Just as one of the world s most famous professional golfers was about to sit down for a bite last week, a chorus of high-pitched squeals rose from the employees, most of whom were on a lunch-hour break from their jobs on the golf club assembly line. The commotion wasn t for Daly, though; somebody had just opened up a prized gift during the Secret Santa exchange. The workers were all so wrapped up in their festivities, they barely gave Daly a glance.
And why should they? The guy has been hanging around the offices for a month. By now, Daly is just another workaday subject in the place TaylorMade likes to call The Kingdom.
Only he doesn t need a photo badge to get into the building. In the precious time professional golfers have between their 11-monthlong seasons, most want to sit down in an easy chair at home and relax. Daly has parked himself and his $1 million luxury bus in the massive employee parking lot at TaylorMade, back in the hills not far from Legoland.
My new residence, right here, Daly said with a grin. When Tiger Woods roughs it, he does so on his $20 million, 155-foot yacht named Privacy. Daly has the bus, and TaylorMade employees have been knocking on his door just to shoot the bull.
I m so used to being on the road with this, when I pull up to my home in Memphis or Arkansas I ll sleep on the bus, said Daly, who has a white-knuckle fear of flying. It s crazy, but I m as comfortable on the bus as I am at home. Daly, 40, who signed a multiyear endorsement contract with TaylorMade in February, arrived in North County a month ago to get a jump on testing new clubs and balls for the PGA Tour season that begins next month.
The winner of the 2004 Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines, he is coming off a confounding year of injuries and personal setbacks that caused him to lose his full-time tour playing privileges for the first time since his breakthrough victory in the 1991 PGA Championship. But like that good ol relative who made himself comfortable and didn t go home, Daly has stayed to help with the chores, doing everything from making sales calls to holding guitar-and-harmonica jam sessions with customer service reps. He plans to stick around for three more weeks, until the Sony Open in Hawaii.
The TaylorMade people have contracts with dozens of professionals, and they say they ve never seen anything like this before. Their least successful players don t show this kind of commitment, and Daly is a two-time major championship winner and arguably the second-most recognizable golfer on the planet behind Woods. To say this is refreshing is an understatement, said Mike Ferris, the director of product development for TaylorMade clubs and Maxfli balls.
And it s not something that we re forcing upon him. This is John s behavior, John supporting the cause. Very honestly, this is totally unique.
Unique. Rebellious. Tempestuous.
Crazy. John Daly tests the thesaurus when it comes to describing his larger-than-life existence his triumphs, his divorces, his troubles with gambling and alcohol, his on-course meltdowns.
Daly is just another workaday subject at TaylorMade, where he doesn't need a photo badge to get into the building.
He has dabbled in golf course design and has his own line of apparel with his colorful lion logo. He is the first and only tour player to copy NASCAR and sell merchandise out of a travel trailer. He does so, before each golf tournament, at the nearest Hooters restaurant, another of his sponsors.
In the past, Daly has had some trouble sticking with golf companies. He was dropped from a $3 million contract by Carlsbad-based Callaway in 1999 when he left a San Diego-area alcohol rehab center after one night. The second-tier companies jumped at him he played with Dunlop s Loco ball and a Redneck putter but it was TaylorMade that gave him another shot at big-time legitimacy last winter.
For them to put their faith in me is something very special to me, Daly said. The day Daly signed his contract, TaylorMade CEO and President Mark King declared it a company holiday. With your brains and my big ol swing and gut, we can get it done, Daly told a gathering of employees.
Said King: We love John for what he is. That s why the average person loves him so much. He s not perfect and he doesn t always say the right thing, but when you get to know him, they don t come better than John Daly.
It s beyond over-the-top compared to our other staff players, said Scott Cuppett, a TaylorMade tour rep who has been traveling with Daly. I love him to death. An entire advertising campaign for the new Maxfli Fireball is being prepared solely around Daly.
Before last month s Skins Game, he did a promotional appearance by riding in on a fire engine. Corny, sure, but nobody was smirking that night when Daly contributed $5,000 to families of the five firefighters who died in October s Esperanza fire. John is awesome .
.. beyond awesome, said Michael Mark, president of NYCA, the Encinitas-based marketing firm that is handling the Daly campaign.
His is a persona that transcends the game. The Fireball balls cost $20 a dozen inexpensive by today s standards and will be sold at places such as Wal-Mart and Target. I want it to be a price people can afford, Daly said.
Ferris said Daly drove himself to a buyers meeting at Wal-Mart s Bentonville, Ark., headquarters to pitch the ball, and then dined with Wal-Mart s chief financial officer at the Skins Game. When Daly was done, Ferris said, he d convinced the massive retailer to buy about 40 percent more balls than it had planned.
He told Mark (King), I got you another $1.2 million, Cuppett said, laughing. John loved that.
In Daly s fascinating world, his reach goes well beyond golf. He and his 3-year-old son, Little John, in the fall took part in filming a country music video for a Steve Azar coming-of-age song called You Don t Know a Thing. Sings Azar: If you re afraid to give away your heart and face what life brings, man, you don t know a thing.
That s my life, Daly told Azar, a friend. It s everybody s life, in a way. Then recently, Azar called Daly for a favor.
He asked if the golfer had any connections to help get him the job as the opening act on Bob Seger s tour. Kid Rock is a good friend of mine, so I called him, Daly said. I asked him if he could talk to Bob because Steve s awesome.
Two hours later, Kid called back and said Steve was in. I thought that was pretty cool, he said.
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