ARMCHAIR GOLF Roundtable: Sam Snead, Ben Hogan and Byron Nelson

(Editor’s note: In honor of Sam Snead, whose longtime golf home was The Greenbrier, site of this week’s Greenbrier Classic, I bring you the following from the ARMCHAIR GOLF archives.)

These are real quotes and comments. The questions are made up. Welcome to the ARMCHAIR GOLF roundtable.

At the roundtable:
Sam Snead – 82 PGA Tour wins, 7 majors
Ben Hogan – 64 PGA Tour wins, 9 majors
Byron Nelson – 52 PGA Tour wins, 5 majors

Q: Gentlemen, welcome. Ben, let’s start with you. After all the rounds and practice sessions, tell us something you have learned about this game.

BEN HOGAN: Golf is not a game of good shots. It’s a game of bad shots.

Q: Byron, how about you? What about the game comes to mind?

BYRON NELSON: Golf is a lot like life. When you make a decision, stick with it.

Q: Sam?

SAM SNEAD: Playing golf is like eating.

Q: Eating?

SAM SNEAD: It’s something that has to come naturally.

Q: Ben, it didn’t come naturally for you. You constantly worked at your game.

BEN HOGAN: Very few times in my life I laid off two to three days. It seemed like it took me a month to three months to get back those three days when I took a rest. It’s a tough situation. I had to practice all the time.

Q: Byron, were you a natural like Sam or did you have to work hard on your swing?

SAM SNEAD: When I swing at a golf ball right, my mind is blank and my body is loose as a goose.

Q: Uh, thanks, Sam. Byron, any swing secret?

BYRON NELSON: Swing the club as though you were driving 60 miles an hour on the freeway. Not too fast, but not deathly slow. Once in a while, if the risk isn’t great, you can push your swing to 70, but never go faster than that.

Q: Ben, it’s well known that putting was not your favorite part of the game.

BEN HOGAN: There shouldn’t be any cups, just flagsticks. And then the man who hit the most fairways and greens and got the closest to the pins would be the tournament winner.

Q: Sam, are you with Ben on this?

SAM SNEAD: I shot a wild elephant in Africa thirty yards from me, and it didn’t hit the ground until it was right at my feet. I wasn’t a bit scared. But a four-foot putt scares me to death.

Q: How about you, Byron?

BYRON NELSON: Putting affects the nerves more than anything. I would actually get nauseated over three-footers.

Q: You all had humble beginnings. Talk about that.

SAM SNEAD: People think growing up in the hills was a handicap I had to overcome. In a lot of ways it gave me an advantage that has lasted me to this day. Just like with that stick, I’d have to overcompensate for just about everything.

Q: Anybody else?

LEE TREVINO: My family was so poor they couldn’t afford any kids. The lady next door had me.

Q: Lee? I didn’t see you come in. Any final thoughts, gentlemen?

SAM SNEAD: The only reason I ever played golf in the first place was so I could afford to hunt and fish.

BYRON NELSON: I tried to give my best to golf.

BEN HOGAN: Don’t ever get old.

LEE TREVINO: The older I get, the better I used to be!

Q: Thanks to all of you.

−The Armchair Golfer

(Source: The Gigantic Book of Golf Quotations, published by Skyhorse Publishing.)

‘Feherty’ Premiere Sets Golf Channel Record

FEHERTY, HOSTED BY GOLF commentator and wiseacre David Feherty, debuted on Monday as the most-watched series premiere in the history of Golf Channel. The opening episode featured an interview with Hall of Famer Lee Trevino. I caught a bit of the replay last night. Trevino and Feherty are funny squared. Can you imagine having a cold one with those two characters?

The 12-part interview series continues on Tuesday at 9 p.m. ET with actor Don Cheadle. Episodes with NBA Hall of Famer and hoops analyst Charles Barkley and golf legend Tom Watson are also coming soon.

Feherty’s self-deprecating humor is legendary, but the Northern Ireland native who is now a naturalized U.S. citizen could golf his ball. Feherty won five times on the European Tour and had three top tens in majors. His best finish in a major was a tie for fourth at the 1994 British Open. He also played on Europe’s Ryder Cup team in 1991.

Until he discovered his golf ability, Feherty wanted to be an opera singer. “I was always interested in music from a very early age,” he told Golf Channel. “But when I turned pro at age 17, I haven’t sung a note since. Now, I only sing to punish my children.”

Feherty retired from the tour in 1997 when CBS offered him a job as golf commentator. “I always enjoyed talking more than playing,” he said.

−The Armchair Golfer

(Photo: Courtesy of Golf Channel)

Interviewer Makes Fred Couples, Others Sweat

DURWOOD FINCHER. REMEMBER THAT NAME.

For all the talk about the golf media, some good and a lot bad, here’s a man who knows how to put a tough question to PGA Tour players.

Watch Fred Couples squirm and sweat, Brandt Snedeker grin and chuckle, Lee Trevino nod and stutter, Charles Howell III bob and weave, and Nick Price just shake his head.

Anybody else ready to put Fincher on the course or in the booth? Can we assign him to interview Tiger Woods?

Televised golf and media conferences could become a lot more fun and entertaining.

−The Armchair Golfer

The Genius of Johnny Miller

HATE HIM OR LOVE HIM, Johnny Miller is a lightening rod in the television tower and was an immensely talented player who could match shots with the best players of his generation, including Jack Nicklaus and Lee Trevino.

In The Genius of Johnny, Jaime Diaz profiles Miller for Golf Digest (December issue). Here’s an interesting tidbit that I didn’t know (or had forgotten). John Miller was told by his agent, Ed Barner, to go by “Johnny” to promote his image. But he grew up being called “John” and signs his name without adding the “ny.”

I remember Johnny as a player who literally knocked down the flagsticks in the mid 1970s at PGA Tour stops such as Tucson, Phoenix and Palm Springs. Sometimes faulty, my memory served me well. Diaz reports that Johnny “… did crazy-good things, like hitting the flag 10 times with iron shots while winning at Tucson.”

My favorite player was Jack Nicklaus, but Johnny Miller was the best iron player I ever saw. From January 1974 to January 1975, Miller won 10 times in a career that produced 25 PGA Tour victories, two of them majors, the 1973 U.S. Open and 1976 British Open. Johnny slumped after the mid 1970s blitz and has said he lost his desire to excel on tour as he and wife Linda raised six children.

Here’s what a couple of Johnny’s peers told Diaz.

Lanny Wadkins: “Johnny was the best I ever saw at hitting pure golf shots. I was very fortunate to play with a lot of the true greats: Jack and Trevino and Tiger, sure, but also Snead, Hogan and Nelson, who might have been past it, but not so you couldn’t see what they could do. But I can’t imagine that anyone in history has ever consistently hit the ball as solid and as close to the pin as Johnny did.”

Lee Trevino: “Johnny’s advantage was damn-near perfect mechanics. He had that extremely weak grip like Hogan, and he would set it going back and then just release it as hard as he could with total confidence. He didn’t have to re-route it or hold onto it or practice like hell, like most of the rest of us. Maybe because he grooved it so young, he was basically on automatic, where hitting the ball hard and straight and solid was actually easy. He got to a very rare place.”

Among others things, Johnny says one of his regrets is not winning the Masters, where he finished second three times. Wherever you stand on Johnny, Diaz’s profile is a worthwhile read. You’ll probably learn something you didn’t know about him.

−The Armchair Golfer

Golf Digest’s 75 Best Rivalries

GOLF DIGEST HAS PUBLISHED “Best Rivalries in Golf,” the magazine’s top 75 ranking of the game’s most intense and enduring grudge matches. I can’t argue with Nicklaus vs. Palmer at No. 1 on the list. There was a nine-year stretch from 1958 to 1966 during which Arnold and Jack captured seven Masters. Actually, Nicklaus appears in at least five of the rivalries. Besides Arnie, Jack’s other listed rivals include Tom Watson, Tiger Woods, Lee Trevino and Tom Weiskopf.

Sam Snead vs. Ben Hogan is a solid pick, as is Bobby Jones vs. Walter Hagen. I’m not buying Mickelson vs. Woods at No. 4. Tiger has had no true rival to this point. (Tiger vs. Field?) That’s bound to change. And perhaps soon.

The rankings are an interesting walk through golf history and include non-player rivalries that have impacted the game. Courses, issues, architects, countries, grasses, continents, swing coaches, college programs, magazines, baseball players, equipment and even years (1953 vs. 2000) are pitted against each other.

Take a look here.

−The Armchair Golfer

(Image: Keith Allison/Flickr)

Backswing Watchers

“SO, THAT’S WHAT MY backswing looks like.” This is PGA Tour player Kevin Na taking what might have been an admiring look at his backswing on the practice range at TPC River Highlands, the site of the Travelers Championship. Or maybe not. Maybe, instead, Na was thinking, “What is going on here?” Or: “Where’s my swing coach?” Or: “I’m definitely firing that guy.”

Are you a backswing watcher? I’m not talking about watching the backswings of others. No, I’m talking about watching your own backswing. Taking it back slow and studying your shoulders, arms, right elbow, hands, wrists, trajectory. Checking your position at the top. Wondering about your swing plane. All that swing mechanics stuff.

A friend of mine who was a collegiate golfer was a backswing watcher. Russ could really stripe the ball. When he was hitting the ball well with his woods and irons, he would hit it high with a pretty little draw. When he wasn’t hitting it well (for him), that pretty little draw turned into a hook or a pull hook. And as Lee Trevino once said, “You can talk to a fade but a hook won’t listen.” I played as Russ’s partner in tournaments over the years, and he’d check his backswing a lot. I marveled at this, thinking I could never get that focused on my mechanics without it messing with my mind. I had a pretty good idea what Russ was doing. He was trying to get a little more upright on the backswing. If he could get the club in the right slot, the rest would take care of itself. At least that was the plan.

I remember Nick Faldo being a backswing watcher. Sir Nick always seemed like he was fidgeting with his swing between shots. Many other players are backswing watchers. I think some are rehearsing, some are correcting and some are probably completely stumped and trying to figure out how they’re going to get to the clubhouse with that mess of a golf swing.

I’m not a backswing watcher. I don’t want to see it or over-think it because I’m predominately a feel player rather than a technical player. I usually focus on a swing key or two and go from there. When my ball is flying in the wrong direction or I’m not striking it solid, I’m decent—not great, but decent—at self-correcting. Sometimes it’s my takeaway and sometimes it might be something as simple as shortening up my backswing. But I don’t watch it. That would be too scary.

−The Armchair Golfer

(Image: RGlasson/Flickr)