Mallon a Winner At Last : * Golf: After several lean years, Ramona golfer picks up a couple victories.

Ramona’s Meg Mallon was right on target two years ago.

As one of the have-nots of women’s golf at the time, with meager career earnings of $26,574, Mallon set a goal of making it big by 1990 or 1991. She said, “If I haven’t established myself by then, it will be time to re-evaluate and consider something else to do.”

Not to worry. After winning the LPGA Championship in Bethesda, Md., last weekend in a stirring stretch duel with veterans Pat Bradley and Ayako Okamoto, Mallon, 28, is among the elite. The only problems she has now are pleasant ones, such as how to invest the $150,000 she earned and how to deal with sudden fame and fortune.

“It’s so exciting, the impact of it hasn’t sunk in yet,” Mallon said. “With all the hoopla that’s been going on with my family and friends, I don’t know what this is going to mean.”

One thing Mallon’s victory figures to mean is income from endorsements.

“I’ve already talked to people about things like that,” she said. “I was already having a good year, and this capped it off. It may have driven the prices up.”

Mallon spoke by phone from Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich., where she spent Monday night at the home of her brother, Paul, before driving to Sylvania, Ohio, today for the Jamie Farr Toledo Classic.

Mallon grew up in Birmingham, which, like Grosse Pointe Woods, is a suburb of Detroit. She was born in Natick, Mass., but her family moved to Birmingham when she was a year old.

Mallon had won one previous tournament this year, having scored the first victory of her career in the Oldsmobile Classic in Lake Worth, Fla., the second event of the season. She had earned a career-high $158,298, and the fat paycheck she got as LPGA champion--along with a convertible--boosted her from 13th place to third with a total of $308,298. She trails only Bradley ($441,643) and Beth Daniel ($404,948).

Asked if winning her first major tournament had shoved her other victory into the background, Mallon said, “Not necessarily. You can never take away that first victory. I jumped just as high in the air after that one as I did Sunday.”

As for her plans regarding the $150,000 addition to her bankroll, Mallon said, “I’m sure the government will eat a bit of it up, and of course I’ll give some to my caddie. Beyond that, I hope to invest in something that will make money. All my checks get sent right to the bank.”

One thing Mallon is determined not to do is let her rise from relative anonymity go to her head.

“I try to keep everything in perspective,” she said. “It all depends on how I handle it, and I think I’ll handle it all right.”

Mallon is hardly the type to be spoiled by success. Her beaming personality and humility have made her so popular with her peers that in a recent poll conducted by the Toledo Blade, they overwhelmingly voted her the friendliest player on the tour.

“People give me a hard time about that,” Mallon said. “I haven’t found a player who voted. I think one person said, ‘How about Meg Mallon?’ and somebody else said, ‘OK, I’ll put her down.’ It’s very flattering, but I’m not sure how much stock you can put in it.”

Mallon’s reservations notwithstanding, two players contacted on the subject testified to the validity of the poll.

Barb Thomas said, “Everybody who meets Meg just loves her. She’s very charismatic, and she’s genuine in her concern and care for others.”

Lori Garbacz said Mallon’s demeanor has even helped her game.

“Meg has a certain confidence and a great attitude,” Garbacz said. “Nothing inside of her is false. When you carry that onto the golf course, it’s obvious that you know what you’re doing. She takes the child in her out to play, and that’s important, too. Her game has come a long way over the years. She’s a different player now.”

Mallon, who lives in Phoenix, is the youngest of six children of John and Marian Mallon of Ramona.

Oddly, for a town so small, there are two John Mallons in Ramona. When people jammed the telephone lines Sunday and Monday to congratulate Meg’s parents, the “other” John Mallon got many of the calls.

“They kept me hopping,” he said. “We don’t even know each other, but congratulate them (Mallon’s parents) for me.”

The John Mallon who is Meg’s father, a retired marketing executive for the Ford Motor Co., estimated that he had received 50 to 60 calls in the first 24 hours after the tournament ended.

“The phone rang all day Sunday and started again at 6:30 Monday morning,” he said. “Besides relatives and friends, we had two calls from Sports Illustrated, one from the Boston Globe. . . . I can’t remember all of them.”

Paul Mallon, who is in the magazine-advertising business, had the same experience in his office Monday.

“It was a useless day at work,” he said. “I got absolutely nothing done. I literally didn’t get off the phone from 10 until 5. It was fun, but I didn’t bring in any business.”

Unlike other members of the family, Paul Mallon couldn’t see his sister win the tournament from the comforts of his home. Because NBC’s telecast was pre-empted by a Detroit Tiger game, Paul and his wife, Nancy, had to drive 50 miles to a bar in Monroe, Mich., that picked up the golf on a Toledo station.

“We just weren’t going to miss it,” Paul said.

Mallon calls basketball her first love, and even though she left Massachusetts at an early age, she became a Boston Celtics fan because her father had employed some of the players for promotional purposes for Ford.

“I’m sure all of them don’t remember me, but some of them were at my christening,” Mallon said.

One who does remember is Hall of Famer K.C. Jones, now coach of the Seattle SuperSonics, with whom Mallon has established a lasting friendship. He called her last week to wish her luck.

“I got to know K.C. when the Celtics played in Detroit,” Mallon said. “He used to tell me that nice guys can win.”

Mallon began winning when she attended Ohio State University, making the all-Big Ten team in 1984 and 1985. Then she began a struggle that finally paid off with earnings of $129,381 last year. As a tour rookie in 1987, she made a mere $1,572.

“I gave up a lot to get started,” she said. “We set up a corporation, with my parents as general partners plus three other partners. Last December, I was able to pay them back, so now I’m just in kind of a partnership with my parents.”

Does she relish her newly attained stardom?

“I’m not in pursuit of stardom,” she said. “I’m not in the class of players like Betsy King, Beth Daniel, Nancy Lopez and Pat Bradley. They’re consistent winners.

“It’s just great to have worked hard and see something come out of it.”