Maverick McNealy is the son of Sun Microsystems founder Scott McNealy. Sun Micro was acquired in 2010 by Oracle for a cool $7.4 billion. But you would never know it by the way McNealy and his wife Susan have raised their four children. “Despite the family’s wealth, the boys slept in one room with four twin beds down a wall, barracks style, and did their homework in a specially-built study with a desk along each wall and chairs in the middle,” writes the WSJ’s John Paul Newport. “We wanted them to do stuff that’s productive. Get used to being productive. Productive is fun,” says McNealy.
Son Maverick is having quite a career playing golf at Stanford University. But he didn’t start playing golf full-time until he reached his senior year of high school. After all, sports is supposed to be fun.
As for sports, they were priority number two, behind academics. “We don’t let them be single-sport athletes. I don’t believe in that,” McNealy said. “Sports are fun. That’s what they’re supposed to be, although we seem to have lost that. The reason I think Mav is doing so well in golf now is because he knows it’s a game. We taught them to love the game, not work at the game.” Family vacations in Palm Springs, Calif., often consisted of dawn-to-dusk golf. Maverick said that he and his father have played 72 holes a day together multiple times.
Through high school, however, hockey was an equal passion and McNealy explored the possibility of playing both in college somewhere. “I definitely think the athleticism of hockey translates well into the golf swing,” he said, mentioning the balance, stability and core strength required to generate swing speed. “I miss it a little bit but I’m having so much fun with golf I don’t miss it too much.” He thanks hockey and the other sports he played growing up for his continuing excitement about golf. “I’m the opposite of burned out,” he said.