Brooks Koepka’s Meteoric Rise Begins As Youth In Palm Beach County

Here’s a good background piece on the metamorphosis building of Brooks Koepka (thanks to P1 Matt for the link to Tom D’Angelo’s Palm Beach Post article).

Bob Toski had seen enough. The legendary instructor and Hall of Famer knew of Brooks Koepka as he rose through the ranks – from junior golf to Cardinal Newman High School to Florida State – and through a request from Brooks’ dad, Bob Koepka, met them on the range at Sherbrooke Country Club in Lake Worth to watch a 20-year-old Brooks hit one more time.

“I said ‘Brooks, can you draw the ball for me?’ ” Toski, now 92, recalled. “He hits a draw. ‘Can you fade the ball for me?’ He says, ‘Yeah.’ I said, ‘Can you hit it straight?’ He said, ‘Yeah.’ ”

Toski had seen enough.

“I said, ‘You don’t need any help. All you have to do is go out and play golf now. You could go on the tour right now.’

“And I said he’s going to become a hell of a player and he’s going to win majors.”

Bob Koepka did a double take. Majors? Plural?

“You put an S on the end of that,” Bob Koepka said to Toski, before adding, “If he can just get out on tour I’ll be happy.”

This is way beyond “happy.” The feeling now is “surreal” or “awed” or “amazed” for those who have watched Brooks Koepka’s’ meteoric rise to the No. 1 golfer in the world. The kid who was hitting plastic clubs at age 2, had to learn how to control his temper on the courses at Okeeheelee in his teens, was on the varsity at Wellington Christian as a 6th grader before moving on to Cardinal Newman, was an All-American at Florida State and got his start in Europe, now is being mentioned in the same sentences as Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, Arnold Palmer and Ben Hogan.