Watching the PGA golf championship last weekend left me with several follow-up thoughts, some positive, some negative. On the positive side, I couldn’t have been happier for Aaron Rai. His 60-plus foot birdie putt on the 17th hole pretty much clinched the championship. It was truly an amazing putt, especially given at that point he had a couple of other players still breathing down his back. He is a humble man and his humility and demeaner in that environment is to be commended. Also, in this day and age when many of us are “bitten” by the urge to go out and purchase the latest equipment in search of the holy grail, it’s amazing Aaron plays with a driver that is seven years old and he was driving it out there with the best of them using the latest equipment.
On the negative side, I would love to see some changes made to part of the game. Whether it be driving, iron play, sand play, chipping, pitching, putting, and even reading greens, all require an incredible about of skill on the part of these pros. Several years ago, both the USGA and R&A had the opportunity to address the issue of “anchoring” the broomstick length putters. Their solution to continue to allow the use of these length putters provided the player’s hands no longer touch their chests is a joke in my opinion. Players like Adam Scott, Akshay Bhatia, Berhard Langer, and Matthew Schmid just to name a few would be lucky to even make the weekend cuts without the use of these “crutchlike” putters. The USGA and R&A missed the boat when they simply could have changed the rules to say that a conforming putter can be no longer than a player’s wrist line. This also would have done away with the technique used by Bryson DeChambeau and Matt Kuchar of anchoring the putter against their upper forearms.
While slow play continues to be an issue on all the tours and in amateur play as well, one thing that doesn’t help alleviate it is the player’s use of a line on the golf ball to help them line up their putts. This wastes time, especially when the players squat down and realign their ball line several times to try and get it right. Great players like Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus never used anything like this in their day. The bottom line is if a player can’t line up his/her putter without having a line on the ball to assist them, they ought to go practice and figure out how to do it.
Finally, as I mentioned above, green reading is a skill that is also part of the game. I would like to see Tour pros have to read their putts without the assistance of their caddie. As much as I like Cameron Young as a player, he has admitted that he is terrible at reading greens and he has his caddie read most if not all of his putts. I’m sure there are plenty of other pros on all the tours who hire caddies specifically for their green reading ability. I’m sure this change will probably never come to fruition, but it would be interesting to how some of today’s leading players might fare without the use of their caddie reading their putts for them.
Dave Siano is a former 60-year Greenfield resident.