Hit It Bubba Long (in Your Dreams)

“DON’T JUST HIT IT LONG. Hit it Bubba long.” That’s Bubba Watson talking in the above spot for Ping G15 and K15 drivers.

I understand. It’s marketing. But it still makes me smile. I can hit it Bubba long? Really?

Last time I checked (which was a few seconds ago), Bubba was averaging 311.7 yards per drive on the PGA Tour this season. That’s well above the average driving distance of your run-of-the-mill PGA Tour player. Which means most of Bubba’s fellow players can’t even hit it Bubba long.

(By the way, Bubba’s driving accuracy is virtually identical to the PGA Tour average: 60.03% vs. 60.20%. So Bubba is pretty darn straight while being Bubba long.)

I played golf with my dad in California using a borrowed set of clubs. Dad is a tinkerer, so he has assorted golf clubs, golf balls, a carry bag, the works, in his garage. It includes a respectable backup set of irons and several drivers and fairway metals. That’s what I use when I show up. There’s no need to lug my set through airports for a couple of nine-hole rounds.

Anyway, I hit the snot out of a Ping driver my dad no longer uses, a part of my makeshift borrowed set. I really killed it. In fact, I hit it straighter and farther than my own driver. To be honest, it was a better club than the piece of junk I carry in my bag. It was a Ping.

But I didn’t hit it Bubba long. Not even close.

−The Armchair Golfer

Rickie Roughs Up Phil

PHIL MICKELSON WAS SMILING. But inside he had to be hurting from the 6 and 5 smackdown he received from that young dandy clad in pink and white, none other than Rickie Fowler. The early Thursday match at the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship got off to an ordinary start. Phil won the 3rd hole to go 1 up. Then Rickie climbed all over Lefty, reeling off birdie, eagle, par, par, birdie, a something (Phil conceded), birdie, birdie, par and, at last, another Phil concession. Match over.

I thought Fowler might beat the goofy grin off Mickelson’s face. I should have known better. Not going to happen. Besides, they’re friends, the Golf Channel talking heads emphasized.

Match play is a different animal. You can play pretty well and still get thrashed. Pars don’t get it done, as Phil and others (ahem, Rory McIlroy) learned. You and I might have some bad days at work. But I’ve never come home and said, “Honey, I had a tough day at the office, took an 8 and 7 beating.”

That, by the way, was the score of the Ben Crane-Rory McIlroy match. Rory, the No. 2 seed in his bracket, got “hammered,” as the PGATour.com headline writers put it, by gentle Ben. Let’s just say Crane birdied Thursday. The No. 10 seed will meet Miguel “The Mechanic” Jimenez on Friday.

Another wax job: Bubba Watson polished off Mark Wilson, 6 and 5.

With Tiger and Phil already gone, Lee Westwood became the third No. 1 seed to be eliminated, losing to Nick Watney. Kaymer, No. 1 in the Gary Player bracket, is still alive. The Germanator faces Hunter Mahan in the quarterfinals.

It could be a bloodbath. Because anything can happen in match play.

−The Armchair Golfer

2011 Waste Management Phoenix Open TV Schedule and Tournament Notes

THE 2011 WASTE MANAGEMENT PHOENIX OPEN is scheduled to start on Thursday at TPC Scottsdale in Scottsdale, Arizona. Currently, the start time has been pushed back at least two hours due to frost. A strong field will play in front of the largest crowd on the PGA Tour, including Bubba Watson, Phil Mickelson, defending champion Hunter Mahan, Dustin Johnson, Geoff Ogilvy, Jhonattan Vegas, Bill Haas and Camilo Villegas.

Purse: $6.1 million
Winner’s share: $1.08 million
Defending champion: Hunter Mahan


Inside the field
Inside the course
Tee times
Tournament overview
Tournament news
Interviews
Waste Management Phoenix Open website


2011 Waste Management Phoenix Open Leaderboard


TV SCHEDULE

TV coverage of the 2011 Waste Management Phoenix Open is on Golf Channel and CBS.

Thu, 2/3:
GOLF 4p - 7p ET

Fri, 2/4:
GOLF 4p - 7p ET

Sat, 2/5:
CBS 3p - 6p ET

Sun, 2/6:
CBS 3p - 6p ET

SIRIUS-XM broadcast times

−The Armchair Golfer

The High School Golf Swing of Bubba Watson

A Bubba Watson original at the season opener in Hawaii.

CBS’S PETER KOSTIS DOES A good job on swing analyses. Whereas other golf talking heads sound like they’re blowing smoke, Kostis, as I’ve written, hypnotizes me. He just sounds believable.

But, as I learned yesterday watching the final round of the Farmers Insurance Open, even Kostis struggles to put Bubba Watson’s swing into words. I sympathize. Bubba’s action defies explanation. It just works. Watson had all the shots in his bag this past weekend as he cruised to his second career victory at Torrey Pines.

Not long before Kostis and crew took a slo-mo look at Bubba, Kostis analyzed the swing of Bob Hope Classic winner Jhonattan Vegas. Vegas contended to the very end on Sunday before dumping his second shot into the pond that fronts the 18th green. Vegas’ swing looks like it’s out of a golf instruction book. Kostis drew two lines and a triangle, explaining how Vegas was on plane and returned the club to the same position and angle as at address. Or something like that. The point is, Johnny’s swing is near perfection. Kostis was like a college anatomy professor explaining how and why it works.

After Bubba launched a 363-yard drive on the par-5 13th, Kostis took a swing-vision gander at the lefty from Bagdad, Florida. I can’t remember much of what he said. I just remember thinking he was at a loss for words. Bubba is unconventional, to say the least. It’s fairly easy to see at full speed. He has an open stance and a big loopy swing with a follow through that always has me wondering where the ball is going. In slow motion, it’s crazy. On the backswing—dare I say the longest backswing on tour?—the clubhead is pointing at the ground. And on the downswing, just before impact, Bubba is up on the toes of both feet!

I think I figured out why Bubba can’t be explained with lines and triangles and such. He has a high school golf swing. It’s not a knock. It means he’s untouched, intuitive and creative. He’s never had a lesson or a swing coach. He says he never will.

A high school golf swing is long, natural, athletic. I saw lots of them when I played for Palmdale High in California. They’re raw, loopy, wristy and powerful. High school golfers who advance in the game usually shorten and refine their swings as they grow and mature. They adopt “positions” and shed the untamed golf swings of their youth. (I used to have a backswing as long as John Daly—when I was 14. Now I can’t turn past parallel.)

Bubba is self taught, unchanged. He’s refined a one-of-a-kind swing that busts 350-yard drives and curves shots 30 yards to the left or right.

“I’ll never change from that,” he told SI’s Farrell Evans last year. “I’ll keep playing golf the way I know how to play it and hopefully that will keep me on tour.”

I think Bubba is going to be around for a while.

−The Armchair Golfer

Ian Poulter Visits ‘Fat Booth’

IAN POULTER HAD SOME FUN yesterday with the Fat Booth application and posted links to the photos on Twitter. It got a little crazy. Fat pics of Lee Westwood, Graeme McDowell, Bubba Watson, Tiger Woods, Colin Montgomerie, Camilo Villegas, Rory McIlroy, LeBron James, Justin Rose and Phil Mickelson turned up. Poults couldn’t stop himself. He was laughing his fat head off.

−The Armchair Golfer

(Visor tip to Golf.com.)

How Pete Dye’s Dog Killed Herb Kohler’s Sheep

Editor’s note: This tale originates with Monte Burke at Forbes.com. Visor tip to John Strege at Local Knowledge.

HERB KOHLER LOVED HIS black-face sheep that wandered Whistling Straits, the Wisconsin golf course that hosted the 2010 PGA Championship won by Martin Kaymer in a sudden-death playoff against Bubba Watson. (And, of course, the home of the bunker controversy that ruined Dustin Johnson’s bid for his first major.)

The sheep made the Kohler property on the edge of Lake Michigan seem more like Scotland. They also provided photo-ops for golfers. They even trimmed the rough.

(Photo: The black-face sheep of Whistling Straits /
Dan Perry, Flickr)

In advance of the 2004 PGA Championship, famed course designer Pete Dye was summoned to Whistling Straits to build an ambulance road. Dye brought along one of his Belgian shepherds for company as he mapped the road. It was a habit of his. Apparently, Pete loved his dogs. But a problem arose.

“I wasn’t paying attention to my dog,” Dye told Monte Burke. “And the next thing I know, that dog is chasing the sheep.”

Desperate to escape the canine, one of the sheep plunged into Lake Michigan. The dog jumped in after it! The sheep swam out farther. The shepherd followed.

“I ran down and jumped into the lake and grabbed the dog, but by that time, the sheep had gone upside down,” Dye said.

Uh-oh.

Steve Friedlander, general manager of Kohler’s golf courses, descended a hill and made a beeline for the course architect. You are in big trouble, he told Dye. Dye: I know. I’ll tell Mr. Kohler. But that wasn’t what Friedlander meant. An editor for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel was playing the course and saw the entire dog-sheep episode.

Dye trailed the editor and approached him on the 14th. He asked the editor not to make a big story about what he saw, otherwise Dye could write the following day’s headline: “Herb Kohler shot Pete Dye.”

The editor smiled and returned to his mediocre golf game. The anecdote ran as a small item the next day, and Dye surely breathed a sigh of relief.

−The Armchair Golfer

VIDEO: Martin Kaymer and Bernhard Langer Yuk It Up (in German)

THIS STILL IN: MARTIN KAYMER won the 92nd PGA Championship on Sunday at Whistling Straits. The Dusseldorf native defeated Bubba Watson in a three-hole playoff. I’m just reminding myself after getting buried in the bunker controversy. I figured it might take a day or two to get out. I’m playing out sideways.

The video shows Bernhard Langer and Kaymer (pronounced as if the “a” is silent) instructing some German golf prospects at the 2009 BMW International Open. Miguel Angel Jimenez and Colin Montgomerie also appear in the video. I don’t understand any of it. (Except the chuckles.)

I expect the German major winners will have another good laugh next time they see each other. Langer won the Senior British Open and U.S. Senior Open in recent weeks. And Kaymer, well, you know.

Again, Martin Kaymer won the PGA Championship. Glory’s last shot. Tell a friend.

−The Armchair Golfer

Bubba Watson Just Wants to Have Fun

WHEN BUBBA WATSON ISN’T COMPETING against the world’s best golfers, he’s relaxing at his lakefront home in Lexington, North Carolina. And having about as much fun as he can handle. It’s part of his life mission. Drop in on Bubba (above) and watch him play all out on the water. Then ride shotgun as he takes you on a quick tour of the small town he now calls home. (Lexington has at least two of life’s necessities: good coffee and good ice cream. Three, if you count barbecue.)

Bubba is very active on Twitter. Reply to his tweets and there’s a good chance you’ll hear from him.

−The Armchair Golfer