I attended Wake Forest University, which featured a historic golf program. A small list of alums includes Curtis Strange, Jay Haas, Lanny Wadkins, Webb Simpson, Bill Haas, Cameron Young, and this week’s winner, Michael Brennan. But the most well-known Wake Forest golfer was Arnold Palmer, who won 7 Major Championships and is widely credited with bringing the game of golf to the masses.
I learned golf later than most. I was a Baseball, Basketball, Football guy until I got moved from catcher to right field in my Sophomore year of high school. My friend, Ken Woods, suggested I try out for the golf team. If I hadn’t won a JV playoff for the 7th spot with a 9 hole score of 50, the Where’s William Now adventure may never have happened. I was terrible, but I was hooked. And when I get excited about something, I’m like a dog with a bone.
On the academic side, I was a good student because I had no social life. I played sports and studied. My grandparents were from New Jersey and used to drive cross country to visit us during the summers. During their travels, they would stop at college campuses and evaluate them based on my preferred criteria: (1) small student body, (2) good academics, (3) beautiful campus, and (4) at least 2,000 miles from Northern California. I’m not sure why I included the 4th item on that list, but looking back, I think it was because I wanted to go someplace no one knew me–because at this point in my life, I wasn’t happy with who I was. I applied to a few colleges as a junior and got accepted at Wake Forest under their “Early Decision” program. Meanwhile, the quality of my golf was improving.
The Aptos High Golf Team was stacked. 4 of our starting 6 ultimately became professionals. We once shot 7 under as a team in a 12 hole match. We never lost a league match in 2 years. We never performed well in the higher stakes events, but I’d had enough success to think I might be able to walk on at Wake Forest. I attended their summer camp before my freshman year and did well–winning the camp tournaments and connecting with current team members. I tried out as a Freshman and didn’t qualify, but I was lucky enough to earn a spot as a Sophomore. Each year, we’d hold a fundraiser where the alums would return to our home course to play with an amateur team and current WFU players would caddy for the pro in the group. Names were put into a hat and guess who got pulled first? I had an impressive collection to choose from, but ultimately I selected Arnold Palmer as my pro.
I hardly slept the night before and waited nervously on the putting green for his arrival. About 20 minutes before tee time, a car pulled up and The Man stepped out. Our Team Secretary pointed at me and he strode over and extended the largest hand I’d seen to that point (Pau Gasol’s is larger). “Hi! I’m Arnold Palmer. Let’s have a great time today!” And after meeting his regular caddie, Royce, and watching only a few practice putts, we headed to the first tee because The King always starts on #1.
It’s hard to explain the quality of golf I saw that day. Arnold was 57 and was a quick two under after 4. I talked him out of driver at the 5th and he thinned a three wood that barely cleared the left fairway bunker. One yard less and perhaps the day wouldn’t have continued the way it did. He hit a wedge to a foot then birdied the 6th and 7th to get to 5 under after 7 holes. And while he was doing it, he was saying hello to every person that said hello to him. And he knew their names, their wives names, the names of their kids, and their pets. When you read that Arnold Palmer made you feel like you were the only person in the world when he looked at you, I can confirm that to be true.
He hit his tee shot out of bounds at the 10th, but came right back with birdies at 11 and 12 to get back to 5 under. The 14th is a long uphill par 4 at Old Town Country Club and the pro in front of us had smoked a drive to a part of the fairway I wasn’t familiar with. I mentioned that I had never seen a ball that far up the hill. Arnold looked at me and said, “oh yeah?” Then he hitched up his pants and pumped it 20 yards past the spot. “How about that one, Billy boy?”
He finished the day with a 65. He signed my cap and I told him it was the best day of my life. He snatched the hat back out of my hand and wrote “Best Wishes,” which I later found out he added to his signature in special cases.
Fast forward 11 years and I am working the Pebble Beach driving range right after the American group of Dick Ferris, Peter Ueberroth, Clint Eastwood, Arnold Palmer (we internally called them Mount Rushmore) and roughly 130 limited partners had purchased the resort from Sumitomo Bank. It was a celebration tournament and all of the share holders were invited. I can’t remember what I was doing exactly, but I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was The King. “How’s my Wake Forest Billy…?” Some would say he was put up to it. But after what I saw during the day I spent with him, I actually think he remembered me. Because that’s just who he was.
