Peete Says He’s Feeling a Little More at Home Now in Augusta

“Yes, I did have negative feelings about the Masters,” said Calvin Peete. “To me, it was just another golf tournament.

“But now I feel like I’m not just out here . . . “

He hesitated and measured his words.

” . . . in the way,” he said.

Peete felt more at home at the Masters, particularly after Thursday’s one-under-par 71 had put him among the first-day leaders, two shots off the pace.

“The tradition is sort of rubbing off on me,” he said in the Augusta National clubhouse afterward. “I would like to add my name to the winners of the Masters. I’d like to wear the green coat.

“Winning here would make sure people mention me anytime they mention golf.”

For some time, Peete could not shake the feeling of being “in the way” at Augusta, partly because, as one of golf’s shorter hitters, his game simply was not tailored for this spacious course, and partly because, as one of the tour’s few black professionals, he was aware of how long it had taken for anybody black even to be permitted to tee up.

Bitter sentiments spilled out of him during the tournament of 1983. “Asking a black man about the tradition of the Masters is like asking if he enjoyed the fact that his forefathers were slaves,” he said after the third round.

Peete was agitated that day after shooting an 87 on a rain-soaked course that was “unplayable,” he remembered Thursday. He regrets now that he spoke as harshly as he did.

A 71 on opening day can make a fellow more mellow. Peete was pleased because he had played so many poor first rounds before this. Last year, he had to overcome a 75 to tie for 11th place. In ‘84, he shot an 84.

The only good thing a bad round does is relieve the pressure. “It’s like starting from the bottom. You’ve got nowhere to go but up,” Peete said. “When you open up with a 79, there’s no pressure after that. You’ve got nothing to lose. One year I shot 79 and came back and shot 66.”

As good as he is on the PGA Tour--never lower than 25th on the money list in the last five years--Peete nevertheless surprises no one when he has a poor round at Augusta, simply because of the demands of the course. Like others who are not big hitters, Peete has to place most of his shots with the utmost precision. It doesn’t eliminate him as a contender, but it requires that he play with perfection.

Consequently, nobody ever picks Peete to win this thing.

“Well, nobody’s ever told me that I can’t win,” he said, laughing. “You know, maybe if they did tell me that, it would help me. I think back to 12, 14 years ago, before I came on the tour, when everyone said I had no chance of making a living playing golf. I’ve done all right since then. Maybe if I get some negative vibes, it would give me the incentive to go out and do well.”

Peete, 43, never picked up a golf club until he was 23. The first time he did, he tried to hold it like a baseball bat. And when someone eventually did show him how to grip it, a broken left elbow he had suffered as a kid in Detroit kept him from completely straightening the arm. It still does.

The reason Peete took up golf was because his only income came from selling clothes, food and other goods to migrant farm workers along the roadside, out of his car. One day, he happened to see a golf tournament on TV and heard that Jack Nicklaus was making a couple hundred grand a year playing golf. So, he thought he would try it.

Since 1982, Peete has never earned less than $230,000 a year on the tour.

He still wishes someone had introduced him to the game sooner, or that he had more time to go to the inner cities and run clinics for children.

“Not only for blacks, but Hispanics,” Peete said. “They’re all not going to grow up to be 7 feet tall and slam-dunking from the center line. They’re all not going to be Reggie Jackson. They’re all not going to be Herschel Walker.”

Peete was asked if he was aware of the controversy involving the Dodgers, who earlier this week fired a top executive for unseemly comments about what he perceived to be the limitations of black athletes. “No, I’m not familiar with that,” Peete said. “Better I don’t say anything.”

Pro golf events like the Masters do very little to further social consciousness. This year’s field, for example, includes four players from South Africa--Gary Player, Nick Price, Denis Watson and David Frost--as well as several who continue to enter South African events, in defiance of United Nations sanctions against that racially divided nation.

Calvin Peete, no activist, nonetheless realizes that he represents his people. After mentioning that he hopes to pursue an announcing career “once the putts stop dropping,” Peete added: “I think golf is going to need a black announcer in 10 years. Hopefully, there will be more black golfers then.”

Peete’s putts had not been dropping before Thursday. In the last three tournaments he entered, he tied for 49th place, tied for 48th and missed the cut. Only once in his last nine tournaments has he placed among the top 10, and he is currently 59th on the season money list.

“I’ve been playing awful,” he said.

That, coupled with his previous disappointments at the Masters, seemed reason enough to exclude Peete as a contender for this year’s title. But he also has spent considerable time lately trying to go 5 or 10 yards longer off the tee, the better to alter his game for Augusta.

“I’m trying to hit the ball harder,” Peete said. “Just trying to keep the ball in play at the Masters is no good.

“This is a golf course that will lend itself to the longer hitters. Players like myself or Curtis Strange or Tom Kite, we’re going to have to play with a lot of patience. Not that a short hitter, an average hitter, can’t win. It just makes it tougher to win.”

And to win the Masters--well, wouldn’t that mean a lot to Calvin Peete?

“With my career starting so late, it means a lot to me to win anywhere --not only here at the Masters. I wasn’t bred to win the Masters. I don’t have a long line of golf history behind me. I started so late, I’m happy to win any tournament. I’ll take the Milwaukee Opens and Anheuser-Busches anytime and be quite satisfied.

“I really didn’t grow up with the Masters implanted in my mind. It wasn’t like my father sent me to college on a golf scholarship, or my uncle kept telling me about the Masters all the time.

“But naturally, just to think you have a chance to win the Masters or the U.S. Open or the PGA, that’s outstanding, because so many golfers don’t even get a chance to do that.”

Yes, someone argued, but to win this one, the Masters, wouldn’t that make Calvin Peete something of a . . . well, a historical figure?

“Hey, just about every time I win I’m a historical figure,” Peete said.