I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset. When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. And when I find my ball in.
A Friday Egg, Friday egg, the dreaded Friday Friday, Frida Egg Egg, Friday Bride Egg, Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the hump.
Welcome back to another edition of the Friday Golf Podcast. I am Andy Johnson and I am back from Augusta. What a week? What a I mean, it's always a whirlwind. You get to Augusta and we get you know, we got in on Saturday, Saturday night, and then before you know it, it's like Saturday night the next week and you're you're looking at the final round right down the barrel. So what a win from skyt Scheffler. Unbelievable performance and really quite the run that he's been on. It's I mean,
it's just been amazing. So I had Shane Bacon. Shane was working doing Future Groups coverage for Masters, and it was fun to just kind of we didn't talk a lot during the week. It's funny, you know, you got all your media friends there, and Shane's a good friend of mine, and you know, we We see each other in passing, but we don't really talk about what's going on.
So it was fun to fun to chat with Shane and kind of unload each of our notebooks and stuff we wanted to get off our chests from this year's Masters. So before we get to Shane, today's podcast is brought to you by Bushnell. Bushnell has a new rangefinder. It's probably the best one yet. Is the Bushnell pro X three Bushnell Golf pro X three plus. It's precision perfected and this is next level performance because it now has wind.
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I remember back to junior golf, my first Bushnell. I mean, it was huge they're so much smaller now. It was like the wide one. You felt like you were looking through like a pair of binoculars. On the first one it was wide, it had one eye. But then now they've got and so far they obviously have the slope and it's super easy to turn off and on. Same with the wind for tournament play. Uh it it grabs a pin super quick, It has the magnetic amount for
people to ride in carts. And one of the big things it is waterproof, so you don't have to worry about it if it's raining. So learn more about the new pro X three plus uh with the wind gage and all that good stuff, and visit bush Nell Golf dot com. That's Bushnell Golf dot com. All right, I'm here with Shane Bak and Shane was on the featured groups calls this week. Great job with thanks, Thanks, you
know a lot of fun. I miss covering the Masters from home a little bit because I miss out on all like the Master's coverage because I'm kind of running around and I'm not really connected to it that much. I'll like occasionally I'll sit inside for like half of day and and I'll get to, you know, watch and listen to it, but you know, a lot of days I'm out, so I didn't. I didn't hear a lot of your work. I heard a lot of your work was great though.
Oh that that's that's nice. Who told you that was that? Like like friends of friends or did I text you.
That it was great?
Like three three three of your friends? It was an anonymous group chat chat. I got that. I didn't even have their numbers on my phone. They texted me Shane was really great.
Yeah, I passed.
By the way, case your wondering, I always send your number of people anytime they were like any course recommendations, I'm like, text Andy.
He loves giving those out. So I'm always just passing your number to people.
Yeah, so that's that's who told me that you were perfect?
By the way, I know, I consumed a lot of your podcasts this past week, and I've read a lot of your stuff and I thought it was great. So that's actually that's a first person compliment right there.
Well, I will say there's like I've imagined with boothe and working with people you've worked with Colton Kratz Hurt a couple of years now running I'm imagining that you get better every year.
Right, Oh, I mean I think uh, I think, you know, one of the main things about covering the Masters that's different than covering ever of the golf tournament is constantly remind yourself that people are there to watch the golf course first, i'd say, is probably the most likely thing, and second is the golf tournament. And so we try as best we can to be minimalist in terms of the broadcast, and Kratz is the best at it, i'd
say in the group. I mean, Kratz is so good at interjecting when he's got an amazing point to be made. Colton I can be a little sillier at times, I mean, as silly as you're going to be doing the Masters, but I feel like, yeah, I mean, I think this is our third or fourth year as a team doing it, and you know, we kind of jump in those seats in rock and roll.
But you know, I mean, it's the best week of the year. I mean, it really is.
I Like, it's hard for me not to call the Open my favorite major championship just from my kind of roots across the pond, if you will, like growing up and caddy and things like that. But in terms of the most fun work week of the year, I think the Masters is easily number one.
Yeah, yeah, I think. I think there's times where you can be really excited about a course on one of the other major championships because they rotate. Like this morning, the news that Kiowa got another PGA came out and I was like, oh, I'm really excited because last time Kia was awesome. It was awesome to cover. It was an awesome tournament, like one of the most memorable majors
of the last ten years. And for my job, it was awesome to cover because like I was just at Kiwa Resort, could go home, I ride ride a bike to the golf course and be back and it was just like the life. Yeah life. So from that that standpoint, you know, there are majors in like last year's LACC. I was probably more excited for LACC last year than I was for the Masters, just because it was something that we don't get all the time. So I think
that's kind of the push and pull. But especially this year with the weather, I mean, the the golf course was just we haven't seen it, we haven't seen it like that forever. I can't even recall going back when the last time we had really like four solid days of you know, Thursday was a little soft because of the rain, but I mean it dried out so quick with the wind.
So you know, I was thinking about this during the week last week, Andy, to your point about Augusta Nastional. And I got a little out out of Brendan's article about this as well, when he obviously got a chance to play it, and then he wrote a great piece.
If you haven't read it, by the way, absolutely go check that out. It was awesome.
But we all know.
And when I say we, I mean golf fans, right, diehard golf fans know Augusta National, and we learn more and more about it every single year. And when I'm calling the golf, I've never played Augusta National. I mean I've never been between the ropes, right, I mean, I don't know what it's like to play the golf course and experience certain golf shots. But I know on every single hole where a guy's in trouble and if a
guy's in a good spot. And I'd say that's pretty much across the board for anybody that's a golf fan that pays any amount of close attention to golf courses. I'd say people listening to this podcast probably understand, like you see a t shot with the tracer headed left on eight, and you know that guy's in trouble instantaneously. And I can't think of another golf course where you know right away if the person has a shot or does it. I was thinking thirteen. You'd see the second
shots on thirteen, especially Friday and Saturday. You'd see those second shots creep over the back of thirteen in that little swale and you know, again without having played the golf course and having no real course knowledge, you know how hard that golf shot is. And there's no other course on the planet like that where people truly know the goods and the bads of where players can hit shots.
And I think that's what makes it so cool is you almost have personal roots to it, even though almost everybody's never played it.
I think you know you hit on something here, just overarching it. Just so people have the premise of the episode, We're just.
We're dead beats right now, just so you know, but yeah, go ahead.
The premise of the episode is we're just gonna unload thoughts on the Masters. I was planning to write something, and I was writing it on my flight back. It was a late night flight back, and I was literally just like nodding off while I was writing. At one point my head hit the monitor of my commuter because I had fallen asleep. And it just seems like this is better served for the podcast. So so this is the ideas we're gonna kind of unload some thoughts on that.
But what you were saying about the course, Like, I do want to point out pro golf, male pro golf especially, and I think women's pro golf is the same way. Unfortunately, they don't play. They play like a handful of courses where there are good and bad spots every weekend, week out. You know, at TPC sod Farms, TPC Minnesota, it really doesn't matter if they hit it on the right side or the left side of the fairway or the rough, like,
it doesn't matter. And I think that's one of the big problems with professional golf and with the PGA Tours events, like they don't have a ton of an identity. They go back to the same place, but it's you know, a lot of them just aren't great golf courses. And one of the reasons that this has happened is like pro golf has outgrown a lot of the great golf
courses in America. And I think, you know, one of the things I in the lead up, I in the lead up of the of the Masters, I looked at the work on six and I think Augustin National is in a really weird spot in terms of identity. I think Joel Beale hit on this in his article Great Golf Digest article last year. You know what what is Augusta National? Is it a great club? Is it a club or is it a tournament host?
You know it?
Does it run and host the biggest golf tournament in the world. And when you think about it through the lens of that, the golf course through the lens of that, I think they've been doing a lot of work and they're probably the only ones with the means to do this to keep their golf course relevant. And we saw it on full display this week. Like I have a hard time believing that there was a better test of golf in the world than what we saw this week.
Like I couldn't you just looked at the golf course, you watched the shots that you had to hit and like. As the tournament went on, the leaderboard just separated more and more, and it was very, very clear who the best players in the world were at that time, who had all the shots, who had all the tools to play because it was demanding everything of everyone. And you look at that leaderboard and you go through the top ten and it's like every one of those guys in
the top ten is a stud. Those were the only guys that could handle this golf course this week. And sure there were some great players who didn't have their best stuff and that got snuffed out. And at a lot of places that doesn't happen. But August is in this weird spot where if you were you know, I look at the work that they've been doing and you know, it's like some of it the six holes, the big one of the big things they did this year, or the second te I don't love the work, right, I
don't love the idea of the work. If I'm looking at it through the lens of were great club, you're now you have an Alistair McKenzie course, and some of this work takes it further away from being an Alistair McKenzie course. And if you're looking at it through a club standpoint, I don't like the work now if you're looking at it through a tournament venue standpoint, like moving the tea back on two made a big difference in two.
Adding that little like back runoff that dips down on six made that shot on six more difficult and there's more consequence to you when you missed. Is that change on six in the spirit of what Alisair McKenzie wanted and Bobby Jones wanted, No, like they don't want to have like a little shelf in these sharp edges. They were very it was very artistic, and that sharp edge
is very anti mackenzie. But if you're looking at it through the lenses of a tournament venue and demanding the best out of the pro golfers, you know, maybe that change was good. So I think it's just like I kind of leave. I really believe, you know, more so than maybe in years past that listen, this is this is a this is a tournament venue and a golf tournament organization that operates as a club fifty three weeks of the year. But like the main reason for it
is this tournament. And when you look at the changes through that lens, it does make a difference. I will say one parting thing. I the changes are one thing. The work is sloppy, and I don't think it's great work that they're been doing, Like from the technical, artful nature of the work, it could be done much better. And I would say that's my one big critique.
Well, expand on that a little bit, because when you say it's sloppy, is that going back to what you said about the Alis McKenzie proto like layout if you will initially is that your point on the on either quote unquote sloppiness.
I just think when you look at the this is stuff that a lot of people won't care about. Like the changes are the changes, and I understand that, but it's just like shoddy construction work. You know, there are they're just the way that the stuff ties in. There's ways that they could tie it into the landscape a little bit better. The way they are utilizing drains, the way you know, just the way the edges and everything
flows together. It just it doesn't look great. I would compare it to like, you know, you could get a plus work on your house or you could go with a cheaper option. And if to me it feels and I'm not saying they're spending less money. In fact, I bet they're spending more money, but they're just getting less quality work than is out there with other options. So I did.
I wanted to ask you about a couple of things because I think the last two years you talked about changes to the golf course, and I think the big changes to the golf course over the last three years have been thirteen and fifteen. And I've seen a couple of articles and podcasts that have talked about how these changes have now made the second night on Sunday less exciting. And my pushback to that, Andy, and I wanted your
thoughts on this. The guy that won, the guy that won the Masters the best player in the world by an enormous gap. And I'm going to get into that gap in a little bit because it's a point I want to throw your way. That guy hit thirteen and fifteen and two on Sunday when he went on to win,
that guy easily hit thirteen and fifteen and two. And so if you're pushing those teas back to make it more challenging to hit those shots, the second shots into those par fives, not only does it make it obviously harder to hit the second shot in because you're hit more club. But it makes those tea shots more demanding. And I know you've been on this on the shotguns.
Start about Max hitting three wood on thirteen. You have to stand on that team and hit a really good t shot and it's got to move a little bit right to left. Probably less than people think on thirteen, but it does need to move a little bit if you're a long hitter, and Scotty is an extremely long hitter. It's something Colin Moricowa talked a lot about playing alongside the guy.
Right.
He easily hit it on the green in thirteen and fifteen easily. I mean, you know it's not like it wasn't he didn't need to do it, but he did it because it takes the serious trouble and the big
numbers out of play. And so for people out there that say we've lost some of the roars because of the distance added to thirteen and fifteen, my only pushback at that is the dude that wins the golf tournament, the best golfer on the planet, the guy that's been on this crazy run over the last twenty five months, took on those par fives and pulled the golf shots off,
and so that's more to me. The dude's chasing the guys that want to win the Masters that haven't won it yet, Colin Moricow and Max Homa and Ludvig who's playing in his first Masters. The guys that were closed didn't hit those golf shots that the holes are asking in modern times. And if you want to see the guys be able to hit mediocre T shots and hit seven irons in, then so you have more eagle putts,
that's your distinction on the golf tournament. But to me, what we're seeing in the modern times with these second nine par fives forces the guys to hit awesome T shots and awesome second shots, and the best player in the world is pulling those shots off.
Yeah, and if you don't hit an awesome T shot, say you hit a good a mediocre T shot, then it just raises the bar on the next shot you have to hit if you'd want to get home in two, right, which I saw with what about Tiger when he pulled lumber was on Friday.
On fifteen on Friday, when nobody was getting there, everybody was laid up. This dude's forty eight years old, and I know he still got speed, but he took on that golf shot. He probably had a good number, but he took on the shot and hit an awesome shot there. And again, this is what these holes have asked of past generations. You and I have talked a lot about eighty five with Curtis Strange over the years, when he had hit three wood into both those part fives and
didn't pull the shots off. But he had to hit three wood, and that's a really hard shot with three but it's not that hard of a shot with an eight iron.
I think we're in a little bit of an adjustment period. You know, These these changes happen and the holes change a little bit. And what we've gone from is, you know, we used to we used to be like what a shot? What an eagle? Then we moved to all of a sudden, everybody's hitting these shots. Everybody's got eagle putts, and it's like a little bit like it take away the specialness of getting home into and now we're restoring some of that. But there is like a trailing aspect of like, wait,
what about all these eagles? You know, I, for one, like I was lucky to be in the grand stands when Shuffler made his eagle on thirteen. I'll tell you what, on Saturday, that was a massive moment. I'm not going to forget about that, with the way the ball just kind of like crawled up and in over the front edge of the cup. Like I'll I never forget that. The roar, the roar from people because this was like
this monumental eagle. After it looked like he was kind of playing himself out of the tournament, he makes this eagle and then I think he burned fifteen as well, maybe one other hole coming in and it's like, oh my god, like this guy like as soon as you think he's out, he's back in and I think you look at Scheffler overall like ParvE. I think one of the things I took away this year is just how important it is to pick a part of the par fives.
Scheffler played him nine hunder. Everybody since Sergio Garcia's played them at least eight under par. The golf course and the way they've been able to modernize it has the par three's in the par fours are just so difficult. They are they just wear on you like, there aren't
many easy birdies out there. The par fives are where you have to get them, and I think par fives par five performance is just generally, especially with elite players, like a really good barometer of how where they're where players are at in their game because you have to hit good t shots to score on par fives. You're then hitting long second shots into par five. So if you're hitting great long irons, you're gonna have easy two putts, right, But if you're just a little off, then it becomes
like how good is your short game. You're gonna have to get up and down to make a lot of birdies on par fives. It's just a really good, I think, all encompassing stat of like where your game is that and augusta where you have four reachable scorable par fives, it is the ultimate barometer. I would love if there was like a side by side leaderboard par five leader board, because I bet they would look so so so similar.
Well, and you brought up the eagle from Scotty on Saturday, and how monumental it was because we hadn't seen a lot of eagles on these holes. I don't think it was the only eagle on thirteen.
For the day. The basically what we've replaced.
With the added distance on those par fives on the second nine is you've got to play the whole f in great to make an eagle, like you have to hit three unbelievable golf shots, but you've got to play it really well to make a birdie. And I think that, to me is the big difference, because one of the things I always felt of the Masters was when we had those guys going out early, like when Rory did it a couple two or three years ago, and Speed did it a few years ago when he messed up
eighteen and shot whatever sixty four. You'd get those guys out early trying to post a number, and in the back of your head, as much fun as it was to watch it, in the back of your head you thought, well, the leaders still got to play thirteen and fifteen, and they're gonna make birdies on those holes. And nowadays they're not assumed birdies. You know. We saw it with Max on Sunday, where you get to thirteen and fifteen and if you lay up, you have to did an awesome
wet shot to make birdie, and those wet shots. We weren't awesome. They were fine, and you don't make birdies. And what I like about it is eagles are incredible, but birdies are also really good. And I think that's been something I've enjoyed in terms of the length, restoring that feeling where if you make a birdie on thirteen, you play that hole awesome and you didn't have to hit an eight iron to the middle of green or a seven iron to the middle green and two putt.
It feels like they've just made those two holes. They've kind of shifted and I'm going to say for thirteen, it had turned into a par four point twenty five, okay, And I feel like what they've done now is shifted it back to what they really wanted to be, a par four and a half. Like that's what that's why it's this great hole. It's a talent like you, you feel frustrated if you don't make a four, but it's
still very hard to make a four. And then fifteen it feels like it had shifted to like maybe a four point five, and now it's back to like a four point seventy five. Right Like fifteen, especially they got that west wind a couple of days when that thing's
barreling into the into your face. I don't that's about as hard of a part part five as you could get, because you know that great when you're hitting a wedge in the green's so shallow and you got the wind in front in your face, it's so easy, like you know, the first half of the green, you're just not hitting anything on this shallow ass green. You're not hitting anything that lands on the front half because you know that's gonna spin off into the water. So it just gives
you this back part. I remember what, I can't remember which wedge it might have been. Right out of the out of the gates on Friday morning, Tiger hit a wedge and and he hit it to like the back edge, and it was howling in it was cold. He hit it to like the back edge, and he looked so content with where it ended up, like he was so content missing the green with a wedge, And I thought that was like that hole is just everything you could want when it's into a strong win well.
And I mean, you know everybody's talked about it Andy for so long about fifteen is you know, if you lay up it's one of the hardest wedges in pro golf. And I think what we've seen with the additions at fifteen and thirteen is you're seeing so many more players have to hit one of the hardest shots in golf, and that should be fun for viewers. It should be fun for fans watching is seeing the best in the
world have to manipulate an eighty yard shot. They've got to land on a you know, six by six square to be able to make a birdie. Like that's the great stuff about this golf course. And it's like Adeki's shot at fifteen and he won felt like an outlier at the time. Now it feels like a bit out we see more often. So I just those that was something I wanted to bring up to you was I thought there was some people that were not disgusted, but frustrated by the fact that we don't see as many
eagle roars and cheers and things like that. And to me, it's just simply been replaced by a birdie cheer and if you do make an eagle, that's incredible. And I will give you another thing I love about this golf course, Ady, because when you're doing feature groups, obviously you're starting everybody out on one. One of my favorite things about Augusta National, my favorite parts of covering this golf tournament is the first holes. One of the hardest first holes in golf.
Played a little easier this year. You saw little you saw a little bit more action there. But what I love about it, Andy, I know you've played a lot of tournament golf, is having scorable holes early in the round is such a mental hurdle. And I love the fact that you get through one and have literally the two most scorable holes you're likely to get to play for the week.
Especially this year.
Two was very easy and three was relatively easy depending on the whole location, right, But you feel like you absolutely have to start out four four three or five four three or four four four or something like that, because you know how difficult four through seven is. And I just think that's so cool to throw the curveball at those players right out of the gate. Or you know,
I'm settling in the round. I just played the first hole, which is really hard, but I've got to be one under through three or it's probably gonna be a rough first nine. That's such a fun part of Augusta National.
Yeah, and if you think about if you flip the part, flip the nines, where you'd hit the scorable stretch on the back nine. If that the back nine, the second nine became the first nine, you'd hit the scorable stretch. It's your fourth hole that would be thirteen. That's such a more comfortable place.
Yeah, into it even if you're one over, you know, at least say ten, because that was the way you used to play, right, Andy was initially designed where ten was the first hole.
Yeah, like ten, eleven, twelve. If you if I get through there are one or two over, I'm okay. I'm like, you're fine, like best fine. I averted the disaster I from there. If you change like the dynamic, it's like it's like getting that first three holes, that's kind of getting out of the blocks right right. You could get slow out of the blocks with those three holes and
be just fine. You can't. You don't feel like you could be slow out of the blocks there with one, two, and three as it exists today, correct, because you're you get through with three and if if you're over part you're like, oh.
No, I got no chance. You've got no chance.
I mean four, five, six, and seven, and you mentioned six plans so tough this year, it was firm. Those whole locations are so hard to get.
To three three back hole locations.
Like that is that is such a stretch of golf, And like I was a member at Phoenix Counch Club and I used to live in Arizona, and I the first holes the easiest hole on the golf course. It's like five twenty par five away, which would be if it was in the middle of your round. You're kind of riding down Bertie. Right, I'll make Bertie. It's not a big deal, but the fact that it's the first hole.
When you don't make Bertie on one or eagle at one and you get to two and three, you feel like you left a shot out there to start your day. And I just think since golf is such a middle game, it's such a cool underrated part of Augusta National is the way the first three holes can either jump start your round or can almost ruin your round as you get set for the hardest stretch of the golf course.
Yeah, I think that's a great assessment observation of a gust step. All right, let's take a quick break and talk about another partner of ours, ors An Alps. It it was refreshing in Augusta National to see the sun as often as we did it. It was very warm on the weekend. It was very sunny all week I mean it was that type of day, clouds for like three straight days, which was awesome for watching golf. You could see the ball, you know what.
It was.
One thing, though, with all that sun that I had to worry about was my skin and protecting it. So skin cancer rates have risen fifty five percent among men for the past decade, and the way I protected against that was with Oars and Alps. They make an awesome easy sunscreen. I've got a couple of different sizes. Brendan brought the small size to the golf course and my golf bag. I'd keep a bigger one because I use it so often. So with skin cancer going up, only
fourteen percent of men wear skin is sunscreen daily. This is a great way to reduce your chance of Melanova and golfers are way more likely to develop skin cancers. So one of the reasons I love Oars and Alps products is that they are really good. They have great quality products, but they also don't make you smell when you put the sun screen on. It's just like putting on your moisturizer. You don't get greasy hands, there's no residue, and it's just simple easy to use. So I love
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And can I throw something at you here? I wanted to throw this at you and get your thoughts on it. I think you're probably going to disagree, which is fine with me. But I was thinking about Scotty and the comps that we've had over the last you know, three months, and really over the last year and a half two years. I was thinking about the guys that you and I would list and name as the other superstars in golf.
And I think if you and I were going to do this right now, you'd mentioned Rory, and you'd mentioned Brooks, and you mentioned maybe you'd mentioned JT more of DJ that group, right, all of those players, I would say, are in either the second or third phases of their career, you.
Know, you know, I mean maybe Mori cow is not it might be in the last.
It's fine.
DJ's DJ's on on seventeen, Like, I think, he's just good to be whatever.
He's He's on his boat, he's on his boat.
He's he's minds, his mind's fishing, and his body's swinging right, Like, that's where we're at with this guy. But I was thinking about the gap from Scotty to the next best peer of his. When I say peer, I mean guy in his realm, right, So that's not Rory, that's not Brooks, that's not Jordan, that's not justin it's gonna be more. Maybe it's more Kawa. And the gap from Scotty to the next best person currently in professional golf feels like a bigger gap than Tiger to anybody of his era
when he was in his prime. And I think a lot of that is the players that were in Tiger's era. VJ wins nine times in Tigers. What about what about Ram?
I think Ram, you could throw in the in the bucket of contemporary.
Okay, that's fine, And maybe maybe Rom is the Maybe Ram is the guy, and Ram is similar age to him and his career is similar. But I was wondering your thoughts on the gap from Scotty to the next best guy currently. I'm talking about right now twenty twenty four, mid April Postmasters headed into the rest of major season. The gap between Scotty and the next best player versus at any point in Tiger's career and the next best player,
and that next best player was three names right. At one point, it was VJ, at one point, it was already at one point it was Phil right. But I'm just wondering, is that a crazy thing to say?
I think right now I need a little bit more time because at this time last year, at the at the end of the FedEx Cup last year, we were operating in a world, in a world where Rom and Scheffler were equals, and Rom goes to live. Scheffler takes off this year, and I need I need a little bit bigger sample size to get there. That being said, if John Rom finishes twenty fifth in every major to the rest of the year and and Scheffler wins two and contends in another one, I'd probably be getting close
to that. I mean, now he's got three wins of the year. What's what are you what do you think for Scheffler over under?
On?
Like if I said five and a half wins on the PGA Tour, I mean, nobody's winning five wins on the PGA Tour now, is like crazy, Yeah, it's like the especially because you know, like Scheffler doesn't play many fields that are weak, if.
At all, I mean he plays Houston, He'll play probably like one of the events, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, one of those events. I think that's dude, I think that's an amazing over under. I was thinking five as you were talking, feels like five wins is where he should be at by the end of this year if he continues to play even close to what he's been playing. I mean I I think that he played his B
minus to C plus game in Houston and almost one right. Again, not the biggest field the world, but you know, Tiger beat not great fields in his area at times. Oh yeah, I would say he probed for me to really exclamation mark this point of mine. He's probably got to win five times at another major this year is probably the feeling i'd sit in.
Yeah, I think like to exclamation point at if he if he gets to something like seven wins this year, which I don't think is crazy. I don't think it's crazy.
I don't think it's crazy.
But it's so many, it's so many.
It's more, it's more than double what he's won at this point.
Six seven wins. If he gets to something like that, I'm really on board with the like this is there's there's this huge gap. I think, like the other aspect of this is he's doing it in an era that's extraordinarily hard to separate yourself. The way that equipment is, you know, it's it's great for recreational golfers. It's great for people that want to get better the game. I think for professional golf, it's like Muddy the water, Like he's a great driver of the golf ball and a
great long iron player. He rarely hits long irons on the PGA Tour, Like I think one of the things about Augusta was he was hitting long irons, and that's only going to separate his advantage. It's going to make the advantage bigger.
So you feel like if the NBA was like, you know what, Steph shooting two many threes, let's make the line longer, and you'd be like, well, yeah, that helps Steph curry that thing.
To anybody else?
Yeah, And I think like, if we're talking about Scotty here, one of my big takeaways from the week is Scotty Scheffler's just processed. And I think it's it's so simple and and golf it's all these counter counterintuitive things. But when I think about Scotty Scheffler's process, the way he prepares, the way he treats his range sessions, it makes so much sense and it's so simple, and it's like, well, why doesn't everybody do this? So this was from his
pre tournament press conference. I think Luke Kurdnien asked this question. When you're on the range using that molded grip and got your practice station sort of all set up, I'm wondering what exactly are you doing there and why is that such an important part of your kind of pre tournament prep. Here, Scotty really just checking my fundamentals. I feel like when my swing gets off, it's usually something very basic about what I'm doing. And so I have
my grip club because I'm checking my grip. I have my alignment sticks down because I want my alignment to be good, and then and then also helps me with my ball position. Then usually Randy or Teddy is back there making sure I'm taking the club back online, and I'm just working on my form and hitting shots. Is pretty much my normal practice. That's exactly how I practice at home. So when I come to a tournament, it
just makes it just is more of the same. So he then goes on to talk about like he doesn't have a lot of structure. He just wants to make sure he feels right, Like he doesn't spend more than an hour out there, and he doesn't make any rash decisions. Really right. So I have long contended a belief of mine is that if you simply like the hardest thing in golf, the actual hardest aspect of playing high level golf is consistently setting up to the golf ball correctly.
This is like the most underrated hard thing to do in golf. Everybody talks about like swing playing all these things. Guess what if you set up well all the time, there's very little like that can go wrong. And I think like everybody's missing this boat, like the boat of like what Scotty's doing in terms of like you know, these tour pros, they have their track man's out. It's like this, like don't worry about setting up all your numbers, you know, And all Scotty's doing is like, hey, am
I gripping the club right? Is my alignment? Good? Is the ball position good? Is my takeaway good? And if all those things are good, it is extraordinarily hard to hit a bad shot for a player of their calb, of a tour pros caliber. And I just like, maybe golf instructions gotten too too complicated, because this makes so much sense to me. I just like couldn't stop thinking about it once, he said this because it's like, okay, like if you take away like my setup's gonna vary,
like I think this is in you. You probably could attell, like do you I find like why I play bad? Because I play so sporadically as like, oh, like I spent all day. I was aimed like ten yards left all day and I didn't know it, you know, And that's why I was hitting like poles and blocks, you know, because I was trying to like fade it back or I was you know, my body knew I was in a bad spot. But if you're in set up right, it's almost impossible to hit a bad shot.
I mean, it's what I battled the most, Andy, I mean literally, the thing I battled the most is simply alignment. When I'm not playing a lot of golf, to your point, I'm almost always closed. I see a video myself and I'm saying, oh, well, of course I hit it bad. My feet are aimed, you know at ten o'clock, you know, as a lefty, I mean, I can't do that. It It's funny, you know. You you saying all of that
about Scotty. All I could think about is you were saying that Andy was how many things we've talked about, and you guys have podcasted about this year of his contemporaries that if change caddies and change swing coaches and
gone through this and gone through that. Guys like Victor Havin and Colin Moorekawa and even Rory at times who have kind of they're they're they're dabbling with this person and they're asking questions here, which I don't think there's anything wrong with that, But when you're looking at the guy that's the most consistent player in the world and the best player in the world, all of those things are stable. The instructor's stable, his caddie's stable. What he's
trying to work on is stable. He's not trying to go find all these answers that he doesn't need, all these answers of questions that he doesn't need to ask himself, because he knows if X, Y and Z work, then my golf swing swing's gonna work. And I just mentioned
Steph Curry. I don't I hate to go back to him again, but I remember Steph was on this SmartLess podcast a few months ago and one of the guys asked him a question, like a very simple question about shooting, said, you know, like, how do you make how do you shoot as well as you shoot? And he said, I've gotten to a point in my career where if my feed are set and I'm in balance, I feel like I'm going to make a three now again. Steph Curry
never looks like he's in balance. It never looks like his feet are set right, he's coming off screens, he's shooting crazy shots. But to him, if you if you break it down to balance, Steph Curry feels like if he's in balance, he's gonna make a three pointer. And for Scottie Scheffler, he feels like, if my hands are on the club the right way and my feet are set up the way I want to set him up,
I'm gonna make a great golf swing. Like it's simplifying the complicated, which is what pro golfers are almost going against right now.
Think about think about how easy it is for your grip for your left hand to maybe shift a centimeter one way, and how massive of an impact that has on everything that goes into the swing and face position of a club. I mean, it's crazy to me, like, as I think about my own golf game, why don't I use a grip club.
I agree with you.
Like that's like, since since like Sunday, that's all I've been thinking about, is like why don't I Just like I could spend ten minutes just setting up to a golf ball and not even hitting a golf ball, and I would be better for it. Like it is so insanely simple that it makes a ton of sense. I had a friend of mine texted me, He's like, isn't the comp And it's John and Zechowitz. I want to give him credit here, very smart guy, worked worked in basketball,
now now does very high level financial things. But John John texted me on Sunday and he's like, isn't the comp for Scottie Tim Duncan the big fundamental Like he's boring, doesn't like give you a lot and and interviews? I think Boring's like I think he's he's fairly fairly interesting. I'm not going to say he's not exciting to really super exciting to watch. He doesn't jump off the off the page on impressed conferences, But damn is he good at everything? And he doesn't make mistakes.
That's the best.
That's the comp is is like a Duncan type mixed with Tiger as a golfer because to me, he plays golf like Tiger used to play golf. And I think that's probably the biggest compliment you can give anybody in this sport, is he's so smart, he's so dialed. He can hit his numbers, he can hit his spots, and
that's what Tiger was so good at. And I do want to throw something else at you about Scotty because I was thinking about the gap that I mentioned to you, and I was watching on Sunday and I was thinking, is Ludvig the guy that we're gonna see? Because the biggest bummer about Rom going to live for golf fans was last year we kind of had Scotty versus Rom,
especially early in the season, and we lost that. This year, we're gonna get him into Majors, which is the golf tournaments that matter, obviously, but I think the build up at other events helps the Majors storylines and leading into the week and you can go, you know, we had Scotty and Rahm go at it at riv and go at it here and at Bayhil YadA YadA, right, and we lost that. I wonder if Ludvig's the guy that Scotty's going to battle with over the next five years,
because it sure seems like talent length maturity. I mean, his ability to just act like he's forty when he's twenty four is incredible, and how he doesn't get.
Up in down his dispositions in golf is really unbelievable for such a young player.
But Andy, don't you feel like they have similar dispositions. Don't you feel like when you watch Scotty you see a lot of Ludvig in them where it's just like, all right, man, if I hit it over there, I'll just go find it.
Try to make par I think the other thing is just the golf swing. I mean, it's so simple. I just don't I don't see how it can go really wrong ever, right right, I agree with you.
So I've been thinking we we've lost Rom and Scottie. Like golf is a golf major championship golf is the only bummer about major championship golf is we only get it four times a year. And when you look back over the history of golf, as many duel in the suns as we got and as many Tiger Phil pair together on Saturday and Sunday at the Masters, as we got more often than not, we never got those right,
Like we don't get the matchups in professional golf. And this is what the signature events were supposed to be. And unfortunately, I think the signature events have fallen a bit flat after year one. Right, It just they're just not necessarily working. So we need.
Harbortown this week.
It's it's no knock to Harbor Town, it's no knock to anything. It's just simply put, you can't have an NFC championship game and expect people to care the week after the Super Bowl.
You know the home you know what this is.
You know what it is.
It's the Pro Bowl. We just we just played the Super Bowl, and it's like, oh, we got this Pro Bowl.
But if you expected the players to play full out, all out of the Pro Bowl, you know, versus it being the silly event, That's what I'm saying is it's almost like going back to the NFC Championship game the week after the Super Bowl, right where you go, like, could you imagine asking Patrick Mahomes to go play the best football of his life four days after the super Bowl. That's not a real realistic thing to throw somebody's way. I mean, they're going to change, is I really hope so?
Because having a vent after the majors anyway is a bit silly, but having a signature event seems crazy. That's neither here nor there. My point is we are we will be lucky if we get Scheffler versus Ram one out of eight majors over the next three years. We'll
be lucky if we get that. But if we get Scheffler Ludwig, and then we get Ludwig Ram and then we get Scheffler Rom, like, that's there's potential for that, And I feel like there's an opportunity for us to create a little bit back and forth with Luddig because he's on the PGA tour versus Rom not being there anymore.
Yeah. I mean listen, like when the Chips Chips were down on Sunday, to me, you know, of the chasers, Mark Kaala and Max were No. I don't think like exposed is the right word, but I think they they were. It was kind of clear that they were in a little bit different situation than uh, Ludwig and Scottie, and I thought Ludwig was like I wasn't sure about Like I thought his approach play was a little bit you
know of a worry coming in. His short game hasn't been the best, but I'll tell you what, Like when you watch him hit the golf shots, the like I came away like wow, Like there's this is a guy that's young, that could be in the same mold, like Scheffler has no holes. Like short putting is like the one thing that you can be like you know what,
it's not great. Everything else is just like well, he could be the best at that, like one of the things, like Scheffler is not gonna lead strokes gained off the tee. He's but from a sense of I don't I don't know if any big hitter that has a better fairway finder than Scheffler, Like if you tell me, like, oh, I need a guy that to hit it three hundre in the fairway like Scotty's mic, Like he tees the ball down and he hits that little bleed cut and it's just like okay. And then when you pair that
with his iron play, it's it's unstoppable. It's it's impossible because that stuff shows up week in, week out. Ludwig feels similar where you could get to a point where it's like because like the short game stuff, this is his technique, Like that's easy, super easy to get better at short game. I think like you could get to above average with just technique. I think Scotty's generational with short game because it's like what he grew up doing.
And there's that famous stuff with like the Royal Oaks that was you know, the pros were out there and you know short game was the only place he could beat him. You know, like that's the stuff like the generational short game players, whether it's Sevy or whether it's Phil or whether it's it's you know, now Scotty and like cam Smith to me is another one that like I love watching him, like they just have something that even great technical short game players don't have. And it's
this thing that like imagination mixed with perfect technique. But I could see Ludwig getting to a level of golf where he is really sounded everything and great, Like you know when you look at Ludwig versus Scotty off the tee, like that's where Ludwig can really do some things that Scotty can't do you.
Know, Yeah, you mentioned the I think this.
I think this is worthy to mensh out to mention because we talk so much about Scotty and now we're talking a lot about Scotty, and that's followed by Tiger. Is Tiger wasn't a great driver of the golf ball. A lot of distance at his day, but he wasn't a great driver of the golf ball. He hit it wayward even in his prime. Jack wasn't a great chipper of the golf ball, right, I mean, there were slight holes in the greats games. And so for Scotty's hole to be five feet and in or whatever the case
may be, whatever you want to call it. Everybody that's been great has had a little bit of a hole in something, right, So this isn't this isn't different for Scotty.
That is un Yeah, exactly exactly. So I mean, I just I just.
Wanted to point that out. And I think you're you're spot on the chipping, the pitch in the sand play. The shots that he can hit with his wedges are absolutely next level. Now my next point I wanted to throw at you, Andy, I don't and I'm not this isn't red meat for you, dude. I'm not doing this to get you riled up or to make you jump on a perch that you've sat on for a while. Is it realistic to say that the speech JT Era is we're past it? Is that realistic to say?
It's a great question. I I think when you think about stars, you have to think about their windows, and I think, like, to me, the question is, is the really really great players are ten year windows generally?
Right, You've been on this forever and it's great. I love when you do this.
By the way, tigers like ten years to the to the t like ninety seven to two thousand and six, just like, and it's it's a different career after that. You know, Phil is an outlier where he's kind of spanned out, Nick Faldough. If you look at it ten years, then there's other guys like David Duval five years.
So those guys are the good.
Those are the good, not great, right, Those are the guys that were very good but maybe not generationally great. I mean, David Vall won one major championship one of players, but again not not to the level of the guys you mentioned.
So you just I think like looking at it through the context of years, and it's very rare. It's extraordinarily rare to get a twenty year star like Phil like is trending towards like Rory is is trending towards somebody that seems like he's going to be effectively a top fifteen player in the world for twenty straight years. That is extremely rare. So if you think about it through that context, like JT and Speith have had five great years and in Speed's stamp for Speed, like when was
his last great year? Twenty eighteen, it's a long time ago. See that's six years ago, and you think about it, it's like, okay, like he had five great years and now we're at ten years. We're almost at I think about ten years of Jordan Speith and it's okay, Like if he's not the same player, I think like the game has changed a lot that off the tee, like the game has changed tremendously since Speed came, but also
like the fabric of Speed. One thing I've been thinking about a ton is just like how golfer's mindsets change when they're twenty one versus when they're thirty one, Right, just the idea of like who you are. When I noticed this, like I was on a hike in Sedona, and I was just like I was kind of nervous about like where I was and the heights, and I was a kid that was like scared of nothing. But it was just like this idea and it kind of
like clicked with me. As like you get older in things, things change in your mind, the way you approach life, the way you think about life, the way you think about golf. Some people get better, some people get worse.
But I think with regards to a lot of the players that are aging, that are in aging, I mean like at this point is like they're into their thirties, the relationship that themselves have with golf has changed significantly, And I think that that is a piece that's immeasurable in terms of there's no analytics, there's no strokes gain number, but like the what they're thinking about when they're standing over a shot, or what they used to never think about and now they do think about that, that has
definitely changed for all these guys.
Yeah, I feel like with those two guys, I was thinking about Jordan and Justin because we talk about them at every major in some capacity. Right, we talk about Jordan the most and then we talk about Justin as well. Is they have to play absolutely perfect golf these days to win golf tournaments, and I'd say they almost have to play beyond perfect golf to win a major championship.
I mean JT.
Listen, he played great at the PGA Championship. Be one, not taking any away from he shot sixty seven in the final round, needed a little bit of help by a couple of guys, and he won the PGA. He was there and he won it, and that's a major, and that's a big deal. But this is a guy that has missed four of his last five cuts in major championships and he's won once in twenty twenty one.
Now that's a players that he won, by the way, played great, shot sixty four on Saturday, near flawless golf, and he won once in twenty twenty two, and that was the PGA Championship. These are enormous wins from Justin Thomas. But when you talk about when were they last great, I think Jordan, you go back to twenty eighteen, and I think for Justin you go back to twenty seventeen.
Like this is this a lengthy gap between them being really monumentally great and in the conversation at multiple big events and then playing well for a week and winning and then kind of going away. And So I've been really thinking about the era we're in right now, and it feels like this year, more than ever, we have turned the page on a lot of the guys that you and I've covered for decade plus.
Yeah, I you know, I think they still have the talent and the skills to knock one of these off. Totally agree, But to think of them as first page favorite is a bit silly at this point.
It's hard to put them in that and it's hard to put those guys with where their games are and where they're This isn't recency, This isn't recently they've been playing bad golf. I mean this is now on years right for both of these guys. I mean the way they've played in the Ryder Cup and the way they've played when they've teamed up in these events. Like we laugh at this stuff and we joke with how they perform as a team because at one point in their prime,
that team was unbeatable. That team had two guys that were top five talents in the world that had the game and the ability and to your point, the mindset to go out there and flush it and beat the hell out of anybody that stood in front of them. And they simply can't do that anymore on skill set alone. They've either got to find something that is absolutely clicking a bull for four days, or they've got to run into somebody that does something silly like Mito did or
plays terrible in a match for them to win. And I just wonder, to your point about odds and first page and things like that, is are we flipping the page on that crew? And who is that next top five page? Is it Ludwig and Scottie and Rob?
I was gonna ask you, like, if I gave you Xalatorus and Cam Young versus Speith and JT the rest of the majors, who are you taking?
I mean Xalatorus and Cam Young, no doubt about it. I mean I'd take Tom Kim as well, like I mean, I'd take these I'd take these younger guys that are extremely hungry right now. Over as I mentioned Justin Thomas, who has missed four of his last five cuts in major Championships and Jordan Speith, who in that first round look like a guy that had absolutely no idea what window the ball was going to come out of, had no idea what shot was going to come out of the face it was going to go left or right.
You know, it's not close. This isn't shooting seventy four to seventy three and missing the cut. This is this is shooting nearly eighty on the same day that Bryson shoots sixty five. I mean, you're talking, what's that fourteen shot difference? I mean, you know that was the scorable day Andy is and Jordan goes out and shoots whatever, seventy nine.
Well, I mean like he's an augusta national specialist, is his reputation. But you know that's that was based off of his first five Masters, where he went T two win, T two, T eleven third. You know, if you go from twenty nineteen, six years.
Ago, seven years ago, is that the last time? Yeah, six, twenty seventeen, twenty sixteen.
Twenty eighteen to the end, and now now twenty nineteen on T twenty one, T forty six, T three cut, T four cut. So like still some you know this is a great golf course for him to pop up and play well at, but it's a different player. And I think, like one of the other things with with majors is like, and what enthuses you about Scotti has to is the most challenging major mentally to win and
the one that can kind of haunt you. The Masters he's now knocked off too very early, and he's he's with the list of two time Masters champions is like pretty pretty good, you know, Like I think the one player you could probably look at on that list and say is Bubba Watson. But that being said, like still it's it's such an impressive list of players.
Winning multiple Masters. And going back to the Jordan thing, right the way Jordan started his career augusta National, we all said he was gonna win multiple Greens Jackets, and I would now be surprised if Jordan Speed wins at other Masters. I mean, the game's getting better and better by the second. Guys are getting longer and longer, They're coming out earlier, they're hitting it straighter as well. I mean, it's going to be tougher for him to win each
and every year as we move forward. I feel the same way about Rory. Obviously, Rory is a completely different player in terms of skill set than Jordan Speed is. But it's not getting easier for Rory to do it. Really, Sergio's the outlier in terms of a guy that's when in this many starts at augustin n Ashvial, right.
I think like one of the things that the rollbacks slated for twenty twenty nine, yep, could there be a potential like where we have twenty twenty nine come around and then all of a sudden, like long irons are hit more and short game matters more again, and we have like this era that then there's like a correction because when you put regulations in there are like unintended consequences that will happen, and it could push us back to where like some of the older players that are
used to playing golf when the ball doesn't go a mile are actually you know, rewarded. And I think that is one thing to think about with Speed, okay, is that if the ball, if the game is scaled back a little, I think he is, you know, really going to be bumped up. I think, like, what's what's funny
to me? Like, what's actually like comical to me with all the rollback talk is like a lot of the players who would benefit the most from a rollback are vociferous against it, you know, Like, you know, Justin Thomas is a great example. Like when he came on tour, he was like he was an elite driver of the ball because of the distance, Like he had pop in the bat that other people didn't have. Now you go down to driving range and Justin Thomas kind and just another guy on the range, but justin.
Another just another guy for you. You're gonna have to make new hats.
But like you watch Justin Thomas around the greens, you watch him hit long irons, you watch him move the ball, and you're like, wow, this guy is something. Those skills have all been kind of diluted as players have gotten longer and longer, and courses fewer and fewer courses are able to hold up to it. All.
Right, so we're talking a lot about Scotty, and every pod that's doing anything Postmasters is talking pretty much exclusively about Scotti Scheffler. Right, if you and I had done this podcast at the end of twenty fourteen, you and I would be talking about Rory and what's the future
and how many majors is he gonna win? So let me ask you this, Andy, How is this different than Rory in twenty fourteen where he'd won three straight including two majors, and he was king of golf and he was gonna win ten majors And now we're sitting here still waiting for the next one. How is Scotty's run right now different than Rory in twenty fourteen, Jordan in twenty fifteen, JT and twenty seventeen where he wins five times in a major championship.
Why do you feel like this might feel different? If it feels different to you at all?
And how does Scotty not, in theory, fall off a major cliff in the next six months or two years and never win another major again.
Well, the beauty of sports, the beauty of covering this is we have no clue, but it might be the same. It feels different, but in the moment it's always hard to you know, you always tend to over inflight things. Yeah, I think like to be like the approach of Scotty, of the fundamental stuff that I talked about. He doesn't seem to me to be a guy like we've seen with speed. Like speak's on top of the golf world
and he's trying to change his golf swing. That should always be mentioned, like you know where he is now. The game got harder for him because he tried to make a big change. I read something about Victor Hovland changing his golf swing over the last you know, six months, since he was playing the best golf of his life, and it's like.
He wanted to change it. He wanted to change it during during the playoffs. He was unhappy with the way he was swinging. When he shot twenty eight on the back at the BMW or whatever, and then wins the Tour Championship, he was talking about wanting to change things.
I mean, I think Rory's swing has changed dramatically from twenty fourteen. You know, it's not the same. He's got different equipment, Like there's all these things that go into it. I think one of the other difficult things when you become a superstar, super duperstar is the time commitment of
all the other stuff and the clutter. Really, like, if you are the best play golfer on the planet for a couple of years running, you're gonna have more time commitments and and it goes to like, you know, I think like a thing is if you want to be truly great at anything, you have to put the time in and you have to continue to block out the time to do the stuff that you're great at. It's I think why you see so many bands be one
hit wonders, like one album wonders. You get famous and then you stop putting in the work that may be famous. And with golfers, I think it's the same thing, Like you get you become great, and then you get all these like burdens like i'd you know, I'd love you love to hear Ricky Fowler sometime talk about what you know, his life looked like when he was peak endorsements and how that took maybe took a toll on his golf game.
But I think that's that's uh. That's the thing with with Scotty is like can he keep his life simple? And I think he I think like, if you want to make a case for him being different, that that's the thing I would. I think I have a lot of faith in him not changing.
Andy, I've never thought about this, and I'm asking you this question kind of blindly, but it's an incredible good, incredibly good point about Scotty Scheffler. But now that I'm thinking about it, so Scotty wears Nike with no other branding on him, right, he doesn't have branding.
On the golf bag.
I don't think Taylor Made.
Taylor Made. I saw. I think Jonathan Wall said that the leaderboard.
Now, like you know, Titleist will put their their mark next to players that play a Titles ball or Titleist Ambassador ball player that was not on the Master's leader board. So maybe he's moved away from that partnership. But I'm trying to think of brands that Scotty's aligned with away from those two companies Taylor Made and Nike. I don't know if there is one.
Is that crazy?
He's got that fitness company that you see them, what is it Forever Golf?
Well, but I mean that. But all I'm saying is like.
Marketing across the vat and on the sleeve and on the back and all of those things for people that don't know at home, every brand that you're signing onto is going to ask stuff out of you, whether that be a corporate day.
Four maybe it's three days four days like.
Something like that.
But that stuff adds up and all of a sudden, if you've got five sponsors on your shirt, that's fifteen or twenty days of your year. If Scotty eliminates that entirely to just be this normal dude in Texas, how amazing is that for your mental health and your mental.
Health competit and it's a competitive advantage, huge advantage. I from what I gather, Nike hasn't used any of its player days in years, So the Nike deal has days, but they don't use them. So you have like all this only person that asks him for time is Tailor Bade.
I mean, that's that.
Like again, so he's gaining let's say against then let's say against anybody else in the top ten in the world. Let's just say and again you and I don't know this for sure, so if this is if this is slightly wrong or wrong, that's on us. But I'm going to assume that the best golfer in the world gains fifteen free days over anybody else in the top ten in the world. And I think that's probably fair to say.
Yeah, I mean, and think about even if you just spent the fifteen days at home with your family doing nothing. How big of an advantage that is overgoing flying somewhere to do a corporate thing.
So same instructors since he was a kid, same community and great family wife that he's been with. I think maybe since high school or college or whatever the case may be. Right, He's not trying to kind of push himself out to different brands to make more money because he understands that if he plays great golf, he will make the money that in theory he would have made
from the brands. And I mean, I can only imagine brands are calling his agent all the time, right, I mean, this is the number one golfer in the world that's getting people to come his way. So you're doing all of these things to make your life as simple as possible. And I would say, on top of that, and I know this was a big talking point Master's week, but this is a dude that is that has constantly said said golf does not define me.
So if he doesn't win another major.
Championship, I would say, if you look at Scotti Scheffler, he seems like a dude that would be completely content in that world.
Man, I want two Masters.
What a great life I've led And now I know he's competitive, and I know he talked on Sunday about telling his buddies on Sunday morning. I wish I didn't like winning this much, but that's what he does. That's who he is as a professional golfer, as an athlete, as a person. That's job is to be a golfer. But stepping away from that world, to not be burdened by all these other things has got to be unbelievably freeing to this guy.
Yeah, I mean, I yeah, it's the simplicity. The simplicity is what makes you believe that this is sustainable.
Amazing, just amazing.
All right, Shane, it's been It's been a pleasure. Do you have any other loose ends that you want to do?
I have absolute an idea.
If we talked about anything, or if we talked about something, I have no idea.
I think we talked about talk about something. Yeah, do you have anything else you want to onload? Any any Bryson takes, any anything else?
I know, but I know I gotta I've got a Bryson take. I wrote this on Twitter earlier in the week that I missed him a lot. He is. He is so awesome to watch compete at golf in every way that we to laugh at, to laugh with, to marvel at, to be impressed by, to scratch your head on. Everything the guy does is exactly what.
We need in our sport.
And the fact that we don't don't get to see him as much as I wish we got to see him as a bumber, because again, either either because of him or or or alongside him, he is an absolute treasure.
I did thirty six Souls a Bryson in the middle. I did Friday and Saturday with bred. It was unbelievable.
You're a Bryson. Stand there, you go, look at you.
I gotta say, like, I think he's I think like one of the tough things with him is who he was at twenty three is what everybody like kind of like came away with totally, you know, and built opinions on. But so many people who you are at twenty three is like so different than who you are at thirty. And I'm not I don't think he's like, listen, dude, am I going to hang out with Bryson?
Would I?
Probably not? But I do think like he's gotten more self awareness and if he was doing what he's what he was, what he's doing with his YouTube page and playing on the PGA Tour. I mean, this guy would be the most talked about player in golf. Like his YouTube page is like legitimately pretty good. I don't like I in terms of like, and I think it's generating
fan interest, like especially young fans. And the thing I saw with Bryce and that I loved was he just like engages with the he just wants to be loved. It's you know, it's Saturday and he's in the final group and he's like pounded fists with people and and you know he was he in the second to last group. He was in the second to last group with Max's.
He's he's engaging with the fans. Like on Friday, there weren't a lot following them, and it was amazing, Like you could hear all the interactions with the fans, like he's he's opening up his snap bag and somebody's asking him what's in it, like whos and he's answering, and he's answering them.
Okay, he like.
Nobody else, Like the professional golfers get inside the ropes and they ignore everybody. He's actually engaging with people. I mean His response was great. He opened He's got the bag opens, big zip block bag. This guy, this bros like Bryson, what's in the bag?
Man?
And he just you could tell he was like trying to think of what to say, and he was just like the good stuff, bro.
I mean like like ridiculous and you roll your eyes at it, but you also enjoy it. You know, it's like yeah, also like it's kind of cute. Like he's kind of a cute guy now, you know, versus what he used to be, where he wasn't the most fun human to be around. I'll say this, you can impact so many people's opinion of you by one simple interaction, especially young people.
Right.
You think about giving a golf ball to a kid, and that kid's forever gonna remember that, even when they're an adult. I remember when Bryson to Shamble gave me a golf ball at the Masters. I remember this was before the wayte management and closed sixteen.
All the way around.
See there was kind of a walkway between sixteen seventeen. I was in college, Okay, I was an idiot. Of course I was an idiot, right, I mean I'm an idiot now. For God's sake. You mentioned Bryson at twenty three. I mean I was twenty one and a complete dipshit. And I was there with some friends of mine and we were standing on seventeen t and there's always a weight on seventeen as you know. Short part four, one of my buddies was trying to get guys to bet
twenty bucks they drive the green. Okay, twenty bucks, you don't drive the green as they're standing there. I'll never forget this. Nick Watney came over and was laughing about it, and it was into it and was like cracking.
I always drive the screen. You don't want to take this.
Bet, you know, like having fun with us, right, And I remember there was another guy a couple of groups later that was offended by the question that came over to us and was kind of getting into my buddy's grill about even asking or bringing up such a horrible thing at a pro golf tournament. And I will never forget a Nick Watney's approach to that and the guy that did it at the be guy that acted the
way he acted. And if you're Bryson and you're out at the Masters and you're yeah, I cut it up with with fans and patrons and you're doing all that stuff. Those guys are going to be fans of you for life. And I feel like Bryson, as you said, is a guy that has just wanted to be loved and it feels like people that he's understanding how to do that, and also he's got the personality that allows that to happen. You know, he's a pretty fun loving, kind of goofy kid.
But I like the Bryson we're seeing right now, and I think he might be the most interesting pro golfer in the world.
Yeah, I found myself fascinated by him. I asked him a question which I believe is so I asked him about the YouTube stuff, Like, you know, you talk about like the most regimented, rigid golfer in the world when he was when he was going full steam right right. Since then, he's done this YouTube stuff and he's done
like a lot of different stuff. He played one club with Sergio Garcia for nine holes and you could see at the beginning of that round he had no clue what to do, but this is one of the most talented players in the world. They played for nine holes and by the end of the nine. You could see he really was starting to learn how to hit the shots. Sergio, like, I recommended this on a pod months ago to go
watch this. Sergio was incredible, like utterly unbelievable to watch play golf with one club because he has all the shots, he has everything. But by the end of the round, Bryson got like a lot better. So he's done, Like forward t's break fifty, he's done. He played the old equipment, so he's done all these different weird things. And what I asked him was like, do you think you're a
better player because of these YouTube formats you've done? And he's like, oh, definitely, I'm more versatile, Like I'm not locked in. I'm not locked into this is the way I play because these these other ways has Like, you know, I'm paraphrasing what he said, but you know, I have to believe that he's getting better because of this experimentation.
He's learning more shots. He's not as locked into like the science of like this swing, this, this spin, the all that, because he's doing things that require you to think differently. And I think, like it's a beautiful kind of evolution. Now I wish I wish that the world got to see him play. Instead, they're playing on you know, a platform that gets you know, one hundred thousand viewers instead of two million. I'm not going to acknowledge the caffeine,
but like, I think he's a fascinating character. I can't wait to see him again at the PGA. I can't wait for the US Open. I can't you know, I would love to see And I think this is a reason why the game has to come back together, is because there are characters like it's too small of a game to be split and and only getting this for four weeks a year.
By the way, last thing, he's not picked to win the PGA. Just want to throw that out there, Bryson's my I should pick. Put put it out there right now so that it's on the record now. If I picked four other people on podcasting on Twitter.
That's on me, that's on our on our preview master's preview, I picked Scottie.
Okay.
That being said, later in the week, I changed my pick twice. So I went to Ram and then I went to Rory because I got to the point where nobody believed Rory was going to win. So I was like, well, you know, it would be a good moment to be on the other side of the fence.
Well, at least you played the hits. At least you didn't go like totally off the board. But yeah, that's uh, that's interesting. I'm taking Bryson out the PGA.
Andy.
I love what you guys did throughout the week. It's must listens to Shotgun with you and poor Ath. It's very entertaining. I'm glad I got to kind of eat lunch next to you one day, even though the wouldn let us push, wouldn't let us push our tables together, but that was that was that was great, even though you know.
No computers at the lunch room. The Master's week is the best week.
And I want to give a shout out to this simply this, the Master's social team is. I worked a little bit with them, and it's a group of people that want to put out awesome stuff. Now they do put out awesome stuff, but they want to put out
awesome stuff. And I feel like in an era where that's not always the case across a lot of media, not obviously not just golf, but across a lot of media where sometimes it can feel like a job that team and that crew makes an effort to put out in unbelievable awesome content for a week and you're left wishing that you got more of it. And that is an extreme compliment in this day and age. So shout out to that crew in that team, because they absolutely crush it.
I mean they dominate Master's weeks. It's hard being creators in this in this space because they do such an awesome job that it's hard to have stuff that stands out because you know you just can't aren't going to be able to match the quality. You know, part of that act access, but you know the other part is the talent that they've amasked over there.
And the interest and the interest to be great. I mean, you got It's like Scott, you gotta want to be great. But anyway, that's it's the best week.
I love it. I'm bummed it's over. I hate that we have to go a year till we get.
It again, but I am happy that we still have some majors I feel I do feel, like, do you think you get more bummed out Postmasters or Post Open Post Open?
Okay, me too, I agree, I mean like then it's just like, what what are we doing for eight months, and you got.
To start thinking about the Bears too, which is probably probably catch kicks.
This year we got the draft. There's a lot of optimism. I saw Sauce Gardner tweeting about how did the Bears pull this off? They got tons of talent and two picks in the top ten. I think the NFL is a little worried about about my bears.
There you go, There you go. Always a pleasure, my friend.
Talk to you soon, Shane. All Right, that does it for today's episode of the Friday Golf Podcast. Big thanks to Matt Russ for throwing this together, editing it all up, and all of his hard work. Last week he was doing a lot of those Masters reels that you might have seen on our Instagram as a quick reminder, you know, Masters is over, It's time time to get back into CLUBTF. We are going to be grinding. I know Garrett is planning to have a Harbor Town profile up and design
Notebook will be kicking back off this week. So if you're interested in more content from us, I think I'm jumping on next week on a hangout on CLUBTF. But if you're interested in more content, just joined CLUBTF. It's one hundred and twenty dollars for the entire year and it goes to support a lot of the stuff we do and I think you get a lot of great content for it. So join CLUBTFE. It's above fridagg dot
com slash membership and you can sign up there. Thanks for all the support, and thanks for another great Masters a week. It's a true privilege to get to cover these events. It's it's unbelievable to get to go to Augusta National for a week and cover it and wouldn't be able to do it without all of your guys support over the years, So big thank you to you guys, and we'll be back next week with another podcast, maybe two podcasts.