Ogilvy Golf Digest Interview, Vol 3: "It’s just different."

Geoff Ogilvy's nuanced take on changes in the game as detailed in his Golf Digest interview with John Huggan:

You’ve criticized what has happened to the modern game. Is it that bad?

It’s just different. There’s a very large percentage of golfers who enjoy the game more with the large clubheads and the balls and all the rest of it. Playing with the old clubs was like driving an old car: They have a bit of charm about them. But it’s still nice to drive a new car with all the bells and whistles.

Is the modern game better or worse as a spectator sport? A lot of people think it’s less interesting to watch than even 10 years ago.

That’s true. But it has more to do with the way golf courses on tour play today rather than the equipment. The equipment is just the catalyst. The trouble is that 99.9 percent of golfers don’t hit the ball like a professional. They don’t want to look for their balls in the rough all day. They play to enjoy the company of friends and watch the ball fly through the air.

Still, I would counter that unregulated changes in the ball have driven the two things Ogilvy hates most: soft conditions (to help hold the harder, less spinnable ball) and high rough/narrow fairways (to try and take driver out of the player's hands).
 

Ogilvy's Golf Digest Interview, Vol. 2

Moving on to the last hole at Winged Foot, I thought this bit from Geoff Ogilvy's Golf Digest Interview with John Huggan was interesting because he downplays the severity of he divot lie in the 18th fairway and emphasizes (as we suspected here last year) that the chip shot on 18 was rather incredible. I also like the sound practical advice about wedge play around the greens from Dale Lynch...

So you posed the finish?

Oh, yes. [Laughs.] I looked at it for a long time. It hit up on the green, and even then I thought it was going to be all right. But then you hear the groans. And it starts trickling back. All week long shots had been taking big bounces up that green. I’m still surprised, given how hard the greens get at the end of a U.S. Open.

When I get to the ball, I realize it’s in a pretty filthy little spot. But then I see that Colin had made 6.

I was thinking if I got up and down for par I wasn’t going to be any worse than second. At that point, all Phil has to do is par the last to win, unless I chip in. But that wasn’t realistic. The reality was that I was 30 yards from the hole, 10 feet below the level of the cup and chipping off a really tight lie. And he’s one shot in front. It still didn’t look great.

I hit a pretty good chip shot, probably the best of my life. It was way better than the one I holed on the previous green.

Did your upbringing in Melbourne help you there? Some people would have putted from where you were.

Two things helped me there.

One, growing up in the Sandbelt, all you have there is tight-lie chips up hills when you miss a green. And that was a very Sandbelt-type shot off a tight lie. So I’m sure there was a level of comfort somewhere at the back of my head, knowing I had done that a thousand times at home.

Two, about three years ago Lynchy [instructor Dale Lynch] decided that my chipping action was poor for that particular type of shot. I did what most people do: I was trying to spin the ball a lot. I was hitting sand wedge and lob wedge from anywhere, taking more and more loft off the club. Before I knew it, I was hitting the shot I should hit, but with the wrong club.

It sounds obvious, but if the shot calls for an 8-iron, you hit an 8-iron; if you need a wedge, you hit a wedge. That helps your technique. For the first 18 months I just couldn’t do it. I was terrible. But I improved. And the reason I worked on it so hard was because of shots like I had at 18. Two and a half years ago I would have hit it a lot lower. So I would have had to really open the face and cut across the ball. Which is risky.

And the club?

I played it with my lob wedge.

You made it look straightforward.

Maybe, but it was a shot I’ve spent maybe five minutes on every day for the last three years. Sixty degrees is a lot of loft. But I played the shot properly with the right height. It came off just like I wanted. Even better, if you can imagine. At that point I was, for want of a better phrase, s----ing myself a bit. There are 10,000 people ’round the green, and it’s the culmination of 72 holes. 

Ogilvy's Golf Digest Interview Vol. 1

Geoff Ogilvy's "Golf Digest Interview" seems shorter than some of the past incarnations of these always enjoyable chats, especially since just as it ended it felt like things were really rolling. Still, there's still plenty of good stuff to consider.

John Huggan asks the questions and as usual, Ogilvy has a fresh take on the still interesting subject of American golf and the dreaded state of our under-30 set:

There is a contrast right now between Europe and the U.S. when it comes to developing young players.

That's true. I know the U.S. press is looking for the next great American under 30.

Is it just cyclical?

It's an expensive sport in the U.S. It's cheaper in Australia, or the U.K. or South Africa. Anyone can play.

I do think that the American college system is really good at producing guys who can get the ball in the hole, but it neglects the technical aspects of golf. They're looking for the wrong things. I'm not saying the American guys aren't talented; all I'm saying is that some talent is getting missed.

If the Americans sorted their system out, we'd have only five on the PGA Tour [a dozen Aussies are among the top 100 of the World Golf Ranking]. We get more out of our talent than they get out of theirs. Their way of doing things can't be better than ours, because we have 20 million people and they have 300 million. It just doesn't add up.

Given the enormous influx of Australians on the PGA Tour, why hasn't a college coach wondered why and gotten himself down to the VIS [Victorian Institute of Sport] to have a look?

What is that, exactly?

If you go way back to the early 1980s, the Australian government realized we weren't winning any gold medals in anything. Or hardly any. For such a proud sporting nation, that was unacceptable. So the Australian Institute of Sport was started, mainly for Olympic sports. We did well in Atlanta [nine gold medals in the 1996 Olympics], and Sydney [16 golds in 2000] was amazing. And we did even better in Athens [17 golds in 2004]. It's crazy how well we do for such a small nation.

How did golf become a part of that?

The Victorian government decided to supplement it with an institute. Golf kind of came along for the ride. The deal was that you got a scholarship for a year. You got access to the top coaches. You got physical training and nutritional advice. Anything that was going to help make you better.

If I had to sum it up, I'd say that they basically took the best boy and girl players in Victoria and gave them access to all the experts in Victoria--for free. It was brilliant, really. And the bonus was funding for travel.

The best part of it was that they never dictated where you went or how you went about things. They would simply make everyone and everything available to you and let you get on with it. You had to make your own way. And you got time to ride out any bad periods of play.

“I think that would be a fantastic eighth hole, but not as the 71st hole of a tournament, or 17th hole of your round.’’

Thanks for all of the memory-jogging nominations for great greens in the game. The chapter got a whole lot easier to write.

Though I noticed no one really got too excited about my 17th at TPC Sawgrass nomination, and now I read in Doug Ferguson's piece that Tiger the architect thinks the 17th is poorly placed in the sequence of the course. Kinda spooky I know, but when you are going with the whole Fazio thing in your design business, the overriding theme is bound to be dull design.

“I’ve always thought that hole is too gimmicky for the 17th hole of a championship,’’ Woods said. “I think that would be a fantastic eighth hole, but not as the 71st hole of a tournament, or 17th hole of your round.’’

Thankfully Geoff Ogilvy was around to lend some more rational and thoughful perspective:

“If that was just a bunker around it and not water, you’d probably find more people would hit it on the grass,’’ Geoff Ogilvy said. “There’s something about water that does it to people. It’s a fun hole. I’m glad it’s here. You wouldn’t design an island hole on every course in the world, but it seems to work here. It’s cool.’’  

And because this is my clipping archive, here's the lowdown on Tiger's Dubai design partner associate, again from Doug Ferguson's notes:

Among those watching Tiger Woods at the Wachovia Championship last week was Beau Welling, who used to be the top designer for Tom Fazio and played a big role in the redesign of Quail Hollow.

But his presence had more to do with the future.

Woods has hired Welling to do the work on Al Ruwaya in Dubai, the first golf course for Tiger Woods Design. The golf course is supposed to be done by September 2009.

Woods said Bryon Bell, whom he hired as president of Tiger Woods Design, found Welling after looking at the philosophies of various design companies.

"Beau fit what we wanted to have happen," Woods said.

Dubai is the only course in which Woods is involved, and he did not say whether he would continue to use Welling for other projects.

Welling now has his own company, and golf course design is not his only interest. He recently was appointed president of the U.S. Curling Association.

Fifh of Four Majors Watch, Vol. 2

It's Monday of fifth major week, which means no one has much to write about. So Jason Sobel and Bob Harig try their best to be like Brittle and Gorse over at GolfDigest.com by doing their alternate shot shtick. Let the fifth major debate begin!

Sobel: Well, I've always disliked the notion of The Players Championship as the "fifth major" and I hated those snarky comments we heard throughout the week about the Wachovia Championship becoming the "sixth major," according to some of the pundits.

Oh I don't think Andrew Magee was being snarky! You did mean Andrew, right?  Lord knows, the word snarky has never been uttered in the same sentence as moi!

That said, it was an enjoyable, memorable weekend of golf from Quail Hollow, culminating in Tiger Woods' 57th career victory.

It's one they'll talk about for weeks. I know I enjoyed thinking about not watching it at while I lounged at the beach.

Of course, it's the same old story: Did Tiger outplay the field in Sunday's final round or did his fellow contenders simply wave the white towel and get out of his way?

Harig: First things first. The idea of a fifth major is ridiculous, no matter how good The Players Championship was, is, or might be. So a sixth is even sillier. A Grand Slam in baseball does not consist of five runs scoring on a home run, and one in golf does not include five (or six) tournaments. And it never will. Too much history would have to be rewritten. And then there is this: When was the last time you saw 19 of the top 20 in the world play the week prior to a major? Probably never.

So cynical Bob!

Meanwhile Doug Ferguson spent Monday trying not to get lost in the new clubhouse, unlike Geoff Ogilvy.

“I’m a little lost,’’ U.S. Open champion Geoff Ogilvy said. “It’s such a big building.’’

And Doug did the fifth major thing, and he comes out firmly that The Players remains the fifth of golf's four majors.

“I think enough fun has been made of their place in the golf kingdom,’’ Sluman said over the weekend. “There are still only four majors, but it is an unbelievable golf course with bar-none the best field in golf.’’

Shouldn’t that be enough?

PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem has said that he only wants The Players Championship to be the best it can be, and he has stopped at nothing to accomplish that. The Tour wants the tournament to be known as “The Players,’’ similar to “The Masters.’’ Television coverage will include only four minutes of commercials every hour, just like the Masters.

The winner of The Players gets as many FedEx Cup points as the winner of a major. In the World Golf Hall of Fame ballots, The Players is listed in bold print alongside the four majors.

“Nobody likes being force-fed,’’ Sluman said. “I think everybody associated with the tournament needs to let it take its course. It will find its spot wherever that ends up in five, 10, 15 or 50 years. But just let it happen.’’

Ogilvy called it the fifth-best tournament in the world, which probably is what The Players Championship is. But what inevitably followed were more examples of what it’s not.

“It’s not a career-defining win,’’ he said.

Can't you get fined for saying things like that? 

"Somewhere it has all gone wrong.”

Paul Forsyth talked to Geoff Ogilvy for a Sunday Times profile.  Thanks to reader John for reminding about this.

“I’m not against the course being lengthened, but the fairways were never meant to be narrow. The point was that you had a paddock to hit into, but you had to make a decision as to what side of the fairway was good. Now you don’t have a choice.” Ogilvy regrets that technology has drastically changed many of the world’s great courses, rendered some of them redundant, and diminished the game’s entertainment value. By responding to Tiger Woods’s every achievement with more rough and more yards, they have made the spectacle more boring.

“You don’t need an array of shots any more, and that’s not good for spectators. Who wants to watch us drive into the rough, chip out to 80 yards, and try to get up and down? There is no excitement in that, no imagination or strategy. One day, somebody will realise that the score relative to par does not reflect the quality of a golf tournament.”

I like this...

By now, Ogilvy is getting everything off his chest, suggesting a think tank of the 100 smartest minds in golf to address the game's problems. “It is in everybody’s interests because it appears, in America anyway, that fewer and fewer people are playing the game. In the old days, you went out in a Saturday threeball, and in under three hours, you would be back in the clubhouse having a beer. Now, it costs you £150 and it takes five hours. At some courses, you’re driving a cart, so you don’t talk to anyone, and you’ve lost eight balls in the rough. Somewhere it has all gone wrong.”

And on the state of world golf... 

There ought to be more, however. Henrik Stenson, the Swede who last month denied Ogilvy a successful defence of his WGC-Accenture Match Play title, is still having to justify his rise to fifth in the world. “It’s incredible,” says the Australian. “Henrik plays well, and they all start questioning the validity of the world ranking system, but he has won four times in the past year. In the Match Play, they were talking as though this guy had never played golf before, and yet he had beaten Tiger in Dubai two weeks earlier. Some people here have a hard time looking past the borders of their own country.”

Ogilvy could do with another big win to cement his reputation. His US Open triumph would not have been possible without the dramatic collapse of Phil Mickelson, Colin Montgomerie and Padraig Harrington. “Another major would make the first one more credible, but I’m not in this to influence what people think of me,” he says. “I just like doing it. Standing on the 18th tee at Winged Foot was the most fun I have ever had in my life. We don’t know how lucky we are.”

Golf's Best Interview

Jaime Diaz in this week's Golf World says Geoff Ogilvy is the best interview in golf:

Ogilvy's figuratively old head, perhaps made wiser by growing up next to Royal Melbourne, startled me the first time I asked him a question. "Golf was better before," he said in October 2005. "There was more art. It doesn't create a really rounded golfer." At a time when the shortcomings of the emerging twentysomethings were still well below the radar, Ogilvy captured the issue in three quick sentences.

"The complicated thing is making it simple, if that makes any sense," he said, offering as good a definition of a first-class mind as any. Indeed, in quotes over the last year including an upcoming interview with John Huggan in Golf Digest, Ogilvy produces one pearl after another.

Of Woods: "I mean, Tiger is the angriest player on tour. He's also the best at controlling it."

Of Sergio Garcia: "When he starts making putts again -- which he is going to do -- he's going to win 10 times in a year. He is the best ball-striker in the world, probably. … But he is so analytical about his putting and not about anything else. … He's like Seve, only in reverse."

On golf architecture: "I like there to be a relationship between the quality of your drive and ease of your second shot."

Huggan On Uihlein: "He has to go."

Remember Wally, I just copy and paste this stuff. In fact, reader David sent this to me, so I didn't find it, didn't write it, didn't think of it. That said, John Huggan has you on his Santa wish list...

2 A NEW LEADER AT TITLEIST: Sadly, the man in charge of the world's biggest golf equipment company is a world-renowned point-misser.

In a position to do the world of golf a favour and agree to withdraw his tacit threat to sue if the game's hard-pressed administrators should make rules that will shorten the vast distances the very best players can propel shots, Wally Uihlein chooses instead to follow a policy that can only damage the sport and, by extension, his own company, in the long term.

Look at some of the nonsense that we already have to put up with: courses covered in long grass and stretched to something like 7,500 yards so as to all but eliminate from contention anyone not physically big enough to hit drives over 300 yards on a consistent basis - goodbye Justin Leonard and Corey Pavin and Andrew Coltart.

All of which is largely down to Uihlein's intransigence.

He has to go.

Way harsh Huggy!

I also liked his plea for more Geoff Ogilvy's and fewer carts in the U.S., but this was especially good:

7 A DROUGHT IN AMERICA: Having not long returned from a visit to Australia, where water is currently in very short supply, Santa would like to see those conditions replicated in the US.

Having sampled fast-running fairways and greens that only enhanced the strategic qualities of the likes of Royal Melbourne, Kingston Heath and the stunning Barnbougle Dunes, some of the same would do nothing but good in the land of 'hit and stick'.

Instead of wedging on to pudding-like greens from basically anywhere, Uncle Sam's nieces and nephews would suddenly be forced to consider where best to place their drives. Angles would have to be created in order that approach shots could be landed short and run up to the flag.

Thinking on the golf course? What a concept, eh?

Different Takes On Star Absences

From Jeff Rude's Golfweek.com column defending Tiger...

The opinionated Arron Oberholser, a TC newcomer, joined some press pundits in impaling America's two big shots for their absence. "I think the biggest players have a responsibility to the Tour to play in these," said perhaps the only young Republican from San Francisco. "Tiger might not want to hear that and Phil might not want to hear that, but they don't write my paycheck, so I don't care. I think it's about having a responsibility to your place in the game."

And from Geoff Ogilvy...

"The Tour is so good because of people like Tiger and Phil, so you can't say that Tiger and Phil are hurting the Tour by not (playing here)," the Australian said. "Where would the Tour be without Tiger and Phil? We'd be playing for $2.5 million a week, we'd have 20 tournaments, not one would be watching it on TV. We'd be back where we were 15 years ago.

Ogilvy, Murdoch and Bush

In the October 16th  New Yorker, Rupert Murdoch tells writer John Cassidy:

"People think I must be close to George Bush. I tell you, I've been to one state dinner, as a result of being put on the list by the Australian Prime Minister. I stood in the reception line and shook the President's hand. And that was my total lifetime experience with George Bush."

Now, you may recall that U.S. Open Champion Geoff Ogilvy also attended the dinner (recounted in this fine Peter Stone story.)

So yes, this means Ogilvy and News Corp. CEO have both met President Bush the same number of times. Of course, Murdoch left out the detail about being seated at the same table that night.