Shoal Creek set for golf major comeback

BIRMINGHAM, ALA. (AP) - Fred Couples is a couple of decades older since finishing second in the last major tournament at Shoal Creek, and he has the aching back to prove it.

But Couples is happily here anyway for the Champions Tour’s Regions Tradition at the scenic course that hosted two PGA Championships a couple of decades ago before controversy erupted over its all-white membership _ and the founder’s comments that the club wouldn’t be pressured into accepting blacks.

The Tradition, the first of five Champions Tour majors, opens Thursday.

“This is a great, great golf course,” Couples, who tied for 15th at the Masters while fighting persistent back problems, said Wednesday. “For the Champions Tour, I believe this is going to be one of the best events.”

For the players and PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem, the past issues seem to be buried about as deep as the Bermuda rough that plagued participants in the 1984 and 1990 PGA Championships.

Finchem called the 7,234-yard, par-72 course, which is nestled between the lush Oak and Double Oak mountains, “by all estimates a significant, supreme test” and “famous around the world.”

But outside of golf circles, at least, it became known in 1990 for founder Hall Thompson’s remarks on black members just before the PGA Championship. Thompson, who later apologized, died in October.

The 600-member club now has a handful of black members, including former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, a Birmingham native and honorary chair of the tournament.

“We certainly have no hesitation of playing here and haven’t had for a number of years,” Finchem said. “Actually, the last five or 10 years we’ve had a couple of, I would call them robust conversations with the club here about possibly playing.

“For whatever reason, those conversations didn’t materialize, but they could have. I mean, we had no reservation about playing.”

The rancor prompted major golf organizations to adopt membership policies for tournament sites.

Several major sponsors _ including Anheuser-Busch, Toyota and IBM _ yanked TV ads and black organizations threatened to picket outside.

And now? “We’re extremely comfortable on all fronts,” Finchem said.

Champions Tour player Steve Lowery, who lives in Birmingham, credits Mike Thompson, a Shoal Creek board member and Hall’s son, for helping put that controversy in the past.

“It’s because Mike Thompson was proactive in taking the initiative to do things right, and he’s done them right all the way,” said Lowery, a former Shoal Creek member. “He’s done a great job with all of those issues. They’re in the past. We’re going forward.”

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