Cancer survivor Jarrod Lyle returns to professional golf

The golf world will get a special treat on Thursday morning at Royal Melbourne when Jarrod Lyle returns to golf after 20 months away battling myeloid leukemia.

Lyle, a 32-year-old professional golfer from Australia, had to step away from the game when he was diagnosed with cancer for the second time (he first was diagnosed when he was 17) and while it has been a serious battle, the kind-hearted Lyle is just excited about getting back to the game and trying to play it again for a living.

His first goal is holding it together on the first tee on Thursday.

“Just walking to that first tee and teeing the ball up and trying to hit it — that’s probably going to be the hardest thing,” Lyle said on Tuesday.

“It’s just going to let a whole lot of stuff out. Hopefully when that ball flies I can just get on to playing golf and put everything behind me and just get back to the golfer that I am.”

Lyle has played in 102 career PGA Tour events, carding five top-10 finishes and 10 top-25 finishes, and his hole-in-one at the Waste Management Open back in 2011 was one of our shots of the year after the season wrapped up.

The PGA Tour video people did an incredible tribute to Lyle that you can watch below, so check that out and if you want to wish him good luck this week, send him a tweet over at @jarrodlylepga.

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Shane Bacon is the editor of Devil Ball Golf and Busted Racquet on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shanebaconblogs@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter at @ShaneBacon!