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

Knowing the golf course pretty well, how do you think she'll fare?

If she plays great, she's going to shoot a couple of 83s, 84s. If she gets a little nervous and the ball starts going a little off line. ... it's just going to be a battle for her.

It really is. It sounds like she's got a decent head and she's not expecting anything special. But why bother then?

What about Annika Sorenstam playing in a PGA Tour event?

I guess if Annika plays really well, she might be able to make the cut. That's the best she could do. And this is going to come out the wrong way again, but there's a reason why women are women and men are men. But in terms of sports, there is no way--their best of the best can't sniff our worst of the worst. But if this all starts, where does it end?

Are you going to play that week at Colonial?

I was going to shave my legs and put on a bra and see if I could get an exemption. I figure the more women who play, the better chance they have of winning.

Time to change subjects. With all your problems, did you ever think of doing something else?

Never even crossed my mind. Even when things were at their lowest point three or four years ago. Plus, let's be honest--what else could I do? I'd never be a club pro. That's impossible. I could never tolerate the members, because that's just not my style of personality. So that's eliminated. So what else is left? I'd just as soon not find out.

There was not a doubt in my mind growing up that I was going to be a golf pro. I don't know what made me think that, because I stunk as a kid. I quit school when I was 16. My mom said, "Well, what are you going to do? You can't quit school." I said, "I'm going to be a golf pro." Obviously I ended up going back to school, but I did stay out for a month. But I can't say it enough: I love golf.

Did doctors ever suggest you might be better off in a less stressful job?

Clearly the psychiatrists thought that golf affected my ability to recover. So we had to work around that.

During your first divorce, the judge told you that you needed to grow up, quit playing golf and get a real job. What did you think at the time?

Our judicial system is a classic. I've had two judges. The first was dead serious: "Go get a real job." That was after my first year on tour, and I think I made like $12,000 or whatever it was. He didn't understand the concept of golf and how you earn your money. He just looked at the bottom line, like, "This boy's not making a dime. In fact, he's losing money." Soon after that I ended up winning.

What was the total bill on the second divorce, with lawyers and everything?

Just lawyers alone was a couple hundred thousand. I've got a room named after me on the sixth floor at Palm Beach County Courthouse, I was there so often.

Does your girlfriend, Jeanne, play golf?

I try not to date golfers.

Is it tough to maintain a marriage with the lifestyle of a tour pro? Do you think that was part of the problem?

I am absolutely, positively a believer that our lifestyle is the greatest lifestyle in the world. Think about it: You play 25 weeks out of the year. So you're home all the time for 27. Out of those 25, you've probably got eight or nine that are during the summer when your family's with you. There are a couple where you're staying at your house. So now you're down to about 12 tournaments where you're away from your family. And that's only for four or five days. So it's a slam-dunk. You can schedule your time around their activities. Michael Jordan has to play on Christmas; baseball players have to play every day. Golfers, if there's something really important that you need to do with your kids for that particular week, you just take it off, you don't play. To say that this is a hard life is someone just being incredibly ignorant or spoiled. It's one or the other. And some of them actually have the nerve to come out and say, "This is very difficult."