Ranking Golf's Best 59s, Including Jim Furyk, Sam Snead, 'Mr. 59' Himself and ... Furyk Again

Golf's magic number was fired again last week on the Korn Ferry Tour, which prompted The Ranking to dig deeper into the Holy Grail of scores.

Fifty-nine is still a magic number in golf.

The Ranking staffers have shot it plenty of times ... O.K., at an 18-hole par-3 course (in an undisclosed location) where par is 54. But it’s still special. To them.

Back in the real world, Mac Meissner joined an exclusive golf club last week when he posted a stellar 59 in the Lecom Suncoast Classic’s second round on the Korn Ferry Tour at Lakewood National. He eagled the final hole, a 465-yard par-5, with a 15-foot putt to finish it off. Impressive. Clutch.

🚨59 ALERT🚨

Mac Meissner has the lowest round of his career with a 12-under 59 at the LECOM Suncoast Classic. pic.twitter.com/GKhysHoBbQ

— Korn Ferry Tour (@KornFerryTour) April 21, 2023

Meissner’s Miracle makes it seem like the right time for The Ranking to review its favorite sub-60 scores. There isn’t room on the list for all of them, including Shigeki Maruyama’s 58 in U.S. Open sectional qualifying, Jason Bohn’s Canadian Tour 58 and Stuart Appleby’s walk-off birdie for 59 at the Greenbrier Classic. But they’re all worth remembering …

10. Sam Saunders

After Saunders birdied his 17th hole (No. 8) in the 2017 Web.com Tour Championship’s opening round at Atlantic Beach (Fla.) Country Club, Saunders’s home course, he told his surprised caddie, “I’m making one (birdie) on the last hole for a 59.” An errant drive at the final hole left Saunders flirting with trees left of the fairway. He had to make a shortened backswing with his 9-iron, hit what he called a "chip-hook” and pulled it off perfectly. The ball rolled onto the green, stopped 10 feet from the hole and he poured in the putt. The 59 gave Saunders a temporary three-shot lead after one round and came near the one-year anniversary of the death of his grandfather, Arnold Palmer. If Saunders’s swashbuckling finish reads like a classic Arnie charge, well, it must run in the family.

9. Oliver Fisher

The Ranking knows what you’re thinking: What? Who? Fisher’s 59 needs to be noted because no one on the European Tour accomplished the feat until he did it in the second round of the 2018 Portugal Masters. Or, in American terms, 41 years after Al Geiberger did it on the PGA Tour. Fisher, an Englishman, had 10 birdies and an eagle and had the luxury of making a routine par on the final hole to secure his 59. There had been 19 scores of 60 in tour history but he was first to break the barrier. Said Fisher: “I was chuffed with the day.” That’s good, right? (Someone get an interpreter who speaks British.)

8. Sam Snead

If you shoot 59 in a tournament named after you and you’re the host, does it count? You bet, dadgummit, and Sam Snead shot 59 in the third round of 1959’s aptly named Sam Snead Festival played at The Greenbrier, in White Sulphur Springs, W.Va., where Snead had been the host pro for more than two decades. Local knowledge was a home-course advantage and Snead won in a romp with a 72-hole score of 259. The event was not an official PGA Tour tournament, however, but Snead’s glory was playing the last seven holes in 7 under par. At the tough par-4 finishing hole, Snead stiffed a 5-iron shot to two feet to finish off a neatly stacked record—a 59 for 259 in ’59.

7. Chip Beck

This 59 began with a streak of six birdies in a row on the back nine and a 29 at Sunrise Golf Club, a new course in the 1991 Las Vegas Invitational rotation considered gettable at par 72 and 6,914 yards. Beck got it, all right, during Friday’s third round with three eagles and nine birdies. There was added pressure, though, because with six holes left, Beck asked a PGA Tour official if Tour partner Hilton was still offering a $1 million bonus ($500,000 of it to charity) to any player who shot 59. Told it was, Beck finished it off in style. He hit 5-iron from 191 yards and birdied the par-3 8th, then dropped an 8-iron shot to three feet for a birdie at the 9th. By the way, he did it while playing with amateurs in the tournament’s pro-am format with partners. Was the course too easy? Only Beck shot the score and he said later, “The way I did it today, I could have shot 59 anywhere.” Beck’s $500,000 bonus was paid in annual installments of $25,000 for 20 years. So lame, Mr. Hilton.

6. Jim Furyk

How good was this 59 in the 2013 BMW Championship at Conway Farms in greater Chicago? It was six shots better than the next best score, 12 strokes better than the field average and … Furyk did it despite three-putting for bogey on one hole. He knew he had to birdie his final hole, the 9th, from 103 yards out to get his 59 and he stuffed a wedge shot to three feet and made the putt. He said later he asked himself, “How many opportunities are you going to have in life to do this?” Yeah, funny he should ask that because …

The hole-by-hole from Jim Furyk's final round at the 2016 Travelers, which moved him from 70th to a tie for fifth. Not bad :: Bill Streicher/USA TODAY Sports

5. Jim Furyk

Do we call him Mr. 58 or Mr. 59? Yes to both. It was at the 2016 Travelers Championship that Furyk had one of the great starts ever. He was 11 under through 12 holes including a stretch of seven consecutive birds, so on a par-70 course like the TPC River Highlands, he was on "59 Watch" early. Then his Bird-O-Meter stalled. He hit 18 greens in regulation, made 10 birdies and an eagle and needed just 24 putts. At 18, he had a 29-footer for birdie and 57 and the putt burned the cup’s edge. Just a crummy 58 for the only man to post a pair of 50-something scores on the tour.

4. Homero Blancas

There are plenty of reasons to overlook Blancas’ incredible round of 55, 15 under par. He shot it in a college golf tournament in 1962 when he starred at the University of Houston. It wasn’t a PGA Tour event. The course was only a par-70 track in Longview, Texas, and just over 5,000 yards long. The Guinness Book of Records acknowledged Blancas’s round as an official record for a few years but later raised the minimum for a record score to courses of 6,500 yards or more. He racked up 13 birdies and an eagle and was known as Mr. 55 even before he made it to the PGA Tour. Maybe this merits an asterisk but he merits a mention. It was an astounding feat 61 years ago.

3. David Duval

The only thing slightly better than a 59 is a walk-off 59 for the win. That’s what David Duval pulled off in the 1999 Bob Hope Chrysler Classic. He knew where he stood, said later his only goal was to break 60 and thus it was super clutch when he crushed a 320-yard drive (a massive blow then, not just an average drive these days on tour) and torched a 218-yard 5-iron shot to seven feet. Then he made the putt for eagle, for 59 and, as it turned out, the victory.

The Ranking puts it No. 3 because it was a ball-striking clinic. The longest putt Duval made was a 10-footer and for the day, after hitting 17 of 18 greens in regulation, he sank only 54 feet worth of putts. If it’s possible for a 59 to be easy, this one was.

2. Annika Sorenstam

Scores lower than 59 have been posted, yes. But Sorenstam’s 59 in the second round of the 2001 Standard Register Ping Championship was clearly even better than The Ranking thought then because no woman player has matched the feat in the 22 succeeding years. The 59 was 13 under par at Moon Valley Country Club and two strokes better than the LPGA mark of 61, which Sorenstam shared with Karrie Webb and Se Ri Pak. “I think it shows we can play,” Sorenstam said in defense of women’s golf. Two decades later, well, duh.

1. Al Geiberger

He won a PGA Championship, sure, but Geiberger was better known as Mr. 59 for being the first player to shoot the score in an official PGA Tour event, the 1977 Danny Thomas Memphis Classic at par-72 Colonial Country Club. Geiberger was golf’s Roger Bannister (the first man to run a four-minute mile) and he did it at age 39 with persimmon woods, balata balls and other antique tools. After heavy rains, the tour put preferred lies into play—lift, clean and place—although Geiberger said later that he didn’t remember taking advantage of that. He did use the smoke from a parking-lot fire, caused by straw thrown down for drying, to note the changing wind direction on several shots. He sank an eight-footer for 59 on the final green and two days later beat Gary Player and Jerry McGee by three shots to win the tournament and make golf history. Geiberger said years later he didn’t understand at the time how difficult it was to fire a 59. “When someone gets close,” he said, “they tend to run out of holes.”