One of the most profitable proposition golf bets I make on a regular basis while hustling, or gambling, at golf is when I am on the fringe of the green.
The short chip, near the edge of the putting green, became a serial money maker for me when I began to practice the following tip.
It kills me to see even experienced golfers shorten their stroke and “jab” at the ball when they attempt a short chip.
Actually I like it because I know I’m going to win the hole and make my money but it still irritates me for some reason and gambling aside, here’s a good way for you to kill the nerves and stop flipping the clubhead at the ball.
One excellent suggestion is to channel the late, great Bruce Lee. That’s right, we’re going to karate chop this bad boy right next to the cup. Here’s how to practice:
Without your wedge, get in your normal position to hit a chip. Bring your left hand away and rest it loosely on your left thigh. Swing your right arm back as if you’re about to hit a 12-yard chip and come back down your target line with your right palm facing away from your body as it passes over the ball (where your clubhead would strike it).
By “karate chopping” your way through the impact zone, you’ll eliminate that excess wrist movement and feel smoother through impact because you’re no longer “flipping” the club at the ball.
Now practice this drill over and over with a wedge in your hands and both hands on the club. Trust me, you’ll never again feel uncertain or nervous when you are just off the green.
In fact I’m confident that you’ll actually look forward to being 10-15 yards from the pin, knowing that the money’s already in the hole.
Make the most of this opportunity at all times by pressing for extra gambling ventures here and bet, bet, bet that you will get the ball within a certain radius of the pin. Force yourself to make this bet here every time.
Two things will happen. You’ll both make and win the bet or you’ll keep loosening up your opponents and get them into the habit of accepting your proposition bets.
The looser your opponent is and the more out of control you seem, the more money you’ll win from him over the round.
Make sure to sign up for my free newsletter for more hustling tips and to learn how to really press any edges and advantages we can get to make that money.
Thanks for reading. Good luck, good hustling.
Big Freddy Kaboot
“As long as there’s been golf, there’s been gambling. And where there is gambling, there will be hustling.”
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Monday, January 12, 2009
Switch hands on your putter to sink more putts
Is your putting a weak area in your game? Utilze this putting drill to really solidify your putting game, take several strokes per round off your score and stop mishitting the ball.
It’s called “left-hand-low”. Both Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer felt they would have been better on the green if they had learned this way and it’s not too late for you to experiment with it.
If you’re serious about winning, you need to roll the ball in the hole consistently. The pros never leave anything to chance. They understand that the relationship between pace and line is crucial and by experimenting with this putting drill you may just get a better handle on both pace and keeping your ball in line.
If you miss a lot to the left or the right, chances are you’re not thinking much about how you grip the putter or, if you’re like me, you’ve been gripping your putter the same since your dad showed you how all those years ago.
If you grip your putter like most people do, the same or similar to how you grip your woods and irons, than its just far too easy to let the clubface rotate open or closed and push the ball right or left.
Follow this popular technique used by many pros and you’ll notice the difference in control right away.
Take your normal grip with your left hand on top and now reverse it so that your left hand is now on the bottom. It may not seem it at first but this is most ergonomically correct and natural way to grip the putter.
Now do the following to set up and put correctly every time:
1. Get your feet at least shoulders-width apart, knees pointed slightly out. Bend from your hips, relax your arms and make sure your head is just inside the ball. The ball should be about an inch in front of center with your putter in the center of your stance.
2. Your forearms should make a triangle and your wrists should never move. Your grip should be tense but low on the tension scale – don’t choke it to death! Pressure chokes off feel.
3. Locate a spot a couple of feet in front of you on your line – a bleached spot perhaps. Now follow this exact routine every time - look at the spot, the hole, the spot and now…stroke.
4. Understand that the putting stroke is one complete movement. Bring the putter back ¼ and forward through the ball ¾ for a nice, sooth roll with good feel. Obviously, bring the putter back farther on longer shots and try to maintain that 3-1 ratio.
Now you have a great set-up and by utilizing the “left-hand-low” grip, your lead hand will do the work, keeping yourself from “pushing” the putter into the ball or “stabbing” at it which will make the ball skip around.
Try it on the practice green or in the hallway or kitchen at your home until you get as comfortable with this hold as you are with your full-swing grip, then go and putt the lights out.
Get more free tips at thegolfhustler.net
Thanks for reading. Good luck, good hustling.
Big Freddy
It’s called “left-hand-low”. Both Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer felt they would have been better on the green if they had learned this way and it’s not too late for you to experiment with it.
If you’re serious about winning, you need to roll the ball in the hole consistently. The pros never leave anything to chance. They understand that the relationship between pace and line is crucial and by experimenting with this putting drill you may just get a better handle on both pace and keeping your ball in line.
If you miss a lot to the left or the right, chances are you’re not thinking much about how you grip the putter or, if you’re like me, you’ve been gripping your putter the same since your dad showed you how all those years ago.
If you grip your putter like most people do, the same or similar to how you grip your woods and irons, than its just far too easy to let the clubface rotate open or closed and push the ball right or left.
Follow this popular technique used by many pros and you’ll notice the difference in control right away.
Take your normal grip with your left hand on top and now reverse it so that your left hand is now on the bottom. It may not seem it at first but this is most ergonomically correct and natural way to grip the putter.
Now do the following to set up and put correctly every time:
1. Get your feet at least shoulders-width apart, knees pointed slightly out. Bend from your hips, relax your arms and make sure your head is just inside the ball. The ball should be about an inch in front of center with your putter in the center of your stance.
2. Your forearms should make a triangle and your wrists should never move. Your grip should be tense but low on the tension scale – don’t choke it to death! Pressure chokes off feel.
3. Locate a spot a couple of feet in front of you on your line – a bleached spot perhaps. Now follow this exact routine every time - look at the spot, the hole, the spot and now…stroke.
4. Understand that the putting stroke is one complete movement. Bring the putter back ¼ and forward through the ball ¾ for a nice, sooth roll with good feel. Obviously, bring the putter back farther on longer shots and try to maintain that 3-1 ratio.
Now you have a great set-up and by utilizing the “left-hand-low” grip, your lead hand will do the work, keeping yourself from “pushing” the putter into the ball or “stabbing” at it which will make the ball skip around.
Try it on the practice green or in the hallway or kitchen at your home until you get as comfortable with this hold as you are with your full-swing grip, then go and putt the lights out.
Get more free tips at thegolfhustler.net
Thanks for reading. Good luck, good hustling.
Big Freddy
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Putt better this spring by practicing in your hallway this winter.
Having a hard time keeping your puts on line? Do your puts miss right or left on a consistent basis?
Here’s a great practice tip I picked up a long time ago that really works.
The problem is that on impact your putter’s face is either open (ball will go to the right) or closed (and the ball will go left). Why do we have such a hard time sometimes in getting our putter face square on the ball? Practice and practice correctly.
Go to the hardware store or your workshop and get a 1” dowel rod and cut it to about 4” in length.
Set the rod up so it’s pointing at an imaginary target or pick a spot out on the floor. This drill works great on hallway floors or on your kitchen linoleum.
Now make your stroke and imagine you have about a 5-6 foot putt for birdie. A very slight mishit will cause the rod to spin off to the left or to the right.
Practice this drill over and over until you can make the dowel rod go straight dozens of time in a row and you’ll know that you’ve got it down and that your putter face is square at impact.
The next time you line up a money put, you’ll have no fear of hitting it off line and you’ll earn that dough!
Thanks for reading. Good luck, good hustling.
Big Freddy
“As long as there’s been golf, there’s been gambling. And where there is gambling, there will be hustling.”
Here’s a great practice tip I picked up a long time ago that really works.
The problem is that on impact your putter’s face is either open (ball will go to the right) or closed (and the ball will go left). Why do we have such a hard time sometimes in getting our putter face square on the ball? Practice and practice correctly.
Go to the hardware store or your workshop and get a 1” dowel rod and cut it to about 4” in length.
Set the rod up so it’s pointing at an imaginary target or pick a spot out on the floor. This drill works great on hallway floors or on your kitchen linoleum.
Now make your stroke and imagine you have about a 5-6 foot putt for birdie. A very slight mishit will cause the rod to spin off to the left or to the right.
Practice this drill over and over until you can make the dowel rod go straight dozens of time in a row and you’ll know that you’ve got it down and that your putter face is square at impact.
The next time you line up a money put, you’ll have no fear of hitting it off line and you’ll earn that dough!
Thanks for reading. Good luck, good hustling.
Big Freddy
“As long as there’s been golf, there’s been gambling. And where there is gambling, there will be hustling.”
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Setup your golf shots like a pro Hustler
To make money hustling golf, you need to be consistent. The number one step you can take to achieve this goal is to setup correctly each and every time you address the ball. Make more money golfing with this step-by-step primer on how to setup correctly every time you go to swing your golf club.
One thing I always notice when golfing is that no matter how good or bad someone golfs, very few take the necessary steps to prepare for hitting the ball. This is a short but important golf lesson and one of the best golf tips I have ever written.
If you have any desire to hustle golf or even gamble for fun, you will dramatically increase your chances if you have an effective, step-by-step pre-hot routine.
So many golfers take very little time in setting up and addressing the ball. They just get up, get in a stance, and swing away. it is impossible to be a real gof hustler or to gamble at golf sucessfully without a pre-shot routine!
When I'm playing golf, whether I'm gambling and hustling or just playing for fun, one thing that I always do before each and every shot is very simple but effective and this lesson will have you doing it too. It's a short, consistent setup drill.
Think for a minute about what you do when you approach the golf ball. If you have no consistent routine for addressing the ball but still wonder why you don’t have consistent ball striking, I have one question for you.
What the heck do you expect?!!
I laugh at golfers who set up haphazardly and wonder why they hit their irons fat or thin and have no consistency in their ball striking.
Listen to what Jack Nicklaus has to say on the matter:
“If you set up correctly, there’s a good chance you’ll hit a reasonable shot, even if you make a mediocre swing. If you set up the ball poorly, you’ll hit a lousy shot even if you make the greatest swing in the world.”
So, clearly we need to set up with some consistency and correctly each and every time we want to hit the ball.
Here are 6 easy steps to take to set up every time you address the ball in order to get into a consistent groove and hit solid shots that the pros use and for some reason almost no professional teacher will teach you while taking your money for lessons.
I guess they figure if they teach you enough to get a little better but not enough to truly get better on your own, you’ll have to keep paying them.
Anyway, here we go. I execute this set-up plan each and every time I get ready to hit the ball.
It may seem time consuming at first but after a few times at the driving range or rounds on the course, it’ll be second nature.
Besides, it takes a heck of a lot less time to set up this way than it does to look for your ball in the woods 4-5 times per round!
Let’s get started:
1. Get your feet in position first. Stand the right distance for you away from the ball with your feet together and with your elbows bent at your sides, arms in front of you and holding the club in the air. The club should be perpendicular to the ground with the head in the air.
2. Open your feet to shoulder width, make sure the ball is in the proper position in your stance, depending on which club you are going to use. The club head should still be in the air in front of you.
3. Now, without moving the club yet, you want to lock your knees stiff.
4. Bend down, lowering the club head behind the ball. Keep your knees straight, bend down from your hips and keep your back, shoulder blades and spine straight.
5. Now you can bend your knees, relaxing them slightly but not too much. Always feel like your leg muscles are “engaged”.
6. Lastly, tilt the upper body to the right so that your head is just behind the ball. Guess what? You’re ready to hit!
I cannot stress enough how much your game will improve if you are consistently following this set up approach.
You can get a free newsletter at my website if you want, where I’ll be blowing the lid off of more things the “driving range pro” won’t teach you in future lessons, so keep your eyes peeled!
Until then, thanks for reading. Good luck.
Big Freddy Kaboot
“As long as there’s been golf, there’s been gambling. And where there is gambling, there will be hustling.”
One thing I always notice when golfing is that no matter how good or bad someone golfs, very few take the necessary steps to prepare for hitting the ball. This is a short but important golf lesson and one of the best golf tips I have ever written.
If you have any desire to hustle golf or even gamble for fun, you will dramatically increase your chances if you have an effective, step-by-step pre-hot routine.
So many golfers take very little time in setting up and addressing the ball. They just get up, get in a stance, and swing away. it is impossible to be a real gof hustler or to gamble at golf sucessfully without a pre-shot routine!
When I'm playing golf, whether I'm gambling and hustling or just playing for fun, one thing that I always do before each and every shot is very simple but effective and this lesson will have you doing it too. It's a short, consistent setup drill.
Think for a minute about what you do when you approach the golf ball. If you have no consistent routine for addressing the ball but still wonder why you don’t have consistent ball striking, I have one question for you.
What the heck do you expect?!!
I laugh at golfers who set up haphazardly and wonder why they hit their irons fat or thin and have no consistency in their ball striking.
Listen to what Jack Nicklaus has to say on the matter:
“If you set up correctly, there’s a good chance you’ll hit a reasonable shot, even if you make a mediocre swing. If you set up the ball poorly, you’ll hit a lousy shot even if you make the greatest swing in the world.”
So, clearly we need to set up with some consistency and correctly each and every time we want to hit the ball.
Here are 6 easy steps to take to set up every time you address the ball in order to get into a consistent groove and hit solid shots that the pros use and for some reason almost no professional teacher will teach you while taking your money for lessons.
I guess they figure if they teach you enough to get a little better but not enough to truly get better on your own, you’ll have to keep paying them.
Anyway, here we go. I execute this set-up plan each and every time I get ready to hit the ball.
It may seem time consuming at first but after a few times at the driving range or rounds on the course, it’ll be second nature.
Besides, it takes a heck of a lot less time to set up this way than it does to look for your ball in the woods 4-5 times per round!
Let’s get started:
1. Get your feet in position first. Stand the right distance for you away from the ball with your feet together and with your elbows bent at your sides, arms in front of you and holding the club in the air. The club should be perpendicular to the ground with the head in the air.
2. Open your feet to shoulder width, make sure the ball is in the proper position in your stance, depending on which club you are going to use. The club head should still be in the air in front of you.
3. Now, without moving the club yet, you want to lock your knees stiff.
4. Bend down, lowering the club head behind the ball. Keep your knees straight, bend down from your hips and keep your back, shoulder blades and spine straight.
5. Now you can bend your knees, relaxing them slightly but not too much. Always feel like your leg muscles are “engaged”.
6. Lastly, tilt the upper body to the right so that your head is just behind the ball. Guess what? You’re ready to hit!
I cannot stress enough how much your game will improve if you are consistently following this set up approach.
You can get a free newsletter at my website if you want, where I’ll be blowing the lid off of more things the “driving range pro” won’t teach you in future lessons, so keep your eyes peeled!
Until then, thanks for reading. Good luck.
Big Freddy Kaboot
“As long as there’s been golf, there’s been gambling. And where there is gambling, there will be hustling.”
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Like to bet on Golf? Try the game of "Bridge"!
Over $10 Billion a year is bet on golf right here in the United States alone. This exceeds all other gambling action on most other sports combined!
The only thing bigger is the Super Bowl and the Final Four.
Clearly, like those events, only one winner will be declared, right?
So if you like to golf, try some of the different gambling games. Learn the rules, the science of betting, the strategies, attitude and more.
One game that is quite popular among the high-rolling, big-cash gambling set is a Partner Game named after the volatile card game of Bridge.
Bridge, (the golf version) definitely puts a lot of pressure on you and your partner to perform. It is not for the faint of heart and can definitely show who has the fortitude and who lacks it.
Hence, when you get an edge you can really put the pressure on your opponents to come through as well.
Here’s the basic rundown of a game that requires much balls, skill, psychology and the ability to read your opponents:
Teams of two alternate holes, bidding the number of strokes that will be the total score of its two balls. For example, if team A believes it can finish the par 5 in 11 strokes, team B can do the following:
1. Accept this bet and hope team A scores higher.
2. Bid lower than 11 for their own score.
3. Accept the bid of 11 strokes and double the bet. Team A can redouble it if they are confident enough to do so.
The hole-winning team gets two points for its bid and an additional point for each stroke under its bid. 2 points are subtracted if the team misses their bet and 1 point is subtracted per stroke above their bet.
Make things even more interesting by making provisions that if both partners birdie, the points are doubled. Playing for $100 per point can have the losers reaching for their checkbooks on the 18th hole!
One key to this game is to vet your partners well or you’ll be sweating it out big time when he starts putting up 8 after 8.
Good luck, good hustling.
Freddy
“As long as there’s been golf, there’s been gambling. And where there is gambling, there will be hustling.”
The only thing bigger is the Super Bowl and the Final Four.
Clearly, like those events, only one winner will be declared, right?
So if you like to golf, try some of the different gambling games. Learn the rules, the science of betting, the strategies, attitude and more.
One game that is quite popular among the high-rolling, big-cash gambling set is a Partner Game named after the volatile card game of Bridge.
Bridge, (the golf version) definitely puts a lot of pressure on you and your partner to perform. It is not for the faint of heart and can definitely show who has the fortitude and who lacks it.
Hence, when you get an edge you can really put the pressure on your opponents to come through as well.
Here’s the basic rundown of a game that requires much balls, skill, psychology and the ability to read your opponents:
Teams of two alternate holes, bidding the number of strokes that will be the total score of its two balls. For example, if team A believes it can finish the par 5 in 11 strokes, team B can do the following:
1. Accept this bet and hope team A scores higher.
2. Bid lower than 11 for their own score.
3. Accept the bid of 11 strokes and double the bet. Team A can redouble it if they are confident enough to do so.
The hole-winning team gets two points for its bid and an additional point for each stroke under its bid. 2 points are subtracted if the team misses their bet and 1 point is subtracted per stroke above their bet.
Make things even more interesting by making provisions that if both partners birdie, the points are doubled. Playing for $100 per point can have the losers reaching for their checkbooks on the 18th hole!
One key to this game is to vet your partners well or you’ll be sweating it out big time when he starts putting up 8 after 8.
Good luck, good hustling.
Freddy
“As long as there’s been golf, there’s been gambling. And where there is gambling, there will be hustling.”
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Golfing with your Kids? Keep things Fresh.
This golf lesson is to help moms and dads enjoy the time spent on the golf course with our kids even more. Golfing with our kids can be extremely rewarding and sometimes exasperating. In this article we explore a fun game to play with our kids during a round to help them focus and stay interested. By taking the focus off of mechanics we can help them have more fun and love the game more.
Golfing with our kids can be one of the most rewarding and yet challenging times we can spend with our children. The question is how to keep our younger kids focused on the game and keep them from getting frustrated or losing interest after a few miss-hits which happen to the best of us.
Golfing with my dad is a memory that stands out among the best of times we ever spent together. I still remember the smell of the grass and leather in the trunk when he'd open it up to change into his golf shoes and get his gear together for our rounds.
I always looked forward to spending 3-4 hours with my dad, walking the loop as we played, him pointing out the markers to me and teaching me the game. I learned a lot about life as well as my dad used this time to explain to me the way a man should carry himself as he makes his way in this world.
I also remember that my dad could drive the ball 260 yards, hooking it around a dog leg and be perfectly in the middle of the fairway and in great position for his second shot and me getting frustrated at my feeble attempts to get past the ladies' tees.
So my dad did something that looking back kept me from getting frustrated and hating the game, quitting on it before I could grasp the fundamentals and strike the ball well consistently.
I don't know if he did it on purpose or not but this worked for us and hopefully you'll try it with your sons and daughters, keep them interested and have a lot of fun as well.
We played the games common to golfers who wager on their rounds but for us, it was all about the fun.
For fun or money, people who play golf like to make things interesting either by wagering money, a soft drink at the end of the round or just plain bragging rights and “pick-up sticks” or “sticks” is a great and fun game to play the next time you get out there on the course with your children.
Sticks is a lot of fun and very entertaining. The game is played match play and for each hole a player loses, he takes one club in the winner’s bag out of play.
The loser of each hole also can reclaim a club taken out of his/her bag on previous holes. Decide beforehand if putters are in play or not. Usually, players agree to keep the putters out of it and leave them alone as they are integral to the game but including them does add to the fun.
Personally, putting with a wedge or a 2-Iron can be easy if you practice for just a few minutes before your next round so I suggest including the putter and after just a few minutes putting with clubs other than your putter, you and your boy will be able to be creative.
The reason why I found this game to be so much fun is that even though I could never beat my dad on most holes, it was great fun to watch him get creative and try to punch and run his 6-Iron to make the ball travel as far as a 4-Iron or tee off with 5-iron on a par 5.
I also learned a lot of strategy playing this game.
Later in life I would play this game with my friends and I learned from my dad to not immediately grab the driver from my opponent’s bag as most people do.
It is the worst club to take away, period. Most players would actually do better without their driver, using their 3-Wood or 2-Iron to tee off with, leaving them 220 yards in the middle of the fairway instead of 250 yards deep into the rough.
Playing this game with my dad also taught me to determine my opponent’s weaknesses and what clubs to choose first. Reading people in this regard helped me to be able to read people off the course later in life as well.
For example, I learned 2 things playing sticks with my dad and I often think about them when dealing with people today.
1. The best club to take first is the sand wedge, hands down. A lot of players rely on the sand wedge for nearly every shot within 100 yards.
It is nearly impossible to get up from any greenside bunkers without that club.
2. Look to see if the player carries a lob wedge. If they do, grab that first and then the sand wedge. Clearly, if a player carries a lobber, they rely on that and that’s what life is all about – getting an edge.
Both of these lessons translate well in my daily negotiations and I often smile when I see the equivalent of a lob wedge in someone's argument during a negotiation.
Although a silly golf game for sure, this is an excellent game for fathers (and mothers) to play with their kids.
Keeping our kid's interest on the course while they duff their way around is essential to their future love of golf. I see too many parents putting the emphasis on "head down, weight shift...etc" and being too serious about it before their kids have the chance to really love what they're doing.
Sure kids want to score well, they like to be competitive just like us but most kids don't have the physical make-up to develop consistent swings yet and they get frustrated quickly.
Avoid having your kids get fed-up with feeling like they have to be so technically precise to enjoy being out there with you that they give up and go sit in front of the TV.
These are precious times with our children and getting away from the world for a few hours in the quiet environment the golf course provides is priceless. Use a game like "sticks" to keep their interest fresh and help them enjoy the time out there with you.
Believe me, by keeping things interesting you'll be enriching their lives forever and someday, they'll think back fondly of the smell of your trunk and emulate the way you carry yourself as you navigate the course without your putter.
Take care,
Freddy Kaboot
Golfing with our kids can be one of the most rewarding and yet challenging times we can spend with our children. The question is how to keep our younger kids focused on the game and keep them from getting frustrated or losing interest after a few miss-hits which happen to the best of us.
Golfing with my dad is a memory that stands out among the best of times we ever spent together. I still remember the smell of the grass and leather in the trunk when he'd open it up to change into his golf shoes and get his gear together for our rounds.
I always looked forward to spending 3-4 hours with my dad, walking the loop as we played, him pointing out the markers to me and teaching me the game. I learned a lot about life as well as my dad used this time to explain to me the way a man should carry himself as he makes his way in this world.
I also remember that my dad could drive the ball 260 yards, hooking it around a dog leg and be perfectly in the middle of the fairway and in great position for his second shot and me getting frustrated at my feeble attempts to get past the ladies' tees.
So my dad did something that looking back kept me from getting frustrated and hating the game, quitting on it before I could grasp the fundamentals and strike the ball well consistently.
I don't know if he did it on purpose or not but this worked for us and hopefully you'll try it with your sons and daughters, keep them interested and have a lot of fun as well.
We played the games common to golfers who wager on their rounds but for us, it was all about the fun.
For fun or money, people who play golf like to make things interesting either by wagering money, a soft drink at the end of the round or just plain bragging rights and “pick-up sticks” or “sticks” is a great and fun game to play the next time you get out there on the course with your children.
Sticks is a lot of fun and very entertaining. The game is played match play and for each hole a player loses, he takes one club in the winner’s bag out of play.
The loser of each hole also can reclaim a club taken out of his/her bag on previous holes. Decide beforehand if putters are in play or not. Usually, players agree to keep the putters out of it and leave them alone as they are integral to the game but including them does add to the fun.
Personally, putting with a wedge or a 2-Iron can be easy if you practice for just a few minutes before your next round so I suggest including the putter and after just a few minutes putting with clubs other than your putter, you and your boy will be able to be creative.
The reason why I found this game to be so much fun is that even though I could never beat my dad on most holes, it was great fun to watch him get creative and try to punch and run his 6-Iron to make the ball travel as far as a 4-Iron or tee off with 5-iron on a par 5.
I also learned a lot of strategy playing this game.
Later in life I would play this game with my friends and I learned from my dad to not immediately grab the driver from my opponent’s bag as most people do.
It is the worst club to take away, period. Most players would actually do better without their driver, using their 3-Wood or 2-Iron to tee off with, leaving them 220 yards in the middle of the fairway instead of 250 yards deep into the rough.
Playing this game with my dad also taught me to determine my opponent’s weaknesses and what clubs to choose first. Reading people in this regard helped me to be able to read people off the course later in life as well.
For example, I learned 2 things playing sticks with my dad and I often think about them when dealing with people today.
1. The best club to take first is the sand wedge, hands down. A lot of players rely on the sand wedge for nearly every shot within 100 yards.
It is nearly impossible to get up from any greenside bunkers without that club.
2. Look to see if the player carries a lob wedge. If they do, grab that first and then the sand wedge. Clearly, if a player carries a lobber, they rely on that and that’s what life is all about – getting an edge.
Both of these lessons translate well in my daily negotiations and I often smile when I see the equivalent of a lob wedge in someone's argument during a negotiation.
Although a silly golf game for sure, this is an excellent game for fathers (and mothers) to play with their kids.
Keeping our kid's interest on the course while they duff their way around is essential to their future love of golf. I see too many parents putting the emphasis on "head down, weight shift...etc" and being too serious about it before their kids have the chance to really love what they're doing.
Sure kids want to score well, they like to be competitive just like us but most kids don't have the physical make-up to develop consistent swings yet and they get frustrated quickly.
Avoid having your kids get fed-up with feeling like they have to be so technically precise to enjoy being out there with you that they give up and go sit in front of the TV.
These are precious times with our children and getting away from the world for a few hours in the quiet environment the golf course provides is priceless. Use a game like "sticks" to keep their interest fresh and help them enjoy the time out there with you.
Believe me, by keeping things interesting you'll be enriching their lives forever and someday, they'll think back fondly of the smell of your trunk and emulate the way you carry yourself as you navigate the course without your putter.
Take care,
Freddy Kaboot
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