He’s been married numerous times, lost a fortune gambling, has lap-band surgery to control his weight, smoked a million darts, and drank an equal number of cans of Diet Coke. Despite all of the drama, John Daly won two of golf’s major championships and his ability to hit a golf ball prolific distances made him a huge fan favourite, something that continues.
Now 50, Daly pulled into Calgary on Monday, and played in the pro-ams at the Shaw Charity Classic, which kicks off regular play on Friday. Typical of Daly, he had a throng of admirers and those intrigued at seeing the big-hitting golfer, who was decked out in American flag pants, a bright red shirt, and strolled the fairways with a cigarette in hand.
“He plays so fast,” said one fascinated spectator, who watched Daly, with a smoke in his mouth, walk under a tree and rapidly chip a ball back to the fairway, a move that seemed at once effortless and without focus. “He just walks up and shoot—incredible,” said another fan. His playing partners struggled to keep up with his pace, but at the same time Daly complimented their occasional good shot while sucking on another cigarette.
My encounters with the man over his career are odd, to say the least. There’s the time I was in a casino/golf course in Mississippi where Daly was sitting in the clubhouse tinkling on a piano. Or the time after he withdrew from the RBC Canadian Open in Hamilton where he spent time selling merchandise in a nearby parking lot that concluded with him signing a women’s breasts, an encounter that reportedly led to one of his divorces. Needless to say, there’s never a dull moment in Daly’s life, one that’s equally as well known for smashing drives on-course and creating havoc with his life off-course.
Why does Daly have such enduring appeal? There’s certainly an everyman element to the big man. In 1991, in the midst of his rookie season on the PGA Tour, Daly was having a mediocre year. He showed up at the PGA Championship that year at Crooked Stick Golf Club as the 9th alternate and only found his way into the field when Nick Price had to withdraw from the tournament because of a family situation. Daly bashed the ball distances previously not considered and overwhelmed the course, winning in the process. A legend was born, one that only grew when he won the British Open at the Old Course in St. Andrews, Scotland four years later.
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Despite that, Daly’s career became known more for what might have been, rather than what he accomplished. He did win five times on the PGA Tour, including the two majors, and a handful of times on the European Tour. But he’s known more for his meltdowns on and off the course, his battles with alcohol and former wives, and often with the PGA Tour itself. He hit a golf ball off a beer can at a pro-am, was fined $30,000 for hitting a shot over the head of spectators at another event, and nearly ran over a security guard at the U.S. Open. Fines have reportedly totaled more than $100,000, and Daly, who made millions in off-course endorsements that often capitalized on his bad boy reputation, says he lost more than $50-million gambling.
All of the issues, the off-course problems and run-ins have actually likely Daly’s appeal to sports fans who don’t actually follow golf. He’s seen as an everyman, a good ’ol boy from Arkansas who isn’t other blue-blood country club golfer. He just steps up and hits the ball as hard as he can, finds it, and hits it again.
That’s why he’ll attract the biggest crowds at the Shaw Charity Classic through the weekend—Daly, warts and all, has a connection to the fans that can’t be denied.
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