The world of men’s professional golf has its four majors. The Masters is the baby of the four grand slam events, having first been contested in 1934. The PGA Championship was initially played in 1916 when the golfing professionals of America decided to hold their own tournament. The United States Open was first played in 1895. It is our National Open and it is run by the United States Golf Association, an organization that also runs the U.S. Amateur, the U.S. Senior Open, the U.S. Women’s Open and a handful of other events. The oldest of the game’s four majors is the Open Championship, which is commonly known as the British Open. It was first contested in 1860 at the Prestwick Golf Club on the western shores of Scotland.
This past weekend, stage two of the Fed Ex Cup playoffs were held at the Olympia Fields Country Club in the far southern suburbs of Chicago. Olympia Fields, a former U.S. Open and PGA Championship site with a who’s who of past champions, was set up similarly to the way the 2003 U.S. Open was when Jim Furyk won his major title there. The greens were lightning fast, the rough was definitely rough, and when all was said and done, the conclusion to last week’s BMW Championship was nothing short of riveting.
World No. 1 Dustin Johnson was one stroke behind world No. 2, Jon Rahm, going into the final hole. DJ had a 48-foot birdie putt that he needed to make if he were to pick up that stroke and earn his way into a playoff. Dustin hit his putt softly, watched it get to the top of a ridge, and then start to roll downhill toward the cup.
With 5 feet to go, his putt was slightly outside the right edge of the cup. It then made a leftward turn and dropped into the hole for a dynamic birdie and a spot in the sudden-death playoff with Rahm.
Some 20 minutes later, both men were on the 18th green, which served as the first playoff hole. Rahm had a putt similar to the one DJ had made just minutes before except for the fact that it was even longer. The folks at Shot Link told us it was a 62-footer. Rahm’s putt crept to the top of the ridge and then descended toward the cup. It looked an awful lot like Johnson’s earlier putt. Amazingly, it too turned into the hole and dropped for an incredible birdie-three. DJ missed his putt and Rahm hoisted the hardware for this year’s BMW.
The perpetual trophy that Jon Rahm held during the awards ceremony is the third-oldest golf trophy in existence in the world of professional golf. The Claret Jug that goes to the winner of the British Open has been around since 1865. Prior to 1865, the Open champion received a belt similar to the type used in boxing and wrestling. The U.S. Open trophy has been in existence since 1895. The trophy that Rahm was holding on Sunday was first given to Willie Smith at the Glenview Club in Chicago in 1899. He shot a 156 (12-over par) to win the 36-hole tourney.
The BMW trophy was the Western Open trophy from 1899 through 2006. When the Fed Ex Playoffs were initially formulated, the Western Golf Association was willing to go from a Fourth of July annual event to part of the playoff format. Yet for the sake of continuity, the WGA still hands out its perpetual trophy with the long and glorious history of those old Western Opens.
In the days of Harry Vardon and Walter Hagen and the game’s early greats, the Western Open was considered one of the game’s four majors alongside the U.S. Open, the British Open and the Canadian Open. Its purse was a little better than the rest, and like the other so-called major tournaments, it traveled around from site to site. While many Western Opens were contested in the Chicago area, it did wander to sites as far east as Brookfield Country Club in Buffalo, New York, and as far west as the Presidio Golf Club in San Francisco.
The names on the perpetual trophy that Jon Rahm held Sunday evening is a virtual who’s who of great golfers. Walter Hagen and Tiger Woods have their names on it five times. Billy Casper is on it four times. Jim Barnes, Ralph Guldahl and Tom Watson are listed three times. Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Ben Hogan, Sam Snead and Nick Price have each won two Western Open titles. Great golfers rise to the top on great courses.
When I was a kid growing up in Chicago and caddying during the 1960s and 1970s, the Western Open was an all-Chicago event. The tournament would rotate every three or four years to a handful of old-style courses, including Medinah, Olympia Fields, Midlothian and Beverly. Beverly was a Donald Ross-designed course that first opened in 1908. It was an immediate impact course and hosted its first Western Open in 1910. That Western was won by the game’s first great amateur, Chick Evans. That win had a big impact that remains today.
Similar to nowadays, amateurs cannot win money from the tournament’s prize fund. Unlike today, the amateur golfer used to be able to earmark those winnings to a charitable cause. Evans, who added to his illustrious golfing resume by winning both the U.S. Open and the U.S. Amateur in 1916, wasn’t initially sure of what to do with his prize money. He was first introduced to the game as an 8-year-old who caddied at Edgewater Golf Club on Chicago’s north side. Evans’ mother suggested that he put the money into a fund to offer full-ride college scholarships to caddies who needed the money to further their education. Hence was the beginning of the Chick Evans Scholarship Program. While Jon Rahm won a bundle of money last weekend, the Evans Scholars were also the big winners as proceeds from the BMW continue to support caddie scholarships. The Evans pays for all aspects of the college experience.
Today there are 1,010 kids in 18 different universities throughout America receiving Evans scholarships. There are 11,050 Evans alumni. The graduation rate among Evans scholars is listed at 95 percent and the grade point average pencils out to 3.3. The annual cost of the program is $25 million, with a large amount of the proceeds coming from the BMW Championship as well as tens of thousands of people like me who belong to the Chick Evans Par Club and donate annually. While Chick Evans is long gone, his caddie scholarship program is stronger than ever.
The PGA Tour concludes its 2019-2020 wraparound season this weekend in Atlanta. One of the 30 golfers in the field will walk away with $15 million in Fed Ex Cup money. It’s a new world out there. Yet the old world of the Western Open and Evans Scholars remains strong as well.
