Afterhours - Hughes Norton - Tigers first agent Encore
Join Jeff Tracy as he dives into an engaging conversation with Hughes Norton, author of the new book "Rainmaker," which chronicles the fascinating world of golf management and the rise of star players like Tiger Woods. Hughes shares insider stories from his time as a super agent, detailing how he transformed Tiger into a wealthy icon in the 90s while managing notable figures like Greg Norman and Pete Jacobson. The discussion goes beyond mere anecdotes, touching on the current dynamics of the golf industry, including the controversial LIV Tour and its implications for the sport. With humor and insight, Hughes reflects on memorable moments from the course and the importance of maintaining decorum in golf. Tune in for a blend of entertaining stories and valuable lessons for anyone interested in the game or the business behind it.
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Painted Hills Natural Beef
- Liggett and Myers
This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:
OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy
Transcript
Welcome to Grilling at the Green After Hours.
Jeff Tracy:The conversation that took place after the show ended.
Jeff Tracy:Hi, everybody, it's jt and this is a special version of Grilling at the Green.
Jeff Tracy:Grilling at the Green is brought to you in part by Painted Hills Natural Beef.
Jeff Tracy:Beef you can be proud to serve your family and friends.
Jeff Tracy:That's Painted Hills Natural Beef.
Jeff Tracy:Welcome to After Hours here on Grilling at the Green.
Jeff Tracy:I'm Jeff Tracy, or JT as people call me.
Jeff Tracy:We're with Hughes Norton today talking about his great new book called Rainmaker.
Jeff Tracy:It's the story behind the story on put it that way, because Hughes was there in the thick of things.
Jeff Tracy:Hughes made Tiger a.
Jeff Tracy:A very rich young man way back in the 90s and continued.
Jeff Tracy:He had lots of other clients like, oh, Pete Jacobson, as you know from living here in Portland, and Greg Norman and Raven Floyd.
Jeff Tracy:I thought the Raven Floyd story was really funny.
Jeff Tracy:You bagman, you.
Hughes Norton:He is.
Hughes Norton:He is a classic.
Hughes Norton:One of my favorite guys of all time.
Hughes Norton:He just is character.
Hughes Norton:And, you know, when he got in contention, his eyes got real big and he'd walk right by you.
Jeff Tracy:He didn't know you were.
Hughes Norton:Yeah, he's the best phenomenal player.
Jeff Tracy:You know.
Jeff Tracy:I'll tell you a Ray Floyd story, a reference.
Jeff Tracy:And we talked about this in the regular show with Peter Jacobson's tournament.
Jeff Tracy:He put up on here the.
Jeff Tracy:The Fred Meyer Challenge, Peter's party.
Jeff Tracy:All.
Jeff Tracy:It had various names.
Jeff Tracy:And I was watch.
Jeff Tracy:I was there at the tournament one day, and I was watching Trevino and his.
Jeff Tracy:This was in the, you know, the Pro Am.
Jeff Tracy:And Trevino's up with these four guys, and they got the ball on kind of the back of the green.
Jeff Tracy:It's not off the green.
Jeff Tracy:It's right on the fringe.
Jeff Tracy:And so Lee.
Jeff Tracy:Lee grabs his putter.
Jeff Tracy:Three guys grab their putter.
Jeff Tracy:Another guy grabs his wedge, and the.
Jeff Tracy:And it was a very lengthy putt.
Jeff Tracy:Lee was gonna putt last.
Jeff Tracy:Fine.
Jeff Tracy:So the first couple, three guys, they.
Jeff Tracy:They made good putts, but they.
Jeff Tracy:It didn't hold it.
Jeff Tracy:The guy comes up with a wedge.
Jeff Tracy:And Trevina goes, wait, stop.
Jeff Tracy:What the hell do you think you're doing?
Jeff Tracy:And the guy goes, I'm going to chip it.
Jeff Tracy:He goes, there's only one guy that can make that chip shot, and that's Ray Floyd.
Jeff Tracy:And, brother, you ain't no Ray Floyd.
Jeff Tracy:Now go get your putter.
Jeff Tracy:And he.
Jeff Tracy:And he said right in front of, you know, there was 300 people standing around that green.
Jeff Tracy:I always thought that was pretty funny.
Hughes Norton:Absolutely.
Jeff Tracy:Here's some fun stuff for you.
Jeff Tracy:If Hughes Norton was declared Supreme Leader of Golf for one day, what would Hughes Norton, as Supreme Leader, decree?
Hughes Norton:I would dissolve the live Tour to appease them.
Hughes Norton:I would try to incorporate some of their trump card, which they, which they play, which is the team golf aspect.
Hughes Norton:And remember, remember, one of the most appealing events every two years, Jeff, is the Ryder Cup.
Hughes Norton:That's a team event.
Hughes Norton:So there's, there's a, there's, there's something there that people like.
Hughes Norton:I think they've maybe overdone it on the live Tour, but overall, I would, I would bring Jay Monahan and Yasir, the head of the, the Saudi Live Tour, and I'd lock them in.
Hughes Norton:I'd lock them in a room.
Hughes Norton:I wouldn't have to be there, and I wouldn't let them out until they settle this thing.
Hughes Norton:Because if we're not careful here, pretty soon the only place all the best players in the world are going to be at the same time is the four majors, the Masters, US Open, British Open, pga.
Hughes Norton:And we've seen what happens in tennis.
Hughes Norton:We went through this 25, 30 years ago when the players and the federations and the players union all get in a war.
Hughes Norton:Pretty soon the same thing happened in tennis.
Hughes Norton:The Grand Slams, Wimbledon, Australia and US Open, French Open, were the only place that the top players were appearing.
Hughes Norton:And that's what fans want to see.
Hughes Norton:And guess what?
Hughes Norton:All the other tennis tournaments around the world pretty quickly ended up on ESPN2, because nobody wants to see that.
Hughes Norton:You want names, you want stars, and we're on the precipice here.
Hughes Norton:I mean, we've got to be very careful.
Hughes Norton:And so if I were, I, I would.
Hughes Norton:There's going to be a settlement.
Hughes Norton:If you're asking for a prediction.
Hughes Norton:That's what I would do if I were the czar, if it.
Hughes Norton:But in terms of.
Hughes Norton:There has to be a settlement.
Hughes Norton:There's too many intelligent voices now, Rory McElroy being the latest, saying, look, look, I was against this at the beginning.
Hughes Norton:I hated those guys.
Hughes Norton:But this cannot continue.
Hughes Norton:We're tearing, we're tearing both tours apart.
Jeff Tracy:Do you think a sidebar, and then we'll get on with the fun stuff here.
Jeff Tracy:Do you think Greg Norman will survive that?
Hughes Norton:I don't.
Hughes Norton:They made it pretty clear, the PGA Tour when, when they testified in front of Congress, whatever it was last fall, that any, any solution, any merger.
Hughes Norton:Wrong word.
Hughes Norton:But they didn't use that word.
Hughes Norton:But any coming together in terms of the PGA Tour meant that Greg would have to be totally out of it.
Hughes Norton:But I think Greg by that point will be smart enough to realize, even if he's ousted, you know, to take his 50 million or whatever the Saudis paid him to front this thing and go off, you know, in pursuit of his next venture, which he always loves to do, I, I give him enough credit to not be seen to be fighting this if in fact we can come to an agreement.
Jeff Tracy:You know, this live wasn't Greg's first venture into this, you know, and you talked about that and talked about when Arnold stood up and said, I don't want anything to do with this and blah, blah, blah.
Jeff Tracy:I, as somebody who knows Greg, you or knew him, why do you think he kind of had that chip on his shoulder?
Jeff Tracy:And I don't know how to describe it any other way.
Hughes Norton:He always had that jt.
Hughes Norton:He just was, he, he.
Hughes Norton:When people, you know, I work with him for 11 years, and when somebody crossed him or he felt that somebody had crossed him or done him wrong, he never forgot it.
Hughes Norton:And he always carried sort of a kind of a grudge.
Hughes Norton:And I'm going to get back at him, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm in the right and that person's in the wrong.
Hughes Norton:And it, you know, it's, it's just part of his personality.
Hughes Norton:He had a lot of wonderful things about his personality, but I saw it with, I saw it with caddies, I saw it with business managers.
Hughes Norton:After he left us, he, you know, parted ways with the next two guys that he, that he ended up having manage him.
Hughes Norton:So just part of his DNA, I think.
Jeff Tracy:Okay, all right, fair enough.
Jeff Tracy:If you could play.
Jeff Tracy:Back to some fun stuff here, Hughes, if you can play around a golf with one of your golfing heroes, and you've played golf with a lot of top guys, obviously, and ladies over the years, but with one of your golfing heroes, who would it be?
Hughes Norton:I'll go you a couple better than that.
Hughes Norton:I've always thought my, my favorite foursome or dinner companions, if it was four, would be, and I'll tell you why, in no particular order, Raymond Floyd, Johnny Miller, Norman would be up on that list because he's great fun to hang with.
Hughes Norton:But the other guy, and he was sort of a forgotten guy all these years later, Tony Jacklin, maybe the best English player of all time.
Hughes Norton:He won the US Open and the British Open.
Hughes Norton: h green or whatever, that was: Hughes Norton:Tony would have had one more British Open, but Jacqueline was one of the greatest storytellers of all time.
Hughes Norton:Miller's just wacky.
Hughes Norton:You know, Johnny Miller, he won pebble beach one year, putting, looking at the hole.
Hughes Norton:And that was before Jordan Spieth and anybody else had come up with it.
Hughes Norton:Johnny would try anything.
Hughes Norton:He told me the great story at Oakmont once when he won there.
Hughes Norton: on Sunday to win the: Hughes Norton:open.
Hughes Norton:He was six or eight shots behind going into the.
Hughes Norton:He gets on the range and he's not hitting it very well.
Hughes Norton:And he says that.
Hughes Norton:I heard this voice.
Hughes Norton:It told me to open up my stance, and I'm.
Hughes Norton:I'm listening to him say this.
Hughes Norton:Really said, yeah.
Hughes Norton:So I opened up my stance.
Hughes Norton:I thought, I got nothing to lose.
Hughes Norton:I'm six, six shots behind.
Hughes Norton:And I started striping the ball.
Hughes Norton:And then the voice said, open your stance even more.
Hughes Norton:And I hit 10 pure shots in a row.
Hughes Norton:I took it to the golf course that day.
Hughes Norton:Jeff.
Hughes Norton:He had.
Hughes Norton:This is a US Open course, right?
Jeff Tracy:Right.
Hughes Norton:He had 12 birdie putts inside 10ft and chat 63.
Hughes Norton:Yeah, but he was.
Hughes Norton:And he's always.
Hughes Norton:He has wonderful thoughts and, and stories about the golf swing and stuff he's messed around with.
Hughes Norton:And Raymond is.
Hughes Norton:Is for sure one of the great storytellers.
Hughes Norton:And let me tell you, with that threesome with me, or if that's the foursome, Hughes Norton will do a lot of listening and a lot of laughing.
Jeff Tracy:I'll come cook.
Hughes Norton:Please do.
Jeff Tracy:I'll come cook.
Jeff Tracy:Besides Rainmaker, do you have a favorite golf book?
Hughes Norton:Boy, that's.
Hughes Norton:That covers so much territory.
Hughes Norton:I mean, the, you know, the Harvey Pennock book, the little, Little Red book.
Hughes Norton:And then he did a little green book or something for instruction.
Hughes Norton:I've always loved.
Hughes Norton:Because it's.
Hughes Norton:It's so simple.
Hughes Norton:George Pepper, my collaborator, has written a number of wonderful books.
Hughes Norton:I'll suggest one for your.
Hughes Norton:For your audience, Jeff, while I'm at it.
Hughes Norton:George actually lived just to the right of the 18th fairway at St.
Hughes Norton:Andrews for seven years.
Hughes Norton:Never intended to.
Hughes Norton:He's there 30 years ago playing the golf course, and he.
Hughes Norton:He's walking up the 18th fairway, and he looks up.
Hughes Norton:You know, the street is right there, right?
Hughes Norton:And the.
Hughes Norton:The buildings are right there.
Hughes Norton:And he sees this sign in the window, you know, flat, which is what they call apartments over there, flat for sale.
Hughes Norton:And he thought, cut it out.
Hughes Norton:Went over and took a look at it on a whim, Bought it.
Hughes Norton:He and his wife Libby moved there from The United States.
Hughes Norton:Lived there for seven years.
Hughes Norton:Loved every minute of it.
Hughes Norton:He became a member of the RNA and he wrote a book called Sojourn in St.
Hughes Norton:Andrews.
Jeff Tracy:I've read that book.
Hughes Norton:I fear it's out of print now, Jeff, and I hope I'm wrong.
Hughes Norton:But if anybody wants to get a taste of George Pepper's writing style, besides Rainmaker, which I hope you'll buy and read and enjoy, that one Sojourn in St.
Hughes Norton:Andrews, I, I.
Hughes Norton:Absolutely fascinating.
Jeff Tracy:I actually have George.
Jeff Tracy:I have a couple of George's books.
Jeff Tracy:And that is, you know, like, getting there.
Jeff Tracy:Make sure the power's turned on.
Jeff Tracy:And.
Jeff Tracy:And it's.
Jeff Tracy:It's not all about golf.
Jeff Tracy:It's about life too.
Jeff Tracy:So it's very good.
Jeff Tracy:Okay, so what's the dumbest thing you've ever seen Now, Hughes, you.
Jeff Tracy:You.
Jeff Tracy:You can eliminate yourself from this if you want to, but what's the dumbest thing you've ever seen done while representing somebody.
Hughes Norton:Oh, boy.
Jeff Tracy:That.
Jeff Tracy:That's a big, wide open field.
Jeff Tracy:I'm pretty sure.
Hughes Norton:Yeah, it sure is the dumbest thing I've ever seen done.
Hughes Norton:Gosh.
Hughes Norton:I mean, I've seen the greatest players in the world hit shanks.
Hughes Norton:I've seen the greatest players in the world six putt.
Hughes Norton:There's a lot of, you know, gotta think about that one, Jeff.
Hughes Norton:You got me.
Jeff Tracy:Well, we can come back to that.
Jeff Tracy:We can come back to that.
Jeff Tracy:So if we.
Jeff Tracy:If we put your skills to music, what would the music be?
Hughes Norton:50S gold.
Hughes Norton:I'm.
Hughes Norton:I still have serious set on that channel in my.
Hughes Norton:You know, I'm.
Hughes Norton:I'm a dinosaur.
Hughes Norton:I grew up with Elvis and Chuck Berry and Ricky Nelson and Connie Francis and Buddy Holly.
Hughes Norton:Buddy.
Hughes Norton:All of that.
Hughes Norton:I still.
Hughes Norton:I still listen to it.
Hughes Norton:I make my trainer twice a week put that channel on, and it drives him out of his mind.
Jeff Tracy:Okay.
Jeff Tracy:If you could dine with.
Jeff Tracy:This is actually one of my favorite questions.
Jeff Tracy:If you could dine with a historical figure, they can still be with us or long gone.
Jeff Tracy:Who would it be and what would be on the menu?
Hughes Norton:Wow.
Hughes Norton:Well, obviously grilling at the green would be.
Hughes Norton:Would be catering this event.
Jeff Tracy:We can do.
Hughes Norton:And I.
Hughes Norton:And it could be a blank menu because I know all your stuff's great.
Hughes Norton:I.
Hughes Norton:I pop Pops into my head.
Hughes Norton:Bobby Jones.
Hughes Norton:He was such a gentleman.
Hughes Norton:You know, he's a brilliant lawyer.
Hughes Norton:His.
Hughes Norton:His writings about golf.
Hughes Norton:I mean, just.
Hughes Norton:Just reading the words that he wrote.
Hughes Norton:That was when people took a lot of pride, Jeff.
Hughes Norton:And what they wrote and how they communicated.
Hughes Norton:It's just Masterful, you know what I'm talking about?
Hughes Norton:And I would love to have a conversation with him.
Hughes Norton:Hey, when you and Alistair McKenzie were walking around that, that, that, that farm in Augusta, what, you know, what were you thinking?
Hughes Norton:What.
Hughes Norton:All those kind of things, you know, he was, he, you know, people forget.
Hughes Norton:He got a ticker tape parade in New York City when he came back from winning the Grand Slam, which in those days was the US And British Amateur Championships and the US And British Opens.
Hughes Norton:There was no pga.
Hughes Norton:The Masters hadn't been invented.
Hughes Norton:This guy was, you know, historically one of the, yeah, he's in the Babe Ruth category, whatever.
Hughes Norton:People have forgotten all that, but I just would love to.
Hughes Norton:And he was, and he was a Southern gentleman and, you know, he, more often than not, he wore a tie when he played golf.
Hughes Norton:I mean, just that.
Hughes Norton:That's fascinating to me.
Jeff Tracy:That whole era, there was something to be said for the gentleman part, too.
Jeff Tracy:We've seen it over the years.
Jeff Tracy:You right in the middle of it sometimes, but I see it as a press guy and on the exterior.
Jeff Tracy:Sometimes we lose the.
Jeff Tracy:Our decorum and not very often in golf.
Jeff Tracy:It's lost in a lot of other things in our society, I'm afraid.
Jeff Tracy:And I'm not preaching here, but that's one of the things that drew me to golf as a kid was kind of the.
Jeff Tracy:There was a set of rules to play by, but there was also an unspoken set of rules to behave by.
Jeff Tracy:And I always kind of liked that because you kind of knew what you were going to deal with there.
Hughes Norton:You know, I'm one of these, I'm one of these guys, Jeff, still, that it just irks me when the young kids come into the clubhouse, into the locker room, into the grill room and keep their hats on, you know, or have their hats on backwards.
Hughes Norton:That used to drive Arnold Palmer nuts.
Hughes Norton:And at Bay Hill, he's tournament.
Hughes Norton:I've seen, I've seen Arnold do this.
Hughes Norton:He would go around to some of the young pros and just stop by their table and in a quiet voice, not make an exam.
Hughes Norton:He just said, would you please take your hat off?
Hughes Norton:We're inside.
Jeff Tracy:Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Tracy:Yep, yep, yep.
Jeff Tracy:Absolutely.
Jeff Tracy:When your player was on a tour and, and there was a lengthy weather delay, storm, whatever, they all head into the clubhouse if.
Jeff Tracy:And you as a agent could usually get in there and stuff.
Jeff Tracy:But what did you do?
Jeff Tracy:What did you talk about then?
Jeff Tracy:Or did you just kind of hang around them and let them, you know, talk about whatever they wanted, whether it was the round they were having or the chicken sandwich at lunch.
Hughes Norton:Yeah, the latter.
Hughes Norton:You know, you just, at that point, you're just trying to, you're taking a break.
Hughes Norton:You've been intense and focusing and concentrating out there as a player, and now you're inside.
Hughes Norton:And I found the best players just tried to clear their mind, you know, talked about the basketball game that might be on TV over the lunch table or, or talked about their wives, their kid, you know, whatever it was.
Hughes Norton:And I always tried to be a listener, not a talker.
Hughes Norton:You know, I'm, I'm the caddy for a lot of these guys, right?
Hughes Norton:I'm sort of, sort of as important as I might have been with their outside income and stuff.
Hughes Norton:I just love to hear them talk and learned a lot just by listening, which is maybe one of the lessons in our book.
Jeff Tracy:I, I think so.
Jeff Tracy:I think so.
Jeff Tracy:I, and I, you know, Hughes, I was very close to my father, and he always had these little funny, he was cowboy, so to speak, and he always had these funny little sayings and stuff, a lot of which I've kept in my repertoire over the years.
Jeff Tracy:But, you know, I, I, I think that we can learn a lot, even starting as a young person, if you kind of get your mind wrapped around it, you know, listen to your dad, listen to the people around your, your parents and that, I think that makes a lot of sense to people.
Jeff Tracy:Okay, so let's go back to the question we passed on.
Jeff Tracy:This isn't password here.
Jeff Tracy:We got to come back to it.
Hughes Norton:Okay, I thought I won.
Jeff Tracy:Okay, go ahead.
Hughes Norton:This is in the book, and it's, it's just plain funny.
Hughes Norton:But.
Hughes Norton:And it goes to public relations.
Hughes Norton:And as I point out in the book, IMG was not very good at public relations.
Hughes Norton:And Mark never had to be.
Hughes Norton:He started out with Arnold Palmer, who was the, who is a PR dream, you know.
Jeff Tracy:Right, right, right.
Hughes Norton:Sort of passed down to the rest of us.
Hughes Norton:But we had a client by the name of DeWitt Weaver.
Hughes Norton:Very few people will remember him.
Hughes Norton:Southern guy, and he won more than once on the PGA Tour.
Hughes Norton:Wonderful guy.
Hughes Norton:And one of his championships that he won on the tour, and this would have been early 70s, early to mid-70s, was a tournament in North Carolina sponsored by Liggett and Myers.
Hughes Norton:The tobacco company.
Jeff Tracy:Yeah.
Jeff Tracy:The cigarette people.
Hughes Norton:Yeah, correct.
Hughes Norton:So at the prize giving ceremony, the television guy is there interviewing DeWitt.
Hughes Norton:All the Liggett and Myers people are lined up behind him, all wearing the Liggett and Myers sport coats with the, the corporate emblem on, on the jackets.
Hughes Norton:And the commentator says DeWitt to what do you attribute your great play this week?
Hughes Norton:And DeWitt thought for a moment and said, I stopped smoking.
Jeff Tracy:Oh, priceless.
Hughes Norton:It became very quiet.
Hughes Norton:The microphone and I think the interviewer stammered and quickly went on to the next question.
Jeff Tracy:I'm sure they did.
Jeff Tracy:Here's one last question here.
Jeff Tracy:If you were to give a piece of advice to anybody, but this question is usually directed at people kind of getting started out in their careers and, you know, they've got a journey to go on, like you and I did.
Jeff Tracy:But if.
Jeff Tracy:What would your piece of advice be to anybody listening?
Hughes Norton:I think of a number of things when I.
Hughes Norton:When I think of that question, Jeff.
Hughes Norton:For sure.
Hughes Norton:Communicating.
Hughes Norton:Being able to write clearly, concisely, as well as communicate in speech.
Hughes Norton:I think you always improve at whatever field of endeavor you're in if you read widely.
Hughes Norton:And that goes back to what I said a minute ago about listening.
Hughes Norton:Talk to as many people at different stages of life as you can and learn from them.
Hughes Norton:Learn to sell.
Hughes Norton:Some people have it innately in them that they're good salesmen or saleswomen.
Hughes Norton:Others have to learn it.
Hughes Norton:And then my other thought would be, just try to find as much joy as you can.
Hughes Norton:A career is a long time.
Hughes Norton:I worked for 30 years.
Hughes Norton:I had planned on working longer than that.
Hughes Norton:Most people work 40 years or more.
Hughes Norton:Find something that you love.
Hughes Norton:We referred to it earlier because it'll never seem like work.
Hughes Norton:And believe me, you will be better at something you enjoy doing.
Hughes Norton:Thank if that's not the case.
Jeff Tracy:That is true.
Jeff Tracy:Hughes Norton.
Jeff Tracy:I should say John Hughes Norton iii, right?
Hughes Norton:You can.
Jeff Tracy:Okay.
Jeff Tracy:The book is Rainmaker the Super Agent Hughes Norton and the Money Grab Explosion of Golf From Tiger to Live and beyond with his co writer, George Pepper.
Jeff Tracy:It's hitting the bestseller list, I guarantee it.
Jeff Tracy:But, Hughes, thanks for being with us.
Jeff Tracy:Stick around after I turn everything off, but really, really appreciate your time, Jeff.
Hughes Norton:It was a pleasure.
Hughes Norton:Thanks for having me.
Jeff Tracy:You bet.
Jeff Tracy:We'll be back next week.
Jeff Tracy:Next week's actually the Masters, so enjoy that, everybody.
Jeff Tracy:And until then, go out, play some golf.
Jeff Tracy:And remember, be kind, take care.
