The second coming of Goose: One of the world’s best disc golfers, Aaron Gossage, returns to defend his GoPro Mountain Games title

Given his lineage, Aaron Gossage maybe should have assumed professional sports would be his eventual calling all along. During countless childhood rounds with his dad growing up in Grand Junction, however, it never crossed his mind disc golf could become a career.

“This wasn’t really on my radar until a couple years ago, I guess,” said Aaron, the grandson of the cousin of hall-of-fame pitcher Goose Gossage. Aaron has also adopted the “Goose” moniker.

After helping to launch Colorado Mesa University’s own disc golf team, Gossage amped up his playing time considerably. Always interested in science, technology and math, he studied engineering and physics before finally settling on computer science.

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“I had a plan to get a job doing that,” he said. By his 2020 graduation, however, his skyrocketing rating had catapulted him within striking distance of a viable Professional Disc Golf Association (PDGA) pro tour livelihood.

“And then I was like, ‘you know what, this would be a good time to just go out, try the pro tour and everything,'” he said. Rolling the dice was less akin to a first job interview and more about simply not having regrets.

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“Mainly I was like, ‘hey I just want to do this to kind of prove to myself I can’t make it so I can be happy with the rest of my life,” he recalled.

Of course, he proved just the opposite.

A second-place finish at the 2020 Colorado state disc golf championships was a seminal turning point. After taking the five-stroke win, Joe Rovere told Gossage he believed there were great things coming from the then 22-year-old.

“That was one of those big deciding factors; I’d always known I could try and play at that touring level,” Gossage said in a YouTube interview for his sponsor Discraft last fall.

“Now was a good time to go out on the road and see what I could do.”

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In 2021, he finished the PDGA’s Disc Golf Pro Tour (DGPT) ranked 34th in the world. He jumped to 16th the following season, which culminated with a runner-up finish to Paul McBeth in a thrilling — but ultimately tragic, somewhat bittersweet — PDGA World Championships in Emporia, Kansas.

The drama started on the final round when Gossage gave away his three-stroke lead during a disastrous sixth hole. After going back and forth for the following few holes, McBeth took the lead, only to shank his 15th-hole drive. Gossage missed low on a risky, pond-facing putt on the course’s iconic, island 16th hole, and McBeth nailed his similarly angled look from just a step closer. They came to the 17th neck-and-neck.

Gossage looked well-positioned to regain his lead on account of McBeth’s terrible drive, but the 32-year-old six-time world champion from Huntington Beach, California, recovered with an insane 450-foot second shot. He proceeded to drill the 80-foot putt and take a one-stroke lead into the final hole.

“The putting is just getting out of hand — people are making putts from any distances,” Gossage told the Vail Daily this week when asked how the game has changed at the highest level in recent years. One could only wonder if McBeth’s crazy moment in Emporia was on the back of his mind during that response.

“It’s crazy to watch.”

Gossage stayed cool in Emporia, rifling his own monster forehand second shot at 18. It settled by the hole and led to a play-off-forcing birdie. Back at 16 to decide the title, the Coloradan’s drive — though it landed on dry land — was considered out of bounds. McBeth easily cruised to the win — his fourth in a row.

Reflecting on worlds, the silver medalist told Discraft, “It really has changed my own view of what I’m capable of and I know that when the pressure is a little bit lower or when I’m able to handle those nerves, I can compete with anyone.”

Even after his breakout 2022 campaign, Gossage doesn’t have too many specific goals for this year.

“Definitely played above where I thought I could,” he said of last season. “My goal is just to kind of maintain that status, get myself up there at the top and get myself in contention for wins more … and get that kind of practice, that pressure — all that stuff.” 

He’d like to be at the pro tour finals, reserved for the top-32 in the world rankings, at the end of the year.

“It would be nice to get a win, of course, but that’s pretty hard to accomplish, said Gossage, who comes to Vail firing on all cylinders. He placed second at the Portland Open last weekend, moving up nine places to No. 10 in the world rankings. 

“The season’s going pretty well so far,” he said. “I had kind of a slow start, playing pretty consistent golf but not any great finishes. But the last couple tournaments I’ve been playing quite a bit better.”

One of the top-10 distance guys on tour, the shortened Maloit Park course doesn’t give Gossage a window for flashing his 500-plus-foot power. He’s alright testing his short game, though.

“The holes are going to be technical, you’re going to have different gaps to hit, throw through the trees, that kind of thing. At the end of the day, it kind of minimizes my advantage over the field,” he said of the two courses, which sit a hop, skip and a throw away from his family’s cabin between Leadville and Minturn.

“It’s kind of fun because it really is competitive. It’s not something where I come and I’m like, ‘oh I know I’m going to win. It’s something you’ve gotta work for, for sure,” he continued.

“And it’s cool playing with the locals. They all enjoy seeing a pro tour player show different lines and different shots they’re not used to seeing.” 

When asked about what other evolutions the young disc golf tour, which started in 2016, is experiencing, Gossage noted the increased depth of the overall field.

“It used to be there’s just three or four guys right at the top that are winning every weekend,” he said. “Now, there’s not nearly as much separation; we’re all pretty close. Anyone can kind of win on any week.”

Disc golf missed the 2024 Olympic bid, but there’s hope for the future.

“We’ve been talking about it a bit and we’ve been trying to make a push for that, but we’re still a ways away,” Gossage said, adding that drug-testing implementation is one of the main logistical hold ups.

“I would love to see it in the Olympics; that would be really cool,” he continued.

“It’s big in Europe and some in Japan as well, but it’s just so predominantly a U.S.-based sport that I can’t really see it being an Olympic sport in the next few years.”

While other athletes on the pro tour will either be chasing points at a silver series — the DGPT’s second tier of tournaments — competition in Montana or heading over to the High Plains Challenge, a long-standing regional event in Fort Morgan, Gossage chose Vail.

“It just says a lot that he’s making a point to step away from the tour for a couple weeks just to do this,” said Leonard Siegel, the Mountain Games disc golf tournament event director.

The Grand Junction native is excited to unwind and relax before the PDGA’s upcoming midwest swing.

“Just overall, it’s a really fun weekend and if it keeps working out, it’s a great time to take a little bit of a break from the pro tour,” the two-time Mountain Games winner (and two-time runner-up) said.

“It’s a good time for me to stop off at home, have a good time.”