My mind moves in directions other people don’t take. How else can I have kept this blog going for fourteen years?

This thought occurred to me last night.

We have the backswing and the downswing. Those two are opposites, because they take our swing in opposite directions. Shouldn’t they have opposite names?

If you like the word “backswing,” which implies that we swing back and forth, which we do, the swing part that hits the ball should be called the forthswing.

But maybe that’s awkward, so forswing. That’s awkward, too, so how about forward swing? But to be consistent, we would need to relable the backswing as the backward swing.

Hmmm… Let’s start over.

With the downsing. This one is easy. The opposite of down is up, so the downswing would be preceded by the upswing. But those might suggest swinging the club in exaggerated directions that we don’t want.

(This is turning out to be harder than I thought.)

(Five-minute pause.)

How about this? The windup and the release? Perfect description of what we do.

Except that the word “release” is already taken in golf, so we would have to come up with a new word for what it now means.

But that’s another post.

I’m in the wrong business. It’s because I am so far behind the times.

I just read an article on GolfWRX about Paige Spiranac who is making over $8M a year on her Instagam account. Paige was a decent college golfer, but not good enough to make it on the LPGA Tour. So she turned to leveraging her looks, and why shouldn’t she? (see photo below, and no, I am not trying to turn this blog into something like the fleshy part of Tumblr)

She gets paid (I don’t know how this works) $8-12K PER POST!!! The nearest PGA poster, Scottie Scheffler, gets a bit over $2K per post, Xander Schauffele just peeks over the four-figure barrier, and the rest of them get peanuts.

Now I’ve been an influencer since 2009, and most of the time I influence you in the right direcction. Maybe I need to figure out this Instagram business.

What do you think?

I put up three posts in the earlier years of this blog on how to choose the right set of tees. The posts were all too long and took too much time to get to the point.

Add your average driver distance (carry plus roll) to your average 7-iron distance (carry only) and multiply by 16.

The end.

This is a variation on the traditional scramble. Partners in the scramble have a decision to make on every shot and they have to live with their decision.

Here are the rules:

1. Each team can play two balls, one by each player.

2. After the first ball is played, but before the second ball is played, the team must decide if it wants to play the first ball.

3. If the team decides to play the first ball, that ball is in play for the team, and the second ball is not hit.

4. If the team decides not to play the first ball it becomes out of play, and the second ball then gets hit.

5. Since the first ball is no longer in play, the team MUST use the second ball for its next shot.

It’s best if partners have similar handicaps. If partners have significantly different handicaps, the player with the higher handicap should hit the first ball.

[Note: I have subsequently discovered that a fairway wood works much better for this operation.]

My lawn has very few dandelions in it because I jump on the blossoms when I see them and pick them off so they don’t go puff-ball on me. Every day I make a tour.

Yesterday, I was in my backyard driving range and the idea stuck me that as long as I had my 7-iron in hand, I could take care of the weeds and get a little chipping practice in at the same time.

I worked just great. Until I got too close to one of the borders.

Last fall I put down a sheet of 9-mil black plastic to cover a spot I want to put new plants in, so nothing would grow in the meantime. I saw a bulge in it and didn’t think that that might be a rock underneath. Which it was.

I got rid of the dandelion blossom right beside it, but I put a serious nick in the clubhead on the followthrough. Fortunately, a little filing smoothed down the rough edges, and the golf ball doesn’t seem to mind, so why should I.

So seriously. Get rid of those weeds with your golf club. Beats bending down all the time. Just make sure your entire arc is clear.

[Note: This post has been superceded by Do You Play From the Right Set of Tees-Part 4]

The Play It Forward movement began in spring 2011. The idea was to encourage golfers to play from tees suited to the length they hit the ball, which would make the game more fun, and speed up play. All fine by me.

I have always thought someone read my blog post on the subject, which came out about two months earlier, and stole my idea. But because I am an idea guy, and not a self-promoter, c’est la vie.

You might want to read that post, and this one too, before you continue here.

My idea in the original post was to divide total course length by 25. That is the length of drive suited for that set of tees. I got that figure by finding the average length of courses on the PGA Tour and dividing by the average length of drive on the Tour.

However, it occurred to me that dividing total course length by 25 isn’t quite right. That takes into account par 3s, on which you don’t use a driver, and par 5s, on which you do, but having three shots to get to the green puts less of a premium on driving distance.

That leaves par 4s. Judy Rankin once said, “If you can’t hit a 7-iron into some par 4s, you’re playing the wrong tees.” I turned that advice into this test: if there are more than two par 4s per side 400 yards or over, those tees are too long for me. That worked for a good number of years.

But my mind never gives up on these things (drives my wife crazy) and a few days ago I came up with this more accurate way of determining which tees to play from.

Add the length of your average drive to the carry distance of your 7-iron. Let’s call that your cut-off distance. For example, my drives go 235 yards, and my 7-iron goes ~140 yards. My cut-off distance is 375 yards.

Now look at the scorecard for the particular set of tees you want to play. There should be between four and six par-4 holes at your cut-off distance or shorter. If there are fewer than four, those tees are too long for you. More than six, and those tees are too short.

I took out the scorecard for the course I play most often with the tees I play from and arrayed the length of the par-4 holes from shortest to longest: 325, 335, 366, 372, 375, 380, 395, 400, 423, 431. You can see that 375 gives me five par 4s that are short enough. I’m playing the right tees on that course.

If I had divided overall course length, 6,402 yards, by 25, I would have come up with a driving distance of 256 yards which makes it look like those tees are way too long for me. But they’re really not.

On this course from the blue tees, one tee box back, the par 4s look like this: 358, 371, 390, 407, 420, 421, 423, 438, 439. Those are definitely too long. I would get only two 7-irons all day if I played from there. I actually did that once, just too see. I survived, and said, never again.

Now once you have figured it out, play from the right tees! Really! You’re out there to have FUN and pars and occasional birdies are more FUN than bogies or doubles. At least I think so.

A few years ago I wrote about how to fix the FedEx Cup. The way points are rigged and adjusted during the four-tournament competition is too confusing for anyone to follow, and players can sit out a tournament and still be in it. The last thing we need to generate interest at the end of a long season is four more four-round stroke play tournaments. You might want to read my brilliant plan before you read this brillianter one.

Here goes. You start off with a 144-man field, composed of the top 144 golfers in FedEx points acquired during the year. The golfers are seeded, high to low. The first tournament is a set of matches according to standing. #1 plays #144, #2 plays #143, etc. The 72 pairs of golfers would play four rounds of stroke play, but only against each other. Four days of man-to-man competition against the same man. The winners of these 72 micro-tournaments move on to…

…the second tournament, a collection of 36 two-man mini-tournaments in the same format–two golfers playing four rounds against each other, stroke play, the pairings seeded by season-long FedEx points earned. No adjusting of the points. The 36 winners move on to…

…the third and final tournament. FedEx Cup points are thrown out, and the 36 remaining golfers play four rounds against the field straight up, winner gets the Cup.

What do you think?

The idea here is that to win the Cup, you have to win all along the way. FedEx points give you an advantage in the first two tournaments, but you still have to WIN to advance.

Could a long shot win? Could the #144 golfer win it all? Yes, but let’s go back to the Tiger Woods era to see clearly what would be required. #144 would have to play Tiger man-to-man four straight rounds and beat him. Then he would move on and play, say, Phil Mickelson four straight rounds and beat him. Then he would have to play against 35 very good golfers and beat them.

Maybe #144 could do one of those, but all three? Those are long odds. L-o-o-o-ong odds.

The FedEx Cup has become a snooze. Actually, that’s what it has been since its inception.

My plan solves three problems. First, four tournaments are too many. It becomes three. Second, fans would understand the format. I say again, does anybody understand how the points are adjusted, or why, and why someone can lose the Tour Championship, or even sit out a tournament, and still win the FedEx Cup, and is that right?

And finally, it would be DIFFERENT. You want to generate interest? Do something DIFFERENT. The four-round stroke play format is really kind of boring. This new format isn’t.

Tim Finchem made a game effort to keep professional golf relevant after the PGA Championship and before the Ryder/Presidents Cup by creating the FedEx Cup. But the current format ain’t doin’ the job. This one might.

(But then what do I know? I’m just a recreational golfer.)