That logo on Aaron Rai's shirt? Here's the story (and coaches) behind it

Yes! Calling all new Raiheads out there.

As if we needed another reason to jump on the bandwagon of a new and unexpected PGA Championship winner, right in Aronimink in the suburbs of Philadelphia, the storied Aaron Rai. Here it comes anyway – put your gloved hands on it here.

You know how (to cite one famous example) John “Wild Thing” Daly, the 1991 PGA champion, will rent out any part of his golf apparel in the name of commercials? Aaron Rai, the Mild Thing of golf, does not. Every day is a crazy day at Raiworld. And we love it!

Consider the animated logo and four letter words – Me and My Golf – above the brim of his baseball cap. You can also see it on the all-important right chest of Rai's shirt. (The right chest, for a good golfer, gets more air time than the left, at least at the end of the swing.) Those are the two main pieces of real estate. JD will tell you that. So does JT, as in Justin Thomas, two-time PGA Championship winner. Anywhere a professional travel agent will tell you that. Except Aaron Rai. Those places are not rented. They are a gift to his two greatest teachers.

Namely, the two guys behind Me and My Golf, Andy Proudman and Piers Ward, English golfers/teaching professionals who have been with Rai for most of his golfing life.

“I almost feel disrespectful, I just call them 'my coaches,'” Rai, 31, said at the PGA Championship winner's press conference earlier this month. “They've been so much more to me than that, since I was young, young, on this journey as a professional golfer. They've been my mentors, my big brothers. They're almost like family to me.”

Proudman and Ward, who were with Rai earlier in the week in Aronimink, were honored, but not surprised, when they heard the service.

“He's a very generous person,” Proudman said in a phone interview the other day.

Ward added, “You can see the growth in everything he does.”

You might say that Rai's comments on Sunday night about his two teachers were right on brand, except for that a symbol it's not a name you just associate with Rai. He is not looking to get paid to use this or that product. He doesn't want the product at all. His stuff is tried and true and getting better all the time.

Rai's black gloves, for his left and right hands, are not made by FootJoy or G-Fore or any other golf company. They are the product of a small English manufacturer called MacWet Limited, makers of all weather gloves for sailors, hunters and the equestrian set. If you zoom in on a Rai golf glove you can see the unusual company logo. The chances of it registering with you are close to zero, unless you're a sailor or a hunter or a well-positioned member of the horse set.

Proudman and Ward remember when Rai first wore them, as a golf kid hitting balls in a wet, wet English winter. He was already a self-made golfer, a smart guy who was going to get to university, but his dream and plan was to play professional golf regularly.

“At 17, he was ready,” Ward said. He's not ready to take on the world, but he's ready to start playing championship golf for a prize, traversing the United Kingdom at a young age, often with his father as his manager. As for his attitude, teachers say, Rai was a 12-year-old champion, but not a copy-cat, mini-me pro. To this day, you can see young golfers who look like 10-year-old Rickie Fowlers.

Rai, through his two teachers, was a young and analytical player who discovered things on his own, with the help of his two teachers and his father. He learned from his divots and his ball flight (as old school as you can get) again from the biometric skin stickers on his body.

Proudman started working with Rai when he was about 4 years old. Ward entered the picture a few years later. They met him at the 3 Hammers Golf Complex in England, a Birmingham short-course public driving range where Proudman and Ward worked. This is where two teachers developed their method of integrating everything (mind and body) into teaching which is the core of Me and My Golf, which is the teaching business they own and operate today.

“With the driver, Aaron's thing was always played from a distance,” Proudman said. “We had a 70-yard hole, and he was driving the green [age] 5 and 6. He was always comfortable hitting the driver in very small areas.”

After Rai's win at Aronimink, many casual golf fans, hearing him talk about the game he clearly loves, were struck by his humble and humble demeanor. Rai is an Englishman of Indian descent on both his mother's and father's sides. Rai's mother spent years in Kenya. The two teachers say that when you visit Rai's children's home, you are overcome, in the most delicious way, by the aromas and spices of Indian and African cooking.

Like their now famous student, Proudman and Ward are modest in nature. They described traveling across the United States and Australia some years ago, staying in hostels to cut costs, doing extensive research on some of their favorite teaching professionals, a few of these familiar names. In the videos, you can see two teachers working with Rai as he uses the cane to not only align but also measure and position the foot. This is accomplished. . . standing on the alignment rod. Two teachers often ask probing questions and listen carefully, letting the expert do his thing. Good teachers are always learning from their students. It is a two-way street.

“I remember at the BMW PGA Championship [at Wentworth, in England] “For about six years now, Piers has been swinging me until 11:30 at night on Tuesdays,” said Rai on Sunday night at Aronimink. They played a big part in this cup and a big part in my development as a golfer.” But Saturday night at Aronimink, Rai was the last man standing in the short game practice area, hitting one pitch after another, without a soul around, not even his caddy.

The two teachers did not share the financial details of their program with Rai, but they explained in detail how he works in everything he does in the game of golf, whether it is working with the guys from Me and My Golf, not being on social media, using an old driver, rarely looking at his cell phone or anything else.

“If it doesn't fulfill his desire to improve in the game of golf, he doesn't care about it,” said one of these women.

“You're different,” said another.

We have seen. We celebrate.

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at [email protected]