Patience Was the Key for Price in PGA

The four major championships of golf for the 1992 season are so much history now, each one serving up a memorable final round and an exceedingly worthy winner. That last member of that group is PGA Championship winner Nick Price, who persevered under excruciating pressure on the back nine of Bellerive late Sunday afternoon to take home a major event trophy he’d coveted for so long.

Price’s three-stroke victory will be popular among his fellow professionals, just as Fred Couples’ triumph in the Masters and Tom Kite’s victory in the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach were applauded in the world of golf. All three were overdue, all three had been close and all three had heard the whispers -- and in Kite’s case, a high-decibel roar -- that yes, they were fine players, but what a pity it would be if they’d never won a major championship.

Price, who finished at 6-under-218, admitted Sunday that he had started to wonder if he’d ever break through.

“There have been some doubts,” said Price, 35, a resident of Orlando, Fla., born in South Africa and raised in Zimbabwe. “When you get to your mid-30s, you need to start winning. Raymond Floyd, Jack Nicklaus winning the Masters and Tom Kite winning the Open, I knew I had some years left. I know you can play in your mid-forties and still compete.”

The proper ingredients for Price’s victory included a deadly accurate driver that kept him out of Bellerive’s smothering rough, a putter that finally did not fail him and a heaping helping of patience that every professional talks about, but few ever achieve.

The patience not to allow the occasional bad shot to force a dangerous gamble to recover. The patience to pick your spots for bold attacks at the flag. The patience not to be rattled on the final nine holes of a major, despite trailing by two strokes after 10 holes.

“I told my caddie ‘If I’m going to win, I’ve got to start now.’ ” Price said. “I birdied the 10th hole, the 11th and the 12th. I turned to my caddie and said ‘That’s it, I’ve got it, I’ll cruise in now.’ I made a bogey, then a double bogey and I lost by a shot.”

On Sunday, Price made a 25-foot birdie putt at the 222-yard 16th hole, then kept a two-stroke lead over playing partner John Cook when he rolled in a 12-footer for par at the 536-yard 17th hole. Cook was forced to play for birdie on the 18th, and when his second shot to the par-4 green went off into the crowd, Price had his first major.

The 1992 PGA also provided a tale of two Nicks. Nick Faldo, the British Open champion and for now, the player of his generation, will forever view this event as a wasted opportunity to add a sixth major to his already sterling resume. Faldo was done in by an uncharacteristic round of 5-over-par 76 Saturday that basically took him out of contention, though he did rally smartly with a 67 to grab one-fourth of second place.

Faldo, 35, said this week his only focus over the next 10 years is to win majors, and he has the work ethic to accomplish that goal. Couples, 32, has the talent, but has had difficulty coping with all the attention his game has helped create. Kite, 42, has won twice this year and, like Faldo, labors diligently at his game. His competitive fire has hardly been dimmed and he’d dearly love to get back on the U.S. Ryder Cup team next year, another strong incentive to prepare diligently and win another major.

Price, 35, also said he had no intention of resting on his laurels. Like Faldo, he’s got at least another 10 years of competitive golf in his sights.

“If you stay in good enough shape and you’ve got the desire,” he said, “there’s no reason you shouldn’t stay on until your late forties and compete. These guys have shown it can be done.”