Tom Watson (golfer) - Distinctions and Honors

Distinctions and Honors

• Named PGA Player of the Year 6 times, 1977–1980, 1982 and 1984, and trails only Tiger Woods, who has been named Player of the Year 9 times.
• Won the Vardon Trophy for lowest scoring average three straight years: 1977, 1978, and 1979.
• Played on four Ryder Cup teams: 1977, 1981, 1983, and 1989 and captained the victorious 1993 team.
• Voted the Bob Jones Award in 1987, the highest honor given by the United States Golf Association in recognition of distinguished sportsmanship in golf.
• Inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 1988.
• Inducted into the Stanford Athletic Hall of Fame
• Won 1992 GCSAA Old Tom Morris Award
• Resigned from the Kansas City Country Club in 1991 in protest to its exclusion of people of Jewish ethnicity. He subsequently rejoined after the club's acceptance of Jewish and minority members.
• Became involved with golf course design in the early 1990s.
• Author or co-authored several books, including Tom Watson's Strategic Golf. His latest, The Timeless Swing, will be released by Atria books in March 2011.
• Has written a golf instruction column in Golf Digest magazine since the mid-1970s.
• Was ranked as the 10th greatest golfer of all time in the 2000 Golf Digest magazine list.
• Is, after Sam Snead, only the second Golf Professional Emeritus at The Greenbrier Resort in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia
• Is the oldest player to hold the lead after 54 holes at a major championship (2009 Open Championship at Turnberry, Scotland)
• Is the oldest player to lead after any completed round at a major championship (2009 Open Championship at Turnberry, Scotland)
• Granted a lifetime membership to the European Tour