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ORLANDO, FLORIDA | Every golfer has stood over a putt, envisioning the roll of the ball toward the hole and the stroke it will require. In a rare moment like this one, I could feel something else:
The man the putter belongs to, holding it as I was, needing a 10-footer to drop so he could keep his Masters hopes alive. The crowd is a dozen deep on all sides and falls deathly silent, waiting to erupt into a deafening roar. Their hero, known widely as the King, lead commander of Arnie’s Army, squats into a stance with both elbows bent outward and his hands nearly touching his knees.
No instructor would teach a player to putt like this today. But for many instances like this one, the technique and sheer desire raced the ball into the back of the hole. A fist pump, a swelling of the Sunday charge, paints vivid colors into my imagination.
The reality of the moment is quieter. I’m standing over a 10-foot putt on the practice green at Arnold Palmer’s Bay Hill Club and Lodge as part of the recent media day prior to the PGA Tour event that will be contested there this week. The tournament organizers offered us lowly scribes an opportunity most will never get – the chance to use three of the late legend’s putters, all of which had a substantial impact during his career.
For a 30-foot, downhill, right-to-left breaking putt, we were given the MacGregor M1 Palmer used as a boy during the 1940s. The rusted relic came in stark contrast to the white, Palmer-designed putter we were handed for a return effort up the hill. He won more than 40 PGA Tour events with this one, adding lead tape on the back of the head to make it heavier than one of his handshakes.
If the first two putters came with a rush of excitement, the final one was a solemn farewell. An Odyssey White Hot Two-Ball, the last putter he held in competition, greeted us as we coped with a left-to-right sidewinder.
All three putters were chipped and weathered from decades of practice. More than a few times, they were jolted violently toward the golfing gods, sometimes in enthusiasm after a clinching birdie and other times in heartache after a runner-up finish. They all, however, lived a life as full as the man himself, now humbly telling their story like Palmer would if he were sitting down for lunch on the back patio of his club.
For how much putter technology has improved, Palmer’s putters still felt comforting, like a home-cooked meal on a stormy day.
Later that day, I decided to use my own far-less-famous putter in a round at Winter Park Golf Course, a modernized and ultra-playable nine-hole layout across town from Arnie’s place. Coming from a spiritual experience at Bay Hill, I found myself amused that my randomly assigned playing partner for the afternoon was a 72-year-old Catholic priest named Bill. On the fourth hole, a par-5 that bends to the left, I hooked my tee ball out of bounds into the adjacent Palm Cemetery.
As I went to retrieve my ball, Bill walked over and offered to show me his favorite tombstone among the hundreds that surrounded us. It belonged to a woman who had passed away at age 92. Adorning the stone in unmistakable white lettering was the following phrase: “The Three F’s: Faith. Family. Friends. No Regrets.”
“Isn’t that simple and beautiful?” Bill said with his thick Massachusetts accent. “That’s all that life should be.”
Arnie knew that. And after that day, I felt it a little more, too.
Sean Fairholm