Nicks in Mix : Price, Faldo Draw Attention at British Open

SANDWICH, England â€”  He answers to Nick, speaks the queen’s English, can tear up a course with a one-iron and is a favorite to win this week’s British Open on the wind-swept pasture of humps and hollows at Royal St. George’s.

Price or Faldo?

Absolutely.

The question of the week: What makes these Nicks tick? And, furthermore, who’s going to stop them?

Nick Price, 36, who grew up in Zimbabwe--it was Rhodesia then--is the hottest golfer in the world, the PGA Tour’s money leader and winner of consecutive tournaments--the Greater Hartford and Western opens--heading into this week’s play.

Nick Faldo, the sometimes dour Englishman who turns 36 on Sunday, is generally regarded as the world’s best player.

They walk alike and talk alike.

Yet, all Nicks are not the same.

The British tabloids love to prod Faldo for what they perceive to be his robotic pursuit of golf excellence.

Price is not held up to similar inspection, perhaps because until his recent run of luck, he had always been golf’s bridesmaid, a capable top-level player who went years between victories.

The expectations are greater for Faldo, the burdens heavier, the face more sullen.

He is a three-time British Open winner and two-time Masters champion who practices so much it worries people. Faldo and Price have the same coach, David Leadbetter. It was Price, in the mid-1980s, who suggested that Faldo visit Leadbetter for a tuneup.

Faldo grabbed hold of Leadbetter and wouldn’t give him back.

“Nick (Faldo) is far more analytical than me,� Price said. “I would work with David for four or five weeks and say, ‘That is enough, let me go out and work on what he has said.’ Nick prefers that David should hover around him.�

As Faldo hovered, Price tried to shake the dark cloud that follows career runners-up.

He still has only one major victory--the 1992 PGA Championship--to his name.

But Price can speak volumes on the two British Opens he almost won, the first in 1982, when he led the tournament by three shots with six holes to play before losing to Tom Watson.

And in 1988, Price began the final day with a two-stroke lead but wound up shaking hands with Seve Ballesteros, the eventual winner.

Price doesn’t hesitate to admit how much he wants to win at Royal St. George’s.

“Very, very badly,� he said. “Having had a hand on the trophy twice, it will be nice to get both hands on it at the same time.�

Of the Nicks, it is Price who projects emotionally, pouring out to all concerned his struggles on the European tour in the late 1970s, when the sun-baked kid from Zimbabwe went north, only to discover something strange and new . . . weather.

“Coming from Zimbabwe, where we have 360 days of sunshine every year, coming over here, the weather was so different than where I was brought up,� Price said. “It was a huge adjustment for me, playing in cold weather, playing with a couple of sweaters on, playing totally different golf courses than the ones I grew up on. There was a time when I was just absolutely hopeless. At some stages, I actually thought about packing it in.

“I remember 1979, and also in ‘81, I was playing so poorly that, in a two-month stretch, I might make one cut in eight tournaments.

“It makes the way I’m playing right now so much better.�

For Price, years have brought perspective.

In 1991, for instance, he withdrew from the PGA at Crooked Stick to be with his wife, Sue, who went into labor with their first child.

Price did not marry until he was 31 and says marriage and parenthood have changed him.

As the game became less important to him, though, his level of play improved--dramatically. Consider that Price had won only one tournament from 1977 through 1991 but has won seven in the last 11 months.

“Sometimes you think that it’s a matter of life and death,� Price said of the game. “I got married pretty late in life and got a son that’s coming up on 2 years old. When you have family, your priorities change. That’s part of the maturing process for me. My family comes No. 1 and my golf is pretty close behind. But if push came to shove, I’d take my family first. That takes a lot of pressure off you anyway. When you’ve got the support of your family, that’s an even greater thing.

“That’s probably why Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus had six kids each.�

Price, swept up in the midst of a great golfing streak, wonders when it’s going to end.

“You often wonder, ‘What am I doing that’s different to the previous 14 years,’ � he said. “You just ride it out. If it ends this week, it ends this week. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.�

And sometimes great isn’t good enough.

Faldo is chronicled as golf’s Ice Man, a calculated killer of courses, a man who wears his heart on his pitching wedge.

The stakes are always higher with Faldo, who this week will defend his British Open title.

But in England, the headlines scream: “You’re a Bore, Faldo!�

In England, he is portrayed as aloof, a player not willing to share his time with younger players.

“If they don’t ask, they won’t know,� Faldo counters.

Sweden’s Jesper Parnevik, the Scottish Open champion, said Faldo reminds him of Bjorn Borg, the famous tennis star who burned out in his mid-20s.

Parnevik was quoted as saying in a tabloid: “It is not for me to talk about his personal status, but when golf takes up 99.9% of your time, there must be a lot of pressure.

“You have to take time to enjoy it along the way and it would be a shame if Nick finished up like that. . . . Nick could learn a lot from lightening up and looking as if he enjoys the game. He doesn’t smile until it is all over. He never relaxes until the last putt has gone in.�

Then again, maybe that’s what separates Faldo from the field.

Faldo says of Parnevik: “He does not know me. Simple as that. I don’t know the guy. Everyone has their opinion. Everyone’s entitled. It doesn’t upset me at all.�

As the pressure mounts, Faldo throws himself into his work. His game had slipped some in recent months, and there were the usual whispers. But a recent victory by Faldo in the Irish Open has his fans believing again.

“I’m defending,� Faldo said of his Open title. “I haven’t come here for a good time.�

Until he broke into smile, no one knew Faldo was joking.

British Open Notes

Jack Nicklaus, fresh from his victory in the U.S. Senior Open, arrived Tuesday and played a practice round in the rain. Royal St. George’s has never been kind to Nicklaus. In the 1981 Open, he shot a career-high 83, prompting one columnist to write: “I always wanted to play like Nicklaus and now I do.� At the 1985 Open, Nicklaus missed the cut. . . . The afterglow of winning the U.S. Open is catching up with Lee Janzen, who arrived in England exhausted. “I have not had much sleep lately,� he said. “It has been nonstop every day.� Because of personal commitments, Janzen said he hit only five golf balls last week. “It’s been tiring, but it’s been fun,� he said.

In a practice round Tuesday, John Daly drove to the fifth green, which is 421 yards from the tee. It was estimated that the downwind shot traveled 340 yards on the fly and rolled the rest of the way. . . . It was not a confident Fred Couples preparing for Royal St. George’s. “When you are not getting results, it becomes frustrating,� he said. “I am not saving strokes. I don’t see myself as a match against Nick Price, Nick Faldo or Payne Stewart head to head.�