Walker is still ailing, flailing
Lyme disease, prolonged slump not a ‘lot of fun’
The last time Jimmy Walker teed it up at the Valero Texas Open, he found himself in an unfamiliar place.
The winner of the 2016 PGA Championship was mired in his worst slump in a decade, having gone 18 straight tournaments without a top-25 finish.
“I’m not going to lie — it hasn’t been a lot of fun,” he said.
Two years later, not much has changed. His current streak of finishes outside the top 25 is 19. In his past 20 starts, Walker has failed to make the cut 14 times.
He’s ranked 514th in the world. “I just haven’t been putting it together,” he said. “I work hard every day and bust it, and it’s just not happening.”
Walker hopes he can change that with a win at this week’s Texas Open, Thursday through Sunday at TPC San Antonio’s The Oaks course.
The former Boerne resident, now living in San Antonio, will settle for a strong showing, perhaps a top-25 finish or better. That would mean putting four good rounds together, something he hasn’t done in a while.
Four years after being diagnosed with Lyme disease, the 2015 Texas Open champion is still battling the illness that struck in the prime of his career.
Symptoms first appeared around Thanksgiving 2016, about four months after he won the PGA Championship. That was part of a three-year run that saw him win six PGA Tour titles and become a familiar face on Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup teams.
He began experiencing severe flu-like symptoms — body aches and fatigue — that drained him of energy. Forced to cut back on practice time, his game suffered.
With treatments, the former Baylor standout rebounded in 2018 with a tie for second at the Players Championship, four top 10s and seven top 25s in 23 starts.
In 2019, Walker had three top-25 finishes in 22 events. Then came the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, ending any chance at momentum.
After back-to-back top-25 finishes at the Honda Classic and Arnold Palmer Invitational a year ago, Walker has been stuck in a slump.
He’s had his moments. He shot 64 to grab a share of the first-round lead at the Sanderson Farms Championship in October, only to shoot a 77 on Friday, spoiling his effort. He ended up making the cut but finished tied for 46th.
He carded a first-round walk-off eagle on No. 18 at the American Express in January but closed with a final-round 76 to finish tied for 60th.
In his most recent start, the Honda Classic, Walker completed three rounds of par or below on his way to a 58th-place finish. A 77 on a windy Saturday sabotaged his score.
“It was a baby step but was positive,” Walker said.
Physically, he says he feels “really good.”
“There’s some residual mental stuff (related to Lyme) going on that’s hard to pinpoint,” he said.
Mostly, it affects his fine motor skills, particularly in chipping and putting, he said. He’s gone through several swing coaches, including Butch Harmon, Harmon’s son Claude and Matt Killen. He recently took a lesson from Cameron Mccormick, perhaps best known for his work shaping the swing of former Texas star Jordan Spieth.
Walker says he’s officially “under nobody right now.”
“When you hire a coach and you’ve been with them for a while, you’d hope to see some results,” Walker said. “But it just hasn’t happened. So it was time to move on and try something else.”
Walker’s struggles on the course come at a time when his life off it couldn’t be much better, he said.
Walker, wife Erin and their two boys, Mclain, 10, and Beckett, 8, recently moved to San Antonio after selling their $3 million, 10acre estate in Cordillera Ranch.
They’re remodeling a house in Terrell Hills, with sights set on moving in soon. The boys are thriving, learning to play golf and fencing.
At 42, Walker concedes his struggles could partly be the result of age. But he says he’s determined not to give in. He says he hasn’t considered retirement, but he has discussed with Erin the possibility of taking a couple years off before eventually joining the Champions Tour for players over 50.
Walker has put himself in position to do that, with more than $25 million in career earnings.
He has to win a tournament or make the Fedex Cup playoffs in 2022 to maintain his fully exempt status on the PGA Tour.
Meanwhile, his battle with Lyme disease marches on.
“He may never be the same,” said Erin Walker, who also was diagnosed with the disease in late 2017. “That’s a reality we talked about.”
Her husband said he still “loves the game.”
“I’m building a golf simulator in my house where I can hit balls inside and work on my game,” Walker said. “The desire is still there, for sure. I just have to start playing better.”
He’s hoping it starts with this week’s Texas Open. Including his title in 2015, Walker has finished in the top 30 or better eight times in 13 starts.
After the Texas Open he’s set to play in the Masters, where he never has missed a cut, on a course he loves, Augusta National.
“It’s a new level of normal I’m still trying to deal with and cope with,” Walker said. “I’m playing against the best players in the world. Everybody’s young and healthy. So it’s just tough.
“Hopefully, this thing will turn around. It’ll be fun being home and being back in front of the home crowd.”