Faldo’s TV persona belies gruff reputation
Nick Faldo, the knighted Brit with the wicked wit and six major championship titles, will be officially celebrated today as the 2015 Memorial Tournament honoree.
When the 57-year-old Englishman steps to the microphone to speak during the honoree ceremony near the driving range, the man he idolized — Jack Nicklaus — will be in close proximity, just as he was nearly 42 years ago.
Except then it wasn’t the spacious green expanse of Muirfield Village Golf Club that connected Nicklaus and Faldo, but the cramped quarters of a green
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portable toilet located in Troon, Scotland.
We’ll let Sir Nick handle this one:
“In 1973, I went to my first (British) Open. My dad took me up to Troon in our VW Beetle ... and I would go down every day and watch the guys practice,” Faldo said on a recent trip to Columbus, where he regaled the crowd at a Nationwide Children’s Hospital fundraiser. “So one day I’m on my way to the practice ground on the back of the hotel and Jack jumps over the fence to avoid the fans and he says, ‘Hi,’ and he goes into the British porta-johns. You know, the big, giant, green things. And he goes in on his own. Then he comes out and heads out to practice.
“So I think, like you do as a young kid of 16, I go in there and of course I use every single one. So I wiggled where Jack Nicklaus has wiggled.”
Faldo is quite the entertainer. And quite the evolved golfer species. Barely a decade ago, Faldo-as-entertainer would have been considered an oxymoron. As a player, he was known as a 6-foot-3 sourpuss who seldom interacted with the gallery or even other competitors.
“He wasn’t real sociable,” Nicklaus said of the Memorial’s newest honoree. “For about a 10-year period, he was dead-focused on what he did.”
It worked. In the mid-1980s, Faldo went at the game rather lackadaisically, but after rebuilding his swing in 1987 with the help of David Leadbetter, his concentration improved. And his success skyrocketed. He won five majors over six years, including three British Opens, then collected No. 6 at the 1996 Masters, where he caught and passed a staggering Greg Norman with an impressive round of 67 that gets overlooked amid Norman’s collapse.
As the championships increased, so did his reputation as a slightly churlish chap. His acceptance speech after winning the 1992 British Open at Muirfield, Scotland, included the infamously impish line, directed toward the media, “I thank you from the heart of my bottom.”
Faldo felt frustration over being misunderstood and unfairly judged as an insensitive and self-absorbed player. Was it not enough to win tournaments? Must he do so while tap dancing in a top hat?
“If someone calls your name and you don’t hear them, then that person’s first reaction is, ‘I called to him and he didn’t react to me, the ass.’ But if you didn’t actually hear that person at all, because you were so focused, then why are you given that label of being an ass?” he said, sounding more reasonable than riled up.
Looking back, Faldo wishes he would have conducted himself differently, but being “in the zone,” as he calls it, was the only way he knew how to play.
“Head down, blinkers on,” he said. “I didn’t look to be distracted. I genuinely tried to stay in a golfing mode all week long.”
Faldo was the Daniel Day-Lewis of his sport, staying in character on and off the course. And his reputation took a hit for it.
Then things changed. Beginning in 2004, when he joined ABC’s golf broadcasting team, Faldo’s fun-loving personality flowered. He transformed, remaining quick with a wisecrack but showing a warmer side few had seen. He joined CBS in 2006, sharing the booth with lead announcer Jim Nantz, and in 2007 doubled as the Golf Channel’s lead analyst. Many viewers embrace his style, which can be described as Johnny Miller Lite, and respect his golf knowledge. He doesn’t often unload on players, but doesn’t sugarcoat their mistakes, either.
Faldo also shows a touch of self-deprecating humor that remained well-hidden in the deep rough of his personality when he played.
As a player, Faldo was not particularly long off the tee or considered an incredible putter, but he excelled in most areas of the game. Combine his physical skills with strong mind control and impeccable course management and you have a player with 41 professional wins, including 30 on the European Tour and nine on the PGA Tour.
Mental strength and the ability to think one’s way around 72 holes of golf is a big reason Faldo feels a kinship with Nicklaus, whose powers of concentration are legendary.
The connection goes back even before that chance encounter at Troon.
“I was a young kid back in England. I was a sportsman looking for a sport. I didn’t know anything about golf,” Faldo said. “The real seed was we got a color TV when I was 12. At 13, in that spring (of 1971), I watched the Masters for the first time. It was Jack who I saw and watched that weekend. Jack didn’t win that one, but I literally came back the next day and (told) my parents, ‘I want to try golf.’ ”
Now Nicklaus will watch Faldo receive an honor that might not be as grand as being knighted by the Queen of England, but being crowned by golf’s greatest champion isn’t a bad deal, either.