The Golf Intervention

EP 42: Turning Masters Motivation into Better Golf in 2025! "How Bad Do You Want It?"

Eric Layton Episode 42

Send us a text

In this episode of The Golf Intervention, we ride the wave of Masters-induced motivation and ask the big question: How bad do you really want it?

The Masters always sparks that itch to get better, but what separates the golfers who actually improve from those who just ride the high for a few days? We dig into the keys to making real progress this year—turning that spark of motivation into long-term discipline, learning how to allocate your time, energy, and money in smart ways, and filtering out the noise from social media that derails so many players.

If you’re serious about getting better this season, this one’s for you.

Topics Covered:

🔥 Can you turn short-term motivation into lasting discipline?
 🧠 The mindset shift needed to stop chasing and start improving
 📊 How to invest your time, energy, and money to actually get results
 🚫 Ignoring the endless stream of bad advice on social media
 ⛳ What it really takes to build a better game this year


For bonus content and to support the show, click the link below: 

https://thegolfintervention.substack.com/

Tyler:

Today's episode is brought to you by the premium content subscribers on the golf intervention substack. And we would of course like to thank all of our listeners for tuning in, you make it all worth while. If you would like to support the show or sign up for our free newsletter, you can do that at thegolfintervention.substack.com or follow the link in the show notes.

Eric:

You know, Rob fails today. The masters started, I taught all day'cause people are excited about golf. It's that time of year. The grass is green in Central Virginia. We're back on recording the Golf Intervention podcast after a slight hiatus of busy life. But we're back and we're full throttle ahead because it is now golf season in Central Virginia and we are excited about your golf improvement. So today on the Golf Intervention Podcast, we're gonna cover a few topics. A little catch up with Rob and I see what we're up to. I know a lot of you are curious about how Rob's Fantasy Dynasty League draft one a couple weeks ago. So we'll get an update on that later for sure. That we will definitely get a little update on that later

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

and, but what we're gonna cover today is this question that I want you to ask yourself. So this is gonna be an interactive episode. I am going to, Rob and I are gonna challenge you today to just. Look introspectively a little bit and think about this question. How bad do you want it? How bad do you want it? And by it I mean golf super stardom for yourself, whatever that means. Goal, accomplishment, satisfaction, plan better. How bad do you want it? And what are you willing to do or not do to get yourself to play better Golf today on the Golf Intervention Podcast. Welcome in co-host Rob Fields.

Rob Failes:

Welcome.

Eric:

life been in Charlottesville, Virginia these days? Been busy.

Rob Failes:

it is been busy. It's, we've, we've had some spells of, uh, summer and some spells of winter in the last couple weeks, so it's been a little bit, uh, a little bit of a shock to the system here and there. But, uh, but no, we're having a good time. And like you said, golfers are fired up.

Eric:

Central Virginia Springs can be a little bit of like experiencing a bunch of seasons all in one day. It, it can be up and down and, but it's been, it was a very cold winter here, but about a month ago. It's sort of like the sun came out. But yeah, it's a little bit cold this week. The grass is green a little earlier this year than, than normal. That Bermuda grass coming outta dormancy and people are excited and, and I've been exceptionally busy with lessons, which is great. And one thing that I've been communicating, yeah, well, yeah, true. But, um, what's been getting me excited, because I feel like, you know, I've been doing this a long, a long time. I'm a lot older than you and I've been at this a long time, but every hour or half hour is a new, it's like a new experience that you're in, right? You're on this journey with a lot of people. I mean, I literally teach hundreds of people golf every year. Hundreds. So. Every time they come in the, uh, in the room, it's a new experience. And you know, we've talked about on the pat on the show and the before, I love teaching in the off season because I think of the off season people are very focused on what do I need to do? Not just to, because I've been playing bad the last couple weeks. I came to see you for a lesson, but what do I need to do to improve for next season? So they're not really worried about their scores in the winter that much. They're not playing that much and they just want to improve. And we have great f facilit. You have great facilities. I have great facilities for winter instruction.

Rob Failes:

Yeah. We're both

Eric:

And so very fortunate we've added TrackMan Range at the Country Club of Virginia too. So you wanna talk about being spoiled? I mean, TrackMan Range is so cool. Um, but we're just getting going. I'm excited to see what we can do with our students, um, with TrackMan Range, but. The fun thing is in the winter we're really focused on long-term develop. It feels like we're more focused on long-term development, whereas in the season, it's kinda like, Hey, uh, I played a couple times last week and I couldn't hit my driver. Right? So those lessons end up being a little more short-term fix me type lessons, which are fine too. Well, I like it all, but it's really fun to sit down with somebody and talk about the process. The process. Like how do I improve at this game? What are we currently working on? Are we working on your swing? Are we working on your skills? Are we working on scoring better? You know, what are we working on? And. It's been really good. I mean, I've, I've had some students tell me things recently, like record breaking scores, which is so cool to hear.'cause measuring success in golf is pretty easy. I shot a better score. It gets pretty straightforward. Right? I always wondered when my kids played soccer, like how do they know who the good players are when no one ever score? It's like one, nothing like, huh. Yeah. How do you know who's good? Right. But who's the best offensive lineman? It's hard to tell, but in golf it's like, it's you in the golf course and you shoot scores and we track it and we have metrics and all this stuff. But I had one that I was sharing with you a little bit, um, who's, this guy's played golf his whole life. He's in his seventies and truth be told, for probably 10 years, he's been coming to see me for more of those fix me lessons a few times a year. Like, Hey, I can't hit my driver slicing. Okay. I asked him the other day after he, he signed up for six lessons and he said, I want to get better this winter. I wanna train, I wanna get better, I wanna do whatever I need to take equipment, working out, swing, skill, whatever. And after the fifth lesson, he was hitting it so much better. I mean, it was, it was 40 yards longer with his driver, 40 yards longer with his driver. We got him a hybrid that he could hit, approach shots with better all this stuff. And I said to him, what's your record score of all time? And he said, 88. And I said, you're gonna average under 88 this year, average under your record score of your life this year. And he shot 38 on his first nine

Rob Failes:

That's pretty insane.

Eric:

the other day, 38. For someone whose record score of all time was 88. Why we went through the process that you and I have talked about on this show. So many times we got into the, into the heart of the matter and we said, what are we lacking to play better in your skillset? What are we lacking? And is your equipment lacking? Is your access to skill lacking? Does your swing need to change? And a little bit of all that had to happen. Okay. And all of a sudden he's hitting better shots and we've never even talked about scoring and he's scoring better. So, super cool. And I've had several of those stories this winter with folks that have come and done a series of lessons to, to, to improve in the winter. It's just really, really fun to see and I'm fired up about it. And carrying that into Masters week is so exciting. Um, I didn't get to watch much of it today'cause I, I just got home from work and saw a little bit, but,

Rob Failes:

I just saw the leaderboard.

Eric:

so what's been happening on your lesson t out there in Charlottesville, Robbie? We seen anything fun out there? Any, any big concepts that are really clicking with people these days?

Rob Failes:

Yeah, I think, um, as I try to reflect about it, you know, I was actually talking to, uh, mark Grace not too long ago on the phone. Um, and it's just

Eric:

Mark Grace, friend of the pod.

Rob Failes:

Yes. And I was just commenting on how they're starting to look a little bit more similar than different. Um, the variability's a little bit more in the skill and kind of what skill we're working on and how are we working on it. I think is where the variability is. But, um, working through Domino number one, which is acceptance, being on time and on task, I think I. are so many lessons where just knocking over that first domino cleans up so many things down the chain that you almost don't need to even go anywhere else. A lot of times, I had a, I had a really good one earlier this week where one of my clients went on a golf trip to Bakers Bay, and he's a casual golfer. He just hits balls on the range. Honestly. He comes to see me because he wants to hit draws. Uh, he just likes to see the ball of draw. He wants to see it go right to left. He's like, I just have the most fun when I see the ball do that, that's all I want you to tell me to, or all I want you to help me do. And I was like, okay, let's do it. I'm, I'm not in the business of, uh, telling you what goals you should or shouldn't have, right? If, if a draw helps you

Eric:

Mm-hmm.

Rob Failes:

I'll help you hit a draw. And,

Eric:

what it's all about.

Rob Failes:

and he, uh, he went on the golf trip and, you know, I. I don't care who you are. The, the score still matters. Like people still, uh, have an importance of, of score. And so he, um, he definitely experienced a little bit of anxiety on the golf course based off of his feedback. He said that my swing started getting really fast. It got really short. I started hitting these wild fades, and then I started just aiming 50 yards left and just trying to bunt my driver out there. I stopped hitting, then I stopped hitting driver, I started hitting seven irons, and it just, it got to be this very, very aversive experience where he is like, you know, I was seven holes left. I was like, many holes? Like, how, how many more holes do I have to endure this for? Right? And so

Eric:

Ugh.

Rob Failes:

it was a very, very kind of dark and stormy place to be. But I just asked him, I was like, okay, well, what, did you regret more? Did you regret the shots? Did not going the way you want? Or do you regret how you went about it? And he, like, without a, like a moment's delay, he's like, oh, I, I regretted, like how I went about it. Like I just started playing scared. I started, um, trying to control this. I started, and, and we just had a really good conversation about like, hey, like you have two types of regret. have type one, which is you gave it your all, you did it exactly the way you wanted to do it and the outcomes just didn't work out. And then type two is you allowed something that already happened or hasn't happened yet to change the way you were doing it, so you actually didn't do it the way you wanted to do it in the first place. Right? And so he was like,

Eric:

Yeah.

Rob Failes:

it was all type two regret. It's like the entire time I was like, okay, so what can we do to help sidestep this in the future? He's like, well, I was like, I, I just really think if I can just before I go out, just like find that like rhythm or kind find that freedom that we've talked about. First I was like, okay, great, then let's do that. Let's, let's. Get the club swinging back and forth the way that you wanna swing it. And then whenever you're ready, you're just gonna walk that swing into a golf ball. And first few, the skills definitely didn't line up right. Bottom swing was higher, lower for the forward, for the back. Um, but we just kept with it, kept with it, kept with it, and he probably hit to 20 balls, not even on the face, like over. then I asked him like, how did that, like, were you happy with how the general swing felt? He was like, oh my gosh. Like that felt so much better. Like it wasn't hurting. He's like, literally my swing started hurting me halfway through the round because I was like so tight. He's like, um, it feels faster. It feels like I could do it the entire round and not get tired. I'm like, okay, great. It's like, so let's keep that the same. Let's not change that and let's just explore where you could get the bottom of that swing rhythm. I. In space, higher, lower, further forward for the back. So we did some differential training. Turns out the bottom of his golf swing was about half an inch further forward than he thought it was, right? So he is hitting everything off the heel. He either didn't recognize it or just didn't have the confidence to try to change it. So we just gave him an intent. It was like, okay, I want you to swing this thing as freely as you possibly can. Just get the bottom of the golf swing about a half inch closer to you than what you think is correct. So you're gonna try to make an error, quote unquote, in the opposite direction of your tendency. Flush rocket, flush rocket, flush rocket, flush rocket. And he just looked at me, he was like, I fixed the wrong thing. I was like, yep, you fi, you were trying to fix your general, you were trying to solve a skill problem. Well, first off, you weren't willing to accept those outcomes. First off, that was, that was really the, the big issue, number one, and then an unwillingness to accept that could happen caused you to. Tighten up, try to control this thing, and you started changing your general swing opposed to just changing the thing that's causing the ball to do what it's doing. And,

Eric:

Mm-hmm.

Rob Failes:

and so I think he now understands that next time that happens, he's gonna push the right button. He's gonna push a much better button. Right. To try to, he's gonna flip a much better switch in order to try to get that performance going in the right direction. And it's not just to get the performance going in the right direction, but our feedback is like, okay, regardless of the outcome, regardless of what you shoot, can you sign your name to the scorecard? Can you finish the round okay, that was, I, I gave it what I, what I got. Right? I, I sent it, I gave it a chance, I did everything that I wanted to do the way I wanted to do it. It just didn't work out today. Right. And that's gonna be so

Eric:

Mm-hmm.

Rob Failes:

for him. And he'll, even though like he might not shoot the number he wants, but he's gonna have a heck of a lot more fun playing these awesome golf courses than he will just steering it around the park. Right.

Eric:

Yeah. That's coaching. That's coaching, right. So, and it, for, for a long time in golf instruction, I think it was, it was all swing. It was all swing instruction. Like if you, if you went for a lesson, you were getting swing instruction, driver instruction, iron instruction, short game instruction, it was just, that's what it was. I teach the swing. You came to me to learn the swing, right? And what you just went through was an, an encapsulation of coaching, right? Like, it, it was, okay, let's set the table for success. Let's find out what's gonna drive you. Let's find out what's gonna make you better. We all know this from being students in our lives and playing multiple sports. Those coaches that influenced us and those teachers that influenced us. They understood who we were and they understood what was going on with us and what, what they could draw out of us to play our best. And what you did there, this is what, this is what instruction's all about. It's about drawing out of the player and understanding.

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

Of how to play their best. You asked him questions, he looked inside himself, he started to understand what the correlation between, um, his issues were and his enjoyment was. And by doing that, that that organic learning process is what sticks in the end. It is not what we do. Should not be, although it is sometimes with, with people that teach golf,

Rob Failes:

yep.

Eric:

here's the thing you need to do.

Rob Failes:

Mm-hmm.

Eric:

is why.'cause I said, so this is what, you know, and I'm hoping we're evolving in the right. This is why we have this show. We're trying to put this message out. Right. A lot of, a lot of instructors are very much like we are. Right. I'm not saying we have all the answers either, by the way, but it,

Rob Failes:

and

Eric:

it's just, we definitely don't by the way.

Rob Failes:

Yeah, if I can interject is like, I think that is the difference in what we're doing is like you and

Eric:

Right.

Rob Failes:

you and I are acknowledging the fact. we are working with incomplete information. We're

Eric:

Yeah.

Rob Failes:

the fact

Eric:

And it's okay.

Rob Failes:

it's okay. We're acknowledging the fact that there are a lot of options to this. Right.

Eric:

Yeah,

Rob Failes:

Whereas I think a lot of other instructors operating on the fact that I am the gatekeeper of the right answer. Right?

Eric:

correct.

Rob Failes:

is no

Eric:

Yeah.

Rob Failes:

this is, this is the way it is. Right? no, I think that is probably the, the distinction

Eric:

If you wanna see how golf used to be taught, and I'm not, I'm not doing this to pick on anybody or to criticize, um, but there's, there's some historic moments in the golf kind of instruction world, and one of'em was, is this famous moment where. Two golf instructors basically almost threw down with each other. They were arguing so much at a, at a, at a teaching seminar. And people talk about it. They'll show it on the big screen at different things. And one of them's name was Jimmy Ballard, who's a great instructor. This is Rocco Mediates instructor. He worked with, um, heard his strange at the height. Like, this guy's great, right? But he's the epitome of, I've got the answers. Listen to what I have to say. Everything I say is right. And this was in the eighties and nineties, so it was a very different time. Right. But if you, you can go on Instagram and find a Jimmy Ballard Instagram account. I've been following. I'll watch these videos. They're hysterical.'cause it's just what we're telling. It's just what you were saying.

Rob Failes:

Yeah, for

Eric:

like, he'll say, you gotta do this with your right hip because this does this and this does this and you gotta lift your arm and you gotta do this.'cause you have to, you have to. You can't, you can't, you can't. You know. And so I just watch it and I, and I learn, you know, I watch to learn.'cause I bet he does have some good answers. Right. He taught, I. Rocco and Curtis Strange and all these guys. So he, he, he knows things, but at the end of the day, it's, it's not a very, it's a very different way of instructing than what what we just laid out. Right. And I think that what we're talking about is coaching, and I think there's a distinction there, right? You can go find some sensei that has, you know, whatever, these are my answers and my rules or, but at the end of the day, hopefully what we do is work with people with what they have,

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

try to draw out of them, try to gain understanding. And all we try to do is gain understanding every day too. And I think that's what helps us is open-minded, growth-minded people to coach the game in a way that I feel satisfied with at the end of the day. Right. Um, and so I, I'm excited. I, I've seen a lot of, a lot of growth

Rob Failes:

Yeah.

Eric:

outta the people that come to see me. I, I get, I've been getting, and I'm not saying this to brag, but I, I'm saying this because I think with the golf intervention. You and I have discussed this, it almost forced us to come together and lay out in a way we could communicate better to a podcast world what it is we're trying to do. And in so doing, I've gotten better at what I'm trying to do. And I, and there's no question about it. And so, and I'm getting messages, like text messages or emails, like I got two emails today from people I taught that literally said, thank you so much for today. And I mean, I teach thou I've taught tens of thousands of lessons, right? But it's pretty rare an hour later to get a message that says, Hey, I just really think that was great, you know? Um, not that it, and so got two of those today. Pretty fun. And, and I'm, and I really do count this show for helping me not change how I teach, but communicate it better and think about it deeper and, and learn more. And, and so thank you for doing that with me. Uh, Rob fails.'cause I think we're. We're, uh, we're both learning and growing as we

Rob Failes:

and, and I

Eric:

move along in our career.

Rob Failes:

echo the same thing, is like the, the enjoyment in the session for me personally as well as my student, is one thing that I've seen. Be a lot different from when I was more like, I guess, authoritarian in my coaching. It was like, right. Uh, to now. Um, because it's really just share with the student, you know, first what are the options? Right? We have overall strategy, we have our process for predicting and, and having an intention for a shot. We have skill and we have our swing, right? And then swing, I lump kind of like grip posture right into that as well.

Eric:

Yeah.

Rob Failes:

And

Eric:

Yep.

Rob Failes:

I tell them, I was like, Hey, like if we're gonna go out and perform today, tomorrow, like we're probably just gonna stay up in those first two. Like, what is your overall strategy? And then can we develop a process for creating an intention and a prediction? Like, you're never gonna get worse. You're only gonna get better. Right? And it's gonna give you more margin for error. Right? If we're here to learn and, and acquire something that we don't already have, it's probably gonna be more like something skill development or swing related. Right? I don't know currently what the best option for you is, but let's start somewhere, right? And let's let it play out a little bit and let's see where we get. Um, and I think if you can just be honest with your client and just say, Hey, look, this is, this is we're gonna explore together. It's so much more fun because it's almost like this, this experimentation that we're both running, right? At the same time, it's like, okay, we're gonna test this for a little bit. Let's see what happens. Give me your feedback. What did you notice there? Is that something that you think you could do, on the golf course or when it matters? Right? And so it's, think a much more intrinsic way of, of going about it really. It's, it's, um, less anxiety, right? Because I used to

Eric:

Mm-hmm.

Rob Failes:

there saying, oh gosh, I, I better get this right'cause I got one shot. I gotta, I gotta

Eric:

Yep.

Rob Failes:

the one thing that's gonna make this person, but now it's like, no, I can, I'm, I can pretty much do what I want. Like, and it's, and I'm

Eric:

Oh yeah.

Rob Failes:

I'm not gonna be steadfast to say, okay, the, the first answer I'm gonna come up with is the, the thing, right? It's gonna be no. Like, we've got a ton of options here. Like half the time I'm just making a guess. I'm like, all right, I got somebody in front of me. Do I think that with their current rhythm, if I just do differential training, if I think, you know, is that gonna get them what they need? I've been surprised before. I've been like, I don't, I think they really need some grip posture, kind of swing stuff. But we're gonna go differential training here and see what happens. And then just like through the differential training they get way back. I'm like, okay, alright. That was cool. That was surprising. And then sometimes it's the other way around. Sometimes I'll start with saying, okay, let's take what you're currently doing and, and do some skill stuff and see what we get. And it's just like beating our head against the wall. And it's like, all right, cool. That was, uh, I wasn't expecting that to, to not get us anywhere. But that's okay. We'll we will pivot and, and we will go into some grip, posture, swing stuff or you know, we can even do some process stuff. Right. I mean it's, it's,

Eric:

Yeah.

Rob Failes:

there's a lot of options. So, um, yeah, I think just that, that awareness and understanding of like, we don't have the one answer I think is a, a lot more fun way to coach and, and the players, it is a lot more fun for the player'cause they're having the, the choice, right? We're giving them like, okay, now you give me the feedback. Tell me what you perceive there. It's not, it's not us telling right.

Eric:

Yeah. I would say the one, the one thing that cracks me up though, even it happens several times a week to me, is the student that goes. Tell me, tell me what I need to do. Right.

Rob Failes:

I know.

Eric:

Make, you know, before we sort of go through any of the process, they'll be like, oh, I came over the top, or I, I hit that bad. What do I usually it's just bad contact. What do I need to change? What do I need to do? And I'll be like, well, let's, uh, hit a few more and then we will, we will figure it out, you know, we'll kind of, we'll kind of work through it. And so to slow that person down is a little tricky.

Rob Failes:

and that's,

Eric:

I just need you to tell me, well, we're gonna get there. We're gonna, we're gonna get there. And then we get there and it's like, oh, cool. Like, things are, things are going well. So

Rob Failes:

job is to be able to take them from. You know, they, they experience an outcome and they look right back at us. Right. They're, they're trying to, um, they're trying to look at for, for outside

Eric:

I do there?

Rob Failes:

Exactly. And our job is to turn that around and be able to, to give them the tools to be able to say, alright, which skill was outta place? Or was, did you just steer it right or did,

Eric:

Yeah.

Rob Failes:

being able to start to diagnose this thing accurately, I think is, uh, is most of our job really.

Eric:

So as we get into the topic for tonight's episode, which is How bad do you want It? Um, I think it's fun. I kind of, I kind of harken back to an assistant pro that we had that was from Knoxville, Tennessee, big time, big, like quintessential Knoxville, Tennessee, SEC football guy, right? And when we talk about football, he said, I don't, I don't know if he wants it bad enough. I don't know if he wants it. Everything was about wanting it. I think at the SEC it's all about how bad do you want it, right? What are you willing to do? It just means more, but at the end of the day. When you talk about your goal, when you talk about your goal, well, you're an,

Rob Failes:

a Clemson grad. I can't stand the SEC,

Eric:

yeah, I'm a Big 10 guy. Big 10, kind of dominated college football this year, but I digress. Don't get mad to me people, it's just the facts. So, um, as we look at how bad do we want it, what does that really mean? Well, I think it's this, I think it's like, there, there's some parallels and, and this is kind of what got me thinking about it this week, this topic of an episode, is, I think there's a lot of parallels in the development of golf game development of a lot of things. But golf is, golf is tough.

Rob Failes:

know?

Eric:

Golf is hard. We don't know when it's gonna improve. It's a little mystic at times with what we're doing. It can, where there's highs and lows and there's cycles and there's all this stuff, right? We can feel good, we can feel bad. Not everything's like that. Right? I don't think pickleball is like that. You know, you kind of, I. You play and have fun and you know it's over. So, um, but golf is such a tough sport. You learn so much about yourself. And there, I've always thought there's so many parallels between just like general health and wellness and golf. Like when people are trying to say, Hey, I need to get healthier. I need to get in shape, I need to clean up my diet. Like, so here I am, I'm a lot older than Rob is, and now I'm pushing into my late forties and I'm like, you know what? I gotta focus on my health and wellness. Not that I'm like on a super unhealthy, I'm not, I'm not on any medications. I'm not, you know, I might have, I kind of got a little overweight the last few years, but not massively, just a few, few extra pounds, like as we do in our forties. And so I'm like, look, I. I need to figure out, because last year I played very little golf and I didn't feel very good physically. And those two things probably went kind of hand in hand in a way.

Rob Failes:

For

Eric:

And so I decided I'm gonna focus on my health for a while. So I've gotta figure out how I'm gonna make time for that. Right? We have limited resources in our life, right? And the main resources that we struggle with are time, energy, and money are the things that we're sort of allocating out. And everybody, most everybody has to calculate that out in some way, shape, or form. I know me as a 40 something year old with a, you know, I'm a golf pro, so we know what that schedule's like. And I got four kids at home and I've got a little bit of land that I gotta take care of here on this property. And I got two golden retriever dog. I got stuff I gotta deal with here, right? So trying to carve out, um. Time and energy for, to focus on me is a, it's a little bit outside my personality. And then b, it's, it's gonna be a challenge'cause I don't feel like I have a ton of time anyway. Right. So I had to sit down, you know, and basically plan out what am I gonna give up in my life, which I don't do a ton of stuff anyway to make sure I have the time and energy to do and am I willing to do the thing I haven't done in the recent years. And so I've been, I've been, I. Now, I'm not moti. I'm trying not to be motivated by anything. I'm trying to be disciplined. And I think this is kind of one of our points for today is when you're trying to improve at something, motivation comes and goes. It's masters week, which gets me thinking about this too. Everybody gets motivated to want to play golf and play better golf'cause it,'cause the masters is so inspiring and that usually lasts a couple weeks and then it goes away, right? But if you can develop discipline on what it is that you're trying to do, I think it can lend you to improvement. So the first thing we're gonna talk about here is that just allocation of

Rob Failes:

of

Eric:

life. If you are willing to, are you willing to carve out a bigger, uh, time in your life for golf? And how are you gonna do that? Right? So.

Rob Failes:

I,

Eric:

think this is one of the big things. If I'm gonna improve at golf, I've gotta change what I'm doing. I gotta change a habit. Is that true, Rob? Like

Rob Failes:

Yeah.

Eric:

habit change is probably like the biggest thing. And, and growth mindset again, laying the foundation for, yeah, okay. So I gotta, I gotta do something else. Right? So when you have someone coming to you and they say, Hey, you know, I really want to improve at golf. I've been a, I've been a 12 handicap for 32 straight years, and I wanna, I wanna be a, I wanna be a six'cause I'm going to Scotland this summer. And I,

Rob Failes:

Mm-hmm.

Eric:

I, I watch the masters

Rob Failes:

Yeah.

Eric:

then I, I decided I'm gonna go to Scotland and I'm gonna play carti and I wanna be good at golf for that trip and I wanna play better. Um, what do you, as a coach, how do you as a coach approach that conversation?

Rob Failes:

Yeah, I would, I would probably call timeout and just get curious about what that really means to them. So like, okay. Let's talk a little bit about that. Like what would that mean to you? Right. So the biggest thing, kind of where I'm leading here is that if your motivation is based off of getting somewhere like this external, like, okay, I've gotta get to a six. first off, like the quote unquote got to, right? Like, you can see that we're imposing these, uh, say, um, requirements, right? So if we, uh, if we think about Dr. Pryor's, um. A first A shaped versus V-shaped beliefs, right? So A shaped would be at the top, very minimal space, which would be room for error. At the bottom would be widespread long-term consequences, right? And then conversely, V-shaped would be at the top, a lot of margin of error with very temporary specific external consequences. So when I hear, okay, I just, I gotta get to a six. The first question I was like, okay, well I believe you can get there, but what? What if you didn't? Right? What if you didn't?

Eric:

Right.

Rob Failes:

And I think it just starts to open up the conversation about like, why are we doing what we're doing? And I think the more we can start to value the things that we are. from the process of getting there. Say, okay, well the things that you're gonna need to do to get to a six, well, how is that going to change your daily behaviors? What kind of things are you putting in place? What are you doing to, make that possible? If we can get the value from the thing that we're doing while we're doing it, if you don't get there, then it's like you're still coming out ahead, right? Because you actually enjoyed the process. You actually got something from it, and whether or not the outcome was what you wanted is inconsequential, right? It was always worth the, the effort. Whereas if it's like, no, I gotta get to a six because my buddy's a six, or my, my, my other, like, whatever they're gonna think of me is gonna depend on if I'm a six or not. Well, are you sure you wanna make that sacrifice because you're gonna get there? Let's say you get there, then it's like. Okay, this, this is all, this is all for this. Like, what's next kind of thing. So it's like, me, it, it's, the more that you can, you can talk about, okay, what are, what are the, what are the benefits? Where are the long term, what outcomes that, that we want to, to develop regardless of whether we get there or not. I think, I think that's really kind of what we wanna try to, uh, instill.

Eric:

One of our favorite episode, one of my favorite episodes that we did was called Are Your Goals Killing Your Gains? And we talked a lot about this kind of. Discussion. And it was, it was really fascinating to me to realize how de-motivating or ab obstructive of your process, it can be to put a timeline on a goal like that. Like, I wanna be X by X time. It, it's very destructive, right? All of a sudden now your mental state of like, am I keeping up to, to your point that, that like, am I keeping up? There's no, there's no margin for error there, right? And

Rob Failes:

gonna

Eric:

how I'm behind I'm not right, and am I gonna be okay when I get there? And so what we have to delve into a little bit is A, where's the motivation coming from? And B, understanding that motivation is fleeting so that CI can focus on the process, right? So. You, you're basically coaching that person up to say, Hey, I understand what you're saying. Let's talk about the process. And then I would say that my biggest thing I have in that conversation right there at the same moment is I basically say, here's the process, right?

Rob Failes:

Yeah.

Eric:

This is what, this is what the process looks like. And I think that's where golfers are very stuck. That's why our show, I think is resonating with people is,'cause we talk about this process all the time. It's like, if I'm gonna improve, what is it that I need to do? What is that process like? And I think that what, I'm glad we started with a little bit of a discussion about, um, how the off season instruction has gone and what we're seeing recently because. When people come in and they say, Hey, I've got the, I wanna play better. I'm ready to, what I'm actually saying is, let's take the timelines off of all that. Right. Let's, let's, let's, yeah. We're, we're taking the timelines off. We're taking, we're gonna build acceptance and, and that we're gonna focus on what it is that we're focusing on.

Rob Failes:

Yeah,

Eric:

And one of the things that I've found in that process, which is really, really fun to communicate to people in their feedback is this, and we talked about this a lot in the last few episodes, which is people always wanna work on their swings. Okay.'cause they don't understand skill. Okay. And so, right, so you have golf shots, everybody understands that part. I'm swinging and then there's a shot, right? And basically what Robbie has said, and I just think it's a brilliant way to describe, it's like there's an in-between part to this. There's skill in between there and that skill, what we've defined on here in most of your full, especially in the full swing part, is. Essentially the skill is like, okay, can I make good contact with the ball? Right? Proper good contact for what my goals are. Consi, you know, in some consistent way, which is gonna have variability, but in line with our goals. Two, can I control the face and path relationship with emphasis on face to control the ball flight, you know, the way I need to. And then three is what, what's the speed or energy like of the swing that I'm, that I'm producing? So, um, and then those things produce shots, and then you put the shots into the context of scoring, right? And you've got this process that you're seeing, right? So like, somebody came in today and they were just, they were swinging, swinging, swinging, hooking, hooking. And they're like, what did I, what did swing, what did I do with my swing? What, why was that swing worse than this swing? And, and I said, just let's slow down here for a second. Okay? I said, what if I told you I thought your swing was fine? And he was like, what do you mean? I said, your swing is fine. But I'm hitting it all over the place. Yeah, we're gonna work on your skills. Okay. Okay. Well, what do you mean? So we go through just like we would, well, you know, the impact location's a little bit iffy. The face is very variable, swing to swing. So we gotta kind of think about that for a second. That's the big controller of the issues that you're seeing. But your swing itself is functioning pretty well. Balance and rhythm and speed is awesome. And like we can hit the shots with the swing you have. We just gotta work on your skills. And he was like, oh. It was like really freeing to him, right? So we spent 10 minutes working on that. And so this is the part that's been really fun for me is when they, when they hit a shot and we're working on skill and I got track man running right? I say, don't worry about the shot. Why? Because we're not working on the shot, working on your skill. Right. Your skill here is we're trying to find some, some variability in the face that's acceptable for you, right? It's gonna make you happy, it's gonna make you score better. And so when you hit a shot or you hit a pattern of shots, we're gonna look at that. That's what we're gonna judge ourselves off of right now. We're not gonna judge ourselves off of the shots. What? Yeah. Okay. Or if I'm working on the swing, swing mechanics, right? Conversely,

Rob Failes:

Um,

Eric:

okay, I'm working on this one thing. Whatever it is, it's temp, it's rhythm, it's, it's whatever. Okay. Think of swing mechanics. Just name one, doesn't matter. Okay. Well, we're not looking at the skills right now. Oh, I missed that one. Yeah. Who cares? We're not focused on that, right? We're focused on the swing to, I want you to judge yourself on how you did the swing, how you approached it, how you executed it, right. We're gonna try and, and focus on that. Right. And then it goes back through that process. Swing skills, shots, scoring. So you're just, and, and I think that people all of a sudden are going like, oh, you just taught me how to practice.

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

You just taught me how to focus when I'm prac. You just taught me how to learn

Rob Failes:

Mm-hmm.

Eric:

better golf.'cause we had that. So when they say, when we tell people, Hey, there's a process to getting better. Well, let's work on the process, right? Foundation is growth mindset. We work through these swing processes, like producing skills. It's really cool. And so the communication of that, this is some of the tightening, tightening of the communication I've been talking about, um, with my students, which has been really fun. And so I get them really honed in on that. Now, ask yourself in the context of this podcast topic, ask yourself, listener, am I willing? How bad do I want it? Am I willing to let go of shot for a little bit to work on other things if I have to?

Rob Failes:

Mm-hmm.

Eric:

Am I willing to do that?'cause golfers are really, really hard on themselves when it comes to the shots that they hit. And so I find it's hard when you're working on skill or swing to get'em to let go a little bit there, to get into the, into the development phase.

Rob Failes:

a hundred percent. And like, the biggest thing that I, that I've noticed in terms of why that is, is that oftentimes we place priorities on things that aren't relevant. So number one is other people's perceptions of us. So, again, let's go back through this. All right, so golfer walks in and says, okay, I want to get to a six. It's like, okay, let's, let's talk about that. Like. To get to a six, right? We're gonna probably need to learn to be more focused on the task at hand. We're gonna need to be more present. We're gonna be, need to be more accepting, And we're gonna need to be smarter about how we're allocating our time and work harder to get better, not look better. So if we're like, okay, yeah, sign me up. Like, if I could develop those four values or those four core, um, behaviors, then even if I don't get there, I know I'm gonna be better off for it. I was like, okay, awesome. Let's, let's go for it. Let's do it. Let at no point in that to get from here to there, is it relevant that, oh, Johnny, Johnny really liked that shot. He said that was a good shot. Like, at no point is that relevant, right?

Eric:

Is that relevant to you, Rob?

Rob Failes:

other people, what other people think, right? Of, of what you're doing. Has no consequence on whether you develop those habits or not. Right. So think that is oftentimes the, one of the biggest barriers to this is that prioritize how we're perceived. And, and I know I do. and I think it's evolutionary. Like I think Dr. Pryor was talking about how there was a time in human history to where if, know, when we were tribal, right? If, if you weren't liked by the group, you get tossed out. Right. You're out into the, in the wildness. You, you're dead. If

Eric:

You are the last one to eat or whatever. Yeah. Yeah.

Rob Failes:

So, the pro problem is like, as much as we've evolved now to where like, okay, we're not actually like that. Right. Someone like we could be not liked and it's not gonna necessarily. be a, uh, a life-threatening thing. Our brains haven't evolved at the speed that, like society has evolved, right? So our, we have to literally teach our brains that this thing that we're prioritizing is not relevant, So these come in the form of judgments of like, okay, this was good, this was bad, this was great, this was terrible. I try to get players to like, spend some time not judging the shot at all, just say, okay, the ball was here. Now it is there. That is what happened. The ball hit the heel. not good or bad, it's just ball hit the heel. Face was

Eric:

Data point.

Rob Failes:

right? It's just, it's just a what exactly what just happened because that is developing a sense of awareness that is a. A, a key skill, a key behavior, a key value to get us where we want. At no point, right? Is, is judgment. Is um, is labeling going to help us get where we want? So I think that's, I just wanted to make that point as well, is that, uh, I think that's a huge barrier for us if we can start to strip

Eric:

Well, I also think people use that for motivation. And again, motivation's the wrong thing here,

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

right? So if I'm using, if I'm motivated by, hey. And that's actually, this happens a fair amount, Eric. Um, this guy I play with all of a sudden is playing better than me, or he's hitting it further than me. And just to be honest, like I'm a better athlete than him, or I'm in better shape than him, or I've always beat him at golf and now I'm here. That's the motivation for taking the golf lesson or wanting to work on this one. That'll be so fleeting. It's crazy. Like that'll just come and go. Right? So when we talk about trying to. Try to, if we are motivated at times, like health and wellness, here's another thing. You go to the doctor and you realize, oh my gosh, I'm 20 pounds heavier than I thought I was. Or my blood pressure is up, or I'm, you know, I'm pre-diabetic. Like, these are things that, again, they're like motivators. Like, I've gotta get in shape or I gotta, you know, find wellness or work on my wellness. And again, if you use that as motivation, it's gonna come and go. What you have to develop is, is discipline, right? You've gotta develop a discipline. You've gotta have, like you were saying, I've gotta have acceptance with myself, I've gotta have acceptance of outcomes. And then I've gotta say, okay, um, in health and wellness, I'm not gonna be okay with certain outcomes, right? Like, I, I can't develop type two diabetes. I can't have high cholesterol. Like I am not gonna be obese. I am not okay with those outcomes, right? So I'm gonna be disciplined about how I approach. This new thing. So for me, how I fit this into my life, now we're looking at how do I allocate, how do I plan my life? How bad do I want it? Right? I've had to say, there's no chance in the world I'm ever gonna exercise after work. Zero chance. Zero.

Rob Failes:

Yeah.

Eric:

Because I'm exhausted. I stand on my feet and teach for 11 hours a day. Like there's just no chance I'm gonna come home and work out. I can't do it. Plus I have dad duties, right? So what I've gotta do, and husband duties and, and home duties, like all these things come into play.

Rob Failes:

so

Eric:

what I have to do, I know, is I've gotta allocate time in the morning for that. I've got to, right? And so I've gotta be disciplined to. Plan out my evenings so that I can plan out my mornings right? And I've gotta just kind of work on that. So that's what I've been doing. Been proud of myself, been getting up earlier, not crazy, not crazy earlier, but just a little bit earlier. And I'm, and I'm going through the motions of, you know, some level of exercise every morning, stretching, weight, training, a little bit of cardio here and there, like whatever. So it's gonna take time for me to develop that discipline over. Long periods of time. But what I'm trying to be careful about is not having any motivation. I'm not, I don't have, you know, motivational pictures up of like six pack abs or something. Like, I'm not,

Rob Failes:

yeah,

Eric:

I'm not worried about any of that. Right? So what I'm trying to do is just develop the, the discipline and it's hard. It's very hard. It's hard to fit it into my life. I don't have tons of time. So as we look at golf improvement, we gotta find those parallels like, how do I fit in improvement into my life, right? We're busy, the time is limited, the resources are limited. And one of the big things that I would say is there is definitely addition by subtraction when it comes to some of this stuff. Okay. So one of the things I would, I would say, and I wanted to cover this point, and I'm sorry, I'm gonna cover this point again, is that when you talk about development of your game, then. Trying to quote unquote, change your swing, learn a tip from YouTube, whatever, da da da, da, da, all over and over and over again. Guess what that does? It sets us back in time. Every time, pretty much.

Rob Failes:

correct.

Eric:

Maybe not every time, but a lot of the times, right? So then we're trying something we have no idea of its context. Is it gonna help me? Is it gonna hurt me? All I know is I keep muddling up my process, right? So what we wanna do is say in that process that Robbie and I just doled out, how do I know what I need to work on and what I need to do? What's not that answer you're not gonna find on the latest TikTok? Um, whatever. 32nd tip video, it's likely not lying in there. What you need to do is say, I need to study this and understand, right? I can find some understanding on my own, or I need to find a coach that can help me find my understanding. And so when I say, how bad do you want it? Yeah, coaching can be an investment, right?

Rob Failes:

For sure.

Eric:

I think that you have to, it's an investment in time. It's an investment in, then follow up practice, it's an investment in money. All those resources are limited, right? So time, energy, money, all three of those, if I'm taking lessons. But the point is that person should set you into this process pretty quickly and say, Hey, here's where we are. Here's your next step. Here's the big picture, and let's work on this one thing, and I'm gonna give you some things to do in your time that's limited to work on it. So a lot of what I do with students is I'm just asking them, how much time do we have? Like this is in the beginning, what's your practice? How much time do you have? Do you have moment? Yeah. What are your constraints? Do you have an at home setup? Do you, you know, how's the body, there's a con constraint as well. How bad do I want it? Right? Am I willing. To do something I've never done. Am I gonna allocate time and resources in a way that are gonna help me improve? And I think that that is a step that it's just, it's just right there. It's right there. And we all know we need to do it when it comes to wellness, and we know we need to do it when it comes to a lot of things. But it's like taking that step, getting outside of our comfort zone and saying, you know what? Like I don't have a swing coach, but I'm gonna go, what? I'm gonna try to find one. Right. Um, and I think that that's a huge deal because just telling you to practice more, you can use some of the tips that we give you and have

Rob Failes:

Time

Eric:

fruitful practice. There's no question,

Rob Failes:

yeah, time is not a good predictor of quality of practice

Eric:

right. Or improvement in any way, shape, or form it. It could actually set you back the other direction. But the point is, I. If you're gonna find time, you gotta have, you gotta have someone helping, in my opinion. I mean, if, if John Rahm is on the range right now at Augusta with his coach, Dave Phillips, then you know, you and I probably need a coach too. And so at least to help us in those moments, right? Those relationships are important too, to, um, to build and, and, and guide us on our way. So I'm a believer I don't have to sell anybody on golf lessons, like, you know, you know what I mean? Like, I'm not, I don't do that. But I will say that, you know, what I do say is in relationships are important, right? And those, and if I could help someone understand the process and be their guide on the way, that's all I ever want. It's really fun for me to be on the ride with them, so to speak. So, um. That mo that part of it is, is I think the trickiest part, like what we just described, is like, find the resources, allocate them, plan your life. How bad do you want it? Right. And what you don't wanna do. You, you gotta sit down and prioritize a little bit. And I had to do this right. I'm not gonna sacrifice my time with my children or my wife. That's not happening. Right. I can't necessarily work less. I could maybe be a little smarter about the hours and try to figure out how that all works. Get, maybe if I needed time in the morning to exercise, I could go in later a couple days and just stay later, you know, that kind of thing. But I had to sit down and plan all this out. Right. I just had to do it and put it in a schedule and say this is what I'm doing. Right.

Rob Failes:

So

Eric:

when it comes to golf and you're coaching with people, Robbie, do you feel like, do you spend a lot of time in this moment, like trying to help people construct. Sort of the process of their improvement.

Rob Failes:

for sure. Yeah. We start with, um, start with kind of the, the end goal in mind. And, and by that I mean like from a, from a, how you're doing this standpoint, right? lot of times it's like, Hey, like golf is not fun for me right now. I want it to be more fun. Can you help me make it fun? So I want to come out and do it kind of thing. It's like. I don't really care what your stats are, if we're always off time, if we are always off task. So I, again, I, I always tend to start with that because I mean, I'm, I'm a huge believer that we play our best when we're having fun, So I get people to, to understand that piece first. And then once you're able to check that box pretty consistently, and, um, Dr. Pryor said again, there's, he, he hasn't had someone in a, in a good while submit a, uh, a scorecard that's been a hundred percent on time and on task, right? I think 80 percent's great. if you can get up to, you know, 80 ish percent of your round on time and on task, you're gonna be having a good time and you're also gonna be aware of what's happening, So if you're aware of what's happening, then we can say, okay, well, what could we do? What would be the most efficient allocation of time to get your score moving in the positive direction? And that's where we would start to look at stats of like, okay, you know, what's, what's the missing link here? Is it off the t? Is it approach to green? Is it short game putting for, for the level of golfer that you're at to get to the next level? Where do we need to be? Right? And then to eventually get there, like we've said many times, it's gonna be some combination of scoring, strategy, shot, process, skill, and swing, right? So it's a matter of, typically if you're on the earlier side of that learning curve, you're gonna start with swing stuff first and kind of work your way up. if I'm working with a college player, I typically start at the top, And then swing is the very, very last thing that I would do with them. but it's always gonna be a matter of, of looking at this thing objectively, getting them to, um, assess using facts, um, nonjudgments, right? And then starting to teach them what actual. Training looks like it's not creating an environment that is the easiest for you to perform in. Right? So a lot of people have the perception that, okay, if I perform well in practice, that means that I'm learning, that means I'm getting better. So they will organize their entire environment make the performance as good as possible, which taking away all the spacing, all the variability, having the lowest challenge point humanly possible, So getting them to understand, okay, well we actually wanna stretch our capacity. We want to get ourselves just to that, you know, like 50 50 success failure rate, don't wanna stay at like 80, 90% where it feels great, or it's like going out and, and having ice cream, right? It, it tastes great. It's not the greatest for you kind of thing, right? Um, so there's a lot of that education too. Um. And that's, and that's pretty much, I mean, I do a lot of concept each, like education. It's not a whole lot of like, okay, you're gonna spend five minutes doing this and then five minutes doing that, and you're gonna do this for three days a week, and you're gonna like, I just don't think that, I don't think that's sustainable. Now, if it's, if it's organic to the individual, if I give them these concepts and if then they come to me and be like, okay, this is what I'm gonna do based off of my life, then I'm be like, okay, great. Now let's take that time and then let's start to organize that the way we want. But,

Eric:

Mm-hmm.

Rob Failes:

I, I teach them concepts like when you're gonna come out to the range off of what you're trying to do, where could you spend your time? Well, how could you do this? That's typically how I like to, and whether it be right or wrong, um, that's kind of how I've, I've typically done it.

Eric:

Yeah, I think that the, um, me as a older, you know, you're what, 30 turn 30 this year, right? So you're 30. Um, I'm, I'm an elderly 40, you know, in my late forties. And so, you know, with two, but you have a 2-year-old, I've got two in college. Right.

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

I think when, when I, I, I sort of have lived through this crazy, crazy life period, which you're gonna get to, you know, like where it's like, you feel like you're in the weeds and you're just all over the place. And so I think that it's, it's people will come to me and be like, Hey, I gotta figure this out. I gotta figure out, like, and, and one of the things that I've heard someone say, which I think is really great is. What can I do the least amount that's gonna be the most effective? What can I do the least of? That's gonna be the most effective? And that's why I kind of go back to the process. Like when we're talking about what we're working on. Like if you go straight to swing change all the time, that is not the least amount. Uh, it's not, it's not the least amount. Um, if you are constantly trying, every swing tip you come across, that is not the least amount to be the most effective. It is not, it is actually the least efficient thing you could probably do, and least effective thing you could probably do. So what we're saying is don't do that. You've got limited everything. Figure out a better way. Right. Um. One of the things that I realized a few years ago is that with a lot of things, like I used to think in my mind, like, if I'm gonna do something, like that's, I play the guitar, right? Play the guitar. I love to read, I love to work out, I love golf. Like I got, uh, some things that I do, right? Um, and what I also, also, what I used to think in my mind all the time was, I need an hour. Like, I would, it would be like, I need an hour to figure that out, right? If I'm gonna work out, I need an hour. If I'm gonna practice, I need an hour. I don't know why. It's just, I think our mind is like, we're used to dividing everything up an hour blocks. I take a lesson, it's an hour. If I'm gonna practice guitar, it's an hour. Well, none of that's true, right? If you do a really good, efficient workout, you can be done in 15 minutes with, and do a lot of stuff, right? Go stretch for 15 minutes and tell me it wasn't effective. You're gonna feel better in 15 minutes.

Rob Failes:

yeah,

Eric:

So what I'm saying is you can fit nooks and crannies a little bit, especially if you're kind of like a club member. Like that's helpful, right? If you're a country club member and you're around pickleball and tennis and the fitness center and the restaurants and the kids' activities, like you can find little nooks and crannies. I tell people, I tell the dads like, Hey, when you're, when you're picking your kid up from junior clinic on Wednesdays, just, just try to get there 15 minutes earlier or have little Johnny come over and get'em a, you know, get'em something to play with and you can hit balls for another 10 minutes at the end, right? Or when you're dropping your kids off for swim, team might go practice then, or tell your wife, I'll take him to swim team. Right? Then it's like you're doing a duty and you're. Practicing at the same time, or I'm gonna play pickleball, get there 15 minutes earlier and put practice your aim point. You know, like you can do, you can fit these little nooks and crannies in. Um, and those add up just like it does in exercise. It adds up. Speaking of aim point, Rob fails a little bit of an aside here. The AIM pointers are doing pretty well at the Masters, are they not?

Rob Failes:

doing okay.

Eric:

I have a great story. I mean, it's interesting to me alone and maybe, maybe some of the listeners is, as the listener knows, if you've just tuned it in for the first time, if it happens to be you. A couple things. We've alluded to Dr. Raymond Pryor, we've interviewed him on the show. We did a, we did an episode, we kind of reflecting on that interview. Uh, golf Beneath the Surface is his book. He's brilliant. If you're interested, I'll link it in the show notes. So that's kinda, we're referring to the on time on task. Those, those references, um, are all Dr. Pryor, uh, and he's just awesome. So, um, those insights are great and we've also done a lot on Aim Point. Robbie's a great aim point instructor. I use it now and I'm just. I really floored with how well it works. So I played the other day and I texted Robbie like I, I couldn't believe it. Um, I was doing a playing lesson and I had a putt for par 6, 6, 6, 7 feet. I didn't measure it, but it was like that distance. And I walked up and I'm like, this is a four now. A four is like four is four is a steep, you know, we, I, we don't have a lot of fours. Okay? 4% is, that's, that's a, that's a pretty big slope that you're putting across. So the guy I was playing with also did our clinic

Rob Failes:

yeah.

Eric:

and he uses it too. Loves it, by the way. Loves it. And really what I've noticed is with a lot of these guys that I teach, they kinda like, they learned it in the fall last year, if you remember. And in the winter they haven't played much or used it and they're not even doing it quite right and they're still getting great results, like pretty darn good results. We'll put it to you that way. So we were refining, I kind of refining is as we went and um, I stood out and I go, oh my gosh, that's a four. And then I second guessed it for a second and I'm like, Nope, it's a four. So that thing downhill right to left seven footer was probably eight. I was probably aiming 16 or 18 inches outside the hole. And I was like,'cause the greens were fast. And I was like, oh my gosh, just trust. And I hit that, put it, and it went right in the middle. And he was like, what? Are you serious? Like, we went and looked at it. There's like, there's no way in the world we'd have played that at 16 or 18 inches of break. There's no way. No way ever. And so aim point, you know, getting a bad rap, it slows everything down and all, it absolutely does not slow anything down if you do it the right way. So if you're watching the Masters, um, Justin Rose, he's a big aim point guy. Had a decent score today, Ludwig Oberg. Hmm. Big aim point guy had a great score today. Scotty Scheffler Caddy at least uses it and helps him read the green. So I think that, uh, you're seeing more cows playing great with, he's been a big defender of it recently, which is pretty cool to see. So, um, yeah, those top players, they're, they're aim point. They don't show it, they don't show it on the screen. But,

Rob Failes:

don't always

Eric:

uh, it's pretty cool to see. Have you, have you followed some of the commentary, like the hateful commentary that's been going around about any point recently?

Rob Failes:

My, my head's in sand.

Eric:

Yeah, it should be because it just, it just doesn't matter in my opinion. Like again,

Rob Failes:

social media anymore, honestly. Yeah.

Eric:

Wow. I, yeah, I actually, there was like Wall Street Journal article. Which a lot of people sent me, I got like four emails one day and a couple texts like, did you see this Wall Street? And the Wall Street Journal article actually was really fair about it. Um, it was after that picture of the woman who was standing on like a one foot putt and everybody was losing their mind over it. Like, gimme a break, you know, like whatever. So, um, any point Green Reading Tech, again, if you're new to the show, green Reading Technique, Mark Sweeney, um, was on the show so you could go back. That's one of my favorite episodes. Very entertaining guy. Super sharp. Um, university of Virginia Guy, which I hadn't realized, you know? Did you know that? I just didn't know that. I guess I would've talked to him a little bit about that, but

Rob Failes:

big,

Eric:

son goes to UVA and obviously

Rob Failes:

Yeah.

Eric:

Robbie works at UVA, so the UV of course. So anyhow, how bad do you want anything else you add to. When you see students, and you and I are not this way, we're not SEC football guys, so we don't like grab people and ask'em how bad do they want it? Like, how bad do you want it? Like how bad, how much does this mean to you? We don't really do that. But anything else you see that people are doing and you're just like, man, why do we keep doing that? You're just, if you just did this other thing, it would be, it would be better.

Rob Failes:

no. Yeah. No. I think we covered it.

Eric:

But there's many, there's many, there's many.

Rob Failes:

How much time we got

Eric:

So in this week of the Masters, which I've been on record, I'll tell everybody, everybody will tell you. And, and obviously today is the end of the first round. We're recording. And Oberg played great, but I, that's been my pick since I watched that Cyborg play last year. O Oberg, he's bel, he's built for Augusta, right? Like. He's a machine. I don't think he's human. I don't think he's human. I think he's, he's from some other planet, but such a great player. Gosh, he's a good player and uh, it's fun to watch him play. And he's built for Augusta like just bombs it and hits a draw if he wants to. And Hess that any point, degree, the green's really well. So I think he's gonna be a force to reckon with. So we're gonna take the motivation from seeing the masters, we're gonna turn that into a disciplined approach to playing golf better. We're gonna focus on process. We're not gonna focus on results. We're gonna get a coach if we need it. And we're gonna allocate our time, energy, and re all of our resources towards planning out a way to play better golf to the full enjoyment for 2025. Does that sound pretty good, Rob? Fales? All right, so I think that wraps up the less important part of the show. Now, the most important part of the show, Rob, we talked last time about Dynasty. You had a di so this is fantasy football talk. Just for aside, just indulge us please.

Rob Failes:

Nope. There

Eric:

You had a dynasty league draft start up,

Rob Failes:

folks.

Eric:

super flex startup, uh, which means that the quarterback position's pretty much the most important. You had the number one pick. You were gonna pick the Redskins quarterback. Did you go ahead

Rob Failes:

I did.

Eric:

and take our guy?

Rob Failes:

I got, Jayden

Eric:

You had to take him.

Rob Failes:

had

Eric:

Uh, it's hard not to take em.

Rob Failes:

he's

Eric:

hard not to take them. Where did, where did my guy, um, Ash Genti go on that drive?

Rob Failes:

Yeah. So this was a cool draft because we actually picked, um, kickers as placeholders for our rookie picks, which is gonna be, um, after the draft is when we'll do the, uh, the actual supplemental rookie draft. But Ashton Gente went 2.8 in a startup.

Eric:

Way too late. Way too late.

Rob Failes:

He

Eric:

Just write this down.

Rob Failes:

just, he went just after Jamir Gibbs. he went after Bijan and Gibbs. I would put him, I would've put him RB three right now. Right behind Gibbs and or I mean, I don't know. Gibbs. I

Eric:

SA one still RB Saan Still RB one in this startup for now, in my opinion.

Rob Failes:

a dynasty.

Eric:

Yeah. Yes, in a dynasty, just trust me, I've been doing Dynasty for many years. Saquon is gonna be great for at least three more years. Just trust me. When I did our dynasty Dr. Start up,

Rob Failes:

what's happened

Eric:

I took a couple of players that everybody thought was washed. I took, I took LaShawn, McCoy and like the six round,

Rob Failes:

Okay.

Eric:

I took, uh, Larry Fitzgerald in like the eighth round. Oh, they were old. They're this, that and the other. And they produced for like four straight years and they were awesome. And Saquon has no, no slowing down ahead of him. The Eagles have an absolutely outrageous offense that he's gonna produce in year, over year, over year. He's gonna be at least three years. Great. And he is absolutely the number one, um, fantasy dynasty startup guy in my opinion, for running back.

Rob Failes:

That's

Eric:

Um, but

Rob Failes:

I don't think I, yeah,

Eric:

Jamir Gibbs, are you kidding me? Jamir Gibb. He's fine. He's whatever. He's 200 pounds, like whatever. Gimme a break.

Rob Failes:

Jamir

Eric:

went to Alabama. Those guys always fade.

Rob Failes:

might be the RB one in Dynasty. I mean, when you

Eric:

I don't think so. No, I don't think so.

Rob Failes:

I, I have Bijan Gibbs, uh, Genty, maybe in the same tier, and then next tier down would be Daon. And then,

Eric:

my gosh, you got so much to learn. Grasshop. You got a lot to learn here.

Rob Failes:

but there's a

Eric:

Now if you said, oh yeah, Derrick Henry should go in the 10. Yeah, well that makes sense. Derrick Henry might have one. He might have zero Good years left, right? He had a great year last year. We don't know.

Rob Failes:

No, I

Eric:

Saquon is not anywhere close to the end of his.

Rob Failes:

Yeah.

Eric:

He has nowhere close to the end of this career, and you're going to just, we'll revisit this in three years and we'll see who's done better. Jamir Gibbs or Saquon. We'll see how that, how that play and be John's in a terrible offense. So he, he had good year, but can you trust the Falcons year after year? I'm not sure you can. So we'll see. We'll see how that all plays out.

Rob Failes:

take, I'll take Jamir three year, uh, total points. I'll take Gibbs. You take Barkley. Let's do it. Let's, let's, let's

Eric:

Done, done. DUN Done and thus ends our fantasy Football minute.

Rob Failes:

We're gonna come out with a

Eric:

I hope you have all have enjoyed

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

the Golf Intervention Podcast. There may be a fantasy football spinoff, but I think my wife's gonna shut that idea down. You don't have time for that.

Rob Failes:

Yep.

Eric:

see as fantasy football season approaches. But thank you for tuning in.

Rob Failes:

should make that a, uh, the last 10 minutes of every podcast should be about fantasy football. I, I, I

Eric:

We'll see, we'll see.

Rob Failes:

make that a, make that a tradition.

Eric:

it's, I think it's fun for the listener to be understanding that we are humans that have other interests other than golf, right? So it is pretty cool. Thank you for tuning in to another episode of the Golf Intervention Podcast. You know, it can always send us questions. We have a Gmail or we have a website, or we have a substack, and any one of those you can reach out to us or our Instagram and uh, and send us a question and we'll try to address it on the show. We love question and answer episodes, so maybe, maybe the next one, we'll do one of those. Outside of that, I have nothing left to say. Hope you all are motivated and therefore gonna be disciplined to improve your game in 2025. Have a great night everybody.

People on this episode