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LA QUINTA, Calif. — Because I’ve been called “Two Left Feet” for most of my adult life, I feel uniquely qualified to interview Tommy “Two Gloves” Gainey, who always wears two gloves while playing golf.
Tommy Two Gloves never removes his mitts, even when he putts.
Early Thursday afternoon, as he walked off the Nicklaus Resort Course at PGA West, Gainey was 2-under-par for the first 36 holes of the PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament.
“I hit it terrible in both rounds,” Gainey said after shooting 71-71. “To tell you the truth, I’m pretty pleased to be 2-under at this point. It could be a lot worse.”
With four rounds to go in the 90-hole Q-School, Gainey is anticipating that his powerful game will come around. He is one of the longest hitters in professional golf, and long is an important ingredient on the lush, overseeded fairways of PGA West.
The top 25 players, plus ties, will earn fully exempt status on the 2009 PGA Tour. Gainey currently is five strokes out of the 25th position.
“I wanted to play on the PGA Tour ever since I was old enough to know the difference between right and wrong,” said Gainey, who has lived his entire life in the Columbia, S.C., area. “I guess that would be 10 or 11 years old.”
He achieved his dream when he advanced through the Q-School in 2007, although he made the cut in only six of 24 events during 2008 and ended up 148th on the money list. A second-place finish at the concluding tournament of the year, the Children’s Miracle Network Classic, lifted his spirits heading into another Q-School.
Gainey wore two gloves when he played youth baseball. After discovering golf at 10, he continued to wear two gloves, which is common in baseball but unorthodox in golf. No great golfer has ever worn two gloves.
“All I need to know is this,” Gainey revealed. “Tiger Woods talked about no two golfers being the same or playing the same game. I wear two gloves because I feel comfortable that way. It’s the way I play the game.”
Two gloves, huh? It’s become a prominent trademark as well as a nickname for Gainey. Because of the publicity he received while winning Big Break VII on Golf Channel, he couldn’t hide his identity these days if he wore a bag over his head.
His hands are a giveaway. Just look at them. They’re lily white. No other golfer has two hands that look like this.
If the proverbial “farmer’s tan” consists of a red sun-scorched neck and pale shirt-covered torso, a “Gainey tan” is characterized by sun-bronzed arms and milky white hands.
“Have you tried playing with one glove?” I asked him.
“Yes,” he said, “but I didn’t like it.”
Call me weird, but I always wanted to shake Gainey’s hand. With a glove on it.
So I stuck out my hand, and he — well, darn — removed the glove and shook my hand. He was in “gloves off” mode, having finished his round.
Gainey, 33, is something of an icon in professional golf. And rightfully so. He grew up poor, started playing muni golf when he was 10 and graduated from Central Carolina Technical College while supporting himself as an assembly line worker.
His brother, Allen, has been his only instructor. “He’s watched me play all my life,” Gainey said. “I can call him up, tell him where my bad shots are going, and he will tell him right away what to work on.”
Gainey’s caddie here at Q-School is another Big Break graduate, the fiery Don Donatello. It was Donatello who correctly diagnosed Gainey’s putting woes before the Children’s Miracle Network tournament.
At Donatello’s urging, they visited the Rife Putting Studio prior to the event. Gainey left with a 34-inch Rife Barbados putter, one inch shorter than his previous putter.
“That made all the difference,” Donatello said. “Everything was lined up properly. He felt good about it, and he made a lot of putts.”
I guess so. Gainey was 24 under par, one back of winner Davis Love III.
How long is Gainey off the tee? During the 2008 PGA Tour campaign, he averaged 298.3 yards, which ranked 24th. A better indicator, though, could be seen in the final round of the Children’s Miracle Network event.
On the par-5 14th hole of the Magnolia Course at Walt Disney World, Love laid up short of a water hazard on his second shot. So did most players in the field. Gainey was over the green with a 4-iron second shot.
Gainey carries an Adams Golf bag and uses Adams Idea Tech a4 irons, Cleveland wedges and a Cobra driver.
“Next time you see me, there will be an Adams driver in that bag,” Gainey said with conviction.
I don’t know about that. All I know for sure is that Tommy Two Gloves won’t leave a single fingerprint anywhere on the golf course.
Posted: 12/4/2008
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