HOW MANY KEYS ON A PIANO?: A TRIBUTE TO KATHY WHITWORTH
It was April 2002 and I was walking with my then teacher, Craig Harmon, and his young son, Ben during a practice round at The Masters. Craig spotted Kathy Whitworth in the distance and then asked Ben if he knew how many keys are on a piano. Being a gifted musician who would eventually attend the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Ben thought it was a really stupid question. He answered in a somewhat bothered tone, “Dad, of course. 88.” To which Craig replied, “Well, Ben, that’s the number of professional wins that woman has. More than anyone else.”
1990 U.S. Solheim Cup Team
Let’s put it this way: Ben was no longer bothered but in speechless awe.
Golf lost one of its finest ambassadors ever on Christmas Eve, but to me she was much more than that.
I had the great privilege to have played with Kathy Whitworth toward the end of her career, to have played for Kathy Whitworth on the inaugural U.S. Solheim Cup team, and to have learned from Kathy Whitworth throughout my career—lessons still in play on a daily basis.
Kathy was the consummate professional on and off the course: driven, caring and always impeccably presented. She was also ruthless in the expectations she placed on herself, brutally berating herself when she’d hit a poor shot or putt. Imagine a winner of 88 professional golf tournaments saying, “Whit, that putt was so bad they should just take your [tour] card.” She said exactly that on Friday afternoon of the 1988 Boston Five Classic, needing to make a 5 footer on the final hole to make the cut. She stomped after the putt, nearly beating it to the hole, believing she had missed it before it feebly fell in the high side. I know because I was in the group with her, and no one around could stop laughing after the ball went in. Kathy included.
Kathy also was open to sharing the mistakes of her career so others would not make the same. One such example was to not blindly trust in those who say they are looking after your best interests. Again, imagine a winner of 88 professional golf tournaments being fleeced by a “money manger” to the extent it left her (and other LPGA players) nearly destitute. She fought her way out of that hole, like she did as a rookie in 1959 when she played so poorly that she made just over $1,200—but it was a cruel reality to have suffered nonetheless.
Another great piece of advice from Kathy came to her heavily favored 1990 U.S. Solheim Cup team on the eve of the first day of matches. She told us, a team that would eventually count 5 LPGA and World Golf Hall of Fame members on its eight player roster, to never let our guard down because underdogs in any competition will find a way to play better than they ever have before. Sure enough, she was right. In the leadoff match, Nancy Lopez and Pat Bradley lost to Laura Davies and Allison Nicholas by a margin of 2&1.
2002 Memorial Tournament. Dublin, OH.
Kathy also had a tremendous sense of humor, especially when it came to her impeccable appearance. I don’t ever recall seeing her without her shoes polished and she certainly never wore a wrinkled shirt or trousers. Her hair, however, stood out above all. Always coiffed to perfection, the rule of thumb on tour was that it wasn’t a three club wind until Whit’s hair moved. I had the honor of introducing Kathy in 2002 as one of the honorees at the Memorial Tournament in Dublin, OH and told that story. Everyone in attendance laughed, but the biggest laugh was from Kathy herself!
Kathy’s playing career was a series of benchmarks for young players to compare their own performances and I used her for a bit of motivation that still makes me particularly sad. In early 1992, I was closing in on the $1 million mark in career earnings and knew that Whit had been the first to reach the lofty mark in July 1981, with 81 winners checks in that total. I also knew I likely needed a top 5 finish to cross the mark at that week’s Hawaiian Open. Chipping in for birdie on the final hole for 65 and a T-4 finish got it done, but I will always remember February 22, 1992 as a bittersweet day because I had reached the $1 million mark faster than anyone else in the tour’s history (to date) and with only 2 wins… nothing like the contribution Kathy had made.
As the conversation around Tiger Woods’ pursuit of Sam Snead’s record 82 PGA Tour wins ramped up in 2019, I found myself frustrated and sad that Kathy’s 88 wins weren’t getting more attention. Kathy was the “GOAT,” and the storytelling was neither complete or accurate. But Kathy would never say a word about that. She was too humble, too graceful, never wanting the spotlight to shine too bright.
And then came the perfect opportunity.
It took me a long time to work up enough courage to ask Kathy to write the foreward to “Letters to a Future Champion.” As someone who I so respected and who also shared a similar mentor figure in her life, she was the person to write those words. But even more so, I wanted there to be more awareness, conversation, and appreciation for the woman and her record… and to have that be in her own words. She was brilliant and genuine, exactly as you would expect.
As Tiger tries to break Sam’s record every time he now tees it up in a PGA Tour event, let’s remember who the winningest golfer in history on any single professional tour was. It was a hardcore competitor, trailblazing woman named Kathy Whitworth, whose 88 wins—the same number as keys on a piano—are a song worth singing from mountaintops.
