Wyndham Clark's career has taken off since his maiden PGA Tour win at the 2023 Well's Fargo Championship.
Since then, the American has claimed his first Major title, at that year's US Open, finished third at the Tour Championship two months later, and won one of the PGA Tour's signature events in 2024, the Pebble Beach Pro-Am. In between all that, he also made his maiden Ryder Cup appearance in the match at Marco Simone.
Throughout that time, Clark has had John Ellis on his bag. Ellis attended the University of Oregon, where he played college golf before turning pro in 2003. He had some success, too. Five years later, he won the Canadian Tour's Order or Merit after claiming three wins in 2008.
That year, he also reached a career-high world ranking of 245th, but despite several more seasons as a pro, there were only rare glimpses of what might have been, including a handful of PGA Tour appearances, which led to a best finish of T24 at the 2010 Frys.com Open, and two missed cuts at the US Open.
Finally, Ellis left his professional career behind in 2016 to take up the position of assistant to men’s head coach Casey Martin at his alma mater. At that time, Clark was at the university in his senior year, and the two teamed up, with Martin assigning Ellis as his caddie.
That relationship soon began to flourish, and much of that was to do with Ellis' ability to get the best out of Clark, as Martin explained to Golfweek's Adam Schupak: "John did an unbelievable job for a guy that’s never coached before. He and Wyndham hit it off. He has an amazing ability to kind of tease Wyndham and to get his point across without being overly serious. He absolutely nailed it.”
The next year, Clark turned professional, and Ellis continued in the role. By the 2018 season, Clark had earned his PGA Tour card and got off to an encouraging start, with several top-10 finishes. There were frustrating times, too, and, despite runner-up at the 2020 Bermuda Championship, Clark failed to break into the world's top 100 until a T5 at the March 2023 Valspar Championship took him to 90th.
Two months later, he had his first PGA Tour win, after which Ellis described his talent, saying: "He has the work ethic to be the best player in the world. To win against this field, on this course, the next step will be feeling comfortable in Majors, but the sky is the limit.”
Those words have appeared prophetic as time has gone on, with Clark's other victories - including at the Los Angeles Country Club Major - helping him become a mainstay of the world's top 10.
Clark has warm words for his bagman, too, and told Golf's Fully Equipped podcast: "He wants it just as bad as me. We have a great relationship. We play Gin [card game] on the road all the time, we've stayed together a handful of times, we go and play golf a lot together, I'll hang out with his family. It's definitely more than just a player-caddie relationship."
