For Sam The Price Is Always Right

I don't get excited about athletes. We manage Miller, Heard, Casper and Hill and Don Sutton of the Dodgers, and I have them in my house, but I don't get excited about it. But Sam, he's different. When Fm with that old man I feel like Pm with a piece of history.
ED BARNER

Sam Snead crushed the box of cornflakes in his hands, opened it and spilled the crumbled contents into the bowl, then layered the top with bananas.

"I don't eat much lunch," he said. "I like to keep my weight about 190. I'm about 195 now." His thick fingers worked the spoon into the cereal. He was in the dining room of the golf club at Disney World , an hour from tee off in the PGA Seniors tournament, which he had won six times. He complained that he had had to pay the greens fee for the practice rounds he had taken the two previous days.

Tommy Bolt , heavier and grayer than remembered, came by and the two men exchanged greetings.

"I talked him out of this thing one year," Snead said, grinning. "He stuck his head over my locker and said, 'Hey, Nudie, what the hell you doing?' I said, 'Hey, what's the matter with you, Thunder?' He said, 'Whaddaya mean?' I said, 'You look awful. You look green around the gills. I never saw you look so bad.' 'Well, hell, I don't feel good, Sam.' 'Gee whiz, Thunder, you don't look good.' He went right out and withdrew, and he was the only guy in the tune-ament who could beat me."

The tour, he said, had changed a lot since the days he and Bolt were big numbers. "Motels made a difference," Snead said. "Everybody used to stay in the same place, sat around, got to know one another. I traveled with Johnny Bulla for about 4 years, splitting expenses. Now you never see the same guy twice in one year unless you play with him. And the young guys are more conscientious. Used to be they'd shoot a 65 and blow up. Now they do it four days in a row. They're more fit. They're in their rooms doing push-ups and eating Wheaties . Trouble is, you get so that's all you think about, and somebody asks you your name, and you can't tell 'em.

"I was always a loner. I liked to get away from it, to fish or hunt or watch a shoot-'em-up. I didn't hang around with anybody much, except Bulla. Hogan? You'd play a round with Hogan, and the only thing he'd say was, 'You're away.' But if you'd walk alongside him, you would hear him grunt, 'Unh, unh,' like he was talking to himself. I offered him a drink of water once at the Masters and he looked at me like I was crazy."

His companion noted that Snead had always seemed able to reduce golf to the most elemental level, to turn what was essentially a game of detachment (man against the beguiling irregularities of nature as produced by golf-course architects) into an emotional contest of individuals. At one time Snead won 13 consecutive man-to-man match-play events on television and, with one exception, had always beaten Hogan in match-play events and playoffs.

"There are some guys, you know, you just figure if you go out there and look 'em in the eye, you're gonna beat 'em," said Snead . "Valerie [Hogan] told me one time, 'We never relax until you're in the clubhouse.' Hogan never said anything like that, of course. But that's why I like to play with the guy I have to beat. Then I can watch him. See what he's doing. You watch a guy long enough, you pick up a pattern. Does he play fast? Does he talk a lot? Does he waggle his club before he hits? Then if he changes—a little hesitation, a little extra waggle—you know you got him. Hogan did that over a putt when we were in a playoff at the Masters one year. Hesitated over a putt on the 16th. I knew I had him then.

"C'mon," Snead said, "let's go see if I can put something together."