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Byrd's recent run tops rookie charge
Posted: Saturday April 05, 2003 10:34 PM
Updated: Sunday April 06, 2003 1:38 AM
By Scott Michaux
The Augusta Chronicle
There is no official ranking system for such things, but Jonathan Byrd's 70-day stretch at the end of last year has to rate among the finest.
Oct. 27, 2002 - Rides eagle-birdie-birdie-birdie-eagle stretch at Buick Challenge to win first PGA Tour event over David Toms and Phil Mickelson.
Nov. 3 - Ties for fifth at rain-shortened Southern Farm Bureau Classic to secure 39th place on the money list and a Masters Tournament invitation.
Nov. 30 - Marries college sweetheart Amanda Talley.
Jan. 5, 2003 - Departs for Kapalua, Maui, to participate in winners-only Mercedes Championships.
"I feel like I've gotten more congratulations than anybody in the world the last three months," Byrd said. "So much good stuff. The win, the Masters, the wedding, the rookie of the year and (Kapalua). I've been so blessed."
You make your own blessings, and the former Columbia resident and Clemson All-American has made plenty from his supreme golf talents. Byrd just wasn't sure it would happen so fast.
"It's hard to say I really thought it was going to come together, as bad as it was going for awhile," he said. "I started off pretty shaky, had a couple of good tournaments, but I really wasn't doing it. But from a day-to-day basis I kept working, never changed anything and never gave up. I knew it was out there and I knew there was one day that it was going to click and golf wasn't going to be quite as hard as I was making it to be."
With a third-place finish in Greensboro, N.C., last season, Byrd's game and confidence started coming together. While tying for 13th in Las Vegas, he stayed calm and relaxed during a disappointing final round and learned something about poise.
Two weeks later, he won at Callaway Gardens and his whole world changed - or at least his immediate future. Byrd moved up on the list of rising stars.
"The better you play, the expectations change," he said. "Last year coming out, I was a young gun but I wasn't hyped at all. I kind of liked that. I've always liked being the underdog where people tell me I can't do something and I go out and try to do it. I'm built that way. Expectations come with the territory and I feel like I can handle it. I feel like I'm good enough to play with anybody."
A week after his first win, Byrd was in the hunt again in the Mississippi event that ends the PGA Tour season opposite the Tour Championship. Final-round play was suspended Sunday because of unplayable conditions, with Byrd tied for fifth.
The $85,150 Byrd would earn if the tournament was called would put him in the Masters, but Byrd was eyeing the four-shot gap on leader Luke Donald - not the 30 guys within four shots of him that could ruin his chance at Augusta. When the tournament was called Monday morning, Byrd was in the Masters.
"I was standing next to Luke Donald and congratulated him on winning," Byrd said. "I wanted to play that day and try to win, but I knew if I didn't I was going to get in the Masters. I had plenty of people call and tell me that, so I knew the whole time. But I wanted to play."
Byrd downplays it, but his family doesn't.
"The Masters thing, he wanted that pretty bad," his wife said.
"I don't think he can think of anything else," his mother said.
Byrd's parents, Jim and Jo Byrd, live in Columbia; his mother is from Winnsboro, S.C. Jonathan said she was more excited than he was.
"That might be an understatement," she said. "I've always dreamed about one of my sons playing in the Masters. I told them, 'If you ever get in the Masters I'm going to go every single day and watch.' We never dreamed it would be so soon, if ever. That's the pinnacle. We get butterflies every day thinking about it."
Living so close to Augusta, the Byrds have long been Masters patrons - never more than one day a year on borrowed tickets. Jonathan liked to go study the players, watching Tiger Woods practice on the chipping green for almost an hour in 2001.
"I didn't go there to watch golf," he said. "I went there to learn and watch the guys practice and try to pick some stuff up."
Byrd, who played the course twice while at Clemson, wouldn't attend as a PGA Tour rookie because he wasn't in the field.
"I felt last year I had a chance to get in and didn't," he said. "I wouldn't want to be a spectator knowing I had a chance to play."
All of Byrd's biggest successes have happened close to home. He won the amateur Southern Cross Invitational at Palmetto Golf Club in Aiken three times. He won his only Buy.com Tour event at The Cliffs in Travelers Rest, S.C., in 2001. The third in Greensboro and win at Callaway Gardens, Ga., are his best on tour.
What about the Masters, the closest event (70 minutes) to his parents' home?
"Omen? Might be," he said. "I never thought of it that way. I'm real behind at Augusta and I've got a lot of work to do to prepare. I know it a little better than I would have if I'd never played it, but it's totally different that week. It's just going to be fun being in the Masters and being that close to home."
Reach Scott Michaux at (706) 823-3219 or scott.michaux@augustachronicle.com.
Copyright 2003 The Augusta Chronicle. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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