Journeyman golf pro and legendary caddie Lance Ten Broeck, who famously caddied and played at the same event, has died. He was 67.
The cause of death was organ failure, Ten Broeck's son Jonathan told the Palm Beach Post.
Ten Broeck, who earned the nickname "Last Call Lance," was known as a colorful character and a talented, passionate golfer who performed strongly into his retirement years.
Over his pro career, Ten Broeck made the cut at 162 PGA Tours and placed in the top 10 eleven times.
He played in seven U.S. Opens and won the 1984 Magnolia Classic, but it wasn't an official win as it was played the same week as the Masters. Ten Broeck had his biggest win at the 1991 Chattanooga Classic, where he placed second.
"I probably didn’t have enough confidence, but it’s hard to have confidence when you’re not playing well. And when I played badly, I didn’t want to play," he told The Caddie Network in 2019.
In 1999, Ten Broeck became a caddie for Jesper Parnevik. When Parnevik won the Wyndham Championship in Ten Broeck's first week, he joked that the timing was perfect because he had run out of money.
He went on to caddie for the likes of Ernie Ells, Tim Herron, Robert Allenby, and Fredrik Jacobson.
We lost a great friend of the game of golf yesterday, Lance Ten Broeck.
Lance spent his whole life around our great game as a player, a caddy, and a coach, for that matter.
A True legend and most of the stories are true!
Loved that man - RIP brother!
— Ernie Els (@TheBig_Easy) May 1, 2023
The retired pro memorably golfed and caddied at the same event during the 2009 Valero Texas Open. Ten Broeck, who had spent the previous night drinking, shot 71 with borrowed clubs and ended up beating Parnevik.
Ten Broeck shot 70 in the second round, failing to make the cut by two strokes.
“I was half-kidding when I asked him to caddie for me at a family barbeque,” Parnevik said Monday. “He was one of the great characters in golf. Wherever we traveled and played, he had friends in every city and corner of the world. Everybody was always happy to see him.”
A longtime Florida resident, Ten Broeck was raised in Chicago, where he picked up golf from his father. His son Jonathan said Ten Broeck was an "all-in or all-out kind of guy."
"My dad came from nothing and made his way through golf,” he said. “He fell in love with the game at an early age and from then on, he only wanted to be a golfer. He found his God-given talent."
