MAKING US LAUGH, HURT AND PROUD TO BE AMERICAN
We’ve been warned that comedy “equals tragedy plus time.” Still, it can be jarring to learn that someone you only know as “hilarious,” who seems to have everything he could want in life, struggles with inner demons and self loathing, same as so many others do.
David Feherty, golf’s most lovable joculator, is now on the “safe” side of the depression and alcoholism battles he says nearly killed him in the middle part of the last decade, but he makes no secret that it’s still a fight.
The same jester who can effortlessly slay audiences with lines like, “Working with Gary McCord is like being handcuffed to a primate;” or, “Tiger Woods has amazing touch around the green; he’s like a gay florist;” or, “Roger Maltbie is six inches taller when he’s lying on his back;” floors you all the more when he says, “I spent a lot of my life thinking I was pretty worthless and, for a lot of my life, I have been.” It hurts you that it hurts him.
Resilient almost from birth, Feherty lived his formative years during the most turbulent period in Northern Ireland’s history. He was a 13-year-old in Belfast when the infamous Bloody Sunday massacre went down some 70 miles away in Derry. He says he routinely saw bombings, sectarian violence and military troops patrolling the streets. “It was like Baghdad with worse weather,” he quips.
Now a resident of Dallas when not on the broadcast circuit, he says that environment helped shaped the unique perspective that enabled him to become a distinctive writer and broadcaster after his 20-year playing career ended in 1996. “I tend to see things from a different angle and I’ve got a keen sense of the absurd. As it turns out, that’s been invaluable,” Feherty says.
A genuine wit, Feherty, 52, keeps viewers of CBS golf broadcasts and readers of GOLF Magazine in stitches with candid observations on the game, its people and the culture of golf. On golf’s current Youth Invasion, Feherty muses, “P.J. O’Rourke said that age and guile will always beat youth and a bad haircut, but throw in a ghastly hat and try telling that to Rickie Fowler.”
Sometimes it’s the details most of us overlook that Feherty seizes on and spins into gold. When he noticed a cigarette had been Photoshopped out of an iconic Image of Ben Hogan on the program for the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial, he joked, “This sanitation of history pisses me off. How long before we remember Porky Oliver as thin? Lee Trevino as mute and Tommy Bolt as a zen master?”
If you crave more of Feherty’s trademark perspectives, you’re in luck. The Golf Channel has ordered 12 episodes of Feherty, a 30-minute prime time series that promises to showcase the man’s “unabashed candor, extensive knowledge of the game and propensity to say whatever is on his mind.”
In Feherty’s words, “I consider it my civic duty to provide those who watch and play this stupid damned game with insulting, sometimes disturbing, and occasionally downright moronic-yet-strangelyinteresting crap that other sports simply can’t deliver.”
Feherty recently spoke with Texas Golfer's Carl Mickelson about his career, life and the game that’s made him a household name:
TG: What’s the skinny on Feherty, the show you’re now producing and starring in for the Golf Channel?
DF: It’s an interview-based show, but it will also have other fun elements. It’ll be trial and more than likely error, at least for the first season. We’re interviewing athletes, golfers, politicians, celebrities and people with a connection to golf who you might not necessarily know much about. They’re a little unlike regular interviews you see. We’re calling them “outerviews.” I want to interview the people who form the exoskeleton of the game. Like the observer of the drug tests at a PGA Tour event. Who applies for that job, and why? Who wouldn’t want to know?
So, a little bit deeper into the game than what we’ve seen in typical golf programming?
Not so much deeper, but wider. My own life has been such a monumental (screw)-up from time to time, that I’m comfortable asking questions and using myself as a reference point. With all my own troubles with addiction and mental illness and all the crap I’ve been through, everyone pretty much knows everything about me. There are other people out there, though, who’ve had issues. We’re not a Barbara Walters fearless exposé by any means, but I’d like to see people show their underbellies at times.
Has it been easier to talk about your struggles because you had a public platform, or did that make it more complicated?
I was lucky, in fact. I was always able to write or talk myself into a corner. It was therapeutic for me. The best comparison is like when you see people with the unimaginable loss of a child and they form a foundation or charity to help other people. That’s the only way they can help themselves. Their last sort of self-defense is to Be able to help others. In that sense, this, for me, is a purely selfish project. That’s what it does for me and if it helps somebody else along the way, that’s sort of a by-product.
Because you’ve gone public with your personal agonies, do you often get people identifying with you and then calling you or cornering you in the room at cocktail parties…?
Yes, I do. But, just because you’re screwed up like that doesn’t make you a therapist.
You’re not instantly, I don’t know… “Dr. Phil”… or pick someone out of a hat…
No, no. He’s actually a good choice. He’s not a therapist either.
When people bring up your name, “funnyman” usually follows soon after. I heard someone credit your upbringing during the violent “Troubles” in Northern Ireland for giving you your unique perspective on things. Do you laugh to keep from crying?
That’s right. I think that’s a common trait among Ulster people. You see it in other parts of the world, in difficult environments. Humor is the last barrier. It’s selfdefense. If you can’t find it funny, then all hope is lost. There’s a particularly dark sense of humor that comes from Northern Ireland. You see it in Graeme McDowell, Darren Clarke and Rory McIroy. It’s just a product of where we come from and it gives you a keen sense of proportion, how important one thing is to another, if you come from a place like that.
You’re a natural as a television performer and you studied as an opera singer in your youth. Did you always dream of performing in front of people or is this just the personality that developed naturally?
I was a classic ADD child growing up. Both my sons, when they were diagnosed, I looked at their test results and saw my own reflection. I thought, “Oh my God. When I went to school, they just called it stupid.” Music and English were the only two things I was interested in and the only two things at which I excelled. With music, they best thing I ever learned was how to listen. I figured out that the world didn’t need another mediocre Irish tenor, some drunk clutching the bar and butchering ‘Danny Boy.’ They needed a mediocre professional golfer instead.
As we get farther removed from your playing career, people seem to forget you won five times on the European Tour, 10 times worldwide. That’s nothing to sneeze at.
But it is imminently forgettable. I won about £3 million pound in 20 years, which, these days, is an average six weeks for Phil Mickelson. I won 10 times in 20 years, sure, but there were phenomenal peaks and valleys. You see, again, that attention deficit: win, and then take six months off.
You had some standout appearances in Majors. You tied for sixth at the 1989 British Open and for fourth in 1994 and you had a top 10 in the 1991 PGA Championship. Do you ever stop and ponder if a few putts had rolled differently or a few breaks fell in other ways, what life would have been like for “David Feherty, Major Champion”?
I look back at those three events and there was a point on the back nine of all three of those championships on Sunday where if I holed it, I would have a genuine chance of winning, and I made sure that I missed it. It was much the same way Jean Van de Velde made sure he wasn’t going to win the Open Championship, but he left his until the last hole. I mean, you could have put Kermit the Frog on that tee at Carnoustie and he would have won the British Open. You know, though, Jean didn’t want it. He didn’t want the responsibility that came with it. It was a subconscious thing. It was the same for me, as well. It was only afterwards, with hindsight, I look back and realize I never saw myself as being a Major champion. I didn’t want the responsibility that came with it. It would have made me uncomfortable.
Really?
Oh, yeah. You can see players that have made that mistake and won a Major championship almost accidentally and they never played any good afterwards. I think that’s a syndrome a lot of people don’t realize at the time. In order to be number one, you have to want to be in a place where you know you’re going to be uncomfortable. A lot of people don’t really want to be there, if they were to be completely honest with themselves. With the rest of my life, I’m sort of forced to be honest with myself that it’s not that difficult to look at my career objectively and understand I was a decent player and that’s all I was ever going to be. I can be number one at what I do now, I think, but in professional golf, I couldn’t be anywhere near it.
There seems to be a mild panic here in America because the #1 player in the world isn’t a member of the U.S. PGA Tour. Sixteen of the top 25 in the World Rankings weren’t born in America. Lee Westwood and Rory McIlroy didn’t play in THE PLAYERS Championship. Is this the political crisis some Americans are Westwood and Rory McIlroy didn’t play in THE PLAYERS Championship. Is this the political crisis some Americans are making it out to be, or just kind of a natural progression as the game continues to broaden globally?
Respectfully, most Americans have the wrong outlook on this one. Sure, a majority of the top 20 weren’t born here, but they play here and many of them have homes here. America’s only one country and you’re talking about the rest of the world, 200 countries. We’re doing extremely well in America, and I say “we” because I’m proud to be an American. I support the U. S. Ryder Cup and soccer teams, there’s no Irish-American in me, I’m just an American. I think it’s important for us to feel that way as a nation. The World Rankings are fueled by America. Even though most of the top players weren’t born here, they want to be here and it’s their goal to compete on this stage.
Do players on the European Tour have more fun? They certainly seem more closely knit than the Americans on Tour.
That’s fair enough. It’s much harder to travel there. It’s a monumental pain in the ass just to get from one country to the next and players are thrown together there more. There are fewer official hotels. Courtesy cars are almost unheard of—they would lose half of them. Sixty or 70 of them are often on the same flight, so there’s a brotherhood that’s born out of the rigors of playing on the Tour.
You and Sam Torrance had fun out there in your day. He had one of the great lines about you after an incident at Wentworth. I have to ask, though, how do you, as a contestant in a professional golf tournament, find yourself being bitten by a snake?
I was giving it my best Marty Stouffer [narrator and producer of the animal documentary show Wild America]. “Don’t worry, I’ll identify this creature,” and I said, “Hey, Sam” as I’ve got my finger down the shaft of the 5-iron I’m holding, noting that it’s the only poisonous snake on the British Isles. It’s an Adder. At that point, it wrapped itself around the shaft and got just far enough up to nip me in the end of the index finger. I jumped back and dropped the club and Sam reminded me that it’s the only poisonous snake in the British Isles. The next thing I know I’m in the hospital and Sam’s bringing me the one grape left from the bunch he just ate. Outside the hospital, reporters waited for Sam to come out. He told them, “He's got blood poisoning and they doubt very much if he'll make it.” Then he said, "Oh, you mean David! He'll be fine. I thought you were asking about the snake.”
You’re from Northern Ireland. Do the successes of McDowell and McIlroy give you a special sense of pride?
Absolutely. I was the assistant pro at Holywood Golf Club where Rory was brought up, just 20 years before he was born. I knew his parents before they knew him. It’s very cool to see these guys doing well. I do think it’s odd that they start winning major championships and U.S. Tour events immediately after I become a U. S. citizen.
True. Now you can’t claim them.
It’s like they were waiting for me to leave.
Tap into your forensic side for moment, what’s your best explanation for what happened to your Scottish Open trophy? (Feherty won the event in 1986. Then, during a 48-hour bender that sounds almost as epic as his 14-under performance on the course, the trophy was misplaced and hasn’t resurfaced.)
I’m almost sure it’s got something to do with Led Zeppelin. They were in town and my original agent in Europe was their road manager and I vaguely remember he was with me during those two days. So I’m not sure if that trophy is under Jimmy Page’s bed or where, but I certainly tried hard to find it. I do want to recreate that, though, maybe go back and produce a program for The Golf Channel, “The Search for the Scottish Open Trophy” as if it’s the Holy Grail.
It could be golf’s version of The Hangover.
Yeah. I hate to say it, but there’s probably a sheep involved in our version.
You played at a time when you saw Nick Faldo and Seve Ballesteros play well at ages that were considered young. You’ve walked alongside Tiger Woods as he dominated from a young age. Still, do you find it a little eerie the way tykes like McIlroy, Ryo Ishikawa and Matteo Manassero are playing so well and so fearlessly?
These are kids that grew up with Tiger setting the bar. I grew up with guys like Tony Jacklin, Peter Oosterhuis, Brian Barnes and Bernard Gallacher as my heroes, and these were guys who lost the Ryder Cup! Younger players from Europe and the rest of the world have grown up seeing a world game where their heroes have had success. Rory won the Quail Hollow Championship last year by closing with six 3s to shoot 62. It’s frightening. They’re hitting shots that players from my generation wouldn’t even think about hitting and it’s not all about equipment. It’s about perception and what they see as possible. There are kids now who have never contended but they’re perfectly capable of winning and they’re not afraid of it.
Does golf need a dominant player?
I think there’s a difference between a dominant player and a Tiger Woods. You can have players that dominated the way Nick Price, Nick Faldo and Greg Norman did for a short while and, in a sense, it’s not domination when you’re winning two times out of 10 starts. When you’re win Ning four times out of every 10 starts, that’s a phenomenon called Tiger Woods. I’m not sure we’ll ever see that kind of domination again. That’s the 500-year flood. You’re playing 150 people at a time. It’s not tennis where the best player in the world wins 95 percent of the time.
Is Tiger still the most qualified to one day be that dominant figure again?
I think he can get back to playing well. It would be foolish of us, though, to think we understand where he is. Nobody’s ever been where he’s been and it’s impossible to understand the frustration he must be feeling coming down from those heights. Trying to get back, trying to make his head quiet so he can allow his body to perform must be immensely difficult, even for someone so mentally strong. The only mistakes I’ve ever made about him, though, were thinking he couldn’t do something. I’ve never seen anybody with that force of will.
You make many efforts to support our military troops, visiting them on the battle lines and at places like Walter Reed. What have you learned from these brave people?
It’s not their fault, but the average American doesn’t realize how cool this country really is and how worth fighting for it is. If you’ve lived anywhere else or traveled around the world certainly you understand how special America is and how different. If you look at the places that hate us, they didn’t have a Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson has become my hero since I first started to study for the citizenship exam. He was probably the most important human being ever born because the Virginia Resolution, which became the First Amendment that separated church and state, was the most important piece of language ever written. If you look at the countries that hate us, that’s what they got wrong. They allowed their church to run their state and the only way that a religion can keep their people controllable is to keep them ignorant. If you allow your population to become educated, well, you’re hosed. They’re going to see right through you. Being around the military and seeing what they do, they don’t do it because they hate where they are. They do it because they love where they’re from. They love what they do because of what it does for the rest of us and our children. We have an entirely different philosophy that just works. As broken as our political system might seem at times, it has that system of checks and balances that Jefferson and his cronies put in place 220 years ago that are just vital.
You’re not just a U.S. citizen, you’re also a Texan and a Dallas resident. Can you tell us what you like about living in Texas?
Oh yeah, I love it. I get up at 3:30 in the morning and I ride my bike for a few hours, then I’m back in the garage by 7 am and I’m making ammunition.
You make your own bullets?
I’ve got my own scales and I’m weighing ingredients down to the thousandth of a gram. I’m making ammunition for snipers. Military sniper rifles. It’s really a great place, Texas. It’s its own country. It reminds you how diverse this country really is. We have our own languages. You can see it in the “Quiet, Please” signs. There’s “Hush, Y’all” in Memphis and “Chill, Folks” in Los Angeles. It should be “Shut the (Hell) Up” in Boston or New York.
Texans are known for being friendly and welcoming, but there’s also this unapologetic quality we have that sort of says, “This is who we are, don’t look for any compromises.” Does that appeal to you?
Very much so. “Come and take it.” I mean this in very positive way, but an armed society is a polite society. There’s a respect that comes from that culture where people are polite, you know, for good reason.
You can’t fly with your sniper rifles, but do your bicycles travel with you?
I have two bikes that travel in the CBS equipment trailers and I ride when I’m on the road, hopefully 25 or 30 miles a day. There’s always a bike wherever I am. That’s my therapy. It’s either that or an AA meeting. I’d much rather ride.