Its been 12 long PGA Tour seasons since Florida native Briny Baird made his professional debut, playing 357 tournaments during that time. Over all of those cuts made, putts drops and drives, well, driven, Baird has never held up a trophy in a PGA tour event in his life, in fact, he’s never ever lead a tourney outright after 54 holes either.
Seven years ago Baird shared a lead at the Disney Open in his native Florida, which he eventually didn’t win, but it was his last time even tasting what a victory might be like.
“Whatever I thought about the other times, throw that out the window,” Baird said. “At Disney, I just played so-so. Unless you have an eight-shot lead, so-so is not going to cut it. If I can feel tomorrow like I did today … of course, if I knew how to do that, I’d be something.”
Veterans Ernie Els and Paul Casey, who have 75 wins between them in their PGA careers, will be his playing partners this afternoon, teeing off at 11:50 am PT.