Celebrities have been big in the golf world forever.  Obviously there was the Bing Crosby Clambake (est. 1937) that eventually became the AT&T Pro-Am at Pebble Beach.  Then there’s the whole friggin’ Celebrity “Tour” circuit featuring the likes of Charles Barkley, Mark Mulder, Jeremy Roenick, Justin Timberlake, Carlton, etc.  In fact, one of the great topics that’s hot in the golf streets right now is if celebrity non-golfers like Steph Curry, Tony Romo, and Jake Owen should continue to get these sponsor exemptions into professional tournaments just to draw a little extra attention.  (We’ll save that debate for another day.)  But did you know that at one point that a celebrity was also the most popular golfer in the U.S.?  That golfer was Babe Ruth.

Golf.com recently ran an article highlighting Babe Ruth’s lifelong obsession with golf that started when he was 20 years old.  The article explains how Bobby Jones was easily the best golfer in America during the Babe Ruth era, but in comparison, golf was a minor sport compared to baseball and not many people really cared.  The crowds at tournaments were nothing compared to what they are today and there was no TV coverage to speak of.  Ruth’s participation in the sport and his exhibition matches brought golf to a wider audience than before.

In the 1930s, it was Ruth who made the game look like fun, and whose passion for golf not only generated large crowds but motivated millions of average Americans who had never pictured themselves playing the rich man’s sport.

Honestly, I never knew that Babe Ruth was into golf, let alone so significant to American golf history.  Frankly, the whole story is really interesting to me.  Another part of the story I didn’t know was that Babe’s backup outfielder was a player named Sammy Byrd.  These two supposedly transformed golf instruction forever!

By the 1930s, the late years of his baseball career, he played almost daily with Sammy Byrd, a substitute outfielder known as “Babe Ruth’s legs.” Ruth was heavy and gouty by then; Byrd would pinch-run for him. More important to the Babe, Byrd was probably the best golfer ever to play major league baseball. After eight years with the Yankees and Reds, Byrd joined the PGA Tour and won six times. He finished third in the 1941 Masters, fourth in the 1942 Masters, and lost the 1945 PGA Championship in a match-play final against Byron Nelson. During his baseball days he tutored Ruth on the golf course, but it was the Babe who gave Byrd a practice tip golfers still use. During batting practice one day, Ruth tucked a hand towel in his armpit to keep his front elbow close to his chest. Byrd tried the trick, passed it on, and golfers have tucked towels on the driving range ever since.

Anyway, rather than copy and paste this thing to death, go check out the article.  Especially if you’re a baseball fan.  I really enjoyed it and like having this golf topic sitting in my back pocket for the right occasion!

Check out the full thing here.