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PGA Tour file of John Daly details his many breakdowns | Jacksonville.com
The PGA Tour ordered John Daly to undergo counseling or enter alcohol rehabilitation centers seven times, once disciplined him for hitting golf shots off the top of a beer can during a pro-am and cited him 21 times for “failure to give best efforts,” during Tour events.
Daly has also been accused of nearly hitting an Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agent after failing to stop his car at a security checkpoint at the 2005 U.S. Open in Pinehurst, N.C., and of launching golf balls over the heads of spectators who were sitting in the bleachers during a 1993 golf clinic, according to the PGA Tour’s confidential personnel file on Daly.
Daly’s file, now public record, provides an unprecedented look into his professional and personal life, and the Tour’s efforts to get him help. Though Daly hasn’t won a PGA Tour event since the 2004 Buick Invitational, he remains one of the game’s longest hitters and most popular players. He underwent lap-band surgery last year and has lost more than 80 pounds, and his second reality show, “Being John Daly,” premieres on The Golf Channel tonight.
The Tour’s initial disciplinary action against Daly was for an incident on April 17, 1991, in Hattiesburg, Miss., when he cursed a playing partner during a Tour event there. That was four months before Daly burst onto the golf scene by winning the PGA Championship.
Eventually, his personnel file at the PGA Tour swelled to 456 pages, with incidents covering 18 years, through the fall of 2008. Daly was fined nearly $100,000 during that span, suspended from the Tour five times, placed on probation six times, cited 11 times for “conduct unbecoming a professional” and 21 times for “failure to give best efforts.”
The Tour has never voluntarily released information on disciplinary actions taken against players to the media, keeping with a long-standing policy. Daly’s file was turned over to Morris Publishing lawyers on a court order after Daly sued Morris in 2005, and became part of the court file after Daly dropped his appeal last fall of a summary judgment issued in favor of Morris on March 23, 2009, and after Daly was ordered to pay Morris’ attorney fees.
Information in the file ends with details of a six-month suspension of Daly after an October 2008 incident at a Hooters restaurant in Winston-Salem, N.C., when Daly passed out after becoming publicly intoxicated, refused medical treatment and spent the night in jail. The Tour also fined him $10,000 and required him to participate in an in-patient alcohol treatment program.
The troubled, charismatic star appears to have stayed out of trouble since then, other than leading several media outlets to believe he was retiring after he finished a frustrating two rounds at the Farmers Insurance Open in San Diego last month. Daly “unretired” the next day via Twitter.
The Tour declined to comment on the information in the file.
“We turned the file over on a court order, but keeping with our policy, we’re not going to comment on disciplinary action taken against players,” said Ty Votaw, the Tour’s executive vice president for communications. “The fact that it is public record does not change that.”
A phone message and e-mail to Bud Martin, Daly’s agent at the Reston, Va.,-based SFX Sports Management, were not returned. The messages requested an interview with Daly or Martin.
For much of the last two years, Daly has been able to play only on sponsor exemptions in the U.S., Europe and Australia. He has made the cut only a handful of times. But the 1995 British Open winner remains one of the Tour’s most popular and recognizable players. Golf Digest estimated in January that Daly made more than $4 million in off-course income last year.
Many of the incidents detailed in Daly’s Tour file involve alcohol-fueled misconduct (such as his trashing of a room at the Sawgrass Marriott the week of the 1997 Players Championship, which resulted in a $5,000 fine and $1,500 in damages), improper withdrawals from events, missed starting times and antics such as being filmed at the opening of a course in which he plays while wearing no shoes and no shirt.
For example, Daly hit a ball off a beer can offered by singer Kid Rock during the pro-am at the 2008 Buick Open. He also was fined for launching golf balls over the heads of spectators in a set of bleachers behind a practice area during a clinic at the 1993 Fred Meyer Challenge in Portland, Ore. The Tour, apparently shaken at the possibility of the damage a Daly drive could inflict on a spectator, fined him $30,000, the largest fine for any one Daly incident.
Daly has been cited by the Tour nearly two dozen times under its “failure to give best efforts.” Among those incidents were continually pumping balls into a water hazard at the sixth hole at the Bay Hill Club and Lodge course in Orlando during the Arnold Palmer Invitational (resulting in a score of 18 on the par-5 hole) and slapping at a ball in motion during the 1999 U.S. Open at Pinehurst, admittedly frustrated that he could not get the ball up a bank and onto the green.
He also has walked off the course in the middle of rounds (at the 1997 U.S. Open and 1993 Southern Open) and withdrew following high scores.
Two incidents — one widely publicized and the other buried in the file for five years — take up a combined 50 pages of witness statements in Daly’s file.
The most recent of the two was at the 2005 U.S. Open in Pinehurst, N.C., in which Daly was accused of nearly running over Eugene Fleming, an agent from the Atlanta office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms at a security checkpoint where all players were required to stop and show their credentials.
According to the file, four other witnesses — all law enforcement officers on duty at the checkpoint — identified Daly as the driver of the car in statements gathered by the North Carolina Bureau of Investigation. Fleming said Daly claimed he was in a hurry to make his third-round starting time.
Despite the number of witnesses, charges were never filed and the Tour took no action against Daly. In a summary of disciplinary actions taken against Daly, the Pinehurst incident is labeled “mistaken identity.”
Fleming, who still works at the Atlanta ATF office, maintains that Daly was the driver and is upset that the Tour never punished Daly. He bristles at the “mistaken identity” characterization.
“I follow golf and I know John Daly, and he was the driver of that car,” Fleming told the Times-Union. “I looked him in the eye. There was no mistaken identity on my part. He was driving. A lot of people wanted the state of North Carolina to prosecute John for that incident. I heard later that the PGA Tour asked [the North Carolina SBI] to let them handle it.”
Fleming said he was told Daly was ordered by the Tour the next day to go to the security checkpoint and apologize to officers. Fleming said he wasn’t on duty at the time.
“It wasn’t my shift, so John Daly apologized to the wrong guy,” Fleming said. “As to why North Carolina never prosecuted him, I have no idea. But I’m surprised the Tour never did anything.”
Noelle Talley, the public information officer for the North Carolina Department of Justice, said the State Bureau of Investigation did not recommend a further criminal probe after gathering statements from officers at the scene. Talley said the only action the SBI took was to send its witness statements to PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem.
The investigator for the SBI who handled the incident, Melanie W. Thomas, has since retired. When reached by the Times-Union, she declined to comment on specifics of the case. The Tour’s Votaw also declined comment on the case.
One of most widely reported Daly off-course incidents occurred a decade before in the 1994 World Series of Golf at Akron, Ohio. According to witness statements in Daly’s personnel file, club pro and tournament participant Jeff Roth and family members accused Daly of hitting into Roth’s group during the final round of the tournament at Firestone Country Club. That escalated into name-calling on both sides, with Daly accused of profanities directed at Roth’s mother and the mother of Roth’s caddie.
Following completion of the round, Roth went into the clubhouse locker room to confront Daly. The exchange continued when Roth left and walked outside, where Daly was heard by witnesses screaming at Roth, “You can’t be me! You don’t know my life! You can’t live my life!” Within minutes, according to witness statements, Daly called Roth’s mother a derogatory name. Roth’s father Bob then jumped Daly from behind. The two were separated after scuffling briefly.
Daly was fined $20,000 for the incident and ordered to take a leave of absence for the remainder of the 1994 Tour season.
Daly’s file also shows examples of the connection he has made with fans, both positive and negative. The file contains letters from fans and tournament officials praising Daly for activities such as participating in clinics, and also in support of Daly’s side of the story in some of the incidents marking his career.
“I’m disappointed the suspension is indefinite,” wrote one fan to former commissioner Deane Beman. “Please reconsider and get John Daly back so many of us can get enthused about the PGA [Tour].”
There also are letters criticizing Daly’s conduct and urging the Tour to take stronger action.
“How long does it take for this young man to grow up and remember that thousands of young junior golfers are out there watching him make an *** of himself?” asked one fan in a letter to Beman.
The PGA Tour ordered John Daly to undergo counseling or enter alcohol rehabilitation centers seven times, once disciplined him for hitting golf shots off the top of a beer can during a pro-am and cited him 21 times for “failure to give best efforts,” during Tour events.
Daly has also been accused of nearly hitting an Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agent after failing to stop his car at a security checkpoint at the 2005 U.S. Open in Pinehurst, N.C., and of launching golf balls over the heads of spectators who were sitting in the bleachers during a 1993 golf clinic, according to the PGA Tour’s confidential personnel file on Daly.
Daly’s file, now public record, provides an unprecedented look into his professional and personal life, and the Tour’s efforts to get him help. Though Daly hasn’t won a PGA Tour event since the 2004 Buick Invitational, he remains one of the game’s longest hitters and most popular players. He underwent lap-band surgery last year and has lost more than 80 pounds, and his second reality show, “Being John Daly,” premieres on The Golf Channel tonight.
The Tour’s initial disciplinary action against Daly was for an incident on April 17, 1991, in Hattiesburg, Miss., when he cursed a playing partner during a Tour event there. That was four months before Daly burst onto the golf scene by winning the PGA Championship.
Eventually, his personnel file at the PGA Tour swelled to 456 pages, with incidents covering 18 years, through the fall of 2008. Daly was fined nearly $100,000 during that span, suspended from the Tour five times, placed on probation six times, cited 11 times for “conduct unbecoming a professional” and 21 times for “failure to give best efforts.”
The Tour has never voluntarily released information on disciplinary actions taken against players to the media, keeping with a long-standing policy. Daly’s file was turned over to Morris Publishing lawyers on a court order after Daly sued Morris in 2005, and became part of the court file after Daly dropped his appeal last fall of a summary judgment issued in favor of Morris on March 23, 2009, and after Daly was ordered to pay Morris’ attorney fees.
Information in the file ends with details of a six-month suspension of Daly after an October 2008 incident at a Hooters restaurant in Winston-Salem, N.C., when Daly passed out after becoming publicly intoxicated, refused medical treatment and spent the night in jail. The Tour also fined him $10,000 and required him to participate in an in-patient alcohol treatment program.
The troubled, charismatic star appears to have stayed out of trouble since then, other than leading several media outlets to believe he was retiring after he finished a frustrating two rounds at the Farmers Insurance Open in San Diego last month. Daly “unretired” the next day via Twitter.
The Tour declined to comment on the information in the file.
“We turned the file over on a court order, but keeping with our policy, we’re not going to comment on disciplinary action taken against players,” said Ty Votaw, the Tour’s executive vice president for communications. “The fact that it is public record does not change that.”
A phone message and e-mail to Bud Martin, Daly’s agent at the Reston, Va.,-based SFX Sports Management, were not returned. The messages requested an interview with Daly or Martin.
For much of the last two years, Daly has been able to play only on sponsor exemptions in the U.S., Europe and Australia. He has made the cut only a handful of times. But the 1995 British Open winner remains one of the Tour’s most popular and recognizable players. Golf Digest estimated in January that Daly made more than $4 million in off-course income last year.
Many of the incidents detailed in Daly’s Tour file involve alcohol-fueled misconduct (such as his trashing of a room at the Sawgrass Marriott the week of the 1997 Players Championship, which resulted in a $5,000 fine and $1,500 in damages), improper withdrawals from events, missed starting times and antics such as being filmed at the opening of a course in which he plays while wearing no shoes and no shirt.
For example, Daly hit a ball off a beer can offered by singer Kid Rock during the pro-am at the 2008 Buick Open. He also was fined for launching golf balls over the heads of spectators in a set of bleachers behind a practice area during a clinic at the 1993 Fred Meyer Challenge in Portland, Ore. The Tour, apparently shaken at the possibility of the damage a Daly drive could inflict on a spectator, fined him $30,000, the largest fine for any one Daly incident.
Daly has been cited by the Tour nearly two dozen times under its “failure to give best efforts.” Among those incidents were continually pumping balls into a water hazard at the sixth hole at the Bay Hill Club and Lodge course in Orlando during the Arnold Palmer Invitational (resulting in a score of 18 on the par-5 hole) and slapping at a ball in motion during the 1999 U.S. Open at Pinehurst, admittedly frustrated that he could not get the ball up a bank and onto the green.
He also has walked off the course in the middle of rounds (at the 1997 U.S. Open and 1993 Southern Open) and withdrew following high scores.
Two incidents — one widely publicized and the other buried in the file for five years — take up a combined 50 pages of witness statements in Daly’s file.
The most recent of the two was at the 2005 U.S. Open in Pinehurst, N.C., in which Daly was accused of nearly running over Eugene Fleming, an agent from the Atlanta office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms at a security checkpoint where all players were required to stop and show their credentials.
According to the file, four other witnesses — all law enforcement officers on duty at the checkpoint — identified Daly as the driver of the car in statements gathered by the North Carolina Bureau of Investigation. Fleming said Daly claimed he was in a hurry to make his third-round starting time.
Despite the number of witnesses, charges were never filed and the Tour took no action against Daly. In a summary of disciplinary actions taken against Daly, the Pinehurst incident is labeled “mistaken identity.”
Fleming, who still works at the Atlanta ATF office, maintains that Daly was the driver and is upset that the Tour never punished Daly. He bristles at the “mistaken identity” characterization.
“I follow golf and I know John Daly, and he was the driver of that car,” Fleming told the Times-Union. “I looked him in the eye. There was no mistaken identity on my part. He was driving. A lot of people wanted the state of North Carolina to prosecute John for that incident. I heard later that the PGA Tour asked [the North Carolina SBI] to let them handle it.”
Fleming said he was told Daly was ordered by the Tour the next day to go to the security checkpoint and apologize to officers. Fleming said he wasn’t on duty at the time.
“It wasn’t my shift, so John Daly apologized to the wrong guy,” Fleming said. “As to why North Carolina never prosecuted him, I have no idea. But I’m surprised the Tour never did anything.”
Noelle Talley, the public information officer for the North Carolina Department of Justice, said the State Bureau of Investigation did not recommend a further criminal probe after gathering statements from officers at the scene. Talley said the only action the SBI took was to send its witness statements to PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem.
The investigator for the SBI who handled the incident, Melanie W. Thomas, has since retired. When reached by the Times-Union, she declined to comment on specifics of the case. The Tour’s Votaw also declined comment on the case.
One of most widely reported Daly off-course incidents occurred a decade before in the 1994 World Series of Golf at Akron, Ohio. According to witness statements in Daly’s personnel file, club pro and tournament participant Jeff Roth and family members accused Daly of hitting into Roth’s group during the final round of the tournament at Firestone Country Club. That escalated into name-calling on both sides, with Daly accused of profanities directed at Roth’s mother and the mother of Roth’s caddie.
Following completion of the round, Roth went into the clubhouse locker room to confront Daly. The exchange continued when Roth left and walked outside, where Daly was heard by witnesses screaming at Roth, “You can’t be me! You don’t know my life! You can’t live my life!” Within minutes, according to witness statements, Daly called Roth’s mother a derogatory name. Roth’s father Bob then jumped Daly from behind. The two were separated after scuffling briefly.
Daly was fined $20,000 for the incident and ordered to take a leave of absence for the remainder of the 1994 Tour season.
Daly’s file also shows examples of the connection he has made with fans, both positive and negative. The file contains letters from fans and tournament officials praising Daly for activities such as participating in clinics, and also in support of Daly’s side of the story in some of the incidents marking his career.
“I’m disappointed the suspension is indefinite,” wrote one fan to former commissioner Deane Beman. “Please reconsider and get John Daly back so many of us can get enthused about the PGA [Tour].”
There also are letters criticizing Daly’s conduct and urging the Tour to take stronger action.
“How long does it take for this young man to grow up and remember that thousands of young junior golfers are out there watching him make an *** of himself?” asked one fan in a letter to Beman.
