One stroke kept Tim O’Neal from PGA Excursion. Years later, HBCU graduate finds home on professional expedition for seniors– Andscape

Forever variable, PGA Journey Champions golf player Tim O’Neal would definitely be remiss to admit he was “residing in the moment” while striking the greatest shot of his life in in 2014’s Ascendancy Power Charity Criterion in Richmond, Virginia.

O’Neal admits he truly did not have a total understanding of “the minute” he continued to be in.

“I never considered the leaderboard, and the leaders entering into the [final] day were playing behind me,” O’Neal specified. “I actually didn’t recognize where I stood.”

O’Neal’s wedge technique that day on the 18 th opening rolled to within 2 feet of the pin, and the happening birdie putt helped seal a two-shot triumph– the first PGA Picturesque excursion Champions win for the Jackson State grad.

That accomplishment in October 2024 supplied a lifeline for O’Neal, that at the time mosted likely to risk of shedding his PGA Picturesque excursion Champions card. Amongst the advantages of the 52 -year-old’s clutch effectiveness in the Ascendancy Power Charity Standard: the capability to prepare his 2025 period, including his first night in the united state Elderly Open, which begins Thursday in Colorado Springs.

“I’m inside the ropes with men I have seen all my life,” specified O’Neal, that stays in his 3rd duration having a good time on the PGA Expedition Champions journey, which was created in 1980 for golf lovers over 50 “It’s outstanding that whatever has settled for me. I’ve put in a great deal of hard work, and I’ve been with a lot of ups and downs.”

Some golf players could not have actually redeemed from the ups and downs O’Neal has actually stood up to.

Merely weeks after Tiger Woods collapsed the PGA Expedition scene with his not likely damage of the location at The Masters in 1997– Woods, at 21, won his very first substantial by a Masters’ record 12 strokes– the New York City Daily Information sent a press reporter when traveling to discover the following Black golf natural born player.

The writer’s journeys took him to Mississippi, where he situated O’Neal, a Jackson State student that was continually battle 300 -yard drives while holding his very own versus the nation’s leading university golf gamers.

“He can play in a foursome with Tiger Woods right now and not humiliate himself,” Jim Headrick, at the time the head golf pro at a New Orleans fairway, informed the Daily Details “It’s very seldom you see ability like this come along.”

In the future that year, the Savannah, Georgia aboriginal, fresh off winning the 1997 Georgia Amateur Champion (at the time the only African American golf gamer to win the title), transformed professional and invested a variety of years establishing his video game on the country’s mini-tour circuit while furthermore attempting to guard a PGA Expedition card using Q-school, a collection of certifying competitors described on the PGA web website as a location “where dreams– and problems– are understood.”

O’Neal’s work showed up stamped. Celebrity Will Smith, fresh off “The Legend of Baggar Vance” movie, moneyed him. Butch Harmon, in the middle of training Tiger Woods with the greatest private golf year ever in 2000, in some way made time to use O’Neal lessons.

“That was a game-changer due to the fact that Tiger (Woods) went to the height of his career and I had the opportunity to deal with the very best instructor at the time,” O’Neal specified. “What I picked up from Harmon aided me get better.”

The just remaining to be barrier for O’Neal: Q-school, the certifying occasion where the leading golf gamers make a location on the PGA Excursion.

O’Neal got to the Q-school finals in 2000 and tipped to the last tee presuming he required a birdie to safeguard a journey card.

He as a matter of fact just required a bogey.

That blunder led him to play the opening extra strongly than he called for to, and it caused him striking his tee terminated right into a danger, a shelter shot over the environmentally friendly, and a triple-bogey changed his desire right into a problem.

He missed out on getting his PGA Picturesque excursion card by round.

“You go to Q-school with the goal to get among those PGA Tour cards, and there were 150 people trying for 25 areas,” O’Neal stated. “The stress you encounter in that scenario, it’s difficult.”

4 years later on, O’Neal once more discovered himself in viewpoint. Once again, he failed by a shot.

On that particular certain unsatisfactory day 21 years back, on his 2nd close phone call, O’Neal had no tip that would definitely be as close as he would definitely reach reaching the PGA Picturesque excursion.

“I saw both of those events on television and it injured me, so I can’t even visualize just how much it hurt him,” stated Keion Witherspoon, O’Neal’s colleague at Jackson State. “A lot of individuals might have given up. Yet he maintained going.”

O’Neal proceeded a roller-coaster trip. He had 2 great durations on the establishing Throughout the nation Journey (presently the Korn Ferry Excursion) in 2005 and 2006, making a combined $ 270, 000, nonetheless he had a hard time the following 2 durations.

O’Neal specified 2008 was his document reduced when he made $ 10, 000, lost out on 9 cuts in 13 celebrations and shed his expedition condition.

“I had trouble paying my mortgage and really did not actually understand what to do and just how I was going to do it,” O’Neal declared. “My ex-wife was working and that assisted because we had children to look after. It was truly a challenging area to be in.”

O’Neal began supplying golf lessons, and he took a work at a golf store. He furthermore played mini-tour celebrations that hardly maintained him afloat.

“Several of those tournaments cost anywhere from $ 800 to $ 1, 000 to play, and paying for resorts and food there was no assurance you ‘d win your refund,” O’Neal stated. “If you don’t have financial backing, golf is hard. At some point, I ran out of money.”

It obtained so inadequate that O’Neal, in 2011, established to desert the sporting activity. He shared those techniques with this mother, Eva.

She had actually not been having it.

“She told me, ‘You’re also excellent to quit,'” O’Neal specified of his mom, that died in 2020 “She was the encouraging element for me remaining to play.”

In 2012, O’Neal wagered the very first time in the EPD Journey (a European third-level breathtaking trip) in Morocco and won, adhered to by one more EPD breathtaking trip accomplishment simply over a month later on. Winning in Morocco raised his self-confidence as he returned to the USA and won 3 occasions on the Supporters Professional Golf Organization journey, which was developed to help expand the sporting activity.

O’Neal, in the following years, continued grinding his technique with lots of journeys that included the APGA, the Korn Ferryboat Journey, the Web.com breathtaking trip and the PGA Excursion Latinoamérica.

In 2015, he advanced from neighborhood licensing to the united state Open at Chambers Bay in College Area, Washington. It was, for O’Neal, a fast choice of what it appeared like playing in a significant golf occasion.

“To contend against the leading players on the PGA Trip was incredible,” O’Neal declared. “It’s a week I’ll never forget.”

O’Neal played in 8 line of work PGA Excursion occasions, containing the 2019 Genesis Open organized by Woods. He played because competition under the Charlie Sifford exception (called for the very first Black golf player to use the PGA Expedition). With his mini-tours and the PGA Excursion experiences, there were constantly good friends in the gallery offering inspiration.

“Whenever he was close to me on the West Coast, I would certainly be there,” stated Witherspoon, the university colleague that remains in the Los Angeles area. “When he’s out there, he’s representing Jackson State, HBCUs and me. I’m just very happy with him.”

As O’Neal progressed deep appropriate into his 40 s, playing the PGA Picturesque excursion Champions, an expedition developed in 1980 for golf lovers over 50, had actually not been something that consumed him.

“However when I transformed 49, my pals would certainly tell me, ‘You’re gon na tear that scenic tour up,'” O’Neal specified. “So, I recognized I was going to go to Q-school when I transformed 50”

For O’Neal, 50 ended up being the brand-new 20 In a Q-school last arrangement, where 78 gamers competed for 5 areas, O’Neal finished in a three-way third-place link that guarded him full-time condition with the PGA Expedition Champions.

“All I can state is better late than never ever,” O’Neal declared. “I would have liked to use the PGA Tour, but it didn’t occur. I never ever quit and when I finally broke through, it was well worth the wait.”

Back to that accomplishment in in 2015’s Ascendancy Power Charity Standard– completion outcome of that competitors for O’Neal was vital.

With the PGA Journey Champions, the leading 36 players at the end of the period are ensured cards the listed here year. O’Neal got in the competitors positioned 55 th in the standings, with simply the leading 54 golf lovers proceeding to the 2nd round of the season-ending 3 occasion playoffs.

His journey card remained in risk.

Not just did that triumph move him to 13 th in the standings (progressing him to the following round of the Charles Schwab Mug playoffs), it additionally provided O’Neal– as an expedition victor– complete exemption for the entire 2025 period.

“I went from virtually losing my card to having the convenience of making my schedule for the entire year, and that removes a lot of pressure,” ONeal declared. “A lot more notably, now I understand I can win. And I wish to win again.”

A moderate-sized team fifty percent loads the watching stands just over the 17 th environmentally friendly at the 2025 Elderly PGA Champion last month. Most of have really included Legislative Golf Club to see the stories– Vijay Singh, Colin Montgomerie and José María Olazábal are among the Globe Golf Hall of Famers in the location– and it’s not a shock to see the team perk up as Ernie Els tips to his round in the fairway.

The shot from Els, champ of 4 majors, rolls just off the back of the environmentally friendly and he at some time makes the very same degree. Yet the emphasize from the opening is the technique O’Neal strikes to within 7 feet of the pin. He makes the complex, rather downhill putt for birdie.

There’s a holler from the stands.

“Way to go, Tim,” is the scream from amongst the customers, that could or might not have really recognized that O’Neal was prior to the shot.

O’Neal winds up the round at additionally par- 72 while Els cards a 76 O’Neal, sticking to the round, was resembled by fans requesting his sign.

While O’Neal confesses was “a little daunting” registering with an excursion and competing versus golf players he invested most of his life watching, he’s currently at a variable where he feels great.

“I’m out there trying to defeat you, much like you’re trying to defeat me,” he stated.

O’Neal’s golf life is the story of a long, arduous and heartbreaking trip. The lost out on possibilities and the financial issue of being a golf journeyman where cash money was so restricted he frequently remained 4 to a resort space with fellow golf lovers, and where he in some cases didn’t take a trip with his staff bag (choosing a smaller sized lug bag rather) as an outcome of the added overweight luggage costs.

That sought that. O’Neal’s Instagram web page should include Kool Moe Dee’s “How Ya Like Me Currently” as its trademark song. The web page consists of images of O’Neal relaxing beachside in the days prior to the Mitsubishi Electric Champion at Hualalai (his very first trip to Hawaii); on the technique environment-friendly in Morocco along with the team bag he can currently manage to take a trip with; and the GQ magazine-like image shared by the PGA after he tape-recorded his really initial win.

Seeing O’Neal’s success make individuals that followed his trip initially, like Randy Watkins– that ran the Jackson, Mississippi, golf web links where O’Neal played in college– happy.

“If you like golf and experience the things Tim did, you might go find something else to do,” Watkins declared. “But if you enjoy golf, you take the licks and penalty and you keep at it. He’s the best instance of what you can leave life if you are absolutely devoted.”

Poet Langston Hughes when developed: “What occurs to a dream deferred?”

In O’Neal’s life, that daydream postponed truly did not leave his objectives combated.

It just caused postponed complete satisfaction.

“My mom utilized to inform me, ‘When it’s your time, it’s your time.'” O’Neal stated. “I never made the PGA Excursion, and it ended up being my time to jump on this excursion. I’m glad I decided to stay with it. The experience has been outstanding.”

Jerry Bembry is an elderly author at Andscape. His container checklist points include being serenaded by Lizz Wright and checking out the Knicks play a DELIBERATE NBA computer game in June.