GOLF : FOLK HERO LANDERS IN RALPHS FIELD.

Byline: Dave Shelburne Daily News Staff Writer

Robert Landers, the tennis shoe-shod folk hero of the 1995 PGA Senior Tour, will make a repeat appearance at this week's Ralphs Senior Open.

The 52-year-old Texas dairy farmer, who realized an everyman's dream by borrowing from his savings, traveling to Florida and earning a '95 tour berth in qualifying school, was one of three alternates added to the Ralphs field Monday.

Landers, Bob Carson and Dennis Coscina got the chance to play in the Friday-through-Sunday tournament at Wilshire Country Club when Tommy Armour, Billy Casper and 1994 Ralphs champion Jack Kiefer withdrew.

Landers charmed appreciative fans nationwide with his homespun ways last year, when he and his black and white cowhide golf bag - toted by wife Freddie - were constant gallery attractions at his 35 tournament stops.

By the end of the year, he had probably been the subject of more feature stories than player of the year Jim Colbert and super-rookie Hale Irwin combined.

But while Landers, a self-taught golfer who used to practice shots among his cows in Azie, Texas, proved a hit with fans, media and his fellow players, he failed to hit well enough on tour.

His $77,378 in season earnings left him 77th on the money list, 46 spots shy of qualifying for this year's tour. That sent him back to qualifying school, where he shot 67-76-66-70 before losing to John Schroeder in a four-man playoff for the '96 tour's final full-time berth.

Relegated to alternate status and sponsor exemptions this year, he'll likely draw another appreciative gallery at Wilshire this week, where fans again are expected to moooo their approval.

Smoke signals: Walter Morgan, the cigar-chomping retired Army sergeant who joined the Senior Tour in 1991, will be seeking his second California win of the year this week at Wilshire.

Morgan, the tour's 1995 comeback player of the year, held off Gary Player to capture the FHP Health Care Classic at Ojai in March, winning in a playoff.

He enters the Ralphs Classic as one of this year's most successful players, having also won the Ameritech Open at Chicago in July.

His top-25 finish in last week's Vantage Championship raised his season total to just under $770,000, keeping him ninth on the 1996 money list.

Not bad for a former baseball player who never touched a golf club until age 25. Of course, his first-ever round, while still in the service after two tours in Vietnam, was a 79. That score, on the course adjacent to the baseball field where he used to spend much of his free time in Hawaii, got Morgan thinking his athletic future might be better served on the fairways than basepaths.

So far, so good for Morgan, who includes three career victory cigars among his Senior Tour stogies.

``It gets easier every week,'' said the 55-year-old North Carolina native, who has 10 top-10 finishes this year and has placed in the top 25 in 22 of his 30 starts.

The six-year senior veteran could take a big step toward joining the tour's single-season millionaire club should he bring home the $120,000 first-place money in the $800,000 Ralphs Classic.

Filling the field: Jim Adams of Newport Beach, Bill Lytle of Hemet and Frank Groves of Solvang earned the final three Ralphs Classic berths in Monday's qualifying tournament at Palos Verdes Golf Club.

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Photo: Walter Morgan, who won the FHP Health Care Classic a t Ojai in March, hopes he'll be planting his lips on another trophy on Sunday.

Daily News File Photo