By Scott Thompson
Watch out! Heavy title leading to major self-analysis upcoming! Not really. I just found some fun quotes in a book and wanted to comment on them. Remember, the key to enjoying this game is to laugh at yourself and with your friends as much as possible. This game is brutally honest in its ability to expose the hidden parts of our inner workings. Keep your golf realities realistic! Let’s get started:
“Baseball reveals character, golf exposes it” -Baseball Hall of Famer Ernie Banks Different sports draw out different responses lurking deep in one’s soul. There is nothing like golf to test how well you think you know yourself.
“Gimme: an agreement between two players who can’t putt”-Jim Bishop Now, at last, we are turning over some real ancient burial plots while digging for personal truths. How short or long is an allowable gimme? In days gone by it used to be the inside of a putter length minus the grip. Now that can be almost 4 feet with the new long ones. Again, this is a massive grey area subject to a group decision. Or as my group of golfing friends say, it has to fall inside our ‘circle of friendship’. Hmmmmmm, the longer the friendship, the bigger the circle? A justifiable injustice?
“The score a player reports on any hole should always be regarded as his opening offer”-Thomas Mulligan
Both this quote and the name of the author are worthy of comment. Any man with this name was either born to play golf or be a nasty PGA tour official. All out or all in. With that name you have to either hold up the absolute highest standard of honor in the game or you have to allow a diverse interpretation of all the rules. The quote itself touches on one of the true heartbeats of the game. Negotiations among playing partners or as I call it ‘Honor among Thieves.’ Don’t get me wrong, I am not a hardliner, I just love what this game exposes in me before, during and after. Before: how bad do I want to win? During: how much do I want to bump a poor lie? And after: what score should I really post?
Now please relax and enjoy a good chuckle at my expense. My thoughts are mostly done tongue-in-cheek, or as I sometimes see myself, foot-in-mouth. I’ve got one more quote that will not only bring this ramble to a close, for it holds the answer to solving all the mysteries of the golf universe. Finally, the revealing of the ultimate golf truth……
“If you really want to get better at golf, go back and take it up at a much earlier age.”
This amazing truth was penned by no other that our new immortal friend, Sir Thomas Mulligan. It seems fitting to give him the last word……..
Remember to have a chuckle over this as you re-tee……..again.
Scotty
Hello, friends. As I sit here watching the smoke rising off my keypad (wishful typing), I am reminded about the amazing journey of a lifetime that the game of golf creates. Starting at an early age while just trying to hit the ball off the ground to advancing into the professional realm, pressure is something you always have to deal with. Half of the battle is external, playing the course and dealing with your game. But I believe that the greater path to success lies within conquering the internal half found between your ears. Faith in yourself and discovering who you are on the golf course will take you farther than any set of lessons. My definition of beating pressure is the opportunity to overcome fear with execution, founded in trusting yourself. You can be your own worst enemy; you are your own best encourager. Only believe!
Another really cool thing about golf is that you can learn some amazing life lessons during the hunt. From chasing your Tour card to enjoying a good walk with friends, this unique game allows a place for every level of skill, or lack thereof. I love this game, I hate this game. To quote a fellow survivor, “ I quit! I never want to play this game again but I can’t wait to tee it up tomorrow!”
Golf is:
“…a puzzle without an answer.” –Gary Player
“…a game of expletives not deleted.” –Dr. Irving Gladstone
“…a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into an even smaller hole with weapons singularly ill-designed for the purpose.”-Winston Churchill
“…a game of endless predicaments.”-Chi Chi Rodriguez
“…not a fair game. It is a rude game.”-Fuzzy Zoeller
“…an awkward set of bodily contortions designed to produce a graceful result.”-Tommy Armour
“…20 percent mechanics and technique. The other 80 percent is philosophy, humor, romance, melodrama, companionship and conversation usually resulting in tragedy.”-Grantland Rice
“…a game where the ball always lies poorly and the player always lies well.”-Anonymous
“…a game where I don’t have a handicap. I’m all handicap.”-President Lyndon B. Johnson
“…the most over-taught and least-learned human endeavor. If they taught sex the same way they teach golf, the human race would have died out years ago.”-Jim Murray
Enjoy storming the fairways of your mind …
Scotty
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
Terrible Tommy's Troubles
Happy New
Year and all the golfing optimism that goes with it! Played my first round of the year yesterday
with my new and improved mindset - no unrealistic expectations! The key word
now is to ENJOY! …being outside…being with friends…laughing at the bad shots
and smiling at the good ones…and most importantly, marinating all my playing
partners in this happy attitude. We are NOT professional so a golf outing needs
to be a good walk enjoyed. I am so done with my (and others) former demeanor of
enjoyment and success based on my score for that day. Participation is more
important than perfection. Not that I have any anger issues on the course, but
I have seen (and owned) the needless damage of unfulfilled expectations.
Enough! Try your best but don’t give in to anger or the needless outbursts of
emotional trauma that this game can produce if you let it.
All
of this emotional cleansing is leading me up to one of my favorite characters
and his impressive array of activities. I now introduce you to the poster child
for keeping your cool on a golf course: Terrible Tommy Bolt. Now: the man and
the legend.
Tommy
Bolt, a PGA tour player in the ‘50s, was notorious for throwing his clubs when
he got angry (a physical manifestation of unrealistic expectations?) His
actions thus christened him the new first name of “Terrible” as he was also
well known for yelling and cursing. Sounds like a real fun guy to spend 4 hours
with. He was so reliable in his outbursts that the PGA passed a new rule in his
honor: no throwing clubs. It is called the “Tommy Bolt Rule” and penalizes a
player for… well, you know. The day after the “Tommy Bolt Rule” passed Bolt
became the first golfer to break it. “It wasn’t that I was angry, gushed Tommy,
it was important to me that no one else was the first to break ‘my’ rule.” Ya
gotta love his sense of timing, of honor.
Some of his funnier refinements: “If
you are going to throw a club, throw it ahead of you, down the fairway, so you
don’t have to waste energy going back to pick it up.” Another beauty, “ Never
break your putter and your driver in the same match, for you will have nothing
to putt with.” Wisdom???
All
this brings us to his closing statement. “The mind messes up more shots than
the body.” Let this last thought be a lesson well learned for both him and you.
Enjoy your time with both your clubs and your friends.
Last
thought: “Most golfers prepare for disaster. Good golfers prepare for success.”
-Bob Toski.
Let that sink in…
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| Scotty with Kathy Baker on the LPGA Tour |
Hello friends. This week I am
preparing for a trip to a small town outside of Ft. Worth, Texas. One of my
favorite memories of that city from a couple of years ago I got to see an
authentic cattle drive right through the main street. I’m talking about real
cowboys and cowgirls herding some seriously large Texas longhorns all the way
through town. You want to know “Where’s the beef?” Rat thar in Texas! The
wingspan on the horns alone had to be darn near 8-10 feet. But what also caught
my eye was what appeared on the other end of these powerful beasts: The
brand.
Switch the scene. I’m hanging out with a
friend as he tries out some new putters so I pick up one of the newer models.
Not a traditional blade or mallet head but a real 21st century space odyssey
special. You know the kind. If you are old enough to remember the early video
games found in the arcades, this thing looked like an alien space ship. I guess
I’m just amused at how putter heads have evolved in the 50 years I’ve been
around golf.
OK. Here comes the bridge in all
this. I looked at this putter and saw it as a perfect cattle brand. I couldn’t
stop laughing as I envisioned all these space-age putters as custom cattle
markers for those people who combine ranching with a love for the game. Just
think of the possibilities: one tool to do two jobs! I just haven’t figured out
how super heating the club for branding purposes will affect your putting
stroke, especially with a melted clubface. Details, details,
details!
My chuckle for the week: Back when
I was caddying for Kathy Baker she had a 4-footer for par but the hole was cut
in the bottom of a bowl-shaped area on the green. It had just enough break not
to be straight. I watched in horror as she tried to make the putt a straight
one and missed four four-footers in a row. This, just to remind you, is during
a professional event. At this point I have a serious choice to make. Break the
tension with humor (and risk the chance of a quick dismissal) or to zip it and
let her stew. These options were a multi-daily occurrence. Me, being me, went
for the former. I gently informed Kathy “that was one of the greatest
stick-handling performances I have ever seen.” You could have cut the tension
with a chainsaw. Then she laughed and said, “I was determined to make that putt
straight!” I am sooooooo glad she rolled with the punch!
Until we meet again I am sure you
will never look at one of those new-fangled putters quite the same. Happy
trails to you!.
Scotty
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Hello, old and new friends. Mi amigo Byron asked me to start a blog for his website and I welcome the opportunity to share some of my golf experiences with all of you. Like most of us that are consumed with this lifelong passion and pursuit of just trying to be better players, I too have experienced the pain found in the bottom of the valley and the pleasure found at the top of the mountain. But I have had the unique chance to see this wonderful game not only from a player’s perspective, but also as a caddy as I worked on both the PGA and LPGA tours during the 1980’s.
Pondering
on what to share with you all in the days ahead, I’m thinking of the many
stories I could share about my times on tour. I’ll try to recount some of the
struggles I saw in both the pros and the amateurs as they set about trying to
control themselves in the environment only found on a golf course. Golf is
supposed to be fun, relaxing and beneficial to one’s health, but for some
reason it is called a GAME! And speaking of health, have you checked your
mental health meter lately after a difficult round? One of the best quotes I have ever heard
summing up all the levels of anxiety found in this ancient sport was attributed
to the great author (and probably frustrated hacker) Mark Twain “Golf is a good
walk spoiled.” I have seen some of the
finest examples of human effort and brilliance totally derailed by trying to
hit a tiny, stationary white ball with a club ill-suited for its purpose. Ya
know, you just gotta laugh!!! In almost 50 years around this game I have
developed a mandatory survival technique: an ability to chuckle and hold
lightly every side of this game, this decision mostly aimed at myself!
If you are
like me, we have both acquired a small library of golf-related books ranging in
subjects from that perfect swing (impossible) to finding the correct clubs
(semi-possible) to having our course temper under control (very possible).
Always having a degree of humor in mind, I think I will close each of our
sessions with a few funny antidotes. Like I said before “Ya just gotta laugh.”
“If you
want to take long walks, take long walks. If you want to hit things with a
stick, hit things with a stick. But there is no excuse for combining the two
and putting the results on TV. Golf is not so much a sport as an insult to
lawns.” National Lampoon
