AP. PGA Tour player Tom Hoge and his caddie, Warren-native Henry Diana watch Hoge's tee shot on the 7th hole during the third round at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am on Feb. 13.

Henry Diana was ready to retire. The Warren native had a solid college and professional golf career as a player before working for about 20 years as a caddie for Charles Howell III on the PGA Tour, but at the time, he considered hanging up the apron.

“I was out there at the time, 19 almost 20 years working 30-plus weeks a year and it took a toll on me physically and mentally,” Diana said. “I had some success, and I was blessed to work with Charles and Bill Haas and a lot of good players. I did think about stepping away and going back to possibly teaching golf and eventually that’s probably what I’ll do after I’m done caddying.”

Enter Tom Hoge in 2018.

Hoge was a rookie to the PGA Tour, but an older rookie at the age of 28. Diana and Howell were paired with Hoge for a tournament and Hoge and Diana got to know one another.

Hoge learned Diana was thinking of retiring and managed to talk Diana into giving the young, budding player a couple more years as his caddie starting in 2019.

Now in the early stages of their fourth year together, the pair is reaching new heights.

First, Diana and Hoge were the runners-up at the American Express at the end of January. Then, they finished in the top 15 last week at the Waste Management Phoenix Open in Arizona. But, the week before that, the pair won the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, Diana’s first win in his 23-year career as a caddie and Hoge’s first career win on the PGA Tour in 203 starts.

“Regardless of ever taking the flag off the 18th-hole flagstick, I just felt like I always won,” Diana said. “Being able to do what I wanted to do, being around golf — I always felt like I won. You always want to win — you always want to be a part of winning and I finished second a bunch of times in my career. Finally to do it there at Pebble in a historic place like that — one of the Mount Rushmore golf courses in the game — it was really special. It was an epic week for sure.”

Submitted photo. Warren native and caddie Henry Diana, right and Tom Hoge pose with the Pebble Beach Pro-Am trophy after Hoge won the event. Diana has caddied for Hoge since 2019.

Diana credits Hoge’s work around the greens and off the tee lately for their run of success, especially at Pebble Beach.

“It’s really everything, it’s not one thing,” Diana said. “If he can drive the ball in the fairway, he can be very competitive out there. (At Pebble), he had a beautiful week of putting and basically ran the table. Jordan Spieth opened the door a little bit coming in, and Tom took advantage of it, birdieing three out of the last five holes to win the golf tournament.”

Diana isn’t the only member of his family with experience as a caddie. His brother John is also a former college golfer and pro and spent a couple years caddieing for fellow Warren-native Jason Kokrak on the PGA Tour. After being the head golf pro at Avalon Lakes and Trumbull Country Club, John served as Director of Golf at The Lake Club in Youngstown, before taking over as Director of Golf at Quail Hollow Country Club up near Cleveland.

Prior to Pebble Beach, after discussing it with John, Henry recommended a putter change to Hoge. The two brothers felt that Hoge’s old putter didn’t necessarily suit his style of putting stroke. The putter that ensued is one-of-a-kind.

“He was using a putter that was considered face-balanced, which has a gooseneck in it,” John said. “We came up with the idea to get him something that has some toe-hang to it. (Hoge) liked the two-ball putters because he likes the mallet-style. So Henry went to the Odyssey reps and asked them to take a two-ball putter mallet and put a hozzle on it so it has toe-hang, but they’ve never made anything like that. So they made it for him before Pebble Beach and we all know what happened there –he went out and shot 63 with it.”

After the run over the past month, Hoge is now up to second in the FedEx Cup standings and Henry hopes the pair can continue the success they’ve had for the rest of the PGA Tour season.

“It’s been a good combination so far and we’ve had a half-decent run,” Henry said. “Tom is starting to progress and really starting to do a lot of positive things in his career and it’s really nice to see.”

nmadhavan@tribtoday.com