Okamoto Stars, Pitching or Putting : Japanese Golfer Gave Up Softball Career for Pro Tour

The story of Ayako Okamoto is not for the ears of any golfer who has spent a year’s salary on lessons but still can’t seem to keep a drive off the roof of the local doughnut shop.

It is not for the hacker who is required by law to have two security guards present for every driving-range session. It is not for the perennial divot-digger who has purchased every “how-to-golf” book ever published but still draws nothing but dirty looks from the local course groundskeeper.

There are guys who would sell secrets to Soviets if it meant knocking a stroke from their handicap.

They don’t want to know about Ayako Okamoto, Japan’s reigning superstar of golf.

Depressing?

It seems that about 11 years ago, at the age of 23, Okamoto grew tired of pitching softballs and decided to take up golf. She didn’t know a fairway from a Safeway. One day, someone rolled a little white ball in front of her and handed her a 9-iron. After Okamoto was shown which end of the club was up, she promptly swatted the ball halfway to Osaka.

Okamoto grew to like the funny little game. A friend told her she could make money swatting little white balls.

“That’s a good idea,” Okamoto said. “I’ll try that.”

Besides, there wasn’t any money in amateur softball. So it was easy for Okamoto to give up her career as a star pitcher.

In October of 1974, she qualified for the Japanese Ladies Professional Golf Assn. tour. She finished 12th in her first tournament. In 1979, she won the Japan LPGA Championship. In 1981, she won eight tournaments and finished second six times.

Okamoto grew bored. She flew to the United States and qualified for LPGA tour. In 1984, she was the tour’s third-leading money winner with $251,108.

She wondered what all the fuss was about hooking and slicing.

“I’ve had a lucky life,” Okamoto said Tuesday as she prepared for the Uniden LPGA Invitational at Mesa Verde Country Club in Costa Mesa. “I was born under a lucky star or something. I don’t know.”

Chances are that you have not heard of Okamoto.

But back home in Japan, she’s become one of the biggest names in sports since Sadaharu Oh.

“She’s a big name, a superstar, like JoAnne Carner is in golf here,” Mitch Sado, a Japanese journalist covering the LPGA, said. “Four years ago in Japan, women’s golf was not so popular. It was just minor. But she’s become a major figure.”

But it almost wasn’t to be.

Her parents, traditionalists, dissuaded Okamoto from a life of golf. They wanted her to marry and settle down.

But she would have none of that. Instead, she negotiated a a deal. Okamoto promised her parents that if she didn’t make the Japanese professional tour in three years she would give up.

Eleven years later, Okamoto is still single. And still golfing.

She is only one of two Japanese who are regulars on the current LPGA tour. The other is Atsuko Hikage.

And the Okamoto fan club is growing by the day.

“All the Japanese players are getting better,” American golf star, Patty Sheehan, said. “But Ayako is their premier player. She is a very aggressive player, real cool and calm. She’s a lot of fun to be around. I really enjoy her.”

Added Bonnie Lauer, winner of last year’s Uniden Invitational: “She’s such a natural athlete. She’s played with a lot of pain, she’s had back difficulties, but her natural ability carried her through.”

About the only thing holding Okamoto back is her back. She played in only 18 tournaments in 1985 because of a herniated disc. Still, she managed a second-place finish and $87,497 in earnings in 1985. The injury was further aggravated by her golf swing.

“When I play a lot, it feels like there are 1,000 needles in my back,” Okamoto said.

Okamoto entered the hospital last August for treatment and couldn’t play golf for four months. Actually, she enjoyed the break.

“I had played golf for 10 years,” she said. “I had played too much golf. I had to start enjoying golf and that’s what I’m doing this year.”

Okamoto has been able to rid herself of the superstitions that used to haunt her game.

When playing in Japan, someone told her that making a hole-in-one while leading a tournament was bad luck; that the leader would soon become the loser.

Well, as bad luck would have it, two times Okamoto shot a hole-in-one while leading a tournament and two times she ended up losing.

“I started believing it,” she said.

Okamoto also had some other quirks. One was that she would only wear yellow clothing after winning a tournament. And when Okamoto was playing well, she followed a strict regimen every morning. When the putts were dropping, Okamoto would always wash her face immediately after awakening. For a while, she had one of the cleanest faces in the country.

“But I don’t do any of that anymore,” Okamoto said. “I feel very comfortable now. I don’t need to do those things anymore.”

It’s all part of growing up on the tour. Her most difficult times came when she first came to the United States and knew little English.

“Sometimes it was very difficult,” she said. “But everyone has been kind to me. When I couldn’t understand English, they would show me how to do this or that.”

Now, Okamoto is showing them a thing or two.