Jim Colbert, winner of 20 senior titles and known for his bucket hat, dies at 85

In a 2007 interview with Golf Digest, Jim Colbert lamented his best chance to win the Masters. He recalled that he was in contention at the turn on Sunday in 1974 when he missed a three-foot putt for birdie on the par-4 10th hole.

Colbert then hit a good drive down the 11th and consulted with his caddie, a local looper, about what he should hit for his approach.

“What do you think,” Colbert remembers asking.

“I think the putt you just missed is the one we needed to win,” he said the caddie responded.

Colbert fired the caddie on the spot, but the man refused to walk away. So they grumbled at each other the rest of the way, including during the 15th hole when Colbert hit a great approach into the green that landed on the front but rolled back and into the pond. He made bogey, mostly ending his chances of winning a green jacket.

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The story ends with Colbert hitting an 8-iron approach into 18 that goes into the hole for an eagle-2. He shot 73 to tie for fourth place, three behind Gary Player. With the gallery going nuts and the fired caddie walking alongside, Colbert politely tipped his bucket hat while muttering under his breath, “That f—ing figures.”

Colbert, one of golf’s colorful characters, who was known for his bucket hat and won eight PGA Tour titles and 20 times on PGA Tour Champions, died May 10. He was 85.

Born March 9, 1941, in New Jersey, Colbert earned a football scholarship to play at Kansas State University. But an injury ended his football career and he turned to golf. In 1964, he finished second in the NCAA Championship.

A year later he turned professional and in 1969 he won his first PGA Tour event, the Monsanto Open Invitational in Florida, beating Deane Beman, who would eventually be the tour’s commissioner. He earned $20,000. Colbert’s last PGA Tour title came at the 1983 Texas Open. He played in 44 major championships and collected three top-five finishes.

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Jim Colbert talking with Jack Nicklaus and Raymond Floyd at the 1974 Masters.

Augusta National

“Golf is just like gambling,” Colbert told Golf Digest in 2007. “If I birdie three holes in a row and I'm in the next fairway, you better believe I'm going for the flag. I'm not going to back off, thinking my luck is about to run out. You've got to have the courage to ride your streaks, and you've got to handle prosperity. If I hit my ball in the water on the next hole, I'm going to regroup and go back to my $10 bet—by making sure I'm in the next fairway and make a solid par, so I can get another streak going.”

From 1991-2001, Colbert won all 20 of his career senior titles, including his lone major, the Ford Senior Players Championship in 1993 when he topped Raymond Floyd.

Wearing a bucket hat for most of his career was his signature look. According to the PGA Tour, Colbert had difficulty with the sun at an event in Kansas in 1957 and almost collapsed. A doctor insisted he start wearing a bucket hat.

But Colbert wanted to get away from it and 13 years later he switched to a baseball cap for half of the season. He quickly realized no one recognized him without the bucket hat and he went back to it.

In 1996, Colbert revealed that he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. It was removed and he was back playing two years later.

Colbert had many other interests outside of playing competitively. He bought his first golf course in 1980 in Las Vegas and he created a business that once owned 23 courses, had 700 employees and an annual gross revenue of $50 million according to the tour. The Kansas State men’s and women’s golf teams play and practice at Colbert Hills Golf Club in Manhattan, which he helped design and opened back in 2000.

Colbert was enshrined in five different halls of fame for his contributions: Kansas State Athletic Hall of Fame (1991), Kansas Sports Hall of Fame (1998), Kansas City Golf Hall of Fame (2018), Las Vegas Golf Hall of Fame (2019) and the Southern Nevada Sports Hall of Fame (2000).

He married Marcia, his high school sweetheart when he was only 17 and the had three daughters. They lived in Kansas City for many years but spent most of their time recently in Las Vegas.