In the wake of the U.S. Women’s Open in early June, Charley Hull, who was coming off both a top-20 finish at Lancaster (Pa.) Country Club and also a viral moment involving a half-smoked cigarette, was a guest on Dan Le Batard’s popular ESPN Radio show.
Several minutes after Hull had dialed in for the interview, Le Batard’s cohost, Jon Weiner, who goes by the nickname “Stugotz,” said to Hull, “I want to ask you a serious question. How many cigarettes per round do you—”
Here, Le Batard jumped in, saying, “Stop with the cigarettes! I promised her at the beginning that we wouldn’t wear her out with the cigarettes.”
But Stugotz, himself a smoker, pressed on.
“—because, Dan, it’s leading to something. I want to quit. She wants to quit. I want to quit with her. I think we’re going to make a pact here.”
Hull told Stugotz that she smokes five cigarettes per round, but the exchange revealed much more than just the extent of her habit — namely that the 28-year-old Brit and the team that represents her clearly want Hull to be known for much more than just her nicotine addiction, and understandably so.
This, of course, is the problem with virality: Once the internet brands you (and we should note here that Hull’s viral moment originated with a GOLF.com social post), for better or worse that affiliation can be tough to shake. Take the Solheim Cup last week. When a reporter posted a video of Hull cozying up to the rope line and borrowing a fan’s lighter, Golf Twitter gobbled it up; Barstool Sports also got in on the action, publishing an article that dubbed Hull the “People’s Golfer” and described her lighting up mid-round as “the coolest damn thing you ever did see.” The dart, the aviator shades, Hull’s glam: it all just kind of works together. Even at the Paris Olympics, where smoking was banned, Hull’s habit became a story line. The question on reporters’ minds: How would not getting her fix influence Hull’s play?
But if that’s the bad, here’s the good: the mass curiosity in Hull’s smoking has undoubtedly helped raise her profile (662,000 Instagram followers and counting) and marketability during a season when her game also has been in form. Even though Hull hasn’t won this year, she’s been on the kind of run that suggests a W is imminent: four top-25 finishes in the five majors, three other top-10 finishes and a Europe-best three-win week at the Solheim Cup that included a 6-and-4 dismantling of world No. 1 Nelly Korda. “I can’t believe she’s not already [a major champion],” four-time major winner Laura Davies crowed after Hull’s singles match. “She’s so talented.”
Hull is a lot of other things, too, many of which have also bolstered her Q-rating. For one, she’s an open book, probably far more open than her IMG minders would like. On Le Batard’s show, she let slip that she had split with her boyfriend the week before the U.S. Open. In a Telegraph interview earlier this year, she revealed she’s had lip fillers. “I’ve had half a mil in my lips, but so have many girls my age,” she said.
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