What now for David Duval? Off the course, he's found love. He's about to become a husband and a father of three. He says he still loves the game, too. There's just one question: will it love him back?

Golf Digest, March, 2004 by Jaime Diaz

"Boy oh boy, that's a hard one," says Bob Duval. "You know he's intelligent, and maybe he looked into himself and figured out he needs to discover other things, because golf--even as great as he can play--really doesn't matter. That's pretty deep. I just don't know."

For the record, Duval doesn't buy it. Or if he does, he isn't going there. His analysis of his poor play is clinical: "It was all caused by injury," he says.

Duval's physical troubles began when he sprained a ligament in his back in late 1999 or early 2000. Although others have speculated the injury was caused by weightlifting or snowboarding, Duval maintains "there wasn't one traumatic event I could go back to." Duval has had his condition treated by Tom Boers, who works on the backs of several tour players, but therapy hasn't prevented the problem from flaring up unpredictably.

"It just feels funny at times," says Duval. "It'll click and snap back funny, and I won't be able to swing the way I want to. What I've learned is that if you have a back that's hurt and not functioning properly, there's no way to play this game--not consistently. You'll be going along OK, and all of a sudden something else starts hurting, or some other place that's been hurt before, and it becomes 'Groundhog Day'--you're set back again."

Along with subsequent shoulder and wrist problems likely caused by compensating for his back, Duval realized that his swing changed. "It got me into this downward cycle of nonperformance, lack of confidence, more nonperformance and more lack of confidence," he says. "Confidence is everything, but as it eroded, I continued to work hard. I thought I was doing what I needed to do, but what I really was doing was ingraining bad habits."

Although his swing is highly idiosyncratic--strong grip, shut face at the top, head rotation toward the target before impact--Duval had never before had any significant swing problems. His only coach had been Bob Duval, who mostly let his son develop his style.

"David's always been a very uncomplicated player," says Bob. "When he was playing well, I could give him a lesson over the phone." Adds David: "I never tried to make swing changes. At all. I'd always thought I swung the club perfectly."

But to avoid pain, Duval reflexively altered his address posture. With his body in a different starting position, Duval began to swing differently, with most observers agreeing that he developed a reverse pivot. With too much weight on his left side at the top of his swing, Duval stopped turning into the hitting area with the dynamic freedom that was his trademark. Instead, he was forced to hold his body back and square the club into impact with his arms and hands, a serious problem for a player with a grip as strong as Duval's.

Duval, who had always relied on a power fade that in essence eliminated the left side of the golf course, for the first time in his career began to hit hooks and pulls. Stunned, he became so afraid of the shot that he developed a compensating move that caused him to hit huge blocks to the right. "Once he stopped turning and started putting on the brakes," says Bob Duval, "his tee shots started going everywhere. And he forgot what his old swing felt like."