Steve Stricker Notches 4th Win This Season, Plans to Climb Tree

Steve Stricker, the guy who was hospitalized off and on with a mysterious illness that lingered for months last winter, the guy who was too weak to play golf for almost six months, has now won more tournaments this season than any other PGA Champions Tour player.  He just added his fourth victory at the Constellation Furyk & Friends tournament.

It looked easy, like Tiger Woods golf.  He kept his drives in play, and he birdied the par fives.  Everything was in order in the final round until his second shot at the 18th. That’s when, as Peter Jacobsen said on Golf Channel, he laid the sod over it. If nothing else, Stricker made golf viewers feel better about their games.  He won in spite of the bad shot.

Even with the last hole theatrics, Steve Stricker was too far ahead of a charging Harrison Frazer, who was 7-under for the round, and a determined Jim Furyk, who made four straight birdies on the back nine, for anything else to matter.  Nobody could stop him. He slowed himself down by a shot, but that was all.

Steve Stricker has had a most unusual year.

After recovering from his illness, which ended up giving him pericarditis and an irregular heartbeat, Stricker didn’t know what to expect for the rest of the year.  He was taking a beta blocker and blood thinner for a while, but eventually he was able to wean himself off those drugs.

Then there was the question of his golf.

“I didn’t know where my game was going to be. When I was starting to come back and hitting it super short and my body felt awful, I was just hoping to play really more than anything,” he admitted after winning.

Steve Stricker’s wife, Nicki, suggested they take it in two-week increments.

“That kind of proved to be the savior because we just could see improvement every couple weeks, whether I felt better, starting to put on weight, putting on muscle, all that kind of stuff,” he explained about the recovery process.

On the bright side, Steve Stricker had a lot of time to work on chipping and putting, although most people would agree that he was already one of the best at those two disciplines.

The victory at Constellation Furyk & Friends put him into strong contention on the Schwab points list, and with the success he’s had in the last month, winning twice since mid-September, he may decide to return in November for the last two events of the season.

However, his immediate plan is to climb a tree.  No.  He hasn’t lost his mind.  Stricker loves deer hunting, and there is only one month during the year when deer are in season. That time is now.

So, Steve Stricker will take his bow and arrow and climb into a tree somewhere in Wisconsin and wait for the deer to come out.  In the past, he has hunted elk on occasion, but this year, it’s deer, watch out.

“I did set a goal of these last three events, and I achieved the goal, so I said if I could achieve this goal, then I could probably, maybe, play in November time,” he explained, sounding not quite convinced.

His goal, amazingly enough, was to win two of the three events, and he did.

“I needed that to get caught up, really, to Steven Alker. I’m still a couple, 250,000 probably behind him, but I needed those two wins to get in the game, to get in the picture, and I am,” he explained about his position on the Schwab points list.

"“I  don’t want to throw that away, either. Maybe I can have some success in the tree early and get back to playing golf.” – Steve Stricker"

And just so people won’t think he’s being wasteful, the deer is or are donated to organizations that supply food to people who need it.

All we can say is good luck in the tree, Steve.