By Mike Purkey at the GLOBAL GOLF POST
The real question is:
Why was the anchored putting stroke perfectly acceptable five years ago
and now, all of a sudden, it’s not?
Is it because you can
putt remarkably better with that method and it is clearly an unfair
advantage? The data collected by the ruling bodies comes to no
conclusion that there is a statistical advantage. In fact, the top 20
putters on the PGA Tour all use conventional putting strokes.
So, then it must be
that so many people are using it that it is threatening to take over the
game. Not exactly. The USGA says that about 15 percent of PGA Tour
players are using an anchored putting stroke. And that number changes
from week to week. But 15 percent is average. And only a small, unknown
percentage of elite amateurs – from juniors to seniors – are using an
anchored stroke. The evidence there is entirely anecdotal.
Well, then, what?
The USGA and the R and A have jointly decided to dodge those questions and, instead, proposed Rule 14-1b to “define the stroke.”
“Anchored strokes have
very rapidly become the preferred option for a growing number of
players, and this has caused us to review these strokes and their impact
on the game,” said R and A chief Peter Dawson.
“Our conclusion is that
anchored strokes threaten to supplant traditional strokes, which with
all their frailties, are integral to the long standing character of our
sport. Our objective is to preserve the skill and challenge, which is
such a key element of the game of golf.”
Did we understand that
correctly? “Very rapidly become the preferred option for a growing
number of players...” Is that what he said? What consists “rapidly” and
“growing number of players?” If you go from five percent to 10 percent
over five years, that’s a 100 percent increase. But it’s still only 10
percent of the whole.
“Essentially, it boils
down to two things; that in the last 18 to 24 months, we have seen a
significant increase at all levels of the game of people using anchored
strokes,” said Mike Davis, executive director of the USGA.
“I’ll start
out with the PGA Tour. For years, we saw two, three, four percent of
players at PGA Tour events using anchored strokes, mostly with the long
putters back in the 80s and 90s. And, all of a sudden, we get to 2006
through 2010, and it jumped to an average of six percent.
“Then, last year, it
almost doubled, and it goes to 11 percent. This year, it’s jumped to 15
percent. And some events have over 20, 25 percent using anchored
strokes.”
So, the USGA did collect data on the PGA Tour on anchored strokes. Just wanted that to be clear.
Listen, an anchored
putting stroke won’t make a bad putter a great one. What it does is
allow the struggling player the opportunity to be a “normal” putter,
allowing himself or herself a chance to compete.
Many players who use
anchored strokes struggle so badly with a conventional stroke that
putting would otherwise force them out of the game, or at least out of
competition.
And, apparently, as
long as the anchored stroke was limited to those afflicted players, the
ruling bodies had no problems. Even when the likes of Keegan Bradley,
Webb Simpson and Ernie Els won major championships with belly putters,
there was no panic. But when it was discovered that elite juniors were
using anchored strokes – especially 14-year-old Guan Tianling, who won
the Asia-Pacific Amateur armed with a belly putter – the ruling bodies
threw up their collective hands and cried, “Enough.”
The bottom line is that
this proposed ban is not performance based. No one can say whether it
makes the playing field lopsided. Instead, the anchored stroke is going
away because the ruling bodies don’t like the way it looks.
They
maintain that the other 13 clubs are designed to be swung and that long
and belly putters, because they have an anchor point, are not swung.
That’s it.
They are also quick to
point out that this is not a ban of longer putters.
They can still be
used, just not with an anchor point. But try and use a putter from 42 to
50 inches by holding it away from your body and swinging with both
arms. Whoever says they can use a long putter without anchoring, well
our hats are off to them because most of the rest of us can’t.
So what’s next? What if
someone wins a major championship or, worse yet, the U.S. Junior, with a
side-saddle stroke with a long putter?
Short-game guru Dave Pelz says
that method, according to his research, is the most effective way to
putt. Will rulesmakers look to ban that stroke because it doesn’t look
right, either?
There are so many other
issues that threaten the game, both on the elite and recreational
level, that the ruling bodies could have taken on rather than this
issue, which affects such a small percentage of the 60 million worldwide
golfers.
Instead, they have made a decision that inexplicably asks so many more questions than it answers.
Labels: Global Golf Post
