Hi. This is Matt McClory from Brentwood in New Hampshire and I play.
At Apple Hill Golf Club.
This is Golf Smarter number.
Four hundred and eighty five, published on April twenty one, twenty fifteen.
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I've got three or four five on my team that I think are going to be playing professional golf at some level PGA Tour. I'd love to see them there. Do they have the talent ability? Definitely, this is a very talented group. I was fortunate enough to win an NCAA championship at Pepperdine in ninety seven, and I would think that this junior college team here is better than our team that won an NCAA championship. There's so many guys.
I mean, just to think that I met Jordan Speed in the first time, I believe he was maybe eighteen or nineteen he got an exemption into the Northern Trust Open when he was at Texas, and I got an exemption to play it as well. And the kid was polished. He looked like a tour veteran at that age. He's not your typical twenty one year old kid right now. I mean the maturity that he has and his golf awareness and knowledge is just beyond his years. And it's
pretty fun to see. So to think that he could have been playing next month the NCAA Championships is scary.
How you or your child can get into a college golf program With Andy Walker, this is Golf Smarter Premium. Here's your host, Fred Green. Welcome back to the Golf Smarter Podcast.
Andy, thanks for having me, Fred, I appreciate it. Buddy.
Hey, it's great to have you on. And for those of you who have not joined us, we are actually broadcasting this live on periscope so that we have some people watching, hopefully hearing both of our sides of our conversation and they can submit questions. We've already gotten one question in. I'm going to actually go right to the question, okay, and then we'll get I need to get an update of what's going on with you. We haven't talked to you in about a year, and I want to talk
to you. Did you get a chance to watch the Masters? I know you've been really busy with your teams. Uh huh, yeah, so I mean there was a guy who won the Masters this year that could have been on your team. Incredible, huh, It's amazing. But we'll get to that later. I want to go right to the first question that we got worthy winner, absolutely right to the question that we got on periscope, which is how do I overcome nerves in golf?
Great question? You know what, nerves are kind of a self induced feeling, and so when we talk about nerves, it means our mind is in a place other than where it should be. So if we're thinking about nerves, we're thinking about the outcome of a particular top Say we're on the eighteenth hole of a tournament and we're really nervous because the consequences of winning could be really big. I'm sure Jordan had a lot of nerves coming down
and stretch this week. But what great players do is they focus on something instead of letting the nerves and the thoughts of what if and what could be overcome us if we have a good focus on and what I like to call process, you know, where we get to thinking about where we want to hit the golf shot, how we're going to do it, you know, what it's going to feel like, and kind of seeing the result and doing a lot of the mental imagery. Then we forget about the what ifs. So our nerves is going
to be there always. But the thing is we can use them to our advantage. They can either nerves can either help us or hurt us. So one thing that I heard is the last thought we have before we hit a golf shot is either going to enhance or hurt what we're trying to accomplish with that golf shot. So having nerves is a good thing. Being able to race them and get refocused on what we want to have happen when we hit the golf shot or play the whole or what we're trying to accomplish on the
golf course at that time. Is what's going to really separate us from failing in that in that time or being very successful at the same time.
Our first first t jitters similar to eighteenth hole jitters, they manifest themselves differently, or is it all about you have to be in the moment and forget anything else.
I don't know if they're if they're much different. I know the first t jitters are because the unknown. We haven't hit any golf shots yet in competition for the day, so we want to make sure that we're still that guy that we were on the range, or we are
every day. I know when I was playing for a living, the reason why I used to practice so hard was because I was scared every day I was going to wake up and not be as good as I was the last day, And so that first shot of the day was always like, Okay, I'm still I'm still me, right, someone else didn't creep into into my body overnight and turn into something else. And I hear a lot of the same thing from a lot of tour players on
eighteen as well. Is you know, we start we start thinking about the outcome of what could happen in the situation, and so we lose some of the process. Rory McCrory when he when the British said last year something very good about two words that he worked on during the whole week, and he said it before the tournament, So in essence, he was kind of predicting that he was going to win, and there's going to be two reasons why. And he used the word process, and he used the
word spot. And I am huge on process, and process goes into so deep, so many things of how we prepare to hit a golf shot, how we manage our emotions, what we're thinking about and why, and then going ahead and hitting the golf shot and executing. And then spot went into while he was putting, he was focusing on a spot. So if I'm focused on something, you know, we can't think about two or three different things at
one time. So if I'm, you know, focusing on my rhythm, or if I'm focusing on a target in the background or a specific swinky, I can't be thinking about the nerves and the situation. And at the same time, we've.
Talked so often about process and outcome.
Right.
We even did a show once there was a teacher who uses NATO golf, which is an ATO not attached to outcome. Okay, and so many of the mental coaches that we've talked to talk about process versus outcome. I can see the sweaty palms on the first tee, you know where your anticipation leading up to it for hours and hours, if not days, weeks, months, versus your knees knocking on the eighteenth hole on your eighteenth hole putt, right,
different kind of nerves. But again it's it's because you're focused on what might happen versus staying in that moment exactly.
And so even if we see with Jordan winning this week was unbelievable performance that really started a month ago. I mean the kids, you know, he goes win, second, second, win. He's been in the leader group, so the kid's been in total control of his process the whole time. But we saw on the seventy second hold the Masters, you know, he didn't hit a very good putt at all. He was not in the moment at that time he was
given his acceptance speech. He was just like, let me, let me cuddle this thing up to the hole and get it in somehow.
And only the announcers at that point knew that it was a record breaking putt. I'm sure he wasn't aware that if he makes the putt, he sets the record for the lowest score ever.
Right, Yeah, subconsciously he may have known it. He wasn't thinking about that he was thinking about, you know what, I'm about to win the Masters. Let me not do something stupid like power lift this thing out and have it spin down the hill to fifteen feet and I leave myself a tough you know. So his thing is
let us let me get this over with. And you know, I'm sure his mind was racing the thing is a kid is just I mean, that was an amazing performance this week, and so the control that he showed that he learned from last year. You know self admitted he had lost control and got a little hot last year after he missed that put on eight. You know, this year he missed some putts as well, but he didn't let it, you know, overcome him. He got right back
into the process of what he was doing. And the result speaks for himself.
It was amazing. It was an amazing performance, and he's got all parts of his game working. It was all working all weekend long. Was it a fluke performance? Not by him but in the world of golf, because you don't you know, I mean, how many times has somebody won by night, you know, by being minus eighteen right on that golf course?
Right?
Was that a fluke? Are they going to have to make changes of the course so they can make it. You know, the winning score should be like in a US Open, the winning should be a minus three, right, not twenty nineteen.
Well, you know, I wouldn't say it's a fluke. It wasn't like he wasn't trying to shoot eighteen under. He was trying to shoot even part shot eighteen. I would say that it might be. I would say, more than anything, I think the core setup was a little different. It was a little softer. We saw that. I heard for the first time that around the greens the grass was cut towards the green instead of away from it, which made chipping a lot easier. You weren't always against the grain.
I don't know if they did that to help out a certain someone who had some short game issues earlier this year, and but you know, at the same time, I just think that conditions were conducive for low scoring this year, and so you know, the guys took advantage of it, and there was a lot of low scores and eagles made and long irons hit really close in three woods that were stopping close to the whole, and you know, so you know, I don't think they really
have to change that golf course. I mean, it's they've added so much laying to it. It's like seventy six seventy seven hundred yards. There's a lot of things that I think are really good with that golf course already
that they don't have to touch. I mean, maybe the green's firming up a little bit more, you know, maybe cutting the grain against the green, you know, going away from the green around the greens is definitely going to change the short game landscape of that golf courch, which is where all the scoring is done is around the green deck.
Enough about Jordan Speed. Everybody's talking about Jordan Speed. Let's talk about Andy Walker. What's going on with you?
Wow? A lot, a lot's going on. It's been a great year.
Glad to hear.
Yeah, still coaching South Mountain Community College. Number one junior college team in the country, Is that right? Yeah, we're number one team in the country.
What's the age group of the kids that you have playing there?
Eighteen to twenty twenty one? Okay, so yep, college kids and we're the number one junior college team of the country. We thank you. We've won every tournament this spring semester, which has been unbelievable. I don't know if that's ever been done before, but we've I've got a great group of guys that are that are playing. I also have the women's team, which is number two in our conference
right now. So they've made great strides from not even really having a full team last year to become the number two team in our region on the women's side, which is pretty fun. Started up a new company called US Golf Combines.
What is that tell me?
Us Golf Combine, It's pretty fun. So it is the most respected and kind of intricate combined rating system in golf. So in essence, we're kind of coming up with a rating system for the game of golf. Ours is going to be targeted towards high school players that are wanting to play in college. So we're going to be traveling around the country. Are first ones in Dallas at Brookhaven
Country Club. So for people that are aware with Dallas, brook Haven is Jordan Speace course that he grew up playing with, and so the people that work with Jordan Speed at Fitness. I know he was talking about the guys when he gave his acceptance speech. Those guys are going to be actually doing our fitness stuff, so it's pretty neat. It was a big week for us with US Golf Combines and Jordan Speed and his whole team, because there's gonna a lot of stuff that we're going
to be doing in conjunction with each other. But we're going to go around the country and we're gonna be rting high school players, so they're going to be going through the trap Man combine. We have short game algorithms and putting algorithms that dictate proximity the whole and give you a rating as well as makes they're going to
go out and play. We have a mental combine that we're going to be doing AMP Fitness, which is Jordan SPI's fitness crew and people that work on his body and physique are going to be doing a physical combine with us, and then we're going to put the kids high school resumes together in appropriate format and from there we're going to videotape them and their interview and have a nice package for them to send out to college coaches so they can play college.
Golf on The combine idea is based on combines, like for football, from college kids going into the pros and you get all the scouts together. That's the concept behind this exactly.
College golf recruiting has been pretty tough. I've been fortunate to get some really good players here where we're at, but college golf recruit there's so many kids that are out there playing high school golf, and only like the Jordan's Speace and the select few that are playing the bigger AJGA tournaments, USGA tournaments and Junior World and stuff like that are get looked at by the top colleges. Well,
not everyone can play in those tournaments. It's just like every event, there's only a limited amount of field, you know that that can participate in the field. So how does everyone else get seen and how do they get hurt? And so from the coaching aspect of it, there are certain things I like to see from a college player. So if I see players that are combined correctly and rated in certain areas, I can pick from these certain areas that I like. I may not need a kid
who makes every put right now. I may not need a kid who's shooting sixty five and sixes of tournaments. But if you can move it pretty good off the t if you have some nice distance and you're tracking combine is pretty good. I can show you how to score lower. On the other side, there's coaches and teams that like guys that roll it really well or already shooting really low, and maybe they'll work on the guys on the technical part of hitting golf shots, and so
we can kind of match up player and coach very well. So, just like you said, is it like the high school or is it like the college the football combines and baseball and basketball combines.
Yes, it is.
You know, obviously we're rating and testing different things, but it's all for the same reason to find out about a player's strengths, what they're good at, and potential as well, and then to find out some of those hidden gems as well.
Absolutely, it sounds amazing. It's taking the moneyball concept and giving the stats so that you can compare apples to apples. I remember having a conversation with the coach at Michigan State years ago, and he talked about how it's difficult to recruit on the high school side, plus college teams don't have that many spaces open, right, But it's difficult to recruit on the on the college side because you
have apples to oranges. They don't all play really nice courses, and they don't all you know, it's hard to compare them.
Across the board hundred percent, You're you're right, And it is hard to judge a player, you know, that's playing maybe in the in the Northeast versus someone that's playing over here in the Southwest, and their seasons are different. And you know, the kids are just coming out on the East coast right now, they're just coming out of a pretty harsh winter, so their skills aren't going to be the same as somebody that's playing in Arizona, California,
you know, in Nevada right now. And so our thing is if we're rating them at the proper time, like I wouldn't go and do a Northeast combine, you know, in March, it's not going to do. Any of those kids aren't going to be ready. But when we get to their spot and their level at the right time, obviously everyone's going to have their skills. So someone's short game may show up better. Who's particularly not scoring their
best or something at the time. So and then you know, like I said, it allows a good player to coach matchup as well, and it gives everyone there their rating at every different pillar that we choose to categorize.
While we're on this topic, what kind of advice would you give to parents who have kids who are in high school that love to play the game, that want to compete? What kind of advice would you give to parents about prepping their kid to play college ball or how they can get into playing college ball?
Awesome? Awesome, Come to US College Golf Combines. So the US Golf Combines dot com is actually going to go live next week. At the end of the week, we're going to go live.
So give me a date on that, because this is going to be broadcast. You know, once we publish, the show may have been already live.
So yeah, so approximately it will be April thirtieth. The website's going to go live. We will get start out on fifteen, twenty fifteen and from there. But you know what, play as much competition as you can play. It doesn't matter what the tournament is, what the name of it is, who's the sponsor of it, where it's at the main thing is to just like we talked about with nerves earlier, the more you're in that situation, the less you're gonna feel those nerves, and the more competition you can play,
the better. One thing I hear a lot. I work with a lot of really good junior and high school players as well, is I'm gonna wait till I'm playing a little bit better. I'm gonna wait till I'm swinging better. I'm'n wait till I'm putting better to get in that tournament. Well, we don't know how we're gonna swing and how we're gonna hit it, and how we're gonna tip it until we get into the tournament. You may get there and find out that you're a great tournament player, not a
good practicer. You know, I have a kid who on my team right now, who's the number two player in the country who does not qualify. Well, well, he's gotten a couple sponsor picker coaches picks by me, and the kid's gone out and played extremely well in tournaments. So you know, there's just like we said, there's gamers, and and so our thing is to make sure that the gamers are found, and how you're going to be found
as a gamer is getting the game. You know that I've never won a golf tournament on a practice team.
Oh I had Sorry, many.
Actually, I won a couple of US Opens and Masters on a practice green, not on the rain.
It made me think of something, Oh, the difference between high school golf and junior golf programs right right? And does that help recruiting a college recruiter if they're playing, you know, junior golf versus playing high school golf.
I would say college recruiters are looking more at the at the junior golf tournaments because they're multiple day tournaments. They're eighteen whole tournaments a day. A lot of high school matches are nine hole matches, you know, and.
They're not always on the best courses, right, and.
They're not always on the best golf courses, and you know it's but we do look at those as well. I mean, obviously I go out to the state high school tournament every year and do a lot of recruiting there for my team. But and I think a lot of college coaches do as well. But they're also looking at some of the a j GA, the local junior tours that are playing. Like here in Arizona, we have the Junior gol Association in Arizona and they have the Desert Junior Tour and the Rocky mounta Junior tro and
all these different junior tours that are going on. So, you know, my thing is how much tournament golf are you playing? First of all, and which tells me a couple of things. You know that that's your commitment to this game. And then you know, what are you shooting in these tournaments? How you how are you placing? How are you bouncing back from from poor rounds. I'm not always looking at your best rounds. I'm looking back. How are you bouncing back after round? Your progression from year
to year? And so, uh, the only way for me to measure that unless you are getting combined by US Golf combine or you're I'm there watching you practice every day. Is the only measurement I have is your tournament scores, So as much competition as you can play.
You said your team is number one in the nation. Is that on not on a D one D two it's community college.
National Junior college yet the NJC double A So n JC double a number one team in the country. Yeah, it's fun. We've had some success against some D one schools. We yeah, we I think Arizona State right now is number two D one team in the country, and we clipped them earlier in the fall in a tournament, so
we got played. Oh it's awesome, it's awesome. I would take my five junior college guys right now and play any NCAD Division one tournament in the country and know that we are not only going to compete, but would have a chance to win. To say that we're going to win every tournament at the D one level would be silly. But I tell you what, these guys can flat play and it is. It's fun. It's a pleasure coaching them.
Yeah, oh congratulations. How does team scoring work like that?
So in our conference in junior college, we play six players count the four low scorers. In our regional tournament which is next Thursday through Sunday, it is five players count four. And at the national championship in May and Alabama's going to be five count four. So every day you play five players in your low four scores or is your team total?
You know, I'm going to go back. We're talking about twenty one year olds here. And my favorite line actually of the day. At the very end when he won, Jim Nantz was saying, well, you know, next month, if he was back in Texas. He would be graduating next month, but he doesn't have to because he got his masters.
That's right.
It was a great line. But do you see kids that you go, Okay, this kid's going to be able to compete on a professional level.
Yeah, definitely. All the time. I've got, you know, goodness, three or four or five on my team that I think are going to be playing professional golf, you know, at some level PGA Tour. I would love to see them there. Do they have the talent ability? Definitely? I mean, this is a very talented group. But you gotta think we're a junior college team. I was fortunate enough to win an NC DOUBLEA championship at Pepperdine in ninety seven, and I would think that this team here is better
than our team that won an NC DOUBLEA championship. And so, you know, there's so many guys. I mean, just to think that Jordan Spieth. I met Jordan the first time. I believe he was maybe eighteen, eighteen or nineteen. He got an exemption into the Northern Trust Open when he was at Texas, and I got an exemption to playing as well. And the kid was polished. I mean, he looked like a tour veteran at that age, and so you know, he's not your typical twenty one year old
kid right now. I mean, this kid, the maturity that he has and his golf awareness and knowledge is just beyond his year, and it's it's it's pretty fun to see. So to think that he could have been playing next month n CUAA Championships is scary. I mean, I just wouldn't want to run against him.
Wait a minute, he's not eligible to.
No, he could have been. I mean state college, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, he can that.
He's not an amateur anymore. Yeah no, no, no, no, no, no, no, far from being an amateur.
Yeah, but if he you know, like I said, he could have been playing that wow, you know, come a month, and that would have been Like I said, I wouldn't want to run across him at that point.
And wasn't when Tiger was that age. Wasn't he held back? Didn't his dad hold him back from playing on an upper level. It's like, just take one stage at a time. That's not rush things he did.
Yep. And I tell people I see high school kids that want to jump right into the pro ranks right off the bat and.
We're not talking about basketball.
Right, We're talking about golfer. And I'm like, guys, if Tiger went to college for a couple of years, yeah, you should probably go to college for now. Are there exceptions to the rule? Yeah? Over in Europe, a lot of the guys don't go to college, like the Rory
mcle and stuff like that. But at the same time, a lot of them do you know, you got Adam Scott, who did you know he went to UNLV for a few years, so you know, there is there's kind of a blueprint ish of how to get there and and college golf gets you acclimated to play in bigger venues
with with the best players all the time. And uh And, like I said, it was, you know, the guys that are the most successful did it for a little while at the college level and one NCAA championships Tiger won as well, and Jordan one and and uh and they moved up with the confidence and ability to be successful at the next level.
You you said a moment ago that they have the talent and the ability. But my question is they have talent and ability, but dot dot dot. You know, obviously there's a whole lot of maturity that is required. There's a whole lot of presence, there's a whole lot of self knowledge that you have to have to succeed at golf at that level. So tell ability, is that just enough? Or what what separates the ones who can from the can't on a competitive level?
There's there's a couple of things this right here. Your heart can't measure heart and and and and your mind up here. And so what what Jordan speak is really good at is is focusing and staying in the present and not being afraid of big situations. And so the awareness level that he has out there is is awesome.
When you see an awareness, you're not talking about about his the competition. You're talking about awareness of self, of self.
On the awareness of self. He his self awareness, his awareness of what he does at certain instances. I have tons of people who tell me they draw the ball and coming down the hardness of of of situations, the ball goes right, and and and I said, your awareness and and and our reality is a little differ front here. Right, if we missed the ball right all the time coming down to stretch and we're aiming right, we've got to disconnect. And so you know, there's the little intangibles that that
separate the good from the greats. Okay, and the greats exactly what is it? It's being able to perform at your best and the most important time. Okay, So myself, for an example, I was a very good high school player. I was a collegiate All American. I went in c doublea's. I played on the PGA Tour, I played on the web dot Com Tour. I won twenty eight professional events. But what was it that I didn't do at the right time that a Jordan Speeth or a Tiger Woods does.
Do you know why were they winning major team? Do they do those guys hit the ball better than I do? No? Do they chip it and put it better than I do? No? But there's a little intangibles that the greats, the Jack Necklaces, the Arnold Palmer's, the Lee Trevino's, those guys that that we see and are the greats of the game do better than the thirty to one twenty five on the money list guys, right, And it has nothing to do with physical ability, has nothing to do with work ethic.
You can't tell me that the twenty four guy in the money list works harder than the twenty five guind of Money list or the five guid of money list, works harder than the fifty guyd in of Mine list. No, there are intangibles that are that are immeasurable that helps you get to that level, and a lot of it, like I said, is repetition. I think Jordan's very successful.
He's been playing a lot of high level golf for a long time, a lot of tournament golf for a long time, and putting yourself in that position as much as you can helps you be successful. And so finding out yourself, Hey, this is what I do when I'm in this situation. Now I'm going to own up to that.
Once I found out what my miss really was coming down the stretch, I got to plan and kind of go into my process a little bit deeper and attack those things so I could be successful in that and cherish those moments instead of being afraid of them and being like the first question, being nervous about it. Right, I had more anticipation than fear, and so that's where the nerves get. You know, they can help you or
hurt you at that same point. So you know those that's a great question that you asked, Right, there is you know, the dot dot dot. You know, what's going to be the commitment to these kids when they come out of college, you know, if they sign a big contract. We see that, I think a lot of players right now, and not to bring up a touchy subject, learned from Tiger's mistake. Okay, they learned. They learned that, hey, we can't, we can't lead this type of lifestyle that is available
to us. Right, because who was the great superstar before Tiger out there? Oh wait, right there, there wasn't one, but Tigers said a blueprint of like this is what can't happen now? Yeah, exactly right. And there was no social media, and there wasn't all these different you know, distractions.
I'm sure that there was twenty four hours sports channels and golf channels.
Exactly, and there wasn't people tweeting when I saw you with a certain I mean, I'm sure that Tiger is not the first person to have transgressions ever that had played golf, right, Probably not, Probably not, And that may not be the most popular thing to say, but it's true.
And professional athlete, there are people following.
Exactly and so and so the kids I think or Speed has really learned, Hey, this is the type of lifestyle that I want to lead to be successful. And he's doing it. And he's got a good camp around him, and he's got a good family around him, and he has people around him that are taking care of him and not trying to use him. And so, you know, I think he's got a lot of the he's got a lot of the tools in place to be very successful in this game for a long time.
Is Tiger's legacy Rory and Jordan? I mean, is you know what what did he bring to golf? Yeah, he brought a moment of amazing excellence. But what did he leave for the long term? Maybe it's the next generation of golfers and what he's taught them. That's a really interesting point that you have, because it seems like right now, more than ever on the professional level, there's a lot of young people playing and competing and succeeding.
Yeah, is that that new breed's coming up? Right? I mean? You know, I mean, I mean Rory made a comment last year about Phil and Tiger being on their back nine. You know, they're on the back nine of their careers. I'm like, Wow, that's that's.
The same age as me.
Yeah, I'm six months older than Tiger. It's like that means I'm done. I've already made the turn. I'm on the nineteenth all right now.
Dude, I talk about being in the back nine of life, so you still got some time.
So you know, it's amazing that you know that these young guys that are coming up are so good and so strong, and you know, Patrick Reid what what what he bringing to this game is awesome and obviously Jordan's speed, and we see these guys that are just these young guns that are out there every week, and guess what,
they're not afraid of Tiger. And I think the generation before Tiger, the guys that are you know, forty three, forty four that we played a little bit before Tiger and the guys that came out with him had that fear factor. We've been stung by Tiger for twenty years and it hurts. It's like, goodness, gracious, and he's only
getting better. Well, the guys behind him never got stung by Tiger before, right, and so they come out there like Tiger who all we know Tiger's We saw you on TV apologizing for getting caught you know, doing that and now you're chili dipping it and you can't get it on the green at tpc's Scottsdale, and you know, it's like that fear. They don't have that fear factor. They don't have those those those scar they don't have the scar tissue of Tiger.
Well, Tiger had this intimidation factor too when he was at his prime that everyone was talking about from you know, from columnists to mean, everybody, even if they weren't into golf, they were talking about his intimidation factor. He walked on the course and everybody was like, oh boy, this is not to be fun.
I sat in a room with a room full of tour players, all tour winners, multiple winners, and we were talking about Tiger. I think this was about twenty ten or so, two thousand and nine, and everyone talked about I said, what's the difference because we all grew up playing against Tiger and we've beaten him, and he's beaten us obviously more than we beat him. But he was gettable. And they were like, Tiger is a different person now,
he's almost godlike on a golf course. They're like, you, he floats around a golf course, you can be hitting balls and you'll feel him fifty yards behind you hitting balls and you'll feel him walking up. Just that presence. Right now, Tiger does not have that same presence out there.
So yeah, I was just going to ask you, you've played against him, you've coached, can you watch him on TV and know like, okay, this is this put's not going in or he's not I mean, can you just feel it from him? You get a sense from him that it's not there.
I saw him play at TVC's Got Still this year and I almost cried. I mean, it was that sad to see the best player who's ever picked up a golf club not be able to chip a ball onto the green from five yards off the green, right. I mean, I'm not talking about not chipping it in what I'm used to seeing him doing, or not chipping it to a foot. He couldn't get a ball on the green right. He's still taking foe arm and trying to roll it up.
And you know, he kind of bought into all this mess about changing his wrist patterns or whatever that means, and gluts being activated and deactivated and not firing, and you know, it was sad. To see, because I was there with a bunch of guys at that play on tour and we're watching like we don't know what's going on. And it was a sad day, I think for golf more than anything, just because being a fan of the game and being able to play against and be around
the best players ever. To see the best player ever go through that type of struggle, it's like, wow, you know what was hard, was like that could happen to me at any time. And then it was beautiful to watch him chipping and pitching the ball the way he did at the Masters, and and see, you know, the last day he stumbled a little bit, but I had no idea. I said, you know, with Tiger, you're going
to get anything. He could have came out and gave it Jordan's speed performance and won by you know, four or five six shots, or he could have shot eighty eight ninety two, right, you know, And so to see him come out and get it out of the way, and I just want him to miss number one green and watch him chip it like chip it on the green and then let's breathe, okay, yeah, And and then you know, he played some some good rounds there in the middle and got himself, you know, somewhat in contention.
Jordan kind of left the field, but he you know, he got himself in contention, and you know, and I think that's good for the game. Tell you the truth, this game as great ass Jordan's speed's going to be for the game, as great as as Rory McElroy is going to be for this game. The game's in good hands right now. But this game needs Tiger. Well.
You know, I've recently received an email from a listener saying, stop talking about Tiger already. Let's focus on what's going on, because there is a youth movement that is happening. Jordan and Rory are the future of the game at that level, and Tiger is not it. And so maybe we put too much emphasis on what was and hoping it's going to come back, because it you know, the fact is watching Tiger this past week, and I commented to a couple of people, I don't remember Tiger having four good
rounds on a weekend. I mean, he has not put four good rounds together in a long time, right, So, you know, you can always talk about the nineteen fifties Yankees, you know about dominating the sport. But they're not coming back either, right, right, right, right, So we do have to look at the future of the game. And you're working directly with these young kids, you think and you see firsthand that's where it's going.
Definitely, definitely, I mean, you know that was I don't think we could have had a better champion than than than Jordan, obviously, other than if Tiger would have won, the golf industry would have exploded. I mean, people don't understand that Tiger feeds us all in the golf industry. Okay, if Tiger had to bow out because you couldn't chip a ball on the green, this two million dollar performance
in a rah hair right now would be struggling. I mean, he gives because because he's going to bring people want to watch Tiger either fail or succeed. But either way you want to watch him. Yeah, and so either way you're you're you're anticipating watching him play. Jordan was awesome because he won by a lot on Saturday and Sunday, right, and so people tuned in on Thursday to watch Tiger. Jordan took that audience away from them, great, right, he took he took the audience, and he was like, hey,
this is my audience and that was awesome. And and Rory you know, didn't quite live up to what he was, you know, touted to do. And but I mean, you know, great player, unbelievable players, so right.
And obviously that course, that course does not compliment his game, right, So clearly he struggles there this concept of Tiger being the messiah for golf. I it's like a bunch of fifty I'm sorry, a bunch of sixty year old consultants talking about when they had their big day in business
and they're waiting for it to come back. It's like, folks, if you're not embracing the Internet and Twitter and periscope and Facebook, if you're not embracing that in the way you do business, now forget about it.
It's like Bundy talking about his high school you know, in high school, I threw for five touchdowns in the state game.
Yeah, and that was your moment.
And so.
Hopefully is Jordan. You know, we've always talked about is Rory the next Tiger? Is Ry? You know, we keep waiting for it to happen, and it kind of does. And he you know, he was on the on the verge of a career Grand Slam and that that is Jordan, the next Tiger. I mean, because we had you know, I mean we we it's big, you know, Arnie and Jack and Tiger. You know, you had. There are certain players for each generation that just carry the generation, and Tiger had his. But he fell from grace so hard.
It's such a shame. But now we got to look to the future again. And is Jordan I think, I personally think because and this is gonna sound terrible because he's an American, it may be much bigger because the advertisers are gonna are gonna clamp onto that. Plus is you know, a horribleness his movie star looks. He's just you know, he's just like a clean looking kid. You know, they could be an advertising boom.
He is and and he's and he's a great kid. And I think he's done everything the right way. And you know, been getting to know a lot of people around his camp lately. And the kid's a star and he's been for a long time. And I think the people around him know it, but they haven't kind of filled his head with all the hooplah. But but at the same time, I think that him that Jordan's speed
being American is huge. It is big for the game because guess what, uh, To be honest, no one really tunes into the golf channel to watch Rory McRoy that much unless there's some Americans in the field that are playing well and he's doing everything. Rory's got a lot of swag, right, But Y didn't show up all the time.
And I don't think he's I don't I think he's got the kind of and is it the word charisma what I'm looking for that Tiger had that there was something about him that just drew you to the screen. It just sucked you in. That Tiger, whether he was on the course or not, right and that, you know, is that what we're and we're always looking for the next one, the next one, the next one.
I think it's pretty unfair to put the next Tiger on anybody, including absolutely Tiger has been the best in the world since at his respective level, since we were five years old. And when he was, you know, thirteen years old, he was the best junior player in the world, so that was everyone under eighteen, and when he was in college he was the best player in the world. I mean, I think Norman was ranked number one in
the world. But you know, Tiger went through a stretch in college where he was shooting sixty threes and fours and win an NCAA championship. Tiger shot eighty the last round in NCAA's and one. Okay, that's how that's how much he had blown us away. At the honors course, I was right there and I was a recipient of
that whooping that he gave everybody as well. And uh, you know, and I think I played with Robert Floyd that week, Raymond's son, and Raymond followed us and said, if this, if this was a tour event this week, Tiger were won by about eight okay. And so you know, to put that on anybody, I don't know, is it is fair? Because they are looking for the next Tiger? How about Jordan be the first Jordan Speed?
You know, how do you sell that?
Yeah?
And so totally, why do you sell that?
You know, Tiger. I'll tell you what. Under armour, these people at the top of these companies know what they're doing. I mean, they signed Tiger for sixty million and he turns into you know, the whole game, and and and under armour, you know, does this big contract with with Jordan and they did a great job. They did an unbelievable job. Uh. And so you know, obviously they know what they're picking and they know what they're looking for.
And these guys are just you know, Nike signs a big contract with with Rory and he becomes a number one player in the world. It's like, these guys, are they know something we don't, right, I need to go to I need to go over there, and you have these guys do my lottery numbers or something like that. But uh, I.
Have one more question and then and then we're going to take a break because you probably have a better sense of this than I do. But are players wearing spikes anymore?
Well, so, so let me give you the let me give you the good answer here. I have a really great relationship with Soft Spikes and they do their R and D out of our performance center. So no spikes. Soft Spikes company by Pride Sports is the only way to go. Would that being said, Yeah, there's some people that still wear nails. Reasons why we probably don't need to know. You don't need spikes anymore. I mean, yeah, you have to have spikes to to hold your foot,
your balance, probably swing it too hard. Tip.
That's that's an excellent point. I was blown away seeing Kegan Bradley wearing high top Air Jordan's.
Those are hideous. Those are awful. Those are were there, spike?
Where were there the you know, there's some sort of grip? Those were regular basketball shoes, were they?
That's that? Now it's that Air Jordan golf shoes. And he I guess he's going to release it or yeah, and and and Kegan's wearing those are brutal.
I was like blown him, like I kept rewinding going, oh my god, they really are Air Jordan high tops.
Yeah, that's nuts. That's his buddy. So he's making a shoe for him, you know. And yeah, yeah, yeah it but uh, I don't know.
You're going to provide us with a little tip perfect.
This tip is called follow the handle. A lot's been said about short game lately, with Tiger's troubles and making good contact and hitting thin shots and heavy shots around the green. It's all can be handled in set up and knowing where you're center of grab is. If you know that your center of gravity is underneath your chin, your hands are going to fall back underneath your chin at impact. What happens is people try and hit golf shots low and they get their hands forward. We've all
seen that guy before. And then when you come back and if you try to hit a golf shot and keep your hands forward at impact, you would bottom out back here and lift the ball. And a lot of players do that. They chunk it or they get they hit the ball thin, so they're trying to hit it low. If they come back and their hands fall underneath their chin, the ball goes high and they go walls trying to hit that low. So I always say follow the handle.
If I want to hit a golf shot low and hit three shots for us, I'm going to hit a low chip shot, a medium chip shot, medium trajectory, and a higher pitch shot. And all I'm going to do is follow the handle. So when I say that is I'm going to make sure that my hands in the handle fall underneath my chin. If I want to have this club de loof did, I'm going to follow the handle.
So now the handle's underneath my chin again, so I make contact, the ball will go low, we'll hit it nice and crit and we still make contact with our hands being consistently under our handle, which is underneath our chin or center of gravity. If I want to hit it medium, I set up here again. The shaft is still leaning, but not as much. The handles underneath our chin, and we make a regular chip shot. We'll all go
just a little bit higher. If we want to hit the ball a little higher, what we do is we start to turn. So if I want to add some more law to it, I lean the shaft back. I turn so now the club is right underneath my center of gravity. Again, I'm a little more open to my target. Make the same swing, and we hit a nice high, softer shot. So the main thing is making sure that
wherever golf shot we want to have. If we want to hit it low, we're going to have the club leaning toward our target, but we're going to follow the handle here. If it's medium, we're going to be right here, and if it's back, we're going to have the handle onneath our center of gravity. It's going to help you with contact