Fall is golf’s most casual month. Do you know someone who goes to the range before playing this time of year? Of course not. If you haven’t received it yet, you might as well wait for spring. In autumn, we have fewer sticks in the bag (ideally ones that work), no headgear (pointless, really, in all seasons, unless your woods are made of wood), fewer swinging thoughts, a faster pace in the shorter afternoons – plus leaf rule. Leaf rule should be a year-round thing.
Most golf is casual golf. Golf would be better if we had a wider acceptance of (feel free to offer a better phrase) casual golf. Here are some guidelines for the MUG/CG (My Regular Game/Casual Golf) game that most of us already play:
*OB? Drop it where it came out, add a kick.
*Lost ball? Likewise.
*The ball in the lake? Yes, the same thing.
*Play each hole from a green where you can easily reach the fairing green. If your 22-degree hybrid goes 160 yards, don’t play par-3s longer than 160 yards. Indeed, for most of us, anything over 420 yards is a par-5, and four par-5s are plenty. At least one of your par-5s should be reachable in 2 A+ shots, so choose your lame ground according to the circumstances. While we’re at it: create a mobile par-4 for yourself. If your Sunday best is 220 hours, play a hole in 220 hours.
Why should Bryson and Rory have fun?
*MUG/CG Score: You can’t do worse than triple bogey on any hole, regardless of your skill level, so get it when you get to 6 or 7 or 8, as the case may be.
*MUG/CG Handicap: Add your score. Discount par for the course. Subtract 2 from that total. Count only your good days in your regular course. This is your MUG/CG handicap.
Example, the average good day score on your home course, par-71, is 86. So: 86-71=15. Minus another 2. You are a 13. Recalculate on a monthly basis in the season. If you’re playing nine-hole rounds—always a good idea—just double your score.
Pay more attention to the sticks you put in your bag. You can find, if you are a casual golfer trying for it break 100 or 90, this 10 is more than enough. While we’re at it, it’s probably a good idea to carry clubs you can use competently, and leave the decorating clubs at home, or in your luggage, with your covers.
I haven’t kept one 3-wood in years.
I played the other day in a four-club tournament on a very short (and beautiful) nine-hole course that I play regularly. Eight par-4s short and short and a par-3 in the middle, the 5th. (Regular readers of this space will know that I am referring to the St. Martins course Philadelphia Cricket Club.) I played with a man and a woman, unknown to me before the round, both athletes, both lawyers, both companions. I had a driver, a 7-iron, a pitching wedge, and a putter, which, from random polling and my previous experience, seemed to be a popular combination. My friend Glenn, one of the shop and course administrators of St. Martins pro, told me about a lady playing with a driver, hybrid, 5-iron and 9-iron. “Her goal was to crash into the hybrid,” Glenn said. The woman, a 45-shooter, shot something in the low 50s, three-putting a bunch of greens.
I’ll try to make this as brief as possible, and you’re welcome (of course!) to quit right here or jump to the gun. If there was a happy ending, you know the kicker would be on the lede, so use that for guidance if you want.
First hole: The driver, putting the wedge, pulled a 15-foot birdie putt, but the wind blew it for 3.
Second: Driver, putting wedge on the green, misstep with pitching wedge (while wanting me to have my trusty sand wedge), good to make a 5. Now even.
Third: The driver, putting a wedge on the green, two unfit pitches on the edge of the green (while wanting my trusty sand wedge), made 6. Two over.
Fourth: Driver, pitching wedge, two-shot par. Still two over.
Fifth, par-3: Pitching wedge from 110 to 11 inches. Keep it! Now one over.
Sixth: Driver, poor wedge shot, did well with three shots. Two again.
Seventh: Driver, pitching wedge, two-shot par. Still two over. Played the second shot from the neighboring fairway. Mrs. Gilligan, walking up the third street, said, “Bamberger, right?” Her husband is one of my friends. “I’m playing a Titleist 4, too. Does yours have a little monkey on it?” Yes, mine had a little pink monkey on it. Our daughter gave me a sleeve of them. I haven’t lost one yet.
At two o’clock in the 8th game, I knew I had no chance of winning it. There are always some serious sticks that will break the norm. But if I could get into 4 more I thought I would be competitive for the net title.
Eighth: Best drive of the day. Ever since I played in a pro-am with Gary Player last year, I’ve been trying to make every shot. Gary Player (sort of) even seems to get his paws on slices! As Lee Trevino says, “This golf ball, it’s a clock: 12:00, 3:00, 6:00, 7:00.” His strike comes at 7. My hero. Long draw (for me) driver shot. From the inside. Head behind the ball on the kick. I will write it on an index card and put it in my bag.
My second shot was a nice spin wedge. It was on the green for a nanosecond and ended up on an easy, fluffy lie just outside of it. If I had my sand wedge, I most likely would have made bogey from there and maybe even par. Felt pitching wedges thus long and hard in my hands, as it was on the second and third holes. Of course, I choked and opened my face. However, I felt the pull of a missing friend.
A minute later I was in a trap on the edge of the green others side of the green requiring a lift and on 7. Trying to slow things down, I said to my playing partners, “It’s so weird trying to play these shots without your sand wedge.” They nodded sympathetically. I counted them: 10. Now I was eight over.
Nine: Driver, wedge that rolled off the front of the green. Three shots (first from the green) for a par 5 and a nine-hole 44.
I asked Pete, Glenn’s colleague at the shop, if we had a maximum score for this semi-random event, something like a 10-run mercy rule in pie-wee baseball and beer league softball.
“Double,” he said.
“Really?” Was this more of a coincidence than I realized?
“No,” said Pete.
I asked him which four clubs he would bring to a four club event in St. Louis. Martins. His game is similar to mine. He said, “Driver, putter, pitching wedge, sand wedge.”
Some of you may notice that the 7-iron never went over these nine holes. I would have used the sand wedge in three holes. It might have saved maybe half a dozen shots.
It’s hard to go home. Rory McIlroy will tell you that. Bryson DeChambeau too. And even in a nine-hole, four-club event, it’s hard to get home. Golf. Golf!
That night, in bed, waiting for sleep, I replayed the 8th hole in my mind and realized I missed one. I had actually done an 11 there. No double par. No triple maximum. This was no casual golf. I’d be fine with using MUG/CG handicaps for the net – I think such a system would reflect golfing ability at every turn as well as the real system – but counting is counting and counting is the essence of the golf experience. This four-club event in St. Martins was the truth.
In conclusion:
There is real golf and there is casual golf, and they are not the same thing at all.
And that’s it. . .
OK!
Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@Golf.com.
;)
