Kohler has been a great podsie

Jul 3, 2006
Gary D'Amato
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Check out the shirts and hats of the professional golfers at the Brown Deer Park Golf Course this week and you'll find logos for most of the major equipment manufacturers, plus a lot of resorts, financial companies and businesses related to golf.

Ted Purdy stands out in the crowd. His shirts bear the logo of the Kohler Co.

So what's a PGA Tour member doing selling toilets?

It's one of the great "right place at the right time" stories you'll ever hear, a disaster that turned into a huge stroke of luck for Purdy.

In 2003, he was a struggling Nationwide Tour player with a six-months-pregnant wife and a zero balance in his checking account when he earned one of the final spots in the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am in open qualifying.

Herbert V. Kohler Jr., the president and CEO of the Kohler Co., was a regular at the AT&T but had had some health problems and only at the last minute decided to enter.

With the big-name pros already paired with amateurs, the AT&T stuck Kohler with Purdy, whose best finish on the Nationwide Tour the year before was a tie for 15th in something called the Hibernia Southern Open.

Kohler didn't know Ted Purdy from Ted Nugent.

Sure enough, though, Purdy played great. So great, in fact, that he was on his way to the biggest paycheck of his life. So great, Kohler was going to make the cut in the pro-am for the first time in his life.

"Herb has never made the cut in 15 years and he's finally going to make the cut in the AT&T," Purdy recalled at the British Open on Sunday. "I'm under par for the week and in the top 10. I had made $30,000 on the Nationwide Tour the year before, so we're just scraping by, with a kid on the way."

Then, just like that, the dream week turned into a nightmare. Purdy forgot to sign the score card that included his pro-am team score. He left the course and didn't discover his error until it was too late. He was disqualified.

So, too, was Kohler.

"Oh, he was upset," Purdy said. "He was, like, 'Call Tim Finchem. No, better yet, call George W. Bush.' He was really upset."

Not even the PGA Tour commissioner or the president of the United States could undo the damage. Rules are rules, and Purdy had broken Rule No. 1: Always sign your score card.

"I felt terrible," he said. "I'm going, 'This is the low point. I made $30,000 last year and I've got a kid on the way. This is the low point of my career. What am I going to do?' "

A couple days later, Purdy got a phone call. It was Kohler, offering to sponsor him on tour.

"I think Herb felt so bad about what happened he wanted to help me," Purdy said.

The Kohler Co. sponsorship paid Purdy's expenses and took the pressure off so he could play golf without stressing over finances. It's probably no coincidence that his career took off.

He finished 15th on the Nationwide Tour money list with $206,584 that year and, more importantly, earned exempt status on the PGA Tour.

In 2004, he banked $1,636,876 and had runner-up finishes in the B.C. Open and MCI Heritage, where he lost in a five-hole playoff to Stewart Cink.

Two months ago, the 31-year-old Purdy broke through with his first victory, firing a final-round 65 to win the EDS Byron Nelson Championship by one stroke over Sean O'Hair. He already has earned $1,542,555 this year.

"The luck of Kohler," he said with a grin. "It's never-ending."

In his first British Open last week, Purdy finished in a tie for 74th place. The best part of the week? Being picked up by Kohler's private jet in the Quad Cities, where Purdy had played in the John Deere Classic, and flying directly to RAF Leuchars near St. Andrews.

"I lucked out with that ride," Purdy said. "Mr. Kohler is really generous for letting me come on. He insisted that my wife and son come along. Shoot, just the ride over trumps about any other sponsorship anybody else has."

Minutes after the final putt dropped Sunday, Purdy was winging his way to Milwaukee to play in the U.S. Bank Championship. Had he flown commercial, he said, he probably wouldn't have committed to play at Brown Deer Park.

Now that Purdy is established on the PGA Tour he really doesn't need help from the Kohler Co. anymore, but he hopes the, uh, royal flush of sponsorships continues.

"I really do," he said. "I'm not sure Mr. Kohler is real interested in sponsoring golfers. But I won this year at the Byron Nelson and the logo was all over TV for a few hours and in magazines and things.

"But who knows if I sell toilets or not? Next time you see Herb, try to convince him that I do."

In loo of that, let's just say Purdy is worth his weight in porcelain.