PGA Champion Celebrates 8 Months Sober: ‘Jesus Christ Changed My Life’
By Movieguide® Contributor
PGA golf champion Grayson Murray credits Jesus for changing his life after he struggled with alcohol abuse.
At just the age of 16, he won the 2006, 2007 and 2008 IMG Junior World titles. Now, at the age of 30, Murray is back in the golf world and recently won the Sony Open in Honolulu, Hawaii.
“A lot of hard work pays off. It’s not easy. I wanted to give up a lot of times. Give up on myself, give up on the game of golf, give up on life at times. Just persevere and when you get tired of fighting, let someone else fight for you,” he said following the win.
He added that, while the win has changed his career, it hasn’t changed his life.
“It’s a lot for my career,” Murray said. “I knew today was not going to change my life. My fiancé changed my life. Jesus Christ changed my life. Today wasn’t going to change my life, but it did change my career a little bit.”
He said, “Jesus Christ is first and foremost. Without him, none of this would be possible, and He’s just given me a platform to write a new story to write my own story. And I hope everyone watching can get a little inspiration from me. If I just help one person, that’s all it takes.”
One way he hopes to help others is through his sobriety journey.
After he began struggling with alcohol abuse, he was admitted as a patient at the Hazelden Betty Ford Drug and Alcohol Treatment Center in Minnesota.
“After treatment, I got out and did pretty well for a while,” Murray told the PGA Tour. “Like everyone, you think you can get back to having a couple. It just was a slippery slope, and I got back in it.”
Murray was under the influence when he crashed his scooter into oncoming traffic while playing in the Butterfield Bermuda Championship in the fall of 2022.
“I should have died,” he said. “If I didn’t have my helmet on, I probably would have died. It should have been my rock bottom, but I had to keep going. I felt like I was still invincible.”
His near-death experience didn’t change his perspective about alcohol, though. In April of last year, at the Barbasol Championship in Vallarta, Mexico, he “started to chug some alcohol before the round just to get rid of the jitters. And I got out there and shot like 80. (He shot 79.) I got home and had an anxiety attack that lasted four days; it was the worst feeling ever.”
“I did not want to go through that ever again,” he added, “and that was the last time I had a drink. I would have rather been dead, those four days. I just kind of locked myself in my room and didn’t tell my parents or anything. It was bad. It was really, really bad.”
Now, eight months sober, Murray is planning to compete in other major tournaments this season.
“My story is not finished. I think it’s just beginning. I hope I can inspire a lot of people going forward that have their own issues,” he said.
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