New Releases by Curt Sampson

Centennial History of Fox Chapel Golf Club, Pittsburgh PA

The incredible true story of Tiger Woods’s dramatic comeback following his humbling and very public personal, physical, and professional setbacks. One publicly imploded marriage. Two car accidents. Eight surgeries. And now, a miracle of hard work and storied talent: five Masters wins. Once hailed as “the greatest closer in history” before he fell further than any beloved athlete in America’s memory, Tiger swung at the world’s wildest expectations and beat the skeptics with his April 2019 Masters championship. Roaring Back traces his road to Augusta and the improbable, phenomenal comeback of one of the greatest golfers in history. New York Times–bestselling author Curt Sampson details the highs and lows of Woods’s career in three gripping acts. From his startling loss at the 2009 PGA Championship, detrimental obsession with his swing, and that infamous night involving an ex-wife and a nine-iron…to adoring fans and lucrative sponsors turning their backs, exclusive interviews with past instructors and PGA tour peers, and an arrest complete with a toxicology report . . . finally to Tiger coming from behind for his fifth green jacket as the crowd rumbled in Georgia, and how his comeback rivals those of the most dramatic in his sport. Sampson also places Woods’s defeats and triumphs in the context of historic comebacks by other notable golfers like Ben Hogan, Skip Alexander, Aaron Silton, and Charlie Beljan, finding the forty-three-year-old alone on the green for his trajectory of victory against all odds. As this enthralling book reveals, Tiger never doubted the perseverance of the winner in the mirror. “Sampson admirably details all the highs and lows.” —Jim Nantz, CBS Sports

The firebrand former NBA coach and player recounts his career in this candid memoir. During his three-decade career as a head coach in the NBA, George Karl has amassed more victories (1,175) than all but four men in league history, including Phil Jackson. While Jackson may have earned his iconic status by morphing into the Zen master, Karl has succeeded in the opposite manner—as an excitable firebrand who never backed down from a confrontation on or off the court. In telling his story, Karl holds nothing back, talking candidly about the greed, selfishness, and ass covering he believes are characteristic of many modern professional players. Off the court, Karl has summoned that inner steel to battle cancer alongside his son, Coby. Their shared struggle to overcome the toughest of all opponents shows a rarely-glimpsed side of Karl—a warmer, more compassionate streak that values family above all else. Raw, hard-hitting, and brutally honest, Furious George is as in-your-face and entertaining as the game that has defined Karl’s life. Whether in backwater semi-pro towns or in NBA cities, George Karl coaches one way—all out.

An unlikely champion. An unprecedented accomplishment. A powerful story of a man on the verge of becoming a legend—at a time when the nation needed every hero it could get. In the 1930s, Bobby Jones did what no golfer had done before—and what no golfer has done since—he won all four major championships in one year. This dominant performance earned him untold riches and the adoration of the public. He had two tickertape parades to commemorate his achievement. He dated starlets. He became one of the best paid men in the country at a time when the Depression had ravaged the economy. Then, at the top of his game, he quit the sport. He walked away. One of golf''s greatest writers, the New York Times bestselling author Curt Sampson, focuses on the 1930 golf season and how Bobby Jones changed a country, how Jones exemplified an era, and how his own personal demons threatened to swallow him whole, even as he performed unparalleled feats on the greens. A must-have for golf fans, THE SLAM captures the essence of an era—equal parts compelling sports biography, sweeping social history, and stirring human drama.

The true story of the dramatic 1991 Ryder Cup at Kiawah Island, which changed the competition in golf forever. The 1991 Ryder Cup began in 1985. Up to then, the biennial match between all-star teams of golf professionals from America and Europe was more ceremonial exhibition than real competition, with the Americans consistently beating the Europeans. That all changed in 1985, when the Europeans wrested it away at the Belfry in Sutton Coldfield, England. The Europeans would go on to win again in 1987, and in 1989 the competition ended in a draw. By the time the 1991 Ryder Cup arrived, the American team had vengeance on their minds. The 1991 Ryder Cup also occurred between the United States’s victories in both the Persian Gulf War and the Cold War that year, and the sense of patriotism that came along with the end of those conflicts permeated the national psyche. The competition was broadcast to over 200 million people in twenty-three countries across the globe. Fans forgot golf ’s gentlemanly code of conduct, and loud boos, jeers, and cheers of “USA!” could be heard from the gallery. The Ryder Cup began to resemble the Super Bowl, and it quickly became evident that this match was about more than just golf. In The War by the Shore, veteran golf writer and bestselling author Curt Sampson chronicles this pivotal competition. He interviewed dozens of key players from both Team USA and Team Europe, and provides historical context to explain why the tension was ratcheted so high at this particular Ryder Cup. Well-researched, engrossing, and deeply entertaining, The War by the Shore is the story of when golf lost its manners (and, to some extent, its mind).

For a century and a half, the best golf players in the world have, once a year, attempted to beat the weather, the pressure, and one of the toughest courses in the world at the British Open. In Royal and Ancient, Curt Sampson, the bestselling author of Hogan and The Masters, draws a definitive and affectionate portrait of this legendary tournament, with a fascinating narrative of both its rich history and its exciting present. The thread of Royal and Ancient is the 1999 cham-pionship--the most astonishing four days in British Open history. Sampson follows individual players as they meet the gut-wrenching challenge of the links at Carnoustie: the icy classicist, Steve Elkington; the good-looking bon vivant, Andrew Magee; the struggling hopeful, Clark Dennis; Zane Scotland, the youngest Open qualifier in history. Sampson is there for Jean Van de Velde''s dramatic collapse on the final day, probing both Van de Velde and his caddie for their emotional insights. He gets inside the heads of stars and journeymen, caddies and groundskeepers, and shows how they prepare and how they think as the tournament pro-gresses, from the qualifying rounds to the practice sessions, all the way through the play-off on the final day. Beyond his excellent reportage, Curt Sampson captures British Open history as it''s never been captured before. With an insider''s knowledge and expertise, he draws us into the rare-fied atmosphere of tradition and myth, telling the amazing--and sometimes heartbreaking--stories of past champions, of triumphs and tragedies, of deaths and ghosts. We hear the unexpectedly poignant story of one of the early greats, Tommy Morris, the invincible champion of the 1860s and 1870s, and explore the loyal Scottish fascination with the legendary Ben Hogan. The reminiscences of past and current participants combine with the behind-the-scenes stories of everyone from the club superintendent to the local pub owners to give an intimate look at this unique tournament. In his book The Majors, John Feinstein called Curt Sampson''s The Masters the best book ever written about that Augusta event. Now, in Royal and Ancient, Sampson cracks the inner circle of another remarkable major to provide this fascinating and truly all-embracing view of the British Open.

Of all the games ever played in a sporting competition, never has an event been so bizarre and yet so fitting for its historical moment: the 1968 Masters. Anger gripped America''s heart in April 1968. Vietnam and a bitter presidential contest sharpened the divides between races and generations, while protests and violence poisened the air. Then an assassin''s bullet took the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Cities burned. The smoke had barely cleared when the Masters began. Never was the country more ready for distraction and escape--but could the orderly annual excitement of Palmer versus Nicklaus provide it? For a while, it could and it did--except that instead of a duel between golf''s superstars, several unlikely members of the chorus stepped forward with once-in-a-lifetime performances. There was blunt-talking Bob Goalby, a truck driver''s son from Illinois and former star football player; loveable Roberto De Vicenzo from Argentina, who charmed the galleries and media all week; and Bert Yancey, a Floridian who''d dropped out of West Point to face his private demons of mental illness. Just as the competition reached a thrilling crescendo, it all fell apart. The Masters, the best-run tournament in the world, devolved into a heart-wrenching tangle of rules, responsibility, and technicality. In a fascinating narrative that stops in Augusta, Buenos Aires, and Belleville, Illinois, bestselling author Curt Sampson finds the truth behind The Lost Masters. It''s a story you''ll never forget.

The interplay between fathers and sons has long been one of golf’s most essential and enigmatic relationships. In Golf Dads, the best-selling writer and former touring professional Curt Sampson brings to life ten remarkable stories of golfers, their fathers, and the game that brings them together. The stories feature well-known subjects such as Michelle Wie, Ben Hogan, Lee Trevino, and David Feherty, as well as some surprises, such as six-year-old phenom A.J. Beechler--not yet known to the world. “This is a book about fathers,” Sampson writes, “using golf as a wedge to pry open a few insights.” We get up close with the embarrassing Byung Wook Wie and his talented daughter at a PGA Tour event in Pennsylvania; travel to the Mexican jungle for bogeys and butterflies with a club pro bearing his father’s ashes in a black Hogan shag bag; journey to San Francisco for transplant surgery for a golf pro father from his golf pro son; feel the wonder and weight of fathering a six-year-old golfing sensation whose future is too bright to see clearly. For fans of James Dodson’s Final Rounds, Golf Dads is sure to resonate with anyone who has been handed a worn club by his father or who has watched his child swing a stick at a rock and marveled at the possibilities.

Texas held its first state golf championship in 1903, but nobody came.The scenario is not literally true, of course. For two warm days in May, forty-four gentlemen in woolen golf suits bustled around the Dallas Golf and Country Club. The three-year-old club had miraculously shoehorned eighteen holes, a clubhouse, and a place to park a horse and buggy on its fifty-five acres. Such coziness is unthinkable today; modern courses require at least three times old DG and CCs acreage. The links were fairly alive with players, commented the Dallas Morning News. But not with spectators: the few who came out to watch this curious new gamenew to Texas, that is did so from the clubhouse porch, with binoculars, and while holding a glass of something cool.

All eat from the bowl of life. Tiger Woods just has a bigger spoon. So writes Curt Sampson in his ground-breaking account of the current state of golf. Tiger Woods has changed golf forever. His mix of power and skill combines with his extraordinary business savvy to make Woods the biggest global sports figure since Michael Jordan. Like Jordan, Woods'' competitive signature is equal parts inspiration and intimidation. But what about the other guys? It''s either catch up or give up for the rest of the golfing world, and in Chasing Tiger Curt Sampson exuberantly charts the state of the game as the new century unfolds. There are Duval and Mickelson and a host of other stars, of course, but there are also the junior golfers and their parents, corporate America, agents, instructors, fans, and the media. Just as he did in his controversial bestsellers Hogan and The Masters, Sampson digs deep to uncover stories that wouldn''t otherwise be told. There''s the golf course employee in Austin whose admiration for Woods leads him to spend every waking minute mimicking his hero (including the trademark pumping fist, only here it''s on the practice green). There''s the awestruck unemployed talk show host who stretches the bounds of good taste and hero worship with his Web site, Tigerwoodsisgod.com. At the other end of the scale is Charles Howell III, skinny as a 2-iron, a up-and-coming player who has been tapped by Jack Nicklaus to be the next great challenge to Woods. Howell is the anti-Tiger: a man unfailingly friendly to fans and media, recently married, opinionated, and entirely lacking in caution, yet he struggles to earn enough money to make the Tour. Curt Sampson has written an affectionate yet wary account of one extraordinary man''s impact on the world of sport. By turns moving, hilarious, and eye-opening, Chasing Tiger is a wonderful addition to the golf canon.

Was there ever a year in golf like 1960? It was the year that the sport and its vivid personalities exploded on the consciousness of the nation, when the past, present, and future of the sport collided. Here was Arnold Palmer, the workingman’s hero, “sweating, chain-smoking, shirt-tail flying”; Ben Hogan, the greatest player of the fifties, a perfectionist battling twin demons of age and nerves; and, making his big-time debut, a crew-cut college kid who seemed to have the makings of a champion: twenty-year-old Jack Nicklaus. And of course, the rest: Ken Venturi, Chi Chi Rodriguez, Doug Sanders, Gary Player, and the many other colorful characters who chased around a little white ball—and a dream. Would Palmer win the mythical Grand Slam of golf? Could Hogan win one more major tournament? Was Nicklaus the real thing? Even more than an intimate portrait of these men and their exciting times, The Eternal Summer is also an entertaining, perceptive, and hypnotically readable exploration of professional golf in America.

The Masters golf tournament weaves a hypnotic spell. It is the toughest ticket in sports, with black-market tickets selling for $10,000 and more. Success at Augusta National breeds legends, while failure can overshadow even the most brilliant of careers. But as Curt Sampson, author of the bestselling Hogan, reveals in The Masters, a cold heart beats behind the warm antebellum façade of this famous Augusta course. And that heart belongs to the man who killed himself on the grounds two decades ago. Club and tournament founder Clifford Roberts, a New York stockbroker, still seems to run the place from his grave. An elusive and reclusive figure, Roberts pulled the strings that made the Masters the greatest golf tournament in the world. His story—including his relationship with presidents, power brokers, and every golf champion from Bobby Jones to Arnold Palmer to Jack Nicklaus—has never been told. Until now. The Masters is an amazing slice of history, taking us inside the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Augusta''s most famous member. It is a look at how the new South coexists with the old South: the relationships between blacks and whites, between Southerners and Northerners, between rich and poor—with such characters as James Brown, the Godfather of Soul; the great boxer Beau Jack; and Frank Stranahan, the playboy golfer and the only white pro ever banned from the tournament. The Masters is a spellbinding portrait of a tournament unlike any other.

Ben Hogan won four U.S. Opens in six years, three of them after a near-fatal head-on automobile collision. Driven by an obsessive dedication to the game, legend has it, he practiced until his hands bled. The concentration and precision he exhibited on the course awed spectators and fellow players alike. In this extraordinary book--the first full-scale biography of the enigmatic Hogan in twenty years--Curt Sampson explores the milestones of Hogan''s life--his father''s suicide, his miraculous comeback after his brush with death, his many triumphs on the Tour. Sampson draws on interviews with fellow golf legends Byron Nelson, Jack Nicklaus, and Sam Snead to present an in-depth portrait of a man with bullet-proof confidence and singlemindedness, a man who turned the negatives he encountered into a life of glory and achievement.

A portrait of the 1994 season of the Seattle Sonics basketball team profiles their coach, George Karl, their roster of players, and their battles on and off the court

Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson, Ben Crenshaw, Judy Rankin, Tom Kite, Fred Cobb, Harvey Penick, Babe Zaharias, Lee Trevino . . . the list of Texas golf legends reads like the leader board of an imaginary 20th-Century Golf Greats Invitational. The Lone Star State has spawned more than its share of golf heroes, and fifty of the best are featured in this collection of portraits and interviews. Milosevich deftly illustrates each golfer with compelling head-and-shoulder portraits and action views. Sampson''s brief vignettes of the golfers capture the dramatic incidents and illuminating details that help make each person a legend on and off the links. BEN CRENSHAW Nineteen eighty-six Buick Open, thirteenth hole, final round. Again Crenshaw is fighting to hold a one shot lead, but he hits a wild four-iron second shot on this par five that stops against the trunk of a tree. He has no shot—or does he? "My only shot was with a nine iron, upside down—left handed" says Crenshaw. He hits the damnedest pressure shot anyone has ever seen: from forty yards and between trees, Crenshaw''s left-handed hack stops four feet from the hole. He makes the birdie putt, of course, and wins the tournament. LEE TREVINO On the first tee, a laughing Trevino held up a rubber snake he kept in his golf bag. The gallery laughed too, feeling the same release from the drama and tension of the moment that Trevino did. Nicklaus sat quietly, at the back of the tee on a spectator''s chair while his mugging opponent dangled the toy reptile at the end of the club. Nicklaus joined in the merriment—he asked to see the fake snake, then flung it back to Trevino—but his smile seemed forced. Trevino won the playoff [with Nicklaus], sixty-eight to seventy-one, for his second US Open title. Three weeks later he won the Canadian Open and the week after that, the British Open. TOM KITE What would Kite hit? Surely he would play away from the water, with a two or three iron. Perhaps he would gamble and hit a three wood. He looked at his caddy, Mike Carrick. "What do you think about a driver?" he said. The color drained from Carrick''s face. Wind billowed the legs of Kite''s grey pants as he got set to hit. "It''s a driver!" whispered the television announcer. He nailed it.... "Best swing I made all day," said Kite to no one in particular as he walked off the tee. HARVEY PENICK Dave Marr calls him "one of God''s people." He is indeed a gentle man, this patriarch of Texas golf, but he is also humorous and sly. "''I''d like you to meet Mr. Ammanex," Penick says, as a confused-looking member introduces himself as Roane Puett. Ammanex? "Well, whenever I see you, you say, ''Am I next?"'' explains Penick. HOW ARE YOU TODAY, MR. PENICK? asks another member, loudly compensating for the old gentleman''s hearing loss. "I''m Mister Penick''s son Harvey," he deadpans, not answering the question. "BABE" ZAHARIAS "I remember playing in one of those first tournaments with Babe, and I was nervous," recalls Marilynn Smith. "So Babe put her arm around me on the first tee and said in a loud voice, I always like playing golf with you Smitty. You really bring out the crowds." The gallery laughed, of course. They were there to see the Babe. But the humor relieved Smith''s tension and made her a Zaharias fan for life. When he''s not out on the golf course trying to improve his five handicap, Paul Milosevich is in front of an easel sketching, drawing, or painting. A thirty-year retrospective of his work, Out of the Ordinary, was published in 1991 by Texas Tech University Press. Curt Sampson was "broke and disgusted" at the end of a four-year stint as a club and touring pro. So he traded in the trials and tribulations of a golf pro for the woes of a writer, thankful that he can stay close to the game he loves. He is a frequent contributor to national golf magazines and the author of The Eternal Summer. Each collector''s edition is prefaced with signature pages bearing original ink signatures of more than two dozen