A Practical And Detailed Plan For Saving Strokes Around The Green

A comeback isn’t a swing change. It’s a rebuild. We open with Anthony Kim’s emotional return and what it really takes to compete again: repetition, rehab, and the daily work of protecting sobriety while the world watches. From there we get ruthlessly practical about scoring. Speed is a multiplier, not a mask. If your proximity is weak and your short game can’t control launch and land angle, an extra 10 yards won’t fix your card.

We cut through stat myths and explain why fairways hit, GIR, and total putts miss the point. Real improvement starts with segmenting your game and tracking honest trends with tools like Clippd. Then we dive into the short game “wars.” Steep versus shallow? You need both. We show you how to build a neutral “vanilla” shot—square setup, controlled low point, and fewer excessive angles—before layering in the low checker and the high soft one. The key is how you use the ground: pressure left without collapsing, vertical force to stand the body up so the club can go down, and chest rotation to deliver the handle up while the head moves down.

We unpack dynamic lie and why standing up through the strike improves rotation and contact. You’ll learn a simple medicine-ball move to train up-forces, how to position low point closer to the ball for soft launch, and when to open the face and use bounce without fear. Then we head into the bunker: exit strategy beats entry. Wide soles and higher bounce help the club escape soft sand; tighter grinds thrive on firmer lies. Fit your wedges to your turf and bunkers, and test them by chipping and in the sand—not on full swings. Practice like an artist who measures: set constraints, vary trajectories, and let curiosity build skill.

If you’re ready to replace guesswork with moves that travel, hit play. Subscribe, share with a golfer who blames the putter, and leave a review telling us which short-game shot you’ll master next.

Website : measuredgolf.com 

Instagram : @measuredgolf | @theforceplateguy 

Contact Us : info@measuredgolf.com

Transcript

New Season, New Co-Host Energy

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Measured Golf Podcast, where you, the listener, sit down and join Chuck and myself as we discuss all things golf. And we've already got a new intro. We are rolling in season seven. We have a new co-host, Mr. Chuck Hudson, joining us here on the podcast, going to do his best to offer his insights from a true golf degenerate. And that's what I love about him is he thinks about golf probably as much as I do. We talk about golf all the time. And we decided that it would be awesome to kind of get some of these thoughts out here into the podcast because we don't want it to feel uh like a lecture. And I think in seasons past it's been a little lectury from time to time. So really happy to have Chuck on. Uh the first season, or I'm sorry, the first episode of season seven was well received. Uh nobody went on uh strike and said they would never listen again because of Chuck. So Chuck. Uh Chuck has been accepted by the listeners of this podcast. So we're grateful for that. Uh had a surprising amount of people reach out and kind of offer some feedback uh and ask some questions. So that is wonderful. Please keep doing that because that is only going to make the podcast better. And as I said on the last episode, we want to get to a place to where this is more interactive and is serving the people listening to it. So without further ado, Chuck, how are you, buddy?

SPEAKER_00 1:32

I'm great. Yeah, I got I got some uh I was really surprised with people reaching out and having their thoughts and things they wanted answered. I heard from several people that even Mr. Hudson, which we couldn't believe. Yeah, yeah, my my dad. My own dad. So I mean, if you can impress your own dad, you're doing pretty well. He's not impressed by much, so yeah. Um it was that was an interesting one. But yeah, I thought it was great that people were wanting, they were like, Oh, that's great. Like, can I I want here's what I'm interested in. Can y'all touch on it? And I was like, Michael can touch on anything, so we're we're good to go.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

Well, there's rules for that, but yeah, you know, generally speaking, uh, yeah, we we can get into the weeds. Uh, but we also, you know, and we were just talking about this before we started this episode, you know, and I said this once again on the previous episode to where what I'm interested in, what I'm looking at, you know, I don't know how many how many people listening to this are interested in the same things or looking at the same things, and and where I think Chuck does an amazing job and is going to get better at is kind of you know bringing it back down to a level to where the the golfing public, the the golf consumer is kind of at, and we can kind of find a happy little middle ground there so that we're not talking over people's heads because that's that's not really helping anybody either. Yeah.

Listener Feedback And Show Direction

SPEAKER_00 2:58

Um can we I I'm I'm an emotional person. I I think one of the awesome things about sports is that the emotion that comes out of it and and the stories that Hollywood would throw out. Um you spoke on it last time at the very end, just on Anthony Kim and what he's doing. Um I was I was up, you were up at 1 a.m. watching.

SPEAKER_01 3:34

I was crying like a baby. I was crying like I was watching Rudy.

SPEAKER_00 3:37

Yeah, so okay. Great example. Like that's it. It's emotional. Um talk talk a little bit about and put some perspective on what he just did. Like the the going away, the coming back to win a professional golf tournament against Rom. Um who else was on the top of that lead board?

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Bryson was at the top of that lead board, and and Bo raced him, then like backdoor into it.

SPEAKER_00 4:11

Like no boat, no, uh, no backdoor, just like pedal down, and I think that's what so I I just wanted to hear your perspective really quickly on how tough that was and how good he was or what people thought he was early in his career.

SPEAKER_01 4:29

I mean, he you know, it was weird in the two early 2000s, uh, when Tiger was really having his heyday, because anybody who succeeded during that time was kind of anointed as the next coming of Tiger. Like, we we really tiger now is an accepted thing, but back then, kind of like Scotty is now, like, we don't really want to give him the title. And I'm sure that there were some like reasons behind that given who Tiger Woods is, but by and large, you know, they kept saying, Well, the next Scott, you know, there there were a lot of people, you know, Sergio was supposed to be the next Tiger, uh, when he kind of went back and forth with Tiger at the at the Masters.

SPEAKER_00 5:14

Um, you know, there were an important point that what you're saying is at the time, if anyone competed with Tiger, yeah, that was a big deal.

Anthony Kim’s Return And Sobriety

SPEAKER_01 5:25

You didn't have to beat him, you just had to be there to compete with him. Yeah, yeah. So if you were in the final group with Tiger, it was always like, well, here comes the next Tiger. And there for a while, man, like Anthony Kim, I mean, I would say, and I I didn't do enough research on this to really, you know, be a credible source on this, but for like it seems like two or three years, Anthony Kim was at the top of his powers, was you know, I think he won three times on tour, uh, was really like playing at a high level, and it wasn't necessarily that he was playing the same game Tiger was. He wasn't overpowering golf, he was just a flusher and a ball striker and made big putts and really was kind of a fun, engaging, high-energy kind of guy. He had the big belt buckles, you know, he really influenced the style uh of a lot of young golfers back then. He looked different because he was different. Um, you know, it it was a really interesting thing for him. And, you know, like I was watching the uh Arnold Palmer a little bit this morning before we got on here, and I find it interesting because you know, JT is just coming back from a back surgery, and you know, I think last I saw he's five or six over par. Um, and you know, it's normal. Like nobody goes away for a while and comes back and expects to just like saddle right back up, you know. Getting through the week is a process, learning how to prepare or getting prepared is a process, doing all these things to get back to where you can compete is a process. So I, you know, it wasn't surprising to me that Anthony Kim had had been in a really bad place for a very long time. And when he came back out, you know, when Liv signed him up and said, hey, you know, we're basically, you know, betting on the allure that Anthony Kim is still relevant.

SPEAKER_00 7:23

Because it wasn't like he was not to interrupt you, it wasn't like he was on some other tour. He wasn't touching a golf club.

SPEAKER_01 7:31

No, he was in the throes of it, sounds like a pretty serious addiction, um, and not to be to to talk, you know, smack about it or anything, but he has a cocaine nose job. Like his nose didn't used to look like that. And that's from, you know, pretty serious drug use. And I I think that's the thing that's really been overlooked. And and I know he's been very upfront with it and talked about his sobriety and how important that is to him. And as somebody who uh is an alcoholic and an addict, which would be me, not you, but as somebody who has a lot of experience with that, just getting to a place to where you're willing to put yourself out there when you're relatively newly sober. I mean, I I just think it's unreal with him because it's not just the golf for him, it's everything that goes along with the golf. And it's it's learning to think a different way and behave a different way and act a different way. And to be able to manage his sobriety through all that, I just think it's wild. Like I I think at some point it probably will be like a 30 for 30 kind of thing. But I don't think people really because I've heard some stories and I'm not gonna share them because I I don't know the validity of these stories, but it sounds like he really was in the throes of it. So uh yeah, man, good on him. You know, like good on him. Hey, good on him for kind of getting past that lifestyle. Uh, good on him for you know having the courage to get back out there and compete. And I know there's a lot of people that are like, oh, well, they're competing for millions of dollars. Dude, you're you're putting yourself out there for for ridicule. And and dude, they they came. Like when he came out there and was popping 80s and finishing DFL on the Live Tour, I mean, dude, the the critics came for him. Yeah. Um, and and I'm so happy that he was able to get through that and you know, keep hunting and keep fighting and keep digging. And you know, I know that he was kind of when he first came back out, he kind of like rekindled things with Adam Schreiber, his longtime coach from before he went away. And I know now he's uh working with Matt Killen, and it's it seems like they've got a happy little marriage going on, and things are really turning the corner. And I hope the guy can continue to compete, most importantly, stay sober and and enjoy the ride. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:42

He did open him upself up to a lot of ridicule. Like you're saying, he was not playing well. It looked like he was on the live tour because of his name, like he hadn't really earned it, and he got relegated. I was watching um just a few months ago him have to work his way back onto the tour, and he and he won um finished third in the qualifying. Didn't win, but he qualified.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Um like had to do something on the back nine to do it too. Like, you know, I I think I think that was like kind of the catalyst for him a little bit to where, you know, I think I think he had some positive momentum, and I think he was building towards some things, and then I think kind of knowing on that back nine that like, hey, if I want to have a job, I gotta get it done. And then to kind of get it done, like, you know, I always talk to players. I've got a a college player uh that I've worked with for a while now, and uh, you know, I'd say three or four months ago, I take that back, it's longer than that. Uh, last season uh for college, you know, he finished uh like fifth in a tournament, and he calls me up and he's just like super bummed out. And I was like, what's up, man? You just finished fifth. Like, that's amazing. That's the best finish we've ever had. It was a pretty good sized tournament. He's like, Yeah, but I should have won. And I was and I, you know, in a very tactful way, kind of had to explain to him, I'm like, well, dude, how weird was that? How new was that? You knew where you were in this tournament, and you've never been there before. You're swimming in very deep dark waters. So, you know, he feels like he should have won because that's his ego, and thank God he has that. That's what makes him great. But at the same time, it's like you've got to kind of put yourself there. So he has this fifth place finish. The next uh tournament he plays in, I think he finishes like fourth, uh, fourth or third. I can't remember off the top of my head. Uh, and same conversation, right? I feel like I should have won. And now now I'm starting to believe him. Like, yeah, maybe you should win because now we're we're kind of working through this process. Um, and I think it's gonna be a great spring for him, great spring season for him because he's been there, he kind of knows what it feels like now to kind of be in the hunt. Uh, he's had a great offseason, uh, done a lot of really good work for himself. But, you know, it's it's like people think that they're just gonna rise to the occasion, and and that's not how it works typically. You've got to go through those processes, you gotta kind of keep leveling up and and understanding how to kind of work through these things, especially with golf. I mean, you know, people think that they're gonna go from shooting in the high 70s to all of a sudden shooting in the high sixties, and it's like, no, you're gonna have to tack off every single stroke uh and kind of like learn how to go how to do that. Like learning to go low is it's a real skill. Uh, and that's why I think, you know, I get really frustrated with a lot of the parents constantly moving the kids back on T's before they're ready, uh, putting them, you know, in in more difficult competition before they've won. Like you want your kid to win early and often. Uh, and if that means that they're the best eight-year-old, well, that's great because they're eight years old. They should be competing against eight-year-olds. Taking an eight-year-old and having them compete against 12-year-olds, like that's that's not doing anybody any favors, man. So, you know, keep them on the short T's until they can, you know, shoot five, six, seven under par. Like, you got to learn how to do that, and more importantly, you gotta learn to be comfortable with that because there's so many players that start around hot and maybe make a couple early birdies or whatever, and and they're so uncomfortable being under par, it's unreal. They're almost more uncomfortable being under par than they are being about 10 over par. Uh because they have experience being 10 over par. They don't have experience being under par. So I think you gotta you gotta kind of like learn, and there's something to learn here with Anthony Kim. Like, if you go back and kind of just like look at this, it's been a process. Like this moment was kind of coming, uh, but it was a long process and it wasn't a clear process. And I'm just I'm super happy for the guy. I think it's awesome. Growing up, I'm 41 years of age. Um, you know, he kind of hit me right at that sweet spot uh when he was out there doing his thing, and I think there was a lot of like 40-year-olds that were pretty excited to see Anthony Kem back in the winter circle.

SPEAKER_00 14:01

Yeah, the the story arc for that guy is it like I said, Hollywood would throw the script out, um but now we get to have a 30 for 30 on it, hopefully at some point. And last thing on him, he doing it as like a 170-ish ball speed guy. I mean, not he he is not overpowering these golf courses. If you were watching him in the final group, uh there is a immense amount of space between him and Rom and Bryson as he's coming down that stretch.

What Comebacks Really Take

SPEAKER_01 14:37

Yeah, I mean, I was watching um I'm going blank on this, but uh whoever Scotty Scheffler's paired up with right now, uh, I mean Scotty Scheffler's out driving him by 40 or 50 yards, and they literally were shooting the same scores yesterday. And it's it's just like I keep saying this, and look, I mean, I'm the force plate guy, quote unquote. Uh, I can definitely, I mean, I last night I I helped a guy gain 15 yards, you know, a couple people gained a bunch of speed and distance. And, you know, I do that stuff for people, but at the same time, you know, you've got to be able to get the ball in the hole, man. And I er everybody just keeps treating speed as this like thing that's gonna make you way better at golf. And it's like, well, if you can do those other things, if you can get the ball in the hole, if you can chip it close to the hole, if you can, if you can hit the green, yeah, then then speed is going to really help you. But if you can't already do those things, you know, it's not going to just lower your score because you hit it farther off the T-box. Right. Yeah. That's absolutely true. It'd be nice. It'd be nice if it was like that cheat code that it kind of gets portrayed as, but it just isn't.

SPEAKER_00 15:51

Yeah. Yeah. It certainly helps put a club in your hand that's dispersion is less, but it does not mean you're going to score better. Yeah. The dispersion may go down, and you may see scores be helped that way, but it still doesn't, it isn't like you're saying this cheat code of, oh, I hit it 20 yards further. Well, my score is about to change by five years.

SPEAKER_01 16:19

I'll give you a perfect example of this. I had a a young man come in with his parents, um, he's 14, 15 years of age. Uh a good player. Um, you know, probably shoots, probably shoots in the high 70s pretty regularly in tournament play. Not just, you know, he's gonna shoot around par if he's just out there messing around. But like if if he's playing in tournaments, he shoots a lot of like high 70s, uh, which I think is fine for you know somebody that age. I, you know, I don't look at these juniors like finished products like a lot of people do. It's a developmental process like we were kind of talking about just a minute ago. But, you know, this kid's like shooting in the high 70s, right? And he comes in, it's my first time working with him, and we're kind of doing our thing. I get him on the force plates, I do a little bit of an eval with him, and I'm like, Where can I help you, man? Like, what can I do to help you kind of make that next breakthrough? And he's like, Man, I just I just gotta hit the driver farther. And I kid you not, this kid's 14-15 years of age, and he's putting up like 173 ball speed. Strong. It's pretty good, right? 1415, 173 ball. Uh, hits it relatively straight, too. Like, I was pretty surprised. Hits a lot of drivers. Like, his parents had told me like he was on his uh, I think second driver of the year because he had worn out, you know, two of them and broke the face on them.

SPEAKER_00 17:39

So from an outside perspective, I would not have said driver is what he needs to work on.

SPEAKER_01 17:43

Well, yeah, me either, right? So, you know, it but this is the conversation. Like, this is this is golf right now, right? Like everybody just wants to like long drive it, drink their transfusions, hit bombs, and and not care about their score, right? Um, but you know, I'm talking to this young man and he's like, Yeah, I just I gotta work on my driver, I gotta hit it farther. Um, this, that, the other about the driver. And I I look at him, I go, hey man, I go, Where are you where do you play golf at? And he tells me the name of the club. I was like, okay, I was like, Do you have a handicap? And he's like, uh, not really. And I was like, okay, fine. Like you play tournaments, you don't need a handicap. I was like, but what would you guess your handicap would be? And he's like, I don't know, probably, you know, three or four. And I was like, okay, fine. I believe that. Like, that sounds pretty reasonable to me. I go, let's talk about this real quick. I go, if you take a tour player, okay, the average ball speed that a tour player has right now is right around that 173, 107, or I think it's like 170 something miles an hour. Like it's it's right in there, it's right real close to where he was. Uh I think it's like it might actually be 173. But like that's the average ball speed for a tour player. Now, your average tour player with average ball speed at their home club, which is definitely harder than where this young man's a member at. Let me see if I can guess.

SPEAKER_00 19:06

Can I guess?

SPEAKER_01 19:07

Yeah, go for it.

SPEAKER_00 19:08

I would say tour player at their home club with that ball speed plus six.

SPEAKER_01 19:16

They're like plus seven, eight, nine.

SPEAKER_00 19:18

Seven, eight, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:21

Like they're good. They're really good, especially if they know the course they're playing, right?

SPEAKER_00 19:26

They're they are getting close to that course record every 12 rounds.

SPEAKER_01 19:30

Yeah, which is crazy, right? And that's why the guys that are members at places have the course records, right? Like, so and I I look at him and I was like, hey, you know, and I I think I told him, I'm like, they're an eight, okay, like a plus eight. And he's like, okay. And I was like, well, you guys have like the same ball speed, and you're giving up, you know, basically 12 shots, yeah, basically hitting the ball from the same place in the fairway, because the the fairways where this guy is a member, they're pretty wide. So he's probably in the fairway as much as that tour player is because he's playing a little tougher golf course. So it's like you're you're playing golf from the same place in the fairway, you're getting off the T the exact same, and he's still beating you by 12. Like, I don't think driver is the gap. You know what I mean? Like, and it's funny because you you talk to people about that stuff and kind of try to explain the gaps to them, and they just don't get it. And it's it kind of goes back to, you know, I another guy that I recently worked with, you know, came in just he had just went down. We're in Michigan, it's very cold. Uh, it's not very golf weather here. But he had just gone on a uh golf trip down to Florida, and he comes back and he's like, Man, I just putted terrible. I putted terrible, like I'm such a bad putter, like I don't know what to do, like I gotta fix this. I guess I need to get a new putter. You know, all the things you hear people say when they when they feel like they're not putting well. But it was funny because when we he he does the clipped app, uh, as I have a lot of people that I work with do. And the funny thing was is his putting uh was a pretty normative performance for him with the putter. It really was. Like it wasn't when we looked at last season's putting compared to what he did in this round, I mean it's it's within one putt, total putts of one another. It wasn't like he was out there three putting and doing all kinds of crazy stuff. But what was really interesting is how badly he chipped and pitched the ball. But he blames the putter, right? And I it's like you gotta help people understand because I I hear this all the time. The driver's a problem. Driver tends to be a lot of people's strength because that's what they practice the most. And then people blame their putting all the time. Well, if you're chipping it to 12 or 15 feet and missing 12 and 15 feet, like that's not the putter's problem. No, like that's you've got to chip it closer to the hole, and that's Where I think a lot of people just don't really understand these gaps in their games. And it's easy to blame the putter because that's the one that missed the hole. And it's easy to blame the driver because every now and then, when you do hit one in the water, or you do hit one out of bounds, emotionally, it's like a big deal. But at the end of the day, man, like the nuts and bolts of it, you've got to understand where those gaps are.

Speed Myths Versus Scoring Reality

SPEAKER_00 22:20

Yeah, that the um having you got me on the clipped app, I would recommend to anyone that's anybody somewhat competitive at golf. Even anybody. And I think it's been pretty eye-opening to see because you you get to compare your stats against yourself. And I know that we've done that where okay, I'm comparing today's round, and we go and look at what my overall score is as a player, and then comparing, and you're seeing, like, oh, okay, I felt this area was bad, but it's better than what my overall score is, or at the same. And then an area that I thought was really good wasn't even up to par of what I would typically do. So yeah, it's you have to look at it. Um and I until you and I got together, I probably didn't keep my stats as well as I should have.

SPEAKER_01 23:28

And um fairways hit greens percentage, total putts, worthless, tells you nothing. Yeah, tells you just absolutely nothing. And like that's I hear parents all the time come to me with their juniors, and like, oh, we got these numbers. And I'm like, they they tell me nothing, like it's it's so irrelevant. Yeah. Like, you know, if your total putts is 30, like 32 or 31, okay. I think an average tour player is like 29, something like that. But like if you're like 31, 32, that sounds kind of good. You're like, oh, somebody can putt a little bit. Well, if you were knocking at stiff all day and you had 31 putts, like that's not very good. You know, it just doesn't really tell us the whole story. Um, and I I think that that is, it's it's work clipped once again, does a really nice job of kind of identifying those gaps and helping you understand, like, you know, for you, it's like you're an 87 or a 90 or whatever it is. Uh, I can't remember off the top of my head, but you know, this is where you're at as a in total, and then like these are the couple segments, you know, driving and approach play where you're above, and then you know, you've got these couple areas where you're below, and it's like, oh, well, now I know what I actually need to go work on to get better and to improve my overall skill or my overall score. Um, and that's that's just you know, like I was talking to somebody about uh last night, actually. We were talking about how you can't find a public facility anymore with a short game area, and chipping and pitching is easily one of the worst parts of the game for most golfers. Yeah, uh, but you can't find these facilities anymore, like they don't exist because people don't use them. And it's like, I want to get better at golf, I want to chase scratch, I want to do all these things. Well, you know, you're gonna miss greens no matter how good you are, and I think that's that's another interesting conversation about youngsters, especially are convinced if they go out there and and play well, they're convinced they're gonna hit 14 fairways and 18 greens. They think they're just gonna ball strike it to death and everything's gonna go smooth as it can be. But even if you're the best player in the world on tour, greens percentage, you're like low 70s, yeah, right? So 30 percent, you know, a third essentially, six greens in regulation, you're gonna miss. Yeah, you're gonna have to get up and down six different times from six different situations to have any chance of just shooting par. Right? Like you've got to protect yourself. You can't go and auto-bogey every time you miss a green. You're not gonna make seven birdies versus six bogeys to shoot one under par. Like, it's too many birdies. People don't make birdies. You know, ideally, we're trying to get people to make in the competitive scenario, we're trying to get people to make like four birdies around. Okay, well, if we know statistically you're gonna miss six greens and you're only gonna make four birdies, if you're gonna average a scoring average of 70, you better be pretty good at chipping and pitching the golf ball.

SPEAKER_00 26:31

Yeah. That it's like you're uh reading my mind. You have just segued us uh into a perfect spot here. Um we're getting better at this. We're getting yeah. One of the questions or uh topics that came in for us. Listener supported. Listener supported. I mean, it's this could not have been any better. You could not have teed this up better. So on tagging on to that, short game. Chipping, the pitching of the ball. There is, as you are well versed in, a a uh left versus right uh shallow, steep uh why can't we do both? And and I've heard you say that. Like what why is it so one way or the other? There are so many different shots to hit around greens, different ways to do it. Talk to us. I know you're close with Parker.

Juniors, Tees, And Learning To Go Low

SPEAKER_01 27:42

Yeah, um, and I like Joe. I I honestly like the big misconception about me is that I have like some beef, I have zero beef with Mr. Mayo. I need beef. None. Like I if you go on my Instagram, there's I'm literally chipping a golf ball off of a track man, like literally chipping off the track man. And I mentioned Joe in the post, and I'm like, and I showed the track man data, you know, I'm like 10 down or whatever, and I'm and I'm literally at that point in time with that post supporting what Joe is saying, because when Joe first came out and was like, hey man, you got to get you know VSP up and you got to get down on this thing, and you know, you can go double digits, you know, that was really not well received in the beginning when he first started saying those things. And I don't, and I never thought he was wrong about that because I understand like low point is happening well in front of the golf ball, and you can really hit down on this, and that doesn't mean you're gonna stick the club in the ground and hit it fat. So, once again, like I have zero beef with Joe. Zero. Like, I it's not personal for me. Um, you know, he does his thing, I do my thing. Zero beef. Same with Parker. Like, I love Parker to death. He's one of the nicest people in our industry, great guy. I've learned a ton from him. Uh, really enjoy every chance I get to work with him, and we work together a lot. And, you know, I I really like what he brings to the table. But the one thing that I would say kind of got me in the middle of the rift is that there for a bit, it was, hey, you have to chip this way. At least that's how I perceived the messaging that was going out from Mr. Mayo. And the thing is, is like, and I'm nobody, dude. Like, I've I've got a little bit of a following on social media. Parker and Joe have huge followings on social media. And the thing is, is a lot of people take this stuff they see on social media to the bank, and like that's what they're gonna do because that's what they were told to do. And I think with this big following comes a great big responsibility to your audience, to the people that follow you. And I think it's disingenuous to say, and look, he's backed off of it. I'm not saying he's saying it right now, but back then it was very much a you have to do it this way. And I 100% disagree with that because there are times for sure where we want to be steeper, we want to get the VSP up, we want to do a lot of the things that Joe is talking about. Like I 100% agree, there are situations that that is necessary, however, there's a lot of situations as well to where I don't want to do those things because I got to get the ball up in the air.

SPEAKER_00 30:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:31

Right. And I think that that's where I kind of got involved is that, you know, Joe, Mr. Mayo, if you will, uh really kind of went after Parker for what he was teaching because it wasn't just this steep and down and VSP and all that. And that's when I kind of got involved because I don't want to see anybody get bullied. And, you know, recently, uh, I think it was Country Club Collective or whoever kind of shared some of Joe's old stuff. I saw that. What's that? I saw that. Yeah. And Joe's like kind of like saying the opposite of what he's saying now. Yeah. And I don't think that's fair to dig up, you know, the past. And I think Joe, and and and fairness to Joe, Joe stood up to it and was like, Yeah, man, you know, I've learned stuff, I've changed, and and this is kind of where I'm at now. And that was 14 years ago, or how many every years it was, and you know, I've I've learned something and I've changed, and and that's fine. Like we're all allowed as coaches to grow and evolve and change, and and that's good. I think we all should be doing those things. So, you know, I I think it's kind of died down a little bit, it seems like, because honestly, I think arguing about how to pitch and chip the golf ball is is I don't think anybody's really entertained by that anymore. Um, but at the same time, it's like I think, from my perspective, you've got to be very variable with your short game and and how you're gonna chip and pitch the golf ball and what you're what you're trying to do with the ball. You know, I think a lot of people, you know, are struggle with that a lot. I think a lot of people really struggle with low point and understanding where that happens and things like that. And then because they struggle with low point, you know, they're terrified to get the ball up in the air. And uh a lot of people are out there trying to bump and run it and trying to do all these things, but that really limits your ability with certain pens and certain situations. So, you know, for me, it's like I would rather, you know, teach somebody how to hit a high, soft, floaty one and teach somebody how to hit a low, kind of spinny chipper. Um, I think I think you want to kind of have people that have as many tools in their toolbox as possible when it comes to chipping and pitching. And I think we need to be fair to the people listening and go, hey, you know, if you're good at the bump and run, great, good on you. That's a great shot. You can use it when you need it. But you probably need to work on hitting that high, soft, floaty one in case you got to kind of land it on the front side of a green and get it to stop. I I think letting people think that, well, I've got one way and I'm gonna apply this one technique to every situation. I think letting people go out there with that kind of mindset is is criminal. Uh, I think you've got, especially when it comes to chipping and pit, like I want you to have a stock shape off the T. I want you to have a stock shape with your with your irons. I want to let the lie dictate whether you draw or fade it with your approach play. Like, yeah, there it's a little more paint by numbers there, but then when we get into short game stuff, man, it it's really way more artistic, and you have to be able to have some feel and create some different things.

SPEAKER_00 33:34

So this is my number one goal of this podcast is me to facilitate the knowledge of Michael Dutrow. So I if I'm on the other side of this podcast, I am just yearning for you to explain. Talk talk us through if you were going to teach the high one, and then you were gonna teach the low one. Um, and then I will try and if you start uh doing any visuals, I'm gonna try and and get the audio.

SPEAKER_01 34:05

I'm gonna try not to, just because it's a podcast.

SPEAKER_00 34:08

Okay. But give us give us that. Um, hey, how would you teach? What are things to look at? How and shallow, higher, steeper, lower. Tell tell us what you would do there.

Stats That Matter And Clippd

SPEAKER_01 34:20

Yeah, I mean, I I I kind of like, and and this is something I I want to give credit to Parker. I'm I'm stealing directly from Parker, but you know, you got to start with a vanilla shot, you know, and everybody's vanilla is a little different, right? So, you know, for me, let's take and and I'm very fortunate because I have my facility, uh, measured golf in Ann Arbor. We have this giant like 3,000 square foot putting green, and we chip off of it all the time. Uh, and it is a very tight, firm lie. Uh, and it's not the easy like people hate that situation, right? So people don't like like, you know, it's like I'll be out playing golf with people and I would don't don't tell the greenskeeper this, but I'll chip off the putting green every now and then, and people like, oh my god, I can't believe you did that. I'm not gonna chunk it. Like, I I know what I'm doing here. Yeah, so I'm not gonna take a big swipe out of the putting green. But what I generally try to do with people is identify first what their vanilla looks like. So there are people who, if you just go, hey, we're gonna take your stand wedge, we're gonna play it with a square face, you're gonna I'm gonna get them out of this super narrow, lean left, open the body up, kind of position to start. And I'm gonna go, hey, I just want a neutral setup, kind of like you would do with like a pitching wedge, right? And then I want ball middle to slightly back. Okay, I don't want it back off your right foot or anything like that. Like just kind of very, like I said, vanilla, very neutral, right? Like, what does this look like? How does it launch?

SPEAKER_00 35:45

And stance is pretty uh, it's not you're not super feet, super close. We're we're kind of shoulder width. I wouldn't say shoulder width, but I don't want super, super close.

SPEAKER_01 35:56

We're not together, we're not together, right? And we're definitely not wide open with our alignment. Very square, very square. Pretty square, right? Square face, square body, like everything just kind of like I said, neutral vanilla, right? And like the funny thing is, man, is some people from that position will hit like a really low little checker. They get a lot of handle lean in there, which is fine, right? I'm not saying handle lean's bad, but they'll get like a lot of handle lean in there and they'll hit it super low and kind of screaming and spinning and doing all that. Other people from there will kind of hit like more of a mid, and then every now and then you'll get somebody, and this isn't the worst thing ever, but every now and then you'll get somebody that kind of actually launches it kind of high from there, which is interesting. So, long story short, I just kind of start with okay, what would you do if you were just neutral in vanilla? What does that look like? Okay. Now, from there, we obviously have to build, you know, and let's say, let's use the example of they hit it pretty low and screamy and kind of checky from there. Okay, great. We need to soften that up, right? Like that's step one with that person because anytime we're chipping and pitching the golf ball, the mission is to slow the ball down. This isn't a driver. I'm not trying to speed it up. I'm trying to slow it down, right?

SPEAKER_00 37:09

We're doing everything we can to decrease ball speed.

SPEAKER_01 37:14

Correct. So for me, it's if I have the the guy hitting the low screamer, I'm definitely going to figure out like, why is there no loft on that face, right? Or why is the attack angle super down that takes the dynamic loft way down?

SPEAKER_00 37:29

You know, would you say that this person might struggle with low point, and that's why they've got that ball is coming out that way because they're nervous about the heavy shot.

SPEAKER_01 37:40

I think for that person, typically, low point is happening at or before the ball, and they are leaning the handle beyond belief, trying to make sure that they get it in front of the ball and don't lay sod.

SPEAKER_00 37:53

And then where you were going before I interrupted you, walk us through what you'd be saying to that person to add loft that would then be changing that low point where they felt like they could apply it that way.

SPEAKER_01 38:06

Yeah, so I'll use a couple things, but generally what I'll start with is is that that low point conversation. And uh sorry if anybody sees me doing anything weird. Uh we my wife's parents have gotten a new kitten. This is the kitten. Say hello. Okay. Uh, and the kitten is a terrorist and it is just going bananas. So I apologize uh on behalf of the kitten. But uh, so with the low point thing, you know, the first thing that I like to do there is just put something in the way. So whether that be like a putting mirror or, you know, just a towel or whatever you want to kind of use in that situation, uh, I like to put something behind the ball and go, okay, I want you to hit this golf ball and I don't want you to hit whatever's in the way. Um, and generally you'll see people who kind of struggle there because they kind of get a lot of rocking going on in their motion uh and do a lot of weird stuff. But you know, just starting to get the ball out in front. And for the situation we're talking about where they kind of already hit it low and screamy, uh, you start moving low point forward, they start blading it and topping it.

SPEAKER_00 39:12

That's that's what I was about to ask. Is this sounds like if this were me, I would just start leaning the handle more.

SPEAKER_01 39:19

Yeah, and that's typically what they do. Okay. So then all of a sudden it's like, okay, well, now we understand where all the forward shaft lean is coming from because we don't have low point control. But now that we've got low point kind of where it needs to be, now let's go ahead and start standing the shaft back up a bit and take some of the lean out. And I'm not saying that I want zero lean, I'm not getting to that point, but we have excessive lean. And I'm really trying to get people to kind of take a slightly different look at that and go, okay, you know, I don't have to do this all with my hands. I'm kind of gonna do this a little bit more with pressure. And generally what you'll see is like for that person to miss the towel or whatever's in the way and not low point too early, they kind of start moving pressure, not mass, pressure more left. And now there's like a braking mechanism where we can start letting this club release and we can start getting some loft back on the face, and now of a sudden we can get the launch angle back up and kind of create more of a functional, what I would call a functional vanilla shot to where the the loft is gonna, I'm sorry, where the launch angle is gonna create a better land angle and spin rate to where now we're starting to match these things up to where, like, hey, I know it's gonna go that far and I know it's gonna stop, versus the it's gonna hit that green and it's not stopping for a week. So generally trying to kind of help people understand why they do what they do because people are just like reacting to the situation in front of them, right? So generally, like somebody that has a ton of lean tends to kind of be standing on the right foot. That's one of the reasons I hate the super narrow stance with the alignment way open, because those people just tend to stand on the right foot and try to chip from there. Well, if you're standing on your right foot trying to chip from there, you better lean the hell out of that handle because if you don't, you're in trouble, especially if it's soft turf that you're chipping off of, and you're likely to, you know, kind of start laying that sod in that scenario.

SPEAKER_00 41:18

Yeah, I think especially in my part of the world in Chattanooga, Tennessee, right now, you've got all this dormant, wet Bermuda that is even for the professionals, the nightmare situation. For sure.

SPEAKER_01 41:33

It's grabby and it's wet. Like it's a it's a double grab, right?

SPEAKER_00 41:36

Yeah, it's a terrible spot to be. I mean, you can be just sitting there two or three shots in, you haven't moved the ball at all. Um so the when you talk about moving your pressure left, mass is not going left. Correct. Um I and this is just I'm I'm just asking you questions here, but the to me, I think what's when you and I have talked about this, what's also helped me is that when you get that pressure left, to me it almost feels like I'm kind of pushing myself back to my up and back to my trail side. But I think the other piece is your upper body, your your your chest torso has to also be moving that direction, correct? Correct. Okay, because I I think that's a I think that's something that people sometimes miss in this, and maybe you can keep talking about is that well to your point, if you if you get pressure left and you push against the ground, you don't fall into the ground.

Short Game Wars: Steep Vs Shallow

SPEAKER_01 42:50

Like that's the big thing I see that it's really bad is yeah, I think I think there's a lot of information out there about getting pressure left. And you know, Joe's stuff is has been hot for a while now. Get left. Uh, and the problem that I see with that is people, and Joe talks about this, right? Joe talks about getting up, you know, down and up, but kind of staying left and down and up. Like at least I I appreciate that Joe talks about the up part, but I think what people don't understand is that, you know, by and large, there's a lot of people falling left, and then they're just sticking that thing in the ground, right? So I I think the big thing that people have to realize is that we are essentially going to move low point with a combination of center of pressure and center of mass, but I've got to rotate, right, my chest at some level to kind of get my hands forward of low point, right? Like I've I've got to kind of rotate this upper body. Now, I'm gonna steal one from Greg Rose, Dr. Greg Rose, I should say. Um, but the spine works in coupled motions. And that's a fancy way of saying that if I want my thoracic spine.

SPEAKER_00 44:00

To rotate, which And I think this is I think that people need to listen to this because this is very interesting what you're about to say about how the spine moves.

SPEAKER_01 44:08

Right. So if I in the golf swing, there's different ways that you can do this, but we're talking about golf because I'm a golf coach. But in the golf swing, if I want the thoracic spine to rotate, I also have to extend it. And an easy way to kind of figure that out is if you go into your golf posture and kind of tilt forward and try to rotate your chest from it, it's not going to rotate very much. If you let yourself stand up, now you can really start rotating that chest, which is where a lot of golfers run into issues because of all the things that golfers struggle with big time, and like the vast majority of golfers, creating thoracic mobility is that thing that really is a struggle for them.

SPEAKER_00 44:47

And you're you would be hearing from conventional wisdom, oh oh, you can't you can't you gotta stay down on this ball. You gotta keep you gotta keep your your chest, your head down. Right.

SPEAKER_01 45:02

But if I stand up, right, if I create vertical force and kind of get the body to stand up, that's gonna force the club head down. And I think that's what people don't understand, and that uh people like yourself are bringing why is it the people that stay down in their chipping motion, pitching motion, either one, why is it that the people that stay down and don't move their head and this, that, and the other, why are they the ones always blading it? Yeah, right? And it's because there's nothing creating that downward motion for the club head, and it's because they're not standing up. You know, the the funny thing is, I was having a conversation with uh biomechas the other day, which shall remain nameless because I didn't tell him I was gonna talk about this on the podcast and I don't want to talk out of school. But I was having this conversation with them, and we we have a theory, you're gonna love this. We have a theory why golf is so hard. We actually have a theory, like why golf is so hard for people. Dude, I work with major league baseball players that with golf balls can't hit them, right? Like I've worked with other professional athletes that can't hit a golf ball to save their life.

SPEAKER_00 46:06

Which hitting a baseball is the hardest thing to do in sports. So if it's hitting a stationball, it's stationary. They should be able to hit it, yes. Yeah, 100%, right?

SPEAKER_01 46:14

So here's the here's the thing that this Biomech has shared with me. And I never really thought of it, to be honest. So I don't want to like make it sound like this is my thought. It's not, but I've I've been thinking about this for a while. Golf and ski jump. Okay, ski jump, if you're unfamiliar, we just had the winter Olympics. The people that like launch themselves off one of these really big ramps and go flying for what seems like about 10 miles. This is Eddie the Eagle guy, right? Maybe yeah, the guys that were, you know, tucking their underwear in the Olympics and made a big, big, big fuss about things. Those guys. When you play golf and when you do ski jump, you push your body up and your arms go down. That is a very weird thing that we do not train as human beings because these are probably the only two times you're gonna do that combination. Generally, when our body goes up, our arms want to go up. It's very rare that the body goes up and the arms go down. That's how we're actually creating this extension through the arms and kind of leads to good club delivery. And it's wild. And it's probably, I would say, over the past two weeks, you know, I generally, you know, when it comes to force plate application and it comes to like what we're looking at with forces, you know, generally I'm trying to clean up a few things and then get the vertical force. Uh, here lately, I've kind of changed my tune on this and I've been going a slightly different route. And I've been taking a two-pound uh medicine ball. Okay. And the funny thing is, is I think medicine balls are great for golf application and learning how to get better at golf. The problem is that a lot of people, when they go to slam a medicine ball, they go down with the ball. Right? We have to go up and the arms go down. And now, if you're slamming a ball that way and kind of pushing up through the balls of your feet, that's the key part to that. So we're almost doing like a calf raise and then slamming the ball, right? That's kind of how I would describe that to people that are listening. If you can get people to kind of get comfortable with that and then get them to do that slightly left of where the middle is, meaning like kind of outside their left foot, it's amazing.

SPEAKER_00 48:35

In at acting in their downswing, when you say outside, yeah, that would be pushing this medicine ball towards the target if they were in a golf station on the target line. On the target line. So the um I've got so many thoughts after things you've said. The but the big thing being what you were getting at there is that you cannot stay down. No, you you the club head, and and this may surprise some people, the club head and the downward angle of attack come from the shaft being pulled up and the head going down. Correct. It is not from the shaft going down because if the shaft goes down, the club head works the opposite way.

SPEAKER_01 49:25

And this is why, like, for years, I mean years, it's been, I don't know, five five years since I've been to Denmark, six years since I've been to Denmark, something like that. Like, I've always said this. I think the number one most important number that you can look at on track, man, is dynamic lie. You have to look at that number. Like, you have to look at, you know, hey, you know, I'm swinging a seven iron that's somewhere between 60, you know, 62 and 63 degrees, depending on the manufacturer, whatever. You gotta you gotta you need a loft-line machine. Uh, it makes me sick how many golf coaches, A, don't have a law-line machine and B, don't know how to use it.

SPEAKER_00 50:05

And explain dynamic lie. What how is it measured? Uh, how's track man measuring it? Kneecap to those that don't know essentially.

SPEAKER_01 50:13

From say that again. It's bas it's basically measuring the club shaft from kneecap to kneecap.

SPEAKER_00 50:18

Okay, so it's in the downswing. Measuring the angle that that shaft is on from kneecap to kneecap. Correct, more or less.

Building A Vanilla Shot And Low Point

SPEAKER_01 50:27

Right? So the thing is, is like let's say the static lies, and just to use round numbers, let's say the static lies like 62 degrees, and you got somebody delivering that thing at like 58 degrees. Well, how did they get the handle so low? Right? Like, oh, well, they're falling on the golf ball, or how do they get that angle so high? Oh, they're you know, called early extension or whatever you want to call it, but they're getting too up. And it's like, you know, generally speaking, if you start thinking about this dynamic lie scenario and the angle of the shaft or the pitch of the club shaft, some people like to say it that way. My friends across the pond always talk about the pitch of the shaft. But like, if you start messing around with the pitch of that shaft, you're gonna start having some like A face angle issues, and B, the club path is gonna start doing some wonky things too. But if we can get this, and look, I want to be clear, and you already said this, I do not want my dynamic lie to match my static lie. Okay, I should be forcing the handle, as you said, up and the club head down a bit. Like I'm trying to release the energy in that club shaft. So if that's the case, like I want to see the dynamic lie slightly higher, let's say, you know, two to four degrees higher than the static lie. But that's gonna start in my head, like telling me, hey, we got something good going on here, and we're at least getting the club somewhere in the neighborhood of where we need to be to kind of have a neutral delivery, which is gonna allow me to kind of hit some neutral vanilla golf shots.

SPEAKER_00 52:00

Yeah, and I I think that um that shaft being comfortable with um not only pushing up through the ground, um, but it also needs to cause the upper body to come up, like you've you've talked about, and then turn from there that's allowing that that club head to work down. You you feel like you're almost it's like, oh my gosh, I'm gonna hit it thin. But really, you're lining that shaft back up, and it's delivering a great strike. Um stealing something that John Tattersaw used to tell me that most of the time on the thin shots, it was it was that you were catching the ball thin on the way down, not on the way up. Like you had leaned the shaft so much or had pushed the shaft down to where now the club head was going back the opposite direction on the way down, and you were just catching it thin at impact. For sure. Like from the shaft lean, not from you're gonna miss it by you have pulled the shaft too far up and the club is hitting the top of the ball.

SPEAKER_01 53:19

So I think if you don't think that's true, look at the long drive guys, like watch them like slow-mo face on and watch how hard they're pulling that thing up, not pulling it down, pulling it up. Yeah, I mean, it it's absurd. But that's where you really can start creating some good things in your golf swing. Uh, but you need the vertical force for that, right? And I think that's where a lot of golfers really struggle the most is, you know, it's just been an epidemic of stay in your posture, keep your head down, stay down, you know, all those kind of classic things that have been said, um, which logically I kind of get where people are coming from, but it it's just not the way it actually works when you measure things out.

SPEAKER_00 54:00

Yeah, I think that's certainly something that you and I have worked on and has kind of been light bulb moments of oh my gosh, um you know, I I need to I need to push way more than I think. I need to stand up way more than I think. Um Yeah, we call it stilts with you. Yeah, being on the stilts. And so you've got this now you now you've got the ability to control that low point for this vanilla shot that we're trying to hit. Um terrorist. Because it if if you're trying to hit the low one, I I think you would say, yeah, like now we can maybe have some shaffling, like we can probably get away with a little bit more.

SPEAKER_01 54:56

Yeah, for sure. I generally don't find people have a hard time hitting the low one. Generally, I found that people have a hard time getting the ball up. Yes, getting the ball. Especially in the short game.

SPEAKER_00 55:07

So, okay, now take us to the far end of we're trying to hit this soft higher shot that, like you said earlier, people are so afraid to hit because they can't control their low point.

SPEAKER_01 55:22

Yeah, I do the exact opposite, honestly, in a lot of ways. Like I'll stick something in front of the ball, like a towel, it has to be something flat, right? But you know, I'll make them actually start hitting, you know, basically make low point where the ball is. Like, I think that I want to get rid of all the angles that are leaning this thing and taking away loft. And I just want to get to where, and I mean, I I've seen some kids here recently, even off that tight lie situation like I was talking about earlier. I mean, they can hit these like four or five yard little. I'm sorry, I said that wrong. They can hit like four or five foot like pitch shots that are, you know, four or five feet off the ground and just land like elephant crap. Um, you know, like really A, we're gonna get the face more open uh for that kind of shot. Now we're gonna start with a square face and learn how to kind of get it up a little bit through a square face. Um, but once we kind of get the angles drop kicked out of there and we get the shaft leaning up or standing up more, and we're kind of getting low point a little closer to the ball, and that's that's the thing, right? Like I'm not saying I want low point before the ball. I don't. But I do want low point closer to the ball. I don't want it nearly as far forward. I don't want to have the risk of that forward shaft lane that creates that hot shot. I'd really like to see low point happening, you know, just at the ball, just slightly after. Um, but that's the thing that I think people don't get sometimes is that if you're watching this, uh I got a circle here I'm holding up. It's a little jar. Sorry, I just grabbed something. But like the bottom of this circle or the bottom of this arc is here. Okay, well, if the golf ball, okay, if the bottom of that arc is happening in front, I'm still hitting down back here. I'm gonna hit the ground, and this is the thing that I think kind of gets missed misled, is you can hit the ground before the ball, but low point can't be before the ball, if that makes sense. Yeah, and people confuse where you hit the ground with low point all the time. Where you like arc depth, and I think that's a good thing that track man's at it, is when you kind of start thinking about arc depth, as that relates to low point. Now all of a sudden you realize, like, oh, I might hit the ground slightly before the ball, but that doesn't mean that's where my low point was. Right. Right. So I think that's where you know, generally people that have a hard time hitting it higher, once again, they're afraid of chunking it, right? So they're just constantly trying to get low point way too far forward. And I would say for them, generally speaking, those are generally your people where you're spending a lot of time working on that upward movement with the body, because that's what sets the brake, that's what dumps the angles out, and that's what allows us to get the ball up in the air. But generally, we're gonna have to get low point kind of happening somewhere to where we can use the bounce on the wedge a bit. Because as much as bounce sometimes doesn't matter with particular types of shots, bounce really and the grind of that wedge really become important when we start trying to hit the kind of soft, floaty ones. And I think a lot of people, you know, I remember back in the day, you know, well, you know, no good player uses bounce. Dude, lots of good players use bounce. Like you, you bounce is not the enemy like it's been portrayed in the past. And I know back in the day, man, we used to like take grinders to these things and knock all the bounce off of them. Uh, and you'd go out there and dig trenches with these things. Um, but bounce is your friend. And, you know, we've had this conversation before, and I get it before the the people light me up in the comment section. Uh, I understand this, so just stick with me for a minute. If you go to uh, you know, it's titleist.com or it's probably the wedge works website. If you look up a K grind, okay, the K-grind wedge was the most winning wedge on tour last year. It was. Almost, I don't want to say I shouldn't say that because that's a little grandiose. But I mean, it had wide, wide, wide market adoption and the most lofted wedge for most of the guys out, not most, but a lot of the guys out there. And I get it, they're playing a K-Star, not necessarily the regular K grind. But the funny thing is, and I'm convinced of this, if we went to the golf course and stood on the first T and showed everybody a K grind wedge, they'd be like, Oh no, I'd never play that thing. That's an old man's wedge. It's got a big old fat bottom on it.

SPEAKER_00 59:56

It's got a big slant. Yeah, it it you if you showed it, you're right. You the someone looking at it would think that's like a that's to help the higher handicap.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:07

Yeah, and it's not, and people don't understand bounce. Bounce, and I've said this to you too bounce is not trying to deflect the ball off of the ground in the downswing. Bounce is there to get the club back out of the ground, and where a lot of people struggle in bunkers in particular, soft bunkers, which is typically what we see. Like the guys on tour get a firm bunker, everybody else gets a super soft kind of sandy bunker. But guys get down trying to hit two inches behind it and trying to get steep and trying to make spin and all these things. Well, the thing just buries in the sand and it won't come back out. Well, no kidding, there's no bounce. If you have some bounce, you can hit the sand hard and it shoots it back out. And having that wider flange on the bottom or that big old bottom, that's gonna help kick that thing back out for you. And that's where people lose all their speed in the bunkers and struggle in the soft, fluffy stuff. Is that they just bury that thing underneath the sand and it never comes back out.

Pressure Left, Vertical Force, And Rotation

SPEAKER_00 1:01:08

I think that was a another light bulb moment for me was when you explained bounce that way, that it's that it is how it is coming out, not how it's going in. And um it r really kind of changed my it was almost like an aha moment of I have one club that's got some pretty fluffy sand, and I've got another that's got some firmer sand. I love the firmer sand, it's my favorite. It's way easier, way easier, and my tea grind, 60 degree, is fantastic. Um it's so funny, like how many times I'm like, man, I can hit this shot at one place, but I cannot at the other. I do not understand this. And you were like, Well, you've got the tea grind that's gonna work that has like four degrees of bounce, that's gonna work on that firmer surface that you need to cut through and get underneath. No wonder you're not as good off the fluffy stuff. And I'm like, Yeah, my club just always gets it goes into the sand, it's not coming out. Correct.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:12

And so I thought, wow, that's a and I owe Parker all the credit on that one because I mean Parker was the one that totally blew my mind with that stuff. Like, I mean, we were out there with uh Ryan Ruffles in the bunker one day, uh like last year at some point, and just man, like I got I had some like and once again, I'm not a tour player. I'm a pretty good player. Like, I shoot you like 75 most places you want to go. Like, I can play. Play the global, play college golf. Yeah, I'm not like a chop, but I'm not Parker McLaughlin. I'm not a tour winner, right? Like, and he was like, even when he was on tour, he was known as the short game wizard. Like his short game chef came from his time on tour. It's not like just something he made up. So I mean, like getting in the bunkers with him and kind of talking through some strategies and some situations. And then, you know, fortunately, you know, Parker's introduced me to Mr. Tom Pernice, uh, and Mr. Rocco Media, uh, and like talking like through it with like, dude, it's all, I swear to you, it's all exit strategies. And it's all like, how do we get this thing out of the sand? It's not get like they they don't have any hard time getting it into the sand, they don't have any hard times with low point. No, no, no, no, no. How do I get it out of the sand? Like, that's what they're all constantly messing with is like these kind of, I would say, an exit strategy from the sand. And once again, man, like if you're out there with a pretty narrow soled wedge that doesn't have a ton of bounce, it doesn't want to come out. It wants to go, it wants to dig in and stay in. It doesn't want to bounce back out of there. So I think, you know, a lot of people just, you know, what fits their eye and and what they perceive as the right tool for the job, I think is I think they one, you know, need to stop comparing their games to tour players and what tour players need. And two, you know, go out there, like, and this is where I think the companies have gotten better. I talk, I talk smack about some of the OEMs, but I'm gonna say some good things. But like if you're a member at a club or you can get to a facility that does a demo day and they have all the wedges there, man, like A, quit hitting full shots with wedges. Like, that's not gonna tell you. No need. Yeah. Go over, like, find a little chipping area, or if there's not one, you can still chip there on the driving range and just take one of each kind of grind and different bounce scenario and just hit a couple. And it's it's you know, people think fitting is this like super sophisticated thing. When it comes to these wedges, man, it's kind of like Goldilocks. You know, this one's too hot, this one's too cold, this one's just right. But, you know, if you can, you know, chip a bunch of different ones and kind of narrow it down to like, I don't know, three or four wedges. And then if you're really lucky, there's a bunker there somewhere, take them over the bunker, see like narrow it down to two, and now it's like, okay, well, in reality, you if you play a lot of different golf courses, you might want to have a couple different wedges, uh, at least like a 58-degree wedge for the bunker that you're gonna find at that course. And you know, when I go over, when I go over and play golf in the UK, I'm taking a lot different setup than what I'm taking when I play here in the States, because the golf courses are completely different. What I want the golf ball to do is completely different. So you've got to kind of kind of think about these things. And I think so many people, you know, especially when it comes to their wedges, and the higher the handicaps, the more I see this, they're like, oh, well, this is the wedge I have, and all my wedges are the exact same. And the only person I've ever seen that is incredibly gifted when it comes to wedge play, and all wedges are exact carbon copies of one another, is Rocco. And he literally has the guys at Artisan grind them all the exact same grind. The only distinguishing difference between his three wedges, or I think, yeah, three wedges in his bag, are the law. The grinds are all the examples, but man, if you think your hands are as good as Rocket Omediates, I got an uh something to tell you because like that guy has got world-class hands.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:10

Yeah. And I I know we need to wrap this up, but but pulling all that info together, and you you jumped ahead on one of my topics for a later date is this wedge fitting, and and that there are different tools that you need for different uh environments. Um but the that high talking about the bunker and talking about that high shot to to finish it all up is that you would put a put something in front of the ball that that you really are, you're now really getting some verticalness because we have got to get that the angles out. We cannot have the angles.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:47

I teach juniors I want them to get launched the ball with their body, not the club. That's a great thing. So it's almost like kind of trying to pull it up out of the ground with your body. Uh I've explained it to the juniors a lot that way, and they kind of get that. But yeah, man, I mean it's once again, you know, back in the day, um, I think I don't think people do this nearly as much, but we used to just like go over the chipping area and just try to hit stupid shots and do dumb things. And like sometimes, you know, you might learn something from it, you might not, but you know, it's it's funny. I just I think that's how people learn. And people are are so afraid these days of going out and trying something that might make them look a little goofy or stupid or whatever. But I was watching this or I was reading this incredible article uh with a musician I really like uh by the name of Trent Reznor. And you know, Trent's kind of kind of it's changed a lot over the years. You know, I I started as a big nine-inch nails fan, and now they're making all these soundtracks, doing all this like crazy stuff like that. But him and his partner, you know, they meet every day, right, at the same time at his studio, and they have coffee, and like there's not really a plan. Like they just start doing things. And like Trent says in the interview, like sometimes it comes out and sometimes it doesn't. But they're they're just kind of going through this process of trying new things and evolving and learning. And I think that that's very artistic and a great way for somebody who is very artistic to learn is throw the rules out the window. Like, hey, here's kind of the outline of the process of what we're trying to do. And if we make gold, we make gold. And if we don't, that's okay too, as long as we learn a little bit from it. And I think more people kind of could apply that to especially like the short game, the chipping and the pitching kind of aspect of golf, because, like I said earlier, that's really the artistic part of golf, in my opinion. Like, there's some pretty hard and fast rules when it comes to how we hit our driver, how we hit our approach shot, how we putt. But when it comes to like, well, we're gonna have so many different scenarios when it comes to short game, it's unreal. You know, grasses, bunkers, this, that, whatever. So you've really got to kind of have a good feel for that. And I think that's where you kind of almost want to apply like an artistic process to it.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:02

Yeah. Where and not being afraid to get away from the golf ball, you will you will not miss it. You will not miss the ball. You're not gonna hit it thin by standing, you're gonna hit it thin by being too down on it and hitting it with your body on the way down, not on the way up. So 100%. I think we've just my friend, my great friend Blake Chaffee in Austin, Texas is going to love this episode. He's gonna be fired up. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:31

Texas guys know how to chip because man, they're chipping off hard pan. Hard pan, hard pan, right? So, like those guys know how to get it done because obviously, you know, you don't chuck into Texas, you blade the living daylights out of it. So, um, yeah, those guys they they know how to move low point forward for sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:49

This was great. Um, I don't know if you don't have anything else. Uh hopefully did a good job of, and if we did not, let us know.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:58

Uh, I think we're everybody send Chuck a note and let him know he's doing a great job. Because I keep trying to tell Chuck he's doing a great job and he doesn't listen to me. So everybody that's listening to this, send Chuck a message. Just go, good job, buddy, keep it up because he needs he needs some confirmation in his life.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:13

Just that we got the info from you, and I I think you did an awesome job of explaining uh to where in other podcasts you'll hear these terms and they'll talk, but it's like uh tell me how the the juice is made. Like, give me yeah, I think I thought that was fantastic. The way that you just talked us through high, low vanilla is great.

Dynamic Lie, Up Forces, And Strike

SPEAKER_01 1:10:35

Well, I'm just stealing from the greats. So I have to I have to make sure that you know I'm stealing from Mr. Joe Mayo, I'm stealing from Parker, I'm stealing from James Riddyard, uh Rocco, Mr. Pernice. Um, like I've just been very fortunate and been around some pretty smart people that know how to get this stuff done. And I'm always very curious, so I'm always kind of paying attention and asking questions, which uh I think is a good life lesson for most of us is just stay curious and keep asking questions. So um, yeah, man, I think this was a good episode and definitely a good place to kind of wrap this one up. Um, but yeah, we're gonna continue on. Season seven is in full swing now. Uh once again, thank you to everybody who sent in questions, uh, recommendations, comments. As I said, please be sure to reach out to Chuck and make sure you tell him he's doing a great job because I'm having a hard time convincing him of that. But uh yeah, great episode. If you're unfamiliar or if you're new to the podcast, you can find it anywhere you download your favorite podcast uh by searching the Measured Golf Podcast. And then if you are interested in seeing either one of us, we also post this to our YouTube page, and you can find that by going to YouTube.com and searching Measured Golf. That'll pull up the page that has the podcast, it has the other content that we just started releasing as well, getting back into me in the lab and talking about the golf swing. Uh, we actually put up the first video uh in a while uh this week where we talk about how we load the trail hip and the golf swing. And a lot of people have been pretty into that, and I think that's kind of answered some questions for them. But we're really gonna have the YouTube rocking and rolling. So if you're not already following us or subscribe to us on YouTube, please be sure to do that. That way you don't miss a new podcast, don't miss a new content piece. Uh you can also find me on Instagram by searching the Forceplate Guy or Measured Golf, and you can find Chuck. I don't think he's changed it yet, but what's your uh what's your Instagram handle again?

SPEAKER_00 1:12:33

At Hudlove423 at Hudlove423.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:36

And tell him he's doing a good job because he's very sensitive about this, but I think he's doing a wonderful job. And I'm not surprised our YouTube had uh for the podcast did a lot better than usual. And I I think we owe it all to that hairdo that Chuck has. I think that really brought in the viewership this past time. So thanks again. I really appreciate everybody tuning in. Uh, make sure that you're you're subscribing and following along so you don't miss a new one. And as always, keep grinding.