Into everyone's life a little Ken Green must fall: the tour's bad boy is back, and he's still not pulling any punches

Golf Digest, June, 2003 by Peter McCleery

So I had no choice. We had to get them in somehow. And so that's what we did. It was in shifts. You've been known for stunts--hitting balls from your living room through sliding-glass doors, chipping balls through windows of rental cars. Do you ever feel you're being reckless?

Clearly you can't defend it, and I wouldn't try to. Was it fun, and did we have a great time doing it? Absolutely. Do I still do it? Absolutely.

I certainly wouldn't defend whacking balls out of hotel rooms. I've done it out of my house a thousand times. But we've done it in hotels hundreds of times. Trying to hit targets. In Hawaii it might be from one room to the pool across the street--in Hawaii, a lot of pools are on the top floors.

There are a lot of challenges to these shots. We don't do it to cause any harm, and we never have. It's not like we're shooting at people out there on the beach or something, trying to knock somebody off. We do it at the right time. How I've never hit and broken anything is still one of the most amazing achievements a man can have.

You also used to have contests hitting short shots through the open windows of rental cars. No broken glass?

You've got to understand, you're only hitting chip shots. I have handicap requirements. We're not talking abut hackers playing. One of my sons broke a windshield once at the Masters.

When we did an article recounting all your fines years ago, you had an even dozen. Since then you've doubled them. How did those come about?

You'd be amazed at how many letters the tour receives about certain people's behavior. It can be me, it can be Calc. The tour always followed up on the letters they got about me.

Does any one fine stand out?

I got fined on a Tuesday practice round for signing autographs at the PGA at Bellerive in '92. I was playing with Calc, Payne and Freddie. They were all waiting on the tee not doing anything, and I was signing autographs. And a guy just said, "What do you think of the course?" All I said was, "Are you a member?" When he said no, I said, "Course sucks." Simple as that. Somebody from the tour's PR department happened to be walking by and reported it, and I got whacked for it. Go figure.

What would you say the over/under is on you getting fined this year as you get back on tour regularly?

The one thing that will probably get me in trouble is the swearing. I'm a swearer. I'm not saying that is a good thing, I'm not saying it's a bad thing. In all honesty, it probably isn't the best habit to have, and it's not even in anger. It's just a casual, "Oh, bleep."

One of the stories that has been in the news a lot lately is women playing in PGA Tour events. There was the Connecticut pro, Suzy Whaley, who qualified for the Greater Hartford Open. What do you make of that?

You're trying to kill me. ... I think it's idiotic. I respect her and I respect that she played in the [PGA section] tournament and won and all that, but I think it's absolutely ridiculous for her to play in the tournament. Clearly she should have been playing the back tees in the club-pro tournament if she wanted a spot in the GHO.