John Daly, a few years back, was asked why he was popular. Though it’s now been over 30 years since he won the second of his two major championships, he remains a draw.
But Daly wasn’t sure of the answer.
“No idea. I got no idea. I don’t know,” Daly said. “I think Chad does a great job with our T-shirt companies with the sayings on it; young kids like it. I don’t know, maybe because of the beard they think I’m really Santa Claus, but Justin Thomas told me I’m Bad Santa, so that’s out the window. I have no idea.”
The reporter tried again, asking Daly to explain the connection he has with fans.
“I think because there’s really no skeletons in my closet,” Daly said. “If I screwed up, I’ll honestly say I screwed up, and I think fans like that. I think I’m not — I’m not looking over my shoulder; are they going to know about this or that? Everybody knows everything about me on this tour — my life, my ex-wives, everything — and it’s out there so there’s not really anything to hide.
“I think, hopefully, it’s the honesty.”
Was he happy he approached his life that way?
“Yeah,” Daly said. “My mom would have come out of her grave if I didn’t.”
That’s one answer behind his popularity.
Below is maybe another.
This week, Daly is playing the Regions Tradition, the second major of the year for the 50-and-over gang. Through two rounds at Greystone Golf and Country Club in Alabama, Daly is three-over par. But a moment during his practice round on Wednesday is what you should see, though you might have already — as of Friday afternoon, a video of what happened had collected 1.6 million views on X.
It was shared by @alabamabart, who wrote: “John Daly hit it close on 17 and picked a little fella out of the crowd. He calmly walked up and dropped the putt. May be the best thing you see today.” A good summary. In the 21-second video, Daly and a boy walked to Daly’s ball, which looks to be just over 5 feet away. The boy circled around the ball, looked at the hole, paused briefly, then putted with Daly’s putter. He looked up.
He made it, which you can watch below.
Daly raised his arms. Daly and the boy hugged.
And fans around the green cheered.
(Should you be interested in more from Daly, the PGA Tour Champions X feed shared another video featuring Daly at the Regions Tradition. This one, which you can watch here, shows Daly covering Bob Dylan’s “Knockin on Heaven’s Door” — and he inserts a few golf-themed lyrics.)
