PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Every year on the eve of the Players Championship, the PGA Tour parade for a carwash to interview all players for the first time.
This year, there are 17 players who have never played an event before at TPC Sovereigns and one of them is playing the part of Rodney Dangerfield in the film “Back to School”.
Australian Cameron Percy is one of 17 players, as he is 46 years old, while the rest are in all 20. Others see that he is straight out of college and Percy looks like the father of teenage children, which he is.
Percy was a late bloomer. He first made it to the PGA Tour in 2010 and thought he would stay for years after a promising debut, including his first year with the big boys in a runner-up finish in Las Vegas.
Some 11 years later, 164 starts in his rushing PGA Tour stint, the best runner-up finish of Percy’s career. His only win in the United States was a 2014 Korn Ferry Tour victory.
“I got a little overwhelmed with the start,” said Percy, recounting his early PGA Tour experience. “I saw all these people with short-game coaches, sports psychologists, gym people. I saw how advanced it was and I never came into contact with where I come from. ”
Percy is ranked 281st in the world rankings and 95th in the FedEx Cup standings. He found out on Friday that he was on the field this week, as the PGA Tour added 10 spots on the field this year, related to the cancellation of last year’s tournament by COVID-19.
The Tour allowed the 10 highest ranked players in the FedEx Cup standings who were not already qualified for the field. Percy was 89th in the cutoff and came in.
Percy said of playing the Players Championship with 48 out of the top 50, “When you’re younger than that, you think, ‘Yes, I’ll be there’, but it took a long time.” Players in the world rankings in the region. “A regular tour event is huge, but it’s another level. I’ve seen a lot on TV. It seems easy on TV.”
For the past two years, Percy’s caddy has been Brandon Davis, a New Yorker who became one of Percy’s closest friends at his local pub in Ale House, West Village, Baird. That friend was the best man at the weddings of both Percy and Davis.
“Why are you writing a story about Cameron?”
Because Percy’s journey is worthy of a book. Growing up the son of two school teachers, he could not afford clubs and did not start playing using the set of his grandmother’s old sticks until he was 15 years old.
Finish runner-up in Las Vegas? He was in a playoff with Jonathan Bird, it was getting dark and he talked of taking the berth into the dark instead of coming back the next day. Bird defeated a beat-in-the-jar on the fourth playoff hole.
“It was my decision to keep walking in the dark,” Percy recalled with a hoarse smile. “I’m sure [Byrd] To continue, as I was leading the Tour from 170 to 190 yards and in accuracy [the deciding hole] A perfect 7-iron was for me. He then went out to win. If we come back in the morning, who knows? ”
Percy also played with Tiger Woods in the final pair of the Australian Masters in November 2009, which won that week and was still the most prominent player on the planet at the time.
A few days later, Woods’ personal life was stirred up when news of their extramarital affair came to light that one of his mistresses, Rachel Uchitel, was with him in Australia. Woods’ life has never been the same.
“It was incredible,” Percy recalled. “We were talking about how good Skype was and I used to skype with my wife and kids all the time, because Skype was new then. And he said, ‘Yes, I am doing the same thing.’
“I thought later, he was stopping his wife and children and then saying [Uchitel], ‘Okay, you can come in now.’ It was strange. ”
This year will not be as bizarre as the 46-year-old to win the Players Championship.
“I am very keen to retire,” said Percy. “My son now has 14. He is going to leave soon. But I have not made so much money that I can retire. Like everyone else, I too have to keep working to earn so much money so that I can retire. ‘
Asked if he would pull a microphone drop and lose a $ 2.7 million purse this week by lightning, Percy said, “I think I can do it at the Masters and then in Hawaii in January.”
Here lies to that.
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