Before there was Blades Brown — long before there was Blades Brown — there was Chuck Kocsis.
Kocsis' name found its way into the national headlines last weekend, when Brown won the World Wide Technology Championship in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, on Sunday, Nov. 8.
At 19 years, 5 months and 18 days, Brown became the youngest winner on the PGA Tour since Kocsis, a Michigan golfing legend, nearly 100 years ago. Kocsis was 18 years, 6 months and 9 days when he took the title at the Michigan Open in 1931 at Cascade Hills in Grand Rapids. That tournament took place before the PGA Tour was officially organized, but the PGA Tour still recognizes that as an official tournament.
Kocsis remains the youngest winner in PGA Tour history. Brown is now the fourth-youngest.
They are two of just six teenagers to win on the PGA Tour, in a list that also includes Jordan Spieth.
Who was Chuck Kocsis?
Kocsis (pronounced: Ko-shiss) was one of the most accomplished golfers ever to come out of Michigan, where he grew up after his family moved from Pennsylvania shortly after he was born. He grew up caddying at old Redford Golf Club and playing at Warren Valley Golf Club. He won two state championships, and at 17, he won the first of his record six Michigan Amateur championships.
Then, at 18, he won the first of his three Michigan Open titles, again as an amateur. In 1931, he beat World Golf Hall-of-Famer Tommy Armour in a playoff. Armour was fresh off his victory in that year's British Open. Kocsis' victory was splashed in the headlines of the New York Times, though the headline referred to him as "Koosis."
Chuck Kocsis was a legendary amateur golfer from Michigan.
Kocsis went on to play at the University of Michigan, where he led the Wolverines to four Big Ten championships and two NCAA championships, in 1934 and 1935 — still the program's only two national titles. A captain at UM, Kocsis twice was medalist at the Big Ten championships and once at the national championships.
Kocsis remained an amateur after college, playing impressive golf while working as an automotive sales representative, according to his bio from the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame.
As an amateur, Kocsis played in the Masters 11 times (he was low amateur in 1952), and the U.S. Open 13 times (he was low amateur in 1934 and 1937). He also played in the U.S. Amateur 15 times, and was runner-up in 1956.
His game didn't slow with age. Kocsis won championships in seven decades, including three U.S. National Open Seniors titles, and four International Senior Championships, including the 1970 tournament by 21 shots.
Kocsis part of a golfing family
Kocsis was one of 14 children, and several of them were standout golfers, including Kocsis' brothers Sam and Emerick, who, like Chuck, are in the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame. Chuck Kocsis was a member of the inaugural class of the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame, in 1982, inducted alongside Walter Hagen and Al Watrous.
For his career, Kocsis played in 35 major championships — at that time, that major rotation consisted of the Masters, U.S. Open, U.S. Amateur and British Amateur — and he played on three Walker Cup teams, in three different decades.
In 2007, Vartan Kupelian, the late golf writer for The Detroit News, wrote the biography, "Forever Scratch: Chuck Kocsis — An Amateur for the Ages." In the book, for which Byron Nelson wrote the foreword, Kupelian referred to Kocsis as Michigan's answer to Georgia's Bobby Jones, regarded as the game's greatest amateur golfer.
Kocsis still shot in the 70s well into his 80s and continued to play golf weekly until the last year of his life. He died at the age of 93 in Royal Oak on May 30, 2006. Nearly a year later, on May 21, 2007, Brown was born in Nashville, Tenn.
Youngest winners in PGA Tour history
(According to Golfweek):
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This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Who is Chuck Kocsis? Meet the golfer who still holds PGA Tour record Blades Brown chased
