Bramlett Gets PGA Tour Card and Cheer From Woods

On the final hole of the final round of the final stage of the PGA Tour’s qualifying school Monday, Joseph Bramlett delivered a putt that had him roaring, pumping his fist and high-fiving his caddie in celebration.

Sort of how Tiger Woods does it.

The former Stanford standouts now have even more in common.

Bramlett earned a PGA Tour card, joining Woods as the only players on tour of black descent.

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Bramlett shot a 4-under 68 on the Crooked Cat Course at Orange County National, rallying from 33rd at the start of the day to make the cutoff for a tour card by two strokes. He finished 11 under at the grueling, six-round final stage of qualifying school to tie for 16th.

The top 25 scores and ties earned PGA Tour cards for 2011. The next 50 received cards on the Nationwide Tour.

“We’re popping the champagne, baby,” Bramlett’s father, Marlo, said by phone from San Jose, Calif. “Unfortunately, he doesn’t drink. So we’ll give him a bunch of water bottles when he gets back.”

Woods wrote on Twitter: “Congrats to Joe Bramlett for making it through Q School” and “Amazing feat considering he sat out a whole year with wrist injury. Can’t wait to play with him next season.”

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Bramlett grew up outside San Jose in a multiracial family–his father is black, his mother is white–and endured the odd stares at junior events when his parents followed him on the course. He plastered posters of Woods on his bedroom wall after the 1997 Masters, and he later competed in the Junior World Championship in San Diego with a team sponsored by the Tiger Woods Foundation.

When he was 14, he became the youngest player to qualify for the U.S. Amateur in 1992. He was All-America his freshman year at Stanford, when he helped lead the Cardinal to an NCAA title. Bramlett flew straight home to California to try to qualify for the U.S. Open, losing out in a playoff.

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