In the sobering message Seve Ballesteros posted on his Web site this week telling the world he is fighting a brain tumor, he wrote of how good he was at escaping obstacles on the golf course and that he intends to show a similar spirit in the fight of – and for – his life.
This might not be a fight Seve can win.
Ballesteros is 51 now, an age when many of his contemporaries are enjoying a competitive renewal playing seniors golf, the sun still shining on them.
He is in a Madrid hospital, awaiting the results of a biopsy.
Seve's game left him before his health did and when he announced his retirement in 2007 at Carnoustie, the fire had died. He sat at a podium, still darkly handsome, and spoke of his decision, a touch of sadness in his voice and in the game he once dominated.
If you saw Seve in his prime, you won't forget him.
If you didn't, you missed an artist. The clubs did the work but Seve painted the pictures.
He played golf with a rare passion that shone not just on his face but in his walk and in the shots he hit. Seve could make Houdini shake his head.
When Ballesteros was in the chase, on Augusta weekends or on the magnificent links of Great Britain, he leaned into the game, walking as if into a headwind, intent on getting where he wanted to be, taking the galleries with him.
As much as anyone – Ben Hogan, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods included – Ballesteros played golf with his will. He wasn't technically brilliant and his often errant tee shots were proof.
It perturbed Ballesteros that Americans thought of him as a guy who survived on his wits more than skill. He won one of his three British Open championships by making birdie from what the locals call a car park.
The American admiration of his imagination and ingenuity was lost in translation, at least in some small degree, or perhaps Ballesteros chose to see it that way for motivation.
He belongs in a rare class of great players. Around the greens, he was brilliant.
Personality is part of the equation at golf's highest level and Ballesteros oozed charisma.
Seve won 87 tournaments around the world, five of them major championships. When he won his first Masters in 1979 as a 22-year old, it seemed he might win half a dozen. He ultimately won one more and tossed away two others, dunking a 4-iron shot on the 15th hole to lose to Nicklaus in 1986 and three-putting himself out of a playoff that Larry Mize famously won a year later.
It is Seve, who is most responsible for reinventing the Ryder Cup. European captain Tony Jacklin provided the organizational structure for his side but it was Ballesteros, who inspired Jose Maria Olazabal and, later, Sergio Garcia, who provided the heartbeat.
He is the Arnold Palmer of European golf.
If Ballesteros was guilty of anything, it was caring too much. He could play petty games, but at the bottom of it all was the flame that made Ballesteros different from everyone else.
Two years ago at the Ryder Cup matches at the K Club in Ireland, fans were packed into bleachers around the 10th tee, waiting for the next match to arrive.
Quietly, Ballesteros walked onto the back of the tee to watch the action. When the fans saw him, they began to applaud. Then they stood and cheered Seve.
He smiled and tipped his hat in their direction.
Just as we should do toward him today.
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