By Steve Pike, Special to the World Golf Hall of Fame & Museum
For more than 30 years on the PGA TOUR and Champions Tour, Fred Couples has been golf’s King of Cool. With his seemingly effortless swing and matinee idol charisma, nobody has made (and continues to make) a difficult game look easy. Couples never made it look easier than he did 20 years ago, when on March 31, he shot an eight-under par 64 on THE PLAYERS Stadium Course to win his second PLAYERS Championship.
Couples won his first PLAYERS title in 1984 with an 11-under 277 – one shot better than World Golf Hall of Famer Lee Trevino.
Since 1984, Couples and the PLAYERS Championship record books have been inseparable. For example, Couples, along with World Golf Hall of Famer Greg Norman and Roberto Castro share THE PLAYERS Stadium Course low round at 63 (Couples was the first in 1992); he has the most eagles (15) in tournament history; amassed 24 birdies in 1984, second only to Fuzzy Zoeller’s 26 in 1992; and is one of only six players to win THE PLAYERS at least twice. Only World Golf Hall of Famer Jack Nicklaus has won three PLAYERS titles.
Couples needed some record-setting scores to help him win 20 years ago. His Sunday 64 set the record for lowest final round score and lowest finish by a winner.
Couples finished the tournament at 18-under par, four shots free of Tommy Tolles and World Golf Hall of Famer Colin Montgomerie, and earned him the largest payday on the PGA TOUR to that date – $630,000. The victory sealed the Seattle native’s place as one of the top players of his generation. Couples was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame, which came in 2013.
“A pretty easy 64,” Couples said of his Sunday round.
Perhaps, but in fact, it was a 64 – and a victory – that almost didn’t happen.
Due to his notoriously bad back, Couples played sparingly in the weeks leading up to the ’96 PLAYERS. The Tuesday before the tournament began, Couples’ physical therapist – Tom Boers – flew in from Columbus, Georgia, to work on his back.
“If he hadn’t have come in, I would have probably gone to see him, so he had saved me a day of playing and time and everything,” Couples said.
On Sunday, Couples needed a fortunate bounce, an eagle and a birdie on the 16th and 17th holes to chase down Tolles, who went into the day with a four-shot lead.
A solid front nine reduced that lead to one stroke when Couples stood over his second shot on the par-five 16 hole. Couples hit a 2-iron (remember them?) from 220 yards. The ball appeared headed for a watery grave. But Couples is the kind of guy who can fall in a swimming pool and emerge bone dry. His ball stayed dry too. So much so that it ended up on the fringe, only 25 feet from the hole. Couples sank the 25-footer for an eagle and the lead.
“It was a perfect club,” Couples said of the 2-iron. “I cut the ball and I actually overcut it. It was hanging, and I thought it was in the water for sure. And it hung on the edge and kicked down onto the fringe. Not a very hard putt – and it went in.”
The bell had tolled (pardon the pun) for Tolles, who heard the crowd’s reaction to Couples’ putt from the 14th green.
“It sounded like 20,000 people just won the lottery,” said Tolles, who heard a similar roar when Couples sank a downhill 30-footer on the famed 17th island hole.
Ironically, that 30-foot putt wouldn’t be Couples’ most famous shot on Pete Dye’s most famous hole. In the 1999 PLAYERS Championship, Couple
s joined the ranks of countless duffers when he found the water on the 17th. Couples re-teed his ball and flew a shot into the hole for, well, a hole-in-three.
The King of Cool indeed.
About THE PLAYERS Stadium Course
The course that Couples won on 20 years ago is different than the one the world’s best player will test this year. Dye’s legendary layout basically is the same as when the course opened in 1982, but in 2006 the course underwent a major renovation to its tees, fairways and greens. Each was rebuilt with new sand and a new drainage system was installed to create faster and firmer conditions.
Immediately following this year’s PLAYERS, the MiniVerde Bermudagrass on the greens will be replaced with TifEagle Bermudagrass – the same grass that was recently installed on Dye’s Valley Course.
The TifEagle is expected to hold up better against cold weather and thrive just as easily as MiniVerde in the heat. The PLAYERS Stadium Course is expected to re-open in November.
