Today’s Hal Sutton is a much different person than the PGA pro who once concerned himself solely with his golf swing.
By Dave Orman
Illustration by Roberto Parada
For PGA Tour veteran Hal Sutton, life has always been about balance. Throughout most of the last 25 years, that meant maintaining the proper balance in his golf swing. He obviously did a good job of it, playing well enough to earn a spot among the top 35 golfers in career winnings.
Lately, however, Sutton has been teeing it up a little higher, focusing on a broader view of balance. “In a way, I was selfish,” says Sutton, a member of Southern Trace Country Club in Shreveport, Louisiana. “To me, balance was simply something I had to perfect in my golf swing to become a better player.”
Sutton recently looked back to a specific PGA event in 1998, the Tour Championship, where he spent most of the day working on his golf swing. His wife had just had their first child and was pregnant with twin daughters, but for the superbly talented Louisianan, the most important thing in life was winning that tournament. “I thought I had it all figured out,” he says. “But I was leading a very self-centered life. Today, I’m looking for balance in my life. We can all use more balance.”
NEW PERSPECTIVE
That’s the message he conveyed last September upon receiving the Payne Stewart Award, which honors players who — among other things — reflect Stewart’s “respect for the traditions of golf” and his commitment to uphold the “game’s heritage of charitable support.”
In recent years, charitable support for Hal Sutton has meant the Sutton Children’s Medical Center in his native Shreveport. A dramatic trigger for his change of perspective came in 2001 when Reagan Little, the 7-year-old daughter of his agent, died of viral meningitis. “We have very good local health care,” Sutton says, “but not the kind of health care we needed for kids. So when Reagan passed away, I was at a point in my life where I was searching for higher meaning. I have four kids of my own. I thought we could do something about this, and I wanted to be the catalyst to do it.”
The folks behind Christus Schumpert Health System loved the idea and agreed to help if Sutton could raise, say, $6 or $7 million. “We did, and they did,” says Sutton, who was on hand when the 80-bed facility officially opened in April 2006.
GOLF AND BEYOND
The Payne Stewart Award wasn’t the first time Sutton has been recognized for maintaining a balance that goes far beyond his golf game. He was the winner of the Omar N. Bradley Spirit of Independence Award in 2003, awarded in the past to groups such as the Harlem Globetrotters and, in 2001, to New York firefighters, policemen, and other “Heroes of New York City.” Individual winners have included Ronald Reagan, Bob Hope, and Gen. Tommy Franks.
In 2006, he shared a Golf Writers Association of America award with fellow Louisianans Kelly Gibson and PGA colleague (and Southern Trace member) David Toms for the more than $2 million in aid they helped raise for victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Oh, and the $1,080,000 purse that he won for his 2000 Players Championship victory? He donated $100,000 of it to his alma mater, Centenary College, and to the United Way of Northwest Louisiana.
For many golf fans, the lasting image of Sutton remains that 2000 Players Champion-ship — a fist-pumping, toe-to-toe triumph over Tiger Woods. It was a memorable moment for the tour veteran whose many memorable moments include 14 tour victories and his role as captain of the 2004 U.S. Ryder Cup Team.
“But I’ve learned there’s more important stuff in life than chasing the little white ball and merely chasing your own personal dream,” Sutton says. Some of that “stuff” includes doing whatever he can to prevent personal tragedies like the one he is all too familiar with. “I get a lot of personal satisfaction,” he says, “but the bottom line is that we now have better health care for children in Shreveport.”
LOOKING AHEAD
Given his envious list of golf accomplishments, Sutton insists that he’s not one to celebrate success. Not even that win over Tiger? “There was always internal satisfaction,” he acknowledges, “but I can’t get caught up in that. In fact,” he continues, “my wife tells me I’m not much fun. Instead, I’m usually looking ahead to the next things we can do.”
While many of those “next things” involve the hospital, Sutton also oversees a golf course design business. His first course, Olde Oaks, opened near Bossier City in 1999. And today, he’s heavily involved in developing the Boot Ranch luxury home project in Fredericksburg, Texas.
“When I walked away from golf, a lot of other things became apparent,” he explains. Boot Ranch, for example, reflects his desire to create “an entire community, one where we can get away from the busiest world we’ve ever lived in — a world with cell phones, laptops, our ongoing need for instant gratification. So it might be wishful thinking, but I’m hoping to create a small-town environment where people actually have relationships, where they can reflect about some of the good things from our past.”
A concern for the past is important to Sutton these days, but he’s also keeping an eye on the future — especially since he becomes eligible in April 2008 for the weekly pot of gold available on the Champions Tour to the world’s best golfers 50 and older.
“You never know what tomorrow will bring or what goal you’ll be chasing,” Sutton says. “I’ve been busy with a lot of other things the last few years since I realized that trying to get better at something doesn’t always have to involve golf.”
Still, he admits to having been out hitting a few balls now and then. He also knows that golf is “a platform” that, in the end, makes it easier to draw attention to his charitable efforts. “And the truth is,” he adds, “I kind of miss certain aspects of competitive golf. I miss my friends.”
Chances are they miss him as well. And that he’ll soon be back up on that platform.
Dave Orman is a Los Angeles freelancer who chases the little white ball just like Hal Sutton does. He just chases it in places Sutton probably never knew existed.
A HOME FOR HOPE
The Sutton Children’s Medical Center combines the latest in pediatric technology with a kid-friendly atmosphere designed to enhance the health care and quality of life for children throughout Sutton’s native Louisiana.
The 60,000-square-foot, 106-bed facility (www.suttonchildrens.com), which opened with 80 beds in 2006 as part of the Christus Schumpert Health System facility in Shreveport, Louisiana, spreads a message of hope to its patients and their parents. “That’s what these parents are looking for,” says Sutton, deeply touched by what he and the donors he’s encouraged have been able to provide.
“I can’t tell you,” Sutton once told a reporter, “how many times I’ve been in a grocery store when a mother has come up to me, crying, and said, ‘I never thought I’d see the need, but I have experienced it, and I thank you.’ That’s the kind of thing that makes this all so rewarding.
“You spend so much time in your own personal life chasing your own dreams and living selfishly,” added Sutton, whose wife, Ashley, heads the Medical Center’s Women’s Council. “But when something tragic happens to you or someone close to you, that’s the wake-up call. These kids in the hospital, they touch your life. And their parents are worried to death. They just want hope.”
Which, for Hal Sutton, is exactly what the golfer ordered.
HAL SUTTON
Occupation: PGA Tour professional.
Birth date: April 28, 1958.
Birthplace: Shreveport, Louisiana.
Education: Centenary College.
Turned pro: 1981.
PGA highlights: 14 Tour victories, captain of 2004 U.S. Ryder Cup Team.
Recent accolade: PGA Tour’s Payne Stewart Award.
Family: Wife Ashley; daughters Samantha, Sara, and Sadie; son Holt.
Member: Southern Trace Country Club, Shreveport, Louisiana.
Hobbies: Trains and sells cutting horses.