Speaker 1: The guys from Ping. They've kind of showed me how
Speaker 1: much the equipment matters.
Speaker 2: I just love that I can hit any shot.
Speaker 3: I kind of want we're gonna be able to tell
Speaker 3: some fun stories about what goes on here to help
Speaker 3: golfers play better golf.
Speaker 4: Hey, everybody, Welcome back to the Pink proven Grounds Podcast.
Speaker 4: I am Shade Bacon, joined as always by Marty Jerts
Speaker 4: and Marty. I get excited about guests. This is like
Speaker 4: high on my excitement level of guests. A guy you know, well,
Speaker 4: a guy you've played a lot of golf against.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's Jimmy hard K Welcome to the pod. Hey,
Speaker 3: Jank you Jim went to the Colorado School of Mines,
Speaker 3: my alma mater.
Speaker 1: What's up with that?
Speaker 4: By the way, if you go to the School of Minds,
Speaker 4: do you immediately get a job at Ping? Is that
Speaker 4: kind of how this pipeline works. There's a little pipeline there. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I think we're just counted up. We have a total
Speaker 4: of eight engineers now from the School of Minds, including
Speaker 4: Corey Bacon, who's been on the pod. Fellow Bacon, Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: and Jim You know, I went to the School of minds.
Speaker 4: It was a D two school and you know, set
Speaker 4: a few records, you know for wins and things of
Speaker 4: this nature, and was it the you know, I got
Speaker 4: in the Athletic Hall of Fame and then a long
Speaker 4: come ten years later, Hard k here and just obliterated
Speaker 4: every single record I set there. So you're so, you're done,
Speaker 4: You're out, and he's in. First of all, thanks for
Speaker 4: taking some time and joining the pod. I want to
Speaker 4: kind of talk about your twenty twenty four because I
Speaker 4: know it was extremely interesting with you kind of both
Speaker 4: personally and then a career in career wise. I mean,
Speaker 4: you're a guy that's played professional golf most of your life.
Speaker 4: You've had a lot of success as a pro. You've
Speaker 4: played on the PGA Tour, You've played on the corn
Speaker 4: Ferry Tour. I know you've won a ton of Mini
Speaker 4: tour events and I want to see if you actually
Speaker 4: even know the number to that at some point. But
Speaker 4: you made a transition in twenty four after that great
Speaker 4: run at the waste management. How has twenty twenty four
Speaker 4: gone for you and how's it been working a ping?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been a whirlwind of a year for sure, Shane. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and you like you touched on getting into the Waste
Speaker 2: Management Phoenix Open in twenty twenty four, Monday and incredible
Speaker 2: dream week. I had already I had known that I
Speaker 2: was going to come work at Paying. I had lost
Speaker 2: my status the prior year on both PG Tour and
Speaker 2: the Corn Forry Tour. Reached out you know, for for
Speaker 2: for a few different places Paying, especially because I know,
Speaker 2: you know, the heritage and the and the family feel,
Speaker 2: the small uh the small field, the small family feel
Speaker 2: here at Paying. Wanted to be here. Whirlwind year. Got
Speaker 2: the job with with Paying. Thank you to John k
Speaker 2: and thank you to Marity. I was really excited to
Speaker 2: start it started. I mean my start date I think
Speaker 2: was end of February and mondayed into the Phoenix Open
Speaker 2: early February. I was going, okay, well let's do this.
Speaker 2: You know, no pressure, Pressure's off, playing loose and free,
Speaker 2: played great that that week, had a lot of fun,
Speaker 2: a lot of publicity, and then and then came to
Speaker 2: work here paying, and family moved here to Phoenix. It
Speaker 2: was it was a whirlwind of year.
Speaker 1: It's it's interesting.
Speaker 4: I mean, you know, we we don't dive into the
Speaker 4: lives of pro golfers or mini tour golfers that often.
Speaker 4: But I mean your guy you have you have three kids?
Speaker 1: Is that correct?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean married three kids.
Speaker 4: You know, you obviously know you have the game to
Speaker 4: go out there and compete and play, but at some
Speaker 4: point you've kind of got to look at the future, right,
Speaker 4: and you've got look at where am I gonna make
Speaker 4: consistent money? How can I make life a little bit
Speaker 4: more consistent? How was that conversation with you and your
Speaker 4: family to get to that point to maybe hang it
Speaker 4: up a bit. I know you're still playing on I
Speaker 4: want to get into that as well, but how did
Speaker 4: you get to that point where you said, maybe playing
Speaker 4: full time is not gonna be my life and let
Speaker 4: me see if there's a there's an option elsewhere.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, Shane. Is is a really hard discussion
Speaker 2: and a hard conversation to have with my wife. But
Speaker 2: but we had kind of honestly come to that realization
Speaker 2: in that conversation when we had we had two kids
Speaker 2: another one on the way. This was the end of
Speaker 2: twenty twenty two. I had lost my PGA tour status.
Speaker 2: I was going into the twenty twenty three season with
Speaker 2: conditional corn Ferry touristatus, not even great Cornferries, which is tough.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you've got to You've got a priority early in
Speaker 4: the season to have a chance at that Ryan.
Speaker 2: And early in that season I had some back issues.
Speaker 2: I wasn't playing well. We had kind of had a
Speaker 2: conversation throughout the year saying, hey, if you know, if
Speaker 2: I if I continue with corn Ferry Tour or you know,
Speaker 2: best case scenario, get the PGA Tours status, We're going
Speaker 2: to continue this journey. But if not, I'm gonna have
Speaker 2: to look elsewhere. I'm gonna have to look at you know,
Speaker 2: different because my priorities have changed, right with the three kids,
Speaker 2: With the three young kids, I needed a good place
Speaker 2: to earn a steady paycheck, if you will. I can't
Speaker 2: do another year on the mini tours. As as fun
Speaker 2: as that is. Sometimes it's really nice early in your career,
Speaker 2: you know, there's nothing, there's not really any uh.
Speaker 1: Well, it's just you. I mean you know that.
Speaker 4: That's that's what happens early in your life. It's just you,
Speaker 4: and the focus is on you, and this is my
Speaker 4: dream and I'm gonna play. And then you start to
Speaker 4: add those other factors in and all of a sudden,
Speaker 4: it's like, well, I gotta I've got to provide for
Speaker 4: these people. I mean this, these are these people look
Speaker 4: at me.
Speaker 2: For Yeah, no, I'll say I add to the second
Speaker 2: part of that decision came about when I was going
Speaker 2: on I think a three or four week tournament stretch
Speaker 2: and in that corn Ferry Tour season, and I think
Speaker 2: my son was he was four or five at that time,
Speaker 2: and I was I was about to pull out of
Speaker 2: the out of the garage the head of the airport,
Speaker 2: you know, to go who knows where, and my son goes, Dad,
Speaker 2: I don't want you to go, you know, and he
Speaker 2: gives me the the soft eyes in the in the
Speaker 2: you know. Oh, I just I was crushed at that moment,
Speaker 2: you know, And I said, well, maybe maybe this is
Speaker 2: for the best. Maybe my priorities are changing in the
Speaker 2: right way at that time.
Speaker 3: Jim, So, going back to the w M a year ago, now,
Speaker 3: was that the first time where you felt this kind
Speaker 3: of I don't know, loose or freedom, like like you
Speaker 3: didn't have your livelihood on the line anymore? And how
Speaker 3: how what was your headspace like there?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was Me and my wife were joking about
Speaker 2: this because It's funny. As a professional golfer, you're always
Speaker 2: working to get into the flow state, you know, the
Speaker 2: zen state where it just it's easy and nothing, nothing's
Speaker 2: bothering you, and your swing is absolutely perfect and you're
Speaker 2: chipping and making everything on the greens. And I think
Speaker 2: I finally reached that state. But it had to be.
Speaker 2: It had to be because I was I was stopping
Speaker 2: playing professionally a full time, right, you know. I read
Speaker 2: all the books Doctor Geo and then Bob Rotella and
Speaker 2: how to how to get into this flow state and
Speaker 2: how to I couldn't do it, you know, any everything
Speaker 2: I tried. Finally I had this position where I was
Speaker 2: taking a job here the pressure was actually off that
Speaker 2: I literally had no pressure. I could have finished fifth
Speaker 2: that week. I could have miscut would have felt the
Speaker 2: exact same to me. Obviously, I wanted to play well,
Speaker 2: but there was nothing on the line. My career wasn't
Speaker 2: riding on the line, if you will, so I was
Speaker 2: able to just go out there have fun. Like I said,
Speaker 2: I really think I got in the flow state. Like
Speaker 2: my swing was just on plane, you know. I was
Speaker 2: just hammering the driver just so well all week, making
Speaker 2: Potts like it was just it was just so fun.
Speaker 4: Seventy two, sixty six, seventy sixty eight, you finished TI
Speaker 4: twenty eight that week at the WM. Marty, I know
Speaker 4: you've played at the WM as well. Can you just
Speaker 4: kind of chat about to I'd like to hear from
Speaker 4: both of you guys just about that experience, what it's
Speaker 4: like playing in that environment. Marty, I know you've talked
Speaker 4: a little bit about on the pod throughout some of
Speaker 4: these episodes, But you know, like Matt McCarty you know,
Speaker 4: you think about Matt McCarty this year in twenty twenty five,
Speaker 4: get an opportunity to play in this event, you know,
Speaker 4: growing up going to it, and you think about Max
Speaker 4: home On when he won at Riviera. Like, major championships
Speaker 4: are huge to play in. But for somebody that's local
Speaker 4: to this area or somebody that has lived in this area,
Speaker 4: the WM is everything. So can you just kind of
Speaker 4: chat about those experiences of what it's like to stand
Speaker 4: on sixteen for people that'll never get that opportunity.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it is truly like the Super Bowl and growing up,
Speaker 3: you know, it's like it hits me close. I grew
Speaker 3: up being a standard bearer there when I was a kid, so,
Speaker 3: you know, taking a couple of days off school, carrying
Speaker 3: the sign, getting the autographs, doing that whole thing. It
Speaker 3: was always like the pinnacle, like you know, and I
Speaker 3: had played in plenty of majors. I knew what that
Speaker 3: experience was. The WM is a next level, which is
Speaker 3: really cool. Jim's first tournament he played on the PGA
Speaker 3: Tour was in seventeen the WM. Corey Bacon caddied for
Speaker 3: him in the Monday and to get in. And so
Speaker 3: when I got in in twenty Jim was, I think
Speaker 3: you had risk surgery or you were recovering or something
Speaker 3: at the time. He came out and walked a few
Speaker 3: practice rounds with me and gave me some tips, which
Speaker 3: was really fun. It was a surreal experience. It was
Speaker 3: just so fun to have like all my coworkers here
Speaker 3: at ping, my local family, all my friends out there
Speaker 3: following along. Super magical. Obviously I got to play Victor
Speaker 3: Hoblin too, when he wasn't even on the tour yet
Speaker 3: he got a sponsor's exemption. Very magical. A sixteen was
Speaker 3: I was not as nervous on sixteen as I thought
Speaker 3: I would be, and I think it was because a
Speaker 3: you're hitting a short iron, you're hitting a wedge and
Speaker 3: you can just rip it, so you'd like, okay, maybe
Speaker 3: it's like you're hit your pitching wedge, like you know
Speaker 3: one forty seven, you got one sixty two hole, you're
Speaker 3: just ripping the pitching wedge.
Speaker 1: Don't pull left, but I'm gonna hit wedge.
Speaker 3: And I hit two great shots on sixteen. That was
Speaker 3: super memorable, And I loved having my family there, like
Speaker 3: like my wife and kids. Most people don't know this,
Speaker 3: but when you play, they have a little special pathway
Speaker 3: for your family. They get you right in because you're
Speaker 3: kind of like, hey, how do I get in there right?
Speaker 3: You know? So they have a couple thunderbirds fast track
Speaker 3: your family right in their front row seat. Boom, they
Speaker 3: get to be right there. I will.
Speaker 1: I'll never forget that, Jim, your experience. I'd love to
Speaker 1: hear both of them.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, the w and Phoenix op it. I mean
Speaker 2: really it kind of bookends everything for me, even as
Speaker 2: a as a as a kid at in college at
Speaker 2: at Corloro School of Minds, me and my buddies would
Speaker 2: me and the golf team, we'd take a trip. We'd
Speaker 2: come down here and we'd watch the tournament. We'd go
Speaker 2: to sixteen and watch the guys come through there, and
Speaker 2: then like like Marty said, I mondayed in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 2: had Corey Bacon on the bag, fellow engineer here and
Speaker 2: he was a classmate of mine, same class, and we
Speaker 2: just had a blast that that week. I missed the cut, unfortunately,
Speaker 2: I missed, I think by one or two. But on sixteen,
Speaker 2: like Marty said, you're you're walking up there, you're playing
Speaker 2: fourteen and fifteen, and you just kind of hear the rumble,
Speaker 2: you hear the roar, and like that's more of a
Speaker 2: like heartbeat when you walk in, Marty said. Like Marty said,
Speaker 2: it's like a steady rumble. It's like a steady buzz. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So hitting the shot is actually not that bad, you know.
Speaker 2: It's more when everybody's quiet and then there's like a
Speaker 2: lot of noise closed, that's when it really gets to
Speaker 2: you. It wa it's a steady buzz. It's really not that bad.
Speaker 3: I always thought on sixteen if everybody literally went quiet,
Speaker 3: that would.
Speaker 4: Be crazy racking crazy. Got all these people and you
Speaker 4: got the surrounding grand stands. But yeah, the constant noise
Speaker 4: probably makes it little.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it would be for sure, that would be for
Speaker 2: sure worse if everybody was just dead silent. But the
Speaker 2: constant buzz I was happy to part. I've parted six times,
Speaker 2: missed the cut the first time in twenty seventeen, but
Speaker 2: I parted all the time. It was hilarious too. The
Speaker 2: first time I went through there was early in the day,
Speaker 2: hit the green gout and cut some cheers. Hit it
Speaker 2: to like thirty feet and two putt and kind of
Speaker 2: got some cheers. The second time I went through there
Speaker 2: on Friday, I was the last group. We were literally
Speaker 2: the last group to go through there. Hit the green
Speaker 2: at thirty feet, got boots, gonna say, make a whole one.
Speaker 2: If your last group, they're not going to be a
Speaker 2: happy Yeah. Lagged it down there to a foot and
Speaker 2: tapped it in you know from my par and walked
Speaker 2: out of there with it. But it was it was
Speaker 2: so much fun. That's a that's a great hole on
Speaker 2: UH Saturday's round. This this this past year twenty twenty
Speaker 2: four at wmpn SO. But I almost made a whole one.
Speaker 2: It was that front left location. Hit it just passed
Speaker 2: the hole and buzzed it back and almost went in
Speaker 2: and unfortunately missed the putt but almost made a home
Speaker 2: white crowd went crazy, you know, Saturday w It's it's amazing.
Speaker 4: So I mean I mentioned maybe not your last start
Speaker 4: on the PGA Tour because I mean, I know you're
Speaker 4: working a ping and I want to get into how
Speaker 4: that's gone for you over the last year. But are
Speaker 4: you still playing? Are you still you know, trying to
Speaker 4: play in state opens, are you still trying to money
Speaker 4: qualify to events? Like how are you approaching job at
Speaker 4: paying family? And then also obviously still have an interesting
Speaker 4: game to play professional golf for sure, great question.
Speaker 2: I'm definitely keeping the game up because I want to
Speaker 2: keep playing. I'm following in your co host here, Marty's
Speaker 2: footsteps with the PGA PGM program. So I'm going through
Speaker 2: the PGM program. I'm going to get my PGA Class
Speaker 2: A membership so i can play in the Southwest PGA
Speaker 2: section of events.
Speaker 1: Marty sent an emails on the back end get him
Speaker 1: out of here. We don't want this guy.
Speaker 2: The main reason I have to beat the I have
Speaker 2: to beat the boss, right, And so yeah, I played
Speaker 2: a couple events this this last summer, the Colorado Open
Speaker 2: being one of them, played well there, finished second, unfortunately
Speaker 2: lost in the playoff. Played well at the Arizona Open,
Speaker 2: but I was I was second engineer. Marty beat me
Speaker 2: in that event, so a low engineer. Yeah, we gotta
Speaker 2: keep we gotta keep the game up so I can
Speaker 2: beat the boss listed Martin.
Speaker 4: Marty's no joke. You had a good summer, Marty. Marty
Speaker 4: played very good, solid golf throughout the summer, as he
Speaker 4: tends to do.
Speaker 1: But I mean, will there be any money qualifiers?
Speaker 4: Will you try to do any of that stuff or
Speaker 4: will it be focused mostly on state stuff?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: For sure, I'll play the money qualifiers that are kind
Speaker 2: of close in region to Phoenix. You know, I'll play
Speaker 2: with WM. I'll play farmers out in out in California,
Speaker 2: you know, the the SA Safeway whatever that's called now,
Speaker 2: so you know, if you here and there until at
Speaker 2: least until they're around, I guess, you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Jim a couple of close calls in Fall
Speaker 3: twenty four, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Fall twenty four, Yeah, up and up in Napa,
Speaker 2: I played really well. Uh, and then and then in
Speaker 2: Utah yeah, Utah, Yeah, I missed by one in Utah
Speaker 2: and Las Vegas, So I was kind of I was
Speaker 2: kind of bummed about that, but playing really good golf. Still,
Speaker 2: I'm still happy to be shot sixty one a coror
Speaker 2: Oude Open, So I mean, hey, it's still there.
Speaker 4: Still there can burn it up. You've played a ton
Speaker 4: of Monday qualifiers, and Marty, i'd like your your kind
Speaker 4: of thoughts on this as well. But what, like, you know,
Speaker 4: so many people look at them. Obviously, everybody follows Ryan
Speaker 4: on Instagram and on Twitter, and he's a great job
Speaker 4: kind of chronicling Monday qualifiers and people trying to get
Speaker 4: into events. You go on the first tea of a
Speaker 4: Monday qualifier, like where's your head at versus playing a
Speaker 4: four day golf tournament? You know, is it? Is it
Speaker 4: like you know, a closer in baseball coming out and
Speaker 4: just trying to throw his arm out for you know,
Speaker 4: two innings or one inning, or like, how do you
Speaker 4: approach a money qualifier versus an Arizona Open or a
Speaker 4: car Rude Open?
Speaker 2: Completely different, completely different than than a tournament tournament round.
Speaker 2: I mean you probably agree with this, Marty, and that
Speaker 2: you step on the first tee and a lot of
Speaker 2: times you know that you're gonna have to shoot seven eight,
Speaker 2: potentially nine hunder par when I'm starting. When I'm starting
Speaker 2: a tournament, I know it's potentially three rounds or four rounds,
Speaker 2: and the main goal is to not make many mistakes.
Speaker 2: In a Monday qualifier. If you make a mistake, that's fine,
Speaker 2: You're probably just not gonna Munday qualify. I mean four
Speaker 2: players for a BJ Tour qualifier, three for WM out
Speaker 2: of however many one hundred. You gotta be. You gotta
Speaker 2: be on fire that day. You gotta be. You gotta
Speaker 2: feel it. You gotta make a lot of putts. You
Speaker 2: gotta make a lot of birdies. There might be a
Speaker 2: mistake here and there. That's fine. It just means you're
Speaker 2: not gonna make it. But in a tournament, I'm trying
Speaker 2: to limit the number of mistakes that I make over
Speaker 2: the over the of course of the tournament. Would you
Speaker 2: agree with.
Speaker 3: That, I'm in a Monday qualifier. It's a binary result.
Speaker 3: You're either the jury or out. Yeah, you're playing. You're
Speaker 3: playing a four round tournament. You know if you don't win,
Speaker 3: you know it's it's hard rare to win. So you know,
Speaker 3: your risk calculus changes you know, basically right from a
Speaker 3: strategy standpoint.
Speaker 4: Interesting, I mean, you know you you think, like, do
Speaker 4: you guys like cut up the who holes like you're
Speaker 4: playing eighteen holes and it's like, all right, I need
Speaker 4: to be one under through three, or I need to
Speaker 4: be a couple under through three, or or break it
Speaker 4: up that way or is it just simply you know,
Speaker 4: foot on the pedal, let's go.
Speaker 2: Uh yeah, that's a good question. I think. I think
Speaker 2: you kind of know in your mind that the horse
Speaker 2: the holes that you can score.
Speaker 1: On, right, like the poor five short part four or
Speaker 1: someone like that.
Speaker 2: Part five short, part four us. I think in the
Speaker 2: case of I play when I was up in Utah,
Speaker 2: I was I was like one under through eight or
Speaker 2: something like that. Nothing crazy, but I'm thinking, Okay, now
Speaker 2: I gotta now, I gotta kind of step on the
Speaker 2: gas a little bit, make the turn it I think
Speaker 2: I made the turn of two under. I'm going, okay,
Speaker 2: I gotta get things going. So you still, I'm you're
Speaker 2: still kind of calculating in my mind. I have this
Speaker 2: weird sense of like I know what the number is
Speaker 2: gonna be even while I'm playing.
Speaker 1: Like nailing it, Like you feel like you always get incredible.
Speaker 2: I'm super good, so weird, Marty.
Speaker 1: Marty said, this is like there's worst golf and you're
Speaker 1: saying that's your best guard. Was very interesting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, even this Utah one, I'm going I'm I'm thinking
Speaker 2: it's gonna be a it's gonna be eight, and I'm
Speaker 2: standing on the last hole at six. I'm going, well,
Speaker 2: if I birdie at least, maybe i'll be at sat.
Speaker 2: You know, I'll be at seven. Maybe there's a chance.
Speaker 2: Well I roll it in for birdie and I get
Speaker 2: to the clubhouse and I'm still in the playoff currently,
Speaker 2: last group comes in eight on.
Speaker 1: Eight and I get nailed it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Marty, what is what does Jim do so well
Speaker 4: in terms of the way he plays? Like what you've
Speaker 4: You've played a lot of golf with him, You've seen
Speaker 4: him up close in personal and tournament golf. Like, what
Speaker 4: does what does he do that impresses you?
Speaker 3: Driving the golf ball? Well, I mean the two staples
Speaker 3: driving the ball. So Jim's got a high ball speed
Speaker 3: one eight, you know, high one seventies, one eighty ish
Speaker 3: ball speed with the driver and hits it high. Okay,
Speaker 3: so he's got the towering trajectory that you're like, I
Speaker 3: wish I could do that. Uh, and then he rolls
Speaker 3: the rock. I mean, his putting is absolutely incredible.
Speaker 1: That what you say, that's the best part of your game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would agree with that. Those are probably the
Speaker 2: two strongest parts of my game, and in rolling the
Speaker 2: rock is number one. That's that's Honestly, when I came
Speaker 2: out of college and I needed things to work on,
Speaker 2: I was watching these mini tour guys down here in Phoenix,
Speaker 2: I was I was competing against them. One of the
Speaker 2: things I need to do better drive the ball better, longer,
Speaker 2: and make more putts. And that's that's what I did.
Speaker 2: And I would say putting is now my number one.
Speaker 1: What putter you got in the back right now?
Speaker 2: I still use an old school ping vault two point
Speaker 2: zero Dale answer that I believe our co host designed
Speaker 2: over here.
Speaker 1: Is that right.
Speaker 3: I haven't done many putters, but I did do all
Speaker 3: the design and cat work on that Dale answer, which
Speaker 3: is really fun. And yeah, no, Jim didn't even know that.
Speaker 3: But that's the putter.
Speaker 4: We'll throw a photo up if you're watching this on
Speaker 4: YouTube so you get a feel for the putter. How
Speaker 4: long has it been in the bag.
Speaker 2: It's been in there, oh gosh, probably since twenty eighteen,
Speaker 2: So what is that? You know, well, six years. So
Speaker 2: I was playing at a conventional length for a year,
Speaker 2: and then I think right around there was a time
Speaker 2: when like Bubba was using the armlock putter. If you
Speaker 2: remember this, he went to I think it was the
Speaker 2: Arna model, and he was just he was rolling pretty well.
Speaker 2: It wasn't it didn't stay in his back very long.
Speaker 2: But that was also the time when Coocher was rolling armlock,
Speaker 2: and I mean he just absolutely rolled everything in. I
Speaker 2: was on the PGA tour at that point or early
Speaker 2: in twenty nineteen, and I was going, hey, you know, Tony,
Speaker 2: can I experiment with this? You know, do we have
Speaker 2: anything available? So I let Antnia at Serrano, our designer.
Speaker 2: He was out at Innisbrook in Tampa. There. I was
Speaker 2: playing the Valspar Championship and so we were just messing
Speaker 2: around with it. It felt, it felt amazing. I already
Speaker 2: had the shaft angle aligned with my forearm, so then
Speaker 2: I and I already had a bit of a forward press,
Speaker 2: so both of those things. Then you just extend the
Speaker 2: shaft a little bit longer in the grip and put
Speaker 2: it against your arm and bow. You got an armlock putter,
Speaker 2: so it came really naturally to me. And then anything
Speaker 2: inside eight feet, you know, ten feet just feels almost automatic.
Speaker 3: Scary to play somebody like that, Marty, Yeah, Jim's putting
Speaker 3: is I remember that at the WM a year ago
Speaker 3: you made this pot on eighteen I think you described
Speaker 3: any interview as drippy.
Speaker 2: You know, just the speed is just a great way
Speaker 2: to put it.
Speaker 3: It's so perfect. It was drippy.
Speaker 4: Let's lean in your work at Ping because I'm interested
Speaker 4: in what you've done the last year. So can you
Speaker 4: kind of explain to people what your role is, what
Speaker 4: you do, how maybe your day to day looks in
Speaker 4: week to week.
Speaker 2: Yeah, really fun role here at Ping. Thanks so, Marty.
Speaker 2: He kind of he kind of brought me in with
Speaker 2: a broad spectrum of responsibilities, which is really cool for me.
Speaker 2: I get to see a lot of the different part
Speaker 2: of the company. I get to work with the design engineers,
Speaker 2: I get to work with ant I get to work
Speaker 2: with engineering, I get to work with the fitters, I
Speaker 2: get to work with the education team. So I would
Speaker 2: I would break my role up into kind of three chunks,
Speaker 2: being fitting performance, kind of working on the tools on
Speaker 2: the back end that our accounts can use it, our
Speaker 2: national accounts can use to help fit the average golfer better.
Speaker 2: And part of that is designing new tools. I'm working
Speaker 2: on a really cool tool that are internal master fitter
Speaker 2: putter fitters can use when people come in the lab.
Speaker 2: So that's really exciting working with the education team team
Speaker 2: when accounts come in account visitations, getting the knowledge for
Speaker 2: the new product that's coming out, and then also helping
Speaker 2: on the back end with with our digital UH education
Speaker 2: platform called ping Academy that you know, that's a big
Speaker 2: that's a big thing for them. They can go on
Speaker 2: there and learn about the new product and and about
Speaker 2: our fitting foundations. That's another thing I've been working on.
Speaker 2: And then the third the third thing being just kind
Speaker 2: of jack of all trades. I'm just you know, if Paul,
Speaker 2: doctor Paul Wood comes to me, hey can you do this? Yes,
Speaker 2: you know, we we ran an awesome putter study with
Speaker 2: a sports psychologist measuring brain activity that was really cool.
Speaker 2: Anything Marty brings to me, you know, Okay, can you
Speaker 2: do this tour research? Hey can you do these player tests? Hey?
Speaker 2: Can you you know, run over to.
Speaker 1: Like do you pick up lunch sometimes? And I feel
Speaker 1: like you're I mean, it hasn't come to that. Have
Speaker 1: you ever been bored.
Speaker 2: Ever?
Speaker 1: It's like, what do you do everything?
Speaker 4: And I'm like, I do almost everything if asked, And
Speaker 4: by the way, that's a good way to be in
Speaker 4: the first year at a job.
Speaker 1: Can I do this? Sure, I'll do it, and maybe
Speaker 1: i'll goog go ahead on the back end, but I'll
Speaker 1: do it exactly.
Speaker 2: My answer is just yes, yes, yes, I can do that.
Speaker 4: It's a big part of sports broadcasting too, like, hey,
Speaker 4: can you do baseball? You're like, oh, it's my favorite
Speaker 4: sport and you go home and you're like, what is baseball?
Speaker 4: I think, I don't know what this is, but I
Speaker 4: could handle it. Marty, How has it been, I mean,
Speaker 4: how did how did the conversation go when you guys
Speaker 4: were chatting about potential work at paying And how has
Speaker 4: it been the last year together?
Speaker 3: Yeah? No, I think with Jim. I mean, to be honest,
Speaker 3: it's there's been a few times where we've had that
Speaker 3: conversation over your career. You know, I don't know if
Speaker 3: it didn't just happen last year, It didn't just happen.
Speaker 3: You know, I think a few years into the mini tours,
Speaker 3: maybe it's kind of like, hey, you know, you know,
Speaker 3: I should I keep this thing going. And then Jim
Speaker 3: then it got on the corn Ferry and it's like, Okay,
Speaker 3: I don't need to talk to Jim for a few years.
Speaker 3: He's good.
Speaker 2: Mark's been a really good mentor for me in that aspect.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and then Jim gets on the PGA Tour. It's like, Okay,
Speaker 3: I really don't need to talk to him for a while.
Speaker 3: But then yeah, I mean, obviously I think I think
Speaker 3: Jim got a little unlucky with some wrist injuries and
Speaker 3: things of that nature that you know. Yeah, it was
Speaker 3: kind of like, okay, we kind of stayed in touch
Speaker 3: a little bit having that conversation, and it was during
Speaker 3: the fall of twenty three as Jim talked about where
Speaker 3: he got a little bit more serious, like, hey, you know,
Speaker 3: three kids, it's time to kind of think about a transition.
Speaker 3: I love Jim's approach, which is no golfer ever really
Speaker 3: retires from golf, right, you know, it's kind of like,
Speaker 3: Jim had this amazing PGA Tour, corn Fairy career, It's
Speaker 3: time for the next phase of this thing. Let's help
Speaker 3: let's help build someat build and fits some great golf equipment,
Speaker 3: keep playing? Why not?
Speaker 2: It's right?
Speaker 4: Hey, I mean, Marty, are you carving out a space
Speaker 4: for him? Is there a role that he fits into?
Speaker 4: Or when you have somebody coming your way that obviously
Speaker 4: has an elite level of play and a great knowledge
Speaker 4: of the game and obviously went to an amazing school, like,
Speaker 4: can you carve out a space for him within the team?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I think that's a good question. I think Jim described
Speaker 3: his role. It's kind of a choose your own adventure role.
Speaker 3: What we want to maximize for Jim. You know, he's
Speaker 3: spent ten years out there on the tour with all
Speaker 3: the little nuance of playing the game, which I admire,
Speaker 3: and I have a lot to learn. You're asking Jim questions.
Speaker 3: I'm like tuned in, like what's the answer to qualifiers?
Speaker 3: But yeah, we wanted to create a situation for Jim
Speaker 3: to like learn, So how do we maximize his learning?
Speaker 3: And that's the kind of the scenarios in here, looking
Speaker 3: backward at about exactly one year now, Jim is give
Speaker 3: him in a spot where he can learn where see
Speaker 3: where he has the most interest. It's been kind of
Speaker 3: in the putter space, putter fitting, putter design, brain wave stuff.
Speaker 3: I mean that's you know, he's such a good putter,
Speaker 3: that's kind of where he's he's naturally gravitating towards. But yeah, no,
Speaker 3: that's been that's been been the spot. And we have
Speaker 3: him in a role where he's on that our ping
Speaker 3: academy team. This is our team that teaches all of
Speaker 3: our fitters how we fit here, kind of educates him
Speaker 3: on new product. So there's also this philosophy in teaching
Speaker 3: is where you do the most learning. So that's also
Speaker 3: where we've had Jim kind of lined up.
Speaker 1: Where did hard k come from? When did that start?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Nickname came about really in my professional career when
Speaker 2: I came down here to play the Gateway Tour. You
Speaker 2: guys probably remember remember.
Speaker 5: The on the Gateway Tour Back in the day, I
Speaker 5: was a Gateway Tour boy on the gate I absolutely
Speaker 5: lost money as well on the Gateway Tour. You know,
Speaker 5: you know, you know how there were like two people
Speaker 5: that played Gateway Tour. There were the people that took
Speaker 5: the checks home and the people that sent checks in.
Speaker 5: I sent the checks.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I hear that. One of the starters, uh, you know,
Speaker 2: found out the pronunciation my name canals the hard K.
Speaker 2: So so from there on out, every time he you know,
Speaker 2: I come up to Hey, hard Ka, Hey, Jimmy hard
Speaker 2: k you know. And so when I got out on
Speaker 2: the tour, that kind of just stuck. Everybody's just calling
Speaker 2: me hard Kale over the plays.
Speaker 3: It.
Speaker 2: It's just kind of a nice it's a nice right.
Speaker 1: It is a great. It's a really really good thank you.
Speaker 4: How many many tours and tours do you think you've
Speaker 4: played on? Do you think you could even count them?
Speaker 4: Do you think it's like twelve? Uh No, I don't
Speaker 4: think it's that many. It's probably it's probably eight ish,
Speaker 4: you know, something like that, including Cornfery and PJ Tour.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I didn't. I didn't branch out a ton
Speaker 2: to be to be perfectly honest, I played Gateway Tour.
Speaker 2: My my granda parents live here in Phoenix, so right
Speaker 2: out of school I came down and lived with them.
Speaker 2: Played the Gateway Tour solely got me, you know, like
Speaker 2: what you were saying, I got my butt kicked by
Speaker 2: everybody does down here, just playing NonStop, which was good
Speaker 2: for me, my game got better because of that, and
Speaker 2: then then a little bit on the East Coast, but
Speaker 2: then mainly my goal was to get on the Corn
Speaker 2: Forry Tour on the PGA Tour. So it was a
Speaker 2: priority for me to play Corn Ferry Tour Q school
Speaker 2: every single year. Saved up money, you know, to play
Speaker 2: that every year, and finally got through i think five
Speaker 2: five years in twenty sixteen, got through fall of twenty
Speaker 2: sixteen on the Cornfory Tour.
Speaker 1: How many wins do you know the amount of wins
Speaker 1: you've had.
Speaker 2: It's probably it's probably in the ten to fifteen area
Speaker 2: somewhere in there. Pro wins. Nothing on the corp for
Speaker 2: your tour and PGA Tour, unfortunately, nothing yet. Thank you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we've got a future ahead.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: What's been some of your funnest moment or your the
Speaker 3: funnest moment on the most memorable moment on the PGA Tour.
Speaker 2: Most memorable moment on the PGA Tour for sure was
Speaker 2: Hole in one at Tory Pine South number three, Sunday
Speaker 2: Sunday Hole on one Tory Pines number three South, the
Speaker 2: picturesque you know, down hill hole and to boot I'm
Speaker 2: playing that hole with with Sung JM and Mark Leaschmann.
Speaker 2: Great group following Tigers group. Tiger's playing that was twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2: He's playing. There's like two hundred thousand people there. He's
Speaker 2: playing number six, which, if you know, the course goes
Speaker 2: back right, but the t the teaser right there. This
Speaker 2: this whole area is.
Speaker 1: Just catching yeah way too.
Speaker 2: And we're right in front of Ricky and JT. So
Speaker 2: they got a massive crowd right behind us. So I
Speaker 2: hit this shot and it's just a beautiful curving, you know,
Speaker 2: just a slight draw. I played this nice little draw
Speaker 2: penskin on the right side, bounces once, kind of trickles
Speaker 2: three feet and go in, and I mean people just
Speaker 2: went crazy, and I went crazy too. And I had
Speaker 2: a friend playing with Tiger and he supposedly gave me
Speaker 2: like a little clap clap, and you know, hey, I'm
Speaker 2: just saying that he said that happened. But I take
Speaker 2: I throw the clock, I take off running down the hill,
Speaker 2: if you know. And I'm just I'm doing the high
Speaker 2: five line. You know, everybody's just there. I'm just high
Speaker 2: five all the way to the hole. It was best
Speaker 2: moment by far on the PGA tour that it it.
Speaker 2: You know, I bought some beverages for the clubhouse afterwards,
Speaker 2: so that that put me back a little bit, but
Speaker 2: it was worth it. I mean it was incredible.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, can we talk about the hole in
Speaker 4: one rule, about the buying the drinks?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 4: Man, I don't love it. I do think that it
Speaker 4: should be switched. I do feel like you should be
Speaker 4: rewarded for the one.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 4: I get the idea that you had something great happen,
Speaker 4: so you can kind of celebrate with everybody.
Speaker 1: Else, But shouldn't you.
Speaker 4: You know, like everything else you do successful in sport,
Speaker 4: you're the person that receives accolades.
Speaker 3: Right, then there's the interns thing, you can do it
Speaker 3: in your club and all that. I mean, then it
Speaker 3: gets all complicated.
Speaker 4: So complicated, so complicated Europe, and then will be good exactly. Well, Jim,
Speaker 4: it's been great chatting obviously, h I know everybody at
Speaker 4: PING has been pop fired up to have you here,
Speaker 4: what a resource you are, and obviously we're going to
Speaker 4: continue to root for you in terms of your playing
Speaker 4: as well, because, uh, it seems like you're still hungry,
Speaker 4: it seems like you're still interested in Oh, absolutely, compeding.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, and thank you for having me today. And
Speaker 2: like I said, I just gotta I just gotta be
Speaker 2: good enough to beat Marty. I mean that's that's really
Speaker 2: what it comes down to. It's gonna be hard looking
Speaker 2: back on twenty four.
Speaker 4: It's not gonna be easy the way that the way
Speaker 4: that Marty's playing, in the way that Marty is training.
Speaker 4: But uh, the hard K, the hard K, the man.
Speaker 4: Fun to have you on the podcast. This is the
Speaker 4: Ping Proven Grounds Podcast.