Sports writing legend Dan Jenkins dies at age 89

NY Post ^ | 8 Mar 2019 | AP

[Rummyfan]

— Dan Jenkins, the sports writing great and best-selling author in a career that went from Ben Hogan to Tiger Woods and the manual typewriter to Twitter, has died. He was 89.

TCU athletic director Jeremiah Donati confirmed Jenkins died Thursday in his hometown of Fort Worth.

Jenkins started his writing career at The Fort Worth Press and rose to stardom at Sports Illustrated. He wrote best-sellers “Semi-Tough” ”Baja Oklahoma” and “Dead Solid Perfect” and was a columnist for Playboy and Golf Digest.

Jenkins played golf at TCU for his beloved hometown Horned Frogs and was a close friend of Hogan, also a Fort Worth native. A member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, Jenkins started covering the sport following Hogan and fellow Fort Worth star Byron Nelson.

“Being from Fort Worth, I would follow Ben Hogan and Byron Nelson anywhere,” Jenkins said on a 2011 conference call to announce his Hall of Fame selection. “Since they’re in there, I’m happy to be the third guy from Fort Worth so included.”

Jenkins covered his first major at the 1951 U.S. Open. Hogan shot 67 in the final round to win at Oakland Hills, and Jenkins still says that round on that “monster” of a golf course remains as good as he has seen anyone play.

“Oakland Hills looked more like a penitentiary than a golf course,” Jenkins said.

[Rummyfan]

One of my favorite writers. RIP Dan Jenkins.

[Captain Peter Blood]

Great writer and told it like it was.

[Rummyfan]

Also a nice tribute here:

Remembering Dan Jenkins, the Most Influential Sportswriter Ever

[jjotto]

Meanwhile, up in Minneapolis, sportswriter Sid Hartman is about to turn 99!

[razorback-bert]

Best sportswriter ever

[bruin66]

Could “Semi Tough” even be published, today? Don’t axe.

[AppyPappy]

Re: a college running back “I’ll give him a 7-11 and he can rob it whenever he needs money”

[OrangeHoof]

I read Semi-Tough in college (1970s) and in the full political correctness of the times, he explained why Fort Worth is the largest city in Texas:

“If you subtract all the (blacks) out of Houston and all the (Hispanics) out of San Antonio and all the Jews out of Dallas, then Fort Worth becomes the largest city.”

[Rummyfan]

“I just take pride in being right,” Mr. Jenkins said in 2001, recalling an angry encounter with a stranger in a bar. “He squinted at me and said, ‘Aren’t you Dan Jenkins?’ I nodded. He said, ‘I’ve read some of your stuff. Man, you’ve got a problem.’ I said, ‘No, you’ve got the problem, I’ve got the typewriter.’ ”

[mozarky2]

“If you want to put golf back on the front pages again, and you don’t have a Bobby Jones or a Francis Ouimet handy, here’s what you do: You send an aging Jack Nicklaus out in the last round of the Masters and let him kill more foreigners than a general named Eisenhower”.
~Dan Jenkins
He’ll never be replaced...

[Rummyfan]

Could “Semi Tough” even be published, today? Don’t axe.

No way.

[wildbill]

Jenkins could write great ‘straight’ sports stories as well as some of the best and funniest novels about sports.

A true two-way talent.

[Rummyfan]

I have read just about everything Jenkins wrote. Heck I even considered moving to Ft Worth and hanging out at He's Not Here. I will reread some of his works now.

[yarddog]

Never heard of him but have heard of his books.

I personally think Grantland Rice was the greatest tho.

[wjcsux]

He was one of the best.

[fieldmarshaldj]

RIP.

[bigbob]

Probably not but damn it was funny!

[BatGuano]

Dan Jenkins, a wonderful writer with a great sense of humor.
RIP Dan.

[gnickgnack2]

I’ve never heard of Dan Jenkins, but I still love the hotel scene with Corinne Bohrer in Dead Solid Perfect. I’ll have to look him up.