John Feinstein, biographer of David Feherty: ‘I don’t think it shocked him but that doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt’

It is 30 years since John Feinstein first encountered David Feherty. Doing the gumshoe work for his classic golf book, A Good Walk Spoiled, Feinstein had been granted access to a two-day orientation course for newcomers on the PGA Tour. He walked into a media-training seminar, and draped across three chairs at the back of the room was Feherty, lifeless, like a mannequin.

The media coach offered the players a variety of tips on how to say something and nothing in front of a microphone, and after a while her patter pierced the fog of Feherty’s hangover. He mustered the energy to raise his hand.

“Can I ask a question,” Feherty said. “Is there something wrong with just telling the truth?”

“When I heard that,” Feinstein says now, “I liked him immediately.”

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Feherty wasn’t like the other PGA Tour rookies in the room. By then he had played in the 1991 Ryder Cup and won five tournaments on the European Tour, none of which spared him the Hunger Games of Q school when he needed to pursue playing rights on the PGA Tour.

In his mid-30s the chaotic circumstances of his life had led him to this new beginning. Feherty’s catastrophic first marriage to Caroline had ended, slowly and then suddenly. After one tournament a few months earlier Feherty arrived home to a deserted house and a note on the kitchen table that contained just three words: Moved to Dallas. To be near his two sons Feherty needed to make a career in America.

I saw both sides of him. The public side, which is so charming – genuinely charming. The private side isn’t always that way

—  David Feherty's daughter Erin on her father

By then he was a functioning alcoholic. As his marriage fell apart, his drug-taking had intensified too. Feinstein knew nothing about the turmoil in Feherty’s life 30 years ago, and even as they became friends in later years, there were gaps in his understanding of Feherty’s story that he would later discover. A book about his friend had been on Feinstein’s mind for a long time, but in Feherty’s ever-spinning world, when would be a good time?

“One thing I learned from writing books for a long time is you never know as much as you might think about a person or a subject until you do a deep dive into their lives. David’s life was a lot more complex than we saw out front.

“He’s dealt with the worst tragedy you can deal with, losing a child [his son Shey died of an overdose]. He went through a horrific first marriage. Was an addict – both an alcoholic and a cocaine addict at one point in his life. He knew that if I did a book, or if anybody did a book, it was going to get into a lot more than his one-liners and his cracks. Eventually he said, ‘Let’s do it.’ He felt secure enough where he was in his life to do the kind of book that we eventually did.”

In many sports books, the subject is the hero and the casting is simple. In the book that Feherty has done with Feinstein that is not the case. Feinstein suggested that they do it in the third person so that he could root around and furnish the story from other sources too. Feherty agreed. For the book to be a mirror, Feherty needed to see his reflection in other people’s eyes.

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In the harrowing chapter about Shey’s death, and it’s impact on their family, two of Feherty’s other children, Erin and Rory, speak frankly about their Dad, with no desire to paint over the cracks.

“I saw both sides of him,” says Erin. “The public side, which is so charming – genuinely charming. The private side isn’t always that way. I’ve always worried about my Mom [Anita, Feherty’s second wife] because she’s the one who has had to handle him at his worst….I remember Mom telling me eight years ago that Dad was drinking again and he needed help. I think it’s fair to say that I just freaked out. Honestly, I was worried about her. My thought was, ‘How much more can she take?’

[ Dave Hannigan: A comic and tragic David Feherty shoots from the hip ]

“I’m not sure anyone knows how much she’s been through….At times, he can be a moron. At other times, he’s absolutely brilliant.”

Feherty was happy for Feinstein to talk to his kids, knowing that their childhoods with him had been rough at times, and expecting that they would be honest. He read the book from cover to cover before it went to print and he didn’t try to censor any of it.

“I don’t think it shocked him to read those quotes, put it that way,” says Feinstein. “That doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt. But I don’t think it shocked him.”

Being Feherty’s friend, though, made Feinstein think twice a couple of times and question his reporter’s instincts. There’s a story in the book about Feherty getting drunk after a live telecast at the Masters and being arrested after driving his car onto the world’s most famous Par 3 course, lost in the dark.

Remarkably, the police officer called the chairman of Augusta National, asking what he should do with Feherty, rather than just booking him for driving under the influence. The green-jacketed emperor spared Feherty with a raised thumb, like a Christian in the Colosseum.

“Remember, he was still working for NBC at this point [when he told Feinstein the story]. I said, ‘Are you sure you want this story in the book?’ And again, I was acting as a friend there more than a reporter. He said, ‘If we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it right.’

Feherty describes himself as a “dry drunk” rather than “a recovering alcoholic”. The implication seems to be that one of these conditions is less stable than the other. Feinstein says that Feherty’s worst drinking, “was often done alone”. When his alcoholism was at its most destructive Feherty could consume two bottles of whiskey in a day.

And yet, in the shadow of all this, Feherty fashioned a brilliant second career in broadcasting and on the stage. As an on-course reporter he had a distinctive voice, slicing through golf’s stuffiness with cutting one-liners.

“I think when he was first hired by CBS he was worried – they were worried – could he be funny sober?” says Feinstein. “He found out early that he could be. It came naturally to him sober.”

With Feherty’s kind of edgy humour, though, came the risk of causing offence. It was Feherty who characterised Colin Montgomerie as Mrs Doubtfire, the nanny played by Robin Williams in the hit movie of the same name. For a host of reasons Montgomerie suffered at the hands of American galleries during his career and Feherty’s playground taunt added to his torment.

Tom Watson told David ‘I want to fly you back to Kansas City with me because there’s an AA group there that I think can help you.’ David said, ‘It’s too complicated to get there,’ and Jack Nicklaus says, ‘I’ve got a plane’

—  John Feinstein

Sam Torrance was one of Feherty’s closest friends, and as vice-captain of the European team at the 1999 Ryder Cup in Boston, he asked Feherty to help with some logistical stuff. One night he joined them for a buffet dinner in the team room. As he was queueing for food Montgomerie’s then wife Eimer suddenly started roaring at Feherty, blaming him for all the abuse her husband had taken over the years.

Directly behind her Monty was silently heaping salad onto a plate until, “with a guttural yell” he wound up like a baseball pitcher and fired the plate in Feherty’s direction. Instead of its intended target, though, the missile struck a hapless waiter who wandered innocently into its flight path.

“Colin and Eimer walked away without another word,” says Feherty in the book. “I never found out if Colin got anything to eat that night. I suspect he did.”

In later years he went on tour with a hugely successful one-man show, where he was essentially walking on stage as a stand-up comic. There is a certain tyranny in going through life as a funny man. By every account in the book Feherty is generous with people who wander into his world, uninvited, looking for a picture or an autograph and expecting to be tickled by something he’ll say, as if the killer lines are baked fresh every morning.

“I’ve sat with him before his stand-ups on a number of occasions,” says Feinstein, “and he was always terrified. That’s the interesting thing about David – he’s an introvert by nature and yet he led this extroverted life.”

In his day-to-day life Feherty found ways to get by. Over the years he was diagnosed with being bi-polar and with depression and ADD, and the medication helps. Every day he consumes 13 pills.

“There’s not a day goes by when I’m not sad at some point,” Feherty says. “It’s been that way pretty much all my life. I fight a constant fight to keep being sad from becoming depressed.”

Along the way he was blessed with angels on his shoulder. For more than 25 years Anita has been an unflinching companion; and when her husband crashes, the first person she calls is Tom Watson.

Feinstein tells a story about a made-for-TV exhibition match in Canada between Watson and Jack Nicklaus in 2006, where Feherty was leading the coverage. Watson is an alcoholic too and, at that time, Feherty was in denial. Watson confronted him.

“He looked at David and said, ‘You’re not well,’” says Feinstein. “And David was kind of trying to fight him off, saying, ‘No, I’m okay.’ And he said, ‘I want to fly you back to Kansas City with me because there’s an AA group there that I think can help you.’ David said, ‘It’s too complicated to get there,’ and Jack Nicklaus says, ‘I’ve got a plane.’ So, Jack flew Tom and David to Kansas City. David went to AA meetings with Tom and set him up with a group in Dallas [where Feherty lives]. He didn’t stay in it for long but Tom became his unofficial sponsor.”

Last year Feherty accepted an offer from Greg Norman to join LIV Golf and lead their on-line telecasts. He had left CBS in 2015, and his contract with NBC was winding down, with no guarantee of an extension. Watson sent him a picture of the Twin Towers and asked him to think hard. Feinstein was conflicted too about his friend’s decision. He went anyway.

“It’s very easy for me to sit here and say, ‘I wouldn’t take the money,’” says Feinstein. “David was offered huge money – huge money. And a five-year contract. He had only one year left on his NBC contract. Do I wish David hadn’t gone to LIV? I think it probably hurt sales of the book, so selfishly I wish he hadn’t gone to LIV. I am morally conflicted about what LIV is. But do I understand why he went? Yes. I understand it, I get it.”

No more than the rest of us, Feherty couldn’t have lived his life without forgiveness.

Feherty, by John Feinstein, is published by Hachette Books