B shared many stories and cocktails. “His stories almost seemed like fiction,” said Strange. “They were so memorable. My wife, Sarah, and I stayed with him at the Hope and I couldn’t wait to get home every day to listen to him talk about all 18 holes.” Rosburg was honest – sometimes brutally so – and always maintained a sense of humor. Accord- ing to Strange, he was the smartest man on Tour. “He was brilliant on the air, in the respect that less was more,” Strange said. “He didn’t get paid by the word.” Rosburg also enjoyed the needle and had a quick wit. Maltbie recalled a pro-am party at Silverado Country Club in Napa, Calif., site of the old Trans- america Senior Championship. Arnold Palmer was on hand and surprised to see Rosburg. “What are you doing here?” he said. Without missing a beat, Rossie replied, “You’d still be plenty good if they put all the pins in the left bunker.” That was Rossie. He always spoke his mind. “He was candid in a profession where people are very careful about the words they chose,” said Rankin, whose late husband, Yippy, was close to Rosburg. “He didn’t do that, which made hi
m
ore entertaining. There’s no doubt there were times when he was wrong and made a mistake, but the way I saw it, how often do you as a player in the game of golf make the same error?” Rosburg became famous for the phrase, “He’s got no chance, Jim,” when sizing up a recovery shot to ABC lead announcer Jim McKay. Seem- ingly more times than not, someone pulled off a great shot. “People still joke about Rossie, but that was his sense of humor as well,” Maltbie said. “He always saw the glass half-empty.” Added Rankin, “People have said, ‘Well, he never should have said that.’ But, basically, he was saying exactly what the players saw and were thinking.”
Bob Rosburg won six PGA Tour events, including
the 1959 PGA Championship.
When Strange won the first of back-to-back
U.S. Open titles in 1988 at the Country Club in
Brookline, Mass., Rosburg was the first person to
greet him.
“I loved that he was calling my biggest win,”
Strange said. “I seemed to play well on ABC a lot
and got to know him. He had a great heart and we
kind of had the same attitude.”
Rosburg will be missed when the U.S. Open
returns to Olympic Club in June. But between
raising a family, playing golf, television, buying
and rooting for race horses, and wowing people
with card tricks, Rankin thinks he had no regrets.
“I honestly believe Rossie did everything he
wanted to do,” she said. l
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