Masters 2023: Inside the wild world of John Daly, golf’s ultimate maverick

John Daly had his fair share of controversy as a professional golfer, but he’s still as popular as ever. Here’s why despite all his flaws, Aussie golf fans still love him.

Inside the wild world of golf maverick John Daly.

You take the turn out the Augusta National gates and head left. About 500 metres down Washington Road – or roughly a 10-minute walk – you find the Hooters that John Daly calls home for Masters week. Has done for as long as most can remember.

Usually, he has his van parked out the back but on this day it is wet. Very wet. So Daly and his lackeys have set up shop inside the restaurant, where you can buy some merchandise, grab an autograph and if you’re lucky, share a cigar with golf’s original wild thing.

The line is out the door. We’re told it’s about an hour wait but we can go and sit at the bar if we like, as long as there is only one of us.

Any more and there just isn’t any room. You’ll have to wait outside and brave the elements if you want to get anywhere near the two-time major winner, whose occasional visits to Australia invariably ended in controversy.

The monster queue lining up outside Hooters to meet John Daly.

We were keen to get a few thoughts from John on those very trips to our shores but the clock was ticking given there was a golf tournament to cover.

We were told we could try around the back, where you could make direct contact with John’s people. So off we went.

Around the back of Hooters to a door that was bolted shut. We tried to open it before one of Daly’s people came to the window and promptly informed us we would have to wait like everyone else at the front.

We explained we were media from Australia and keen to reminisce with John about his visits to our fine land. We even showed them our accreditation. Would be quite the hoot, we said, attempting to throw in a bit of Aussie humour.

All to no avail. If we wanted an audience with Daly, we would have to queue like everyone else. So we took a peak in the window, saw Daly and his merchandise table, and hot-footed it back to the course.

John Daly draws a crowd wherever he goes. Picture: Getty

Such a shame because Daly was at the centre of some of the greatest tales in Australian golf. Birdies and back page headlines were his specialties.

There was the time he took offence to having his picture taken and smashed the offending camera against a nearby tree. The owner of said camera proudly posed for pictures afterwards. He was on cloud nine.

How about the time Daly hit his ball in the water at the Australian PGA, played a penalty shot, backhanded his second ball in the hole and threw his putter into the nearby lake

It was retrieved by a bloke in scuba gear, who waved it in the air like he had just won the Masters. Or the unforgettable occasion when Daly hit seven balls into the water at The Lakes in Sydney, stormed off the course and left the country.

It was the first round. Australian golf officials talked about banning him but it was a moot point. Daly’s best days were behind him and he had exhausted his opportunities with Australian golf officials.

For all his flaws, Australian golf fans loved Daly and the show that came with him. He was box office. Still is if the line at Hooters is anything to go by.

They have queued throughout the Masters, snapping up merchandise and taking selfies with the great man when they can.

They all want a piece of Daly, who thrilled golf fans with his swashbuckling style on the course and unpredictability off it.

Daly last played the Masters in 2006 but he has been making an annual pilgrimage to Augusta to cash in on the biggest golf tournament in the world.

The queues suggest Daly is doing all right. He is 56 now and has been through four divorces. He has battled cancer and alcoholism. He has been on death’s door too many times to count, but he is still standing, albeit more often than not in garish orange pants.

He has gambled away millions but he is still one of the hottest tickets in town.

They keep snapping up his t-shirts and caps emblazoned with “grip it and rip it”.A few years back, a lady queued up for an autograph.

There was a catch. She wanted it on her backside so she pulled down her pants and handed Daly a black pen. He duly obliged.

Nothing surprises him any more.