Thought it would be cool to add a few pages from 1985 when Lag was finishing up in college and show the caliber of players that were out there playing…I think player #10 in amateur rankings has a Lag affect in his results (US Amateur loss) !!!.. This would have been my 1st year of college had I accepted my scholarships so it is interesting to me to see who was out there at the time… College golf was a much bigger deal then IMO…don’t really hear that much about it anymore with the over saturation of all the other events going on live before our eyes.
Lag will probably provide some great insight into the players listed and some of the events played I am sure- Nostalgia Lane
1985 was quite a star studded year of collegiate players. Oddly this clipping omitted our conference from it’s list The PCAA or Big West. Therefore my win was omitted with that! lol
I’ll see if I can dig up some old clippings to set the record straight. It used to be straight! Amazing how time can tarnish your record!
Jay was the man to beat back then. I played the major amateur circuit in 84 and 85, Western Am, Sunnehanna, Porter Cup, NE Am, Cardinal, Rice Planters, Eastern Am all the big ones. It was great because they were all on great classic courses, the tournaments were run great and treated us like celebs, and I can see why guys like Sigel just stayed out on that circuit for years. The events are tough to get into, and you kinda have to do something to get noticed. I won the conference championship, quarterfinals in the US amateur and had some other good college finishes such as the Sun Bowl. That got me in and those were too really amazing summers.
A friend of mine who was a pro and a couple years older told me that when I turned pro, I would be playing worse courses in less prestigious events. He was talking mostly about mini tour events. I steered clear of mini tours and was fortunate to get through the Q school in Canada on my first try… then played well enough up there to get a card on the Australian Tour… so I went down there and really enjoyed that first rate tour.
I think anyone who can go out and play golf for a living, even for a year or two is pretty blessed. It’s a great experience to have in life, especially if you are passionate about golf. Some of my fondest memories are things I did off the course, sights, and interesting people I meet.
Interesting to see Deane Beman prominently featuring for many years. Had a quick look at his bio, a very impressive amateur career and a very promising start on the PGA Tour with 4 wins, but then he decided to become Commissioner after 5 years. Strange career move–any story behind that?
Probably the same reasons Clampett, Strange, McCord or even Faldo went into the booth. It’s tough out there and I would argue even more so in the persimmon and balata era.
Gotta remember all of those pros like Claude Harmon and Snead who were successful on the Tour and then decided to become the Head Pro at a country club.
I would imagine that back then if you had a successful year on Tour, you probably did well for yourself financially in the grand scheme of things for that year. But, if you had an off year, it was probably very hard on your bank statement. So taking a job at a country club that probably paid quite well at the time and was pretty easy work (I doubt Claude or Snead were running twilight leagues )
Plus the travel was a lot rougher back then. Lot less roads back then and a lot less well constructed roads, too. Put that with an old car from that era, probably not that fun to travel that much.
Clampett, McCord and Faldo quit for really the same reason, they couldn’t keep up with the guys on Tour. Clampett and Faldo’s games basically fell apart. McCord regained it when he worked with O’Grady, but just how much are you going to make on the Champions Tour when you can’t putt and Hale Irwin is around. I got to follow McCord at the old Senior Tour Tour Championship in Myrtle Beach as I got to hold the cable wires for ESPN as they paid me and the guys on the golf team at CCU to do so and man, McCord was really pathetic to watch on the putting green. His game on the Senior Tour was more or less birdie every par-5 and hit almost every green and pray 1-2 birdies go in, shoot 69 and collect a few nice paychecks. But compared to what he was making off the course, tough to pass that up. McCord is genuinely a nice guy, so was Trevino.
)