Mark James (golfer)

Mark James
— Golfer —
Personal information
Full name	Mark Hugh James
Nickname	Jesse
Born	(1953-10-28) 28 October 1953 Manchester, England
Height	6 ft 0 in (1.83 m)
Weight	178 lb (81 kg; 12.7 st)
Nationality	England
Residence	Burley in Wharfedale, West Yorkshire, England
Career
Turned professional	1976
Current tour(s)	European Senior Tour
Former tour(s)	European Tour Champions Tour
Professional wins	31
Number of wins by tour
European Tour	18
PGA Tour Champions	3
European Senior Tour	2
Other	2
Best results in major championships
Masters Tournament	CUT: 1980
U.S. Open	CUT: 1990, 1996
The Open Championship	T3: 1981
PGA Championship	T31: 1999
Achievements and awards
Sir Henry Cotton Rookie of the Year	1976

Mark Hugh James (born 28 October 1953) is an English professional golfer who had a long career on the European Tour and captained Europe in the 1999 Ryder Cup. He has also played senior golf on the European Senior Tour and the U.S.-based Champions Tour.

James was born in Manchester, England and educated at Stamford School. He won the English Amateur championship in 1974 and was a member of the Great Britain & Ireland Walker Cup team in 1975. His first professional win was the 1977 Lusaka Open and the following year he picked up the first of his eighteen wins on the European Tour at the Sun Alliance Match Play Championship. He also holds the record for the highest European Tour event round of 111 strokes at the 1978 Italian Open in Sardinia.

James never won a major championship, but he had four top-five finishes at The Open Championship. He was consistently competitive on the European Tour with twenty top-thirty finishes on the Order of Merit, including seven top-ten finishes, the best of them third place in 1979. He was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 2000, but after treatment began playing golf again in 2001.^[1]

James represented Great Britain & Ireland or Europe in the Ryder Cup seven times including 1989 when Europe tied the match and retained the cup they had won in 1987, and 1995 when they won it outright. He was the European captain in the controversial "Battle of Brookline" in 1999, when the behaviour of the American galleries and team created a great deal of resentment in Europe, and also James' own actions during the matches drew fire from both sides of the Atlantic.

Prior to the event, James controversially chose Andrew Coltart as his second captain's pick on the team, thus leaving out Nick Faldo and Bernhard Langer (veterans who were the two most successful players for the European team in Ryder Cup history). In one of the most discussed moves in the Ryder Cup, James then kept Jean van de Velde, Jarmo Sandelin and Coltart on the bench during all sixteen matches during the first two days of play, relegating them to singles matches on Sunday only. His refusal to play those three first-time players helped lead to Europe's defeat, as none of the three won their one match. On the other hand, United States captain Ben Crenshaw played all twelve players at least once during the first two days, even though Mark O'Meara only played once.

James published a best selling book about the event called Into the Bear Pit in 2000. In addition to criticising the behaviour of the Americans at Brookline, it also detailed James' clashes with some of his fellow Europeans including Faldo, the fading superstar whose merits as a potential captain's pick for the Ryder Cup had been much debated in the UK. James revealed in his book that just before the Ryder Cup began he had thrown a letter of encouragement from Faldo into the bin rather than share it with team. The controversy that this revelation aroused led to James resigning as one of Europe's Ryder Cup vice-captains for 2001.

A follow-up book, called After the Bear Pit, covering James' cancer and his experiences as a European Tour player, as well as further thoughts on the Ryder Cup, appeared in 2002.

James qualified to play senior golf when he turned fifty in late 2003. He chose to play mainly in the U.S. and was second in the Champions Tour Qualifying Tournament Finals that November. In 2004 he became the first European player to win one of the Champions Tour's senior majors with victory at the Ford Senior Players Championship.^[2] In 2005, he won on the Champions Tour for a second time at the ACE Group Classic and finished in the top 20 on the money list for a second consecutive season. His last full season on the Champions Tour was 2010 and he has played mainly on the European Senior Tour since then.

James has also worked as a golf commentator for the BBC.

Professional wins (31)

European Tour wins (18)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	Margin of victory	Runner(s)-up
1	1 Jul 1978	Sun Alliance European Match Play Championship	3&2		Neil Coles
2	17 Jun 1979	Welsh Golf Classic	−6 (72-68-68-70=278)	Playoff	Mike Miller, Eddie Polland
3	26 Aug 1979	Carroll's Irish Open	−6 (73-75-69-65=282)	1 stroke	Ed Sneed
4	17 Aug 1980	Carroll's Irish Open	−4 (71-66-74-73=284)	1 stroke	Brian Barnes
5	2 May 1982	Italian Open	−8 (70-67-71-72=280)	3 strokes	Bobby Clampett, Ian Woosnam
6	17 Apr 1983	Tunisian Open	−4 (74-69-69-72=284)	2 strokes	Gordon J. Brand, Gordon Brand Jnr, Tom Sieckmann
7	19 May 1985	GSI L'Equipe Open	−16 (68-67-71-66=272)	3 strokes	Carl Mason
8	17 Aug 1986	Benson & Hedges International Open	−14 (65-70-69-70=274)	Playoff	Hugh Baiocchi, Lee Trevino
9	15 May 1988	Peugeot Open de Espana	−18 (63-68-63-68=262)	3 strokes	Nick Faldo
10	5 Mar 1989	Karl Litten Desert Classic	−11 (69-68-72-68=277)	Playoff	Peter O'Malley
11	27 Mar 1989	AGF Open	−11 (69-67-69-72=277)	3 strokes	Mark Mouland
12	18 Jun 1989	NM English Open	−9 (72-70-69-68=279)	1 stroke	Eamonn Darcy, Craig Parry, Sam Torrance
13	3 Jun 1990	Dunhill British Masters	−18 (70-67-66-67=270)	2 strokes	David Feherty
14	19 Aug 1990	NM English Open	−4 (76-68-65-75=284)	Playoff	Sam Torrance
15	17 Jan 1993	Madeira Island Open	−7 (71-69-70-71=281)	3 strokes	Gordon J. Brand, Paul Broadhurst
16	14 Feb 1993	Turespana Iberia Open de Canarias	−13 (71-69-69-66=275)	6 strokes	De Wet Basson
17	12 Mar 1995	Moroccan Open	−13 (70-70-70-65=275)	1 stroke	David Gilford
18	27 Apr 1997	Peugeot Open de Espana	−11 (67-68-73-69=277)	Playoff	Greg Norman

Other wins (5)

• 1977 Lusaka Open (Africa)
• 1981 São Paulo Open (South America)
• 1980 Euro Masters Invitational (Italy – not a European Tour event)
• 1983 Euro Masters Invitational (Italy – not a European Tour event)
• 1988 South African TPC
• 2011 Gary Player Invitational (with George Coetzee)

Champions Tour wins (3)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	Margin of victory	Runner(s)-up
1	11 Jul 2004	Ford Senior Players Championship	−13 (68-67-67-73=275)	1 stroke	José Maria Cañizares
2	20 Feb 2005	The ACE Group Classic	−13 (69-68-66=203)	2 strokes	Tom Wargo, Hale Irwin
3	11 Feb 2007	Allianz Championship	−15 (64-69-68=201)	2 strokes	Jay Haas

European Senior Tour wins (2)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	Margin of victory	Runner-up
1	4 Sep 2005	Bovis Lend Lease European Senior Masters	−9 (70-71-66=207)	Playoff	Sam Torrance
2	10 May 2009	Son Gual Mallorca Senior Open	−10 (70-70-66=206)	Playoff	Eamonn Darcy

Other senior wins (2)

• 2011 Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf - Raphael Division (with Des Smyth)
• 2012 Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf - Raphael Division (with Des Smyth)

Results in major championships

DNP = Did not play
CUT = missed the half-way cut
"T" indicates a tie for a place
Yellow background for top-10

Summary

• Most consecutive cuts made – 7 (1980 Open Championship – 1986 Open Championship)
• Longest streak of top-10s – 1 (five times)

Champions Tour major championships

Wins (1)

Year	Championship	Winning score	Margin	Runner-up
2004	Ford Senior Players Championship	−13 (68-67-67-73=275)	1 stroke	José Maria Cañizares

Results timeline

Results not in chronological order before 2014.

DNP = Did not play
CUT = missed the halfway cut
"T" indicates a tie for a place
Green background for wins. Yellow background for top-10.

Team appearances

Amateur

• Walker Cup (representing Great Britain & Ireland): 1975

Professional

• Hennessy Cognac Cup (representing Great Britain and Ireland): 1976 (winners), 1978 (winners), 1980 (winners), 1982 (winners & individual winner), (representing England) 1984 (winners)
• Ryder Cup (representing Great Britain and Ireland/Europe): 1977, 1979, 1981, 1989 (tied and retained cup), 1991, 1993, 1995 (winners), 1999 (non-playing captain)
• World Cup (representing England): 1978, 1979, 1982, 1984, 1987, 1988, 1990, 1993, 1997, 1999
• Alfred Dunhill Cup (representing England): 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995, 1997, 1999
• Four Tours World Championship (representing Europe): 1988, 1989, 1990

See also

• List of golfers with most European Tour wins

References

External links

• Mark James at the European Tour official site
• Mark James at the PGA Tour official site

Mark James in the Ryder Cup
European Ryder Cup captains Great Britain 1927 Ted Ray 1929 George Duncan 1931 Charles Whitcombe 1933 John Henry Taylor 1935 Charles Whitcombe 1937 Charles Whitcombe 1947 Henry Cotton 1949 Charles Whitcombe 1951 Arthur Lacey 1953 Henry Cotton 1955 Dai Rees 1957 Dai Rees 1959 Dai Rees 1961 Dai Rees 1963 John Fallon 1965 Harry Weetman 1967 Dai Rees 1969 Eric Brown 1971 Eric Brown Great Britain & Ireland 1973 Bernard Hunt 1975 Bernard Hunt 1977 Brian Huggett Europe 1979 John Jacobs 1981 John Jacobs 1983 Tony Jacklin 1985 Tony Jacklin 1987 Tony Jacklin 1989 Tony Jacklin 1991 Bernard Gallacher 1993 Bernard Gallacher 1995 Bernard Gallacher 1997 Seve Ballesteros 1999 Mark James 2002 Sam Torrance 2004 Bernhard Langer 2006 Ian Woosnam 2008 Nick Faldo 2010 Colin Montgomerie 2012 José María Olazábal 2014 Paul McGinley 2016 Darren Clarke Great Britain and Ireland Ryder Cup team – 1977 Brian Barnes Ken Brown Howard Clark Neil Coles Eamonn Darcy Peter Dawson Nick Faldo Bernard Gallacher Tommy Horton Tony Jacklin Mark James Peter Oosterhuis Brian Huggett (non-playing captain) Lost: 7.5 – 12.5 European Ryder Cup team – 1979 Seve Ballesteros Brian Barnes Ken Brown Nick Faldo Bernard Gallacher Antonio Garrido Tony Jacklin Mark James Michael King Sandy Lyle Peter Oosterhuis Des Smyth John Jacobs (non-playing captain) Lost: 11 – 17 European Ryder Cup team – 1981 José Maria Cañizares Howard Clark Eamonn Darcy Nick Faldo Bernard Gallacher Mark James Bernhard Langer Sandy Lyle Peter Oosterhuis Manuel Piñero Des Smyth Sam Torrance John Jacobs (non-playing captain) Lost: 9.5 – 18.5 European Ryder Cup team – 1989 Seve Ballesteros Gordon Brand, Jnr José Maria Cañizares Howard Clark Nick Faldo Mark James Bernhard Langer Christy O'Connor Jnr José María Olazábal Ronan Rafferty Sam Torrance Ian Woosnam Tony Jacklin (non-playing captain) Tied: 14 – 14 European Ryder Cup team – 1991 Seve Ballesteros Paul Broadhurst Nick Faldo David Feherty David Gilford Mark James Bernhard Langer Colin Montgomerie José María Olazábal Steven Richardson Sam Torrance Ian Woosnam Bernard Gallacher (non-playing captain) Lost: 13.5 – 14.5 European Ryder Cup team – 1993 Peter Baker Seve Ballesteros Nick Faldo Joakim Haeggman Mark James Barry Lane Bernhard Langer Colin Montgomerie José María Olazábal Costantino Rocca Sam Torrance Ian Woosnam Bernard Gallacher (non-playing captain) Lost: 13 – 15 European Ryder Cup team – 1995 Seve Ballesteros Howard Clark Nick Faldo David Gilford Mark James Per-Ulrik Johansson Bernhard Langer Colin Montgomerie Costantino Rocca Sam Torrance Philip Walton Ian Woosnam Bernard Gallacher (non-playing captain) Won: 14.5 – 13.5 European Ryder Cup team – 1999 Darren Clarke Andrew Coltart Sergio García Pádraig Harrington Miguel Ángel Jiménez Paul Lawrie Colin Montgomerie José María Olazábal Jesper Parnevik Jarmo Sandelin Jean van de Velde Lee Westwood Mark James (non-playing captain) Lost: 13.5 – 14.5