Pair Game

By Tim Rosaforte
Photo By Andrew Redington/Getty Images December 28, 2007

Once considered inseparable, pro golf's ultimate wingmen, Fred Couples and Davis Love III, haven't seen each other since the Masters. They didn't talk between Augusta, when Couples ended his season, and October, when Love had ankle surgery. It's not as if anything was wrong between them -- Freddie was purposely laying low on the West Coast, and when Davis wasn't on tour, he was being a father and enjoying life with his full toy box in Georgia.

"I'm bad on the phone, and Freddie's famous for not returning calls, but he called me when I got hurt," says Love, who tore ligaments in his left ankle Sept. 19. "Of course he had to find an excuse, have somebody else call and then hand the phone to him. Then we talked for an hour. Once you get him or sit him down, he can't quit."

In their catch-up session, Couples and Love talked about their wives, their kids and how they would come back from injuries that hampered their 2007 seasons. Love came away from that conversation thinking they could both be candidates for comeback player of the year in 2008. Couples has lower expectations. "For me, I want to play well a couple of times," he says. "I'm not asking to go out and shoot 69 every round. For Davis, he's a handful of years younger, and his swing is as good as anyone's."

Couples and Love. Love and Couples. Before Tiger Woods they were the faces of American golf, associated as much with one another as themselves, linked by friendship and back pain, by the trauma of lost major championships and on a personal level, loss of life. So recognizable they were known simply as "Freddie and Davis," they shared laughs on the road for more than a decade, as well as hope to captain Ryder Cup teams someday and ultimately be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame -- despite admitting to underachievement in the majors. Couples' Masters victory came 15 years ago; it has been 10 years since Love won the PGA Championship under the rainbow at Winged Foot.

"With the talent they had, there's no question they should have won more majors," says Hall of Famer Nick Price, who won three during the same era. "When we played against them at Lake Nona [in the 1993 World Cup], they were unstoppable. They could both hit their 3-irons higher than I hit an 8-iron."

Couples, 48, is now on the cusp of the Champions Tour, while the 43-year-old Love is ready to make the final push of his PGA Tour career. He enters his 23rd season 67th on the World Ranking and hasn't qualified for the first three majors of the year. Couples, who joined the PGA Tour in 1981, returns to Augusta hoping to do more than break Gary Player's consecutive-cut record. When he's not taxed by the wear and tear of tournament golf, Couples is still world class. He proved this by taking out Vijay Singh in his Presidents Cup singles match in 2005 and by nearly winning the 2006 Masters over Phil Mickelson. Couples knows he can't contend in as many tournaments as Love, but when it comes to Augusta, "that's a tournament we all feel [Love] can still win, and I feel like I can win."

The old friends were never bookends. Love is the son of a famous teaching pro. Couples' father worked in parks and recreation for the city of Seattle. While Couples was raised in a baseball family, Love was a Southern boy, always at a country club driving range. In 1988, before they knew each other, Love's father, Davis Jr., died in a plane crash. Love was 24 at the time and sought the guidance of Tom Kite and Ben Crenshaw, who were close to his dad. Couples had already won a Players Championship (1984) and was the coolest guy in golf -- somebody both men and women had a crush on. Love admits, "I wanted to meet Fred Couples, hang around Fred Couples and see what he was doing, why he was so good. I was enamored by Fred Couples."

Their friendship blossomed after their only head-to-head battle, a playoff win by Couples in the 1992 Nissan Open. "They were all rooting for me extremely hard, and if it was anyone else, we might have lost a little friendship over it," Couples says. Not Davis, who won the Players Championship two weeks before Fred won the Masters that same spring. It was the height of Couples' popularity -- he was No. 1 on the World Ranking -- and Love seemed not only to understand it but also play the understudy in it. Always well spoken, he volunteered to sit next to the media-shy Couples for interviews during some of their early World Cups, when trips to Spain and Puerto Rico cemented their bond. The pair won the cup four times (1992-95) and teamed for a 6-4-1 record in Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup matches.