Article #17
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Dear Jitterbug Gang:
I hear announcers on television refer to some golfers as feel players, while calling others technical players. What's the difference?
Rod Marcos, Jitterbug Gang Fan
Jitterbug:
Basically speaking, feel players see golf shots. Technical players see golf swings.
Feel players assign a club to a situation. Technical players assign a club to a yardage.
Feel players are never out of the game. Technical players are never sure they're in it.
Starting out, most everybody is a feel player. This is what hooks people in; golf is a game that truly scratches the beginner's creative itch.
But, somewhere along the way, golfers tend to lose their desire to invent shots. Time spent with other golfers popularizes the false notion that expertise lies in observing proper form, and that it is each club's function to carry out a one-dimensional task. And while this would appear to simplify things, it renders useless whatever God-given powers of creativity the golfer has.
So, from my perspective, day in and day out, I want the feel player, not the technical type, on my team.
Charlie Rucker:
To illustrate the difference in the two styles of play, let's do a little experiment.
Drop two balls next to the practice green so that each is a fair-lengthed chip to a hole. With the first ball, use, say, a pitching wedge, to chip up.
Probably didn't require much planning, right? All you thought was, "This is the appropriate club for this shot. I'll chip it to there, make it roll to there, and hopefully…"
Now, for the second ball, chip with a club you'd normally never use; for instance, a seven-wood or a five-iron.
If you're like most people, seven out of ten times you'll hit the second ball closer than the first.
Why?
Because you had to use your senses. Think back on it; with that second ball, you studied the range and terrain before you played it. You took more time to see the shot. You thought about how the club, though ill-suited for the task, must meet the ball to access the hole. In short, you hit a feel shot. Feel players, unlike the more technical types, play with this sort of inventive design all the time, the same whether blasting out from between trees or executing a seemingly straight-forward approach.
In my estimation, feel players can never be counted out.
Mr. Vaughn:
I don't know if it's true, but supposedly, someone once asked Ben Hogan how far he hit his seven-iron. Mr. Hogan dropped three balls, and with his seven-iron, hit the first shot 100 yards, the second 140 yards, and the third 170 yards.
Whether or not Mr. Hogan offered a verbal explanation beyond that, I think his meaning was clear.
I suggest you do the same thing. Next time you play, take just three clubs with you out on the course. Say, maybe a five-wood, an eight-iron and a putter.
I guarantee you, that's right, GUARANTEE YOU that you'll score nearly as well, if not better than you usually do. That's because whatever disadvantage may be imposed by you not having an entire set of clubs will be atoned for by your capacity to invent.
That, my friend, is a lesson you can teach yourself.