Tommy Jacobs passes away at age 87

In 1951, Tommy Jacobs won the U.S. Junior Amateur, defeating Floyd Addington, 4 and 2, at the University of Illinois Golf Club. Later that year, Jacobs played in the U.S. Amateur, at Saucon Valley Country Club in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, beating Ken Venturi on his way through his bracket before losing to Joe Gagliardi in his semifinal match. As one of the 200 players who made it to Amateur’s final four, the 16-year-old Jacobs received a letter from Augusta National Golf Club, inviting him to play in the 1952 Masters Tournament the following spring in what would be his PGA TOUR debut. At the time, Jacobs was the youngest competitor to ever grace Augusta’s fairways. One of 20 amateurs in the field, Jacobs finished 60th that week.

Jacobs maintained that youngest-to-play-in-the-Masters distinction for 58 years until Italy’s Matteo Manassero supplanted him in 2010. Following a stint in the U.S. Army, Jacobs would play one more PGA TOUR event as an amateur, coming agonizingly close to winning the 1957 Los Angeles Open at Rancho Municipal Golf Course, one of six players to tie for third, three shots behind winner Doug Ford. By then, Jacobs’ game was sound enough, and he turned pro five months later, spending the next 14 years as a touring professional. While he won four PGA TOUR titles during his 346-tournament TOUR career, it was at the major championships where Jacobs, who died July 9 in Reno, Nevada, of causes incident to age, at 87, gained a semblance of fame that at least matched those victories.

Besides his 1952 Masters appearance, at the 1964 U.S. Open, Jacobs was unable to convert a two-stroke, 54-hole lead, shooting a final-round 76 in suffocating humidity and heat to finish second to Venturi, who exacted revenge from 13 years earlier, winning at Congressional Country Club outside Washington, D.C. Two years later, back at the Masters, Jacobs finished regulation tied with Gay Brewer and Jack Nicklaus, the trio embarking on an 18-hole playoff the following day, an extra session that Nicklaus won.

Jacobs, born February 13, 1935, in Denver, Colorado, but a Californian for most of his life, won all four of his TOUR titles in the west, in his native Denver, as well as in San Diego, Salt Lake City and Palm Springs.

Jacobs broke through with his first title at the 1958 Denver Open, shooting an opening-round 65 before firing three consecutive 67s to defeat Ernie Vossler by a shot at Wellshire Golf Course. His 1962 San Diego Open title came when he defeated Johnny Pott by sinking a 14-foot birdie putt on the first playoff hole at Stardust Country Club to secure the win. Jacobs’ 1963 Utah Open concluded in dubious fashion as he three-putted for bogey on the 17th hole Sunday then double bogeyed the final hole but still was able to hang on and hold off Don January by a stroke.

His final win, at the 1964 Palm Springs Golf Classic, a five-round, four-course affair, came when he finished 90 holes tied with Jimmy Demaret and then defeated the Texan in a playoff.

By 1968, with a 1965 U.S. Ryder Cup team appearance on his resume (a 3-1-1 record in his five matches) and that runner-up finish at the Masters, Jacobs had fallen to 127th on the money list. A year later, he rebounded with a pair of top-10s, his second-place performance at the 1968 IVB-Philadelphia Golf Classic his best showing. As his game continued to wane, Jacobs grew weary of the travel and the grind. His last full TOUR season came in 1970.

He later told the New York Times, “I played the Tour long enough. I got tired of traveling. I got tired of packing my bags and unpacking them. My game started slipping in 1966. It got good again in 1970, but I wasn't scoring good. I realized the reason—I was tired. I resolved to quit and take a good club job.”

That he did, accepting the Director of Golf position at the La Costa Resort Hotel and Country Club in Carlsbad, California. Coincidentally, La Costa was the new home to the TOUR’s Tournament of Champions, an event that had moved from Las Vegas a year earlier. As the Director of Golf, Jacobs also ran the tournament, getting the course and the facility ready for the players he used to regularly compete against.

Jacobs didn’t totally give up TOUR life after becoming a club pro. He played a handful of events—22 between 1971 and 1979. He made his last TOUR appearance in 1991, at Torrey Pines Golf Course, not far from where he won the San Diego Open 33 years earlier.

After leaving La Costa in 1986, Jacobs went to work at The Farms Golf Club in Rancho Santa Fe, California, a course that opened in 1988 that he helped design, with Pete and Alice Dye. He later established Tommy Jacobs Bel Air Greens in Palm Springs and was a part owner of Magnolia Greens Golf Plantation in Leland, North Carolina.

Jacobs turned 50 in 1985, yet he never immersed himself in PGA TOUR Champions golf. His 10 starts in 1987 were his most, and he never recorded a top-10 among his 67 career starts. His last official appearance came at the 2003 Senior PGA Championship at Aronimink Golf Club outside Philadelphia. Although Jacobs wasn’t competitive, missing the cut, he stayed for the remainder of the week to watch his younger brother, John, win the tournament by two strokes.

Jacobs will be cremated, his ashes spread in Mission Bay near San Diego, where the family spread the ashes of Jacobs’ wife of 55 years, Sally, in 2013. Besides his wife, Jacobs’ older sister, Margaret, preceded him in death. Jacobs is survived by his brother, John of Boise, Idaho; and sons Keith (Yvette) of Scottsdale, Arizona, and Michael of Reno, Nevada. The family will hold a memorial service in September.