'Sky is the limit' - son of golf legend tips young player for stardom
Javier Ballesteros enjoying new role in game after ending his own playing career
He is the son of a golfing God who is now working with Angels. Step forward Javier Ballesteros, Seve’s son, who may have given up on his own dream of golfing glory but, nonetheless, is getting huge satisfaction from a different role in the game.
“I stopped playing two years ago,” Ballesteros, who, seven years into his professional career, was still chiselling away on the third-tier Alps Tour when he played in the Dunhill Links in 2021, told The Scotsman.
“I was lucky enough that a small Spanish company called All in Sports approached me about starting a golf branch and I am now managing a few players, including Angel Ayora.”
The Spaniard he referred to is a 20-year-old who is stepping up to the DP World Tour in 2025 after finishing fourth in the Challenge Tour’s Road to Mallorca rankings last weekend.
“I think Angel is a special talent,” added Ballesteros, speaking at Club de Golf Alcanada in Port d’Alcudia after watching another of his players, Angel Hidalgo, beat Jon Rahm in a play-off to win the acconia Open de Espana in Madrid in September. He turned pro last year after starting the season with almost no category on the Challenge Tour.
“He had Category 15, which allowed him to play five tournaments while he also had some invites from the Spanish Golf Federation and he’s now finished this season fourth in the rankings. I really believe the sky is the limit for him.”
Some of the fans supporting Ayora in the Rolex Challenge Tour Grand Final in the north of Mallorca last week wore t-shirts that not only marked the day he officially became a DP World Tour player but also had one of Seve’s quotes on the back.
“Nothing is achieved without effort and what is achieved without effort, you neither appreciate nor value,” it read, with Ballesteros revealing he’d had them made and was proudly wearing a hat himself with Seve’s iconic logo on it from his celebration when winning The Open in 1984 at St Andrews.
“When you love a sport as much as I do with golf, first and foremost you want to become a professional and both play and win on the DP World Tour,” admitted Javier. “Though I practised very hard, it just wasn’t possible for me to achieve that goal and I am now very glad to have this alternative opportunity to help young players.”
As for the logo, he added: “I like to remember my dad. I do that every day. I always post on Instagram on ‘Seve Sundays’ and he is always in my mind. I try to go a lot to Pedrena to what I keep calling his house. It’s not any more as it is my brothers and my house, but I still say it is my dad’s house.”
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