DUBLIN, Ohio – Brandt Snedeker couldn’t hit any of five milkshakes positioned on a stand a mere 10 yards in front of him on the driving range at Muirfield Village Golf Club on Tuesday. It was part of a timed contest for charity and as Snedeker raked another ball in front of him, he inquired, “How much time do I have left? I’m better than this.”
He eventually smoked two of the club’s renowned milkshakes – a terrible waste of the tasty treat in my humble opinion – but pardon the rust on the game of Snedeker, a nine-time PGA Tour winner who hasn’t played a PGA Tour event since September’s kick-off to the 2022-2023 season at the Fortinet Championship in Napa, California, after undergoing surgery in December to repair his sternum.
Snedeker had been diagnosed with a sternum issue in 2016 and for much of the next six years had been traveling to South America to do stem cell treatments. Even still, he was living with constant pain and a mixture of Tylenol, Advil and steroids only would do so much. It had limited his practice to the point that he couldn’t even hit driver when he was home.
“I’d have to save them up until I got out here,” he said. “It just had taken over so much of my life.”
Snedeker had rested for eight weeks and decided to play the Fortinet Championship nine months ago. He felt fine until the second round when he started experiencing a knifing pain with every breath. He made the cut and persevered through the weekend, finishing T-59, but he concluded he couldn’t continue down this path. It was now or never to do surgery.
“Or we’re gonna have to find something else to do,” Snedeker said.
Brandt Snedeker, right, walks off the 10th green with Larry Fitzgerald and Heidi Ueberroth during the Workday Golden Bear Pro Am at the Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin. (Photo: Joseph Scheller/Columbus Dispatch)
Easier said than done, however. Snedeker had manubrium joint stabilization, a disease with about 10 known cases in the country and limited surgical options.
“To say it’s a rare thing is an understatement,” Snedeker said.
Dr. Burton Elrod, a Nashville, Tennessee, orthopedic and sports medicine surgeon had performed a procedure on NFL quarterback Steve McNair in 2004 to strengthen his chest but had sworn to never do it again because of the risk of infection to the patient.
“I talked him into one more,” Snedeker said of the experimental surgery that took a bone from his hip and stuck it into his sternum. “He told me, ‘This is the last one.’ ”
The surgery on December 1, which left him with a six-inch scar, has been judged a success. Snedeker spent the next four weeks in a recliner – “I felt like someone hit me with a Mack truck,” he said – and didn’t hit a golf ball until April 1. He took some trips he’d always wanted to do, including to the Bahamas where he bumped into Jack Nicklaus and talked fishing for half an hour, and enjoyed being a full-time father. But he also made an important realization: “I think I found out I’m too young to retire,” said Snedeker, 42.
With four starts remaining on a minor medical exemption, he had circled this week’s Memorial on his calendar, and after playing every day for the last two weeks and experiencing no setbacks said he’s ready to get back to “the only job I’ve really ever had.”
“I was like you know what, gotta jump into the deep end at some point,” he said. “Until you start doing it every day, week after week, month after month, I won’t know for sure but so far, so good.”
And his goal hasn’t changed.
“Just win baby,” he said. “I still know how to do it. I’m not an idiot. I did this one time, I can do it again.”
