The Garner Files: A Memoir (23 page)

Golf spectators are knowledgeable, quiet, and respectful (but not always—more about that later). They are so polite, in fact, that their silence can be intimidating. You swear you can feel every set of eyes on you. But galleries didn’t bother me, and I developed a little trick for playing in televised tournaments. It’s humiliating to hit a bad shot on national TV. The good news is that the camera stays on the golfer, not on the flight of the ball, so when I hit my shot, even if it was a shank or a snap-hook, I just held my finish, smiled, and strode briskly down the fairway. I used the technique more than once with excellent results. The only time it failed was when my ball hit the camera lens.

Jack Lemmon wanted to make the cut and play on Sunday more than anything else in the world, and we were all pulling for him. But he couldn’t seem to get out of his own way. To give you an idea, on the long, par-three seventeenth at Pebble Beach one year, we had a breeze at our backs and Jack nailed a driver right at the flag. Unfortunately, the ball sailed forty yards over the green. It was the only good shot he hit all day, but it was in the ocean.

Another year Jack and Peter Jacobsen were only a shot or two behind the lead and looked certain to make the cut when the pro-am was canceled because of heavy rain. And then there was the time Jack shanked one into his hotel room at the Del Monte Lodge. His wife Felicia was in the john at the time. She said the ball ricocheting off the walls sounded like a machine gun and she thought terrorists were attacking Carmel.

Jack always accepted defeat gracefully. His perseverance and good humor were inspirational. I think that’s why he had so many golf fans rooting for him. They could relate to his tribulations on the course, like when he’d take three strokes to get out of a bunker. Maybe even non-golfers identified with his struggle. It became an annual story line—a quest that became ever more urgent with each
passing year. Peter Jacobsen said he would rather see Jack make the cut than win the tournament himself. But it wasn’t to be.

Contrast Jack Lemmon with Bill Murray, whose behavior at the AT&T is a disgrace. He thinks he’s mocking the whole thing by dressing like a slob and putting with the wrong end of the putter, but he’s only making an ass of himself. He should have been banned from the tournament years ago after he tried to dance with that old lady in the bunker and she fell down. I don’t care if
she
didn’t mind,
I
did. I’m glad I was never paired with him, because I would have refused to play.

Clint Eastwood fell in love with the Monterey Peninsula in the 1950s, while in the army stationed at Ford Ord. He promised himself he’d settle there if he ever earned enough “crumbs.” Well, Clint wound up with the whole bakery, and not only does he live on the Monterey Peninsula, he was elected mayor of Carmel in 1986, owns his own course there, Tehàma, and a piece of Pebble Beach Golf Links to boot. Clint played his first Crosby in 1965, when he was playing Rowdy Yates on the TV series
Rawhide
. He’d been interviewed on television and asked whether he’d be playing in the upcoming Crosby and he said, “No . . . I guess they don’t like cowboys.” Bing heard about it and sent Clint an invitation with a note, “See, we do like cowboys.” Clint’s been playing in the tournament ever since.

The Clambake, as Bing liked to call it, was one of the highlights of my golfing year, but in 1964, I almost didn’t play. I’d banged up my ribs shooting the beach scene in
The
Americanization of Emily
. I went to the hospital for x-rays and the doctor said they weren’t broken, so I went back to work, though they were really sore. That night I drove to Pebble Beach for the tournament. The next day, Monday, I played a practice round and the ribs were still hurting. When I got back to the hotel there was a call from the hospital—they’d misread the x-rays and several ribs were broken after all. I didn’t have to play until Thursday, so I went to a doctor in Monterey. He told me I
couldn’t do any more damage to my ribs or lungs by swinging a club, so I figured out how to play without worsening the pain: I just blew all the air out before swinging. I played okay that way and my team made the cut.

Bill Saxon and I were often in the same foursome at the Crosby, and in 1981, Nick Faldo was Bill’s pro and I was paired with young John Cook, whom I’d known since he was a boy. My brother Jack was Bill’s caddie. We usually played at Pebble Beach on Saturday, the big TV day, but the weather had been so bad, the tournament was shortened to three days and we finished at Spyglass. We’d played the back nine first, so the ninth hole was our eighteenth and final hole. I hooked my tee ball into the skinny pines in the left rough. The ball hit a spectator and knocked him down. I felt terrible and went over to make sure the man was okay. Then I said, “The hell with it, I’m not playing the hole.” I always tried to stay out of the pros’ way. If I didn’t have a chance to help the team on a given hole, I’d pick up.

At that point in the tournament, John Cook was individually tied for the lead. A win would have been a big career boost and a windfall in prize money. As I walked down the fairway, I heard a shout from the gallery: “HEY, ROCKFORD! HEY, ROCKFORD!” Some jerk had been heckling me all day. I’d done my best to ignore it, but when he kept it up, I motioned him to be quiet because John was trying to putt out to win the tournament. John missed the putt, triggering a five-way playoff.

We signed our cards, and as I walked through the gallery, I said, “Who’s that loudmouth?” The crowd parted and there were two guys in their twenties who’d obviously been drinking. I told the guy, “You shouldn’t yell like that. It doesn’t make any difference to me, but the pros are playing for a lot of money. John Cook would have won the tournament if he’d made that putt.”

He didn’t say anything, but started picking at my sweater, just below the neck.

“Don’t do that!” I said.

“Or what? You’ll deck me?”

Before he could finish saying, “deck me,” I decked him.

The next thing I knew he was on the ground and Bill Saxon was trying to keep me off of him.

“You want some more?” I said.

“I’m a big fan of yours, and my dad, who died of cancer, just loved you,” he said.

Then he started crying.

Oh, man.

I’m happy to say that John won the tournament when he made a birdie on the third hole of the playoff. It was his first win and it launched a successful career on both the PGA Tour and now the Champions Tour.

I thought the incident was closed, but someone had snapped a photo and sold it to the tabloids. The next day it appeared all over the world. The heckler brought a case against me for assault and battery, claiming irrevocable harm because he was a recovering alcoholic and drug addict, and I had intentionally inflicted emotional distress on him.

I had no such intention. I only wanted to beat the crap out of him.

The complaint alleged $2 million in damages. The trial was in Monterey a few months later. I took the stand and told my side of the story. When the jury came in after deliberating for all of half an hour, the judge asked if they’d reached a verdict. The foreman said, “Yes, Your Honor, we have two statements: One, Mr. Garner’s not guilty, and two . . . we’d like to have our picture taken with him.”

W
ith Bill Saxon’s airplane at our disposal, we’d fly to Greensboro, Charlotte, Atlanta, Asheville, and Tampa to play in pro-ams and other golfing events. We didn’t miss too many in that part of the country.

Bill was an oil operator for most of his professional life. His
Company, Saxon Oil, would search out prospects and then round up investors to finance drilling. Arnold Palmer had been one of Bill’s early investors and they became friends. They bought a golf course together near Orlando called the Bay Hill Club, and during the winters they had a regular game there at eleven o’clock every morning. When
Rockford
was on hiatus, I’d stay with Bill and join them. It was a great time and I got to meet and play with a lot of interesting people, including Arnold. I’ve never met anybody who enjoys golf more or plays harder to win a two-dollar Nassau than Arnold Palmer.

I
’ve never been much of a gambler. I never bet the ponies or the lottery, and I don’t care for casino games, but in the early 1950s, I used to go to Las Vegas on weekends. I’d take only one or two hundred dollars, because I wasn’t making any money. I had a golfing buddy there, a blackjack dealer named Montana. Before I’d leave town he’d say, “How ya doin’?”

“Oh, I’m down about two hundred bucks.”

“What time are you leaving?”

“Eleven o’clock.”

“Okay, come in around ten-thirty.”

I’d sit down at his table and in half an hour, I’d have my two hundred back. But no more.

I played a lot of backgammon with Luis over the years, but never for money. I played poker, mostly in home games, though I did play in the World Series of Poker in 2006. Got knocked out in the first hour by a guy with a bigger full house than I had. Ordinarily my hand would’ve kept me going for a while.

I’m not a
bad
poker player; I just draw bad cards.

I learned the game around the kitchen table with Uncle John Bumgarner, who was a good player. He’d say, “We used to be wealthy; it cost me a lot of money to get this good.”

If you’re wondering whether being an actor helps at the poker
table, yes and no. Yes on offense, like when you’re bluffing, no when it comes to reading “tells.” I’m terrible at that.

I don’t bet on football games, but I love the NFL. I’ve been an Oakland Raiders nut since the 1970s. The late Dr. Robert Rosenfeld, who was my orthopedic surgeon, was also the Raiders’ team doctor. I’d fly up to Oakland with him and sit on the sidelines with the players. There was a long stretch when the Raiders won whenever I showed up for a game and lost when I wasn’t there. Soon if I wasn’t there and they lost, they blamed me! When the Raiders moved to Los Angeles, I had season tickets at the Coliseum.

In the glory years, the Raiders had great players and a great coach in John Madden. George Blanda played until he was pushing fifty. Kenny “the Snake” Stabler could burn you at thirty yards; Fred Biletnikoff was as clutch a receiver as ever played the game; Jim Otto never missed a game—he never missed a
play
. Art Shell, Ted Hendricks, Gene Upshaw—I loved those guys.

T
here’s an annual tournament at Bel-Air named for the swinging bridge across the ravine that bisects the tenth hole. It’s a tough format: The first day of the tournament is better-ball of partners and on the second day, play is from the back tees and both balls count. On the third and final day it’s alternate shot, which can be tough because you feel like an idiot when your partner hits a great drive and you screw up the next shot.

The bad news about the Swinging Bridge Tournament is that it draws such a huge field, rounds take over five hours. But everybody wants to play in it because it’s so much fun. And hard to win.

In 1998, my regular partner couldn’t play, so Bill Saxon suggested I team with John McKay, a friend of his from Dallas. John is a good player and he knew the course after having spent twenty years in LA with CBS Television. He’d played in the Swinging Bridge Tournament many times before.

On the first tee I told John, “I only ask two things: one, we never say we’re sorry, and two, we never say, ‘We really need this one, partner.’” (John later told me he’s used that with partners ever since.)

John and I played well enough the first two days to stay in contention. On the last day, it all came down to the eighteenth hole. John hit a good drive, and after I put our approach shot to within three feet of the hole, John needed to sink the three-footer, which had a six-inch break, to win the tournament. With a crowd watching, John lined up the putt, hunched over the ball, and calmly stroked it into the cup.

I. Went. Crazy.

I was so thrilled, I didn’t even mind going to the awards ceremony—I’d never gone in all the years before. When they handed me the trophy, I said, “I think I’d rather have this than an Oscar, because with an Oscar, you just go out and work and if you’re lucky, it happens. But I went out to win this tournament.” It was a moment I’ll always remember.

Arthritis keeps me from playing golf now, and I miss it. Looking back, like all golfers, I had my strengths and weaknesses. I drove the ball pretty far, with a little fade. My irons were okay, except from about a hundred yards out. That shot was my Achilles’ heel. My short game was pretty good, especially putting. Sometimes I didn’t do what I was supposed to do on the golf course, but it wasn’t because I choked. Spectators never bothered me, but my temper was a problem. I think I could have been a better player if I’d controlled it. I had a love/hate relationship with the game: I got frustrated when I didn’t play well and I’d make myself miserable. If I hadn’t been so hard on myself, I’d have enjoyed the game more. But golf took me all over the world and introduced me to many wonderful people. Bottom line, I’ve taken a lot more out of golf than golf has taken out of me.