I’m forgotten 5ft 7in, 140-pound golfer who beat Jack Nicklaus, Nick Faldo and Greg Norman to win shock PGA Championship
Jeff Sluman is not your typical golfer.
The New York native majored in finance and stood at a less than imposing 5ft 7in while weighing 140lbs.
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He turned pro in 1980, won just $13,643 as a PGA Tour rookie in 1983 and lost his card before regaining it the following year.
Sluman had played the professional game for eight years by the end of the 1980s but was yet to win a tournament on the US tour.
But all that changed at the 1988 PGA Championship when he defeated some titans of the game to win his first major championship and first title on the PGA Tour overall.
The then-30-year-old arrived at the Oak Tree Golf Club in Edmond, Oklahoma as a rank outsider.
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Heavyweights Jack Nicklaus, Paul Azinger, Nick Faldo and Greg Norman were all part of the field but Sluman flew under the radar to pull off a stunning victory.
Azinger made a hole-in-one to take a one-stroke lead over Dave Rummells going into the final round but Sluman remained in contention by carding rounds of 69-70-68 to sit three strokes off the pace.
Rummells fell of the pace on Sunday and Azinger buckled under the pressure.
Sluman, meanwhile, was on the warpath, and rolled in for eagle on the 590-yard par-5 to jump to 9 under.
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Azinger made bogey on the same hole while Sluman continued to make big shot after big shot.
He picked up birdies on No.10 and No.12 and held a two-shot lead on the back nine of one of golf's major tournaments.
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Sluman wobbled slightly on the 13th with a bogey but went on to post a final round of 65 (six-under), giving him the joint-second lowest 72 hole total for the US PGA of 272 (-12).
Azinger birdied at 16 and 17 to reduce Sluman's advantage to two, but a bogey at the 18th put him on 71 and handed an improbable title to to Sluman.
"He shot 65 to beat me," Azinger said. "I had a guy who had never won (chasing me), and I thought if I shot par, that might have been good enough. But it didn't even come close."
Despite the odds, Sluman had done the unthinkable and beaten Azinger by three shots with the likes of Faldo, Norman and Tom Kite in the top 10.
“You talk about Johnny Miller’s 63 at Oakmont to win the (U.S.) Open, or Jack Nicklaus’ 65 to win the Masters in ‘86, but Jeff Sluman’s round today had to be one of the greatest,” Azinger said on the day.
The highlight of Sluman's career came during a tournament when Nicklaus missed the cut.
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The Golden Bear stuck around for the weekend to witness Sluman win his maiden major and even handed him a congratulatory note.
Sadly, in the furore of the victory, Sluman lost the note.
“Here’s one of my all-time heroes saying how great I did,” Sluman .
“Your first win, they’re pulling you in a million directions, come over here and hold the trophy, do this interview. They physically gave me a check out of a checking book for $160,000. You had to sign the back of it. That’s one of the unique things I remember.
"Well, in all the hubbub, I lost the note. The following week I went up to Jack and thanked him for the note and said, ‘Jack, I hate to ask you this but any chance you remember what you wrote and would jot it down again?’ Kind of a unique request. I just wanted it for my personal scrapbook. He was very kind and did.”
Sluman would go on to win five more times on the PGA Tour, but his next win wouldn’t come for nine years.
But shortly before his 40th birthday, he started winning consistently on the Tour and in non-Tour events.
After winning the 1997 Tucson Chrysler Classic, he won seven more events including four on the PGA Tour during the next seven seasons.
His best season came in 2002 when he finished the year ranked 15th on the PGA Tour with $2,250,187 in earnings.
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He won six more times on PGA Tour Champions after turning 50, but none were more special - or surprising - than his win at Oak Tree Golf Club in 1988.
"Everything kind of clicked...It was just one of those days," he said.
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