Speaker 1: The golf courses just played into the manufacturer's hands and
Speaker 1: just rewarded exponentially rewarded distance so disproportionately from everything else.
Speaker 1: The reason you say what you say on tour is
Speaker 1: the golf courses are set up to challenge you to
Speaker 1: hit it as far as you can, and if you do,
Speaker 1: you can succeed. If you don't, you can't. I got
Speaker 1: thoughts in my head. Can't get them out, John, Nothing
Speaker 1: what I'm thinking about. The gouts in my head. Can't
Speaker 1: get them out. Not think what I'm thinking about. Hello,
Speaker 1: this is Alan Ship knocking back for another Fire Drill podcast,
Speaker 1: joined by a heavy hitting trio Michael Bamberger, Matt Ginella
Speaker 1: and US Open Champion Jeff Ogilvie. The big story in
Speaker 1: golf at this moment is the USGA's move to throttle
Speaker 1: back the golf ball through this local rule. We want
Speaker 1: to convene this panel to kick it all around. Um, Jeff,
Speaker 1: We're gonna start with you. Not only are you a player,
Speaker 1: but you're an architect. You have to you have to
Speaker 1: account for the distance the ball flies. Um, you're also
Speaker 1: a traditionalist. What is your take on this decision and
Speaker 1: how is it going to impact the game at every
Speaker 1: level in your mind. Yeah, I don't know. I guess
Speaker 1: I'm just getting my head around it a little bit.
Speaker 1: Um they've been threatening this for a while. It seems like,
Speaker 1: I mean, they've been getting a bit more diligent on there.
Speaker 1: What do they call that report, the Distance Insights Report
Speaker 1: or whatever it is. Yeah, Yeah, I don't know. I
Speaker 1: think it's more complicated than people think. I mean, you say,
Speaker 1: I'm a purist, and I guess my favorite version of
Speaker 1: golf would be persimonon bladders around the old course or something,
Speaker 1: you know what. I mean, that's my fat But that
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that's everybody's favorite version. Um, So I kind
Speaker 1: of have empathy for. I mean, I guess the real
Speaker 1: driving factor is the golf courses. I mean, when you
Speaker 1: start seeing Augusta spanning millions and millions of millions buying
Speaker 1: neighboring real estate and moving their teas out of bounds
Speaker 1: and or what used to be out of bounds and
Speaker 1: the old course sort of moving their teas to other
Speaker 1: golf courses and having to sort of manipulate what they've
Speaker 1: got to challenge the best players in the world. I
Speaker 1: think that's sort of disappointing, so I can sort of
Speaker 1: see the motivation behind it. I don't think it's quite
Speaker 1: as simple as just making the best players hit it
Speaker 1: a little bit shorter and like that fixes all those
Speaker 1: sort of problems. I think it's way more complicated than that,
Speaker 1: So I'm not like a massive fan of splitting up
Speaker 1: the rules. I think business and technology and like the
Speaker 1: manufacturers are such an integrated part of the game game,
Speaker 1: and they have been for so long that I think,
Speaker 1: I don't know, I'm on the fence. I mean, I
Speaker 1: love the philosophy, you know, I think of preserving the
Speaker 1: third eighth at the Masters and had playing team the roadhole,
Speaker 1: like off the correct tea and or the original tea,
Speaker 1: and I love all that, But golf's never Golf's never
Speaker 1: really been stronger, at least in my lifetime. I mean,
Speaker 1: you can't get a tea time anywhere, at least in
Speaker 1: Arizona and in Australia, you can't get tea times. Golf
Speaker 1: shops seem to be selling a lot of stuff. I mean,
Speaker 1: we've got billions of dollars getting put into the programe.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's in a good spot. So I
Speaker 1: stepped forward slowly. I guess, you know, I don't know.
Speaker 1: No one really knows what's going to happen. I mean,
Speaker 1: they've done this sort of three times in my career.
Speaker 1: And if we kind of discount the driver length thing
Speaker 1: that they did, because they don't think that really affected
Speaker 1: very many people. The grooves thing, everyone was jumping up
Speaker 1: and down and going crazy. We're not going to get
Speaker 1: flyers from every time. We didn't the raff and the
Speaker 1: whole game's going to change it. I mean, it didn't
Speaker 1: change anything like it literally changed. Maybe for six months
Speaker 1: we sort of scrambled around and mess around with bounces
Speaker 1: and lofts and different stuff, but they worked out how
Speaker 1: to get us to spin the ball like it used
Speaker 1: to and off to the races. And same with the
Speaker 1: long putter thing. The intent was to get people to
Speaker 1: not use long putters, and just as many people use
Speaker 1: long putters as now as before, maybe even more so.
Speaker 1: This my skepticism about whether it'll actually make any realistic difference.
Speaker 1: Is there a little bit, and it's kind of rescue
Speaker 1: I think, to sort of split up the rules. I
Speaker 1: don't know. Maybe I'm saying that because I've been a
Speaker 1: paid athlete from governmentufacturers my whole life. I'm not sure,
Speaker 1: but the general public and everybody benefits from all the
Speaker 1: r and D that they do on our stuff. You know,
Speaker 1: they research and development for what we want, and that
Speaker 1: it's a bit like Formula one in the cars. Is
Speaker 1: that that sort of filters down and ten years later
Speaker 1: that comes into the end users product. I think if
Speaker 1: you sort of mess that process up, I mean, maybe
Speaker 1: do all them or does all the money go into
Speaker 1: our ball or does all the money go into the
Speaker 1: average players ball? And what's the motivation for titlists or
Speaker 1: tailor made or anybody who makes a ball to sponsor athletes?
Speaker 1: Then if people if they're going to be so different,
Speaker 1: you know, and that would completely change the fabric and
Speaker 1: the macap of the whole sport, at least on a
Speaker 1: professional level. So I don't know. I think it's I
Speaker 1: love the philosophy of not having us hit it so far,
Speaker 1: but I think it needs to be well thought out.
Speaker 1: And these things usually work best when they evolve as
Speaker 1: opposed to get forced. That's my feeling. Michael, you didn't
Speaker 1: have any qualms. You wrote a pretty strong piece for
Speaker 1: firepay Collective dot Com laying out your thesis that this
Speaker 1: was an important moment for the USGA to show some
Speaker 1: leadership and as stewards of the game, and explain your
Speaker 1: the emotion behind that that story. Why do you believe
Speaker 1: this is this is the right move? Yet just a
Speaker 1: quick nod to Jeff, because then we've had this experience before.
Speaker 1: You could just take what Je' said, print it up
Speaker 1: and put it in a magazine. It was such a
Speaker 1: well reasoned essay almost about why he feels the way
Speaker 1: he does. But I think it's but I say that
Speaker 1: in part because I think it's very significant to realize
Speaker 1: where we all come into the game in different places,
Speaker 1: including the four of us, including the millions of people
Speaker 1: who are so passionate about the game. I think the
Speaker 1: interest here on the USJ and the RNA part is
Speaker 1: very narrow. And let's just think about three courses that
Speaker 1: we all know, Pebble Beach, the Old Course in Gusta
Speaker 1: National you know, occasionally in every year in Gust's case,
Speaker 1: those tournaments are played on those courses and millions of
Speaker 1: people around the world watch them, and that's an invitation
Speaker 1: to play the game. When those courses become pitch and
Speaker 1: put courses like Camp Smith's thirty on the back nine
Speaker 1: and the Old Course last year. It actually creates more
Speaker 1: of a chasm between us and them and actually makes
Speaker 1: the game just kind of less appealing. And if we
Speaker 1: lose those showpieces of golf because they turned into pitch
Speaker 1: and put courses, it doesn't serve the game. Well. I
Speaker 1: think there's a very narrow goal here of preserving the best,
Speaker 1: most traditional courses in the world, including Madonna where Jeff's
Speaker 1: doing work now, and really not that many where golf
Speaker 1: is played on TV, and continue to make them meaningful
Speaker 1: for the pro and continue to make it aspirational for us.
Speaker 1: And I think the USGA in the RNA might go
Speaker 1: down the following path the next couple of years, much
Speaker 1: like a kid going from a metal bat to a
Speaker 1: wooden bat. It would be aspirational for a golfer to
Speaker 1: someday be at the level where you use the tournament ball.
Speaker 1: But it could be very narrow and focus and achieve
Speaker 1: the goal of preserving the three shot Part five. You know,
Speaker 1: when I was coming up in the game, you had
Speaker 1: Part seventy two US Open courses knocked down to Part
Speaker 1: seventy and one of those Part fives will be unreachable
Speaker 1: in the other wood. That was sort of the traditional
Speaker 1: definition of a part seventy. Of course that's gone. So
Speaker 1: to bring that back, to make it, to make us
Speaker 1: recognize the value of the game of eighteen holes comprising
Speaker 1: of Part five's, part fours and Part three's where you
Speaker 1: test every club in the bag, I think is it
Speaker 1: would be very useful to the game. But I would
Speaker 1: be much more narrow in what do they say rolling
Speaker 1: out this new rollback? I would start with the four majors. So,
Speaker 1: matt um did it? Did the USGA go far enough?
Speaker 1: I mean, should they have? Should they have taken a
Speaker 1: more holistic approach to this where it's not just about
Speaker 1: the ball, it's about the size of the driver, It's
Speaker 1: about you know, there's a lot of other factors besides
Speaker 1: the ball, like um, you know, I remember when I
Speaker 1: when I was learning to play the game, it was
Speaker 1: scared to hit a driver because the head was so
Speaker 1: small and if you if you didn't, if you caught
Speaker 1: it on the toe or the heel, it was going
Speaker 1: to go a million miles offline. Like there was there
Speaker 1: was risk to swing in a driver. And now the
Speaker 1: club faces are so big and forgiving that you can
Speaker 1: swing harder and you may not cast it in the
Speaker 1: sweet spot, which you know oftentimes I don't, but you're
Speaker 1: still gonna get it on the face and it's still
Speaker 1: gonna fly pretty well and usually in play. Like they
Speaker 1: could have taken more dramatic action than just just a
Speaker 1: golf ball, Like, what do you think of where they
Speaker 1: landed on this issue. I'm like, and like probably a
Speaker 1: lot of people, I did take a couple of days.
Speaker 1: I'm still trying to wrap my head around. I've read
Speaker 1: several articles, I've listened to several podcasts because because I'm
Speaker 1: trying not to be, you know, quick to overreact or
Speaker 1: to take some sort of dramatic stand, you know, for
Speaker 1: the spirit of taking a dramatic stand. And again I'm
Speaker 1: a I'm a I'm an amateur golfer. We are talking
Speaker 1: about something that's going to affect one percent of the
Speaker 1: one percent of the people that swing that hard, that fast,
Speaker 1: that create that kind of energy with that size of
Speaker 1: a club, you know, with the current ball on courses
Speaker 1: that we see on TV. Because let's be honest, this
Speaker 1: is about golf on TV. And that was my point there.
Speaker 1: You know, at Augusta National the membership who plays there
Speaker 1: day in and day out. The members tease is plenty
Speaker 1: long enough for all members, and members don't go back
Speaker 1: and play the crazy teas we're talking about, you know,
Speaker 1: at Riviera. The membership at Riviera, that golf course is
Speaker 1: plenty long and challenging for them. And at Cypress Point
Speaker 1: and all the differences. Cypress isn't it on TV? And
Speaker 1: Riviera and Pebble and Old Course are at Old Course
Speaker 1: last year the most benign conditions absolutely no, no, no
Speaker 1: traditional Scottish weather, which in large part is a factor
Speaker 1: generally at in competing at that place over four days.
Speaker 1: This was an outlier of a situation and camp Smith
Speaker 1: won at twenty under and he won it by you know,
Speaker 1: with his short game, with his chipping and putting, and
Speaker 1: we marveled at at at his ability, and I think
Speaker 1: we will in April marvel at people's ability to get
Speaker 1: up and down around the green and hit the Scottie Scheffler.
Speaker 1: The chips that are talked about are in those first
Speaker 1: free few holes of the last round. It's not about
Speaker 1: what he was hitting into thirteen or fifteen. It was
Speaker 1: about his short game that that converted what should have
Speaker 1: been two or three over to two or three under.
Speaker 1: That was his short game. So one percent of one
Speaker 1: percent for fifteen yards, okay, for you know, why is
Speaker 1: it just the ball? Why why now, in the middle
Speaker 1: of the ship storm that's happening in the world of
Speaker 1: professional golf? Why why why now for something that we
Speaker 1: will contemplate into August and then wouldn't go into effect
Speaker 1: until twenty six. Can we just let this other stuff
Speaker 1: kind of play out a little bit for a little
Speaker 1: while longer. If you look at stats and facts that
Speaker 1: since two thousand and four they're hit, there has been
Speaker 1: pretty much a a moderation to what the advancements are
Speaker 1: happening as it relates to the ball. Courses have made
Speaker 1: the changers. Augusta bought the land that it needed to
Speaker 1: make the changes to keep the thirteenth hole relevant. So
Speaker 1: there's a couple holes, a couple venues, a couple people.
Speaker 1: This involves, and we're talking about the tour, the elite
Speaker 1: level player. Why not just involve the governing bodies and
Speaker 1: these players. Why put all of us through all of us,
Speaker 1: Why not go behind closed doors and at least everybody
Speaker 1: get on the same page that there is some sort
Speaker 1: of issue that needs to be dressed and then decide
Speaker 1: how they're going to address it, in which they already
Speaker 1: know that the tour is going to adopt it. Because
Speaker 1: if they do this and the tour doesn't adopt it,
Speaker 1: now we have more of a shit show. Now, it's like, now,
Speaker 1: what does that mean to the USGA and the RNA,
Speaker 1: the you Why not just raise the mowing levels of fay.
Speaker 1: We see thirty to forty to fifty yards of roll
Speaker 1: out right now on these modern mode fairways at these
Speaker 1: classic venues. That to me is just as much of
Speaker 1: an issue as swing speed and ball distance, because that
Speaker 1: ball goes and then it just keeps going. So why
Speaker 1: don't we talk about mower length? Why don't we talk
Speaker 1: about loft of a driver? Why don't we just why
Speaker 1: isn't it a combination of a few things? Why is
Speaker 1: it just the ball? To try to simplify such a
Speaker 1: layered decision and focus on one thing, one factor in
Speaker 1: this spirit of this idea that it needs to go
Speaker 1: back like freeze it now, keep it now, marvel at
Speaker 1: cam Smith's thirty. Instead of saying this is a problem,
Speaker 1: marvel at the guy achieved something that should be celebrated
Speaker 1: forever instead of being the catalyst to some sort of rollback.
Speaker 1: It just doesn't. I just think all of it just doesn't.
Speaker 1: It doesn't make sense to me. Let me read butt
Speaker 1: a few of those things for the spirit of conversation.
Speaker 1: I mean, why now, it's because Mike Juan took over
Speaker 1: the USGA. I mean they have they have a new leadership,
Speaker 1: they have a new energy, and you know they've they've
Speaker 1: been They've been talking about this for twenty years and
Speaker 1: the game has changed in since they started studying this issue.
Speaker 1: I don't think there's any doubt to Jeff's point. Even
Speaker 1: though this rule is only going to affect the pros,
Speaker 1: there is a trickle down. It will affect the average
Speaker 1: consumer based on how much these manufacturers UH put into
Speaker 1: R and D and what that means to our to
Speaker 1: our game as well. So that's not a huge factor,
Speaker 1: but it is a factor. So everyone everyone in golf
Speaker 1: is touched in some way. But as golf consumers, I
Speaker 1: would say, I don't think this is about camp Smith
Speaker 1: or even Scottie Seffler. They're not the guys who are
Speaker 1: pushing the envelope of driving distance. But um, when you
Speaker 1: see like you know Bryson did to wing foot, which
Speaker 1: is of course that Jeff holds deer, like the pro
Speaker 1: game has evolved to drive or wedge on so many holes.
Speaker 1: But putting some credit there too, Like everyone thinks he
Speaker 1: just powered wing foot. He didn't. It was about his
Speaker 1: short game and his putting that won him the tournament. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was a factor too. But I will say that
Speaker 1: when when you watch when the tour goes to like
Speaker 1: in an old course, like I think about the rocket
Speaker 1: mortgage for instance, like every part four guys are hidding
Speaker 1: wedges into and it gets it gets repetitive. It's like
Speaker 1: just there's no danger. When when I when a tour
Speaker 1: player has a wedge, a bad shot going to be
Speaker 1: thirty feet like there, it just takes all the dispersion
Speaker 1: out of it. The water's not in play, that the
Speaker 1: trees and the bunkers aren't in play. And I do
Speaker 1: notice as a golf viewer that there's a sameness to
Speaker 1: the way the holes get played and and there's there's
Speaker 1: just not that sense of they're not walking a tight
Speaker 1: rope like they used to because the clubs are. It's
Speaker 1: not just everyone likes to watch them hit it a
Speaker 1: long way off the tea, but it's what happens after that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I just think it's a less compelling product.
Speaker 1: And as you said, it's a TV show, And as
Speaker 1: as a viewer watching golf for a long time, I
Speaker 1: think it's a lot more boring now because the way
Speaker 1: they play the game. That's that's my personal feeling. No,
Speaker 1: I'm totally with you, Alan. I think you said that
Speaker 1: I would say the same way the only and I
Speaker 1: would add to that, I would add I agree with
Speaker 1: what Matt saying. It's not just one factor, an Alan,
Speaker 1: to yours point is it used to be a little
Speaker 1: scared to hit a driver. I mean even just in
Speaker 1: the thirty years and we've been putting together at I've
Speaker 1: gone from scared of the driver to love the driver,
Speaker 1: in part because that bald doesn't curve as much as
Speaker 1: it used to and part way a pipe put it
Speaker 1: forward and launch it. In part because of the way
Speaker 1: people design golf course to say, with no rough in
Speaker 1: sixty yard fairways, there's no scare factor. So to Matt's point,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure we would all agree with this, it
Speaker 1: isn't just one factor. But the golf ball is a
Speaker 1: place to start, as Nicholas has been saying, literally for
Speaker 1: for for thirty or forty years, Jeff, how long will
Speaker 1: it take for the pros to get their fifteen or
Speaker 1: seventeen or eighteen yards back? I mean you mentioned the grooves. Um,
Speaker 1: there's there's always there's always a workaround, like, um, there's
Speaker 1: there's going to be a way to to they roll
Speaker 1: the ball back. But it seems like people are clever
Speaker 1: enough that they can they can they can squeeze out
Speaker 1: more yardage whatever they're given, Like this is this only
Speaker 1: going to be an issue for a few years and
Speaker 1: back to where they were right now? I imagine it's
Speaker 1: probably gonna go that. I mean, I don't know how
Speaker 1: that would do that, but and look, I don't know
Speaker 1: enough about the signs that I'd be pretending like I'll
Speaker 1: just be regurgitating what other people say it. But I
Speaker 1: feel like one of the knocks on the way they
Speaker 1: measure is they've always just measured off that one clubs
Speaker 1: that one certain condition, and they measure how father ball goes.
Speaker 1: And that's sort of the line. But there's there's stuff
Speaker 1: in the equipment that we have now that triggers at
Speaker 1: certain speeds and it can change at certain conditions. I mean,
Speaker 1: they could conceivably design a ball the past the test
Speaker 1: that you just swing it a little bit slower and
Speaker 1: put a little bit more spin on it where there's
Speaker 1: a different amount of loft on your driver or something,
Speaker 1: and they will work out how to get it going
Speaker 1: far again. And I mean they're going to do it,
Speaker 1: which is why I think this is it just needs
Speaker 1: to be well thought out if everyone thinks it's the
Speaker 1: way it should go. And I mean just one little
Speaker 1: point that Michael made about six yard fairways and no rough.
Speaker 1: I mean Augustus got plenty of scary shots for sixty
Speaker 1: yard wide fairways, and I don't think I mean, look,
Speaker 1: there was a great someone wrote it about Hogan, or
Speaker 1: it was a quote of Hogan's or someone said that
Speaker 1: this was how he viewed his golf. I mean, he
Speaker 1: measured his drives. He analyzed his drives in terms of position,
Speaker 1: and he didn't measure him in terms of distance. So
Speaker 1: position to him was more important than out and out distant.
Speaker 1: I mean, distance is a part of position. But we've
Speaker 1: ever since the last twenty as this was happening with
Speaker 1: the equipment, the golf courses just played into the manufacturer's
Speaker 1: hands and just rewarded exponentially rewarded distance so disproportionately from
Speaker 1: everything else. The reason you see what you see on
Speaker 1: tour is the golf courses are set up to challenge
Speaker 1: you to hit it as far as you can, and
Speaker 1: if you do, you can succeed. If you don't, you can't.
Speaker 1: So twenty thirty years ago, pros weren't going home with
Speaker 1: launch monitors and working on swinging with heavy and lightweight
Speaker 1: clubs and trying to max out their speed and watching
Speaker 1: long drivers swing it on Instagram. That's just wasn't a thing.
Speaker 1: We were going home and trying to work on our
Speaker 1: soft little fade with a sixth time because that was
Speaker 1: what was rewarded. And so the golf courses and the
Speaker 1: way they've set up and the reactiveness, I mean, this
Speaker 1: is a bit of a reaction to a slow one,
Speaker 1: but a reaction the reactiveness sort of the last evolution
Speaker 1: of the reaction was to make golf courses longer and
Speaker 1: to challenge long hitters more. Well, that just makes us
Speaker 1: want to hit it further. And if you take a
Speaker 1: ball and make it go shorter, we're just going to
Speaker 1: work out how to make it go further. How we're
Speaker 1: going to work out how to have the lower score
Speaker 1: we can on the courses we get presented. And I
Speaker 1: think it's very realistic to present courses that proportionately reward distance,
Speaker 1: not disproportionately. I mean, I know that's kind of what
Speaker 1: the USJA we're trying to do at wing foot and
Speaker 1: all that, and I guess it's not an exact science
Speaker 1: and you can't do it always, but we're just going
Speaker 1: to try to do I say we as as a
Speaker 1: professional golfer, we're just going to try to get our
Speaker 1: games to the point that get rewarded the most on
Speaker 1: the challenges we get put And if you just keep
Speaker 1: putting longer and longer courses that reward distance, that's all
Speaker 1: we're going to focus on. I think it's just more
Speaker 1: complicated than just changing away you measure the ball and
Speaker 1: making certain conditions to go a bit shorter off the driver.
Speaker 1: I think it's a holistic if you genuinely want golf
Speaker 1: to have a smaller fought print and use less water
Speaker 1: and not have to buy land next door and all
Speaker 1: these things that I think should be Really the only
Speaker 1: reason we do this is to preserve golf courses, because
Speaker 1: whether someone hits at three thirty on TV or three
Speaker 1: fifteen on TV, you can't. That doesn't translate like any
Speaker 1: average golfer goes down and watches PGA two players hit
Speaker 1: any shots, really, they're blown away. It wouldn't even matter
Speaker 1: if the ball went thirty yards shutter. They'd watch that
Speaker 1: and go, wow, how good is that? Like that, the
Speaker 1: entertainment product is great regardless of whether it goes three
Speaker 1: thirty or three fifteen. I think it's got to be
Speaker 1: a holistic approach to bring distance back into a sensible
Speaker 1: level of reward as opposed to disproportionately. And I think
Speaker 1: the general reaction with all golf courses is just like
Speaker 1: how long can we make this? We've got to make
Speaker 1: these long. Guys have to hit it even longer. And
Speaker 1: that's just encourages the issue from my perspective anyway, and
Speaker 1: add point to those that perspective there Aaron Hills versus
Speaker 1: Harbortown Aaron Hills, big long essentially built for the modern
Speaker 1: game played by modern players. Brooks Kepta wins because he
Speaker 1: was like the best driver of the week Versus Harbortown.
Speaker 1: You have to hit, you can't drive it through the fairway.
Speaker 1: You have to shape it right and left. You have
Speaker 1: to hit your spots, you have to hit those small
Speaker 1: greens Harbortown like I think the answer is more towards
Speaker 1: Harbortown and less Aaron Hills, which is exactly what you know,
Speaker 1: built in the you know sixties, verse built you know,
Speaker 1: built in the two thousands. I mean, that's a big
Speaker 1: fundamental difference that played right into a long driver's long
Speaker 1: driver's hands. I mean, Augusta is still one. Zack Johnson
Speaker 1: and Danny Willet and Trevor Immelman and some of these,
Speaker 1: you know, some of these guys who win the Masters,
Speaker 1: you know brooks kept and Dustin Johnson and or Adam
Speaker 1: Scott or you know, it's not the longest hitter that's
Speaker 1: not dominating the tours. Brandon Matthews is not dominating anything.
Speaker 1: The Where is the last time the longest hitter wins
Speaker 1: the tournament? It's just it's still so much more nuanced
Speaker 1: than just going out and ripping a three forty. I
Speaker 1: don't care what you have into the green. You still
Speaker 1: have to chip and put where the pin placements are,
Speaker 1: what the green complex look like, how the green speeds
Speaker 1: are running the bunker positions. It's so you know, it's
Speaker 1: so much more complex than just like we need to
Speaker 1: roll the ball back fifteen yards. Bryson pitched, chipped and
Speaker 1: put of the ball like a madman winning what a
Speaker 1: wing foot. So I'm not taking anything away from that,
Speaker 1: but basically, hole after hole hole, he ad driver as
Speaker 1: far as he possibly could to rough that he could
Speaker 1: play out of. It was it was almost meaningless, meaningless
Speaker 1: to him. And I think when you know, when we
Speaker 1: talk about length and it always goes to driver, But
Speaker 1: like the hooded five iron on a hot fairway that
Speaker 1: goes to fifty, Hogan hit drivers two fifty to the
Speaker 1: position and wanted to hit it and was happy to
Speaker 1: do it. So the hooded five iron as a tea shot,
Speaker 1: it doesn't challenge Jeff Ogilvie and the two hundred other
Speaker 1: best players in the world. But if I could just
Speaker 1: post one question, because Jeff is the only architect in
Speaker 1: this conversation. We're all architects in our minds, but Jeff
Speaker 1: actually is an architect. Jeff, do you see in your
Speaker 1: playing life and as you're thinking about Medon and some
Speaker 1: of the other courses we work on that The notion
Speaker 1: of the traditional golf course comprising part fives, part fours
Speaker 1: and part threes is being challenged by the two hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty yards five iron off the tea and the
Speaker 1: three hundred and thirty yard drive. I don't know, we
Speaker 1: don't really build stuff to apply, as Madonna is an exception,
Speaker 1: and we obviously like having to think about that. I
Speaker 1: don't think so. I mean, look, it's just a bigger
Speaker 1: footprint than it was before. Really, I mean, I mean
Speaker 1: we're all like, we all sort of fall in love
Speaker 1: with the game, and we think of the game as
Speaker 1: it's best when we were like the most in love
Speaker 1: with the right usually, Like, I mean, it's just the
Speaker 1: way it is. I mean, some people still get around
Speaker 1: saying Vinyl records are better than Spotify, better than maybe
Speaker 1: but Spotify. I've got every song in the world on
Speaker 1: my phone, you know. I mean, there's that's pretty good,
Speaker 1: you know. Um. And it's like Simon blades and balladas
Speaker 1: at the old course in wearing like twee jackets and stuff.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's really cool and nostalgia and stuff. But
Speaker 1: the game has always evolved and it's always been moving forward.
Speaker 1: It definitely accelerated twenty years ago. I think Carston Solheim's
Speaker 1: got a big part of this with that pig lawsuit,
Speaker 1: I think sort of triggered a couple of things. One
Speaker 1: that Wow, there's crazy amounts of improvement and equipment. Guys, Look,
Speaker 1: if you just put a bit of science into this,
Speaker 1: you can make people better. And he sort of showed
Speaker 1: people that for real, and that the manufacturers could push
Speaker 1: the envelope a little bit and the man and the
Speaker 1: rules bodies would be scared to keep up a little bit.
Speaker 1: That that that was a pretty important situation. I think
Speaker 1: that that whole pin groove issue and ever since them,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just got faster, but everything has two.
Speaker 1: I mean you can't stop time, you know, like you
Speaker 1: just can't. I think golf is an incredible game now
Speaker 1: do I think it's probably a bit more depth than nuance.
Speaker 1: Back with the old stuff, probably it was more about
Speaker 1: you and less about the equipment you were using before.
Speaker 1: Now it's the equipment. It's a bigger part of golf.
Speaker 1: But that's just part of what it is. And I
Speaker 1: mean speaking from a from the player's side of things,
Speaker 1: I mean, these manufacturers, they've put us on TV they've
Speaker 1: advertised us, We're in magazines, We've got big billboard golf
Speaker 1: bags and hats. They're part of the celebrity of the
Speaker 1: whole thing, like they're they're they're part. There's such an
Speaker 1: integral part of the thing. If we'd all just used
Speaker 1: no name equipment forever to a players wouldn't be as celebrity,
Speaker 1: it wouldn't be as big a deal. It just wouldn't be.
Speaker 1: It's just a big part of the enthusiasm and money
Speaker 1: and everything that came into the sports. So it's so
Speaker 1: intertwined to just change one tiny little thing and expect
Speaker 1: the whole thing to come back to where everybody wants it.
Speaker 1: I just don't think that's going to happen, and I
Speaker 1: think there's risk involved, which I think at a time
Speaker 1: when the spirit of this change or this suggestion is
Speaker 1: that golf is in a bad place, I think is awful,
Speaker 1: because I think golf is in an amazing place. You
Speaker 1: can choose to go out and play Godhill with a
Speaker 1: persimon What if you want you know the game that
Speaker 1: whatever game that you want, you can go find. You know,
Speaker 1: you can get on an eBay, you can buy whatever
Speaker 1: equipment you want. You can go play the game that
Speaker 1: you want to play. Professional golf has never been more appealing.
Speaker 1: It doesn't seem like to the money people in the world, corporate,
Speaker 1: the corporate world, Saudi Arabia, everybody is obsessed with professional
Speaker 1: golf at the moment. And I think it's it's so
Speaker 1: complicated that one little rule I don't I think is risky,
Speaker 1: and I think it needs to be well thought out.
Speaker 1: And someone mentioned that I can't remember that everyone needs
Speaker 1: to get on the same everyone needs to get in
Speaker 1: the same room to get tight, the manufacturers and the
Speaker 1: rules bodies and the golfers and a cross section of
Speaker 1: everybody from every level of golf, And like, really think
Speaker 1: this out, because I think, as I said at the start,
Speaker 1: I mean, my favorite version of the game is probably
Speaker 1: a little smaller version than that we play right now,
Speaker 1: but that doesn't mean that's the best version for everybody.
Speaker 1: And I think it needs to be just thought out
Speaker 1: and philosophically. Where do we think that we can sort
Speaker 1: of put the guardrails or the regulations on this sport
Speaker 1: to sort of keep it in the keep it in
Speaker 1: the sort of wavelength we want to keep it in,
Speaker 1: and just keep it inside there and off you go.
Speaker 1: You can't stop evolution of equipment. You can't stop the
Speaker 1: evolution of like working on our bodies and working on
Speaker 1: our techniques, and you just you can't. You just can't
Speaker 1: stop that stuff. It's just and it's part of why
Speaker 1: people play. I mean, if you go to St. Andrews
Speaker 1: and you go through I mean it's the original of
Speaker 1: the original, and go through all those old golf shops.
Speaker 1: I mean they were coming up with clubs to play
Speaker 1: out of water that were like that had holes in
Speaker 1: them and like scoopy looking faces, and they had things
Speaker 1: that looked like hybrids one hundred years ago. I mean
Speaker 1: they this has been part of the game forever. And
Speaker 1: you definitely have to put regulations. You have to put
Speaker 1: sort of a line in the sand somewhere, I guess.
Speaker 1: But just doing this isn't going to stop that move
Speaker 1: forward of this sport. It's always just going to keep
Speaker 1: doing it because, to be honest, that's part of why
Speaker 1: people play it. I Mean, my dad loved golf, but
Speaker 1: I think he loved walking around a golf shop and
Speaker 1: buying new golf clubs more. You know that for him,
Speaker 1: golf was the promise of distance and the new clubs
Speaker 1: are this part is going to make more parts, or
Speaker 1: this drive is going to go further on finally able
Speaker 1: to draw the ball or whatever it is. That to
Speaker 1: him and a lot of people, that's golf. That's their
Speaker 1: favorite part of it. And I think when you start
Speaker 1: messing around with stuff like that, I don't know, it's
Speaker 1: it's a little bit woke in that it's just this
Speaker 1: sort of this narrow loud band of rollback headspace that
Speaker 1: makes the most noise, you know, and look and as
Speaker 1: I said, I'm I'd be in that crowd quietly, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. But I think when you make
Speaker 1: so much noise over there, you forget about all the
Speaker 1: other great things in the sport. And I just think
Speaker 1: probably some lines have to be drawn in the sand
Speaker 1: at some point, because he bawls that go for one
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty yards. That's silly, And at some point,
Speaker 1: if it was unregulated, that would happen. Um. But I
Speaker 1: think it just has to be done cleverly and wealth
Speaker 1: thought out and not rushed into Well. It's important to
Speaker 1: note that this these are not this is not a
Speaker 1: rule yet, This is a this is a proposal and
Speaker 1: a suggestion and this is the beginning of the comment
Speaker 1: period where the USG is listening feedback from the manufacturers,
Speaker 1: from from players, from everyone in the game. So we'll
Speaker 1: see how how this evolves based on the feedback in
Speaker 1: your age. If there are there are different constituents that
Speaker 1: are that are noisy, and whether that have an effect
Speaker 1: on what they do or not, we'll see. But I'm
Speaker 1: not sure if the spear behind this is that the
Speaker 1: golf is in a bad place or more maybe it's
Speaker 1: golf is in a great place and we want to
Speaker 1: keep it here. Because if if you get I think
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty two, driving distance among like the elite
Speaker 1: pros went up four percent, which is not nothing. And
Speaker 1: if it goes up four percent and then four percent
Speaker 1: and four percent, then all of a sudden you're driving
Speaker 1: a twenty five yards further than right now. That could
Speaker 1: that becomes problematic on some golf courses, in some championships.
Speaker 1: So ever, would say, well, they're trying to take us
Speaker 1: back in time. Maybe it's just they're trying to slow
Speaker 1: down the progress a little bit because whatever they cook up,
Speaker 1: as you know, there's going to the players will find
Speaker 1: a way. They always do it. I don't think this
Speaker 1: ends progress. I think this just slows it in. You know,
Speaker 1: I think that it's okay to have those guardrails, but
Speaker 1: people may disagree with that. You know why, Zach Johnson's
Speaker 1: a Hall of Famer in my mind because he's won
Speaker 1: at Augusta and the old course. Like Zach Johnson in
Speaker 1: the middle of all this, the guy, you know, it
Speaker 1: just that that that that's that one percent, that group
Speaker 1: of people, that that's that is going it's going to
Speaker 1: be impact impacted here And again, why would this all
Speaker 1: play out in the in this public forum. Why wouldn't
Speaker 1: they have already gotten in the rooms with all the
Speaker 1: people that it's going to impact and have everybody on
Speaker 1: the same page and make it seem like there is
Speaker 1: actual thought and leadership and you know, and some sort
Speaker 1: of efficient execution to say this doesn't impact anybody. This
Speaker 1: is all it impacted. We met with them, they are
Speaker 1: on board, they're going to implement it. This is how
Speaker 1: that's going to be used. Like this sort of crazy
Speaker 1: discourse of reaction and overreaction and misinformation and and ill informed.
Speaker 1: Just it's just not I don't think this is good
Speaker 1: for the game right now. And I think this is
Speaker 1: another opportunity for the for the people to say, what,
Speaker 1: you know, golf is such a good play, like just
Speaker 1: you know, the t sheheets are packed, just let it go,
Speaker 1: let it, let it happen behind closed doors. I mean,
Speaker 1: if they'd done that, I think there would have been
Speaker 1: a bigger reaction like this is this is the fixes
Speaker 1: in and you didn't listen to the stakeholders. But it's
Speaker 1: only impacting those tour players at those events, at those venues. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but as Jeff notes, I mean, the tour players have
Speaker 1: a very specific agenda. They're paid by the manufacturers. They're
Speaker 1: predisposed to taking that side of things and get them,
Speaker 1: get them all in a room. Don't let people get
Speaker 1: in press conferences and start, you know, just just it's
Speaker 1: another layer of mess. You know, we got tour Verse live,
Speaker 1: and now we got tour players versus a rollback, versus
Speaker 1: the governing bodies with representing manufacturers. Oh my god, great,
Speaker 1: great news. I think the tour players have their way
Speaker 1: that nothing would ever change. It would just be like
Speaker 1: let us just get let us just keep going and
Speaker 1: going and going, and and it might be that way.
Speaker 1: They might not implement this, They might not the tour.
Speaker 1: Why would the tour do this? And who's going to
Speaker 1: make a ball for that small of a marketplace. Who's
Speaker 1: going to make a ball that they sell only to
Speaker 1: a people group of people who don't actually buy balls.
Speaker 1: Well there those people on TV, though, I mean, you
Speaker 1: still you still want if your titleists, you still want
Speaker 1: your ball to win the Masters and the US Open,
Speaker 1: like they will make the ball. But well, I guarantee
Speaker 1: you if you've been to R and D play, titleist
Speaker 1: is still going to be the number one ball. No
Speaker 1: one does golf balls better than the time if you've
Speaker 1: been to their their fact I'm not paid by titleists,
Speaker 1: but I've been around to different different factories, and titles
Speaker 1: is always going to make the best ball. They just
Speaker 1: that's what they're very good at. They're just incredible at it.
Speaker 1: And they have got decades and decades and millions and
Speaker 1: jillions of dollars into R and D. They're gonna it.
Speaker 1: Just I don't know, this is so weird to me.
Speaker 1: I think to your point, you know, when you say
Speaker 1: another four percent year after year, we've had that four
Speaker 1: percent for a long long time now and now we're
Speaker 1: you know, now we're talking about three fifty where they
Speaker 1: used to talk about two seventy five. When when Jeff
Speaker 1: talks about a line in the sand, the time for
Speaker 1: a line in the sand came out a long time ago. Uh,
Speaker 1: and they and the USJ and the RNA missed its
Speaker 1: chance to draw the line in the sand, So at
Speaker 1: some point it has to be the time to do it.
Speaker 1: When Jeff's sisters always going to be advances, yeah, they're
Speaker 1: always going to be advances, but at the same At
Speaker 1: the same time, he says, but there's always going to
Speaker 1: have to be requirements for rules. Yeah, they're going to
Speaker 1: be requirements for the rules. So why not now because
Speaker 1: now it's already too late. Well, it's a fascinating topic.
Speaker 1: I don't think this is gonna be our last conversation
Speaker 1: about this, and we'll see how how it all plays out.
Speaker 1: But um, it's good to get some different thoughts. I
Speaker 1: think we're all coming out it from there's a continuum,
Speaker 1: and Michael's on one end, Matt's on the other. I
Speaker 1: think Jeff and I are in the middle, and that
Speaker 1: that's why it's kind of interesting. There's there's not a
Speaker 1: right I watched Jeff play goad Hill Park at the
Speaker 1: Wishbone Brawl with uh, you know, persimmon woods and on
Speaker 1: a forty five hundred yard golf course. You know, Jeff
Speaker 1: practiced round the day before the Wishbone Brawl. You know,
Speaker 1: I think you were like even par or something, you know,
Speaker 1: through twelve holes or maybe one. On the next day,
Speaker 1: you sharpened up, you made a bunch of putts, you
Speaker 1: made seven birdies, You worked the ball like. It was
Speaker 1: an incredible display of artistry that you know, not any
Speaker 1: of us are ever going to be able to execute.
Speaker 1: And it was fun. Forty five hundred yards. Again, have
Speaker 1: a tournament at a forty five hundred yard golf course
Speaker 1: where everyone plays persimmons and a lot of balls. Oh
Speaker 1: my god, that could be something that would be that
Speaker 1: would be an implication of like a little modern set
Speaker 1: of rules at a different venue. Well, you know, why
Speaker 1: isn't that Why you know, that's a rollback of club,
Speaker 1: you know, not a ball, but of distance of the
Speaker 1: golf course, not of how far the ball goes. It's
Speaker 1: a combination of a lot of things. And that in
Speaker 1: itself was intriguing and it you know, I don't but
Speaker 1: but there's kids now that have never played a per
Speaker 1: semon would so why would it like that's not even
Speaker 1: they don't even know what that even means. They've never
Speaker 1: held one in their hands. It's so layered and complex.
Speaker 1: Well hopefully for the listeners, we've cut through some of
Speaker 1: those layers and it's brought a little insight, um as
Speaker 1: a confusion. Yeah yeah, maybe maybe maybe we'll let let
Speaker 1: this Marina will come back again in a week and
Speaker 1: uh not for Matt Matt stuff. Um, but all right,
Speaker 1: well let's um, let's let's call this uh act one
Speaker 1: in in a multi act play, and we'll keep your
Speaker 1: visiting as as as this the twisted turns of this
Speaker 1: plot continue. But I think I think it's a good
Speaker 1: start and I appreciate all the different perspectives here. So um,
Speaker 1: we're gonna wrap up this Fire Drill podcast. Uh for
Speaker 1: Michael Bamberger, Machinella, and most apecially Jeff Ogilvie out the stoundship,
Speaker 1: thanks for listening, and be back out of soon. I
Speaker 1: be big and I played the win, made a fortune
Speaker 1: with my shot game. Man. I ran the table, never
Speaker 1: thought I could fall down. The winter time hit me
Speaker 1: like a cannon. The ball and now I can't shake
Speaker 1: this losing the street. Every road I take is a
Speaker 1: dead end street. I got thoughts in my head, can't
Speaker 1: get them out, Trying not to think what I'm thinking about.
Speaker 1: I got thoughts in my head. I can't get them out,
Speaker 1: Trying not to think what I'm thinking about.