’ ” he recalled.

Big Mike let out a fresh round of tears when he was asked about his father, and the press ate up the details of a dreamer who put 170,000 miles on the odometer of his 2010 Honda Accord and won 37 times on the West Florida Tour alone. All he seemingly needed was a break.

Later that day, Wolfe was shooting drone footage at a hole where Big Mike was practicing and Visacki made sure to come over to the rope line and thank Wolfe.

“I was just doing my job,” Wolfe said.

But the more he’s thought about it, the more he’s come to realize that he was part of something special and that every once in a while his job allows him to reach an enormous audience and potentially impact lives.

“Being able to change somebody’s life in a positive way just by doing my job, how many people get the opportunity to do that?” Wolfe said.

Big Mike is bigger than ever. While he missed the 36-hole cut in Tampa, none other than Charles Schwab himself phoned to offer Big Mike a sponsor’s invite to this week’s PGA Tour event, the Charles Schwab Challenge in Fort Worth, Texas. From toiling in obscurity to getting an extension on his 15 minutes of fame. Big Mike will never forget what Wolfe, an even bigger Mike, did to shed light on his pursuit of a dream.

Wolfe shot Big Mike’s post-round interview in Tampa and was packing his gear when Big Mike came around a fence to thank him. COVID be damned, this time Big Mike and Big Mike hugged it out. A chance encounter brought them together and neither of their lives would ever seem the same.

Schupak: On any given Monday, PGA Tour dreams come true

Mike Visacki’s week at the Valspar Championship, a tournament he played as a Monday qualifier, are a reminder that dreams come true.

PALM HARBOR, Fla. – Sam Burns took home the trophy and the seven-figure check, but Mike Visacki won the week.

The video of the Monday Qualifier’s teary-eyed phone call to his father after holing a 20-foot birdie putt to win a playoff for the last of four spots into the Valspar Championship has been viewed more than 12 million times.

The moment went viral because of its authenticity – a 27-year-old grinder who never gave up on his dream, even if it meant working at a driving range or living at home with his parents.

Visacki’s story came along at a time when the golf world was coming to terms with the PGA Tour’s Richie Riches getting even richer, divvying up $40 million in Player Impact Program money that pays for box-office buzz rather than how many birdies and bogeys they make. (Could a MQFer qualify for the PIP money grab because Big Mike is surging?)

Here was Visacki, whose father grew up in a home of mud and hay in Yugoslavia and bought his first pair of soccer shoes for $20 when his family immigrated to the U.S., giving voice to the little guy who’s trying to make ends meet on golf’s mini-tour circuit.

William McGirt can relate. He remembers how it felt to cash a $16,000 payday at the Cabarrus Classic on the 2007 Tarheel Tour and pay off his credit card. His big splurge? A GPS. McGirt struck it big, winning the 2016 Memorial Tournament and more than $10 million in career earnings. But he’s never forgotten where he came from or how fortunate he is that he made it.

“There’s a hundred guys on the mini tours who can beat my brains out on the right course,” McGirt said.

The line between success and failure is razor sharp. The futility of McGirt’s quest is memorialized in lipped-out putts on the final green to miss advancing to the final stage of Q-School in 2007 and 2008.

“You look back at it and you’re kind of like, I don’t know if it’s ever going to happen,” McGirt said. “But you keep busting your butt and you grind and all you want is a chance.”

Monday Qualifying is a tough road that can seem the longest of long shots to acquiring status, but 2018 Masters champ Patrick Reed is the poster child for how the dream can be real.

Just four years ago, Keith Mitchell was plying his trade on the Korn Ferry Tour when he was one of four qualifiers into the 2017 Valspar Championship. He finished T-11 in his PGA Tour debut and it spring-boarded him to play well the rest of the year.

“It let me know I could play out here if I had my best stuff,” Mitchell recalled. “I’d put it up there with the most memorable weeks I’ve ever had.”

By 2019, he was a Tour winner at the Honda Classic and has earned more than $5 million in his career. What did he make of Visacki’s story going viral?

“Four guys do it most every week. I’m glad the world got to see what it was like and the feelings that every single one of those four guys have usually,” Mitchell said. “He just happened to get on film.”

Kudos to the PGA Tour, pushed by the yeoman’s effort of Ryan French, Mr. Monday Q Info (@acaseofthegolf1), to shed light on mini-tour life, for being in Tampa last Monday to capture Visacki’s heartfelt exchange with his father, just as they had captured Nick Hardy’s fist pump in Phoenix. Any given Monday is the motto of those who chase the qualifying dream. As mini-tour pro Dominic Formato put it, Visacki served as a much-needed reminder to all the dreamers out there that “sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel is closer that it seems.”

Visacki feels like this year’s Ho-Sung Choi, a social media darling who capitalized on his new-found celebrity to gain other sponsor invites. (Note to Big Mike: start writing letters to tournament directors.)

“I’m definitely going to try to do a lot more Mondays now, now knowing this experience,” Visacki said after shooting 74-71 to miss the cut. “It’s eye opening and it definitely makes me want to get out here and continue to be out here. This is amazing.”

Actually, it’s just another Monday on the PGA Tour.

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The journey of ‘Big Mike’ Visacki comes full circle this week at Valspar Championship

Video of Mike Visacki went viral when he broke into tears telling his dad that he’d Monday qualified for the tournament he grew up attending

PALM HARBOR, Fla. – Michael Visacki teed off at the 12th hole of the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Golf Resort, not far from a banner with the image of Vijay Singh, the 2004 Valspar Championship winner, hanging from a street sign.

Seventeen years ago, Visacki’s father, Mike Sr., brought him to his first tournament and they followed Singh and Ernie Els. That day, a dream was born. “Just being a little kid thinking about one day I’ll be here,” Visacki said of his fondest memory of that day.

But there was another moment later that day away from the course that would be every bit as memorable. Before driving home, his father stopped to fill the tank at a gas station and, in a happy coincidence, Singh happened to be across the aisle pumping gas. Visacki Sr. still has the picture he snapped of his son standing beside Singh.

Before they parted ways, Singh, who came from nothing in Fiji to become a Masters champion and a World Golf Hall of Famer, offered young Mike three words of advice if he wanted to play on the PGA Tour like him someday. Visacki leaned in and listened as if Singh was about to tell him the secret to life.

“Practice, practice, practice,” Singh said.

Visacki, now 27, made his PGA Tour debut Thursday only 90 minutes north of his hometown after making a 20-foot birdie putt in a playoff of a Monday qualifier to earn a spot in the field at the Valspar Championship. In one of this week’s most heartwarming moments, “Big Mike,” as everyone calls him, broke down in tears as he phoned his father with the news.

“I don’t know who was worse – me or my wife,” Visacki Sr. said. “Happy tears. I waited for this moment all of my life.”

Video of a blubbering Visacki, his voice rising as he told his dad, “I made it,” went viral on social media and was replayed on ESPN’s “SportsCenter,” NBC’s “The Today Show” and even Fox Business News.

Visacki is more than just the hometown kid making good. His story resonated because he never quit on his dream. He has been plying his trade in the obscurity of golf’s bush leagues, notching 37 wins on the West Florida Pro Tour while piling on more than 170,000 miles on his Honda Accord and living at home with his parents. Daniel Robinson, a fellow mini-tour player said, “We all think of him as No. 1 in the world without a world ranking.”

Mike Visacki, father of PGA golfer Mike Visacki, watches as his son plays his first round of the Valspar Championship golf tournament. Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports

On Thursday, his fellow mini-tour competitors such as Dominic Formato were part of a boisterous crew that witnessed Visacki stripe his opening drive down the middle at the first hole and nearly hole a bunker shot for eagle at the par 5. He tapped in for a birdie at his first hole on the PGA Tour and his pals roared with approval.

“He makes us all believe in our own dreams a little more,” Formato said, “and just reminds you that sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel is closer than it seems.”

Visacki couldn’t maintain his fairytale start, bogeying the next three holes in a row en route to shooting 3-over 74, leaving him 10 strokes behind leader Keegan Bradley and with work to do to make the 36-hole cut.

But nothing could spoil Visacki’s day. He waved his hat in appreciation as he received an ovation at the 12th green from fans at the Hooters Owl’s Nest, and as one volunteer pointed out, Visacki had the largest gallery outside of Phil Mickelson.

“It is sweet whether he makes the cut or not,” Visacki’s father said. “He made his place in the world. I knew he could do it. It was just a matter of time.”

Kaylor Steger, caddie for Mike Visacki, wears the name Big Mike on the back of his bib during the first round of the Valspar Championship golf tournament. Jasen Vinlove-USA TODAY Sports

The pro golfer who got emotional after qualifying for his first PGA Tour event had a dream first hole

What a start for Michael Visacki.

Earlier this week we brought you the awesome story of pro golfer Michael Visacki, who qualified for his first PGA Tour event in a Monday qualifier for the Valspar Championship and then had an emotional phone call with his dad in which he told his pops that he had finally made it to a PGA Tour event after seven years of trying.

Well, today Visacki, who turned pro in 2013 and has been a mini tour player during that time, teed it up for the first time on the big stage of the PGA Tour and he had a dream of a first hole.

Visacki kicked things off with this 334-yard drive, which is incredible considering the nerves must have been pretty high:

Then he went on to birdie the par-5 first hole.

Amazing.

He bogeyed the next three holes but just being out there this week is pretty darn awesome.

I’m definitely rooting for him.