Green, Strange Talk Hall Of Fame

Hubert Green and Curtis Strange gave wide-ranging interviews yesterday on the occasion of their Nov. 12 induction into the World Golf Hall of Fame. I was traveling to the Charles Schwab Cup Championship and missed the teleconferences, but enjoyed reading the interview transcripts this morning.

One of the best parts was Green's recollection of having had Hugh Durham, the longtime college basketball coach who won 633 career games, as his golf coach at Florida State. "Coach Durham, I can't say enough good about him," said Green. "If anybody could sell saltwater to the Pacific Ocean, it would be Hugh Durham. He knew nothing about golf when he had the golf coaching job.  But he knew enough about coaching to to make it interesting for us and make us work for it."

Durham improvised well, according to Green, especially when it came to the Seminoles' practice rounds on the university's nine-hole course. The rough on the left side of even-numbered holes would out-of-bounds, and the right rough would be O.B. on the odd-numbered holes.

"You get on a par 5 and miss the green by three feet and you're out-of-bounds," Green recalled. "We didn't like [his tactics] at the time, but looking back, it was very smart."

Strange also paid tribute to his college coach at Wake Forest, one of the best ever. "If it wasn't for Jesse Haddock and Wake Forest, I wouldn't be talking to you today," Strange said. "I might have been on tour for 30 years not going to Wake Forest, but it would have been different. I owe him a great deal."

--Bill Fields