Architecture/maintenance practices and the spec of the golf ball

[Thomas Dai]

Do highly skilled players, both amateurs and pro's, really need to play a tour spec high spinning ball and use spinny groove wedges when the fairways are cut low and the rough is minimal? For example, when conditions are firm and fast and the ball can be bounced or rolled or putted from considerable distances from the greens (ie the ground game).

ProV1 or equivalent.......definitely.........or not?

Thoughts?

atb

[David_Tepper]

Thomas -

To quote/paraphrase a famous golfer, "there are no bad bounces in the air."

DT

[Brent Hutto]

Why would a highly skilled player want to play a hard cover ball even if it's only going to take an extra bounce forward once or twice a round?

A ProV1 is more predictable and controllable on a high aerial approach shot. It's also more predictable and controllable when being deliberately played to bounce or run onto a green. There's zero downside to a urethane ball, performance wise. Control and predictability are good things whether you're playing a high shot, low shot, spinning shot, running shot, whatever.

Hard cover Surlyn balls take control away from the player without giving any advantage in return. They're often cheaper but that's about it.

[Adam Lawrence]

Thomas -

To quote/paraphrase a famous golfer, "there are no bad bounces in the air."

DT

Pigeons?

[Kyle Harris]

One of the more brilliant things I've heard Mike Davis discuss is the lie of the golf ball with respect to the point of tangency with the ground.

In other words, the distance from the bottom of the ball to the soil surface and how the height of cut influences this distance. Not all tight lies are created equal in this regard and the closer the ball is to the soil surface, the more the bottom of the club influences the outcome of the shot. One great solution to mindless wedge play is to simply make the ball sit closer to the ground.

Another way to influence this sort of lie is to make the ball smaller, i.e. the equator of the ball is closer to the soil surface meaning less margin for error when the club impacts the ball.

[Jon Wiggett]

One of the more brilliant things I've heard Mike Davis discuss is the lie of the golf ball with respect to the point of tangency with the ground.


Another way to influence this sort of lie is to make the ball smaller, i.e. the equator of the ball is closer to the soil surface meaning less margin for error when the club impacts the ball.

Like a 1.62 small ball That would be great to see back again.

Jon

[Mike Nuzzo]

Kyle
While a smaller ball sounds good to differentiate the pros, it is the wrong direction to go.
The smaller ball is harder to hit, goes further, widening the gap between pro and amateur and requiring more golf course.
Make the ball 1.75" or whatever Feherty suggested.
Cheers

[Kyle Harris]

Kyle
While a smaller ball sounds good to differentiate the pros, it is the wrong direction to go.
The smaller ball is harder to hit, goes further, widening the gap between pro and amateur and requiring more golf course.
Make the ball 1.75" or whatever Feherty suggested.
Cheers

Mike,

I'm not entirely sure I advocate or suggest a smaller ball. I was more looking at the idea from both the vantage point of golf maintenance and the size of the ball as there are, in fact, two sides to the equation.

[jeffwarne]

One of the more brilliant things I've heard Mike Davis discuss is the lie of the golf ball with respect to the point of tangency with the ground.

In other words, the distance from the bottom of the ball to the soil surface and how the height of cut influences this distance. Not all tight lies are created equal in this regard and the closer the ball is to the soil surface, the more the bottom of the club influences the outcome of the shot. One great solution to mindless wedge play is to simply make the ball sit closer to the ground.

Another way to influence this sort of lie is to make the ball smaller, i.e. the equator of the ball is closer to the soil surface meaning less margin for error when the club impacts the ball.

Not really sure where you're going with this, but I see such an enormous trend to mindless off the green putting and hybrids, and less and less wedgeping/bump and run play due to crazy tight, often soft turf.
the joy of short game options is diminishing due to agronomy outracing skill.
such a joy to envision and pull off am umaginative/skillfull shot rather than sweat over whether even reasonable contact can be made from a super tight "fairway"

[Kyle Harris]

Jeff,

For me, the mindless off the green play of hybrids/putting is more the result of architecture than maintenance.

For me, it is equally mindless to automatically grab the wedge and attempt a shot, then blame the conditions because the bounce of the club worked against the limited skill set of the golfer.

On a semantic note: What are the difference between wedges and short irons in terms of the label? Clearly higher lofted clubs often also have some form of bounce that is distinguishable from the numbered clubs, but at the relatively comparable lofts of the 8 or 9-irons not in the same category as the wedge with significantly less, or non-existent bounce? Is bounce the thing that makes the wedge, a wedge?

If the different is, in fact, bounce we are likely going to disagree on this one.

[jeffwarne]

Not sure I understand the question

But when do we start cutting surrounds so they stimp at 15?
No one could've imagined surrounds that are are as short and as tight as i see at high end clubs now.
Where do we stop?

I'm all for firm and tight, but we've gone waaaay past tight at some places.

Teaching amateurs to play off such surfaces (small and full shots) has become an absolute freaking nightmare

[Brent Hutto]

Speaking of modern equipment...

I recently got one of those huge, counterbalanced mallet putters with the heavier shaft and grip. I've always used the "mindless" putter from off the green, in recent years using it probably to excess.

But man with one of those 400 gram clubhead, 600+ gram total weight, high-MOI monster putters I don't even have to put the ball back in my stance. Just a dead stock, normal putting stroke that's a bit longer than usual will run the green through 10-15 yards of fairway cut and up an embankment onto a slightly elevated green. It's quite remarkable, actually, how big a stroke I can make and still put a solid roll on the ball every time.

Basically unless there's more than a couple feet of longer grass at some point in the ball's path or I've got to hit the ball over a bunker it would be foolish to hit a chip or bump and run shot from with 20, 25, 30 yards of the hole. Even when the ball is sitting half buried in Bermuda rough a few feet off the green, again a pretty much stock putting stroke will pop it out and can be judged reasonably well for pace.

Funny how a club designed to simplify and error-proof making short putts turns out to act like the world's greatest "chip-o" club!

[Kyle Harris]

Jeff,

This is a good historic discussion because there was definitely a time when clubs had sharper leading edges with almost no bounce such that playing from a tight lie was possible/practical/easier. I can't tell you how many times I see a guest drop a few balls 10 feet off the chipping green at Streamsong only to send shots either 3 feet or into the dune beyond the green because they are trying to use a high bounce sand wedge instead of an 8-iron or the like. A good separation exists between marginal and good short games simply by applying the right kind of club to the situation. A tight lie should make using the advantages of the high bounce club (the ability to move through grass/sand) null.

In order to separate, I think the conditions need to present multiple options.  

I'm with you on the putting, somewhat, as I am known to abuse the putter (see: Blue #5 or #16 at Philly Cricket Wissahickon, I've also putted through a bunker at a Blaukavitch course in PA) from just about anywhere. For me, the idea behind the tight lie close to the green is to place touch and skill at the top of the tool set and to incur a bit of thought on how to play the shot - using the full range of clubs in the bag.

[jeffwarne]

Jeff,
 A tight lie should make using the advantages of the high bounce club (the ability to move through grass/sand) null.

 

I'm with you on the putting, somewhat, as I am known to abuse the putter (see: Blue #5 or #16 at Philly Cricket Wissahickon, I've also putted through a bunker at a Blaukavitch course in PA) from just about anywhere. For me, the idea behind the tight lie close to the green is to place touch and skill at the top of the tool set and to incur a bit of thought on how to play the shot - using the full range of clubs in the bag.

Variable bounce is your friend on the tight lie, especially if turf is soft or moist, which is increasingly the case to keep iy alive at .01 of and inch.
Of course one needs to know how to use the bounce, and an old fashioned bounce like a sandy andy or R-90 wouldn't be real great off firm links turf unless one played it far enough back.
fascinating to me how different swings benefit from bounce and or no bounce depending upon angle of attack, clubface. and of course turf.

All of which doesn't need to be studied or learned if one is putting from everywhere
I just spent three hours chipping and pitching off tight firm beautiful turf with my three wedges-pretty sure I'd last about 1 minute practicing my "off the green" putting

[JMEvensky]

Aren't you guys making the case for short grass surrounds--those more comfortable putting can putt,those more comfortable pitching/chipping can do that? The only argument seems to be how tight is too tight.

[Brent Hutto]

Just in the two decades that I've been watching golf on TV it's amazing how much more often Tour players seem to be putting from well off the greens.

Are typical Tour courses really maintained with that much tighter lies 10 yards from the green nowadays versus, say, around 1998 or so? Or is it just that the younger generation of Tour players are no longer embarrassed to be choosing such a "chicken" shot?

I remember when Todd Hamilton won his Open at Troon or Lytham or wherever it was. He had a low lofted (16 degree?) hybrid club he was using off the tee, for second shots and at least a dozen times over the course of the tournament he would chip/bump/putt the ball from 20-30 yards off the green with that same club. I thought at the time he could have almost played a two-club tournament with that hybrid plus a sand wedge.

Hybrids were somewhat latest-and-greatest clubs at the time and that shot seemed somewhat novel. Nowadays I think back to Martin Kaymer putting those same type shots all over Pinehurst #2 in the US Open. Seems the hybrid-chip has gone back out of fashion. Today's players either use a high-lofted wedge or a putter and seldom anything in between.

[jeffwarne]

Aren't you guys making the case for short grass surrounds--those more comfortable putting can putt,those more comfortable pitching/chipping can do that? The only argument seems to be how tight is too tight.

JM,
Close, and agreed the question is about how tight (or more accurately how short) I'm all for UK firm and tight, just not seriously low cut andinevitably soft in the summer manufactured tight.
But I also am advocating variety
too much rough? repetiitve
too many bunkers? same
too much short grass-same
In the days of rough surrounding greens (which was definitely overdone) the argument was often made that everybody was the same from the stuff and a flop had to be played. Sometimes true, but the better wedge player used his creativity to play different shots and not all flops, and could definitely separate himself, and hit a variety of shots with different releases and trajectories.
Nowadays we find out who the great putters are-both on and off the green.

and Brent, everything is faster and tighter since 1998 at the high end/Tour sites-no reason for a hybrid when the surrounds run faster than greens elsewhere

[Thomas Dai]

Some interesting comments.

So, if fringes/chipping areas/fairways are cut tighter over a larger surface area do players who buy their own golf balls, really need to play a ProV1 or equivalent or would they be better off playing a longer distance ball (rock, low compression or whatever) and being closer to the green off the tee and then mainly playing the ground game from there?

Is there also perhaps, just maybe, a wee bit of ego and buying into advertising involved here - "I play a (ProV1 or equivalent) so that means I'm a good player".

atb

PS - I recall being told that in the days before the one ball type rule was introduced for the pro game, that some pro's would use distance balls on some holes and balata's on other holes. I also recall being told that back in the days when either the 1.62 or the 1.68 ball could be played in The Open that some pro's would play different size balls on some of the holes. True or just stories?

[Sean_A]

atb

No question some players switched balls depending on circumstances...and I believe this is still legal for AM play in GB&I unless there is a comp rule to ban it. 

Jeff

From my PoV we are still working on increasing short grass areas around greens....I am not too worried about that grass being too short or too firm...its not a big problem that I noticed so long as golfers choose the correct clubs for the job. 

Ciao 

[Brent Hutto]

Some interesting comments.

So, if fringes/chipping areas/fairways are cut tighter over a larger surface area do players who buy their own golf balls, really need to play a ProV1 or equivalent or would they be better off playing a longer distance ball (rock, low compression or whatever) and being closer to the green off the tee and then mainly playing the ground game from there?

Is there also perhaps, just maybe, a wee bit of ego and buying into advertising involved here - "I play a (ProV1 or equivalent) so that means I'm a good player".

atb

PS - I recall being told that in the days before the one ball type rule was introduced for the pro game, that some pro's would use distance balls on some holes and balata's on other holes. I also recall being told that back in the days when either the 1.62 or the 1.68 ball could be played in The Open that some pro's would play different size balls on some of the holes. True or just stories?

A few points to make about current golf balls.

The "distance" balls don't go any farther in the air than a "Tour" ball. They might roll farther when they're on the ground but speaking as a very short hitting bogey golfer I've got say an extra 10 yards of roll on my tee shot is a very poor tradeoff for a ball that won't stop anywhere near where it lands on a firm green. Then again I play almost exclusively on courses with firm-to-hard greens surfaced in Bermuda grass. And not every course nowadays (understatement) is set up to be played by landing the ball 10 yards short and bouncing it on!

Back in the day, something like a Surlyn distance rock would actually fly farther than a soft cover ball with rubber windings. So there actually was some meaningful distance to be gained in return for giving up control over what the ball does when it lands.

As for cost, you can get urethane ball performance without paying for ProV1's. There are plenty of other brand urethane balls that will play almost indistinguishable from the ProV1 in terms of approach shot and short game control. At least in USA some prudent shopping can keep the cost of new, last-year's-model urethane balls under $2/ball. Hard to find ProV1 for much under US$2.50/ball but older Taylormade, Callaway or Nike "Tour" balls eventually make it down to $1.50/ball on clearance sale.

Not everyone may have the same experience as me but I find some of the urethane "Tour" type balls to be more durable than any Surlyn ball I've seen. The newer model (last two versions) of ProV1 are very durable and the last few year's Srixon urethane balls are extremely resistant to scuffs and bruises.

[Brent Hutto]

and Brent, everything is faster and tighter since 1998 at the high end/Tour sites-no reason for a hybrid when the surrounds run faster than greens elsewhere

For some reason my home club's course seems to be playing tighter and firmer around the greens than in some past years. I've noticed that the fairways also have extensive areas that are getting a brownish sheen late in the day so I can only assume our superintendent is leaning out the maintenance and irrigation regimen this year which is A-OK with me!

But anyway, the putter-from-off-the-green is supremely tempting at the moment. I always play that way but even some of the guys with very handy wedge games are starting to putt those shots in situations the margin for error gets particularly tight. This weekend one of the really good players in our group putted a few of those 20-yarders and was hitting the ball past the hole. After about the third time he said, "I keep giving it a little extra but it rolls through the fringe just as fast as it does on the green". I was like, "Yeah, I know. Cool ain't it". Not sure he is 100% committed to it being "cool" but anyway apparently our course is playing like Pinehurst at the moment.

Of course if any more brown starts showing up in the fairways I'm sure someone will twist the greenskeeper's arm until he opens the spigot and gets everything green and soft again...