On verge of a dream

Adams inches closer to PGA Tour card

By Adam Krohn

If you take a look on the PGA’s Nationwide Tour money list, you might recognize the name Blake Adams, who is currently in 20th place. Adams grew up in Dalton and got his start at the Dalton Golf and Country Club as a youngster, learning from his dad, Mike, and older brother Chris.

He also played golf for the Dalton High’s Catamounts his freshman and sophomore seasons in the early 90s under coach Hayden Wagers before moving to Eatonton after his parents divorced.

But Adams looks back fondly on his time in Dalton and still keeps in touch with many friends who still live in the area, including DGCC director of golf Lowell Fritz, whom Adams said he owes a great deal of appreciation to for his success as a professional golfer.

“He helped me out a lot,” Adams said. “He’d spend countless hours with us and never charged us a dime. He’d watch us hit balls, put up with us and really cared about us. I think that’s overlooked by a lot of people in Dalton who don’t realize what a good resource they have in him.”

Adams went on to play golf at the University of Georgia, but transferred to Georgia Southern as a fifth-year senior after the Bulldogs changed coaches. Adams met his wife, Beth, while playing for the Eagles and the couple now lives just outside Swainsboro and have a son, Jake, who recently turned 2.

After graduating from Southern in 2000, he stayed with the school as an assistant golf coach for one season before starting his professional golf career in 2002 on the Hooters Tour. From there he gradually climbed the ranks, making the Gateway Tour in 2005 and qualifying for Nationwide in 2007.

Adams has, however, had to deal with his share of adversity over the past few years.

His father died of a heart attack on Easter Sunday in 2004 at the age of 55.

“He was waiting for me to get done in a tournament in North Carolina,” Adams said of his father, who stayed in Dalton and worked for Shaw Industries, Inc. “He was the first person I called when I was done with every round. He’s always in the back of my mind and he wanted me to play golf for a living, so I feel like he’s a part of what I’m doing. I want to make him proud.”

Injuries also have plagued Adams going back to his time at Dalton High. He believes he was better at other sports like football and baseball, and played basketball as a freshman. But before he graduated high school, he had already torn his rotator cuff twice, and dealt with ankle and back problems.

“Injuries steered me into golf,” Adams said. “I knew I wasn’t going to play college baseball or anything like that, and I wanted to go to a big school. I was fortunate enough that Georgia offered me a scholarship.”

After qualifying for the Nationwide Tour, Adams tried to play through the pain from a bulging disc in his back, but after several poor performances he lost tour status for 2008.

In October of last year, Adams had limited range of motion in his hip and was told by an orthopedist that he had the hip of a 60-year-old. The condition certainly didn’t help his golf game.

“I had three bone spurs, a cyst and all the cartilage was worn out,” said Adams, who is 6-foot-3-inches and 203 pounds.

“(The doctor) recommended hip replacement surgery, but after doing research I learned that the success rate of that procedure was only 50 percent and I couldn’t take that chance.

“So I saw a specialist in Atlanta.”

Adams, who turns 34 on Aug. 27, was told that four months of rehab would be an alternative to surgery, so he decided to go with the second opinion. He would leave his house in Swainsboro every Monday and Friday and drive to Atlanta for rehab and get home after 11 p.m. But he regained his range of motion and was soon playing effectively.

He regained his Nation-wide Tour card for the 2009 season and is enjoying his best year as a pro, having earned $99,833 in nine tournaments.

He’s made the cut in seven of those nine events, with two third-place finishes, including the Knoxville Open where he tied a Fox Den Country Club course record with a first-round 9-under 63. As of this week, Adams is ranked No. 1 in driving distance among Nationwide players.

Adams is on the brink of living his dream of playing on the PGA Tour. The top 25 players on the Nationwide money list earn spots on the PGA Tour. And if that happens, Adams will be sure to remind his grandmother, Carolyn Doss of Rome.

“When I was leaving Georgia Southern, she asked me what I was going to do,” Adams said. “I said, ‘Turn pro.’ She said ‘You can’t play a game for the rest of your life. You need to get a real job.’

“Every week I get a check (from a golf tournament), I call her and say, ‘Just curious if I need to get a real job.’”