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Tall Tales From The Links; A Hacker’s Gripes

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8742707669_6f6b1a14eb_oFor me, golf is a game that involves coordination, concentration, relaxation and inebriation. I do not keep a handicap simply because I don’t have the extra time to practice and improve it.

If I have a good round, hit some great golf shots and birdie one or two holes, I’ll be the first to tell all my golf buddies and even those that could care less. What I don’t understand is why do people feel it necessary to tell fairytales that would rival Hans Christian Andersen.

So…What is it with the piles of horse hooey about incredible and falsified golf feats that must be told? Is it a psychological disorder? Come on, you know that 230 yard drive that turned into a 320 yard monster somewhere between teeing off and hitting the nineteenth hole? For some, the story will stick and take on a snowball effect and actually have others telling it like they were there. And for some, the jury will call the bluff (which yields a greater story) and make the defendant a certified BS’er to his buddies.

Just because the term “lie” is commonly used in golf doesn’t mean you should do it. I think almost every golfer has played a round with someone like this. The best is when a stranger joins your group, you offer to keep score and they end up being “that guy.” At first, you take the verbal diarrhea they are unloading into consideration and think; “Huh, maybe.” Then the signs start to become more visible. The extra shot to get out of the rough that you saw because they thought you weren’t looking. The two chip shots to get on the green because the first one was fat. The three putt. And finally “Put me down for a five…” Oh come on!

Pondering what just happened while heading in for a refreshment, you spot this friggin’ liar entering his info into the GHIN computer. Is this really happening? This mf’er has the balls and mentality to convince him/herself they actually shot that round. You know what? Check that person’s pockets when they leave, I bet they ripped the restaurant off for condiments.

I feel better now…until the next gripe: Hit’em hard and yell fore!

Why Golf is Unique

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(Photo by Greg D’Andrea)

As you watch your short-iron approach shot drift to the right of the 18th green, your initial reaction is calm. After all, we’ve been taught as golfers to think positive. As the ball’s in flight, your mind chases away any concern by predicting you will have a short pitch to the dance floor and a nice one-putt to save par.

Alas, this is not the course you played last week. And where that 18th green welcomed you with short rough to its right flank, this one mocks you with a small pond. In an instant, your ball is wet, your hopes for par are dashed, and you’re hit with the realization that golf is not like other sports.

You see, unlike other sports, no two golf courses are exactly alike. Sure, baseball fences vary, but it’s still 90 feet to first base in every major league park. Football, basketball, hockey and soccer field dimensions are even more uniform, fitting exact specifications no matter where you are.

But in golf, the diameter of greens are never the same. Some are smaller, some are bigger and rarely are they perfectly round. Not to mention, the pin is never in the same position. Can you imagine if some football field end-zones were only 5 yards deep instead of 10? What if the goal post width varied – on some fields they would be 18’ 6” wide, while others would use college football widths (23’ 4”)? For fun, I’d like to see the NFL have their goal posts on hydraulics and move them around the end-zones at random during the game (sometimes you’d be kicking to the back, right corner of the end-zone to a goal post 20 feet wide, while other times you’d be kicking to the front left, with a goal post of 15 feet wide). Hey, that may increase the kicker’s reputation in the sport somewhat!

What about distances? In golf, you can have a 360-yard par 4 on one hole, and a 428-yard par 4 on the next. Par 3’s can be even more extreme. Believe me, when you’re an average hack like I am, there’s a huge difference between a 145-yard par 3, and a 205-yard par 3. Let’s apply that to basketball: It’s 13 feet from the free-throw line to the front of the rim. What if some courts adjusted that to 16 feet? Better yet, maybe some teams have great three-point shooters, so they decide to move the three-point line back a few steps – I’d say that’d cause a bit of a stir.

Hazards? Sand traps, reservoirs, trees, etc. Each golf course has its own challenges and aesthetics. Courses will feature an unimaginable amount of things to keep you from shooting low and, every course presents them in different layouts and styles. A shot you make one day with favorable results, can spell disaster the next day on different course.

Can you imagine if the NHL added a position player to each starting line-up just to go out there and check other players? These guys wouldn’t carry a stick, and wouldn’t be allowed to touch the puck – their sole job would be to slam dudes into the boards in an effort to disrupt the other team’s offense. OK, hockey may not be too far from actually implementing that rule, but this is what golfers face all the time (albeit minus the head trauma) – we hit what we think is a good shot and BAM! A bad kick and our ball careens off into the woods and out-of-bounds – instead of a missing tooth, we have a missing ball and a two-stoke penalty.

Baseball may come the closest – the pitcher must think about every pitch (like the golfer does for every shot). Just a slight flaw in mechanics can be met with disastrous results. And the pitcher has different batters he must navigate around (like golfers have to navigate different holes), and every one of them can be tamed, as long as he executes his pitch (similar to executing a golf shot).

But golf’s uniqueness remains steadfast. Only a very few number of athletes get to compete in professional baseball – most of us with an inkling to play-on are relegated to beer-league softball, where we no longer have to execute a pitch with such preciseness. But golf is unique. We golfers compete till late in life – long after our prime in other sports has passed.

Yet the strategizing, yardage calculations and other course management routines continue in our heads for every shot we take – no matter if we possess a scratch handicap or one above 30. It’s amazing, actually, for a sport to be dominated by players that aren’t very good at it, yet still take the game very seriously – and that, perhaps above all else, is why golf is one of the most unique sports in history.

Golf and A Wife: A Tale of Three Women In One (Part 3)

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Picture the scene: It’s a spectacular Saturday morning. The sun is shining brightly, barely a cloud in the sky. It’s warm, but there’s a gentle breeze blowing making the temperature feel about as comfortable as it can get – warm enough for short-sleeves and shorts, but not so warm that you’ll be sweating like a hog by the 8th hole.

It’s the nicest day of the year by far. It’s the perfect day for golf. Your clubs are clean and shiny, new spikes in the shoes, no sore muscles. You’re all dressed and ready to go. You’re just about to head out the door for another wonderful day on the course. And then it happens.

Have your ears deceived you? No. You heard it exactly right. Your wife just said “Maybe I’ll come with you?” As if she was a Jeopardy contestant, she stated it in the form of a question. But you already know…that was no question. Nope. She just told you she’s going with you.

People always say “It’s not what you say, but how you say it.” Normally that’s true. But not in this case. In this case, it’s both. It’s what she said AND how she said it. But not believing your ears, you ask for confirmation anyway. I mean, it’s possible she said something else and you misunderstood right? Maybe she said something that just sounded like it. Maybe she said “Who’s going with you?” or “I think I’ll wear blue.” or “Hey honey, why don’t you stay out as long as you would like, play golf for a while, drink beer and smoke cigars with your friends and come home whenever you feel like it?” It’s possible. So you give it a shot – “What’s that babe? I couldn’t quite hear you over the sound of my clubs rattling in the bag.” But it’s worse the second time. Now it’s like the scenes from the movies where everything slows down and the voice drops to that deep bass tone, like a 78 RPM record being played at 33 1/3. “I…said…, maybe…I’ll…come…with…you.” You cringe. Now what?

The kicker for me is, my wife doesn’t play golf. Doesn’t care about it, doesn’t want to know about it. She couldn’t tell you the difference between a putter and a bogey. But what she does know is it’s a nice day and the golf course is a great place to relax, have a drink and get some sun without having to put on a bathing suit and get sand in her shoes.

Now I’ve taken my wife to the range before. It was a sight, for lack of a better term. Handing her a club was like handing a cell phone to my grandmother. Some things are better left in the hands of others. I’m no PGA pro and I sure as hell shouldn’t be teaching anyone the proper mechanics of the golf swing. But I do know the basics. I tried to pass those basics along to her, but it was no use. You ever see a baby just learning how to walk? It’s walking into things and falling down and you can’t help but to laugh. Picture that baby with a golf club in one hand, completely throwing off it’s balance even further, and a glass of Jack Daniels in the other. It was like that. But less graceful.

So why on earth does she want to come with me? She’s not going to play. She’s going to be bored out of her mind. And she couldn’t care less about the conversation going on between my friends and I. As a matter of fact, she’d probably be offended, or even repulsed by it! But for some reason, she wants to come.

But I think I know what it is. I think I might know why she wants to come. And better yet, I think I know how to fend her off. So I’m going to take a shot at it. Here I go…

“But honey, we’re not taking a cart. It’s such a beautiful day, we’re going to walk the course.” She responds “Walk?! Forget it. I’ll go shopping instead.” It worked! She just wanted to ride in the cart! I try to tell her that it’s not all that much fun, but those guys on Jackass sure do make it look like a better time than it is.

When we get to the course, I tell the guys about what happened at home and how my wife almost showed up with us. We all had a good laugh before we strapped our bags to the back of the carts and drove-off to the first tee.

So there you have it. The final chapter of the tale of my three wives in one. Fellas, if your wife is anything like mine, then I hope I’ve helped you to understand that you are not alone. Maybe I’ve even provided some insight somehow. However, if your wife is nothing like this, then I at least hope I have provided you with some type of entertainment at my own expense. If this is the case…you’re welcome.

Golf and A Wife: A Tale of Three Women In One (Part 2)

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3470826111_81eb9e2701_oA little over a week ago I gave everyone a bit of a look into my personal life as I was telling you about wife #1 – The wife who hates when I golf. This week, we are going to look into wife #2 – The wife who doesn’t mind when I golf and, often times, is happy to see me get the hell out of the house. Obviously, this is my favorite one-third of my three-part wife.

One would have to wonder how she can go from hating when I golf, to pretty much handing my clubs to me and forcing me out the front door. I want to ask, but I’m afraid to. When she is pretty much telling me to get out of here, I don’t want to give her any reason to change her mind. So I just grab my keys and go. But I do wonder “Why did she make a stink last Saturday but couldn’t wait to get me out this time?” So I’ve come up with a few ideas on my own:

#1 – She loves me and she wants me to be happy doing something she knows I love to do. No, this can’t be it.

#2 – She has learned that, many times, I am more useful out of the house than in. I figure this is a strong possibility. It’s no secret most of us husbands are kept around by our wives for two reasons – opening jars and squishing bugs. Most of the remaining can all be done by the wife herself – and often times done better. I’ll give it to my wife…she simply does a better job than me at many of the household chores….or does she? Wink, wink, nudge, nudge. Fellas, you know what I’m talking about. Bill Cosby? Screw it up bad enough and you won’t have to do it again? Sometimes it works. But in hindsight…this may not be the answer either. See, my wife caught onto my tricks pretty quickly. I figured when I dropped a colorful new undergarment into a load of bleach-filled whites, I was home free. Wrong. I tried again with a new comforter. I practically managed to get that one shrunken down to what a candy company would consider “Fun Size.” Still no good. So after another lesson and the threat of my wife shrinking something else down to “fun size”…I don’t screw up the laundry anymore. So the best I can come up with is…

#3 – She’s just so sick of looking at me growing roots into the couch. This is the best I can come up with. I’ll get out of bed, head down to the living room, turn on the TV, and fall asleep again in front of ESPN. I’ll wake up just in time to put the game on, then fall asleep again from innings two through eight. Hey, if God thought it was OK to rest one day, then it should be OK for me also right? My wife says when I can create an entire world in six days, better yet, when I can consistently do ANYTHING for six days, then I can sleep on the couch all day long if I would like. But until then…. She has a point. But rather than argue with me about it, or try to do everything around me, she sends me golfing. This has to be it.

But upon thinking about it, I don’t really care what the reason is, as long as it continues to happen. And I’ll NEVER ask. It’s like asking my mechanic about the technical aspect of my cars latest problem. I don’t give a crap. Does it work properly now? Is that annoying sound gone? That’s all I need to know.

As long as that one part of my wife will continue to recommend I golf and force me out when it’s time to do so, that’s all I need to know. Now if I can just work on the other two parts.

Check back next week for Part 3 – When She Wants To Golf With Me…

The Greatest Golf Rule

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usga_rules_book_2008_20091-4. Points Not Covered by Rules

“If any point in dispute is not covered by the Rules, the decision should be made in accordance with equity.”

So, let me get this straight – the USGA researches, reviews, implements and revises rules for golf every so often, right? Why? As stated above with Rule 1-4, the USGA has chiseled in stone the ultimate “Watch Their Ass” rule. This pretty much says if it’s not in the book then YOU make a FAIR judgment call and get on with it because it’s…a…rule…in…the…book. Huh? I know, confusing, but what an incredible stroke of genius! It technically means the rule book covers every situation there could be, even if it’s not in the book! Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

The USGA’s rules and regulations committee have given themselves a ridiculous amount of leverage. They can dictate when or if they will be revising the rules simply because Rule 1-4 covers it all. If PGA officials approach the committee with ” We’ve had an unusual situation this past…” The USGA can interrupt with: “Hold it right there Skippy…Rule motherf$%#in’ 1-4…Now if you don’t mind you’re interfering with my nap.”

Could you imagine if this was a law passed by congress? “If any point in dispute is not covered by Constitutional, codified, uncodified, federal, state or territorial laws set forth by the appropriate means for jurisdiction within the United States of America , then you guys work it out fair n’ square cuz’ we said so and it’s the law, bitches!” Still got that pipe lying around?

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