One year before he shot the round of his life, Ken Duke was sitting in a parking lot in Phoenix, facing his professional mortality.
What started out as an ache in his heel had grown into excruciating pain. He called PGA Tour officials to explore the possibility of a major medical exemption.
He had already overcome Scoliosis as a boy to forge an unexpected PGA Tour career, but maybe this foot injury would finally be his end.
“I couldn’t walk,” the 47-year-old Duke said in a recent telephone interview, just days after his brilliant 65 on a brutally-difficult third round of The Players.