New Season on Pro Golf Tours Starts With Many Fresh Faces

Maybe they should call it “Beavis and Butt-head Do Golf.” A new breed has grabbed hold of the game and it doesn’t look like they aim to let go very soon.

Suddenly, the young lions spawned by the Baby Boom are the oldtimers, with one foot in the Senior Tour and the other in soft-spikes.

Suddenly, this ain’t your dad’s PGA Tour anymore, or your mom’s LPGA.

A new wave of golfers is rolling over the game, not only pushing aside the longtime stars but also dismissing with some supremely confident swings the notion that golfers don’t hit their peak until they are in their mid 30s.

You can almost hear the adolescent laugh as Butt-head chortles, “Hey look Beavis. Tiger Woods.” And Beavis musters up all his intellectual ability to reply: “Heh, heh. He said ‘wood.’ Heh, heh. Cool.”

Yikes! What would Hogan say? Or Snead? Or Patty Berg?

Likely they would say: “Times change. We were young once, too. Go get ‘em, kids.”

The fresh wind blowing across golf as the 1997 season starts is bringing with it more fans, more players and more respect and recognition for the game than ever before.

This new generation of players seems primed to build upon the admirable accomplishments of their predecessors.

Remember when Baby Boomers--those youngsters born between 1946-66--were the brash, young band nudging aside Palmer, Nicklaus, Player and Trevino?

Can Tom Watson and Tom Kite really be turning 48 this year? How did Ben Crenshaw get to the brink of his 45th birthday. Curtis Strange and Greg Norman will turn 42.

Those are the top-five in career victories playing actively on the PGA Tour. And while their careers are not over, they are hearing the footsteps of players young enough to be the children of Baby Boomers.

Of the 44 PGA Tour events last year, 14 had winners under the age of 30, people born too late to be considered Baby Boomers.

Phil Mickelson, 26, won four times. Tiger Woods, 21, and Steve Stricker, 29, won twice each.

Ernie Els, 27; Justin Leonard, 24; Jim Furyk, 26; Tim Herron, 26; Paul Stankowski, 27, and Dudley Hart, 28, had one victory apiece.

One guy to keep an eye on this year is Stewart Cink, the 23-year-old Nike Tour sensation.

And the youth phenomena isn’t only happening on the men’s tour.

Nancy Lopez, that brash young girl who won nine tournaments as a 21-year-old in 1978, hit 40 the first week of the new year--a mark Patty Sheehan and Beth Daniel matched several months earlier. Betsy King is 41 and Pat Bradley will be 46 in March.

When the LPGA produced its first-ever $1 million winner last year it was none of those big names--or even the thirtysomething crowd of Laura Davies, Dottie Pepper, Meg Mallon and Liselotte Neumann. It was Karrie Webb, the Australian who turned 22 as 1996 ended.

Remember when Jan Stephenson was the big name from Australia? She’s now 45.

Webb was joined in the lofty areas of the money list by Annika Sorenstam, 26, Kelly Robbins, Michelle McGann and Mayumi Hirase--all 27--and Emilee Klein, 22.

Even fresher blood comes in this year with rookies like Charlotta Sorenstam--Annika’s sister--and teen sensation Cristie Kerr.

Another teen-ager--two-time U.S. Amateur champion Kelli Kuehne--can only play four tournaments on sponsor exemptions because she turned pro too late to go to qualifying school.

To make the age shift in golf complete, the Senior Tour got its first jolt from the vanguard of the Baby Boom--the class of 1946 trickled in last year.

Gil Morgan turned 50 in September and won his second tournament. Johnny Miller and Larry Nelson are among those turning 50 in 1997, along with Hubert Green, Jerry Heard, Steve Melnyk, Leonard Thompson and Ed Dougherty.

This should be an exciting year in pro golf, one in which Tiger Woods is not only the brightest star but also a shining symbol of a new era of golf, a changing of the guard.

But there is this for the young bucks to remember: The four major championship winners last year were all 35 or older. Nick Faldo and Steve Jones, both 38, Tom Lehman, 37, and 35-year-old Mark Brooks won’t move aside without a fight. All are playing as well as they ever have.

It should be a great year in golf. But if you must look ahead, remember this: In the year 2026, Tiger Woods will be eligible for the Senior Tour.