Golf: Millbury's Gary Young handles air time in stride as PGA Tour rules chief
Referees in football and basketball aren’t typically interviewed on national television during competitions, but the chief referee in golf often is.
Gary Young, 57, of Millbury knows all about that because he is the head rules official for the PGA Tour.
After the second round of The Players Championship was called off for the day due to rain last month, Mike Tirico interviewed Young live on The Golf Channel to explain when and how play would resume.
Young is regularly interviewed on network television and in the media room at tournaments.
“It’s a function of the sport,” Young said in a telephone interview. “A lot of times people are interested in learning more if there’s a rules scenario, and they want a deeper explanation. So sometimes television will ask me to come on air and describe in more detail what we’re dealing with.”
Young is unflappable, unassuming and easy going. So he handles himself well during interviews on television with golf fans from around the world watching.
“I’ll be honest with you, I try not to think about it,” he said. “I’ve never had any formal media training. I was blessed with having a boss in Mark Russell who was just always calm and a lot of poise under pressure, and I’ve watched how he handled the media and how he handled those situations. He never seemed to get too far ahead of himself, and he was always calm. So I’ve tried to follow that same mold.”
After Young appears on TV, he often receives text messages from friends and family, especially his brothers Tom, who lives in Northbridge, and Jeff, who lives in Upton. Some tell him how well he did and how proud they are. Others poke fun at him.
They sometimes even text him during his interviews or while he’s enforcing a rule during a tournament on live television. So he makes sure to keep his phone on vibrate.
“I always laugh about it,” he said. “I look at my phone after everything’s done, and I laugh about all the text messages, but it’s fun.”
Promotion to senior VP
Recently, Young was promoted from PGA Tour vice president of rules, competitions and administration to senior vice president of rules, competitions and administration. He works 25 PGA Tour events a year and serves as chief referee in about 12 of them.
Young oversees the five members of the management team of the rules committee. He reports to Tyler Dennis, PGA Tour president and chief of operations.
Young grew up in Northbridge and became a first-team All-America golfer at Bryant University before playing the Sunshine Tour in South Africa from 1988-1990. He worked at Pleasant Valley CC in Sutton for 22 years, first in the bag room, then as an assistant to head pro Bobby Molt for four years and then as head pro and director of golf for a dozen years.
PV hosted 32 PGA Tour and 13 LPGA Tour events from the early 1960s through 1999.
In 2007, Young joined the PGA Tour as a rules official. “I love my job. I love what I do,” he said.
Young became vice president at the beginning of 2021 after the retirements of Russell and fellow veteran PGA Tour rules official Slugger White. Those two used to make all the decisions about enforcing the rules and weather or darkness delays, but Young decided to rotate those responsibilities at various tournaments among himself and the five members of the management committee.
Young had to deal with weather delays and 5½-hour rounds when he served as chief referee at The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.
TPC Sawgrass is a difficult course, so rounds last longer than at other PGA Tour venues, and it’s hard to fit them all in with the limited amount of sunlight in March.
“When you figure it all out, 132 players fit perfectly at that time of year in that week,” Young said. “When we go with 144, we know we’re satisfying more members who are now getting a chance to play, but realistically we know we can’t possibly finish, and we’ll have to finish up on Saturday morning, make the cut and go off two tees in threes, and then we should be back on track in order to do our one-tee start in pairs on Sunday.”
'Focus should always be on them'
Part of Young’s job is to enforce PGA Tour rules for PGA Tour players, including such stars as Rory McIlroy, John Rahm and Scottie Scheffler.
“I’d like to think that I have a familiarity with the players, and the players know me,” he said. “There’s a mutual respect there, but I’ve never tried to get really close with any players. I’ve always kept my relationship with them very professional.”
Young believes it’s important for him and his staff to do their job without bringing attention to themselves.
“We’re not celebrities, we’re background players in this sport,” he said. “The celebrities are the players themselves, and the focus should always be on them. I like to take a low-key approach to it, and that’s always been my preference. Just stay in the background. Unfortunately, there are times when I’m put right out in front like when I get called on to television to explain something, but look at that as a necessary part of the job.”
Meanwhile, the PGA Tour is doing its best to not allow LIV Golf to steal any of its thunder.
“I still think that ours is a superior product,” Young said, “and we just need to focus on being the best that we can be, and however LIV Golf ends up, it ends up, but I can’t worry one minute about that.”
Young soaks in the warm weather while working on the PGA Tour, but he still enjoys snow.
“I embrace it,” he said.
Enjoying North Country
Three or four times each winter, he heads to Rangeley Lake in Maine to snowmobile with friends, including Dave Michaud of Northbridge. The two have known each other since they were 5 years old.
He was in Maine for a few days riding his snowmobile 130 miles a day in between working The Players Championship and the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play in Austin, Texas.
Young hasn’t met Michael O’Brien yet, but he knows Jay Kunkel, and he was pleased to hear that they purchased Pleasant Valley CC from the Magill family in December.
“I’m very excited,” he said, “about the new ownership. I actually think the Magills did a fantastic job in their time as owners. They made a lot of improvements to the facility. I think they just decided it was time.”
Young said he has told Kunkel in the past that he’d do anything he could to help PV. He’s also a big fan of Paul Parajeckas, who he recommended to replace him as PV head pro and has been on the job ever since.
“Paul is an amazing guy,” Young said. “He can still play. He’s such a great player. He’s so talented, and he doesn’t need to practice. He can just pick up a club and play. I’ve never seen anyone like him.”
Young hasn’t played competitive golf in more than 15 years, and he allowed his PGA of America membership to lapse. He plans to apply to regain his amateur status so he can play in occasional member-guests.
“Just have fun playing the game again,” he said. “It’s been so long since I’ve played the game. I’ve been administering the game now for 16 years straight and haven’t really touched a club.”
His son, Austin, works in the insurance business in Tampa, Florida, and is polishing his golf game in order to become a top amateur player. Young caddied for him last year in the Massachusetts Amateur qualifier at PV, where Austin shot a 77 to miss by three shots.
“But I was proud of him,” Young said. “He’s really just starting to play competitive golf. So I’m excited for him, and I kind of live vicariously through him now in golf.”
Young and his wife, Lauri, also have a daughter, Haley, who plays some golf and lives in Upton.
Dan Woodbury, who won PV’s men’s club championship at age 15 in 2001, stayed with Austin last month. Woodbury caddies on the PGA Tour for Trevor Cone, his former Virginia Tech teammate. Young said he sees Woodbury often.
“I’ve bumped into some of the older caddies and tried to put in a good word for him,” Young said. “Obviously, it’s a close knit community amongst the caddies, and I’ll do anything I can do to get them to be more accepting of him. He’s a really friendly guy anyway. He fits right in.”
Welcoming ideas
Another golf season is finally here. You can suggest story ideas for this golf column by reaching me at the email listed below. Comments are also welcomed.
—Contact Bill Doyle at bcdoyle15@charter.net. Follow him on Twitter@BillDoyle15.
This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Millbury's Gary Young handles air time in stride as PGA Tour rules chief
