John Daly in Progress

John Daly is perhaps one of the most controversial golfers to have ever played the game.

He is as well-known for huge gambling losses -- he has lost $55 million -- as he is for being one of only six golfers to win two major tournaments before turning 30, a group that includes Bobby Jones, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods.

Daly tries to shed some light on his struggles with gambling and alcohol in his new book, "My Life in and out of the Rough: the Truth behind All That Bull **** You Think You Know about Me." The book hits stores today.

"This was very therapeutic," said Daly, 40. "It got a lot of things off my chest. Things I was feeling about, certain things in my life. And a lot of it is not the greatest things that young kids should be reading. But the thing is it's the truth."

An Adrenaline Rush

Daly writes about losing to Woods in a playoff last fall. He still managed to win $750,000 from the tournament and immediately took that money to Las Vegas.

In five hours, he lost $1.6 million gambling. Daly said he was hooked on adrenaline.

"Every athlete that plays a sport or anybody who is competitive in life, you get the adrenaline going," he said. "When we're not on the golf course, you just feel that [while] gambling."

Bad Boy Golfer Cleans Up, Comes Clean Watch Video

Luckily for Daly, who makes $9 million overall in tournaments, he does many corporate appearances, outings and endorsements to keep him afloat.

The jury is still out on how great Daly could be. In the book, he writes about the time he asked Woods to have a few beers with him, but Woods said he had to work out.

"If I had your talent, John, I wouldn't have to work out," Daly recalled Woods telling him in his book.

What If?

Daly believes he could have been more successful if he had been more disciplined.

"I think if I'd have learned to say no about a lot of things in the early 1990s. You know, too much golf overseas, not concentrating enough on the tour, going over chasing money. … It was so easy," he said. "Overseas, it pays so much money to play and it was just too easy."

Daly said he was working hard on his golf game and actually practicing. He has given up hard liquor but continues to drinks beer and gamble.

"Gambling is something that's just a lot of fun," Daly said. "I don't do what I used to do. Most of those [losses] were from 1992 to 1998. I went two or three years without gambling at all. Now it's more or less a smaller slot machine and I work myself up. I've learned to moderate things a lot better."

Daly still has to grapple with his loved ones' problems. In the last five years, his father has pulled a gun on him, his mother has died, and his fourth and current wife entered prison in January to serve a five-month sentence for money laundering charges in a gambling and drug operation.

"You know, I look at it as 'Hey, I'm not going to give up on my wife,'" he said. "I'm not going to give up on people who have problems. It's so easy -- I've had too many people give up on me when I've had problems. To me, that's not the way to live. You're there with the good times and the bad, and you keep on going."