Profile of John Daly

Years in Football

John Patrick Daly is an American former sports star notable in the field of golf. He was born in Carmichael, California, to a construction worker, Jim Daly, and a homemaker, Lou Daly. During his young age, when their family moved to Arkansas, Daly had begun playing golf at the age of five. Subsequently, after his family moved again to Orange County, Virginia, Daly had played at the Locust Grove and won the spring club championship at the age of thirteen. In there, he had defeated all the male members. Since then, the rules were changed, and the club barred the juniors from their future open club competition.

In the following years, the Daly family moved to Zachary, Louisiana, wherein Daly had completed his ninth to half of his tenth grade. From the middle year of his tenth grade, Daly had attended Helias High School in Jefferson City. During that time, Daly was a junior golf member of the Jefferson County Club. Aside from being a letterman in golf, Daly also played football.

His first significant success was in the 1983 Missouri State Amateur Championship. It was then followed by winning the Arkansas State Amateur Championship in 1984. In the same year of his success in the Arkansas championship, Daly had also completed his final months in Dardanelle Highschool. During that summer, Daly had become friends with Rick Ross, golf teaching professional at the Bay Ridge Club. In the next several years of Daly’s career, Ross had assisted him in his golf games.In his college years, Daly attended the University of Kansas through golf scholarship from the year 1984 to 1987. During his stay there, Daly qualified for the United States Open Championship in 1986.

Without completing his degree, Daly left college and became a professional in 1987. His first pro victory was in the Missouri Open during the same year. Since then, from years 1987 to 1989, Daly had played golf in minor events around the United States. Aside from that, he had also participated in several PGA tour events. In 1990, Daly had earned full privileged on playing in the Ben Hogan Tour. He then won two Sunshine tour events, one was a match against David Feherty in South Africa, and the other was in Swaziland. Subsequently, in 1992, Daly played in the PGA Tour golf tournament in New York, the B.C Open.

According to the performance statistics of 1980, Daly had become the first PGA Tour player who had an average of 300 yards per drive over a full season. Again, from the years 1999 to 2004, Daly remained the only player to do so since then. His last PGA Tour was in the 2004s PGA Tour in San Diego. However, after 2006, his career began to falter. During his career, Daly has been the only golf player from Europe and America who had won two major championships but not selected for the Ryder Cup. Interestingly, aside from golf, Daly has also written and released two music albums. In fact, he had released an album called ‘I Only Know One Way,’ where he had written and co-written eight tracks.

Personal Life

Also, in the year 2006, Daly had revealed in a chapter in his autobiography that he was having a gambling problem. Consequently, he had lost an amount of approximately $50 million to $69 million for a span of fifteen years. This includes the $1.5 million he had lost in October 2005.

Moreover, in October 2008, the Winston-Salem police department took Daly into protective custody after he was found drunk outside the Hooters restaurant. During that time, Daly wasn’t charged nor arrested. Nevertheless, his mug shot was released to the media, resulting in bad publicity. Because of what happened, Daly had committed to stop himself from drinking and had resulted in the progressive revival of his game.

As well as that, the commitment had also resulted in a positive change in his personal life. In an interview on a sports talk show called ‘The Dan Patrick Show,’ Daly had stated that much of his past struggle with alcohol was because he grew up with an abusive and alcoholic father.