USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
Larry Fitzgerald is a living legend. Enshrined in both the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the College Football Hall of Fame, he famously had more tackles (41) over his 17 seasons in the NFL than dropped passes (29).
On the golf course, Larry Fitzgerald is a stick. His GHIN / index at his home course of Whisper Rock Golf Club in Scottsdale, Arizona is listed at a 5.8 with a low of 4.9. He has competed in the Pebble Beach Pro-Am for years and was an honorary co-chair of the U.S. Amateur Championship in 2024.
But before Larry Fitzgerald was able to join Whisper Rock Golf Club he was flat out told he would never be a member. He recently shared this story, and the reason why he couldn’t join, in a conversation with Brian Baumgartner of The Office who is a PXG sponsored golfer (who I met last Fall at a PXG event at Scottsdale National) and co-host of the We Need A Fourth podcast with Cooper Manning and Kenny Mayne.
Why Larry Fitzgerald Wasn’t Allowed To Join Whisper Rock Golf Club
This story has become local lore around the Scottsdale golf scene as well as in celebrity circles. So it was great to hear it straight from Larry Fitzgerald’s mouth as he set the record straight on what happened.
Brian Baumgartner, who played Kevin Malone on The Office, asked Larry “supposedly the story goes Whisper Rock told you that you couldn’t join until you broke 90, is that true?”
Fitzgerald laughed it off at first as if he didn’t see the question coming but then dove into the explanation, saying it wasn’t the club itself but the “tsar, the benevolent dictator of Whisper Rock, Mr. Gregg Tryhus” that wouldn’t allow him to join and he explained why. Larry said he had a mutual friend with Gregg Tryhus who took him out to Whisper Rock and introduced Larry to Gregg.
He says they went out and played Whisper Rock and afterward Fitzgerald told Mr. Tryhus “I would be honored if I had an opportunity to join (the club” to which Gregg Tryhus laughed in his face and said “Larry, there’s no chance in hell you would ever join this golf club because as as nice and friendly as of a man as you are, there’s no way in hell I would ever want to play behind you. And I’m definitely not going to make any of my members play behind you. You’re absolutely terrible.”
Larry Fitzgerald said this happened sometime around February shortly after the Super Bowl was over. After that, Gregg Tryhus told Fitzgerald that if he could improve and go break 90 that they would “make it happen” and he would be welcome to join the club.
As much as I love this story I really need to know what sort of shape Larry Fitzgerald’s game was in before that round. Because there is a distinct difference between a ‘good golfer’ and a ‘fast golfer.’ A bad golfer can play fast and a good golfer can be miserably slow (ie., Patrick Cantlay).
If Larry Fitzgerald was both bad and slow that’s a horrible combination in the game of golf. But it is hard to imagine Larry being slow at anything. He was one of the fastest and most agile wide receivers the NFL has ever seen. And we’ve all seen him swing a stick now, he’s turned his game around and is a single digit handicap.
The clip is also available on TikTok for those who prefer that medium over YouTube:
@weneedafourthshow Larry Fitzgerald caught everything thrown at him for 17 years in the NFL. Apparently golf is a different story. The Hall of Famer joins Brian, Cooper, and Kenny to share the humbling moment a golf club told him he was too bad to join — and the three-month mission to prove them wrong.
♬ original sound – We Need A Fourth | Podcast – We Need A Fourth | Podcast
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