Lesson 4: The International Game Expands
Throughout the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, professional golf expanded dramatically beyond its Anglo-American roots. Players from South Africa, Australia, Spain, Germany, Zimbabwe, and Japan arrived on the world stage, winning major championships and transforming the game’s identity.
Gary Player of South Africa became one of the first truly global golf stars — winning major championships on multiple continents and competing on the PGA Tour as an international player decades before globalization was a common concept.
Seve Ballesteros of Spain electrified European golf in the late 1970s and 80s, winning five major championships with a style of play — daring, instinctive, creative — that had never been seen before. He transformed the Ryder Cup from an American-dominated formality into a genuinely competitive contest.
The international expansion of golf created the World Golf Rankings in 1986 — the first unified ranking system measuring golfers across all tours worldwide. For the first time, there was a single agreed answer to the question: who is the best golfer in the world?
Golf became truly global in the 1960s-80s, with players from South Africa (Gary Player), Spain (Seve Ballesteros), Australia, and Japan transforming the international game.
Create a ‘Global Golf Map’ showing where major championship winners came from in each decade from the 1920s to the 1990s. Mark winning countries on a world map for each decade. Write an analysis: what pattern do you see in how the geographic diversity of champions changed over time? What caused this change?