Prose from the Pros

The U.S. golfer supports a costly habit. Last year, playing on seven thou sand golf courses, he lost or disfigured 60 million golf balls, invested more than $110 million in golf equipment and, if he had the cash left, took lessons to improve his game. If he could not afford an average $15 an hour for personal advice from a pro, the addicted duffer got the word anyway -- in the nation's newspapers. Season after season, it is dispensed by experts in the sports sections of the daily press.

There, between the baseball scores and the fishing tables, the nation's leading golf pros have turned syndicated columnists. It can be an extremely lucrative sideline. Mark H. McCormack and Arthur J. Lafave Jr., Cleveland attorneys who handle the literary careers of Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Doug Sanders and Gary Player, count it a poor year when their clients' bylines do not earn at least as much as their tournament play. Palmer's column, which appears in 150 papers, generates upward of $50,000 a year.

Literary Caddies. Palmer commands the added income with the effortless grace that goes into a good tee shot. An editor of Golf Digest--one of the many magazines that also buy prose from the pros--writes Palmer's copy; the line drawings illustrating the text are traced from photographs taken of Palmer in Pittsburgh in 1959. About the only editorial control that Sam Snead exerts over his column, which has been running since 1940, is to insist that he be shown wearing that familiar Snead trademark, the porkpie straw hat.

Tommy Armour, Gene Sarazen, Alex Morrisson--almost every oldtimer still hale enough to handle a club or a typewriter gets into the act. Gary Middlecoff, the dentist from Memphis, continues to drill out advice, though he stands farther than Palmer from the actual practice of journalism. His ghostwriter, Reporter Thomas E. Michael of the Memphis Commercial Appeal, last consulted the dentist nine years ago. "I'm very much by myself," says Michael, who has since managed six Middlecoff bylines a week--for steadily dwindling readership. Most golf columns lose readers at about the same rate that their custodians lose tournaments. And since Middlecoff hasn't been winning any lately, his syndication is down to 30 papers from a high of 75.

Teeing-Off Tips. The newspaper lessons peddled by the masters cover much that the duffer knows full well: "If it actually is raining," began one Palmer column, "rule No. 1 is to keep your equipment and your hands as dry as possible. A good idea is to carry a towel." Jack Nicklaus can also belabor the obvious: "Prior to driving, a golfer can save strokes merely by looking down the fairway."

The golfer's every move gets detailed attention. The simple act of getting set for a shot turns Tommy Armour into a veritable encyclopedia. "As you address the ball," he said in one offering, "wiggle your toes." Another day, he had another approach. "As you address the ball be sure that your left elbow is straight and your right elbow is a bit bent and close to your body, a little bit forward of in line with your right knee." Sam Snead's approach is anatomical, right down to the X rays: "Imagine that your backbone is visible." Chances are most golfers are busy looking elsewhere --if only at another column of syndicated advice.

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