Nelson lacks pizazz but not much else

Charismatic? Fun? Exciting?

Those aren't the adjectives usually associated with Larry Nelson, as he is the first to admit.

''I always wanted to be charismatic,'' the 51-year-old Nelson said. ''Arnold Palmer is charismatic. Chi Chi (Rodriguez) is fun. Tiger (Woods) is exciting. Me? I'm always described as 'balding.' They say my favorite color is beige; that my favorite ice cream is vanilla.''

What they can say about Nelson, however, is this: winner of the 1981 PGA Championship; winner of the 1983 U.S. Open; winner of the 1987 PGA Championship. And runaway winner of last week's Las Vegas Senior Classic.

And this week, he'll be described as the defending Bruno's Memorial Classic champion, a tournament that Nelson calls ''the Masters of the Senior Tour.''

Nelson won last year at Greystone in Birmingham, Ala. when he birdied three of the last seven holes to edge Dana Quigley and pick up his fifth career victory on the PGA Senior Tour.

Can the owner of three major golf championships really be so bland?

''I don't think so,'' Nelson said. ''I'm really kind of likable. I tell a lot of jokes. I think I'm fun to be around. It's just amazing to see how people perceive me, though.''

It would be hard for anyone to top Nelson's golf history, however.

Nelson's story is familiar and inspirational to golf fans. He never picked up a golf club until he was in his early 20s. After completing a tour of duty in Vietnam, he started going to a driving range across from work to hit balls for something to do.

He read Ben Hogan's book, ''The Five Fundamentals of Golf,'' and went out and broke 100 the first time he played.

''I played baseball growing up,'' Nelson said. ''I think that helped me. I learned to swing with the same motion that I would toss the ball as a shortstop.''

He was on the PGA Tour within two years - but only because Nelson discovered there was more money to be made in golf than in being an engineer, his planned profession.

''I can't say that I enjoyed playing golf for fun,'' Nelson said. ''I enjoy the competition aspect of golf. It still remains to be seen if, when I retire, I play. But now, when I'm home, I don't play. I'm a member of the Atlanta Country Club and live on the course, but I've only played the course maybe three times.''

Nelson did not expect to play on the Senior Tour for that reason, and because he believed the competition would not be the same as the regular PGA Tour.

''But it feels like the old tour, with Tom (Watson) and Lanny (Wadkins) and Hale (Irwin) and Gil (Morgan) out there, all friends of mine that I've competed with for 27 years,'' Nelson said. ''So that made this more attractive.

''Plus, it is a reward. Any time you can make the kind of money we can make doing this, you'd be crazy not to do it. But it's not the money, it's the competition. Money is no longer the object. It's just the opportunity to beat everybody again.''

Nelson was born outside of Fort Payne, Ala. but moved over the border into Georgia when he was 4 years old. It is enough of a connection for Alabama to claim him, and he is a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.

But his career has been quiet, and when the great golfers of the 1980s are discussed, seldom is Nelson the first golfer mentioned, even though he won three majors in that decade.

Perhaps it all has to do with his perceived blandness.

''People tend to look at someone and judge them by what they see,'' Nelson said. ''It's funny. I'm not like Fuzzy (Zoeller) or Chi Chi (Rodriguez). But I've seen those guys both ways - joking with people when things are going well, but yelling when things are not. I'm not like that.

''My sense of humor is dry. I'm more introverted - but that makes me popular in Japan, where 80 percent of the population is introverted and they like that.''

See? Nelson can tell a joke.

But if he's not charismatic or funny or exciting, what adjective would Nelson like in front of his name? Mysterious?

''Mysterious, yeah,'' Nelson said. ''Women like that. You know how I knew I was ready for the Senior Tour? I knew I was ready when the mothers of the guys I was playing with started looking pretty good to me. That's how I knew it was time.''

Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.