Fay: Without Walker Cup, "There would have been no Bobby Jones story as we've come to know it."

A fun premise from David Fay in the September Golf Digest: if it weren't for the Walker Cup, where would Bobby Jones' record stand?

According to the former USGA Executive Director, the Jones as we know him might not be the legend he became.

When played in Great Britain in 1923, 1926 and 1930 (as well as its precursor, the International Match, at Hoylake in 1921), the Walker Cup was scheduled such that the British Amateur and the British Open were played around the same time. Jones took full advantage of bundling the three competitions in 1926 and 1930 by winning the British Open in both of these years as well as his only British Amateur title, in 1930. In 1923, Jones had planned to take advantage of the bundling approach, but Harvard denied his petition to be excused early from classes, so Jones declined his spot on the team. He remained in school and, later that summer, won his first U.S. Open title.

During his competitive career, Jones made only one trip to Great Britain that wasn't in conjunction with a USGA-subsidized competition. That was in 1927, when he successfully defended his British Open title at the Old Course at St. Andrews—a course and a place he had come to love. He did not go for a third straight British Open title in 1928: Work and family obligations along with the steep costs of the trip were simply too much.