Zoeller Wins Big Pot on 12, Skins Fat Cats : With a $255,000 Day, He Even Kisses Off Nicklaus

Fuzzy Zoeller spent Saturday treating his elders with their due respects. As a rookie in the Skins Game, he stood aside quietly as the spotlight shone on Arnold Palmer, the golfer Fuzzy admired most when he was growing up in Indiana.

Playing with Palmer, 56, Jack Nicklaus, 45, and Tom Watson, 36, the 34-year-old Zoeller did not make a dime on the front nine of Nicklaus’ Bear Creek course. Palmer had made $45,000, Watson $30,000 and Nicklaus $15,000.

Sunday, after the sun burned a low-lying fog off the Murrieta valley, Zoeller cast aside his role of reverence and turned the Skins Game into a youth movement.

A 15-foot putt for a birdie on the 12th hole, a demanding par 3 of 204 yards, gave Zoeller a $150,000 pot that included carry-overs from three holes Saturday and two more Sunday morning. When he later pocketed $70,000 for a par 4 on No. 15 and $35,000 for a snaking 25-foot birdie on No. 18, he had a Skins Game record $255,000 to take home to New Albany, Ind.

Nicklaus set the previous record when he won $240,000 with a single putt on the 18th hole last year at Desert Highlands in Scottsdale, Ariz.

The fun-loving Fuzzy also turned the proceedings into a burlesque, winking at Palmer after sinking his $150,000 putt and kissing Nicklaus after Jack lipped out a putt that would have denied Zoeller his $70,000 on No. 15.

“I’ll tell you, my gut was jumping on the 12th hole,” Zoeller said. “I’m not going to try and fool you, the old lump was in my throat.

“I had an opportunity to choke and I didn’t. That surprised the hell out of me.”

On the previous hole, the 555-yard 11th, Watson had prevented Zoeller from winning the rich carry-over bet by blasting from a bunker to make a birdie.

“Tom did what he does best, getting up and down out of a bunker,” Zoeller said after watching his eagle attempt slide a couple of feet past the hole. “I knew when I saw him in the sand I’d need to make a birdie for a half.”

With $150,000 riding on the 12th hole, all four reached the green. Palmer was 50 feet away, Watson and Nicklaus 15 each and Zoeller 12 after hitting a 5-iron off the tee.

Palmer’s long, downhill effort came close but ran past the hole. Watson slid his to the right and Nicklaus pulled his to the left.

“I dodged two large bullets but I got a good read off Jack and a good read off Tom,” Zoeller said. “I thought it was a straight putt, and what I saw convinced me.”

Zoeller stroked it into the heart of the cup, looked over and winked at Arnie and waved to his wife, Dianne, who was watching with Barbara Nicklaus and Linda Watson.

“A straight putt is the most difficult putt to make under that type of situation,” Zoeller said. “I hit my putt nice and solid and it broke straight.”

Watson, who won $70,000 Sunday to go with his $30,000 on Saturday, asked Fuzzy what he was going to do with all his money.

“I’m giving it to my wife,” Zoeller said. “We have a good relationship. I make it and she spends it.”

Junior golf will get a piece of his winnings, too. The players agreed to give 20% of what they win to the PGA Tour Junior Golf fund. This will be $90,000 in all, of which $51,000 will be from Zoeller.

When the group teed off in the fog at 8:30 a.m., there was $100,000 riding on the 10th hole--$75,000 carried over from Saturday and $25,000 for the hole itself.

Zoeller’s start did not indicate the kind of day he was going to have.

His tee shot on the 389-yard hole hooked wildly into the adjacent 11th fairway, and his second shot landed short of the green, in a weed-filled barranca. After taking a penalty stroke for a drop, he lobbed his fourth shot over bunker and off the green.

“Pick it up, that’s enough,” he said.

The other three all made par 4s, so Zoeller was still in the hunt as they headed for the majestic 11th hole, with its split fairway and two lakes. Palmer, Watson and Zoeller chose the short way, landing their tee shots on a thin peninsula to the right. Nicklaus pulled his drive into a bunker just over the first lake.

Only Zoeller, hitting a 3-wood, reached the green with his second shot. Palmer came up short, and Watson pushed his second shot into a bunker. Zoeller’s eagle effort was long, but close enough to assure him of a birdie 4. Both Palmer and Nicklaus could do no better than a par, leaving Watson in the trap and having to get down in two shots--which he did--to tie Zoeller.

“That was about it as far as I was concerned today,” Watson said. “I won a big ($70,000) skin on 17, but that was more Jack’s doing than mine when he missed that little putt and I won with a par.”

At the 11th, it was only a matter of delaying the issue, for Zoeller got the whole thing on the next hole.

Palmer, whose great performance Saturday overshadowed his younger opponents, picked up a skin with a birdie 3 on the 349-yard 13th hole. He put his approach three feet from the hole and watched as the other three missed birdie attempts before he made his.

Nicklaus, whose only skin came on the first hole Saturday when Palmer dubbed a 10-inch putt, gave it back on No. 17 when he failed to sink a 4-footer.

“I read it wrong,” Nicklaus said. “I thought it went one way and it went the other.”

Walking to the 18th tee, Nicklaus said to Zoeller, “Tom didn’t kiss me when I missed that one,” and Zoeller replied, “Well, Tom’s not as crazy as I am.”

The smooch occured on the 15th hole, worth $70,000. Zoeller had made a 20-foot putt for a birdie, but Watson and Nicklaus had make able birdie attempts. Watson’s stopped half an inch short of the cup, and Fuzzy heaved a sigh of relief.

Nicklaus was next, and his 12-footer appeared to be in the hole but caught the edge of the lip and spun away.

Before the startled Nicklaus could react, Fuzzy had planted a smacker on him.

For two days, Nicklaus didn’t have much to cheer about except the beautiful sunshine that bathed his Bear Creek development for TV audiences on Sunday.

On the 18th hole, a treacherous finisher that calls for a delicately placed shot over a lake fronting the green, Nicklaus hit his best shot of the two-day festival.

The by-invitation-only crowd of a little more than 2,000 cheered as Nicklaus laid his approach shot 10 feet from the hole. Palmer, whose two-day winnings totaled $80,000, was in a bunker, Watson was 40 feet away and Zoeller was 25. It looked as though the man who created Bear Creek might earn a $35,000 skin.

But Zoeller pulled more magic from his putting stick, stroking home his 25-footer. When Nicklaus missed his attempt for a half that would have sent the Skins Game into overtime, it was all over.

“I thought I hit the ball reasonably well both days, but I just couldn’t get it in the hole,” Nicklaus said. “Fuzzy got his in the hole and that was the difference.”

Nicklaus made only one birdie in 18 holes. Zoeller made three, all on Sunday.

“The sun came out today, and I came out and hit the ball a little better,” Zoeller said. “I had trouble judging distances Saturday and spent all day chipping. You don’t make many birdies when you chip on every hole. My back was acting up in the cold weather Saturday. I was in the bunker on the ninth hole and almost couldn’t bend over to hit the ball. The sun, and a little pain killer, helped today.

“You have to be lucky in a skins game to make your shots when they count the most. I did it today, but last month I played a mixed-partners skins game with Jan Stephenson in Sacramento and we made six birdies and didn’t win but one skin. We played much better golf than Craig Stadler and Nancy Lopez, but they won $150,000.”

Zoeller said the $150,000 putt he sank Sunday was the richest he ever stood over, but not necessarily the most nerve-racking.

“When I was a kid,” he said, “I played holes for $10 or $15, but I only had a quarter in my pocket.”