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The former PGA Tour player who alleged that Matt Kuchar substantially underpaid a local caddie after winning the Mayakoba Classic late last year has doubled-down on his accusation.
Tom Gillis took to Twitter last weekend to claim that Kuchar paid David ‘El Tucan’ Ortiz only $3,000 out of the $1.3m cheque he banked after winning his eighth PGA Tour title in November.
Kuchar, who won the Sony Open on Sunday, immediately dismissed the furore as “not a story” and said “it wasn’t $3,000”.
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Now, Gillis has come back saying that he has been in contact with ‘El Tucan’… and he has reiterated his (slightly adjusted) claims.
Been in direct contact with El Tucan now for a few days. He did receive a total of 5k. Not 3k after tournament. Still only 0.0023% percent of check. Fortunately there's no more middle man. Stay tuned hopefully he gets paid properly
— Tom Gillis (@tcgillis) January 16, 2019
In the interests of accuracy, it’s worth pointing out that Gillis has got it wrong with his calculation: 10% (the generally accepted going-rate for a caddie) of $1.3m is $130,000.
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If it was, indeed, $5,000 that Kuchar paid ‘El Tucan’, that would make his share of the cheque 0.38% – which is still some 26 times short of 10%.
Kuchar wasn’t asked about the controversy in his post-round press conference on Sunday and Ortiz has yet to comment publicly.
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