McLean Maintains Momentum: Past Pacific Coast Amateur Champion keeps his head in the game

by Logan Groeneveld-Meijer

Much of today’s golf instruction theories can be traced back to Jim McLean, a shooting star as a player on the Northwest’s amateur golf scene in the late 1960s and early ‘70s who would later make his name as an instructor to the world’s best golfers.

Born and raised in South Seattle to a golfing father, Jim enjoyed his own decorated junior career that earned him a golf scholarship to the University of Houston, which at the time was the perennial national powerhouse program commandeered by Coach Dave Williams.

Before long, Jim had three collegiate wins to his name and as many PNGA Men’s Amateur titles, including two consecutively. Among other achievements, he also won the 1971 Pacific Coast Amateur. He soon became a PGA professional and dedicated his life to instruction, spending 19 years with the MET PGA in New York before relocating to South Florida in 1994. In the three-plus decades since, Jim’s career has earned him assorted PGA of America Awards, culminating with enshrinement into the PGA of America Hall of Fame in 2025.

“I feel like I’m still staying busy,” said McLean, 75, as he proceeds with his 35th year of running the Jim McLean Golf School out of the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables. “We still have some great young golfers come out here and train.”

The world’s golf explosion going on six years or so has certainly made its way to Jim’s headquarters, contributing to his cheerfully crowded calendar.

Not to mention that midnight oil-burning typewriter of his. Jim’s 16th book, “The Houston Dynasty,” was released in March 2026 and chronicles some of the many tales he encountered in his college days, like when he first felt the hot Houston air, or once secretly held Ben Hogan’s golf clubs.

Widely known for coining the “X-Factor” instructional term and a corresponding 1997 book, Jim is set to release its sequel in just a few months.

But a packed schedule doesn’t mean the globally known golf teacher can’t sneak off to his Cascadian homeland each and every year. To this day, Jim carries a large amount of love for the Pacific Northwest, maintaining residence at Rainier Golf and Country Club on Seattle’s south side.

“I have a lot of my friends still in Seattle,” Jim said, citing his brother and two nephews, as well as multiple local courses he likes to play. “I love going back, and the weather is so perfect in the summertime, you cannot beat it. It’s just beautiful.”

He certainly came into contact with other local players while on the dynastic Houston Cougars roster, such as Fred Couples and Elwin Fanning, and the brothers Jim and Babe Hiskey. Jim always returned in the summers during college, bypassing the heat and humidity of Houston for the milder Northwest climate, in a place with no less opportunity to keep competing.

“From the city amateurs, to state amateurs, state opens and the Pacific Northwest Amateur,” he remembered of West Coast golf’s far-reaching nature, proven also by Tiger Woods’ win in the 1994 PNGA Men’s Amateur. “To have those opportunities to go play so many tremendous courses is very underrated.”

Of the many hats McLean wears, one is a position on the Golf Digest Committee, a role on which he has more than once suggested further Northwest coverage in the national publication.

His connections to New York and some of that state’s finest golf facilities are well-maintained, too, in ways that also make him a proud dad. Both of his sons – Matt and Jon – grew up playing golf. Matt went on to play at Wake Forest, and Jon at Oklahoma State, where he roomed with soon-to-be pros Rickie Fowler and Kevin Tway.

Today, Matt is director of instruction at Fishers Island Club on that small New York Island, while Jon is in the same role at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club in the Hamptons, the site of this year’s U.S. Open.

So, to recap Jim’s world: busy schedule? Check. Intact West Coast connections? Check. An excellent teaching pedigree shown through his own sons? Check and check.

As for enjoyment? Check that box off in the thickest, greenest ink you’ve got. Jim plainly feels like he’s entrenched within a profession that’s such a natural fit to the point it’s hardly a toil.

“I have a great interest in what I’m doing,” he says. “I have a lot of young people that I work with, and I look forward to going to work. I’m not teaching from morning ‘til night, but I do teach a reasonable amount, and I enjoy helping people of all ages.”

Consider the Jim McLean golf school thriving, too. Ponder why, and sure, one might think its South Floridian location allows for near-unfettered 365-day operation.

That’s completely right. But Jim knows there’s more to the school at its core.

“I have really great teachers,” he said. “We’re all teaching off the same sheet of music.”

A sheet of music most likely on the “A Major” scale.