Getting A Rush From Golf
Sergio Romo is obsessed. Since retiring from Major League Baseball - where he spent 15 seasons, won three World Series championships with the San Francisco Giants, and became one of the most beloved closers of his era - Romo has found a new game to pour himself into. Golf.
"The thing I love about golf is that it doesn't care who you are," says the 43-year-old. "Out there, you're not a World Series champion. You're not El Mechon. You're just a guy trying to hit a ball. And somehow that's the most freeing thing in the world."
The Same Grind, Different Game
It makes sense that a man who built a career on the mound - particularly one built around a single devastating pitch, his signature slider - would find comfort in a sport that rewards obsessive refinement. For Romo, both pursuits demand the same thing: trust. You have to trust your mechanics, trust your prep, trust the moment.
"In baseball, the second you start thinking too much up there, you're done," he says. "Golf taught me the same lesson all over again. It humbles you constantly. But that's what keeps you coming back."
From the Imperial Valley to the Fairway
Romo grew up in Brawley, California, a small Imperial Valley town about 30 miles north of the Mexican border. His grandfather and father both played baseball - his grandfather a member of the Mexico City Diablos Rojos - and the sport was embedded in the family DNA before Sergio ever picked up a glove. Golf came later, the way it often does for professional athletes: slow at first, then all at once.
He'd already taken up the game before his final bow in a Giants uniform in March 2023 - a storybook farewell where he walked to the Oracle Park mound one last time, soaked in a rousing ovation, and fought back tears on his way back to the dugout. When the cleats came off for good, the golf shoes went on.
The Bullpen and the Tee Box
What keeps him hooked is the same thing that kept him in baseball bullpens deep into his 40s: the grind. "When I was pitching, I could throw 500 sliders in a week just to get the feel right," he says. "Golf is the same thing. You can go beat balls for three hours and then go right back tomorrow. That kind of obsessive repetition - that's where I live."
There's the camaraderie too. In baseball, the bullpen creates a brotherhood unlike anything else in sports - hours of waiting, watching, and holding things together before one moment of high-stakes action. Golf, Romo has found, scratches the same itch. "The golf community is a lot like a bullpen," he says. "You're out there with your people, talking trash, telling stories, competing. Only now nobody's throwing 97 miles per hour at your head."
Why TRUE
A TRUE Linkswear ambassador, Romo says the brand's approach to footwear mirrors what he's always looked for on the field: performance that doesn't announce itself. "I've never been the flashiest guy," he says. "I was a 28th-round draft pick who figured it out over time. TRUE is the same way - it's not about the logo, it's about what's actually happening under your feet. The zero drop, the wide toe box - your feet are just doing what feet are supposed to do. That's the kind of thing you feel on the first hole and don't stop noticing."
Giving Back
Off the course, Romo has remained active in the charitable golf world since retiring, participating in high-profile events like the Applied Underwriters Invitational - a tournament that has raised tens of millions for children's health and education nonprofits. He shows up year after year not just for the optics, but because community work has always been part of who he is.
The kid who grew up on the Mexico border, who nearly enlisted in the Navy instead of playing ball, who had teammates sign his final big-league hat because he didn't want to go in there alone - that guy still shows up.
"Baseball gave me everything," Romo says. "And now I get to use golf to give some of it back. That's a pretty good deal."
