Hi.
My name is Josel and Anti and I'm from Pedaluma and I play at Rooster Run Golf Course in Pedluma, California. This is Golf Smarter episode nine hundred and ninety nine.
Rick Martine told me years and years ago and when PGA down at their Port Saint Lucy complex built the Die Preserve, he got to spend a lot of time with Pete and Alice Dye. And he goes, I never really knew this, but once they get the routing done,
they build every hole from the green backwards. So he goes, if you really want to learn how to play a hole, go stand on the green and look backwards, and you will figure out where you need to hit in from to make the ball hold the green, to make the ball have your best release, to be able to get flags to go for other places. And once you figure out where that is, then you walk backwards to that spot and you go, well, clearly, I should be teeing off on the right side of the tee so that
it opens up the fairway for me. I don't know if great players do that on tour, but I do know that most of the caddies I see out there pre walking the course, are walking the exact opposite direction of where we're going, and they look at it that way.
How to read golf courses from green to tea to maximize your game Their old friend Joe Howett.
This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories, tips and insights from great golf minds to help you lower your score and raise your golf IQ.
Here's your host, Fred Green. Welcome back to the Golf Smarter podcast.
Joe, Fred, it's great to see you again. And I know you're on the road to one thousand, and you know you got to have a speed bump along the way, so thanks for taking me in there towards the ultimate goal. I don't want to slow you down on your charge.
Oh my god, this is not a speed bump at all. This is a celebration. Coming up to episode one thousand is just mind blowing to me. And I really wanted to feature and focus on the people who I think made this podcast great. And you definitely get to be in the very highest slot here at nine ninety nine.
You know, if you look that upside down, that might feel how some players feel about their instructor. Six sixty six. You're making me do things I can't do well.
Actually, episode six hundred and sixty six was with golf course architect Trip Davis.
Well, that is kind of the Antichrist if you think about it. Those golf course architects sneak little troubles and tribulations in there.
Do you do you love golf course design or does it frustrate you?
Well, that's a really good question, and I do love golf course design. And I think all of a sudden you're seeing, you know, like the gil Hons's that are out there, and you got the bo Wellings, and you're seeing a lot of golf courses that are designed that are essentially equal, logically friendly, very easy to maintain, and most important and some of Tiger's new courses they're very playable.
I think we've gotten that. You know, Pete Pete Die sort of stuck the golden key in there and open a door and go, what if we make up our three that's surrounded by water? And then everybody else said I can make it harder than that. And now the operators of the golf course have kind of come back and said, well, we like that, but there's a delay on the twelfth hole that is making everybody play this course in six hours, So how do we make this
a little more friendly? And I do love looking at golf course design because you know from a coaching or a playing standpoint, and you know that too, Fred. You get up there and you go, what the world were they thinking? Or Wow, this is a great golf hole and look at all we're not even designers, and you can kind of go, look at all the different whole locations you can have here. Look at you could take a risk and play this way, and you could play it safe, play that way. And then you get to
those other holes and you go, oh, dynamite. That's all this whole needs. Is just some dynamite. They should start over on that one. It's it's and I think there's a level of play where Fred, you and I would look at it and go, it's not because I can't play the whole great. It's because the only person who can play the whole great is either Rory McElroy, Jack
Nicholas or Ben Hogan, you know. And so yeah, golf course design is fun and when it allows places to hit the ball for the average players, places for the better players to take chances, and plenty of spots on the green. You know, it's great to have tricky, undulating greens, but when you go over and you look at the greens over in Scotland and Ireland and England, they're also huge. And one of the tougher shots in golf is a really long put and you know, there's nothing to be
said about, oh, this is a huge green. I hit the green. That don't mean you're making in par That means you got another tough shot in front of you.
Absolutely, I can't. You know, I've had multiple sixty foot putts. I kind of you know, I measure out my putts all the time, and I've had sixty foot putts And it's like, okay, you're in three putt territory here. You gotta that's something you really should be working on is lagging at that distance. But when you get to the hundred foot putts, it's like, please, can't I have a wedge here?
Please? I've never swung a putter this hard and this fast unless I was really angry.
Do you have architects that you like, look forward to playing their courses, that you really appreciate their work?
You know, honestly, one of them that always stands out in my mind. I do love kind of the way gil Hans is letting everything flow around the course, whether it's in the Carolinas or even out in the Palm Springs area or gosh, one of his earliest designs and I'm for getting, oh my gosh, there's a college there and it's just outside jen and I'm not summer set. I'll think of it. But Nicholas has his deals. Tom Weiskough.
Anytime I've ever played a weiss Cough course and I've gotten to maybe the twelfth or thirteenth toll, I'll look at somebody, go who designed this course? I thought. So I'm having a really good time and I'm actually scoring decent and it's kind of tough, So yeah, I thought he was a great designer. Really, just some hidden gems interesting.
Interesting. And as an instructor, and especially because you're a PGA Master instructor and you're coaching at a higher level, how do you incorporate golf course architecture and design into your teaching? Because really what we're doing is we're not playing the golf ball, We're playing the golf course.
I can't give you away all my secrets, you know.
Yes, you can, because nobody's listening.
Honestly, there's two things, and I will. I think all great instructors realize we've never come up with an original idea. We've always learned from our peers. Rick Martine told me years and years ago, and when PGA down at their Port Saint Lucy complex built the die the die course down there, the Die Preserve, he got to spend a lot of time with Pete and Alis Die and he goes, I never really knew this, but basically, once they get the routing done, they build every hole from the green backwards.
So he goes, if you really want to learn how to play a hole, go stand on the green and look backwards, and you will figure out where you need to hit in from to make the ball hold the green, to make the ball have your best release, to be able to get flags to go for other places. And once you figure out where that is, then you walk backwards to that spot and you go, well, clearly, I should be teeing off on the right side of the tee so that it opens up the fairway for me.
I don't know if great players do that on tour, but I do know that most of the caddies I see out there pre walking the course are walking the exact opposite direction of where we're going, and they look at it that way, and that's one big thing, so kind of thinking of the way you're going to play it from the green backwards. And then Gail Peterson, who is an amazing, amazing I mean he's a Hall of Fame instructor, top one hundred, top fifty, Bennett Sea Island
for however many years. She sat down with me one afternoon in Kingsville and she got a beverage napkin tells you where we were sitting, and she goes, I learned this from Moe Pickens, and she goes, this is what players need to do when they get to a golf tournament. And he said, start with the obvious. A seven iron off of a flat lie is a seven iron off of a flat lie. Whether you're in Boise, Texas, New Hampshire, or Florida, the range, the course, it doesn't make any difference.
That's a waste of your time. When you get to the tee, find your line on the tee. That gives you the ability to not run out a room and have the widest area to hit two. I think Scott Fawcett a decade would tell you that in two seconds, you know, find your widest area. And for a good player, make sure you don't run out of room. And I'm telling you as a coach when you say don't run
out of room, this is very important. When you're in competition, you are moving faster and you are hitting the ball further. So if you go, oh, that's two seventy there, I'll never reach it. Baloney, you will hit that. I guarantee you you will hit that unless you hit an off shot. So not running out of room. Give yourself twenty yards, not just ten yards, all right, So that's one the speed of the greens. You got to know that. Find out what the sand is like, because the sand is
different on every course. You might not always be using your sand. If the sand is more beach like, or if it's firmer, or if it's two or stand and it's perfect. You could hit a one iron out of there, probably if you still had one. So you gotta know what the sand is like. And the last thing is
kind of interesting. Rough is rough, and you're gonna know in two seconds the most club you can hit out of there, Okay, find out the grass, the longer grass that's around the green, and find out how the ball will react when it rolls in there or bounces in there. Is gonna is it gonna hang on top of the grass, Is it gonna go halfway down the grass, or it was gonna go all the way down to the bottom of the grass. Learn those shots and learn what clubs
you need. So in terms of course design, find your line off the tee, figure out what the bunkers the sand is, get the speed of the greens, and then find out what that longer grass around the green and how the ball is going to be sitting, and learn how to have your shot around there. And when you go watch the professionals practice, you can see you can see them back there on the tee. They're caddy and then there they got their sheet out and they're drawing lines.
That's exactly what's happening off the tee. Maybe every fourth hole or so, they'll hit a ball out of a green side bunker to make sure that the sands are consistent the putting green and the regular green. They spend hours on there, and then they'll take a couple of golf balls. Sometimes they'll they'll hit a good shot up there, and their cady'll just take three golf balls and toss them over there and go, Okay, let's hit those and
see see how it works. It's very efficient and you learn so much because those are the things that are different on every course you play, and every designer will have their own little spin on it.
Okay, my mind is completely blown. That was so helpful for anybody at any level to have that. Now, of course, it's difficult to walk a course backwards when you're playing public golf or you know. I mean, if you have a country club, great, I'm sure you'll find times on Monday to be able to go walk your course backwards,
but usually it's not the easiest thing to do. So, if I guess, the suggestion would be that make sure when you get to the green, of of course you're playing, turn around and look back so that the next time you're there.
What do you think that's absolutely perfect? You know, And I've been around enough players throughout my career that they do get to the green and then they look back and they go, maybe we should try and carry that bunker. That's a way better line. And if we're down wind. We're definitely going to take it over that bunker. It opens up way down here, so that's a huge suggestion. And then move along, please, yeah.
Right, don't stand there drawing pictures on the green and take your scorecard off the green, leave the area, open it up, then write down your scores. Don't do it on the green.
Okay, all right, So I have to tell you a fast story. But this is the best part about spending time with you. We always we start out with topics that we get way off tnded, but we have love topics.
And we were there's no way we're going to get to all of them.
I just know it, Like, don't stand there and draw pictures. Of course, you have yardage books. There was a young lady years and years ago that played the tour, Stacy Pramanasud, and she went out there I think two times, maybe three, And if I'm not incorrect in my story, I believe
it was her father who was caddying for her. And as I said, you know, they all have the little yardage books, and I happened to and I will tell you very humbly, I was caddying for a young lady who I was helping a long name, NB Park, so she could have picked a better caddy. Anybody who's middle aged with bad feet and add is not a good choice. I can tell you that right away.
Each other.
So Stacy's dad has this book and I happen to kind of walk by him and he's over on the side of the green and I'm like, oh, good lord, he's drawing out the entire greed. I mean, he must have been a courtroom sketch artist at one point in his life, because I'm watching this san and it came together in like thirty seconds. He's got the he she gives him the club. He walks over to the next tee. He's got all the ridges and everything does. And I'm like, you guys need to frame these and sign them. They
are unbelievable. And he's like, uh, sometimes we like the way we do it better. But never delayed play at all. And I was like, I was like, those are works of art, my man. That is just awesome. But today, obviously we have all kinds of topographical maps that we can pull down from anything. So but it's that was old school to a tea and it was a gorgeous work of art.
That's awesome story. Thank you. You know, one of the things that kind of has rattled in my head for years, and I would love to have this disputed because it's probably not right. But I've always felt like the USGA, the governing bodies, let's just say, are advocate it's for the golf course more than they're an advocate for the golfer.
Right.
The goal is, the goal is to make the golf courses difficult as it can be for every golfer at every level, right, And so they're more concerned about make you know, as opposed to when you talk about growing the game, it's not about the people, it's about the property.
Night out. I always and let me tell you, I think Mike Wan, who is obviously the executive director of the USJA and did so much great stuff with the LPGA and making that tour become an accessible and exciting tour, I think little by little he's doing that with the USDA. But I think I think I was chatting with a caddy once and I said, and he and I were laughing,
and he said something about it. He said, boy, if the USDA was in charge at NASCAR, it seems like they'd sneak in and under inflate a few of the tires on the guy's card. Yeah, and they'd probably nicked the brake line. While they're at it. They go, let's
see how you boys do on this oval today. But it is they are advocates of the golf course, and much to their defense, it is the one week a year if you take out the you know, you're British and Scottish and Irish and all those type opens where you have weather that you will never deal with based on tour schedules. So you've got that. But it's going to be one of the toughest tests of golf. And I know it's tough on the players, but it's really a way to go. Okay, you guys are the hundred
best we've seen. You hit your wedges closer than anybody because you go with every flag, You hit your driver further and everybody, and you're tremendous putters. Let's see if you can adapt to a facility or a course that doesn't set up for that. And that is a week where the champions a lot of times you go, God, that person came out of nowhere. How did they do
that good? And they go, well, they adapted and the other ones that are you know, it's that big ego going, I will beat this golf course and you're going, no, first you got to befriend the golf course and go could you give me a little little birdie here on six? Maybe? And well, so it's there are they're advocates for the game, and I think the beauty of what they do is remind us all that this game every day is about adjusting. It's not about overpowering. Some days you're going to play
in cold weather. Some days you're going to play and win. Some days you're going to And if you just think you can have one set of skills that's going to withstand all those. It's not if you hit a high ball and it's a windy day, you're going to struggle. If you hit a low ball and you're playing in a USGA event, it's not going to stop on the green. So, in a very interesting way, it forces even the best players of the world to maybe learn an added skill set.
And of course, you know the beauty of a guy like Jack Nicholas is he could work the ball both directions. He could do whatever he wanted to do with the ball. He could hit it high, he can hit it low. And you find a player that can do that, and you got somebody, and then you get someone like Bryson who says, if I can hit it far enough, we all know how long the rough is. I got a sand wedge coming out of there. That's what I was
going to hit from one eighty. I might as well be at one to twenty and see how I can get it to the creen. But again, that's not overpowering the USGA. That's going I found a different way to adapt. So it's a love and hate relationship I think with the players. And I'm going to tell you on the coaches side, Fred, you haven't lived till you're walking around the USGA US Open setup and a player goes, what
in the world do I do from here? I'm going, I knew I should have stayed at a holiday and express last night.
So we did a an episode recently with Terry Kaylor and we talked about how the amateur golf game, you know, because what you're talking about is for one weekend a year for very few select golfers, but golf courses have to survive all year long, right, and that they the pros literally play a different course than we play, even if we get to the opportunity to play on that same course. And the sense that they hit driver wedge
right the only thing they hit longer. I think he even gave a statistic about Dustin Johnson hitting a seven iron once in one season on his approach shot. Is that the only reason they're hitting something more than a seven iron is because they're going for a part five and two right. They're usually hitting just wedges. Well, we're hitting hybrids, we're hitting you know, long irons, We're hitting three woods and five woods for our approach shots. Our
game is much harder than their game. Yes, you're laughing at me again.
No I'm not. I'm I'm agreeing with you and and all of us as we as we change our hair color, the swing speed we used to have we don't have, and that can facilitate equipment changes so that the ball will come in in what's known as a playable trajectory. You know, you don't want it coming in like a B one bomber, stating across the top of the green and expecting it to stop. If that's your if that's your flight plan, you might want to leave the flag in no matter where you are and hope that it
runs into it. But we are playing a different game than they are. And from that standpoint, if you, I think just to throw the USGA in there again. The year that they had the twin US Opens at Pinehurst, everybody was scratching their head, going how are they going to pull this off? And when you realize that on the fourteenth hole, or the twelfth hole, or the seventh hole, that if the ladies had a seven or eight iron in, the men also had a seven or eight iron into
that hole. And that becomes very much for the average player. And I think golf courses are doing a better job of this right now. Play the ts that will allow you to hit in and approach shot that is in your scoring iron range, maybe six, seven or eight iron, and that's the minute you get that. It's kind of like looking at every hole and subtracting one fifty five and going how far do I have to hit it off the tee? Oh my gosh. If we play these, I got to hit the shortest drive. I have to
hit us two to seventy. The rest of them are three hundred. Yeah, I get it, forget it. And that's let me tell you something. There's there's a pride thing that you want to go back and play the tips. If you want to play the tips, play one of the par fives from the tips, play one of the par threes from the tips, and play one of the shorter par fours from the tips, because if you play the long par four from the tip, you're just playing another part five, right.
Literally, that's a great suggestion, and any suggestion.
If you're going to do that, Gosh, this game can be fun.
The game is so much more fun when you're scoring well. I can't believe how you frustrated. I've been with golf over the years. But when I was able to and I'm not doing it now, but when I was able to hit you know, a couple of rounds in the upper seventies, it was like, Wow, that was fun. That's you know, that's when we get back into talking about the zone and the flow state. That was fun because it was just easy today. Yeah, I wasn't thinking about all those things.
And when you're hitting those scoring irons in it doesn't take long to notice, Wow, this is where I need some work. Either you're hitting the fairway and missing the green or you're missing the fairway and missing the green. You either got to work in your t shot or your rights. But if you're having to reach for maximum distance on every shot, you don't know where to work. All you know is you've got to hit the ball further, and that generally is not a great recipe for getting better.
So interesting that, you know, before we started, you had a couple of topics that you suggested that we talk about, and you just led into one of them as we talk about equipment changes and playing wedges into the green whatnot, and you suggested that maybe we need to talk about these specialty wedges and what they're not telling you, who's not telling us? What are they not saying?
So this sounds like a big teaser, and it's like, uh.
Oh, totally is fred what you said to me.
You're going to put this out there and then my friends are going to go, Hall, it said something stupid again and they're going to go, what's what's so unusual about that? Joey? You know what? Honestly, and I'm gonna tell you, and I even I was even chatting with my better half on this and she goes, yeah, it usually takes you guys a couple of years to figure out what's going on. She's like, but when you're in the background. So I've watched this phenomenon that's been going on,
and it's very prevalent with college golfers. These are young kids that have great swing speeds. And I'm so speaking both on the men's team and the ladies team college golf, and over the past two years for certain, maybe a little longer. All of a sudden, I keep going, I keep hearing the same comment, and like, there's something going on there, and I know it with my game, but I'm going, I don't play as much as I used to.
I probably don't have a swing speed. So and one of them that comes out a ton is like you hear a twenty year old kid go, I don't get it, you know. And all the college kids they always have the latest equipment and everything else, right, they're always up to they take care of the teams, and they go, I just don't get it. I used to hit this fifty six degree wedge one twenty. I can't hit it
over one oh five anymore. Still a fifty six degree wedge, still whatever, And I'm hearing the same comment from the young ladies on the university teams, and they're like, you know, fifty six used to be my go to at one hundred to one hundred and three yards. I can't get it over ninety five anymore.
I'm sorry. I have a sound effect for that.
Yeah, lah lah, Charlie Roan's teacher now. And I know you've had some of the greatest, some of the greatest short game guys in the business, like James Siekman and Stan Utley, and you know they would kind of go, well, first of all, if you're trying to hit your wedge full out, you've got a problem, I mean, because you deserve every evil that's about to come your way. But I went to I went the other route, and I said,
I'm going to go to an authority on this. So there is a tremendously gifted instructor up at Caves Valley named Bernie Najar, and Bernie happens to teach a guy named Kyle Berkshire. If you don't know who Kyle is, he is the world long drive champion, the kid with the long hair and the mullet, the five time champion. And I tell right, yes, exactly, And I said, Bernie I have a question that I'm sure you have run into because a lot of the guys you teach. Now
he teaches tour players. And he said, a lot of the guys you teach. And I said, here's my question. I just posed it. I said, I keep hearing this comment. Is it me? Or are these boutique and specialty wedges? You know, you got Titleist Volk, the Cleveland with Callaway, you got the Glides with the ping, these great wedges that we have now are they going shorter than they used to? Bernie sends back, and I know, figuratively, I'm gonna grab my phone and find the message. But it
was the greatest response I've ever seen. Interesting question. I'll get back to you in a second. It comes back the first line. First of all, wedges are for losers. They should drive the grain. And he said, no, what's
happened on these wedges? The sixty degrees, the fifty eights, the fifty six is fifty four, it's fifty Two's is they are coming up with so many different soul configurations and heel relief and toe relief and different shavings that the center of gravity on those clubs keeps getting a little higher and higher, and that center of gravity starts pushing the club more under the ball. So when a player tries to swing that club faster and hit it further,
it actually gets more spend, goes higher and shorter. But around the green you can operate that club at a much slower swing speed. And now you see these guys and ladies out there hit these chip shots and you're like, how in the world do they get that ball to stop downhill lot of long grass on a downhill green.
That's impossible. So the design of these wedges has become one where at a slower speed around the green or in your twenty thirty forty fifty yard shot where you're not swinging full, they're phenomenal, but the overall distance on those when you try and crank it up to your full swing and normal swing, it's not going where it should be. Now, Bernie ended that and saying, if you look at some of the senior tour players, they are
still playing wedges from three to four years ago. They're just getting them regrooved every year because of the waiting, they can use that extra distance. And Bernie's last sentence said, if you wanted a suggestion, for a player like that, I would get the gap wedge that goes with the set, you know, and sometimes it's an a wedge, and sometimes it says G on it, And as fate would have it, the very next day after that, I was in College Station, Texas,
standing on the tee with Stacy Lewis. She had just come from a fitting at her club supplier as Mizuno, and she said, I got a distance I can't hit, and they're having trouble dialing these wedges in because they're not going as far anymore. She said, So I put this in the bag. What do you think? She pulled out the gap wedge exactly as Bert and I took a picture of it, and I said, Bernie, did you
two guys talk before I got here? But I'm telling you that from the player that is maybe kind of the more athletic player doesn't have to be the college player. But if you like to go after that wedge, give that gap wedge that matches your set of clubs, give
that another look. When you first got it, you probably got your wedges and everything, and you put that guy over in the garage, and little by little it's time to move the backup quarterback off of the bench and put him near the sidelines and let him take a look at what's going on.
It's interesting to say that because I've been playing PXG clubs for about a year and it came with a gap and a pitching wedge, and I have found that I can really get a lot. I don't have to have a distance to pull out that gap wedge. Sometimes I choke up and I can knock ten yards off of it, right. Sometimes I use it as not necessarily a putting stroke. But if I just need to keep it along the ground, you know, keep it low and let it roll up, I can do that from forty five fifty yards.
Yeah.
But what about like these boutique wedges, these companies, you know, like we're talking about Terry Kaylor and Edison Golf, and you know he comes up with lots of soul designs and whatnot makes his clubs unique. Can those boutique companies, can they compete with the vokies in the Cleveland's?
Can they?
And are they of value to the average golfer? Oh, I was talking about the amateur golfer.
Yeah, I definitely think so. And for the amateur golfer, there's two things that you know. There is physics of the golf club and you can't argue with those literally, and there's physics of the driver and you can't argue with those. So that boutique wedge that you're going to look at, here's here's your two criteria. Number One, use them at controlled swing speeds, not full out. Doesn't have
to be slow, but controlled swing speeds. And two, but I'm being honest about this, if it's a cool looking club and you go, God, I love the way this wedge looks, then dog on it. Stick it in your bag, because you're now you're dying to get to that spot to use the wedge. And that's the same spot used to go, oh god, I'm here again on fifteen. I hate this serially. At least if you have a club in front of you and you go, I really like
the way this thing looks. Controlled swing speed looks good. Look, the grooves are going to be fine, the bounce is going to be fine on it. That's stuff you can find through any manufacturer, any fitting. But there's an area for those boutique wedges, just like there is potters. We talked about lab golf a little bit earlier, and you know, it's it's what meets what meets the eye as a
big confidence builder. You know, you and I have had to go to things in our careers and we've gone and we've had to put on a coat and tie and you get halfway out the door and you go, I look like an idiot in this tie. Take the tie off and put a better tie on. Then you feel better and you have a little more confidence.
But I'm only laughing because yeah, I really relate to that.
You never I returned the tie I had to wear once I got to regifted it. Let's let's be honest, all.
Right, Let's change topics for a little bit, because I'm really interested to get your impression of something that I've talked a lot about this year. And it's not it's weird because I don't I brag about the fact that I don't talk about the PGA or the LPGA tour. I have to say LPGA because you're here. But uh, I don't like talking about it because it's old news by the time a podcast comes out. But I was really enamored with TGL this year. I thought it was a lot of fun. I thought that it could be
the future of how we do golf. I loved listening to these guys talk with each other, strategize with each other, you know, give each other a hard time.
Right.
I thought it was a blast and two hours of golf. Any Yes, I love it. How did you feel about TGL this year?
I'm a huge fan, I really am. I just yeah. And Fred, you've talked enough about it with your friends too, and I guarantee you the one within two sentences or three sentences anytime somebody talks about it. I love the shot clock. That's I mean there, it is right there,
and it's beautiful. You know. I don't know how you would ever do it on a live tour event, but you know, at some point it would almost behoove to have that forty five second shot clock behind the green to go, dude, that guy's taking a minute and a half. And then you look at the official timing and you're like, he's been checking his emails for the last forty five seconds. Oh, let me start the buzzer, you know, so.
And then all of a sudden, boom boo boom, yeah boo boom boo boom, and it's it's kind of like I it's so latable today because so many people and the affordability of the technologies and the launch monitors and the home simulators and the net.
I mean, people can do this in their house and they can kind of play the same. And you know, if you grow this thing out, you go, well, you have your TGL leagues, but now you have your amateur leagues, and now you can get into sort of a bracket division and go the people that when the Southeast Division are going to be part of the TGL Championship and maybe the amateurs take on the pros. And I mean,
I love it. It's it simulates golf, but it simulates the strategy, It simulates the pressure that they're under with the time clock. It simulates the camaraderie in this game, and it's you know, it's but you don't have.
In tournament play because everyone's on their own island, right, But here you have team golf, which we know team golf works. Yes, between Ryder Cup and you know, President, we know it works.
I I just I can't wait to see where it grows too, to be honest with you, because I think all it's going to do is keep getting better and better and to have a time limit and go, hey, I can watch this. Not only that, I can actually go back and I can. I'm I'm of that age. So do we still DVR or do we TVO? Or we way past that? Now?
We record it?
We recorded, Yes, that's what I We.
Don't say videotape anymore. We just record it.
But then you know, even you know, sometimes you go, oh, don't tell me what happened in the last round of the Masters, and then you rewatch it and you're like, Okay, that's six hours out of my life, and you're trying to fast forward and TGL You're like, man, this I can watch this and I can do it quick and I it's it's so accessible and it's so relatable to an Okay, there's a gentleman who I call the authority in the game of golf, and you need to have
him on the podcast once. His name is Tim Briand, and he is with foresight, and he is the source of information of nobody I've ever seen. At this point worldwide, forty four percent of golf is off green grass.
Tell me that number again, forty four if.
I'm not incorrect, and I'll tell you what after the podcast I'll come back and you can put a different number down there if that's what it was. But it's so high to think that over forty percent of the golfers that's probably a better number, are not playing golf on a golf course. They're at top Golf, They're at Puttshack, They're at simulator places that are popping up all over the place. They're at their house, they're playing the World Golf League and Fred, You and I have a golf
date with Jim and Bob every Thursday night. We are in our simulator room because we can afford the simulator. And oh, by the way, this week we are playing Oakmont and it's you and I best ball against their alternate shot. I mean, these things are going on all over the world. So the overall number of golfers is insane, but how much golf is non golf course golf is amazing, and that tgl is. I love everything that grows this game, literally, and I do. I really love top golf. Everybody's like,
do you like it? And I'm like, well, you get I'm kind of new. I go, well, then make sure you're on the second floor or higher because every shove will be airborne regardless of what's happening, right, But sometimes that's as far as they go because it is fun to go there. It is fun to hang with your friends. It's fun to get a little bite to eat and maybe grab a brew or something and have a few chuckles. But the number of people that are like, gosh, I'd like to go try this on a golf course because
it's a different game. But all of a sudden, the simulator golf and then you see the tgl and you're like, okay, let's do that. That is just pushing and it's hanging the biggest it's not a carrot, it's a giant ice chocolate cupcake. At the end of that stick to peepler going we are going to take a trip and we are gonna go play sand Hills, Nebraska, and we're all in,
let's go. And the same people who might not have played the game four or five years ago but learned it on a simulator and they get pushed forward there.
But does it grow the game?
I think it grows the game, and I also think that it grows the participation on green grass golf courses. You do think so, yeah, because you know at some point you go, oh, my gosh, I had no idea the hill on this hole was that bad. Yeah, and then you get that real life tingle and you're like, oh man, this is insane. I can't I can't believe we're here. So it it grows.
Yeah. Yeah, and it's interesting because you know, is TGL leading the way and simulator golf or they just like this is going on and it really represents what is going on, and now we have a media outlet to it that people are like, oh, you see, we are doing that, right, So you think that the future of simulator golf is the real thing.
Yeah, I think they opened that can and all of a sudden they're going, lord yeah, I mean yeah the can.
Ye I was like, what was that noise you just made?
But literally, when you go over to Korea, so much of the golf is played in simulator rooms. I mean, that is your golf outing because the courses are so difficult to get on. And all of a sudden they peered open through that door and you go, my gosh. People have been doing this all over the world for the last eight to ten years, and now it's not like,
come on, everybody, let's go. Do I feel like, do you guys realize how many people have been doing this for the last six, seven, eight years and it's a big fan, a huge fan.
And I think that you know, in the fifties and sixties it was bowling alleys. I think simulators. I actually think if you get a room that has simulators and bowling and maybe even a couple ping pong tables, put a stage in a bar, we've got a room.
Right.
So do you like on TVL.
Pain putt and pen paint putt and pins?
Be careful, yes, exactly. Now do you do you like on TGL how they're playing courses, you know, holes that are designed that no one's ever seen before. It's like, you know, we hear about oh I want to go play Bethpage Black because that's what the pros. Well, you can't play that course and you know the way they play it, right, But this is a course only the hand selected best players in the world are getting to play.
Do you like that or do you wish you saw a little bit of pebble, a little bit of Saint Andrews, a little bit of you know, sawgrass.
I think in a different way like with TGL and some of those holes that. I mean, that's another avenue for the amateur, be it a golfer, an amateur architect could go, I have an idea for a hole you guys could play and Fred you and I. I'm surprised they haven't done this yet, but I want to say, was his name Lloyd or Loyal Chapman that used to make the paintings of the insane golf holes, you know, like the side of the Grand Canyon where it just
dropped and then you know you had the machog. Yeah, yeah, and so again another avenue that brings more people into the game and interest to kind of go, hey, why don't you design a hole? Maybe you can end up on TGL.
That's a great idea to open it up for a design contest. Wow. Yeah again, and it's you know, once that out there, then you go, how do I How do I play that golfle on my simulator?
That looks like so much fun? Right, And maybe it's not a real golfer in real life, but you go, I got to play with the pros played.
There you go? There you go, though, maybe they should make them available. We had Augie Pisa who designed you know, he was one of the three designers and he talked about those assignments. It was great. Do you know since you were really tapped into the LPGA, do you know of any women that have been approached that they said, Hey, we're going to do an LPGA TGL or possibly even
co ed teams. I just think that the what they can do with different teams now, between co ed, between the seniors, between you know, bringing in amateurs or not. I think that there's something that they can do to make this. It just doesn't have to be one time of year. It could be. I'm sure ESPN's looking to expand this because it worked for them.
Yeah, and it could definitely be things to do in the off season. Do I know if anybody has approached the LPGA. I do not at this point, but I will tell you this, the comments and the interest from the ladies out there is like, that would be so much fun. That would be so much fun, and it's like, oh, we definitely have to get the team. We've got to get you know, Lexi Thompson and Maria Fosse for length off the tee and oh my gosh, you know we
can bring inby Park out of retirement. She's one of the greatest putters ever and all of a sudden you go, So the enthusiasm is there on the lady side. And I've heard that same comment too. It'd be like, wow, if they could do a co ed thing, it would be really neat.
Right, right, Yeah, but less I think for seniors to bring. You know, it's like, the thing that was beautiful about seeing Tiger first of all, is that it made him human, unlike anything we've ever seen. He was having so much fun, and he was vulnerable, and he made mistakes. We love to see that, right, But with we're not going to see Tiger walk seventy two holes again. No, I'm pretty much. I think everyone can agree that that ship has sailed, unfortunately,
but he can play a TG. He can play it so far in Florida, right it's around not only around the corner from his house. But seniors don't have to have that seventy two holes of walking. They have two hours of going from this hole, you know, from hitting over here on the grass to their little funny green.
Fred, You're an influencer in this business, and the only thing that's going through my mind right now is they can definitely have a Wendy's three Tour Challenge on the TGL, and that was I got to go to those a couple of years with Stacy Lewis and to talk about how much fun those players had and how much fun the spectators had. But it was neat to see the players. I remember the one year Stacey played with bou Weekley and Kenny Perry and to just be standing there to
the side and then watch them. You know, Boo is like, how do you hit that shot? And then Kenny Perry's coming over and he's like, you know, I found that as I got older, I changed this a little bit and that actually gave me more distance on my driver, changing this in my swing and I'm over there. I can't write things down past he speaks slower, please, But what a simplistic idea, but that that was so much
fun for the players. And when you get those, when you get the co Eds or you bring the seniors in, every one of those players in the group learns something from one another. And it isn't just like I got to hit it longer, or I got a putt better to it's it's just great being around and go all right, I'll tell you something I've never told anybody else. Now here's what I do out of the rough. I actually swing slower than my normal swing, so the grass has time to part out of the way, so the club
will hit the back of the ball. Whatever. And you hear these things and you're like, Okay, we're going to go try that as soon as we're off the course.
Yeah, exactly.
That's where the secrets come out.
Yep, yep. A lot of fun, as is having a conversation with you, my friend. I really really appreciate you coming back on and helping us celebrate episode one thousand coming up, and being part of our cavalcade of creative geniuses who we get to pick the brains of Joe Hallett. You're my hero.
I thank you, man Fred. Anytime you call, I tend to pick up the phone. Now sometimes I don't sign on in time, but my man, what you do for this game. First of all, congrats on the thousand. You're off on your journey for the next one thousand and if anybody wants to, I mean, the beauty of what you do is any player of any level can learn something, have fun, have a laugh, and take something to the
golf course. When they're done, and that is the way you get people interested in the game and keep playing. You're doing a great job.