Chi Chi: Pure Comedy Mixed With True Emotion

DALLAS - Behind the saber act and all those Spanish-accented one-liners and the fat pension portfolio is a current of emotion. So Juan "Chi Chi" Rodriguez was crying again, no surprise, this time after relating one of life's parables from childhood.

"Sorry about breaking down," he said.

He was moved by remembrance of an incident in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, back when he was about 12, making 50 cents a day as a plower, living in a house that had no electricity or toilet, just an outhouse hole dug in the dirt.

One night his father, a tough man, told him to go get a machete because a neighbor was stealing bananas from a tree behind their home. The elder Rodriguez went at the man with the blade, but instead of hitting him, as Chi Chi had figured, he chopped the bunch of bananas in half. And he gave them to the man.

"Next time you want something from my house," the elder Rodriguez told the man, "come through the front door."

This message of giving wasn't lost on young Juan Rodriguez. "I learned," he said, crying after telling the story, "that I had good genes. My father was a man."

Rodriguez also shed tears a year ago at Stonebriar Country Club in Frisco, Texas. He had just won the Murata Reunion Pro-Am, a title he's defending this weekend, and he choked up.

That is one side of Rodriguez. The emotional part. It meshes with the comedic side, and they both come at you often.

"I've known Chi Chi for 25 years, and he's for real," senior pro Jim Colbert said. "He's so for real that if he's not careful, he'll let his emotions run away and give away the farm."

The farm is big. Rodriguez has won more money than anyone in senior golf history, about $3.3 million since he turned 50, and he gets about $30,000 per corporate outing. None of his 20 senior victories has come this year, but, still, he ranks No. 2 to Lee Trevino in 1992 earnings, pushing $300,000.

As seniors go, he is a veteran, which usually means the bell curve is heading down as skills do. But at 56, Rodriguez is not sliding, though there were signs he might be. After ranking second and first his first two senior seasons, he dipped to 10th and 17th. But he elevated to fifth in 1990 and fourth in '91, when he won four tournaments in seven weeks.

So much for erosion. By his figuring, he's "middle-aged." His family tree tells him that. His grandmother and grandfather lived to 114, he says, and two uncles lasted till 108 and 106. "I figure I'll live to be 120," he said. "If I'm off five years either way, I won't complain."

This year, he leads the tour in birdies, is second in scoring and greens in regulation and, remarkably, is sixth in driving distance at 263 yards. That, for a man who is 5-7, 132 pounds and 3 1/2 years shy of 60.

"The little man jumps off the ground when he hits it," Trevino says, "but he's got the greatest hands since Roberto De Vicenzo. And he has a tremendous pair of legs, a very fast body movement."

A body part inside the chest seems to move fastest, even though it's large.

"He's about 140 pounds soaking wet," Lee Trevino says, "and I don't know how he carries his heart around."

Rodriguez's charitable acts often focus on children. In 1986, the PGA Tour honored him for contributions to junior golf. In 1989, the U.S. Golf Association gave him its highest honor, the Bob Jones Award.

The Chi Chi Rodriguez Foundation runs a school and golf course for troubled youths in Clearwater, Fla. The school takes in about 650 kids a year, 48 percent of whom have been sexually assaulted, he says. The students learn business in the pro shop. They learn math by figuring how many pounds of fertilizer and nitrogen are needed to keep the course green. They learn life from volunteer counselors and club members.

According to one report, he was having trouble making ends meet when he wrote a $1,000 check to start the school in the early 1980s while he was in between tours. "I could've used the money," he says. "The IRS sent me a get-well card. I'd make $37,000 and spend $200,000."

He won eight tournaments and $1 million in more than 20 years on the regular tour, making over $100,000 only one year. He has his own jet now, Sabreliner 60, but once he flew all night in economy class from Puerto Rico to California for a $500 appearance fee. One year he did 116 outings, from $1,000 to $3,000 apiece, about $28,000 less than his current price.

His star and savings hadn't risen then. Thinking he'd do well when he joined the Senior Tour, he went to the Big Three U.S. automakers seeking an endorsement, but each turned him down. Score another victory for Japan; Toyota took him.

Now his popularity is such that he signs autographs by the ink barrel, and kids get advice about life ("Stay in school and stay away from drugs, you hear?") with his signature.

While signing for a stream of youngsters at the Legends of Golf in Austin, Texas, recently, Rodriguez dangled this promise to a boy wearing an earring: "If you take that earring off, I'll give you an autograph now and I'll give you a 2-iron after the tournament."

The loop promptly was jettisoned.

This is not to say Rodriguez is opposed to jewelry. His childhood role models were Winston Churchill and John Wayne, and he figures if the Duke had worn an earring, "I'd put one on and feel right about it."

Instead, Rodriguez is weighed down with crosses and other religious artifacts. "All have love on them," he says. One cross dangles around his neck. In his pocket he carries what he calls a 560-year-old Indian arrowhead, a gold coin a little boy gave him and a five-inch-long sterling-silver cross a man in a wheelchair gave him. "He told me the pope blessed this 125 years ago," Rodriguez said.

If you watch closely, you'll see the cross. He pulls it out to look at about 10 times a round. "Every time I get in trouble," he says. Rodriguez is in stitches more often than he's in trouble. He is the tour's jester, and his Chi Chi-isms are time-honored and frequently recycled.

A sampling:

-- "An amateur asked what I thought of his swing. I told him, `You're one year away from the tour. And after one year, you'll be two years away from the tour.' There are 384 dimples on a golf ball and this man hits one at a time."

-- "Never invest your money in something that eats or grows. People in Puerto Rico put their money in horses. The only problem with horses is that they eat like horses."

-- "I was bad in math, so my teacher told me to go outside and count all the holes in the fence. I came back in a few minutes and told her there were 33,333 holes. She said that was wrong, that I couldn't count that fast. I said, `You could go out and prove me wrong.' "

Rodriguez has proved a lot of people wrong. He is an anomaly in a professional golf environment full of country club silver-spooners. He grew up brushing his teeth with charcoal, which made them white but didn't do much for cavities. "Bad teeth runs in my family," he says. He learned golf hitting tin cans around a baseball field with a guava-tree branch.

"I could hit that from home plate to second base," he says.

So when you ask him about the Murata Reunion Pro-Am course, about how well it fits his game, you are not surprised by another dose of Rodriguez perspective.

"I learned how to play golf in a baseball park," he said, "so every course looks good to me."