Less backspin + tougher short game = less advantage for long hitters???

In an effort to take away some of the advantage that long hitters have, the United States Golf Association has successfully punished shorter hitters; they are putting a ceiling on how skilled a player can be with their wedges.

The USGA’s policy, to be implemented on the PGA Tour beginning Jan. 1, 2010, will alter current wedge (and iron) designs in two respects: one, it will reduce the maximum groove volume by 25 percent and, two, will limit the groove edge sharpness to a minimum radius of .010 inches.

Current U - Groove Proposed New Groove Traditional V-Groove

According to a recent Titleist study, the new grooves will result in a 30-50 percent spin rate reduction, a five-degree higher launch angle, and nine to 15 feet of more roll out. The study also found that players who generate less club head speed will be affected more than those with higher club head speeds.

Essentially, shots played from the rough with future conforming grooved wedges (and irons) will have less backspin than they did previously, will come out with less control (trajectory) than before, and there will be a greater likelihood for flyers – when grass between the ball and the clubface at impact causes the ball to fly with less than normal spin resulting in greater distance traveled—in the future.

Ultimately, this policy is regressive; it makes the short game equally more difficult for shorter hitters – who rely more on their short game – as it does for long hitters – who do necessarily need as much short game skill to score well – and, for the general public, it affects those with less skill, less knowledge, and fewer resources more than those who are acclaimed and privileged. As has been illustrated in golf throughout history, top players are able to accommodate to changes in the game with greater ease than those that are less skilled.

With the advent of the modern golf ball, skilled players note on how it is increasingly difficult to control the curvature of a shot. As a result, skilled players simply aim at their target more often and try to curve it there less often. New club technologies make the golf ball travel significantly higher than before, yet skilled players have learned to control their trajectories in adverse conditions if they desire, or simply use more club.

The USGA claims that the new wedge measures are “designed to reduce spin on shots played from the rough by highly skilled golfers, and thereby restore the challenge of shots played from the rough to the green. This should result in an increase in the importance of driving accuracy.”

Aside from the impractical workings of the policy, the USGA’s rationale for adopting it is equally unconvincing. They want to curb the benefits of distance by making the short game harder; they want to take away the advantage that distance provides by making it more difficult for players that rely on their short game to score well.

PGA Tour player Steve Stricker currently ranks 110^th in driving distance, 52^nd in driving accuracy, 54^th in greens in regulation, and 48^th in total ball striking – not exactly impressive ball striking statistics. Yet, Stricker currently ranks second in PGA Tour scoring, third in the Official World Golf Rankings, he won three PGA Tour events this year, and made over $6 million in earnings. Why the success? Stricker is ranked second in scrambling – how often a player makes par after having missed the green in regulation – on tour.

Now, take away the capacities of Steve Stricker’s wedge game . . .

At the end of the day, players with the physical abilities of the likes of Tiger Woods, Bubba Watson, and Phil Mickelson will be able to spin the ball from the rough with greater ease than will be less physically able players, such as Tim Clark, Steve Stricker, or Zach Johnson. This is not due to skill to any degree; it is simply caused by physical speed/strength that allows certain golfers to generate more club head speed.

Yes, the new grooves will put an emphasis on accuracy; yes, the new grooves will make scrambling more difficult. But, it’s not as if tour players will suddenly prefer playing a five-iron from the fairway as opposed to a wedge from the rough.

As the golf courses continue to get longer, as they do each and every year on tour, players will be increasingly burdened with difficult up and downs. Long hitters have an advantage on longer courses in that it is easier to hit it on the green from 150 yards than it is from 200 yards – sometimes even if the ball is in the rough.

As there is an undeniable correlation between how close a player is to the green after their tee shot and the their proximity to pin after their approach shot, players hitting from a longer distance are more likely to miss the green. The USGA is simply making it more difficult for them to get up and down.

By permitting equipment companies to produce drivers and golf balls that have increased the median driving distance by over 25 yards in the last 20 years, the USGA has allowed an elemental transmogrification of the game. Where only three Tour players averaged over 280 yards in 1989, 25 did so in 1999, and today 157 of the 188 card carrying PGA Tour members averaged over 280 yards – similarly, zero averaged over 290 yards in 1989, five averaged over 290 yards in 1999, and today 80 average over 290 yards.

Since 1989, the median greens in regulation average has remained almost identical, the median scrambling average has gone unaffected, as has the median scoring average.

Where it is difficult for the average viewer to understand the skill behind shooting 68 en route to a 24-under winning tournament score at the Mercedes-Benz Championship, it is essentially impossible for an average viewer to comprehend the skill required to shoot 75 in a US Open winning four-under tournament total. The unparalleled difficulty of some championship golf courses is difficult for many to fathom as they’ve never experienced golf courses like them, needless to say the tournament pressure of competing on such a difficult course. On the contrary, almost every golfer has had an experience with being unable to shoot in the low 60s on even the easiest of golf courses.

The USGA missed the only opportunity to preserve golf as Bobby Jones, Ben Hogan, and Arnold Palmer played it when they did little to prevent the excessive distance that the golf ball travels today; get over it.

Up until now, the USGA has tried to reconcile their mistakes by creating a culture where the size of a golf course is more important than its features and by bastardizing the country’s classic golf courses.

Golf is a game and it is meant to be enjoyed as such. The uniqueness of golf comes with the benefits of potential enjoyment by the young and the old, the athletic and the awkward, the privileged and the blue-collar, the intelligenent and the unsophisticated. The game played by the top professional golfers in the world is the same, although obviously at a higher level of skill, as the Saturday game with friends, with

grandparents and grandchildren, with wives and husbands.

The USGA’s sole mission should be increasing the access to and the enjoyment of golf throughout the country, establishing and operating competitions to determine who is the best in their respective competitive arena, and to implement policies that preserve what remains as the sanctity of golf.

Golf is egalitarian; it is a sport where 59-year-old Tom Watson competed alongside 29-year-old Sergio Garcia and 16-year-old Italian Matteo Manassero at this year’s (British) Open Championship.

Distance or physical ability does not always dictate success, rather it is skill and the potential for excellence that a golfer has with his or her own clubs. In hopes of taking away the advantages that distance presents, the USGA is making the area of the game where distance is not a consideration more difficult; that is like discouraging the three-point shot in basketball by making the hoop smaller, rather than changing the location of the three-point line. You have inadvertently created an advantage for basketball players who can dunk by making all shooting more difficult; the USGA has inadvertently created an advantage for strong ball strikers (or long hitters if one prescribes to the notion that ball striking is easier when playing from shorter distances) by making the short game more difficult.

The USGA’s policy discriminates against those who rely on their short game for success. That is far from its supposed intended demographic . . . I hope.

Photo(s): Diagrams/Graphs, Steve Stricker, Sam Snead/Ben Hogan