Golf: Toshiba Senior Classic

Richard Dunn

NEWPORT BEACH - Joining an already strong field, Raymond Floyd has

committed to the Toshiba Senior Classic for the first time in his

distinguished golf career.

Floyd, who lives in Palm Beach, Fla., has not played in the Senior PGA

Tour event at Newport Beach Country Club in the past because of travel

reasons, not wanting to leave his home in the winter.

Floyd, last year’s Senior Tour Comeback Player of the Year, appears to

be part of a player-recruitment windfall with the tour’s new West Coast

swing, which includes three California stops in consecutive weeks,

beginning with the Toshiba Classic (March 2-4).

“The best field in Toshiba Senior Classic history just got better with

the addition of Raymond Floyd,” tournament director Jeff Purser said.

“This is certainly an instance where the new West Coast swing has been a

benefit.”

Following the Toshiba Classic will be the SBC Senior Classic at

Wilshire Country Club in Los Angeles and the new Senior Tour stop in San

Jose, the Siebel Classic at the Jack Nicklaus-designed Coyote Creek Golf

Club. The SBC Senior Classic was moved from October to March.

In six previous years, the only PGA Tour-sanctioned tournament in

Orange County has never been followed by another West Coast stop, let

alone two in the same state.

In 2000, the Toshiba Classic was wedged between events in Sarasota,

Fla., and Puebla, Mexico. In 1999, members of the Senior Tour traveled

from Naples, Fla., to Newport Beach, then back to St. Augustine, Fla.

Floyd, 58, owns 22 PGA Tour titles and is the only player to win a PGA

Tour and Senior Tour event in the same season (1992). He has won four

majors: Two PGA Championships, one Masters and one U.S. Open.

In 1992, Floyd also joined Sam Snead as the only players in history to

win PGA Tour events in four different decades, when he captured the

Doral-Ryder Open.

Floyd, a 1989 inductee into the World Golf Hall of Fame, was voted the

senior circuit’s Comeback Player of the Year in 2000 after winning the

Ford Players Championship, the fourth major championship in his Senior

PGA Tour career.

Floyd joins a star-studded Toshiba Senior Classic field that includes

last year’s leading money winner, Larry Nelson, along with Lee Trevino,

Hale Irwin, Tom Watson, Tom Kite, Dave Stockton, Gil Morgan and Gary

McCord, the 1999 Toshiba Classic champion.