Circuit Riders

In 1946, when the pressure of big-time golf began to keep Byron Nelson from sleeping nights, he quit the tournament circuit. Nelson worked on his 730-acre Texas ranch, drove a tractor, played a little exhibition golf during the summer. But he came out each year for the Masters, exposing himself to the rigors of tournament competition.

At the Masters a fortnight ago, looking younger than he did three years ago, baby-faced Byron said cheerfully: "I just came over to have some fun." But he didn't really mean it. Last week, at 37, the man once famed for his iceberg nerves and his carefully stylized mechanical swing announced that he was back for some tournaments on the summer tour.

Same Old Faces. On the pro circuit things hadn't changed much since 1946. Most of the men who had dominated tournament play when Nelson left were still on top. At the end of the winter circuit, dapper Lloyd Mangrum, 34, led the pack in prize money (with $9,707); close on his heels in second place (with $9,110) was Sam Snead, 36, the country boy from the Allegheny Mountains of Virginia.

One old face missing was Ben Hogan's, and that wasn't Ben's fault. He won $3,823 in four tournaments before his near-fatal auto accident in February, and is still seventh on this year's list of money winners. As in big league baseball, the flow of young talent had been pinched off by World War II and was just beginning to be seasoned enough to make itself felt.

Like Father. The most successful of the young crop is lean, 28-year-old Dr. Gary Middlecoff, the Memphis dentist. When he gets set to hit a tee-shot, the stock gag with his fellow pros is: "This won't hurt a bit... Ouch!" He has a loose swing, hits a long straight ball, steadies down under pressure like a real pro, works well on the greens with his unorthodox putter (a gooseneck with the blade extending forward from the shaft instead of backward).

Unlike most pros, Middlecoff did not graduate from the caddie ranks. His father, also a Memphis dentist, was club champion of the Chickasaw Golf Club. At the age of twelve young Cary fired a 77 one day to beat the old man. Like father, he studied to be a dentist, practiced in the Army and with his father after getting his discharge. He played now & then on the big-time golf circuit as an amateur while debating whether to be a full-time golfer or full-time dentist. In 1947, after he married Edith Buck, an airline stewardess, he decided in favor of golf and turned pro.

On the recent winter circuit, Middlecoff began burning up the links at Harlingen, Tex., where he won the Rio Grande Valley Open. He was second at St. Petersburg, but won the Miami Four-ball (with help from Partner Jim Ferrier) and the Jacksonville Open.

This week at Virginia Beach's fashionable Cavalier Yacht and Country Club, the young dentist shot a two-under-par 67 in the first round of the Specialists Tournament, then a 70, and then a brilliant 65. His one bad round cost him first place by one stroke, but the $900 he picked up boosted his earnings for the year to $9,384 and moved him ahead of Sam Snead in 1949's money race. Says Middlecoff, who admits along with other pros that big-time golf is a tough way to make a living: "I wouldn't do it if I didn't like it. You know, I don't have to."

Like Byron Nelson, who can go back to his ranch, Middlecoff can always go back to pulling teeth.

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