Nick Piastowski
Brian Mogg wants to tell you about his college golf buddy. Apparently, he was better than most; he played golf in college.
But about the left thumb of the right.
Looking at it from Mogg’s perspective, it landed in a position around 5 o’clock – and it led to some unfortunate consequences.
“Eventually he had to have full wrist surgery,” Mogg said, “because the pressure point was so bad because the thumb was turned back on his left hand.”
of GOLF Magazine’s Top 100 Teachers was speaking in a video recently posted on his Instagram page – which you can watch in full here – and the topic was syllables. Ideally, Mogg said in the video, he would like to see the bone of the left wrist at the top of the glove, but he said players then often struggle with where to place the thumb. Does he stay at that 5 o’clock spot, like how his teammate once positioned him in college? Or is it at 6? Or 7? It’s a subtle movement in the grand scheme of the golf swing, but done poorly, Mogg said, it can lead to poor ball striking.
In the video, he had a tip to help.
Take your left hand and rest a pinch under your left index finger and against your left thumb, where these two fingers make a ‘V’ in your glove.
“Okay, so you take a pinch,” Mogg said in the video, “you put it in there, and now you make a few swings and hold that pressure point there so that the connection between your thumb and this index finger — that muscle there, it’s really important to my club face.
“If there’s a gap there, you’re going to break through the impact. You put that jersey in there, the next thing you know, you’re going to be able to maintain some safety really through the high-speed hitter.”
Readers of this space know I’m curious to see where my game is when I read a piece of advice, and this tip made me feel no different. I gave him a step. My grip seemed fine. Tee did not fall. (However, I will continue to work on a “handful” of other items that need work.)
Let’s continue the conversation with Mogg. my colleague, GOLF.com Instructional Editor Nick Dimengo wrote in June 2023 about how he had his first lesson with the instructor, and you can find that story by clicking hereor by moving immediately below.
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Whether you’re a new player or have been playing for decades, we all have our own golfing habits. Of course, this does not always mean that they are of the good variety.
Unfortunately, I recently discovered this during my first golf lesson, where top 100 GOLF teacher Brian Mogg broke down every aspect of my game, giving me the cold, hard truth. become a better player.
Now, look, it wasn’t easy to tell me that I’ve been playing golf wrong for the last 26 years. It messed with my mind and made me overthink everything I did, knowing that Mogg was watching me like a hawk as I tried to follow the instructions during my first lesson.
But the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem, right? Well, here’s how addressing my bad golf habits during that lesson has helped me take strokes out of my game.
Understanding my bad golf habits
In a previous article, I referred to it how strange my swing sequence it had always been. For years I blamed it on having two bad shoulders from a motorcycle accident in high school (seriously!). But after working with Mogg, he gave me quite the blunt.
He basically told me it was an excuse and the real reason I wasn’t rolling all the way through was sheer laziness – not necessarily a word I’ve ever associated with myself but, hey, it was the truth!
I was making life harder for myself by trying to use my arms more than using my core and hips to my advantage. This caused me to fall off the plane and open my club face – which is why I experienced so many slices, especially with my driver and fairway woods.
I was also gripping the club incorrectly for my swing, initially using more of a weak grip. Mogg rectified this, replacing it with a firmer grip, which helped ensure more of a draw than a fear of a piece.
The video above shows the slight improvement, as you can hear Mogg say towards the end, “Draw. Okay, but where did the ball start?”
While the first attempt wasn’t great, the next swing yielded outstanding results.
As the video below shows, I hit a clean 3-wood right down the center of the driving range, with it reaching about 270 yards after the spin. With immediate results, I knew it was time to stick to the advice Mogg gave me.
Once I figured out what I was doing wrong, it was time to get to work and implement some changes, which wasn’t easy at first.
How addressing these golf habits improved my game
After learning with Mogg, he met me recently for a quick nine holes. No, he never broke character as a golf instructor, which was both intimidating and helpful in cleaning up some of my bad golf habits.
In addition to the swing corrections during my first lesson, he told me about a few other issues that were adding unnecessary strokes to my score sheet.
Setting up the configuration
Are you left or right eye dominant? If you don’t know, it’s worth finding out – because it can really wreak havoc when deciding.
In my case, Mogg discovered that I was left-eyed dominant, meaning I had to position myself with that eye on the back of the ball. I was never doing that, which negatively affected my stroke.
General deployment configuration
As the image below shows, Mogg snapped a photo and sent direct instructions on how to improve my overall deployment setup.
Initially, I bent too much, which caused me to try to push the ball instead of hitting the ball. The face of my putter was not swinging on a pendulum and I was so tense that I actually restricted the path of the putter through the impact.
Instagram/messages
Using the tips above, I have much better control of my shooter. The tension in my hands is gone, and I’m swinging much more smoothly – which is true helping me with my distance control.
Tee box alignment
Whether you already knew this or not, one thing Mogg told me was to lift the ball on the same side the flagstick is on. As basic as this sounds, Mogg assured me that it will help put me in a better position on my approach shots. It allows some forgiveness when you hit a bad shot and further rewards your good shots.
Finding my pre-shot trigger
Get rid of those wavering thoughts and swing at your golf ball with confidence. Unfortunately, many amateur players do the opposite, and instead let their minds run wild. I was guilty of this, thinking too much about my setup, my alignment, my angle of attack and even how I would react if I got it wrong.
Dear Nick, stop with the negativity!
This is where a pre-shot trigger is so important. Mogg told me it can be subtle – his is tightening the strap on his glove as he approaches the shot, which closes and forces him into his shot.
I’ve started doing something similar to relax more before each shot, as I take a deep breath, look down the middle of the fairway, swing the club in front of me to loosen my wrist, and confidently step up and hit the ball. No practice, no overthinking, just doing!
The creativity of the short game
Raise your hand if you always use some type of wedge when around the green. Makes sense, right? A club with a higher height provides some protection against bad shots, allowing a mistake to produce a good score.
But Mogg reminded me that not all shots are created equal.
What does lying look like? Is the ball buried? Is it above or below your feet? Do you need a little run to get your chip in the hole, or is a flop shot required? These were all the things Mogg asked of me during each hole, telling me to stop thinking about the next shot and be in the moment with this one.
On one occasion, he told me to use a 5-iron when I was about 6 feet from the green, trying more of a chip shot technique. I choked, opened the clubhead, dropped the ball exactly where he told me (about 18 inches to the front of the green) and watched the ball roll to within about four inches of the cup.
Look, I have a long way to go to see the consistent results I expect from myself. But as I work to break 80 for the first time by the end of this summer, I’m closer today than I was a week ago, having shaved about two strokes off my game. It asked me to be honest with myself and trust the process – because it won’t happen overnight.
Of course, my first lesson was an absolute crash course in golf instruction. But it did make me break some of the bad golf habits that were taking a toll on my scorecard.
