The Secret of Golf by Joe Posnanski

Author:Joe Posnanski
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

THE TURN

Good caddies tell no tales, and Bruce Edwards was a good caddie. He caddied first for Watson when he was the best golfer in the world. Later he caddied for Greg Norman when he was, if not the best golfer, certainly the most interesting and gifted.

Norman, who grew up in Australia, played a brand of golf that boggled the mind. He could do everything. He drove the ball like Nicklaus, only straighter. He hit high iron shots like Johnny Miller. He had a magical short game like Watson. Norman had golden hair, an Australian accent, and a marvelous nickname: the Great White Shark. He won more money playing golf around the world than anyone ever had.

What Norman did not have, for some reason or other, was success in the major championships. In 1986 he led all four majors after three rounds; he won only one of them. The losses were spectacular and heartbreaking. At the Masters, Nicklaus himself came out of the past to beat Norman at age forty-six. At the PGA Championship, an unknown named Bob Tway holed out from the sand to beat him. And so on. This was Norman’s lot in life; he lost major after major through bad luck, bad timing, or final-round collapses.

People would often ask Edwards to explain the difference between Watson and Norman. Here were two talented men, two larger-than-life figures, and yet Watson won eight major championships while Norman won only two. Edwards mostly avoided the topic. Good caddies tell no tales. But one day, near the end of his life, Edwards spoke about the two men.

“I guess it comes down to this,” he said. “When Greg hits a bad shot, he takes it very hard. He will say, ‘Why didn’t I get a kick left?’ or ‘Oh, that’s the worst place I could have hit it,” or ‘OK, there goes the tournament.’ He’s very hard on himself. And when Tom hits a bad shot, he will look at me, wink, and say: ‘Just watch how I get out of this one.’ ”

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