apropergolf

Absolutely masterful job of demonstrating their complete and utter lack of knowledge on a subject for which they should be better versed. First of all, this idea that longer hitters won’t stay longer than shorter hitters is such bullshit. The ball isn’t just going to fall out of the sky. Athleticism will still be rewarded under the way testing is handled unless they completely throw away the testing protocols, which they haven’t. Anyone with a brain cell would agree the longest drivers should go more than 10 yards and less than 600 yards. At that point we’ve determined that there is a reasonable distance that the ball can travel. Now consider that we have golf courses with finite land, the question now becomes within that window above which is the distance that gives all levels of golfers the best experience. The argument by the USGA is less. For professionals, we can start to have them hit more clubs in their bag more often. Not often you see a pro hit a long iron into a par 4 or a genuine par 5 anymore. And guess what, amateurs will benefit too. Hacks can hit it far now too. But you know the issue with that? They hit it 7 fairways left and right now. Rolling back the ball brings more of those balls in play. Less lost balls means better scores even if partially offset by less distance. You can always move up a tee too (hard for the hardo losers to understand this, I know.) Meanwhile, agronomy gets cheaper because we don’t necessarily need to maintain as much land as playable surfaces. We don’t need to keep building new tee boxes. We don’t need more land for each new course. It might even mean building short courses on smaller properties leading to better access. At the end of the day, these guys have a vested interest in everything staying the same. They’ll leave this Earth while the USGA and R&A continue to endure beyond with a mission of truly being stewards of the game. If I had one critique, the governing bodies aren’t being aggressive enough. Roll the ball back 25%+. Make great courses true challenges for the worlds best. Put long irons back in their hands. Make it much easier for courses to maintain their acreage. Make it harder for an am to lose a ball. The golf world would be way better for it.