LONG LIVE THE KING
Golf’s first legend dead at 87
This before was the last Mastersspring, tournament.an event at Jack Nicklaus’ Bear’s Club in Jupiter, Fla., not too long
Barbara Nicklaus, Jack’s wife, was introducing a new cookbook, and she and Jack had acted as celebrity chefs for a small gathering of club guests and their friends. Some friends of my wife and I had invited us and near the end of the night, I was talking to Jack about Arnold Palmer. It has been impossible for more than a half-century in America to talk about one without talking about the other. Arnie and Jack. Jack and Arnie.
Once it had been the rivalry to watch and talk about in golf, the kid from Ohio coming along to take on the acknowledged king of the sport, the guy known to the golf world as “The King” — Arnold — and beat him for the first time at the U.S. Open of 1962, and keep beating him on his way to winning 18 major championships and becoming the greatest golfer of them all.
But out of that rivalry came something more important: A deep and lasting and splendid friendship. Now, in the spring of 2016, everybody in Jack’s world and Arnold’s world knew that Arnold was failing, it was no secret any longer, Arnold had barely been visible at his own tournament at Bay Hill, in Orlando.
There was even some question about whether or not Arnold Palmer, 86 then, would make it to the first tee at Augusta with Nicklaus and Gary Player, for the ceremonial opening to another Masters tournament.
“Oh, he’ll be there,” Jack Nicklaus said that night. “I haven’t said this to him, but he’ll be on the first tee if I have to carry him.” Jack Nicklaus paused and said, “I’m like everybody else, really. I love Arnold Palmer.”
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When Palmer saw them, he grinned and said, “Fancy seeing you here.”
He won the Open that day. Several years later he lost a heartbreak Open to Billy Casper that he had won. And never won another major after that. It only made people love him more. You should also know this: How much he loved being Arnold Palmer.
He did not just change golf. He and his agent, Mark McCormack, changed the business culture of professional sports. McCormack grew his representation of Palmer into a giant company named IMG, for the International Management Group. You can make the case that not only did Palmer make a fortune for himself because of his immense popularity, he made several fortunes for the future stars of American sports, and not just in golf; make a case that he was as much a champion at business as he was at golf. Maybe more.
I met him one time, at Bay Hill. I was there to write a piece about him for Esquire magazine, and we finally ended up in his office, Palmer talking about his triumphs and his disasters, being as gracious with me as he was with everybody else, because there was never a more available and accessible American sports celebrity. I don’t know how long we were in that office. Maybe it was an hour. Maybe it was a little more. It was one of the best hours I have ever spent in this business.
And there was a moment, near the end, when he was telling another story, and came around from behind his big desk, and grabbed a driver leaning against a wall, and took his stance, and put those bricklayer’s hands on the club, and it was as if all the years between the two of us and my one childhood disappeared.
A few minutes later we were done. He said, “You good?” And I said, “You have no idea.” There have been other star athletes who helped grow other major sports in America. No one ever did more for one than Arnold Palmer did for golf. No one was ever a bigger star. Jack Nicklaus had it right, exactly, and of course. Everybody loved Arnold Palmer.
He was the king of our sport, and always will be. — Jack Nicklaus (above with Palmer)