It is the son’s dream that is here and now, to be cheered and respected for being played out with a youthful exuberance in an era where the entrepreneurial spirit is widely celebrated.
But what of the son’s father, a mountain of a man who lived this same dream decades ago, at a time when it wasn’t so fanciful and admirable, when it was brushed with enmity in an era where ignorance often trumped human dignity?
So, what does Jim Dent think of Joseph’s pursuit of this professional golf dream? “Jim Dent on his son golf-playing Joseph: ‘He’s going to be a great asset to this game’
At the other end of the phone conversation, Jim Dent’s words are slowly delivered and softly spoken. Not because he’s 81 years old, but because that’s Jim Dent’s nature – cautious and gentle. It belies the America in which he grew up but helps explain why Dent was such an intriguing study for virtually all the nearly 1,000 tournaments he played across his PGA TOUR and PGA TOUR Champions career.
It is true what Michael Bamberger wrote beautifully in a Sports Illustrated feature in 2014, offering testimony on behalf of a golfer he had studied and known for more than 25 years. “What I’ll say here is what anybody who has ever stood on a TOUR driving range will tell you,” he wrote of those days when balata golf balls thundered off Dent’s persimmon driver. “Golf will never see the likes of Jim Dent again.”
Yet, here he is, watching his 20-year-old son carry on the dream, a young black man trying to succeed in a pro golf world dominated by white athletes. Could golf see the likes of Joseph Dent?
Jim Dent digests the question, pauses briefly, then says: “Joseph has made me proud already. But he’s going to be a great asset to this game. I just hope I’m around long enough to walk the fairways with him and see him succeed.”
Joseph Dent is not your typical fledgling professional golfer. And not just because he’s black. Nor just because he’s the adopted son of a 12-time winner on the PGA TOUR Champions, a man who navigated through a segregated America to find his way in pro golf.
No, Joseph Dent is unique in that he doesn’t boast a polished AJGA resume, doesn’t go on forever about his tournament experience and exotic travels and practice-range travails. Fact is, he played on the golf team at Strawberry Crest High School in the Tampa, Florida, area for just two seasons – as a freshman and a senior – partly because his passion for the game wasn’t quite there, and partly because he agreed with his parents that he needed to mature and focus on his academics.
“I first played golf when I was 8 or 9, but my dad put us in all the sports. So, I went through phases. Baseball is what I played at first, but in middle school I fell in love with golf,” Joseph said.
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YOU MAY ALSO LIKE: That passion has blossomed since leaving high school, to the point where Joseph Dent is all aboard the Advocates Pro Golf Association Tour (APGA), which this week is in St. Augustine, Florida, at the World Golf Village’s Slammer & Squire course. Representing the Tampa Bay Chapter of the First Tee, the younger Dent already has demonstrated that the road he is on just might have potential.
He opened with a 72 at the APGA tournament at TPC Sugarloaf outside of Atlanta a few weeks ago “and it was the first time I felt like I was in contention (as a pro).” The sense of excitement was intoxicating and even after he closed with a 76 and fell into a share of 13th place, Dent came away with a smile on his face.
“It gave me a real good idea of what I have to work on to get better,” he said.
That Joseph Dent has an avenue on which to travel his pro golf dream is a positive step from his father’s youth. Whereas Jim Dent honed his game at Mays Landing in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and made the National Negro Open (he won in 1969) a “must-play” to be squeezed in around a never-ending series of Monday qualifiers and those mandatory money games, his son feels fortunate to have a circuit that gives him a true sense of what may be ahead.
The APGA was established in 2008 with a simple mission – “to bring greater diversity to the game of golf by developing African Americans and other minorities for careers in golf.”
But while the PGA of America did blatantly discriminate when Jim Dent was a kid – the “Caucasian-only” clause was not lifted until November of 1961, 14 years after Jackie Robinson had broken the color barrier in baseball – the APGA does not. Its tour, which has five tournaments on the remainder of the 2020 schedule, is opened to all golfers, regardless of skin color.
Joseph Dent vows a commitment to this tour, to himself, and, yes, to his father’s legacy, which fills him with pride.
“He has encouraged me to always follow my dream, to do what I love,” Joseph said. “His advice has been simple – you have to put in the work. It’s his fundamental belief.”
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Joseph Dent is putting in the work to achieve his dreams. (Courtesy of the Dent family)
That the golf dreams of Jim Dent and son Joseph intersect at “The Patch” is arguably the most flavorful part of the story. “The Patch” is what they call Augusta Municipal Golf Course in Augusta, Georgia, which is approached via an entrance that only recently was re-named Jim Dent Way.
It is a fitting tribute to a native son who called Augusta home for most of his life and has contributed mightily to benefiting people of color – in that town and throughout the country. While Jim Dent never won on the PGA TOUR like other trail-blazers Pete Brown and Charlie Sifford did, he established a presence for parts of five decades and inspired generations.
Read more at PGATour.com
