| Ben Crenshaw | |
 |
|
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Full name | Ben Daniel Crenshaw |
| Nickname | Gentle Ben |
| Born | January 11, 1952 Austin, Texas |
| Height | 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) |
| Nationality |  United States |
| Residence | Austin, Texas |
| Career | |
| College | University of Texas |
| Turned professional | 1973 |
| Current tour(s) | PGA Tour Champions Tour |
| Professional wins | 29 |
| Number of wins by tour | |
| PGA Tour | 19 |
| Best results in Major Championships (Wins: 2) |
|
| The Masters | Won: 1984, 1995 |
| U.S. Open | T3: 1975 |
| Open Championship | T2: 1978, 1979 |
| PGA Championship | 2nd: 1979 |
| Achievements and awards | |
| World Golf Hall of Fame | 2002 (member page) |
| Bob Jones Award | 1991 |
| Old Tom Morris Award | 1997 |
| Payne Stewart Award | 2001 |
Ben Daniel Crenshaw (born January 11, 1952) is an American professional golfer.
Crenshaw was born in Austin, Texas. He attended and played golf at Austin High School and the University of Texas before turning professional in 1973.
In 1973, Crenshaw became the second player in Tour history to win the first event of his career; this accomplishment was achieved earlier by Marty Fleckman (1967) and later repeated by Robert Gamez (1990) and Garrett Willis (2001). In 1984 he won The Masters, one of golf's four major championships. In the mid-1980s he suffered from Graves' disease, a disease of the thyroid, but he continued to accumulate victories, finishing with 19 on the PGA Tour, including a second Masters in 1995.
Crenshaw won several further professional events outside the PGA Tour, including individual and team titles in the World Cup of Golf in 1988. He spent 80 weeks in the top-10 of the Official World Golf Rankings from 1987 to 1989.[1]
Crenshaw is widely regarded as one of the best putters in golf history. His instructor growing up, Harvey Penick, taught him a smooth, effortless stroke on the greens, which allowed him to master even the speediest of greens — including those at Augusta National Golf Club. In winning the Masters in 1995 (a victory that came a week after Penick's death), "Gentle Ben" did not record a single three-putt during the tournament.
Since 1986, Crenshaw has been a partner with Bill Coore in Coore & Crenshaw, a golf course design firm.
Contents |
Amateur wins (12)
- 1971 NCAA Championship, Eastern Amateur, Southern Amateur
- 1972 NCAA Championship (tie with Tom Kite), Eastern Amateur, Porter Cup, Trans-Mississippi Amateur
- 1973 NCAA Championship, Western Amateur, Sunnehanna Amateur, Southern Amateur, Northeast Amateur
Professional wins (29)
PGA Tour wins (19)
| No. | Date | Tournament | Winning Score | Margin of Victory |
Runner(s)-up |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nov 4, 1973 | San Antonio Texas Open | -14 (65-72-66-67=270) | 2 strokes |  Orville Moody |
| 2 | Jan 25, 1976 | Bing Crosby National Pro-Am | -7 (75-67-70-69=281) | 2 strokes | Mike Morley |
| 3 | Feb 1, 1976 | Hawaiian Open | -18 (70-69-65-66=270) | 4 strokes | Larry Nelson |
| 4 | Sep 19, 1976 | Ohio Kings Island Open | -9 (69-69-67-66=271) | 1 stroke | Andy North |
| 5 | May 15, 1977 | Colonial National Invitation | -8 (65-70-68-69=272) | 1 stroke | John Schroeder |
| 6 | Jan 22, 1979 | Phoenix Open | -14 (67-61-71=199) | 1 stroke | Jay Haas |
| 7 | Oct 28, 1979 | Walt Disney World National Team Championship (with George Burns) |
-33 (62-66-62-65=255) | 3 strokes | Peter Jacobsen & D. A. Weibring Jeff Hewes & Sammy Rachels Scott Bess &  Dan Halldorson |
| 8 | Sep 28, 1980 | Anheuser-Busch Golf Classic | -16 (66-67-68-71=272) | 4 strokes | Jack Renner |
| 9 | May 1, 1983 | Byron Nelson Golf Classic | -7 (71-69-67-66=273) | 1 stroke | Brad Bryant, Hal Sutton |
| 10 | Apr 15, 1984 | The Masters | -11 (67-72-70-68=277) | 2 strokes | Tom Watson |
| 11 | Jul 27, 1986 | Buick Open | -18 (69-67-66-68=270) | 1 stroke | J. C. Snead, Doug Tewell |
| 12 | Oct 26, 1986 | Vantage Championship | -14 (65-67-64=196) | 1 stroke | Payne Stewart |
| 13 | Mar 22, 1987 | USF&G Classic | -20 (66-68-67-67=268) | 3 strokes | Curtis Strange |
| 14 | Mar 6, 1988 | Doral-Ryder Open | -14 (70-69-69-66=274) | 1 stroke | Chip Beck, Mark McCumber |
| 15 | May 20, 1990 | Southwestern Bell Colonial | -16 (68-67-68-69=272) | 3 strokes | John Mahaffey, Corey Pavin, Nick Price |
| 16 | Jul 5, 1992 | Centel Western Open | -12 (70-72-65-69=276) | 1 stroke |  Greg Norman |
| 17 | Mar 21, 1993 | Nestle Invitational | -8 (71-70-69-70=280) | 2 strokes | Davis Love III, Rocco Mediate, Vijay Singh |
| 18 | Apr 3, 1994 | Freeport-McMoRan Classic | -15 (69-68-68-68=273) | 3 strokes |  José María Olazábal |
| 19 | Apr 9, 1995 | The Masters | -14 (70-67-69-68=274) | 1 stroke | Davis Love III |
Other wins (9)
- 1975 Texas State Open
- 1976 Irish Open (European Tour)
- 1979 Texas State Open
- 1980 Texas State Open
- 1981 Mexican Open
- 1985 Shootout at Jeremy Ranch (with Miller Barber)
- 1988 World Cup (individual title and team title with Mark McCumber)
- 1991 Fred Meyer Challenge (with Paul Azinger)
- 1995 PGA Grand Slam of Golf
Senior wins (1)
- 2009 Wendy's Champions Skins Game (with Fuzzy Zoeller)
Major Championships
Wins (2)
| Year | Championship | 54 Holes | Winning Score | Margin | Runner-up |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1984 | The Masters | 2 shot deficit | -11 (67-72-70-68=277) | 2 strokes | Tom Watson |
| 1995 | The Masters | Tied for lead | -14 (70-67-69-68=274) | 1 stroke | Davis Love III |
Results timeline
| Tournament | 1970 | 1971 | 1972 | 1973 | 1974 | 1975 | 1976 | 1977 | 1978 | 1979 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Masters | DNP | DNP | T19 LA | T24 LA | T22 | T30 | 2 | T8 | T37 | CUT |
| U.S. Open | T36 LA | T27 | CUT | CUT | DNP | T3 | T8 | T49 | CUT | T11 |
| The Open Championship | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | T28 | DNP | DNP | T5 | T2 | T2 |
| PGA Championship | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | T63 | T10 | T8 | DNP | T16 | 2 |
| Tournament | 1980 | 1981 | 1982 | 1983 | 1984 | 1985 | 1986 | 1987 | 1988 | 1989 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Masters | T6 | T8 | T24 | T2 | 1 | T57 | T16 | T4 | 4 | T3 |
| U.S. Open | T32 | T11 | T19 | CUT | CUT | CUT | T6 | T4 | T12 | CUT |
| The Open Championship | 3 | T8 | T15 | CUT | T22 | T35 | T21 | T4 | T16 | T52 |
| PGA Championship | T41 | CUT | CUT | T9 | CUT | T59 | T11 | T7 | T17 | T17 |
| Tournament | 1990 | 1991 | 1992 | 1993 | 1994 | 1995 | 1996 | 1997 | 1998 | 1999 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Masters | T14 | T3 | 46 | CUT | T18 | 1 | CUT | 45 | CUT | CUT |
| U.S. Open | CUT | DNP | DNP | DNP | T33 | T71 | CUT | T65 | CUT | CUT |
| The Open Championship | T31 | T80 | DNP | CUT | T77 | T15 | T27 | DNP | CUT | DNP |
| PGA Championship | T31 | WD | T73 | T61 | T9 | T44 | T69 | CUT | CUT | CUT |
| Tournament | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Masters | CUT | CUT | CUT | CUT | CUT | CUT | 47 | T55 | CUT | CUT |
| U.S. Open | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP |
| The Open Championship | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | |
| PGA Championship | WD | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP | DNP |
LA = Low Amateur
DNP = Did not play
WD = Withdrew
CUT = missed the half-way cut
"T" indicates a tie for a place
Green background for wins. Yellow background for top-10
Notable
- He played on four Ryder Cup teams (1981, 1983, 1987, 1995) and captained the 1999 team.
- In 1991, Ben Crenshaw was given the Bob Jones Award, the highest honor bestowed by the United States Golf Association in recognition of distinguished sportsmanship in golf.
- He is now a noted golf course designer, working in partnership with Bill Coore.
- His stepmother, Roberta Crenshaw, was an Austin-area philanthropist.
- He was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2002.
- He is the 2006 Kappa Alpha Order Sportsman of the Year.
- In 2007, Ben Crenshaw made the cut at The Masters beating the likes of notables Ernie Els, Sergio García, Chris DiMarco, Michael Campbell, and Colin Montgomerie.
- "If we are to preserve the integrity of golf as left to use by our forefathers, it is up to all of us to carry on the true spirit of the game." --Ben Crenshaw[2]
See also
References
- ^ 69 Players Who Have Reached The Top-10 In World Ranking
- ^ The Gigantic Book of Golf Quotations, ed. Jim Apfelbaum. 2007.
External links
- Profile on the PGA TOUR official site
- Ben Crenshaw Golflegends.org
- Ben Crenshaw's Texas State Open Victories
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