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Club Pros Get Chance to Live Major Dream at Quail Hollow

By: | Thu 03 Aug 2017


One of the things that marks out the US PGA Championship from the other majors is that it gives men who make their living as club professionals the opportunity to tee it up next to the best players in the world.

Among the starters this year is Scott Hebert, the professional at Traverse City Golf and Country Club in Michigan. And he cannot wait to get there, even though he knows that he is going to be very nervous when he hears his name being announced to the gallery.

"I'd love to play it like a kid, like some of the juniors I teach, and go out there and just freewheel and have fun," 47-year-old Hebert said after qualifying. "But I've got a little too much grey hair and a little bit too much wisdom to know that I will have to plod my way around there. It's an awful long golf course. I'm going to have to use all of my strategic thoughts as well as my ability to play golf to have some success there."

This will be the fifth time Hebert has competed in a major but the first since the 2010 US PGA at Whistling Straits. Hebert's first major was the 2007 PGA Championship at Southern Hills, so he knows what to expect. He also knows how tough it will be, having so far failed to make the cut.

"Southern Hills was an eye opener," he said. "I knew a lot of the guys, but that atmosphere was nothing like you could imagine. The buzz is just unbelievable. Anyone who is anyone in golf is there."

In 2008 he missed the cut by a single shot after closing with two dropped shots.

"To say that you ever get comfortable as a club pro in this environment would be unrealistic," Hebert said. "The golf course is right on the edge of fair. If you're off just a little bit, you're off a lot. You've got to be able to control your ball. You've got to be able to control your emotions.

"I'go into it with low expectations. I'm a club pro. I work in the business. I don't play a lot. But you have some pride and you want to do well."

He will be joined in the field by Dave McNabb, Paul Claxton, Mike Small, Rich Berbarian, Jr , Adam Rainaud, Jamie Broce, Rod Perry, Jaysen Hansen, Alex Beach, JJ Wood, Chris Moody, Greg Gregory, Ryan Vermeer, Brian Smock, Kenny Pigman, Matt Dobyns, Stuart Deane and David Muttitt. There are those who claim that this devalues the tournament but everybody has a right to dream and the bottom line is that all the world's best players are in the field anyway. And lest we forget, an unknown called John Daly once drove through the night to make it to the first tee at Crooked Stick in 1991 and went on to win.

Hebert knows his way around - he is an eight-time Michigan PGA Professional champion. "When I go to a Michigan event, I'm kind of the big fish there. So my expectations of myself are a lot different than they are when I go to a tour event or a major event. You'd like to say they're the same, but they're just not," he said. "It really tests where you are physically with your game, and then you have to deal with the emotional side of it of, 'Boy, this is for something that's important to me.'"

Although the game is the same, Hebert said that he is well aware the competing in a major is a totally different experience. He has no expectations and, for him and the other club pros, just making the cut would be like winning. It would also mean that they could enjoy a tasty payday.

 


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Tags: us pga PGA



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