Southern Nevada’s Own Foltz Returns for LIV Golf Las Vegas
By Brian Hurlburt
Be sure to read the entire article in the winter 2024 issue of Las Vegas Golf & Leisure Magazine. Also, LIV Golf tickets are now available at LIVgolf.com for the Vegas event.
Even though Jerry Foltz no longer resides in Las Vegas, his heart remains in Southern Nevada.
When the former Western High and Southern Nevada Junior Golf Association star returns to his hometown as part of the television broadcast crew for LIV Golf Las Vegas, his thoughts will flash back to his youth in Las Vegas. He played junior and high school golf here and spent most of his days at “Muni”, these days known as Las Vegas Golf Club.
Foltz will return to Las Vegas Feb. 8-10 when the LIV Golf League plays the historic and iconic The Las Vegas Country Club. The course and facility are near and dear to me because I authored The Las Vegas Country Club: Chronicle of an Icon. The membership commissioned me about a decade ago to create the 240-page coffee table book that oozes Club and Vegas history.
Foltz, 61, grew up in Las Vegas, and has been part of LIV Golf since its inception in 2023. His wit and candor, on the Fairway to Heaven LIV Golf podcast and during the broadcasts, is always front and center.
Foltz, a Western High graduate who also played in the Southern Nevada Junior Golf Association (SNJGA), relishes any chance he gets to visit his hometown. Even though he will be in the city that glitters during the first-ever Super Bowl in Las Vegas while also broadcasting a LIV event, his thoughts will reflect to his Vegas youth.
“All of my memories of Las Vegas revolve around Las Vegas Muni, of all things,” said Foltz during a recent phone conversation. “That is where I fell in love with the game, where my dad introduced me to the game, where I ended up getting a job to further the passion I had for the game as just an 11-year-old. Muni is where I played 99 percent of my golf until I left for college.”
In 2015, Foltz, who now lives in Florida, was inducted into the Las Vegas Golf Hall of Fame. He spent the day before the event playing Muni with old friends. Not only did he learn the game on those tees, fairways and greens, he learned about life.
“When you are a kid, your whole world is so small, such a microcosm of the actual world, and Muni was my world,” Foltz said. “The characters that I knew back then, which looking back on them now, they seem like characters, but back then they were just the people in my life. I was essentially raised by a bunch of golf-loving, gambling, knuckleheads, who shared a passion for the game with me. I was raised by adults in a golf environment. I think a lot of what my life has brought me is because of those days, and those people who cared enough about a kid who had a passion for the game to always go out of the way to help.”
Foltz took lessons from legendary Las Vegas Golf Hall of Fame inductee Jerry Belt and vividly remembers some of the other Muni characters, including Monte Carlo Money, John and Bruce DiFloure, who operated the course, and Mel Hayes, a larger-than-life personality in the golf shop.
While Muni was the foundation, playing in the SNJGA expanded Foltz’ horizons and allowed him to tee it up at the best Vegas courses, many of which are not around anymore.
“Playing in the Southern Nevada Junior Golf Association was great because it was our chance to play courses like the Dunes, the Tropicana and the Desert Inn,” Foltz said. “I came from a family of humble resources and junior golf introduced me to those courses. That was a big deal for me, as it was for a lot of the other juniors.”
