Jim Nantz has always trusted himself to find the right words in the heat of the moment, but Tiger Woods once made him change his policy that has defined triumphs for Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth
Tiger Woods’ ‘win for the ages’ forced Jim Nantz to change his approach to announcing (Image: Stephen Munday/Allsport/Getty Images)
Jim Nantz knows the words he utters can last forever, but the CBS golf announcer insists that only once in his 40-year career did he prepare the line for the winning moment in advance.
That golden rule of staying in the moment and not thinking too far ahead has worked wonders for the 65-year-old, who will be responsible for calling the climax of the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow on Sunday.
The policy led to masterful calls that have become intertwined with those moments of triumph, from Jordan Spieth pulling off “one of the epic performances in the annals of the sport” at the 2015 Masters to Tiger Woods’ “return to glory” at Augusta National in 2019.
READ MORE: Rory McIlroy message to Sepp Straka immediately after Truist win shows what’s on his mindREAD MORE: Rory McIlroy and Patrick Cantlay find common ground over controversial PGA Tour decision
Nantz was in the broadcast tower last month for Rory McIlroy’s enthralling playoff victory over Justin Rose that ended a 10-year major drought and clinched the final piece of the career grand slam.
“The long journey is over, McIlroy has his masterpiece,” the announcer said before barely speaking for the next seven minutes, with Nantz and broadcast partner Trevor Immelman astutely allowing the emotionally-charged pictures to do almost all of the talking.
Nantz says those calls were improvised, perfect encapsulations of careers and journeys dreamt up as the crowning moment neared. However, he admits Woods once forced him to change his approach, such was the dominance of his breakthrough victory at Augusta in 1997.
Subscribe to our golf newsletter for all the latest news and views from the PGA Tour, LIV Golf and beyond
Woods, then 21 years old, led by an astonishing nine shots heading into the final round, and the inevitability of his victory and the gravity of the moment – the birth of a transcendent sporting superstar – prompted Nantz to settle on the right words the night before, knowing he could not risk souring such a moment with an ill-fitting call.
“The one kind of obvious pre-planned line that I thought of a lot was Tiger’s ‘win for the ages.’ It was no question he was going to win on Saturday night. He had just blown away the field and it was just a matter of how much he was going to win by,” Nantz said.
“And I felt like if I didn’t think about a very important clip that’s going to play forever, I wasn’t doing my job. I knew it had to be something succinct, and ultimately, I landed on ‘a win for the ages,’ because I thought that would be aligned with a video that would be played back 50, 100, 200 years from now.
READ MORE: Xander Schauffele rolls out red carpet with lavish PGA champions dinner menu after fitting giftREAD MORE: Shane Lowry closing in on $30 million mark after Truist as he overtakes Tommy Fleetwood
“It was a win for the ages. But the rest of them, they just kind of come to you at the very end. I knew that as Rory is coming up 18 if he was to win this or in the playoff that this has been – even that week at Augusta – it’s been an amazing ride. An odyssey. A journey. And I landed on ‘the long journey is over.’
“It’s not written down. It just kind of comes to you at that moment. You feel it. ‘McIlroy has his masterpiece’ was an alliteration that just kind of left the lips and felt right.”
Nantz could announce his second career grand slam champion in the space of just a few weeks if Spieth secures his long-awaited fourth major title on Sunday. Like McIlroy’s “masterpiece,” it would be a moment of huge historical significance if Spieth can get the job done, but Nantz is not wavering from his tried-and-trusted methods.
“And on we go to Charlotte. Nothing is in the head right now, but give me a call on Sunday at around 7 p.m. and I’ll let you know what I’m working on,” he joked.
