KEVIN MITCHELLtalks to John Daly as he sells T-shirts in a car park across the road from Augusta National
JOHN DALY, 43 in three weeks’ time, has reached that stage of his turbulent life when pity for his wasted years and fascination with his excesses are all but drained from the public consciousness, although there are vestiges of curiosity here in Augusta.
When he emerges blinking from his million-dollar, black-glassed motorhome a little after 10am, coffee in one hand, empty beer bottle in the other, to set up his T-shirt stall in a car park across the road from the most exclusive and beautiful golf club in America, there is a small but enthusiastic audience waiting for him.
The Augusta National is a holy grail he nearly captured once, finishing third in the Masters behind Bernhard Langer in 1993, but here they do not clamber for his presence now. If it bothers him to be on the outside looking in, it is not to a noticeable degree.
“I’m happy,” he says. “The sun is shining.”
While Daly is not quite Kevin Costner’s Roy McAvoy in Tin Cup, he’s in that ballpark – or car park now, flogging Dalyobilia for his Team Lion children’s charity, a project that gives him a reason to hit the road. He rarely flies – except to Europe, where he will attempt to resurrect what’s left of his career this summer – and roams the highways like a hired gun, waiting on gigs from friendly sponsors.
The big man who grew up in Arkansas and now lives in Tennessee represents a rare rebel streak in a game more comfortable flogging pink sweaters and hi-tech gear to corporate America. Even in cut-rate, bailed-out USA, Daly appeals to a marginal constituency.
These are not the genteel country-club gawpers who will swarm past the Azaleas today when the 2009 Masters begins in earnest, they are good ol’ boys and girls, fans whose taste of the tournament really gets going at the halfway point.
“Way to go, JD!” they shout. He loves it. Whatever way you want to crunch the Daly numbers – two Majors, four wives, $50 million (approximately) blown in bets, booze and broads, two suspensions, two “sabbaticals” to sort out his life, no more chances – he lives for the moment.
He remains the only American golfer to have won two Majors yet not be selected, by right, to join their Ryder Cup team. Partly that was due to winning in non-Cup years, partly through relief by the selectors that they could justify his exclusion.
He says he is off alcohol, which might be just as well given recent form. In March last year, his swing coach Butch Harmon fired him after he missed a Pro-Am before the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Palmer then kicked him out of the tournament. “I feel like I let Arnold down,” he said in the umpteenth expression of sorrow in a career that spluttered into life 22 years ago.
Daly last appeared on the tour when he missed the cut in Las Vegas in October (the 12th early finish out of 17 attempts for the season, at the end of which he was ranked 232nd on the money list). Then, dressed in an orange jumpsuit, he was seen drunk outside a Hooters restaurant in Winston- Salem, North Carolina, and taken to dry off in the local police cells. The PGA, whose championship he won in 1991, took away his tour ticket.
When he regrouped, he went to Australia for their Open in December and, with some justification, smashed a spectator’s camera up against a tree after he was snapped in mid-shot and trailing badly in the first round. He apologised and bought the guy a new camera.
“Is it fair that I got suspended?” he asked during the maelstrom. “It’s not fair in reality, but it’s probably fair in perception.” Theoretically, at least, he gets his cards back next month.
There are now, apparently, 735 golfers in the world considered better than John Daly , which could be about right.
So, troubadour that he is, Daly seeks one last chance in Europe, where his notoriety is couched more in affection than derision. “I leave at the end of the month,” he says, “got a tournament in Spain, then Italy, Ireland, Gleneagles. This is a fresh start for me, sure. It’s what I do.”
The wild man of golf, as he is cursed/blessed to be known for the rest of his days, is not exactly a treasured entity in the clubhouse here or in the game generally. The country and the game that made him what he is don’t know what to do with him, and never will. Now, for a while, he belongs to us.
Guardian Service
