Golf’s Mr. Personality : After Month Away, Fuzzy Returns to the Hunt

When Fuzzy Zoeller isn’t shooting birdies, he’s shooting birdies.

He’s got this little house in Southern Indiana, and he spent most of his Christmas vacation hunting ducks. They made for a great Christmas dinner.

As for the other birdies--the kind that make him rich--he hasn’t shot one since the Skins Game TV tournament last month. He wiped out Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer and Lee Trevino that weekend and won $370,000. Says he hasn’t picked up a golf club since.

“No, I take that back,” he said. “I picked up my clubs the day before Christmas, because I moved them out from in front of the door.”

Basically, he’s been hanging out at home, cleaning his guns and such. It gets frustrating sometimes, though. Hunters, like golfers, have off days.

“All I caught was a cold,” he said after a birdie-less afternoon in the duck blind last week.

He hopes his afternoons this week will be more profitable. Fuzzy is back on the golf course. The MONY Tournament of Champions will begin Wednesday at La Costa Country Club, and Zoeller--pro golf’s Mr. Personality--is the favorite, according to oddsmakers in Las Vegas.

“You’re kidding!” he said when he heard that. “Are those guys crazy over there or are they on drugs or what? I’d call them back and say, ‘Look, this idiot hasn’t been playing golf.’ ”

He’s been playing hooky, though, and that’s the important issue here. Most golfers, like football and baseball players, appreciate an off-season. Zoeller took his right after the Skins Game.

“That break, it makes me itchy to get back out on the road,” he said.

If you want to call La Costa the road. Players’ wives think this is the No. 1 stop on the tour. There were rumors that Nicklaus was going to skip this year’s event, and a Columbus, Ohio, writer called Nicklaus’ home to see if that were true.

Nicklaus’ wife answered and said: “He’s going to miss what? Over my dead body.”

Well, Nicklaus did decide to skip the tournament, but his wife apparently put up a tremendous fight.

That’s because a typical day for a players’ wife--according to La Costa experts--goes like this:

--Breakfast in bed.

--Go to the spa.

--Go to the pool for lunch.

--Play tennis, ride horses or go back to the spa.

--Socialize at a cocktail party.

--Ask your husband how he did.

--Get dressed up and go out to dinner.

As for the men, this is the first official week of the 1987 golf season, so it’s pretty important.

“What all players really appreciate is that we all start out with a zero at the first part of the year and we’re not guaranteed a thing until we go out and prove ourselves,” Zoeller said. “That’s the way it should be.”

Zoeller has other thoughts on golf, too. In fact, he has become something of a spokesman for the game. Some of his observations:

--On the state of the game: “I think it’s getting stronger and stronger. I hate to bring up certain things that other sports have been talking about lately, but we are kind of a clean, (drug-) free type sport, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

--On getting fat and lazy after winning all that money: “No! There’s a lot of pride in this boy’s body here. . . . I never let down on myself or say, ‘Well, I’ve got a pocket full of cash, let’s stop.’ I’ve always said, ‘If you want to be a pig, you might as well be a big pig.’ Right?”

--On telling knock-knock jokes to the gallery on the 18th green: “I’m not joking around. I’m choking. It’s just nobody else knows that.”

--On opponents: “Oh, you can tell when the other guy is gagging a little bit. The driver is a pretty good indication. When you start seeing a guy hitting big duck hooks out to the left, that’s a pretty good sign his guts are jumping or his nerves are jumping.”

--On choking: “I see nothing wrong with choking. To me, it’s the greatest feeling in the world--having a chance to choke.”

--On his goofy behavior on the course: “I credit my mother and father. . . . They’re just easygoing people. They never forced me to do anything. I think they led me up the right track. They got me drunk a of couple times.”

--On all the young, stoic clones coming up on the tour: “That’s one problem with young golfers. I mean, if you can remember 15 years ago, who was in their prime? Think about it. I know when I was a young golfer, I always looked up to Arnold Palmer. But 15 years ago, who was in their prime? Nicklaus, right? And how was Jack Nicklaus when he was playing the tour? He was kind of blah.

“But he had a great golf game. And I think these young kids kind of took notes and said, ‘Maybe that’s the way we’re supposed to do it.’ So I think we’re in that swing now, the Jack Nicklaus era. Nothing wrong with it. It’s just that I’d like to see the young guys open up a little bit. Because we do have a lot of personalities out there, and I’d like to see them use it.”

--On winning: “I take chances. I’m not scared to make an eight. I think some people are scared of it.”

--On Greg Norman: “Greg came pretty close (to dominating) last year. If he’s ready to participate this year, who knows? He might be burned out a little bit.”

So the ’87 tour is here. Fuzzy’s favorites? He likes Norman and Bob Tway and many others, including himself. He doesn’t have a rifle on this little hunting trip, but he’ll still be gunning for big bucks.

“Listen,” he said, “as long as they give me a chance to choke, I don’t care who I’m up against.”