I thought it was a joke article from the Onion, but the Golf Channel is reporting that John Daly is “done” with golf:
Golf Channel caught up with an emotional John Daly following a missed cut Friday at the Farmers Insurance Open and golf’s lightning rod said that he’s finished with golf.
“I’m done,” Daly told Golf Channel following rounds of 79-71. “I can’t compete. I can’t play like I use too. I can’t keep taking spots from guys out here playing this bad. It’s not worth it.
“I’m tired of embarassing myself in front of (my fans). I can’t do it anymore.”
I have to give him props for having the integrity to hang it up rather than keep others from the field. He’s a popular enough guy that he’d keep getting sponsor’s invites on a regular basis. But golf—especially in the absence of Woody—is going to miss the colorful player.
I wonder what’ll happen to the Golf Channel series he was going to participate in this spring.
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My initial reaction is that Daly is impulsive and probably just blurted out his retirement statement after a tough two days. I will be surprised if he doesn’t change his mind once he sits down and figures out his income and lifestyle will take a huge hit from his retirement. No more endorsement money, no more appearance fees overseas, no more corporate outings. It is not like he saved his winnings for a rainy day or retirement and he is a long way from collecting Social Security.
He looked to me like he was was suffering from some discomfort or pain (not just from his scores).
You’re probably right. But he’s slow. It’ll take him a while to figure that out.
I just watched the video of this exchange on the Golf Channel. The interviewer did everything he could to push Daly into saying the word retirement. I thought it was very unscrupulous as Daly was coming off yet another missed cut and was not in the greatest of moods. On Twitter, Daly made it clear that he did not use the word retire in any statement he made anywhere. I really believe he meant that as long as he’s playing this poorly he won’t be taking sponsor’s exemptions away from other players. That means he will probably go home and try to figure out how to improve his game. Maybe instead of Ray Romano, the Haney Project should have taken on Daly.
Well, not so fast after all. I didn’t see the statement, but it sounded as if it was a little heat of the moment. And if it was for the cameras of his show, this could also just be him sharing his thoughts for that show. But later I did see a comment where he was losing too much money being on tour or something like that. Now his sponsors have asked him to play on, and it might not be beyond belief if some of the tour stops (if not the tour itself) has called and asked him to stay on.
As for Haney—from what I understand, one of his stable is off in rehab somewhere, so Hank might have a few minutes for JD if he did want to go that way.