What if this baseball great had played golf instead? We asked him

On the latest episode of GOLF Originals with Michael Bamberger, viewers may be surprised to see a legend from another sport as Bamberger’s interview subject. But 75-year-old baseball-Hall-of-Famer-turned-golf-nut Mike Schmidt is one-of-a-kind.

“One of the things you get from Mike Schmidt, one thing that makes him an original, is that he has a plan and an approach to getting better,” Bamberger said. “And I took a lot from that.”

Schmidt combined his natural athletic gifts with a “cerebral” approach to the game of baseball, Bamberger said. And after Schmidt’s retirement from the pro game, he applied that approach to golf.

“I can’t take the golf club back without a mechanical thought,” Schmidt told Bamberger. “I tell you what, I swung and missed the ball one time because I forgot what my swing thought was in the middle of my backswing.”

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In his conversation with Bamberger, Schmidt went deep on his analytical process. What would Schmidt’s life have looked like if he had applied his talents to golf before baseball? Bamberger thought he could have had a career on par with six-time major winner Lee Trevino, but Schmidt had a different player in mind.

“I see myself as Tom Watson,” Schmidt said.

“Could you imagine devoting yourself to golf and achieving a Watson-like level, versus being Mike Schmidt and achieving what you did in baseball?” Bamberger asked. “Could a life in golf have been satisfying for you as a life in baseball?”

“Absolutely. Absolutely,” Schmidt responded. “To reach that level in golf would be a lot harder than it would in baseball. I guess the really big question is, would I have the mental ability to become a great golfer as opposed to what it took in baseball? I like to say I’d have figured it out in either sport. I would have figured it out.”

As Bamberger noted in his reply, that’s spoken like a real Hall of Famer.

For more from Schmidt, including why he thinks he could have helped Michael Jordan’s short-lived baseball career, check out the full episode of GOLF Originals with Michael Bamberger below.