My Five: Best Match Players

By Jaime Diaz

February 23, 2011

This is a very tough category. I'm going to leave off Bobby Jones, who won five U.S. Amateurs and a British Amateur, but who never faced pros in official events and said he always preferred medal play. Also missing the cut is Gary Player, who won five World Match Play events at Wentworth, which included beating Jack Nicklaus in two finals, but had no other match play avenues in which to build a record. The PGA Championship before 1958 provides the best sustained measure of who was best head to head, which is why the first three of my five are from that major's match-play era.

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1. Walter Hagen

The Haig was the perfect match player in terms of a scrambling style, unflappable attitude and ability in the clutch. He won the PGA Championship at match play five times, including four consecutive from 1924 to 1927, which comprised 22 straight matches. He also won the unofficial "Championship of the World" challenge match, played at 72 holes, four times, beating Jones 12 and 11 in 1926 and Gene Sarazen 9 and 8 in 1927. In the Ryder Cup, he was 7-1-1. Hagen wasn't always a tidy ball striker, but he was nearly always a fantastic putter. His mantra was "three of those and one of them still count four," which, when put into practice, Jones admitted "get's my goat."

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