In this week’s Golf Legends series, we take a step back in time and look at the career of the great Jack Nicklaus, whose major championship tally of eighteen may never be beaten.
When top sportsbooks list the historic achievements in professional golf, two players stand head and shoulders above the rest, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods.
Jack Nicklaus – The Early Years
In January of 1940, Jack Nicklaus was born in Columbus Ohio, and has been a resident of the state for all his life. Nowadays, at the age of 84, Nicklaus plays host to his own event, the Memorial Tournament, played on the course he built, Muirfield Village.
His father Charlie, excelled at many sports, particularly, American Football and tennis and he also became a scratch golfer. Nicklaus continued the sporting expertise in the family, with his best being basketball, though he was also a strong competitor in Football, Tennis, and Athletics.
At the age of ten, Nicklaus played golf for the first time and was coached by PGA Tour player Jack Grout who was to become the lifelong coach to Nicklaus.
From the age of twelve, Nicklaus won five successive Ohio Junior State Championships and by the age of thirteen Nicklaus played off a +3 Handicap.
Nicklaus won the men’s amateur title for Ohio State at sixteen and proceeded to win the U.S. Amateur at the age of nineteen and twenty-one.
At the 1960 U.S. Open as an amateur, Nicklaus finished second behind Arnold Palmer, setting the record-low score for an amateur that stood until Viktor Hovland usurped it in 2019 as discussed last week.
Jack Nicklaus turned professional in late 1961, having juggled with the idea of staying amateur a while longer to emulate the achievements of Bobby Jones.
Jack Nicklaus’s Professional Career
Jack Nicklaus’s professional career was eagerly awaited by many, non-more so than Mark McCormack who would go on to be the owner of the famous IMG (International Management Group) on the back of his agent/player arrangement with Nicklaus that lasted a lifetime.
McCormack before he took the reins as Nicklaus manager, called him the “Golden Bear” in an interview with Melbourne Age, a nickname that stuck throughout his glittering career.
Nicklaus wasn’t the instant success you might expect after his esteemed amateur career, and it wasn’t until his seventeenth start that he won his first PGA Tour title.
1962 was the year, Nicklaus’s career took off when he won the U.S. Open and in doing so outduelled the popular great of the sport, Arnold Palmer.
By 1980, Nicklaus had accumulated seventeen major championships, five Masters, five PGA’s, four U.S. Open and three Open Championships. Upon reaching forty, his major championship wins had dried up completely.
But, in 1986, at the age of forty-six, Nicklaus turned the clock back and returned to the winner’s enclosure at a major championship for the eighteenth and final occasion. An inspirational back nine at Augusta National saw him steal victory from under the noses of Tom Kite and Greg Norman. That charge saw Nicklaus lifted by the emotion of the occasion and the galleries when he played the final ten holes in 7-under par.
Jack Nicklaus – The Senior Years
Jack Nicklaus, career is one of achievement and his career as an over-fifty was no different as he won eight of the sport’s senior major championships between 1990-1996.
His complete professional career saw Nicklaus accumulate 117 professional victories, 26 of which were major championships.
What Was Nicklaus’s Secret?
I must confess, years ago when reading Jack Nicklaus’s autobiography, it dawned on me what a simple common-sense philosophy he had for winning, especially the major championships when pressure and pars are at a premium.
In the modern world of sports psychologists preaching “staying in the moment” and “playing one shot at a time”, Nicklaus was already ahead of his time and doing so. His autobiography spoke of how during major championships he would play for the heart of the green and take his par or the bonus of a birdie, in the process taking the pressure off his shoulders while increasing it on his opponents.
The Jack Nicklaus Legacy
Only Tiger Woods’s legacy in the sport of golf will be bigger than Jack Nicklaus. Nicklaus was not only the winning most professional but a consummate one with his behavior on the course, always exemplary.
There was one notable act of great sportsmanship at the 1969 Ryder Cup when he was involved in the deciding singles match with European superstar Tony Jacklin. With Jacklin facing a three-foot putt to tie the team contest, Nicklaus proceeded to concede the Englishman’s putt in one of the most famous gestures of sportsmanship ever seen.
Jack Nicklaus’s legacy will be a champion of golf for his results and the sporting manner in which he achieved them!
