ShareThisBy RON KROICHICK
Lee Trevino brings some fond memories to Pebble Beach for this weekend's First Tee Open. He once hit a shot into the sand dunes of Cypress Point, where tournament host Bing Crosby and his wife, Kathryn, graciously helped Trevino look for his ball. (He found it, unfortunately.)
Trevino also brings some not-so-fond memories, beyond the way Jack Nicklaus steamed past him during the final round of the 1972 U.S. Open. Trevino recalled bundling up as if it were the middle of winter, not the brink of summer.
"I almost froze to death once during the Open," he said last week. "I had the fireplace on and I was sleeping in sweat gear. C'mon, man, it's June!"
Trevino was an engaging, omnipresent personality during his PGA Tour career, winning six major championships and entertaining galleries with his good-natured demeanor. But he has not played at Pebble Beach in nearly 20 years, a long absence that will end Friday.
Trevino is one of 78 professionals scheduled to play in the First Tee Open, an event pairing Champions Tour pros with amateurs and juniors. He will play alongside comedian George Lopez, a good friend and Pebble Beach fixture, for one of the tournament's three rounds.
There are many reasons Trevino has not returned to Pebble since 1987. He began doing television work for NBC in the late 1980s, as he reached his late 40s and his PGA Tour career wound down.
Then, in 1991, Poppy Hills replaced Cypress Point in the AT&T rotation, eliminating Trevino's "favorite course in the world." And the Champions Tour did not begin playing an event at Pebble until 2004, when Trevino was nursing serious back problems.
"I quit going to Pebble because they took Cypress out of the rotation," he said. "If there was a way I could jump off that cliff on No. 16 (at Cypress) and let one of those walruses swallow me up, I would do it."
Trevino was one of the Champions Tour's top players when he joined the 50-and-over crowd. He won 24 times in his first five full years (1990-94) on tour, finding a nice niche after a long and thriving career on the regular tour, where he won 29 times in all.
Now, as he approaches his 67th birthday in December, Trevino is a sporadic participant. He has played in only 18 events the past two seasons, slowed by back surgery last year.
He still works on his game near his home in Dallas, where the anti-Pebble summer weather _ routinely more than 100 degrees _ often keeps him in his shop, fiddling with clubs.
"My game is going downhill, and rightfully so," Trevino said. "I've accepted that. ... Even though my mind is telling me I can play, my body says, 'Are you crazy?' Every time I swing, about seven or eight different places say they hurt."
Trevino still offers lively, candid opinions on a variety of topics:
_ On the chance of future tour players relying on a homemade swing, as he did: "There won't be any more homemade golf swings, because power is everything. My swing was powerless; that's one of the reasons I hit the ball so straight."
_ On technology's impact on golf: "The golf ball has ruined the game. It doesn't bend as much as it used to. The USGA has dropped the ball on the golf ball _ they won't admit it, but they know."
_ On his hometown Dallas Cowboys: "We're going to get rid of T.O. (Terrell Owens) in about three weeks and we're going to the Super Bowl."
_ On playing in the First Tee Open: "I'm looking forward to playing with the juniors, because I've been playing with all these old people, (Dana) Quigley and (Jim) Thorpe, and I've heard all their jokes."
_ TIGER'S CHASE: Tiger Woods will move into historic territory if he wins this week's Deutsche Bank Championship near Boston. Woods has won four consecutive starts, his longest streak since 1999-2000, when he won six straight. That matched Ben Hogan for the second longest in tour history; Byron Nelson owns the record of 11, set in 1945.
