Seve Ballesteros (1957-2011)

After a long bout with the effects of a cancerous brain tumor, Seve Ballesteros died in Spain today at the age of 54.

He won five major championships, two Masters and three British Opens, is the career European Tour wins leader with 50, and won six times on the PGA Tour. He was also a force in Ryder Cup competitions, bringing the European to team to parity and then superiority over the American team in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

European players today give him credit for elevating the status of the European Tour in the same way Arnold Palmer did for the PGA tour in the early 1960s.

Ballesteros was best know for being a fierce competitor, and for having an imagination and scrambling skills that left him never out of a hole no matter where he was playing from. Stories of recoveries from impossible positions are legion.

He had dashing good looks and was the definition of golfing charisma. In my experience, no golfer since Palmer has been as magnetic while in the hunt as Ballesteros, and that includes TW. If he was leading or challenging the lead, you had to watch.

While someone is alive, we can still say that we live in their era, even though their productive years have passed. The Ballesteros era is now over. He was one of a handful of players in history who truly changed course of professional golf. Those of us who saw him leave his mark are richer for it.

NY Times obituary

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Executive course as golf’s proving ground

I think the main reason I continue to play golf is that it is, for me, a giant puzzle to solve. There has to be a way to build a swing that hits the ball straight every time. All I have to do is experiment with this or that, and I’ve got it. I don’t believe in the Tooth Fairy any more, but I do believe in this.

My current fix involves strengthening my grip a bit, and a new (for me) way of getting my weight to my left side while staying behind the ball.* Now I’ve hit lots of practice balls in my back yard and these two, I like to call them “adjustments,” are working well. But I don’t want to go out and play until I’m sure they’re going to work.

Enter the executive course. There’s one near my house that is just over 1,000 yards long. I hit these clubs off the tee: wedge, wedge, 5-iron, 9-iron, 6-iron, wedge, 2-hybrid, wedge, driver. That’s five full swings, enough to see if what I’m trying out really works.

Now while this course is not a driving range, I try to play when it isn’t busy so I can hit a few balls off each tee if I need to. There’s something about hitting a ball to a live green that you just can’t duplicate at a driving range. Especially when on two of the holes the out-of-bounds fence is only five yards off the left side of a small green.

So if I can hit the ball well here, I know I can take it to the big course. Actually, hitting the ball well isn’t as important as finding out that the adjustments won’t lead to disaster. I’ve had a few of those outings on the executive course, and I’m glad I went there first.

I’m going out this morning to give these two new things a try. Every time I do this, I go out thinking, “This time, I’ve got it!” And sometimes I do. I’ll let you know. In the meantime,

My new book, The Golfing Self, is now available at www.therecreationalgolfer.com. It will change everything about the way you play.

*Swing in super-slow motion. In the early stages of your downswing, shift your weight to the left while you keep your head right where it is. It’s hard to figure out how to do this when you swing at a normal speed, but when the swing is slowed down enough, you can easily see how to do it.

How To Fix the World Golf Rankings

Since there isn’t much of interest happening in the golf world right now, much discussion in the media is turning to which undeserving player most/least (they can’t decide which tack to take) deserves to be #1 in the World Golf Rankings. (Actually, the fuss is over why TW is #7 or so, when in the last year he has been playing like #25, but no one wants to come out and say that).

And while we’re at it, why don’t we criticize the formula itself, which we’ve never paid attention to until now? The formula puts Lee Westwood at #1, but he hasn’t won a major championship. So what? He plays consistently well more than anyone else in the world. You can make a case that player is deserving of being #1. Not a great case, but a case.

The Rankings formula is too complicated. Again, so what? It’s a complicated matter to compare over a thousand golfers playing on six different tours, most of whom have never had head-to-head competition with more than a few hundred. That’s a complicated feat to pull off.

But the real problem is that a two-year period is too long to carry over performance. Now we’re on to something — the Tiger thing actually. They way he played in 2009 is nowhere near how he’s playing today, or did in 2010. That’s the formula’s biggest flaw, and the one easiest to fix.

Golf’s ubiquitous ranking system is the handicap. The USGA has one, the R&A has one, I think. While the handicaps are rating systems, they can easily be turned into ranking systems.

Base the Rankings on performance in the same vein as my handicap and your handicap is based — on the 10 best of the last 20 tournaments (instead of rounds), with a thirteen-month limit. Not enough tournaments, you’re off the Rankings list.

What everybody wants to know is, who is the best golfer in the world right now? What someone did two years ago, even though those results are down-weighted currently, is no indication of current performance. The USGA recognizes this, which is why they keep dropping off rounds as I add new ones on. They want to keep my rating (handicap) current. If it’s good enough for me, it’s good enough for the pros.

Now I can’t tell you what the Rankings would be using this plan. That requires more data than I have at my command, and more time than I would want to devote to the analysis if I had it. It wouldn’t matter anyway.

This different way of ranking players would have immediate validity because it would be understood by the layman, and it is aligned with how he or she is rated. While there are many ways to rank things, the method that has the greatest acceptance among the consumers of the rankings is always preferred.

You might point to the major flaw in the USGA handicapping system, which is that their formula rewards a hot-and-cold player more than it does a consistent player. This would not be a flaw for the pros, though. Who do you think should be ranked higher — a guy who gets a lot of top tens, or the player who might not be as steady, but who wins a few tournaments every year? The winner, of course. That’s the point of competition anyway, isn’t it?

We’re going through a period right now where there is no dominant golfer, and the Rankings rely too much on ancient history. We can’t scratch the first itch, but we can the second. The powers that be read this blog religiously, and I know they will see the sense of what I suggest. Until they do,

My new book, The Golfing Self, is now available at www.therecreationalgolfer.com. It will change everything about the way you play.