PointMisser.com

...but at least I'm not a rally killer.

Yes, it seems my post last week on the latest musings from GolfDigest.com's "Bomb and Gouge" boys struck a nerve.  So much so, that Bomb and Gouge dropped their unfunny shtik for an ultra serious shtik.

Though somehow I suspect this post was more Bomb (E. Michael Johnson) than Gouge (Mike Stachura)...

We're sure Geoff Shackelford is a nice man. He is certainly an accomplished writer and contributor to the design of a golf course. But personal attacks on our integrity are a sign of weakness and low self-esteem.

But see, they never get personal. No sirree.

And, of course, point-missing. One of his latest musings suggests that our recent posting on attacking the issue of u-grooves was somehow motivated by a desire to promote the golf equipment industry and defend the USGA's equipment decisions.

No, just the golf industry part. I think we're all in agreement that the USGA is indefensible at this point. 

His overused lament is that the golf ball—that ongoing source of sturm und drang among the assembled panic-stricken, progress fearing golf Sanhedrin—needs to be dealt with in some draconian rollback, retrograde fashion.

It's a tired solution-less solution to a problem that does not exist.

I think it's time for the boys to visit The List, where they might note that it's not only little ole me suggesting something be done about this whole distance race, but people who actually matter like Jack Nicklaus, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Watson, Arnold Palmer and, wait, who's that down at the letter T saying he wished a line had been drawn by the USGA? Oh right, your boss! 

But the bigger issue is what exactly are the Shackelfords of the world afraid of? That Myopia Hunt won't be able to host another U.S. Open? That Wannamoisett is too short to be appreciated by today's players? That the subtle beauty of the gently lofted mashie-niblick and the stymie are lost to eternity? The game is a living, growing thing, and just as I assume Mr. Shackelford, despite his bleating cries, no longer wears diapers, the game too must leave behind the things it no longer needs. We may be afraid of distance and the golf ball, but fear is borne and festers out of ignorance. Knowledge and rational thinking keep it in check.

Note to head pros at Myopia, Wannamoisett and anything else built before 1960: E. Michael Johnson says the game can leave behind the things it no longer needs and includes your courses! 

In my conversations with officials at the USGA and the R&A, average driving distance of average golfers has maybe increased 10 or so yards over the last 15 years, to a whopping 210-215 yards. If 215 yard tee shots are obsoleting your golf course, it might be time to pick a new venue. An ultra-elite group of players may be hitting it farther, but 99 percent of the rest of us aren't. And when we roll the ball back next year or the year after, how soon until we have to do it again? And which of us is ready to play a shorter ball? And if the insanely easy to play golf equipment were such an advantage, everyone would be shooting 59 every day. The game finds a way to win.

So the equipment never really works, therefore we must continue to keep pushing the latest thing...for what reason again?

And because there is no need to bog this debate down with an endless dissertation, let's just mull some facts.

1. Currently, there are just two players on the PGA Tour who are averaging more than 300 yards in the tour's statistics that measure all drives. Two.

2. In the tour's driving distance average statistics, 20 players are averaging 300 or more yards. But here's the thing, only half of that number have ever won a tour event—EVER—and a third of that number (Woods, Couples, Love, Mickelson, etc.) have always been among the longest hitters. And here's one more thing, the number of 300-yard hitters is down from a year ago.

3. Driving distance has increased dramatically over the last 10 years. But it's flattened out in the last five. It's up about half a yard this year over last year. 18 inches. That's an increase of 0.17 percent. Is that the sky falling, or maybe something else?

They were doing so well there until point #3.

Flattened in the last five? Now, according to my media guide, the 2001 average was 279.4. And as of this week, the current Tour average is 289.7 (+10.3 yards).  And the gain since 1996 is 23 yards, and nearly half of that has come in the last five years.  Flattened?

Okay, the big wrap up:

The game survives when it chooses to grow.

Was that Darwin or Wind who said that? Sorry... 

Equipment isn't making anyone a dominant player. And when it chooses to test elite players in the way we average golfers are tested on a regular basis, the game will be stronger because it has the power to consistently find ways to turn back all threats.

Maybe that will make sense if we put it in the Ali G translata...

equipment isn't makin anyone a dominant playa. and whun it chooses to da test elite players in da way we average golfers is tested on a regular basis, da game will be stronga coz it as da powa to consistently check ways to turn back all threats.  

No, didn't help. 

"Their skills are limited."

Jemele Hill in the Orlando Sentinel tackles the "why no promising young players" question and gets some interesting replies.

"Young guys just pick a driver out of a bin that goes 320 [yards]," said [Frank] Lickliter, who shot a blistering 62 in the final round of Disney's Funai Classic on Sunday. "They can't carve one on the fairway. They don't know how to knock down a wedge. Their skills are limited."

And Hill writes:

You could blame a lot of things for why golf is the latest sport lacking a strong presence of young American superstars -- the increased presence by talented foreigners is one -- but our obsession with flash is slowly killing U.S. dominance in sports around the globe.

Our kids would rather practice a 360-degree dunk a billion times than set one proper screen. They would rather obsess about home runs than learn how to stretch a single into a double. They would rather hit an 100-mph serve than develop a decent backhand.

In golf, it's all about the 300-yard blast off the tee. Michelle Wie has a big swing and an awfully hollow trophy case, but a mighty big bank account.

"It's kind of sad what's happened to the skill part of the game," said Scott Verplank, a 20-year pro. "The skills required to be a great player in this game are not near as important as they used to be. It's really changed the game."

This is just another depressing reminder of how much our sports culture emphasis on style has hurt the overall product.

Most of us were just fooled into thinking it was strictly a U.S. basketball problem. As it turns out, it's an American problem.

You can sit there and blame YouTube, MySpace and ESPN for the downfall of sports society, but we must take a hard look at ourselves first.

Most of us are more impressed with a teeth-rattling hit in football than a left guard's pull.

This is where you wish Jemile had floated her column idea by her colleague, Steve Elling. 

Golf course designers and PGA officials know we're hooked on Happy Gilmore-esque shots, which is why more courses are being built to complement power instead of finesse.

Ugh...yep, it's all the fault of architects. Now, why is it again that architects are lengthening courses?

Letter From Saugerties, October 23, 2006

It's been a while since former USGA Executive Director Frank Hannigan sent a "letter" (his previous correspondences are here and here). But thankfully he has broken his silence with a devastating appraisal of the current USGA that includes his reaction to the recent ESPN.com chat comments by Walter Driver.

Take it away, Frank...

I was fascinated, if not encouraged, by the passionate arguments on your site after the recent blowing of smoke by USGA president Walter Driver on the subject of distance control.

The central point was missed.  Rolling back distance is not a technical issue.  It’s a political matter centering on the retention of position without annoyance or threats.  

Driver and his USGA know precisely what’s happened.  The average driving distance on the PGA Tour shot up 28 yards on average in 10 years.   The USGA wishes the clock would revert to 1994 so it could at least consider behaving correctly.  But it can’t even say so because that would be an admission it has bungled its most important duty.

Two distinct happenings accounted for the new yardage.  The first was the advent of excessive spring like effect in drivers in the mid 90s.  Everybody on the tour got 10 to 15 yards longer.

Then followed modifications to the ball that enabled the best players to pick up another 15 yards even though the new balls still conformed to the USGA’s critical overall distance standard test.

On spring-like effect, the Rules of Golf already said that clubs designed to produce that effect, akin to what you see with metal bats in amateur baseball, would not be acceptable.   There was no specificity however.  So the USGA Executive Committee in 1998 made a craven decision.

They correctly approved a new test to measure coefficient of restitution (COR) but instead of setting it at the level of the best metal drivers of the early 90s they chose to write the standard around what was already on the market.

Had the right thing been done there would have been hell to pay since a great number of existing drivers would have failed.  A prominent member of that executive committee later said to me, “We thought we were betting the franchise on that vote.”  He and others feared a rebellion by the owners of the springier drivers which would not then conform to the Rules of Golf.  But if you are billing yourself as the “governing body of golf” it follows that you will occasionally have to make unpopular decisions. For more than a decade the USGA has caved in the face of conflict, and by no means only on equipment.

When the longer flying balls came about the USGA was already equipped with a superb testing mechanism, an indoor device that, quite simply, can predict the outcome of any hit.

It was as clear as day that the changed balls were exceeding the intent of the distance tests.

Having capitulated on the driver, the USGA consistently bowed on the ball - announcing that no ball on its list of conforming products would be banned.  Instead, it went into its fake mode and changed the distance standard to accommodate the new and unexpected.

By the way, it’s ridiculous that the USGA should be held to a standard whereby its rules on  equipment have to foresee every conceivable change. The founding fathers of the nation did not anticipate that General Electric would poison the Hudson River, but GE is damn well going to have to pay for cleaning it up.               

Two points: 1. It was the USGA’s highest priority to put an absolute cap on added distance achieved by equipment changes while I worked at the USGA between 1961 and 1989; 2. Nobody HAS to play the USGA’s rules.   Its position should have been to reject the springy drivers and the longer flying balls while saying “We recognize golfers can go right on playing the other stuff but they may NOT  say they are then doing so under the USGA Rules of Golf.  Take your choice.”

Rolling back distance now can be done in any number of ways.  A simple alteration would be to say that as of January 1, 2008, the fail point for the overall distance standard would be 305 yards instead of 320 yards.   Assuming the PGA Tour accepted such a change (remember, nobody has to do what the USGA wants) driving distance on the Tour would drop immediately and considerably. 

The people who now run the USGA are unlikely to come close to making such a change because they want to appear in ceremonies as rulers and get to hang out with Arnold Palmer.  The time has long past when the USGA could enlist for its executive committee citizens of consequence willing to actually take care of golf rather than amuse themselves with toys like a leased jet.

A new and shorter ball would surely be made.  But manufacturers might very well keep on producing today’s ball.

In the pro shops of the hallowed member owned clubs - Pine Valley, Cypress Point, The Country Club - the USGA would be backed to the hilt with notices that only the USGA approved balls would be tolerated on their courses.   Ah, but what about Wal-Mart?  Offered the chance, how many of the long balls might it sell, and at discounted prices to boot?

What would be the outcome on daily fee courses everywhere?  Might there be chaos with two distinctly different balls in play?   I think, and over a short time, the USGA would prevail because there is an internal drive for uniformity in equipment among golfers.  It’s akin to the monkey grip in babies. The USGA should be more than willing to bet the franchise but it will not.

There is a great irony in all this.   The modern equipment changes are enablers only for a tiny percentage of golfers.  You have to be very good to take advantage of added spring like effect.   The average golfer prefers to think otherwise, willing to hit his credit card for a $425 driver that does nothing for him or her.  You have to be a low handicap golfer to get the added juice--good enough to make the semi-finals in a club championship.

But even if I’m wrong so that the average golfer is getting a few more yards, if there was a rollback in distance the matter could be leveled out by putting the tee markers up a few yards.

The USGA has been allowed to stand pat because what has happened is akin to a victimless crime.

The PGA Tour, God knows, has not been harmed economically by the distance explosion.

The Tour exists only (forget the First Tee nonsense) to enrich its members and it has done so sensationally. The USGA, on the other hand, exists to define golf.

Accordingly, there is no pressure on the USGA to act honestly.

I do not blame the manufacturers.  They too have one purpose - make money for their owners.   Many are not tortured by brilliance.    When it comes to balls, one company, Acushnet, dominates the market.    The rest fight over slices of market share.  It would be in the best interest of every ball maker save Acushnet to jump all over a new ball, to start the game from scratch with ads proclaiming “our new ball is more like the old ball than X’s ball.”

The contributors to your site made much of the 2002 Statement of Principles issued jointly by the USGA and its partner in victimless crimes, the R&A of Scotland.  They proclaimed they would not tolerate any “significant” increase in distance. To clarify when they meant to clamp down they used the word “now.”

The very next year, 2003, witnessed an enormous increase in driving distance: 6.5 yards.

By any reasonable standard, that increase was “significant”.  It happened because the manufacturers were playing out the law of physics. They’d gone as far as they could go.  The USGA and R&A did nothing.

Driver has fallen back on saying that distance has been “nearly flat the last 3 years.”  He’s right, but all the horses have left the barns.     

I think stability is likely for some time.  In honesty, though, I must report that if someone had asked me in 1989, when I was managing the affairs of the USGA, if spring-like effect was likely to have an adverse consequence, I would have said “No chance.”

There has been no upside to the collapse of the USGA on distance.   Golf, as a recreational activity, has been flat nationally for a long time.    But in terms of being both artistic and competitive courses like the San Francisco Golf Club, Colonial and the Chicago Golf Club, they have become toys and museum pieces. I fear the same has happened at Shinnecock Hills which was tortured by the USGA at the 2004 U.S. Open in order to produce high scores.

Clubs that want to entertain big events have done what clubs from time immemorial have done when the ball was juiced. They have lengthened their courses significantly and sometimes comically (see the Old Course at St. Andrews which had a tee added on another course.)

As for new courses with thoughts of grandeur, the standard has jumped from 7,000 to 7,500 yards in a short time. That requires more real estate and increased maintenance costs.

The USGA, charged with protecting golf, has caused it to become more expensive.

The only way the fervent minority who care about the failure of the USGA could grow and become effective would be to mount a direct challenge to the USGA as it is.   That means ousting the current executive committee.  A revolt.

The USGA by-laws specify that any 20 USGA clubs, out of 10,000, can submit a slate of 15 to oppose the 15 nominated by the establishment.   (The number used to be 5 until I called attention to the by-laws a few years ago).  

The slogan for the slate should be “It’s the distance, stupid.” An actual ballot would have to be sent to all member clubs.  (Potential insurgents take note--the deadline for submitting a rump slate is Nov. 30.)

Internally, the USGA is a mess.  The Executive Committee, instead of intensely monitoring the work of the staff and establishing policy, is in a hands-on mico-managing mode.   They like to play at golf management and pretend that their presence is essential whereas, in truth, all they should be doing is read what’s sent to them and attend three meetings a year. 

Would an effort to get this crowd out, however noble, succeed?    Not at first.  But it would scare the hell out of those who drool at the thought of traveling on the leased jet.  Above all, it would cause there to be a debate on the subject. The USGA has been more than effective in keeping its malfeasance quiet.

Shareholders revolts sometime work, even in non-profit entities.   The eastern division of the US Tennis Association, its largest, has had a splendid internal fight which has already reached the court and appeal stages.

Even the American Civil Liberties Union is in a quarrel on the issue of who should be on its board. If the ACLU can tolerate a touch of democracy, why can’t the USGA?

Regulating Driver Head Size?

Reader BillS writes:

In my opinion, the easiest (and cheapest) way to control distance would be to limit the size of the head.  Back in the days of persimmon, there were guys who could hit it a mile but the small margin of error made bombing it a risk.

With giant heads, the bombers can swing for the fences without penalty.

So I'm curious what everyone thinks about the driver head's impact on the 10-yard PGA Tour increase since 2002 when the USGA and R&A drew the line in the sand (well, on paper anyway)?

Significant?

Would regulating driver head size on the PGA Tour make a big difference?  

"Do. Nothing."

The Golf Digest Bomb and Shill Gouge boys are at it again! This time with "5 suggestions for the USGA on the spin issue," and like the good ole boys at USGA who believe the ball is going too far and not spinning the way it should, every conceivable solution must avoid dealing with...the ball!

Here's Bomb. Or Gouge, does it matter?

I'd like to think we can come up with five ways to combat the spin issue WITHOUT touching any of your clubs under 50 degrees.

Because even these two know that when the USGA bans U-grooves in all irons, everyday golfers will be saying, "Gee, wouldn't it be easier to just tinker with the ball or make the Tour pros play by a different set of rules."

And since you're the Gouge part of this operation, I'm gonna need help on a couple. But here's a couple on my end:

1.) I know it sounds like a broken record, but just grow the darn rough. And I'm not talking about some wimpish 3- to 4-inch grass but some real salad of 6 to 8 inches. Get in that and you could have grooves sharp enough to saw through one of these and you still wouldn't get any spin.

Brilliant! Pass the cost and burden on to the golf course operators of the world, and inflict misery on the player! This is  vital to health of the game. Eliminate the fairway, I say! Socialize the cost and privatize that profit! (Though I would recommend that the Bomb and Gouge guys read Golf Digest's own Frank Thomas, who says grooves don't matter at the 3-4 inch rough height. I'm guessing that would also include 6-8 inche hay.)

2.) Sorry Philly Mick, but lofts on wedges have kinda gotten out of hand. And I don't just want to keep the 64-degree that Lefty had in his bag for a while out of play.

Hey, 64 degree wedges only make up a tiny portion of the $17 billion club industry, so they're fair game!

GOUGE: I'll give you two more and I'll bet we can combine on a third.

Oh these bloggers have bonded! Do share more pearls of wisdom...

3) There is no doubt that grooves are better today at channeling out grass juice than they used to be. And dirt and grass make golf balls not work right. The volume on the new grooves has increased, bottom line. Second, grooves are better with modern balls in that the urethane covers are able to get gripped by the sharper groove edge radius. You could attack this issue around the greens by making all clubs with lofts higher than 50 degrees be furnished with v-shaped grooves only. And there cannot be any additional face roughness either.

So the ball is playing a part in this extra spin stuff and distance. Well then, we should...have different grooves for different clubs? Oh yeah, that'll be easy to enforce.

4) Shhhhh. But the real answer everyone is afraid of (unnecessarily so) is bifurcation. It's time for the ruling bodies to seriously consider backing off their stand against separate rules for elite competitions. The best golfers in the world are freaks that are even better in real-life than they are in their video games and letting them play with equipment designed to help average golfers isn't like cheating, it is cheating. The soap box derby gets pretty high tech, but none of those vehicles would make it much farther than down the driveway. Tour players should compete with the crudest tools possible, not the most advanced. With two different sets of rules (only in the area of equipment), you could make every club v-grooved. You could even reduce driver sizes to 260 cc if you wanted to. Hmmm. Might be what all that talk at Muirfield Village was all about earlier this year.

Wait, did I just read that? Warning boys, this kind of common sense stuff will prompt an email from you-know-where.

Of course, bifurcation wouldn't be necessary if you just made a few changes to the...oh that's right, anything but the ball. I keep forgetting! 

BOMB & GOUGE: And then there's this.
5) Do. Nothing.

Nice mop up. And they speak as one. Peace at last, peace at last.

Maybe there won't be an email from you-know-where. 

Distance Now And Then

Thanks to readers Mark, Ken and Chris for the head's up on George White's column on distance changes in the game.

The normally eloquent White draws no conclusion, ends the piece abruptly and in general, dances around the cause of the problem, but what's more interesting is that it's been a long, long time since anyone wrote one of those silly pieces about how distance hasn't changed much in recent years. Glad we finally cleared that hurdle. 

Here V Go Again

The table of contents for Golf Digest's November issue has been posted and this caught my eye:

Here V go again: The USGA eyes a ban on U-grooves.  By Mike Stachura

This reminded me of an interesting bit from Frank Thomas's "Frank Talk" column in the October Digest (not posted).

Now, the USGA is looking at banning U-grooves because they are afraid of addressing the distance issue, afraid to acknowledge that there has been a significant distance increase since they issued their "Joint Statement of Principles," and still too angry about players hitting driver-wedge even when they present silly-narrow fairway widths in the 21-25 yard range.

So to stop the players from bombing drivers and hitting wedge approaches, they apparently believe that changing the grooves will force players to lay back off of tees, and voila, distance issue solved!

Ignoring the ridiculousness of advocating high rough and narrow fairways as a partial solution to the distance problem (that cat's out of the bag), just consider the logic and science of claiming that grooves are actually allowing players to spin the ball out of tournament rough.

Here's what Thomas said about balls, grooves and spin (underline added for emphasis):

From light rough (up to two inches), a ball will spin 40 percent less than it would from dry conditions. This is because the water in grass serves as a lubricant between the ball and the clubface. Because the cover never penetrates more than .005 inches into the groove, which is limited to a depth of .02 inches, this is the only condition in which groove configuration matters. Out of light rough the groove depth can carry away more water and decrease the effects of lubrication on spin. However, from rough of four to five inches, it doesn't matter what type of ball or grooves you are using.

So the USGA is going to have to make a strong case that U-grooves are spinning balls out of the rough.

But even then, they still won't address distance and spin of the ball, so it's all really just a big bluff. 

"It's something we put in place to protect our brand"

David Westin reports on a fine moment in Ping history:

A prominent golf equipment company's stance against retailers discounting its products has angered two area golf shops that give military customers a break

Because of the military discounts, Bonaventure Discount Golf in Augusta and Gordon Lakes Golf Course on Fort Gordon no longer receive Ping products. And even if they could, they would refuse to sell them now.

Karsten Manufacturing Corp. of Phoenix, Ariz., which has a registered trademark on the Ping brand, discontinued its Bonaventure and Gordon Lakes accounts in August.

In a letter to the shops, Ping said Bonaventure and Gordon Lakes discounted Ping clubs below Ping's "Improved Fitting, Internet Transactions and Price Policy."

Both shops give 10 percent discounts to military members on all purchases. Gordon Lakes does it for active and retired servicemen; Bonaventure gives the discount for active servicemen.

Wow, a whopping 10%! How dare they do something nice for our underpaid, overworked solders and take money out of Ping's pocket. Wait, no, this doesn't cost Ping a dime. Oh, but I'm so naive, what about the brand? 

"It's something we put in place to protect our brand," said Bill Gates, Ping's director of distribution and associate general counsel.

And what great counsel he's providing.

According to Mr. Gates, no exceptions can be made when it comes to shops selling their clubs under the suggested price listed in their agreement (there is no contract).

"It's something we apply to all of our accounts consistently, and we don't have exceptions to it," Mr. Gates said. "We don't sell direct to the public; we sell to retailers, and we do have certain policies in place with them. Those policies are confidential between us and the account."

Mr. Gates did say that once a retailer buys Ping products, they own them, but must abide by their unwritten agreement with Ping.

If Mr. Waters and Gordon Lakes have been discounting Ping clubs to the military, why have they been cut off now, and both within 15 days of each other?

"It's something that's been in place for several years," Mr. Gates said of the no-discount rule.

"They have had it for years, but didn't pay attention to it because their business has been off," said Mr. Waters, who believes Ping is now enforcing the rule because "they've been hot the last few years."

The discount doesn't cost Ping a dime. Oh, there I go again, forgetting about THE BRAND.

Gosh greed is fun!

Make sure you read the entire piece.

It's The Shoes, Vol. 2

Now Nike and Tiger are joining Padraig Harrington in claiming his shoes have added distance to a player's game.

BEAVERTON, Ore. (September 20, 2006) - Last month's PGA Championship set the stage for eventual champion Tiger Woods to debut Nike Golf's SP-8 TW Tour footwear, which is available in stores this fall. Since donning the stylish new design, which incorporates Nike's newest ground-breaking footwear technology, the Nike Power Platform, Woods' results have been astounding.

Not only did Woods go home with the Wannamaker Trophy after putting Nike's newest technology on his feet, but his average driving distance has since increased by nearly 10 yards. Prior to wearing the SP-8 TW Tour, Woods averaged 304.3 yards off the tee. Now, since wearing the SP-8 TW Tour, he is averaging 313.8 yards off the tee, according to PGA TOUR statistics. Also, among his recent five consecutive victories, three of them were with his Nike SP-8 TW Tour shoes.

"My right foot is grounded, my left foot has rolled forward and I'm in good balance," said Woods about his new footwear. "I definitely feel like I have more traction at impact."

Take that Hank Haney!

Kostis: Golf Will Survive!

Titleist Golf Products Design Consultant Peter Kostis weighs in with one of those mysterious columns he pens on occasion to reminds us just how difficult it is to balance the whole pro-golf ball technology position while acknowledging the ugly stuff that comes with the whole deregulation mindset.

From the days of English aristocracy and class warfare, through racial and gender inequalities and to today's technological world,

 Oh Lordy...jumping ahead:

Some people consider today's golf to be boring. They say it relies too much on power and technology while reducing the skill requirements of the player. But that's a simple, easy conclusion to a much more complicated issue.

And shame on Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Greg Norman and all of the other greats who have said so! They don't understand margins.

Today's golf isn't better or worse than the golf played 20, 50 or even 100 years ago. It's just different, just as our lives and our world are different.

Ahhh...here comes the point of this column, which, oddly, does not include a disclosure of Kostis's corporate affiliation... 

To try and roll back golf to some better time is like saying that life in the 1950s was, across the board, better than it is today. In some cases maybe it was, but in many other cases today's world is far preferable. This concept of yearning for a return to better times has been around forever and coincides with a reluctance to accept change. Dismissing all change as bad is stupid.

While we're doing cliche's, how about not confusing change with progress? Naw, that doesn't fit.

Funny too, but I guess he's referring to the USGA thinking about taking away our grooves, because most people would just like to see a little ball rollback, and let all of the other "change" stand.

Anyway, time for Kostis to break out into full Gloria Gaynor mode:

When steel shafts were in the process of replacing wooden shafts in the 20s and 30s, traditionalists of the day cried out that equipment was going to reduce the skills required to play the game.

Golf survived.

When the Haskell ball replaced the gutta-percha, traditionalists cried out that this was going to make golf courses obsolete and the game too easy.

Golf survived.

I swear I've read this speech before. Hmmm, but where?

With metal shafts replacing wood shafts, was there any doubt that eventually metal club-heads would replace wooden club-heads? No! Neither was there any doubt that traditionalists would bemoan this innovation as bad for the game.

But golf survived.

Finally, graphite is replacing some steel and the solid-core, muti-layered golf ball has replaced the wound, balata ball, and, you guessed it! Traditionalists are saying golf has become too easy and courses obsolete.

Golf will survive. It will just be different.

I wonder how Peter would feel if he paid an assessment at a club because they had to renovate their course, all because the ball can't be rolled back a bit...eh, why am I wondering?

Ah, but then the conflicted view of supporting equipment on steroids clashes with that stuff about people on steroids. 

Golf has, seemingly, been proactive only when it comes to preserving traditions. Golf should be proactive against performance enhancing drugs too, but it won't happen. The, bury your head in the sand, "we have no evidence to indicate a drug problem," philosophy will prevail and golf will lose another opportunity to be a leader. That's a reality that I find revolting and at the same time, laughable.

We need to be diligent in protecting the game of golf. We also have to realize that just as the world around us changes; the game of golf will reflect and not lead those changes. Golf is not a social game. It is society's game. Look to the way we lead our lives and the way the world is evolving, if you want to see what the future of golf will be. There are many who claim golf to be the beacon of civility and reason and, as such, steadfastly reject change. Those people feel strongly that tradition is a commodity to be protected. That thinking kept women from clubhouses in Great Britain, blacks from the PGA Tour in America, and will allow for drugs to invade the game in the future. Golf, because it changes so stubbornly, will always be a follower and never a leader. That is the price to be paid for traditions.

Wow, that was a lot of work. Hope the pay is good!

"Golf has never been exclusively about length, but that seems like the emphasis now"

Robert Thompson blogs about a story he's written quoting Nick Price about the state of the game and his likely final appearance in the Canadian Open.

Unfortunately, in a professional golf world increasingly dominated by players who hit their tee shots remarkable distances, shot makers like O'Meara and Price have quickly become relics of a bygone era.

"It has been very tough for me to be competitive out here in the last few years," Price said. "I've been very vocal about this. The way the game is going -- especially the USGA and Augusta -- and the way it is focusing on length, they are keeping a lot of players from being able to win major championships."

And Thompson writes that Price is actually looking forward to the Champions Tour:

"I'm tired of playing 7,600 yard golf courses," he said. "I'm sick of that. Golf has never been exclusively about length, but that seems like the emphasis now."

But both golfers have different takes on why the game has changed so much in recent years. O'Meara credits it partially to equipment, but also points out that most players are far more physically fit than they were two decades ago. But Price isn't buying that explanation.

"If you looked at Greg Norman when he was 32-years-old, he was as strong as an Olympic athlete," Price says. "So was Faldo. I think it is a slight on them to say the current guys simply work out and that's why they hit the ball further."

Given his nearly three decades of professional experience, Price says he knows the solution to the distance problem.

"Simply change the equipment," he says. "I don't care what the average Joe plays. In fact, let him play equipment that helps his game. Can you imagine what would happen in baseball if they gave Barry Bonds a titanium baseball bat? The pitchers would go berserk. But that's what we did in golf."

It's The Grooves, Vol. 329

The Bomb and Gouge boys are back and as always, they write about the equipment issue like Nuke LaLoosh pitches.

Bomb (E. Michael Johnson) writes about reading the USGA's 104 page paper laying the groundwork for making everyone's U-grooves illegal so they don't have to regulate the ball. (A strategy that I welcome because it will absolutely enrage golfers to the absurdity of the current USGA way of thinking).

Aggressive grooves have played right into the strategy employed by several tour players of bashing the ball as far off the tee as possible and rough be damned. Take them away, and perhaps they start sacrificing a tad of distance for a few more fairways. Or maybe not. Old habits, after all, die very hard. But there’s little doubt distance is at the heart of the USGA’s research. As Rugge has said repeatedly, “The correlation between accuracy off the tee and success on the PGA Tour is almost non-existent.”

Bomb nails it. The USGA was humiliated by the flogging approach and is determined to stop it, even if it means deeming most grooves on the market today illegal (after having approved them!).

I don’t dispute that contention, but I’m still a big believer that distance is not ruining the game of golf as it currently stands. And I certainly don’t want to be writing for the next few years about motions filed on behalf of the manufacturers by noted legal eagle Leonard Decof, as was the case back in the 1980s and ’90s. But when ShotLink stats reveal that more than 40 percent of all approach shots on the PGA Tour are hit with some kind of wedge, I can at least see why the collective brains at golf’s governing bodies are whirling faster than a ball coming off one of these clubs.

That number is still just staggering to me. 40%! Yep, it's the grooves.

GOUGE: I do not want to agree with you. But there is a reason for the fairway. If the rough is not a hazard, then something must be done to make it one. Grooves might be one way, it might also be the most impractical solution to a problem in recorded history. If we all want to play by the same rules as the USGA wishes (humor me), then a groove change rule would force us all to buy new irons and wedges. That in a nutshell is a definition of a class-action lawsuit.

Actually, rough is a product of the modern game to offset poorly regulated equipment. Old Tom Morris was not out mowing and layering rough. Anyway, the otherwise sane reasoning from Gouge (Mike Stachura) ends there...

The USGA’s Executive Committee clearly is ticked off at how elite players are changing the game. Read the report Jim Vernon, chairman of the Equipment Standards committee, gave to the Executive Committee and it's obvious there is a real fear on their part that the game is out of control. But the truth is all they have to do is look at their own championship to realize they’ve solved the difficulty/skill algorithm quite simply. Layered rough makes crying babies out of all the great pretenders out there. And it’s the only thing that’s beaten Tiger Woods in the last three months.

Sigh. Oh yes, it was the rough at Winged Foot that did Tiger in. Couldn't have been that his father had just died weeks before and he was not ready to return. No, it was the rough.

Where Does The Game Go From Here?

Having had a few days to digest Walter Driver's ESPN.com remarks and to read your comments, it seems a bit of a assessment is necessary.

First, the key lines from the Statement of Principles are important to remember:

Golf balls used by the vast majority of highly skilled players today have largely reached the performance limits for initial velocity and overall distance which have been part of the Rules since 1976. The governing bodies believe that golf balls, when hit by highly skilled golfers, should not of themselves fly significantly further than they do today.

Today being May, 2002 when the PGA Tour Driving Distance average was 279.4 (the end of 2001 number)

...any further significant increases in hitting distances at the highest level are undesirable. Whether these increases in distance emanate from advancing equipment technology, greater athleticism of players, improved player coaching, golf course conditioning or a combination of these or other factors, they will have the impact of seriously reducing the challenge of the game. The consequential lengthening or toughening of courses would be costly or impossible and would have a negative effect on increasingly important environmental and ecological issues. Pace of play would be slowed and playing costs would increase.

Should such a situation of meaningful increases in distances arise, the R&A and the USGA would feel it immediately necessary to seek ways of protecting the game.

So instead of the anticipated debate over the meaning of "significant" or "meaningful" increases, Driver's remarks make it clear that such a discussion will not take place when the USGA is unwilling to acknowledge the driving distance average around May 2002 (and remember, the PGA Tour average is the key number for them). Driver on ESPN.com:

The facts are that the tour distances are nearly flat the last 3 years. It went down somewhat a few years ago and then leveled off. So the facts show that there hasn't been much increase to show us that we need to act from when we made those statements.

He's right, the numbers are "nearly" flat the last three years, but not the last four. And we'd be giving the USGA the benefit of the doubt by using the 2002 PGA Tour Driving Distance average (279.8), when the 2001 number (279.4) would seem closer to the Statement of Principles issuing. But since the numbers are so close, either works, right? Well, not for Driver.

His statement about the number going down at any point in recent years is pure fiction and he should be embarrassed to peddle such nonsense, especially when preaching like this:

We have a great deal of facts at the USGA upon which we make our rule making. Many of the people that talk about the game are passionate about the game, but they don't have the facts that we have.

There will be no discussion about the meaning of significant from 2002 to 2006, just a shift to discussion about grooves so the USGA doesn't have to take a tough stance and can keep harvesting rough to mask the problem.

So where does the game go from here? How can the USGA be taken seriously when they post such strong statements and then turn their back on those words?

Your thoughts? 

Googling Golf

MacWorld's Rob Griffiths suggest ways that golfers can get the most out of Google Earth, and includes a pretty cool demonstration video.