“PRO” FILES…FEATURED TOURING PROFESSIONAL – COREY PAVIN

In a world full of bombers, he stood out for his precision short game and putting.  Corey Pavin, with 15 PGA Tour victories and one major, the 1995 US Open, certainly maximized his potential like few others in the game’s history. Pavin turned professional in 1982, and in 1983 won an event on the European Tour, edging Seve Ballesteros and Tony Johnstone by three shots.  He won his first PGA Tour event in 1984, and for the next 12 years was one of the top American players.  Undoubtedly the highlight of his career was his US Open win, when he hit a clutch 4-wood to five feet on the 72nd hole to insure victory.  He won again the following year at the Colonial National Invitational in Fort Worth, Texas, then began a 10-year slide into mediocrity.  His swing deserted him, and certainly a change in golf equipment manufacturers starting the 1997 season didn’t help.   His game started coming around in 2004, but it wasn’t until 2006 that he won again at the US Bank Championship in Milwaukee – his final victory.  He joined the Champions Tour in 2010, where he has been a mainstay on the leaderboards.  So far, he was one victory, in 2012 at the Allianz Championship. It can be argued that Pavin is one of the best players in history, in terms of a ratio of success vs. how far he hit the ball.  Even today, with sophisticated modern technology, he only drives the ball in the 255-yard range, and that’s with the typical firm fairways seen at tour events.  Pavin currently lives in Dallas, Texas, with his wife Lisa and daughter Alexis.