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<\/p>\nPONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. \u2014 Standing atop a golf cart trying to get a good peek at the tee shot above, Roger Maltbie still has time to mess with the masses.<\/p>\n
A gaggle of college-age golf bros swarm Maltbie\u2019s cart, more focused on this sport\u2019s hybrid between \u201cgolf grandpa\u201d and Norm from \u201cCheers\u201d than they are Scottie Scheffler hitting from the fifth tee at The Players Championship. Their vape pens have been hit, to say the least. \u201cThe man, the myth, the legend!\u201d one shouts at Maltbie. He\u2019s in the thick of the action again, and man, oh man, does that feel good to him.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy are your guys\u2019 eyes so red?\u201d Maltbie cracks, laughing to himself.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s 74 now. The droopy mustache has become a tighter white goatee. The signature plump build has trimmed down. But the headset is back on, the microphone in his grasp. And make no mistake, a freshly lit Marlboro menthol remains in the free hand.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese guys are higher than bejeezus,\u201d he says, dropping into his passenger seat in the cart with a big ole grin. He turns to his longtime volunteer driver, Tom. \u201cBack to my chariot!\u201d They speed down the fairway while Maltbie playfully shouts at people in the way, making faces at spectators like they\u2019re all in on some prank together.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople love when you mess with them,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Roger Maltbie is back. Sort of. But even that is enough. Three years after he was unceremoniously let go by NBC Sports in a situation Maltbie said was \u201chandled pretty s\u2014y,\u201d Golf Channel brought him back for nine events in 2026 to do the thing he did as well as anyone for more than 30 years: talk golf.<\/p>\n
He was back at Pebble Beach, where he got married down the road in Carmel 46 years ago and where he\u2019s been known to close down the on-resort property Tap Room a time or two. And he was at the Players, where he let The Athletic tag along for two days.<\/p>\n
But this week, he\u2019ll be at the place that reminds you there\u2019s more to the man than the lovable caricature he\u2019s often framed as. He\u2019ll be roaming the fairways at the Memorial Tournament, 50 years from when Maltbie won the inaugural holding of Jack Nicklaus\u2019 signature event in a wild, luck-filled playoff over Hale Irwin.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n Roger Maltbie has become more well-known for decades on golf broadcasts than he was as a player. (Andrew Wevers \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
In a sport that has had its fair share of larger-than-life characters, Maltbie is the rarity who lives up to your hopes. My god, how he\u2019s lived these 74 years, the kind of persona who could win five PGA Tour events but whose broadcasting career takes the cake. A guy who played with a Michelob sponsorship on his bag, was profiled by Playboy, and once got so drunk he left a $40,000 winner\u2019s check at T.O. Flynn\u2019s tavern outside Boston. The man has three Super Bowl rings (seriously). He\u2019s got a wife, kids and grandchildren. He\u2019s got the whole world in his hands.<\/p>\n
And as unequivocally happy as Maltbie is to be back, the story here is the people watching. To walk with Rog is to be interrupted constantly. Hey Roger! Sup Roger! I think that\u2019s really him! Justin Thomas turned and saw him on the first tee. \u201cHey, Rog\u2019,\u201d Thomas said. \u201cWanna play with us? We\u2019ve only got three.\u201d Maltbie, of course, quipped he\u2019d only slow them down.<\/p>\n
At one point, Golf Channel executive vice president Tom Knapp, who is responsible for bringing Maltbie back to TV, swung by to shake his hand.<\/p>\n
\u201cRog, for two weeks in a row now, you\u2019ve made the internet very happy,\u201d Knapp told him. \u201cYou really have. It\u2019s a rare thing. We call it the Angry Internet, and you\u2019re the one thing that\u2019s made them happy.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a time of phony influencers and contrived personalities occupying our feeds, Roger Maltbie can still break through. And it\u2019s not just because he\u2019s funny. It\u2019s not because he was such a great golfer or because of his insight on TV. It\u2019s something so much simpler \u2014 why people liked watching him play, listening to him on TV, and want to chat with him all night at the bar. It\u2019s because he\u2019s real. He\u2019s Rog.<\/p>\n
To understand why this all works, the secret sauce, pretend you\u2019re at a Morton\u2019s Steakhouse with Roger and the gang. The one on Sand Lake Road in Orlando. Dan Hicks and Jimmy Roberts are there, as usual, the old NBC Sports brain trust and the other members of the Supper Club, three brothers by choice who worry they\u2019ve spent more dinners together on the road than with their families over the last quarter century.<\/p>\n
Imagine Roger is there drinking Ketel One on the rocks with blue cheese-stuffed olives instead of covering the 2000 U.S. Open. The one at Pebble Beach. The one where Tiger Woods dominated the field with records that haven\u2019t been touched since. They\u2019re watching on TV as Woods hacks out of thick rough, behind a tree, 202 yards out from a par 5, and rolls it up to the green.<\/p>\n
Roger turns to Dan and Jimmy, and says, \u201cIt\u2019s just not a fair fight.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s perhaps the most famous line of Maltbie\u2019s career \u2014 and one of the most iconic of Woods\u2019 too. In real life, Maltbie said it as the ball rolled onto the green on the NBC broadcast, but as Roberts thinks back on it, it works because it\u2019s exactly what he would have said to them watching at a bar. Nothing about that line was written. He wasn\u2019t even trying to be funny.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe genius of it,\u201d Roberts said, \u201cis that you know he\u2019s not trying to be anything. You know, he\u2019s just being Roger Maltbie.\u201d<\/p>\n
It all goes back to how this started.<\/p>\n
It was 1987, and Maltbie wasn\u2019t old, but he wasn\u2019t young. NBC asked the 35-year-old to come help out with coverage at Kapalua. They wouldn\u2019t pay him anything, but it was a free trip to Hawaii with his wife, Donna. He said sure, and NBC loved him. They offered him a job and told him what it paid. \u201cI can\u2019t take that kind of pay cut,\u201d Maltbie told them. \u201cI just can\u2019t do that. Thank you very much.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nearly four years passed. More time on the body. A second shoulder surgery. NBC came back asking if he\u2019d help with the second course coverage of the Bob Hope Desert Classic at Indian Wells. Maltbie got an idea. The 1991 Ryder Cup was that fall at Kiawah Island in South Carolina\u00a0 \u2014 what became the \u201cWar by the Shore.\u201d He told them, \u201cI\u2019ll do it if you also let me do the Ryder Cup.\u201d Deal.<\/p>\n
This is where it gets good.<\/p>\n
Maltbie was assigned to follow Payne Stewart versus David Feherty in Sunday singles, and while the U.S. made its epic run, American Mark Calcavecchia was a group ahead, blowing a four-shot lead against Colin Montgomerie with four holes to play. The man just needed a bogey to win the match on the par-3 17th, and after Montgomerie missed the green, Calcavecchia shanked it in the water.<\/p>\n
They halved the match, and executive producer Terry O\u2019Neil got in Maltbie\u2019s ear, with instructions to find Calcavecchia and interview him. Maltbie tentatively did what he was told \u2014 he tracked down Calcavecchia in the TV compound with their mutual instructor, Peter Kostis.<\/p>\n
Calcavecchia\u2019s head was buried in a trash can, puking his brains out. Eyes swollen. \u201cI don\u2019t know what a nervous breakdown is,\u201d Maltbie recalls, \u201cbut this man has had enough.\u201d Calcavecchia thought he\u2019d just cost his team the Ryder Cup (he didn\u2019t). Maltbie took one look at his face and understood.<\/p>\n
Maltbie walked back into his production truck to find a frustrated O\u2019Neil. \u201cI thought I told you to interview Calcavecchia.\u201d So Maltbie explained. Didn\u2019t matter. O\u2019Neil told him to go back and wait with him until he talked.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, I\u2019ve got an idea,\u201d Maltbie said. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you stay with him, and he\u2019ll talk to you maybe. But I\u2019m not doing it. I still gotta go play golf with him. I\u2019m one of them. I\u2019m not a TV guy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Three weeks later, Maltbie was offered another full-time job. That time, he took it. He was a TV guy now.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
\n Roger Maltbie finished tied for fourth at the 1987 Masters, his best finish at Augusta National. (Augusta National \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
He\u2019s also smart enough to know much of his value as a TV guy was because he\u2019s not, in the same way, he points out, Smylie Kaufman is a peer to the current stars. It was a badge of honor not to be a TV guy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t know s\u2014 from Shinola,\u201d he says. \u201cI didn\u2019t know anything about broadcasting on television. And I still don\u2019t. I don\u2019t want to know.\u201d Thirty-five years later, he\u2019s a core piece of television history. He admits he\u2019s become far more known for the last 35 years than the prior 40.<\/p>\n
So he\u2019s asked: When you think of who you are, are you more the golfer or the broadcaster?<\/p>\n
\u201cWell \u2026 you know \u2026 that\u2019s a good question,\u201d Maltbie says, taking a drag of his dart and blowing smoke off the side of a hospitality balcony.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still see myself as a golfer,\u201d he says, and let\u2019s just be Roger Maltbie for a moment.<\/p>\n
You spend your whole life from childhood dreaming of making it on the PGA Tour, practicing your ass off. Go from San Jose City College to San Jose State. Get on tour in 1975. Win back-to-back events, then Rookie of the Year. A year later, the iconic win at the inaugural Memorial. It\u2019s all happening.<\/p>\n
Then, it stops. No wins for almost a decade. Qualifying for majors is a struggle. But still, life is good. You\u2019re a personality. You\u2019re a good time. The guy fans want to have a beer with, and players still flock to. Have a late renaissance, winning twice in 1985, including the World Series of Golf, but time is catching up to you.<\/p>\n
TV is only supposed to be a side gig. Just a couple of weeks while you rehab. An even better offer comes. You\u2019ve got a 10-year exemption, so doing the TV thing to supplement only playing 15 weeks a year makes sense. But you\u2019re damn good at it. They call you the Golf Whisperer. You know the players\u2019 wives, their kids. Go from playing 15 events. To 11. To seven. To two.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou keep going further, and it gets to the point where they don\u2019t even know I played on the tour,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m a broadcaster. They\u2019ve only known me as a guy on TV. You go through these periods of time, and that\u2019s how my relationship with the players and the job has changed.\u201d<\/p>\n
The more you talk to Maltbie, the quicker you learn it was never about him becoming either a golfer or a broadcaster. He\u2019s the river flowing through life, bouncing from one absurd story to the next. The roles? They tailored themselves to him.<\/p>\n
Which reminds Maltbie of the best advice he ever got. It was after that first tournament at Indian Wells. He tracked the producer down in the parking lot and begged for help. He had no idea what he was doing.<\/p>\n
\u201cListen,\u201d Larry Cirillo said, \u201cYou know the subject matter. Just be yourself. That\u2019s all you\u2019ve got to be.\u201d<\/p>\n
Which made Roger wonder, \u201cWhat the hell is myself?\u201d<\/p>\n
The beauty of a Maltbie story is that he doesn\u2019t tell it like he\u2019s giving you the highlights or servicing a larger point. The story is the point. The details are layered and the detours and nooks and crannies are the soul. It\u2019s not your aunt who can\u2019t get to the punchline. It\u2019s an artist who knows that adding the texture makes it feel more real. And Roger wants you to feel part of the story.<\/p>\n
He tells you about how the Michelob deal came together and how it was heaven, because beer brands sell their products at huge events, meaning he got free hospitality trips to Super Bowls and all-star games as a brand ambassador. \u201cPlus, they put a tapper in my home. And the local wholesaler would come, send the guy out, clean the lines, and replace the keg every week. And then they sent me four cases of Michelob every month. You think I\u2019m on the road all these weeks, right? So now, in the offseason football time, I\u2019m like the most popular guy in the world. \u2018Oh, my God, come on. We got a ticket for you for this, come tailgate this.\u2019 I\u2019ll bring the beer!\u201d<\/p>\n
He tells you why he\u2019s wearing a San Francisco 49ers Super Bowl ring. A Bay Area boy, Maltbie played the Pebble Beach Pro-Am with 49ers owner Eddie DeBartolo every year, and eventually DeBartolo invited him to a game, then season tickets, then box seats. They won the Super Bowl, and DeBartolo invited him to the ring ceremony. As players and coaches went off for dessert and coffee, DeBartolo said, \u201cRoger, come with me.\u201d<\/p>\n
He quietly handed him a box with a Super Bowl ring. Floored, because he played no part, Maltibie put in a safety deposit box. Months went by, and they saw each other again, and DeBartolo immediately asked him where the ring was. \u201cThat\u2019s not why I gave it to you,\u201d a disappointed DeBartolo said. Maltbie has worn it everywhere ever since.<\/p>\n
He tells you about when NBC Sports put out a staff mandate to be active on social media, to which he promptly cautioned the executive: \u201cDo you have any idea how much I drink? And what I think is funny at 10 o\u2019clock at night? You really want me doing that?\u201d NBC Sports let it be known that Roger Maltbie was exempt.<\/p>\n
![\"Roger](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/GettyImages-85932368-scaled.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\n Roger Maltbie\u2019s distinctive broadcasting style captured audiences for decades. (Al Messerschmidt \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
But then we get to the last few years, and his time away from the big events.<\/p>\n
He downplays it. \u201cAh, you know, watched some golf on TV. I\u2019m pretty good at doing nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
But it hurt. Maltbie admits he felt both pain and gratitude when his 31 years at NBC ended. But a man who makes fun of himself as much as Maltbie does isn\u2019t the type to let pride be his downfall. He stayed busy, working senior tour events and helping out on the PGA Tour occasionally.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has a really great perspective on life,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cWhen he was going through it, I remember thinking to myself, \u2018There\u2019s something to be learned here.\u2019 I think he feels good enough about himself to not confuse who he is with what he does.\u201d<\/p>\n
But when Knapp and Golf Channel looked to strengthen their brand this year after a round of corporate restructuring, they called Maltbie.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re in this world of wanting to drive the viewership lower and younger,\u201d Knapp said. \u201cWe want viewership to get younger. But I think one of the things that people may not realize is, younger viewers, so viewers in their mid-20s and mid-30s, have grown up with Roger Maltbie. He\u2019s their golf grandpa.\u201d<\/p>\n
And Maltbie accepted, because the part that people might miss about Maltbie is that he really is all about the golf. He loves watching it. He loves getting up close. For years, he refused NBC producers\u2019 suggestions to put him in one of the towers. He said he could do that from home. He wants to be on the ground reading greens and watching ball flights.<\/p>\n
Plus, he wants to be back in the mix. He wants to be back at the Tap Room, at the steakhouses with the Supper Club, and running into random staffers who call his name when they see him.<\/p>\n
All those weeks watching from home let him think about where golf broadcasts are going. He loathes the tape-delay heroes, who make \u201cpredictions\u201d that they already know to be true. \u201cIt\u2019s OK to be wrong,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen you do it right and the words spill from your mouth, and you have painted the picture of what you thought may happen, it\u2019s like hitting one flush. There\u2019s a satisfaction.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oh, and the jokesters. He\u2019s not gonna name names, but he doesn\u2019t vibe with the forced comedy. When you listen to Maltbie\u2019s calls, he\u2019s not trying to be funny or do a stand-up set. He\u2019s reserved, giving direct thoughts with fewer words. \u201cHumor presents itself, presents the opportunity,\u201d Maltbie says. \u201cLet it be natural. I don\u2019t want to hear your comedy hour.\u201d<\/p>\n
For 40 years, Roger Maltbie golfed. For 35 years, he did TV. In all that time, nothing\u2019s really changed in him, no matter the job description.<\/p>\n
As Maltbie set off for a closer look at TPC Sawgrass\u2019 sixth green, Tom, the man who drives Maltbie around in these cameo weeks back on the PGA Tour, spoke some truth. Tom still helped out and drove for the last three years. It was a hell of a lot less fun, he said. So many back at home have felt the same way. Which is why Tom was so blown away by seeing the people react to seeing Maltbie again. He went quiet for a moment.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo a lot of people,\u201d he said, \u201cRoger is golf.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. \u2014 Standing atop a golf cart trying to get a good peek at the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":708154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82,575],"class_list":["post-708153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-golf","tag-sports","tag-sports-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=708153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/708154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=708153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=708153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=708153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}