ELMO WEEKS GOLF COLUMN: Much ado about putting ...

Every golfer knows the clich?d adage, ?you drive for show and putt for dough,? but in a few years the guys that actually play for cash are going to have fewer putting options.

Referencing a ?tremendous spike in usage? and ?growing advocacy? among other specious justifications, the U.S. Golf Association and The Royal & Ancient Golf Club announced last month that they have proposed a ban on anchored putting ? which the weekend hacker would call belly putting ? that would become effective in January 2016. The rule, 14-1b, should be finalized next year but won?t go into effect until the next Rules of Golf is published in 2016, and it will include provisions against a player anchoring the club either directly or by use of an anchor point such as the stomach, the chin or sternum.

The argument issued forth against the belly putter is that the movement made when using it is more of a hinged sweep rather than a stroke, and the proposed rule is expected to address the stroke being made rather than the equipment being used. So was this a necessary introduction of golf legislation to preserve the integrity of the game or the golf?s Supreme Court bowing to pressure from outspoken purists like eight-time major champion Tom Watson who just don?t like the look of a major championship being won by a guy with a whisk broom?

?They were too slow in making the decision,? said Savannah golf club and putter manufacturer Chip Usher, whose companies, Usher Golf and C&L Milled Putters, have built turf weapons for pros like Gene Sauers, D.J. Trahan, Kris Blanks, Mark Silvers and Blake Adams since devoting his career to golf clubs fulltime in 2003.

?They should have come to a decision about this many years ago so that it never got this far. I don?t think you should be able to affix the butt end of the club to any part of your body except maybe your arm, because it?s more of a hinge than a stroke and that?s not the way golf was intended to be played.

?I think they got it right, but they were late to the party,? Usher concluded.

Reactions have ranged from overwhelming approval such as Usher?s to borderline indifference from Savannah?s Brian Harman, a PGA Tour pro who just finished a successful rookie campaign and periodic user of the belly putter who said earlier this week during an event to promote the RBC Heritage on Hilton Head Island, ?I don?t feel like I?m going to live or die without (the long putter).?

Personally, I?ve never been good enough at golf or played enough meaningful tournaments to invest a lot of energy into memorizing the arcane minutiae contained in the USGA rule book, and I couldn?t care less if you go Roy McAvoy and putt with a shovel or a pool cue if you feel like that?s your best option to get the ball in the hole.

And I?m not sure how golf?s governing body could have deemed equipment available at the nearest golf shop to be an unfair advantage to anyone, but nonetheless it appears that this new rule will inevitably arrive and be enforced on professional tours and in international amateur events.

Chip?s shot

It will also affect recreational amateur players like Savannah?s Chip Chambers, 60, who?s been anchoring the putter for 20 years and can?t see the logic behind the decision.

?I was just a little short of livid when I heard about it,? Chambers said. ?When you see folks my age playing for recreation, nobody wants to sit around the green and three-putt all the time. The USGA and R&A really lost their way on this one, because they?re just catering to the pros and not serving the golfing public at all.

?It?s been legal for so long, why change the rule now?? Chambers added.

The rule is changing for one simple reason ? more and more PGA Tour pros are winning major championships with the belly putter. Keegan Bradley, Webb Simpson and Ernie Els all won majors during the past couple of years with flagpoles for putters, and all of a sudden a relative nonissue became a hot-button topic.

If golf really wanted to outlaw something that doesn?t look quite right and threatens the purity of the game, the USGA and R&A should have banned John Daly?s pants or restricted European players giving klutzy high-fives to their caddies. Or maybe instead of focusing on an instrument still used by a small percentage of players, somebody high up on golf?s food chain should take a look at drivers made with NASA technology and coated with Flubber or uranium-filled golf balls that travel six times the speed of sound.

It?s not like anybody on any of the professional tours around the world has been regularly breaking 60 or averaging 18 putts per round since the rise of the belly putter, and in all probability the club?s popularity would have run its course like other golf fads throughout the years.

Fun removal

But this rule change could make the game less fun for the higher handicap players trying to break 80 or 90 and older players whose hands tremble a little over 3-footers.

Foot wedges and mulligans unquestionably violate the spirit of the game, but does it really matter if people putt with stepladders or hockey sticks? Maybe I?m in the minority among golfies, but the game seems hard enough without arbitrary, knee-jerk rules changes that nullify a useful technique that doesn?t change the fundamental intention of rolling the ball into the hole on the green.

?I think there were legitimately people, primarily in the R&A, who felt that the swings people were using with the belly putter were not in accordance with the rules,? said Bill Bayfield, a USGA official and resident of The Landings Club on Skidaway Island. ?My personal belief is that they responded to the success of a few people during the past few years, because nobody cared and now they are announcing a rule change. Like anything else, the devil?s in the details and we don?t have an official rule yet.

?Until they make a rule that will be in the rule book, I?m holding off my judgment.?

Elmo Weeks is a golf junkie and frequent contributor to the Savannah Morning News. Please send your golf news, notes or anecdotes to him at elmoweeks@gmail.com or call him at 912-596-6016 to swap golf stories.

Source: http://savannahnow.com/sports/2012-12-08/elmo-weeks-golf-column-much-ado-about-putting

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