RealClearSports.com: Arnie: Long Live the King

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By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com


He went after a course the way Muhammad Ali went after an opponent. Arnold Palmer didn't "play'' golf, he worked golf, attacked golf. He was fearless but not flawless. He was human.

He was The King. He'll always be The King.
A great nickname, a descriptive nickname, bestowed on so very few, upon Richard Petty, upon a long-ago San Francisco 49er running back, Hugh McElhenny; upon Elvis Presley, of course; and upon Arnold Daniel Palmer.

You didn't have to like golf to like Arnie, but if you did like golf it was so much the better. The man made the game what it is, a multi-billion-dollar operation, show business with bogeys, a television show that runs from one end of the calendar to the other.

Arnie reaches 80 next week -- strokes, not years. America will celebrate. The world will celebrate. He's the hero who stayed humble. As Curtis Strange, a great golfer himself, was to observe, "Arnold Palmer makes everybody feel like he's their best friend.''

Tiger Woods may be in control of the Tour these days, but he's merely leasing it. Arnie always will be the owner.

Ben Hogan was the grinder. "It's in the dirt,'' he told those who wanted to be champions, implying one had to hit shot after shot in practice. Sam Snead was the graceful one, the "Sweet Swinger.'' Jack Nicklaus, who followed Arnie, was the perfectionist, the pragmatist.

One year at Pebble Beach, the tournament now called the AT&T Pro-Am but then called the Bing Crosby, Jack hit his tee shot on the famous par-five 18 into Carmel Bay. The next year, leading, Nicklaus teed off with an iron, not a wood. The late, great sports columnist Jim Murray, almost insulted, wrote, "Arnold Palmer wouldn't use an iron to press his pants.''

Arnie never played it safe. If there's a lot of Nicklaus in Tiger Woods, there's a great deal of Palmer in Phil Mickelson. They want to do it their way, the challenging way, the exciting way.

Arnie tried to make a two on every hole. He spent three rounds attempting to drive the short par-4 first hole at Cherry Hills in Denver in the 1960 U.S. Open, failing each time. But the fourth time he succeeded, made birdie and won his only Open.

He lost in a playoff to Nicklaus in 1962 at Oakmont. It was my wedding day. The ceremony was delayed until the final putt, which produced Jack's first pro win. Arnie sensed what was about to happen. "Now that the big kid's out of the cage,'' Palmer said about the 22-year-old Nicklaus, "look out.''

Arnie was beaten the next year, 1963, in another playoff, at The Country Club. And then came the most aggravating, and the most symbolic, at San Francisco's Olympic Club in 1966.

I was a rookie golf writer for the San Francisco Chronicle and properly awed by Palmer. He had a 7-shot lead over playing partner Billy Casper with nine holes to play, a 6-shot lead with six holes to play. But Arnie was chasing the Open record, and the next thing we knew he had to make a 4-footer on the 72 hole just to tie Casper, who won the playoff the next day.

More than 40 years I've watched and interviewed and followed Arnie as he grimaced after missing yet another putt, as he wandered over to the edge of the fairway and smiled at every woman in the gallery, as he reached out to tap a child on the head and then willingly signed an autograph for everyone who asked.

Arnie loved golf. We loved Arnie. The course was his stage, his existence.

Nicklaus was never more than a golfer, if a brilliant one. Arnie was an actor. Jack couldn't stay when he no longer was competitive. Arnie maybe stayed too long. Or did he?

Three years ago, Arnie, struggling, announced it was time to stop playing competitively.

"I've been doing this for a long time,'' he said, "and first of all, to stand out there and not be able to make something happen is very traumatic in my mind. The people want to see a good shot, and you know it and you can't give it to them. That's when it's time.''

He left competitive golf, and we were left only with visions of the way it used to be.

There he stands, the young man out of the west Pennsylvania coal country, with the blacksmith arms and the blue-collar background. Arnold Palmer is young again. And so are we.

Long live The King.

As a reporter since 1960, Art Spander is a living treasure of sports history. A recipient of the Dick McCann Memorial Award -- given for his long and distinguished career covering professional football -- he has earned himself a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He was recently honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the PGA of America for 2009.