Lucas Glover has won a golf major

Lucas Glover has won a golf major

The 2009 U.S. Open champion’s win at Bethpage Black was marred by that mucky, muddy Monday finish, and by the fact that not many people outside of South Carolina, the Clemson Alumni Donors or Glover’s Book Club – an avid reader, Lucas – knew who Lucas Glover was.And Glover obliged golf fans’ amnesia by essentially disappearing for the last two years since.

In fact, Glover hadn’t won since Players Appear At Tim Tebow Charity Golf Event that national championship. Outside of a third at last year’s Players Championship, his game had such an incognito feel, his Grizzly Adams-like beard fit nicely with the image of a guy whose golf game was on the lam, hiding from authorities.A few months ago, Glover’s beard was so bushy, so like San Francisco Giants closer Brian Wilson, Justin Rose sent a photo of Glover’s hairy mug out on Twitter, with the caption: “Winning a U.S. Open – so easy a caveman can do it.”

Amusing, yes. Even then, when I stared at the photo, I couldn’t place who the bearded man was. Angel Cabrera? No. Geoff Ogilvy? No way. Graeme McDowell? The ladies like McDowell too much for the Ulsterman to dare mess with his mug. Honestly, I don’t think I ever came up with the answer as to who the Zach Galifianakis-like character was in the photo. That’s how obscure Glover’s major was – or how easily it slipped, at least, from my mind.

Nothing against Glover, mind you. He truly seems a likeable character, well-read, intelligent, in good humor, etc. But on a weekend when we mourned the loss of the incomparable Seve Ballesteros, who was all energy and élan and daring, Glover’s fairway/green/two-putt style of play doesn’t put anybody in mind of Severiano. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.Now, though, Glover has done two things: 1. He has won again, putting him back in our minds; doing so with a playoff “W” over fellow Clemson Tiger Jonathan Byrd after a Sunday 69, capping four rounds in the 60s; and 2. He has won sporting that beard.The mind races for thoughts of the last truly bearded golfer to win on the PGA Tour. Honestly, sports fans, I’m coming up blank. Do we have to go all the way back to Old Tom Morris, who sported a beard that appeared to house field mice? But in golf, you get the feeling The Man – who is always clean-shaven, we might add – frowns on the beard. You keep waiting for the beard-wearer to have his membership privileges revoked at “the club.” Wearing a Glover-like beard must be, to the old guard, like parking in the club president’s spot.