The pressure won’t get to this unknown
ST. LOUIS — One of the most offbeat stories at this PGA Championship is a player in the field virtually no one has ever heard of: Craig Hocknull.
He’s a 43-year-old Australian-born club pro who teaches in Arizona and Utah — after spending time as a traveling trick-shot artist who produced the Outback Golf Show in 2003, for which he dressed like Crocodile Dundee and performed his skills around the world.
Hocknull, who’s ranked 2,043rd in the world, qualified for his first major championship as one of the 20 club pros who got in through the PGA National Professional tournament in June.
If Hocknull finds himself nervous on the first tee Thursday, he can refer to the most harrowing time of his life, when he was nearly the victim of a home invasion while in college at Jackson (Miss.) State.
He survived an attempted armed robbery in 1994 while he and four roommates were in their apartment and two gun-wielding assailants attempted to break through the front door. Hocknull slammed the door on the arm of one of the attackers and was able to bolt the door shut.
“That was pretty scary times,” Hocknull recalled. “Growing up in Australia, I don’t even know if I ever saw a gun. I guess I shouldn’t have even opened the door. I was able to slam the door on his hand and shut the dead bolt. I’m thankful to be alive.
“That was scary for all of us. My teammates came out with baseball bats and a golf club because we thought they might try breaking through the window. We turned off the lights and stayed away from the windows. It felt like forever before the police showed up and we gave statements.”
Hocknull is a member of the PGA of Australia, America and Canada and in 2016 won the PGA Professionals of Canada Championship.
“I’ve never even attended a major championship,” Hocknull said. “It’s surreal to work hard your whole life and your dream finally comes true.”
Fans are not the only people rooting for Tiger Woods to win again. Players who Woods will be trying to beat this week are pulling for him, as well.
“Well, he’s Tiger, isn’t he?’’ Tommy Fleetwood said. “For people from my generation that would have grown up with Tiger in his prime, I mean, how many people get to sort of have the chance to be in contention or play against Tiger Woods on a final day of a major when he was the guy that you watched, he was the hero kind of thing?’’
By winning the Barracuda Championship on Sunday, Andrew Putnam captured the first PGA Tour victory of his career and seized the final exemption into this week’s PGA Championship. Putnam will play in just his second career major — his first since the 2010 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach.
If Phil Mickelson is able to make the cut and finish all four rounds, he will join seven others who have played in at least 100 PGA Championship rounds: Jack Nicklaus (128); Arnold Palmer (121); Raymond Floyd (116); Tom Watson (116); Tom Kite (102); Jay Haas (102); and Hale Irwin (100).