The inaugural Players Championship winner Jack Nicklaus has been a very welcome guest at the 50th anniversary of the PGA Tour’s flagship tournament.
Nicklaus, 84, won the inaugural Players in 1974 and was again successful in 1976 and 1978, and is still the only player to capture the title three times – one more than a bunch of others including Tiger Woods, Fred Couples, Davis Love III, Hal Sutton and Aussie Steve Elkington.
And whenever golf’s ‘Golden Bear’ speaks, everyone listens, and that was no different when he got behind the Golf Challenge microphone at TPC Sawgrass.
One of the first questions asked of the 18-time major champ were his thoughts on the current state-of-affairs in men’s pro golf.
“Well, it’s a pretty good question,” Nicklaus said. “We’ve got a few issues we’ve got to clean up right now but I would always like to see the best players in the world play together.
“They do at the major championships right now to a certain degree.
“A few of the LIV players go there but not very many as only the ones who’ve qualified for them get in. I [do] think the PGA Tour’s schedule is fantastic.
“Now being able to play the signature tournaments but also the tournaments they’re building in between, they’re building new stars, giving new people the opportunity to move up in the rankings.”
Of course, there were issues some 60-years ago in the late 1960s when Nicklaus and the likes of good friends Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino, Ben Crenshaw and other golfing legends were competing alongside each other.
It was 1968 when, following the final major of the year at the PGA Championship, several leading tour pros voiced their dissatisfaction with the venue and the abundance of club pros in the field. The increased friction resulted in a new entity being formed in August, one that would eventually become the PGA Tour.
“We tried to do it in the best interests of the game,” Nicklaus said.
“The PGA of America is who we separated from, but when we formed the Policy Board we had three PGA of America executives on the board so they had a big say in things.
“We didn’t want to break away from them in the game, we just felt that players should control their own destiny, and they have been for the last 56 years.”
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