Golf

In Memoriam: The Legacy of Two-Time PGA Tour Winner Grayson Murray

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5m ago

Jun 04, 2024 / 1236 Views

Evan Walker

Two time PGA tour winner Grayson Murray has always been known as a man who was happiest inside the ropes of a golf course. His legacy, which includes a hard-fought battle with depression, is a sobering reminder of life’s fragility.

Life could have been fairer outside the sport, but Murray was not one to dwell on what could have been. He took what came his way and made the most of it.

grayson murray pga winner — Two time PGA Tour event winner Grayson Murray clinched the win at the January 2024 Sony Open. (Image: Grayson Murray/Instagram)

As he admitted after his life-defining win at the Sony Open in January 2024, golf can be a crazy sport. This realisation, along with Murray’s motto of “fight like hell, and when you get too tired to fight, lay down and rest and let someone else fight for you,” unveils a man who refused to relent despite the massive tribulations that tested him to the hilt.

“My parents never gave up on me, so I knew that it wasn’t an option to give up,” said Murray. Outside the warmth of his home and its inhabitants, the golf course was Murray’s refuge. What better way to celebrate him than with his triumphs on the pristine greens of some of the world’s most hallowed turfs?

A dream is born

Among other triggers, a critical factor that marked the beginning of Murray’s tryst with Golf was meeting Arnold Palmer at 9. Wide-eyed as he would have been during the interaction, the gravity of the doyen’s words dawned as he matured and played a role in Murray giving back to the next generation in his hometown of Raleigh in North Carolina.

There were other ramifications of that conversation with ‘The King,’ as Palmer was known, and among them was the undying desire to keep getting better in what quickly became his first love.

Between 2006 and 2008, Murray won the Callaway Junior Championship thrice and was the top-ranked US golfer in his age category. He also excelled at his school, Leesville Road High, and despite switching universities several times before settling down at Arizona State University, Murray never lost sight of the path to excellence.

Webb Simpson, a seven-time winner on the PGA Tour, was another early influence for Murray. The Webb Simpson Challenge is a highly acclaimed tournament on the junior circuit in the US, and Murray had the distinction of being the very first winner. As tournament host, Simpson watched him in action and knew “he would be a great player from Day One”.

Following his graduation onto the PGA Tour, Murray enjoyed several occasions in which he teed off with Simpson. The familiarity deepened this season when Murray and fianceé Christiana Ritchie were seen dining with Simpson after the tournament rounds. Recounting the times gone by, Simpson reflected on the pain of loss, but shared his refuge in the fact that Murray had found faith — belief in Christianity — before his passing.

Preparation for the big stage

Murray’s brush with big-time Golf came early, when he was merely 16. At the 2010 Rex Hospital Open on the Korn Ferry Tour, he got a start and made cut to become the second youngest ever to do so.

The next spike came during the 2013 US Open. Murray was still in his teens and playing his first Major, courtesy of the exploits in the amateur ranks. The rounds of 83 and 81 did not aid his progress to the weekend, but the lessons from that appearance were priceless, and came handy as he went about securing his PGA Tour dream.

Prior to 2016, Murray made the odd appearance on the Korn Ferry Tour. And while it did not yield tangible financial returns, it made Murray a lot more aware of the cutthroat competition he was to encounter later on.

The season of 2016 was the breakthrough Murray had been preparing for. After coming close a few times, the T3 at the Albertsons Boise Open laid the foundation for his win the week after, when he clinched the top spot at the Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship.

The arrival

The PGA Tour card for 2017 had been secured, and Murray was ready to take on the big boys in the world of Golf.

Murray’s PGA Tour entry took him to a zone where ‘W’ was the buzzword. Finding his feet quickly, the 2017 Barbasol Championship heralded his breakthrough, and Murray became part of the select league of rookies with a win in their maiden season.

Shooting under-par on all days at the RTJ Trail (Grand National) for a total of 21-under 263 (67, 64, 64, 68), Murray’s victory was one of many highs including his one-shot win, the USD 630,000 prize, and a crucial 300 FedExCup points. For the first time, he also broke into the top-100 on the Official World Golf Ranking, jumping from No. 156 to 87; the world was at his feet.

Murray was in a space where he could do no wrong on the Golf course, and the air of invincibility was put into perspective several years later, when he sat in the interview room as the winner of the 2024 Sony Open.

While he could say, “This game has given me a lot. Financially it’s given me a lot, (and later it was) a getaway from everyday life struggles,” the early success had an impact that Murray came to rue.

Fighting the demons

“Yes, I would drink during tournament weeks. It was my outlet. I thought I was invincible coming out here as a 22-year-old, winning as a rookie, played three days hungover when I won. The best thing and worst thing that ever happened to me was winning my rookie year but also feeling like I was invincible.”

As a sober champion, Murray said in January 2024, “It indeed took me a long time to get to this point. That was seven years ago, over seven years ago. I’m a different man now. I would not be in this position right now today if I didn’t put that drink down eight months ago.”

Murray encapsulated his past struggles in a succinct manner, but the road back was a lot tougher than he let on, one that extracted a lot out of him and his loved ones.

Another critical reflection of Murray’s battle with the bottle lay in the Tour stats. Season after season, Murray’s plays were peppered with the odd top-10 placements surrounded by missed cuts, withdrawals, and poor finishes, which culminated in the loss of his PGA Tour card.

This was nothing out of the ordinary as players often follow this trajectory, but here was a man in a pitched battle with his body and mind. Even then, Murray did not bow down, and he was not ashamed to talk about his battle behind-the-scenes.

“I’m not ashamed that I go through depression and anxiety,” he said. “Everyone has their battles. And sometimes people are able to hide them and function, and sometimes you’re not. I think our society now is getting better about accepting that, you know, it’s OK to not be OK,” Murray shared in a social media post.

It wasn’t easy for the man and his family as they went ‘through hell and back’. “It wasn’t easy on me and the people around me that love me. They don’t like to see me down and they’ve been my No. 1 supporters,” he said.

Never say die

Here was a man in turmoil who often looked at himself as a failure. “I thought I had a lot of talent that was just a waste of talent”. But even in the midst of it, Murray had the heart to share what he went through with others, even strangers.

“I’ve helped people out in the past just through my social media DMs — people messaging me — and I can use my platform to continue to help with things like that,” Murray wrote in another post. “You have to have courage, the willingness to keep going. Lo and behold, that’s what I did, and I’m here, and I’m so blessed and I’m thankful.”

Test of faith

It certainly seemed that Murray’s recovery had to do with meeting fiancée Christiana and her iNFLuence in his renewed devotion to Christianity.

While Murray saw death from very close quarters in a scooter accident the week of the 2022 Bermuda Championship, the 2024 Sony Open came as an even bigger test of faith.

At the event, Murray forced a playoff with big timer Keegan Bradley and the up-and-rising Byeong Hun An. Before teeing off to decide the winner in Hawaii, the couple said a quick prayer outside the scoring trailer.

“The good Lord is looking over us, and no matter what the outcome was going to be (in the playoff), it wasn’t going to be life changing,” said Murray. “Me and her are still a son and daughter to Jesus Christ, and that’s never going to change.”

The playoff win was huge validation of how the tide had turned. Murray became a world top-50 golfer for the first time, and he came across as a man who had let go of past regrets.

“You’ve got to give yourself grace. We all make mistakes… You’ve got to say you’re sorry and move on,” he said. The champion was in acceptance and going forward, he “wanted to make everyone happy”.

Murray’s plans were chalked out, and it was about “doing the right things”, but life had one last cruel twist in store.

Grayson Murray was loved, and he will be missed.

(Main and featured images: Grayson Murray/Instagram)

If you or your loved ones are suffering from depression, know that you are not alone. Here is a list of resources that may be able to help in your mental health journey. If you would like to know what you can expect from a visit with a mental health professional, this article from high-impact mental health organisation Mind HK may help.