golfweek.com/news/2013/apr/11/ma … 15th-hole/
golfchannel.com/news/equipme … ed-pocket/
The equipment company’s got everbody taking the piss Craig, might say 9 iron but 40 degrees is an 8 iron loft and playing as a 7 iron because of the RBZ speed pocket, inverted cone technology. Give a player a balata ball and Hogan PTIII irons and thats a ripped 6, solid 5, or finesse 4, now you have a dilemma. 15 green is shallow with water in front and back, both running toward the water on each of the sides. Miss the 6 by the smallest amount and it will spin up and balloon in the air, water. Hit the 5 well you would have a good chance of holding the green, but that chance of holding the green would be in direct proportion to the quality of the swing you put on the ball. Hit it flush with the high trajectory required and I can imagine Bobby Jones would say you deserve to be on this green with such fine shotmaking as was intended. Slight miss heavy your in the water, slight miss thin your over chipping back to a green that runs away from you towards water. The 4 is more risk because the trajectory dictates you must land the ball on the front half of the green with a well struck ball, give it a good blade and you could be down near the water on 16. Not as easy to think go for it in 2.
None of this matters, we have not adjusted for the driver with the new ball. Persimmon and balata, minimum 20 yards less on a well struck shot and more like 30 to 40 yards. Player could be 50 yards back from where he is in the modern game with a persimmon mishit of a balata ball, and would be more likely in the rough. Lets say the player hit it well, 20 yards back minimum. Players would think before they went at green with a ripped 4 iron, solid 3 iron, or finesse 2 iron. Now I imagine this is what Bobby Jones had in mind if you wanted an eagle, playing these long clubs into that tiny shallow green from 20 yards farther back and with irons that do not have. golfchannel.com/news/equipme … ed-pocket/
No bulldozers required.
Opening round today anyone notice Ricky Fowler’s stats ?
Fairways - 6/14 or 42% !
Greens - 9 of 18 or 50% !
Double Bogies - 2 of those !!
And ???
A round of 68 to be among the leaders (2 off the lead).
Interesting
lbycyp, thanks for the videos, nice to see those slow motion and see what’s happening with the body and clubs.
Gary Player club angle is definitely very shallow compared to Peterson and Furyk. If my swing intention is to try and shallow out the angle of attack on the ball, would that mean the club face will tend to be more open at P3?
How about if I try to leave the face open at P3, would that shallow out my angle of attack? Which intention is better?
Pulling for Angel Cabrera, love his action, gets the whole body into it. Clubhead mass and body mass. Fire up the kitchen and tuck into a medium rare porterhouse and some red wine, maybe a side of grilled asparagus sprinkled with sea salt and a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil. That’s how you get good at golf. 
I like Cabrera’s chances again. While he is ranked 269 or whatever… Snedeker is #5… but having been to the mountain top twice is all to Cabrera’s advantage. It’s not like he is going to have " I wonder if I can actually hang on and win this thing" racing through his mind. He’s no doubt more comfortable on the old school courses, playing off sidehill lies and tricky greens than most of the other guys. He looks like he is playing golf and not science lab. You can see him make his decision and commit to it quickly over the ball and execute without letting his mind get in the way. The course doesn’t seem to be playing as silly short as it has some other years. Seems to be more laying up on 13 and 15 which is a good thing… I’m not really sure why… as 10 and 11 still are seeing lots of shorter irons coming in than they should.
I am still going with my prediction of another first time major winner. The event still doesn’t require the skill and experience it once did… and the dumbing down of the game is letting a lot of guys into the hunt that would not have been anywhere near there in the past.
I’m probably going to pull for Cabrera. I like the fact that with all the time he has spent over here… he couldn’t care less about learning the English language. He’s passing on the supreme athlete look, and going with what he is… and I feel like he is still viewing golf as a game and not an Olympic Sport. I like his action and attitude a lot. He reminds me a lot of Guy Boros who I played against for years on the Canadian Tour.
Im pulling for an Aussie, i mean GEEZ, its about time i think
Day my choice
It’s Adam Scott and it’s payback! He was clutch with those closing putts. Congratulations to all the Aussie ABSers, you did it! I’ll hoist one for you and I know your continent will rock for weeks. This is huge!
Woo Hoo we have a Masters champion
Pretty incredible stuff for both of those guys. Solid ball striking matching one another shot for shot. Scott’s clutch putting was amazing. Cabrera making birdie on 16 and stiffing that shot on 18 when he knew he had to do it was exactly what you want to see.
Nice strategy by Cabrera on #10 hitting iron off the tee so he could play first into the green and put the pressure on. Scott answered brilliantly. I really thought Cabrera made his putt… even on 17 as well.
Nice to see an Aussie champ! Long time coming. Hard to believe it took this long when you look at all the great Australian players over the years… and also how similar the great tracks are down there.
Nevertheless… some great golf to watch from those guys. Somehow Augusta keeps scripting these dramatic finishes. I enjoyed this year much more than last year… because I thought those guys both showed excellent control over their games and emotions. That is what I want to see… great golf… not two guys choking coming down the stretch and the winner just being the better of two guys crumbling.
That’s a good point about green speeds at other venues, like Royal Melbourne, matching the speeds at Augusta. Players come in much better prepared. One way to challenge Tour players would be to mix green speeds over 18 holes.
I believe players learn to be better golfers when they play on worse conditions and greater adversity. I played many courses when I was younger where surface speeds varied significantly from green to green… for any number of reasons… sometimes a green was in the shade under trees, and sometimes different grasses would be on various greens unintentionally in most cases. Sometimes greens are firmer, some softer… and this effects the grass… and a green in full sun will often have longer grass later in the day than a green in the shade or having a different soil content.
All of this offers a challenge to the player to figure this stuff out. I remember the first time I played on Bermuda greens… and had to deal with the grain. There is a real skill to this.
I don’t like overly homogenizing the game. Intuition, feel, street smarts so to speak. This was more the case years ago. Now most golfers complain about conditions not being perfect from start to finish. But while it’s nice to play a beautifully groomed course… there is a silver lining in learning how to play on courses with less than perfect agronomy.